{"id":235235,"date":"2026-01-13T04:49:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-13T04:49:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/235235\/"},"modified":"2026-01-13T04:49:10","modified_gmt":"2026-01-13T04:49:10","slug":"adelaide-writers-week-cancelled-after-week-of-escalating-controversy-around-author-randa-abdel-fattah","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/235235\/","title":{"rendered":"Adelaide Writers’ Week cancelled after week of escalating controversy around author Randa Abdel-Fattah"},"content":{"rendered":"

The remaining members of the Adelaide Festival board will step down and this year’s Writers’ Week event has been cancelled, after days of furore regarding the decision to cancel a scheduled appearance by Palestinian Australian author Randa Abdel-Fattah.<\/p>\n

The Adelaide Festival board has also apologised to Abdel-Fattah “for how the decision was represented”.<\/p>\n

“This is a deeply regrettable outcome,” the board said in a statement on Tuesday afternoon.<\/p>\n

“We recognise and deeply regret the distress this decision has caused to our audience, artists and writers, donors, corporate partners, the government and our own staff and people.<\/p>\n

“We also apologise to Dr Randa Abdel-Fattah for how the decision was represented and reiterate this is not about identity or dissent but rather a continuing rapid shift in the national discourse around the breadth of freedom of expression in our nation following Australia’s worst terror attack in history.”<\/p>\n

It follows the resignation of AWW director Louise Adler on Tuesday morning<\/a> and the withdrawal of more than 180 participants from this year’s event<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Louise Adler was appointed director of Adelaide Writers’ Week in 2022. (Supplied: Adelaide Festival)<\/p>\n

In an open letter published by The Guardian, Ms Adler, who is on the Jewish Council of Australia’s advisory committee and is the daughter of Holocaust survivors, said she could not be party to silencing writers.<\/p>\n

“The Adelaide Festival board’s decision \u2014 despite my strongest opposition \u2014 to disinvite the Australian Palestinian writer Randa Abdel-Fattah from Adelaide Writers’ Week weakens freedom of speech and is the harbinger of a less free nation, where lobbying and political pressure determine who gets to speak and who doesn’t,” she wrote.<\/p>\n

The board said the decision had been made on January 8<\/a>.<\/p>\n

“As a board we took this action out of respect for a community experiencing the pain from a devastating event,” the board said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“Instead, this decision has created more division and for that we express our sincere apologies.”<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Randa Abdel-Fattah had been set to promote her new book called Discipline. (ABC RN: Jennifer Wong)<\/p>\n

It said its focus was now on “rebuilding trust with our artistic community and audience to enable open and respectful discussions at future Adelaide Writers’ Week events”.<\/p>\n

“The focus is now on ensuring a successful Adelaide Festival proceeds in a way which safeguards the long and rich cultural legacy of our state but also protects the hardworking staff delivering this important event,” the board said.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“With this in mind all remaining members of the Adelaide Festival Board will today step down \u2014 with the exception of Adelaide City Council representative whose term expires on 2 February 2026 \u2014 to allow for an orderly transition to a new board to secure the success of the 2026 Adelaide Festival and beyond.”<\/p>\n

The Adelaide Festival, which AWW is a part of, will run from February 27 to March 15.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The remaining members of the Adelaide Festival board will step down and this year’s Writers’ Week event has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":235236,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[124108,124105,412,127658,85,46,425,127656,43,127657,53073],"class_list":{"0":"post-235235","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-israel","8":"tag-adelaide-festival","9":"tag-adelaide-writers-week","10":"tag-books","11":"tag-fringe","12":"tag-il","13":"tag-israel","14":"tag-literature","15":"tag-louise-adler","16":"tag-news","17":"tag-premier","18":"tag-randa-abdel-fattah"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235235","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=235235"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/235235\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/235236"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=235235"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=235235"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=235235"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}