Published: 27 February 2025
Last updated: 27 February 2025
The Zionist Federation of Australia (ZFA) has written to the Minister for the Arts Tony Burke asking for a review of arts funding to identify publicly-funded artists who are promoting terrorism, extremism or antisemitism.
It wants a requirement that funded art and artists “uphold Australian values of respect and inclusivity”.
Creative Australia CEO Adrian Collette told Senate estimates this week that the organisation would review its selection process for the Venice Biennale, after Khaled Sabsabi’s appointment was cancelled. Many artists have protested Creative Australia’s decision to cancel Sabsabi, which came after a question in parliament about artworks which address the 9/11 attack and appear to glorify Hezbollah leader Hussein Nasrallah.
But ZFA president Jeremy Leibler said a broad independent review of all arts funding, not just the Venice Biennale process, was needed to restore confidence in Australia’s arts funding system and "ensure antisemitism and the promotion of extremism were not allowed to further fester within the arts community”.
The Jewish Independent revealed last week that some artists campaigning to reinstate Sabsabi on the grounds that they oppose political censorship of the arts had called for the boycotting of Israel’s 2024 Venice artist Ruth Patir.
Several artists and creative professionals are using their platforms to attack Jews and Israel. Artists funded by Creative Australia who have supported terrorism and/or antisemitism include:
Comments1
Wesley Parish28 February at 01:09 am
I do remember in high school in Canberra reading a small book on a Yemeni Jewish boy who migrated to Israel, and lived on a kibbutz. And if my memory serves me right, the Israeli boys were full of anti-Palestinian and anti-Arab sentiments. Would the Zionist Federation of Australia consider Israeli hasbarah, full of anti-Arab, anti-Muslim and anti-Palestinian bigotry, also meriting cancellation? Another thing I remember from the newspapers of that time – they never went into any detail on the background to Arab reactions to Israel’s actions.
Another thing, the Israeli settlers on the West Bank have been overdoing the terrorism bit recently, to the extent that during 2023, even the IDF named that as terrorism. Since when have the ZFA ever shown any reaction to Israeli settler terrorism, even though it is the driving force behind Palestinian and Lebanese “terrorism”?