AARON PATRICK: SA Premier Peter Malinauskas gives artists $10m a year. Why did they humiliate him?

The Adelaide Writers’ Festival, which got cancelled for cancelling a writer, compounded its humiliation Thursday by apologising to former director Louise Adler and reinviting Randa Abdel-Fattah, the Palestinian academic whose anti-Israel views it considered too extremist a week ago to platform.

Accepting an apology from the government-funded event, Ms Abdel-Fattah took the offer on notice, illustrating the enormous clout she gained through the week-long frenzy about her sacking.

The apology, which she rejected when offered several days ago, acknowledged her right to speak publicly about Israel’s “atrocities” against Gazans, Ms Abdel-Fattah said.

“I accept this apology as vindication of our collective solidarity and mobilisation against censorship,” she said on social media. “I will consider the board’s offer to participate in 2027 Adelaide Writers’ Week at the appropriate time but would be there in a heartbeat if Louise Adler was the director again.”

While the festival is a niche event compared with professional sports, movies or mainstream theatre productions, the fight over its right to host a Islamist warrior evolved into a demonstration of power by the cultural elites. A writers’ campaign overwhelmed the board, Jewish advocates and the South Australian premier, Peter Malinauskas, who failed to prevail despite leading a government that provides around $10 million in annual subsidies to the event’s parent, the Adelaide Festival.

Conservative ban

Ms Adler, a Jewish critic of Israel who championed Ms Abdel-Fattah, received a public apology from the festival’s new chairwoman, Judy Potter, too. Ms Adler’s return seemed improbable a day ago, but the event’s repudiation on Thursday of its original position makes it difficult to predict what could happen next.

“Louise is a revered figure of Australian literature who we hold in the highest regard,” said Ms Potter, who chaired the board for eight years until 2023. “We wish also to convey the warm affection of the staff for Louise and their gratitude for her strong convictions.”

Ms Adler’s blistering resignation letter on Tuesday portrayed the debate as a fight for freedom of speech — even though insiders say she and Ms Abdel-Fattah dumped a notable Jewish commentator, Thomas Friedman of the New York Times, from the speakers’ program in 2024.

At the time, the festival implied the American writer cancelled. But Friedman told Nine newspapers on Thursday the decision came from Adelaide. “I was told by email that the timing would not work out,” Friedman said. “I said, no problem. End of story.”

Critics on the right, pleased by the initial decision to defy the pro-Palestinian left, were shocked at the capitulation. “The Adelaide Festival has lost its moral compass,” Liberal MP Sarah Henderson said. “I am appalled.”

A long-time book publisher, Ms Adler championed progressive authors while minimising the presence of conservative writers. No pro-Israeli speakers were invited to challenge Ms Abdel-Fattah, whose public comments include expressing “a glimmer” of hope on October 7, 2023, that was “real, palpable and exhilarating”.

In an interview with an American book podcast last month, Ms Abdel-Fattah complained that Palestinians like her were prevented by “Israel and the Western order” from expressing support for Hamas, the terrorist group, and said being asked to condemn violence was racist.

“What they’re actually trying to do is to take away your right to say that we can resist violently and we can resist through armed struggle because nonviolent resistance has not been allowed for us,” she said.

No longer ‘culturally insensitive’

On January 8 the Adelaide Festival said it would be “culturally insensitive” to give Ms Abdel-Fattah a speaking spot given the attack at Bondi Beach. By Thursday, a new board had decided Ms Abdel-Fattah’s celebration of Hamas’s 2023 invasion was no longer insensitive to Jews traumatised by the massacre.

“We retract that statement,” the Adelaide Festival said in a press release. “We have reversed the decision and will reinstate Dr Abdel-Fattah’s invitation to speak at the next Adelaide Writers’ Week in 2027. We apologise to Dr Abdel-Fattah unreservedly for the harm the Adelaide Festival Corporation has caused her.

“Intellectual and artistic freedom is a powerful human right. Our goal is to uphold it, and in this instance Adelaide Festival Corporation fell well short.”

Ms Adler insisted she is fighting censorship, rather than using public funds to advance a political agenda. “Now South Australia’s tourism slogan could be ‘Welcome to Moscow on the Torrens’” she wrote for the Guardian.

Talent in control

Given the festival is designed to attract tourists to Adelaide, the controversy is an unwelcome distraction for Mr Malinauskas, who emerged on Wednesday as more deeply involved than previously known. The premier told the ABC’s 7.30 program he sent a letter to the festival on January 2, at the request of the board, opposing Ms Abdel-Fattah.

“I have a responsibility to call out those who expressly commit themselves to deny other people a voice as Ms Abdel-Fattah has done, when she advocated against the cultural safety of those people who believe in Zionism, which of course, is the vast bulk of Jewish people,” he said on Wednesday.

“So I made that opinion clear but also, when I wrote that letter, Michael, I was very clear in that letter, making it clear that it was up to the board to arrive at their own conclusions.”

Which it has done, showing that when it comes to government-funded arts the talent, not the politicians, write the script.