Flanders Festival Ghent says it made decision over lack of ‘clarity’ about incoming conductor Lahav Shani’s views.

While Shani had spoken in favour of “peace and reconciliation” in the past, his attitude towards the “genocidal regime in Tel Aviv” was unclear given his role as the chief conductor of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, the festival organisers said.

  • Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    14 hours ago

    It’s funny that what looks like a whole Hasbara team has descended on this, including an account used to moderate a very large lemmy.world forum.

    Really shows that this kind of thing really worries the Genociders.

    It makes sense - evildoers are fine if they can hide behind Country or Organisation because it lets them evade personal consequences for their actions, but when they personally, as individiuals, with no hidding behind some responsibility diffusing entity, suffer consequences for their own participation in the evildoing, it’s a whole different story.

    You actually see their fear of their collective cloak being torn down in some of the very “arguments” they’re using here, such as how Israelis should not be held accountable for the actions of Israel (even those who refuse to simply say “I do not support the Genocide in Gaza”), which is exactly about maintaining the nation working as a responsability diffusing cover.

    This tells me we need many more actions like this one in Belgium - make accountable the individuals mass murdering Palestinians or supporting that mass murder.

    • livejamie@lemmy.zip
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      Lemmy seems to be a lot harder for them to astroturf. If this were on Reddit, they might have been successful.

  • Cosmoooooooo@lemmy.world
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    Good for them. They didn’t want to give a stage to an active nazi hate group member.

    These nazi fucks are everywhere, I’m glad someone is trying to keep them away from public speaking opportunities to spread their religious hate.

  • gedaliyah@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    It seems that every Jewish person is now expected to pass an arbitrary moral purity test in order to participate in polite society.

    • homoludens@feddit.org
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      He is an Israeli citizen and music director of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. I’d say he can be seen as representing Israel (Israel, not necessarily the current regime) on a cultural level. Russian athletes can be barred from international events - why is it too much to ask to distance himself from the atrocities in Palestine?

      • icelimit@lemmy.ml
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        14 hours ago

        Iirc the decision to ban Russian athletes wasn’t on grounds of what putler is doing, rather the widespread doping that they were engaged in that the IOC simply couldn’t pretend they were all individual failures, but rather a systematic engagement of all Russian athletes in doping, and not their support of the regime.

        So the analogy of precedence you propose isn’t very relevant.

        As the Olympics was set up to involve all nations and races regardless of background and beliefs, I think a discussion on whether the Israeli athletes or representatives should participate in specific such international events (music, sport, etc) should be included or excluded on basis of their regard (or lack thereof) for human rights.

        Despite the complete disregard for human rights that Israel is exhibiting today, the Olympics for example, might consider this not grounds for expelling them, whereas a music festival promoting human rights may choose to expel them instead.

      • Bobo The Great@startrek.website
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        1 day ago

        People think this is a personal attack. It’s not (unless this guy actively supports his government). It’s sad that people suffer because of their government actions? Yes. Is it necessary? As a symbolic act of protest against a regime you don’t support, also yes.

        • Artisian@lemmy.world
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          I personally don’t understand the logic of this symbolic act of protest, but I often don’t understand how protest is supposed to function. It did pull more attention towards gaza, and attention is everything.

          Would a better protest be to keep the invite, but plaster the space with material about the genocide? Let the person quit if this offends them (which would probably be a more sympathetic headline and just as newsworthy) and make a story out of the performance if they don’t (which should be very photogenic).

          • Bobo The Great@startrek.website
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            The logic is telling Israel “your country is not welcome here, we don’t agree with you”, which is different from saying " your people are not welcome here", because only representative are affected

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        Look at how they never answer your question. It’s incredible how there is people still defend israrl in anyway or shape

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        Russian athletes are allowed to compete as neutrals in international events, as long as they do not openly endorse the war in Ukraine.

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            The only reason Russia and Belarus are banned is that basically the entire West was calling for it. That did not happen with Israel. Just looking at the Olympics, the only ones calling for Israel being banned were the Palestinians. Nobody else, not even from fellow Arab countries could get up and complain at the IOC. No wonder nothing happened. Same is unfortunately true for other countries like Myanmar, which is currently also committing a genocide. The West really does not care about that one though. Either way that is.

            • mrdown@lemmy.world
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              I don’t care about their thought process. At this point Israel should be treated as Nazi Germany. Germany as a whole was banned from participating in the Olympic Games in 1948 for example

        • gedaliyah@lemmy.world
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          In this particular case, he is not conducting as a representative of Israel or any Israeli organization. These acting as a representative of the Munich Philharmonic.

          This is strictly about his national origin and ethnicity.

          • PolarKraken@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            Such half-assed, predictable, lazy moving goalposts here.

            All Jews now…” (extraordinary statement from you)

            “Well no, how about because he’s a citizen of the country perpetrating a genocide, crime of all crimes?”

            “Yeah exactly, in this specific case they’re targeting him cuz of his national origin!” (roughly an entire galaxy away from your original claim)

            If you’re being disingenuous (my assumption) - go fuck yourself. If you’re actually just this bad at thinking and argumentation, strongly consider sticking to reading the comments of others.

            • CannonFodder@lemmy.world
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              If you’re a U.S. citizen should you have to publicly denounce Trump’s fascism or else get banished from the sane parts of the world?

                • CannonFodder@lemmy.world
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                  23 hours ago

                  Even when talking about completely different subjects?
                  And if so, how often? Do they need a precursor on every post?

              • Dholi@lemmy.ca
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                Tens of millions of US citizens voted in a pedophile. So yes, I’d say you’d have to publicly announce you’re not part of the majority that supports a rapist.

              • PolarKraken@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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                More moving goalposts. Is he banished from the sane parts of the world? Or did he just have a concert canceled?

                Let’s look at your question phrased like you’re arguing in good faith instead! Goes like this:

                If you’re a U.S. citizen should you have to publicly denounce Trump’s fascism or else risk having your public performances canceled in sane parts of the world?

                It was a shitty “gotcha” in the first place, but boy is it worse when it’s accurate. No wonder you resorted to hyperbole.

                • CannonFodder@lemmy.world
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                  It’s not meant to be a gotcha, it’s just to try and help people see things from different perspectives.
                  And sure: how about your version of the question? And extend it to sports coaches and players, movie producers, directors and actors? Store owners and employees?
                  It would be fully righteous to go hard core here, but probably too inconvenient for most. And many would say that such politics don’t have a place in … whatever they don’t want to deal with the repercussions of having politics have a place in.
                  There’s also a component of self preservation. It might be unsafe to publically go against one’s own government or it might at least be very bad for one’s career. So damned either way and better to stay apolitical.
                  At your job do you make a point of stating that you hate Trump and think he’s a moron. Or is that likely to get you unemployed so you keep quiet?

              • PolarKraken@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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                As a US citizen and seeing what’s happening to this place, yes, I would recommend everywhere find out where a given American stands on various issues when deciding to allow them in or not. Easy question.

                • CannonFodder@lemmy.world
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                  So do you check the political views of orchestra conductors of every concert you go to? The coaches of each game? The producers and directors of movies you watch? And by that I mean do you insist they definitively make public statements against Trump, not just that they don’t publicly support him?

          • Hawk@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            Yes, it’s about his national origin and ethnicity.

            Asking him to denounce the atrocities his country commits is a very reasonable question. Refusing to answer this already tells me enough.

            They would ban everyone supporting genocide, it doesn’t matter at all what they’re representing or not representing at the time.

            I

      • gedaliyah@lemmy.world
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        The article says that he has previously spoken out in favor of peace and reconciliation. Did you read it?

        • homoludens@feddit.org
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          Yes. But that does not mean, “every jewish person” gets treated like this. They might (because antisemitism is on the rise), but this case is not a good example for that.

          And he may have strongly opposed the Netanyahu regime and the article may have watered it down as “in favor of peace and reconciliation” or he may have been paying lip service or whatever. I don’t know that. And yes, this can be a slippery slope: how much is enough “clarity”? Who gets to decide that? And in what cases (Gaza isn’t the only place where atrocities happen)? But people can also think “This is too much. You need to speak up or don’t want to work with you.” without it necessarily being antisemitism.

    • Allonzee@lemmy.world
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      Why would non Israeli Jews have to denounce the Israeli genocide of the Palestinians?

      The conductor was Israeli.

    • solo@piefed.socialOP
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      I see things differently. Condemning genocide is not an arbitrary test related moral purity.

      And like Jewish Voice for Peace say:

      Never Again For Anyone

      as well as

      Not in our name

      • atzanteol@sh.itjust.works
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        I remember liberals being super angry about conservatives requiring all Muslims to “condemn terrorism.”

        • joostjakob@lemmy.world
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          17 hours ago

          We’re talking about an Israeli, not a Jew. One who has a prominent role in the cultural life of that country. As a “liberal”, I would not have had an issue with questions being asked if some high profile Saudis were invited to a festival in October 2001.

        • mrdown@lemmy.world
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          Did any western country apologized for their colonial past aka terrorism

        • gAlienLifeform@lemmy.world
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          And I remember Iranians and Chinese people being refused entry to places because of things their governments did

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            Please share because I’d like to learn. I can’t think of a single Chinese or Iranian artist who was banned from a performance or display in a European country.

          • gedaliyah@lemmy.world
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            It seems like you are on the attack and defame technique. Pretty hypocritical.

            The article literally says that the concert was not canceled because of any of his statements or views. It was cancelled because he is a professional musician in Tel Aviv who is Jewish.

            I ask you once again, if that’s not true, then what did he specifically say or do to warrant the cancellation?

              • gedaliyah@lemmy.world
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                It’s not sealioning. People are claiming that he refused to condemn genocide, despite nothing of the sort in the article. It is fair to ask someone to explain or defend something that they specifically claim is factual, which has no basis in reality.

                • floo@retrolemmy.com
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                  you accuse “people” of making unsubstantiated claims, and immediately follow that accusation with your own unsubstantiated claims.

                  I guess hypocrisy is only wrong when the other side does it?

                  despite nothing of the sort in the article.

                  Oh, so I suppose that nothing exists unless it’s written in the article? No event ever occurred that the article didn’t describe? How much of a sylopsist are you? Lol.

    • lennybird@lemmy.world
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      Doesn’t seem that difficult of a test to pass.

      Denouncing genocide is pretty easy to do.

      Put another way: if he did denounce it, would he still be leading the Israeli orchestra? Doubtful.

    • zrst@lemmy.cif.su
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      Well, considering Israelis aren’t going to receive any justice otherwise, social justice is the next best option.

      They only have themselves to blame.

      • gedaliyah@lemmy.world
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        He is literally Jewish.

        I have never heard of this type of moral panic over a Palestinian Israeli, or a Druze Israeli for example. It doesn’t seem to be about just citizenship.

        • paultimate14@lemmy.world
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          Source? The article only confirms that he is Israeli, doesn’t mention his religion at all. Because it’s not fucking relevant.

          Russian citizens who refused to condemning the Ukraine invasion have faced similar consequence. There’s plenty of precedent internationally for these sorts of decisions. The only difference here is that Israel has been purposefully supplying propaganda for decades to conflate antizionism with antisemitism.

          • gedaliyah@lemmy.world
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            Yes, he is Jewish. That is his ethnicity. Feel free to look it up.

            Where in the article does it say that he refused to condemn anything? It actually says that he has made statements in favor of peace and reconciliation.

            Belgian Foreign Minister Maxime Prevot said the cancellation seemed “excessive. …We must not confuse the Jewish community and Israelis with Netanyahu’s policies,”

            The German Culture Minister Wolfram Weimer criticized the move as a “disgrace for Europe. …Under the guise of supposed criticism of Israel, a cultural boycott is being carried out here,” he said in a statement.

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              What’s happening in Gaza is Israeli policy, the majority of them support it.

        • Maeve@kbin.earth
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          I have never heard of this type of moral panic over a Palestinian Israeli,

          Uh huh

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          Thought I would put a little work into your question; I checked a random musician from this list and looked for recent news. They’ve literally been doing charity shows to get support for gaza.

          It seems like some groups of people in israel feel there is an emergency that cannot be ignored; and some who do not.

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        What a disgusting statement, when someone who has spoken up for peace and reconciliation is banned from a European country based on the city where he was born and his ethnicity. It wouldn’t be right for someone from China, it wouldn’t be right for someone from Syria, it wouldn’t be right in ANY circumstance.

          • gedaliyah@lemmy.world
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            Yes, actually that’s fair. A German Philharmonic was canceled from a Belgian festival simply because the conductor is Israeli.

            Based on the comments and vote, it seems that most people here think that is justified and appropriate.

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          Liberal Zionists are no different to any other Zionist, they are just better at dressing up apartheid and genocide in palatable, rhetorically pleasing language for Western audiences. Unless Israelis renounce Zionism and call for full equality of Palestinians they are only there as ambassadors to culture wash the crimes of their colony.

        • unconsequential@slrpnk.net
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          You sound like the type who supported Trump when he said, “there’s good people on both sides” if you actually think that limp two-sided non-statement is worth a damn. It’s laughable.

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      Soon they’ll have to wear special armbands and the idiots captured by Iranian propaganda still won’t pull their heads out of their asses.