Media Release 15.03.18

Lorde help us! Palestine, Politics, Performance and the BDS!

Wed March 21 2018 @ University of Auckland

Huwaida Arraf is an international human rights lawyer and founding member of the International Solidarity Movement (ISM) while living in the Occupied Palestinian Territories. At the ISM, she has participated in the training of thousands of volunteers from around the world in non-violence and in human-rights monitoring and reporting.

She was chair of the Free Gaza Movement the organization behind the Gaza Freedom Flotillas organized to break Israel's naval blockade of the Gaza Strip. She was aboard the 2008 Free Gaza boats] as well as the 2010 flotilla that was raided by Israeli commandos.

The emergence of the Palestine Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI) and the subsequent global Boycott Divestments and Sanctions (BDS) campaign has particular relevance to New Zealand , and has implications for artists and audiences here of legislation attempting to suppress these campaigns.

Huwaida’s presentation will reflect critically on the role of artists and their audiences within contentious political environments and she will be joined by Jewish activist Justine Sachs of Dayenu, who along with Palestinian-Kiwi Nadia Abu-Shanab, appealed to Lorde to cancel her planned performance in Tel Aviv in 2018.

The event will be chaired by University of Auckland’s

Assoc Prof Nicholas Rowe, Creative Arts and Industries

with commentary by

Assoc Prof Campbell Jones, Sociology

7pm @ Science Building MLT 1/303-G23

Huwaida’s visit is supported by the Palestine Solidarity Network http://palestinesolidaritynz.net/

http://img.scoop.co.nz/media/pdfs/1803/Media_Release_Huwaida_Arraf_PSN_15.03.18.pdf

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