I was about to begin my performance in Salisbury last Saturday 2nd November when I heard the shocking news of the arrest of Haim Bresheeth, a child of Holocaust survivors and the founder of the Jewish Network for Palestine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The performance came at the end of a conference on Palestine hosted by the Muslim Institute, and Haim\u2019s arrest immediately became the<\/em> focus of discussion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s the relentless logic of the West\u2019s support for the Zionist project: any<\/em> manifestation of solidarity with the Palestinian people must be condemned, silenced and outlawed. The concept of a principled stand against Zionism cannot be tolerated; any fundamental criticism of Israel must be \u2018anti-Semitic\u2019 at heart. The staple chant of protests in defence of Palestinian rights, \u201cFrom the river to the sea\u201d, must now be seen exclusively as an existential threat to Israel. BDS must be banned. The \u201chate-filled\u201d protesters for Palestine must be locked up. All of them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Yes, the UK is becoming a police state, and as each day passes, I no longer feel that I belong.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I am beginning to hate anything that has to do with so-called \u2018Western values\u2019. If these \u2018values\u2019 mean the extermination of my people, or indeed of any people, that is not \u2018civilisation\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I am beginning to regret that my parents taught my siblings and me English, arranged piano lessons and introduced me to George Gershwin. What I got in return, as a Palestinian Muslim, from this civilisation was substantially less than advertised on the packet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Just when I think I have seen the worst possible of Israel\u2019s atrocities, it compounds the crime by unending slaughter, day after day. And now in Lebanon, too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n When the British government airily assured the indigenous people of Palestine in the Balfour Declaration in 1917 that \u201cit being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine\u201d, it could not have been a bigger conceit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The BBC still won\u2019t play my charity single for UNRWA \u201cIf I must die\u201d. To help the Palestinians in Gaza and in surrounding territories today, please share this link and encourage a friend to buy a download or to stream the track from their regular music platform: https:\/\/reemkelani.bandcamp.com\/track\/if-i-must-die-charity-single-for-gaza<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n You can also watch and animation video that accompanies the song, beautifully crafted by Egyptian illustrator Leena Zaher:<\/p>\n\n\n\n