1000+ authors including Sally Rooney unite to boycott Israeli ...
AP
“We will not work with Israeli cultural institutions that are complicit or have remained silent observers of the overwhelming oppression of Palestinians,” the letter reads. / Photo: AP
Over 1,000 authors and literary professionals from across the world, including Nobel Prize winner Annie Ernaux, the Booker Prize winner Arundhati Roy and other distinguished writers, have signed a pledge to boycott Israeli publishers that are complicit in Israel’s actions in Gaza and the wider Palestinian territories.
“We will not work with Israeli cultural institutions that are complicit or have remained silent observers of the overwhelming oppression of Palestinians,” the letter reads.
Signatories include Sally Rooney, the Irish author of Normal People and a long-standing critic of Israel's policies toward Palestinians as well as Pulitzer Prize winner Viet Thanh Nguyen and Booker Prize-recognized author Maaza Mengiste.
The pledge was organized by six advocacy groups, including Books Against Genocide and The Palestine Festival of Literature. They reviewed 98 Israeli publishers and found that only one, November Books, openly opposes inequality and apartheid.
Organisers say that many Israeli publishers support the occupation, with examples like Modan Publishing, which produces propaganda books for the Ministry of Defense, and Bar-Ilan University Press, which awards a prize for books promoting 'land building and settlement' in partnership with the Jewish National Fund.
The open letter states that “Culture has played an integral role in normalising these injustices,” and calls on publishers, editors and agents to recognise their ‘own involvement and own moral responsibility’ to stop engaging with the Israeli state and institutions complicit with Israel.
In response to the letter, UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI) submitted a separate statement to trade organizations and publishers, arguing that the boycott call 'plainly discriminates against Israelis' by singling out Israeli institutions, and warning of potential legal repercussions by its members under anti-discrimination laws.
However, organizers, including PalFest co-founder Omar Robert Hamilton, dismissed UKLFI’s statement as "morally bankrupt," adding that such responses only prove that "Israel’s apologists have nothing to say."
