WEST BANK: Palestinians deplore Roger Waters' decision to perform in Israel, while demonstrators clash with Israeli troops at the West Bank barrier

Record ID: 561204

  • Title: WEST BANK: Palestinians deplore Roger Waters' decision to perform in Israel, while demonstrators clash with Israeli troops at the West Bank barrier
  • Date: 16th March 2006
  • Summary: QALANDIA CHECKPOINT, BETWEEN ISRAEL AND THE WEST BANK (MARCH 10, 2006) (REUTERS) WIDE OF CONFERENCE WHICH WAS ORGANIZED BY THE PALESTINIAN ASSOCIATION FOR CONTEMPORARY ART (PACA) FOR ARTISTS FROM AROUND THE WORLD; LARGE POSTER OF AN ISRAELI PASSPORT HANGING ON WALL ; WOMEN HANDING OUT PAMPHLETS TO ARTISTS; CLOSE OF SLIMAN MANSOUR, HEAD OF PACA; WIDE OF CONFERENCE ROOM (5 SHOTS)
  • Embargoed: 31st March 2006 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Topics: International Relations,Entertainment
  • Reuters ID: LVABYMBOB0BYJ5AEKFWXXZ7CBBHW
  • Story Text: Palestinian artists have appealed to British musician Roger Waters, famed for the 1970s protest song 'Another Brick in the Wall', to cancel a concert in Israel out of solidarity with their fight against Israel's West Bank barrier.
    Pink Floyd singer-songwriter Roger Waters, a vocal critic of the 600 km (370 mile) network of fences and concrete barricades going up in and around the occupied territory, surprised many in the Middle East by agreeing to perform in Tel Aviv this summer.
    Concert promoter Shuki Weiss said Waters was persuaded to come to Israel after it quit the Gaza Strip, another territory where Palestinians seek statehood, last year in a move billed as breaking a deadlock in peacemaking.
    But a group of Palestinian artists said on Friday (March 10) they wrote a letter to Waters this week warning that the concert may undermine lobbying against the barrier, which has been globally condemned for effectively annexing swathes of West Bank land.
    "Pink Floyd and Roger Waters gained our respect and our love when they fought through their music the Berlin wall, against the Berlin wall," said Sliman Mansour, the Head of the Palestinian Association for Contemporary Art near the barrier.
    Israel calls the barrier a bulwark against suicide bombers spearheading a more than 5-year-old Palestinian revolt, but Palestinian consider it a land grab and a violation of their human rights.
    "When we heard that they are coming here to make a concert we were really amazed and disappointed because we think of Roger Waters as a very leftist and humanist artist and any concerts and any artistic events they do in Israel right now will look like it's a support for Israeli policy and the main Israeli policy right now is doing the wall. Like, putting Palestinians in a big prison," Mansour went on to say. "If he has to come here and do this concert we also ask him to come and to make a concert near the wall, so that it will be an even thing here."
    Mansour said the letter called on Waters to cancel the concert or at least put on another performance for Palestinians. The musician has indicated he opposes an anti-Israel boycott.
    "I would not rule out going to Israel because I disapprove of the foreign policy any more than I would refuse to play in the UK because I disapprove of (British Prime Minister) Tony Blair's foreign policy," Waters said in comments published by Britain's Guardian newspaper.
    Palestinians consider the barrier's towering barricades, especially where they cut through Arab East Jerusalem, as a salient symbol of independence hopes dimmed by Israel.
    Israeli officials have said that just 6 percent of the finished barrier will be wall, and that the project could be re-routed or torn down if violence ceases and peace talks resume.
    Such assurances have seldom been sounded, however, since Hamas, an Islamic militant group sworn to the Jewish state's destruction, swept to power in Palestinian elections on Jan. 25.
    Yet Weiss said that Waters had been encouraged by the Gaza pullout and felt that peace should still be given a chance while staying firm in his opposition to the West Bank barrier.
    Also on Friday, hundreds of Palestinian villagers accompanied by Israeli and foreign peace activists, clashed with Israeli forces during a demonstration against the barrier in the West Bank village of Beilin.
    As Israeli troops blocked the road leading from the village to the barrier's construction site which is defined as a 'closed military zone' by the army, protesters continued marching.
    An Israeli army spokeswoman said that demonstrators violated a military order which declared the area a 'closed military zone'. She added that in a similar protest near the West Bank village of Beit Sira six Israeli border policemen and one Palestinian journalist were injured.
    The International Court of Justice said the barrier, being built on land Israel occupied in the 1967 Middle East war, is illegal and contrary to international law. ENDS.
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