One of Australia’s top literary festivals has issued a fresh apology and invited a Palestinian-Australian author to its 2027 edition after her controversial removal generated a massive backlash.<\/p>\n
Randa Abdel-Fattah was dumped on January 8 from the Adelaide Writers’ Week line-up in a board decision, triggering a mass boycott by 180 speakers and the resignation of its renowned director and several board members.<\/p>\n
The writers’ week, which was due to start in February, was entirely canned<\/a> after its programme collapsed, with a new board and chair installed.<\/p>\n A re-issued apology on Thursday came after the former Adelaide Festival board cited “cultural sensitivity” after the Bondi terror attack<\/a> in cancelling the author’s appearance.<\/p>\n “We retract that statement. We have reversed the decision and will reinstate Dr Abdel-Fattah’s invitation to speak at the next Adelaide Writers’ Week in 2027,” the new board led by immediate past chair of the Adelaide Festival, Judy Potter, said on Thursday. <\/p>\n “We apologise to Dr Abdel-Fattah unreservedly for the harm the Adelaide Festival Corporation has caused her.<\/p>\n “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.”<\/p>\n The board belatedly apologised to Abdel-Fattah on Tuesday for how the decision was represented, citing “a continuing rapid shift in the national discourse around the breadth of freedom of expression”.<\/p>\n It approached Abdel-Fattah on Wednesday evening about the fresh apology and the request to attend in 2027.<\/p>\n The author told AAP she would consider accepting the invite to next year’s festival confirming she would attend in a “heartbeat” if respected publisher Louise Adler was at the helm again.<\/p>\n “I accept this apology as acknowledgement of our right to speak publicly and truthfully about the atrocities that have been committed against the Palestinian people,” she said in a statement given to AAP.<\/p>\n “I accept this apology as a vindication of our collective solidarity and mobilisation against anti-Palestinian racism, bullying and censorship. <\/p>\n “I accept this unreserved apology as acknowledgement of the harm inflicted on our community.”<\/p>\n The Palestinian-Australian academic and novelist had faced scrutiny over social media posts critical of Israel.<\/p>\n