BATSHEVA PERFORMANCE DISRUPTED FOR THIRD NIGHT

Dancing to the Rhythms of Palestinian Blood Spilling

NOVEMBER 21 - For the third consecutive night, pro-Palestinian protesters evaded enhanced security checks to mount demonstrations inside Sadler's Wells theatre where the Batsheva dance ensemble from Israel was performing the last of three London shows. Its tour continues on Friday and Saturday in Plymouth where campaigners have pledged to mount further protests.

 Audience members waiting to have their bags and tickets checked were channeled into the theatre in two queues, hemmed in by metal barriers reminiscent of the Israeli checkpoints that restrict movement of Palestinians around the occupied West Bank.  

The current Israeli onslaught on besieged Gaza, killing  more than 160 Palestinians in little more than a week, reinforced protesters' determination to show their support for Palestinians whose rights have been denied for more than 60 years.

 Around 20 minutes in to Wednesday's performance a Palestinian student from Ramallah, who gave his name as Wael, unfurled a green, white, red and black Palestinian flag and called out: "Stop the ethnic cleansing cleansing of Palestinians."  He said he acted on behalf of people of all faiths living in the territories illegally occupied by Israel.

 A second protester, Londoner Georgie Stagg, said she had held up a banner declaring: "Israel dances while Gaza burns".

 "People were sitting watching dancers while the country that sends them is slaughtering innocent Palestinians, stealing their land and bulldozing their homes," she said.

  As on Monday and Tuesday, the performance was halted as security staff removed protesters who were greeted with cheers and congratulations by supporters of the Don't Dance with Israeli Apartheid campaign outside the theatre.

 Deborah Fink, a trained soprano and leading member of Jews for Boycotting Israeli Goods, interrupted Tuesday's performance around 7.50 pm, singing to the tune of Beethoven's Ode to Joy, "Israel end your occupation, there's no peace on stolen land."

 Ten minutes layer two more women emerged having unfurled a colourful banner bearing the words, "Israel dances while Gaza burns."

 Teresa Webb from Hackney, northeast London said, "I took this action to give a voice to the Palestinian people whose culture is silenced."

 Fellow Londoner Anne Gray said her message was, "Remember the blood of Gaza" and "Brand Israel off the stage."

 "Israel seems able to carry out any number of atrocities against Palestinians and yet be treated by British and other western governments as an entirely normal, civilised state with no sanctions applied," said Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi, cultural working group coordinator of the Boycott Israel Network. "Our message to Israel, on behalf of Palestinians whose voices are silenced, is that institutions linked to the state, including cultural bodies like Batsheva, cannot expect to be welcomed as if they represented normalcy when they patently do not."

Debbie Fink - Jews for Boycotting Israeli Goods
Ends

BACKGROUND 

ANGER AT GAZA SLAUGHTER TARGETS SADLER'S WELLS

FROM THE BRITISH COMMITTEE FOR THE UNIVERSITIES OF PALESTINEAND JEWS FOR BOYCOTTING ISRAELI GOODS  

PROTEST OVER GAZA DEATHS MOVES TO THEATRE HOSTING ISRAEL'S BATSHEVA DANCE ENSEMBLE

BATSHEVA ACCUSED OF ACTING AS CULTURAL FIGLEAF FOR ATROCITIES

SADLER’S WELLS BEEFS UP SECURITY IN PREPARATION FOR PRO-PALESTINE PROTESTS

ACADEMICS CONDEMN THEATRE MANAGEMENT REFUSAL TO ENTER DIALOGUE

November 18 - Protests at the growing Palestinian death toll caused by Israel's bombardment of Gaza will move from outside London's Israeli Embassy to the city's premier contemporary dance venue at Sadler's Wells, Islington on Monday.

 A nationwide campaign,  Don’t Dance with Israeli Apartheid, has already interrupted 11 dance performances by Israel’s Batsheva Ensemble in six cities up and down the country and is now targeting the Israeli troupe's three planned performances at Sadler's Wells on Nov 19, 20 & 21.

 Campaigners say their protest is not directed at individual Israeli artists, but at the government which deliberately uses culture as cover for its human rights abuses and violations of international law.

 “We target artistic institutions which are intrinsically linked to the Israeli state through funding and the ‘Brand Israel ’ initiative,” the campaign leaflets say. They quote an Israeli Foreign Affairs ministry spokesman outlining, in the wake of the previous onslaught on Gaza which killed more than 1300 Palestinians, its explicit intention to send abroad cultural icons to “show Israel ’s prettier face, so we are not thought of purely in the context of war.”
 
 Although Batsheva’s artistic director Ohad Naharin has publicly opposed Israeli policies towards the Palestinians, his company is embraced by Israel ’s far-right government as their finest cultural ambassador.
 
 It receives funding from the Israeli state, Israeli arms companies and the racist Jewish National Fund which works openly to dispossess Palestinians and replace them with Jewish immigrants.

“With Israel escalating its attacks on Gaza, killing dozens including civilians, with children among them, we intend our protests to reclaim for the Palestinians a tiny piece of the cultural and physical space which Israel has stolen from them,” said Naomi Wimborne-Idrissi, cultural working group coordinator for the Boycott Israel Network, part of the UK Don’t Dance coalition. "We do not accept that art may be used as a figleaf for killings and collective punishment of a civilian population."
 
 Sadler’s Wells management has emailed ticket-holders telling them to expect “groups of peaceful demonstrators” at the Batsheva Ensemble performances, with the possibility of “some form of disruption inside the venue”. Bags will be searched on arrival and people should be ready for delays, the email said.
 
 The theatre’s chief executive and artistic director Alistair Spalding refused to meet academics from the British Committee for the Universities of Palestine  (BRICUP) who had asked to discuss the invitation to Batsheva with him.
 
 Spalding insisted the Israeli company was no different from other international institutions: “the vehicle for the creative expression of their artistic directors and not .. representatives of the governments of their countries.
 
 “I have a firm belief in cultural engagement rather than exclusion and … will present the work of choreographic artists whatever their nationality,” Spalding said.
 
 Prof Jonathan Rosenhead, chair of BRICUP, said that Sadler’s Wells commitment to cultural engagement seemed not to extend to dialogue with principled critics. Spalding had failed to address any of the arguments BRICUP had made, said Rosenhead.
 
 He referred in particular to the conditions under which Palestinian culture has to operate, described by a Palestinian dancer as “ Israel 's three-tiered system of occupation, colonisation and apartheid [which] ruthlessly suffocates the livelihoods of Palestinian communities, including our right to artistic and cultural expression." 

 Don’t Dance with Israeli Apartheid began its campaign with protests at performances by the main Batsheva Dance company in the Edinburgh International Festival at the end of August , winning support from considerable Scottish cultural figures including the national poet (Makar) Liz Lochhead.
 
 Hundreds of campaign supporters have made their presence felt at every stop on the current tour by Batsheva’s junior Ensemble, beginning in Scotland  before moving on toManchester and Bradford .
 
 In Brighton Green Party MP Caroline Lucas wrote to the Dome Theatre management reminding them that: “Israel’s sponsorship of arts and cultural events is one deliberate way in which it is actively seeking to repair the reputational damage inflicted by its treatment of Palestinians, so Palestinian civil society has called for a full cultural boycott of all cultural performers and exhibitors that are institutionally linked to the Israeli state.”
 
 There were more protests on November 13 & 14 in Birmingham where a letter from a Palestinian Christian organisation questioning the hosting of Batsheva at the Hippodrome was presented to the Bishop of Birmingham, the Right Rev. David Urquhart, who is one of the theatre's directors. Kairos Palestine, which sent the letter, has received no reply. 

 A performance in Leicester on Friday night attracted a hundred or more local people angered by the assault on Gaza. As in every other venue, the show was interrupted on a number of occasions by protesters calling out pro-Palestinian slogans.

Batsheva Dance Company braces for Gaza protests in London

Sadler's Wells theatre steps up security ahead of performances by Israeli dance troupe

Plagued by protests … Batsheva Dance Company. Photograph: Gadi Dagon

Sadler's Wells has increased security in advance of pro-Palestinian protests planned to coincide with the arrival of Israel's Batsheva Dance Ensemble.

The company, who have been touring in the UK since August, when they performed at the Edinburgh international festival, have faced a series of protests en route, with 11 performances disrupted in a nationwide campaign called Don't Dance With Israeli Apartheid. The most recent, in Leicester on 16 November, drew 100 protesters, according to a statement sent out by the campaign.

At Sadler's Wells, numbers are expected to swell as protesters are joined by those who have been voicing dissent over Israel's recent military strikes on Gaza at the Israeli embassy in London.
Staff at the London dance theatre have emailed ticket-holders for the three-night run telling them to expect "groups of peaceful demonstrators" and the possibility of "some form of disruption inside the venue". A bag search will be in operation at the theatre.

Campaigners insist that the protests are not directed at individual Israeli artists, but at the government's use of culture to cover human rights abuses and violations of international law.
However, Sadler's Wells artistic director and chief executive Alistair Spalding said: "Batsheva Ensemble are the youth company of one of the world's most accomplished and innovative dance companies and therefore it is absolutely right that they should be presented within our artistic programme.

"Sadler's Wells would never prevent a company performing because of their nationality. We believe in engagement, not disengagement or boycott. Cultural isolation is not a policy that Sadler's Wells believes in."

Batsheva's artistic director Ohad Naharin has publicly expressed sympathy with the Palestinian people, but in March he dismissed previous protests against the company in the US. "I felt that people were using us as a symbol," he told the New York Times. "It's a publicity stunt for their agenda."

Spalding added: "We are taking every precaution necessary to ensure the smooth running of the performances."

Soda Stream Picket A Massive Success As Picturehouse Cinemas Boycott Sodastream

Shop Empty as Brighton Says No to Apartheid

Excellent picket - as one forelorn Zionist flag droops in the distance

 A lively picket as the Zionists became increasingly downhearted after our Batsheva success last night

A particularly disturbed Christian fundamentalist - with a 'joke' photo of myself - clearly she doesn't appreciate that most people seeing her 'artwork' are even more repulsed by Israel!

PSC stall did a roaring trade despite Zionist attack on it - they shout Shalom (peace) but Wage War!

Christian Fundie Nut (apparently confusing BDS and BDSM!)

Campaign Takes Off as People of Brighton say 'No to Apartheid' and Ethnic Cleansing

 

A large number of Palestinian supporters turned up today

The splendid isolation of Sodastream - not a customer in sight

J-Big Banner - Not all Jews are Nationalist Zealots

 

A number of Israeli Jews joined with J-Big to show that many Jews look to the anti-racist traditions of Jewish people

Jews for Boycotting Israeli Goods there to show that Boycotts are not anti-Semitic

Following on from the successful demonstration at Batsheva last night, the picket today of Sodastream was the biggest yet and shows that the campaign is developing momentum.  Passers-by were extremely supportive and one Zionist, who posed as a jogger, rushed up to the PSC stall and tried snatching and grabbing the leaflets.  He was arrested by the Police as he resisted arrest and this is the first arrest that has taken place.  It gives the lie to the claim that it is the demonstrators who are violent and abusive.  Coupled with an attack on a woman demonstrator last night by the Zionists, an assault on me last week and the consistent abuse by Zionist demonstrators, with an absurd cartoon picture of me on one of the Christian fundamentalist posters – by an admittedly very disturbed woman – it shows we are getting to them.

There were a number of Israelis on the demonstration today coupled with a banner and people from Jews for Boycotting Israeli Goods, we outnumbered the Zionist demonstrators about 3-1.

Also inside an otherwise empty shop was one Timothy Cruttenden, the solicitor who brought an injunction against protestors at the EDO demonstration some years ago.  That injunction was overturned at trial and Cruttenden was severely criticised for his behaviour by the judge at the trial.

manager surveys his shop

Cruttenden deep in conversation with manager - completely undisturbed by customers

Cruttenden -Solicitor Who Lost EDO Injunction (& £1m!) behind Police

Even more heartlifting was the decision today by Picturehouse Cinemas, which runs the Duke of York, Britain's oldest cinema, to replace all Sodastream products by ones which are locally sourced.  All in all a great weekend!

Tony Greenstein

Update:
Brighton & Hove UNISON Local Government, the largest union branch in Brighton & Hove Voted to Support the Boycott and Pickets of Sodastream this week

Further Update
And just to compound the good news, Brighton Quakers earlier this week also announced they were supporting the boycott of Sodastream!

Quakers call for boycott of Brighton store

9:05am Tuesday 6th November 2012 in News By John Keenan, business editor

 

 Religious groups have called for their members to boycott goods sold in a Brighton store.
A new report published by a consortium of 22 organisations across Europe says the EU should discourage businesses from economic, commercial and investment links with Israeli settlements in the West Bank.

The report, called Trading Away Peace: How Europe Helps Sustain Illegal Israeli Settlements, highlights the SodaStream factory in the industrial zone of Mishor Adumim, part of Maale Adumim, one of the biggest settlements in the disputed region.

SodaStream recently opened its flagship Ecostream store in Western Road, Brighton.
Anti-Israel activists in the city say that the shop’s eco-image is a mask which disguises the fact that it has set up a factory on land confiscated from Palestinians west of the Jordan River.

Suzanne Ismail, spokeswoman for the Quaker Peace & Social Witness Group, said Quakers in Britain have made a commitment to boycott goods produced in the settlements and that would include SodaStream products.

She said: “I would encourage shoppers to ask questions about the origin of Sodastream products sold in the Brighton Ecostream store or anywhere else.”

A working paper published by SodaStream claimed that the report was drafted to influence the EU to change its regulations with Israel on settlements products.

It said: “It has no legal authority and contains numerous mistakes and irregularities. “This report addresses so called human rights concerns in the West Bank only, and totally ignores all the real human rights issues in different countries around the world.

“This by itself proves that the report is biased and intends to delegitimise the state of Israel.”
A spokesman for SodaStream added: “This statement reflects a one-sided position from the Quaker movement, we decline to comment further.”

Batsheva Boycott Success in Brighton

Concert goers and Brightonians faced a clear call to boycott Israeli Apartheid Dancers

 

Israel's New Found Friends - just prior to their leaving for the Knesset. KGS the Far-Right and assorted Holocaust Deniers pose for pIcture at Yad Vashem - Israel's holocaust memorial museum!

Pictured are Marc Doll  of Germany’s Freedom Party Die Frieheit, Filip DeWinter  of Vlaams Belang, a Flemish far-right party, René Stadtkewitz  of Die Freiheit,  Heinz-Christian Strache leader of the neo-Nazi Austrian Freedom Party (FPO),  David Lasar (FPÖ); Haim Muehlstein (shady far-right Israeli settler/businessman); Eliezer “Cheetah” Cohen (a Likud MK);

EDL's Union Jack alongside fellow bigots

The Zionist Star of David - the only legal flag bar the swastika in Nazi Germany - was surrounded by an anti-racist messsage

EDL & Zionists - united in bigotry and hate

A Loud & Clear Message - Boycott Batsheva

2 new Zionists obsessed with death whilst chanting 'shalom'!

 

Christian Fundies Experiment with Cameras

One Concert Cancelled, the Other Disrupted as Public Stays Away

Perhaps the most moving and visible display of our success in persuading people to boycott Batsheva was when a woman, with a child aged about 10, came up to the picket and said that she couldn’t in all conscience go in and watch a concert that was seen to be in support of the ongoing occupation and terrorisation of the Palestinian.  She later obtained a refund.

Other examples were the cars who stopped to honk their support of the Palestinian demonstration.  The Zionists don't seem to get the fact that public support for their murderous enterprise is at an all-time low.

Inside the concert hall was just over ½ full and despite elaborate security precautions, there were 4 disruptions of the concert.  As one witness said, the dancers seemed anxious as to when the next disruption would occur and never gained their rhythm.  Perhaps that is understandable.
Outside there was a large pro-Palestinian contingent consisting of Palestinians and their British supporters.  The supporters of Israel right or wrong consisted of the usual eclectic mixture of die-hard Jewish Zionists and Christian Fundamentalists and a couple of fascist (EDL) supporters.  Quite a combination!

The (Jewish) Zionists seem to find it difficult to understand that there are many Jews who oppose racism – be it anti-Semitism directed at Jews or Jewish racism directed at Palestinians.  One particular woman seemed obssessed with the idea that I might not have anyone to say kaddish (the Jewish prayer for the dead!) when I pass away, not seeming to understand that as an atheist I might not want a religious service anyway!   However it is not the petty nationalists who are remembered but the Jewish heretics and anti-fascists such as Hanna Arendt, Spinoza, Marek Edelman and Freud.  I know whose company I’d rather keep!

A special mention should be made for the Christian Zionists who were somewhat more vociferous than their Jewish counterparts.  They seem determined to ensure that as many Jews as possible ‘return’ to the holy land in order that Revelations can be fulfilled and the vast majority devoured in the flames of Armageddon before the Elect float to heaven in the Rapture!   What with harassing women seeking an abortion to portraying gays as uniquely evil, they certainly have their work cut out when it comes to being full-time bigots.

As the Press Release below states, about 70 people were on the Palestinian picket and the numbers increased as the night wore on whereas the Zionists either went inside or drifted away.

On a personal level I had a long discussion with a young Israeli woman who thought that politics and culture did not mix.  When I put it to her that the same was said about the German Philharmonic Orchestra in the 1930’s and their famous conductor, Wilhelm Furtwangler and of course that the same argument was made in respect of the cultural and sporting boycott of South African apartheid she was less sure.

Culture does not exist in a vacuum but is a product of the society from which it originates, which is why the Israeli government sponsors the Brand Israel image and funds tours like those of Batsheva.  Its problem is that in so doing they are actually contributing to the cultural isolation of Israel, which isn’t hard to do given that the present government includes open fascists and racists, like Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman in it.

Ironically, despite their attempts to ingratiate themselves with Zionism, the majority strand of religious Zionism and Orthodoxy has nothing but contempt for Christianity.  This is most evident in the actions of Michael Ben Ari, a member of the governing coalition, who on receipt of a copy of the New Testament promptly ripped it up and threw it in a trash can, stating that:

‘“This abominable book (the New Testament) galvanized the murder of millions of Jews during the Inquisition and during auto da fe instances,” Ben Ari said adding that “Sending the book to MK's is a provocation. There is no doubt that this book and all it represents belongs in the garbage can of history.”

But Ben Ari’s actions are in a long line of such attacks, not only on Palestinian Christians but even on Zionism’s Fundamentalist Christian supporters.  Examples include ‘Orthodox Jewish youths burn New Testaments in Or Yehuda’   and a bomb attack on one Christian Zionist family living on a settlement.

Last year a Christ at the Checkpoint Conference was held in Bethlehem, a town that was 70% Christian before the Israeli occupation.  It is often the villages of Christian Palestinians which have been at the forefront of opposition to Zionist colonisation, such as Bi’ilin.  As Stephen Sizer, an Anglican vicar under attack by the Zionist movement in this country explained:

“The Spanish used the church to suppress the Incas and the other people in Latin America, the British used the Bible to justify the colonisation of East Africa and Asia. In South Africa the Dutch Reform Church used the Bible to justify why the blacks were inferior to the whites.”

And of course when it comes to anti-Semitism, Christian Fundamentalists - the backbone of segregation and the KKK - are no slouches either.  Glenn Beck, ex-Fox News TV Presenter so indulged himself in portraying Jews as the cause of the financial crisis, using every trope and stereotype in the book, including an attack on George Soros, a childhood survivor of the Hungarian holocaust, as being a collaborator with the Nazis, that even the avidly pro-Zionist Anti-Defamation League launched an attack on him.   None of which stopped the Knesset from conferring its most prestigious honour on him, allowing him to address them in session.

Tony Greenstein

Press Release  Friday 9th November 2012

Disruption of Israeli state funded Batsheva Dance performance : Brighton Dome

Friday 9 November

There have been four disruptions of the Batsheva Dance Ensemble's performance at Brighton Dome tonight. Over 70 people protested against the dance performance outside the venue while several people purchased tickets and protested inside the performance.

Soon after the performance began shouts of 'free Palestine' and 'end the occupation' rang out inside the Dome. The performance was repeatedly disrupted by a total of four pairs of demonstrators.
The demonstrators are responding to a call from the people of Palestine for a campaign of 'boycott, divestment and sanctions' similar to the boycott campaign waged against apartheid South Africa.
The demonstration included many Jewish people who oppose Israel’s policies.

The demonstrators informed attenders at the performance that Israel’s Batsheva dance company is financed by the Israeli state, invested in by Israeli arms companies and the racist Jewish national fund which works openly to dispossess Palestinians and replace them with Jewish immigrants.
One of the two planned performances of this company has been cancelled, and Friday’s performance will be subject to special security arrangements.

Andrew Comben, the Dome Director, has appealed to ‘artistic freedom’ to justify the Batsheva appearance, but the demonstrators argue this is an empty defence in light of the oppression and war crimes faced by the Palestinians. The apartheid wall, checkpoints and military attacks leave them no freedom to perform and travel as Israeli companies do.

Caroline Lucas, MP for Brighton Pavilion, has stated that ‘Constituents have raised concerns with me about forthcoming performances by the dance group Batsheva and I’ve passed those on to Brighton Dome – asking whether they took the cultural boycott into consideration when making decisions about events’.

The Brighton demonstration is one of a series taking place at Batsheva performances around the country – including Edinburgh, Bradford, Salford, Leicester, London and Plymouth. These local demonstrations are part of a wider and growing ‘Don’t Dance with Israeli Apartheid’ campaign which faced Batsheva during its North American tour earlier this year, and will surely face it during its future tours.

Notes
For information about the Don’t Dance with Israeli Apartheid campaign see
For information about the Edinburgh demonstrations see
Full statement by Caroline Lucas MP:

As a long standing campaigner for peace, justice and freedom in Palestine, I am committed to raising awareness of ongoing human rights abuses against the Palestinians and the Israeli state’s continued breaching of international law. Israel’s sponsorship of arts and cultural events is one deliberate way in which it is actively seeking to repair the reputational damage inflicted by its treatment of Palestinians, so Palestinian civil society has called for a full cultural boycott of all cultural performers and exhibitors that are institutionally linked to the Israeli state. The arts can play a role in helping to build bridges between the two communities but their potential to act as a forum for promoting peace and understanding is being undermined by the restrictions placed on Palestinian artists and performers who want to participate in tours or festivals abroad, for example.  For this reason, I believe cultural boycotts should be applied on a case by case basis.
 
Constituents have raised concerns with me about forthcoming performances by the dance group Batsheva and I’ve passed those on to Brighton Dome – asking whether they took the cultural boycott into consideration when making decisions about events.
For further information and comment phone
(0044) 7778625910 or
(0044) 7778110961

Ecostream & BDS - A Double Whammy

First a video showing the group Jews for Boycotting Israeli Goods protesting outside Sodastream.  THus giving the lie to any allegations that to Boycott Israeli Stolen Goods has anything to do with anti-Semitism.

Batsheva Dance Company Forced to Cut Performances in Brighton!

Those who play for settlers can't complain if they're not wanted in the rest of the world

 Secondly even better news.  Batsheva's performance in Brighton has already been cut in half because of the fear of disruption.  Now all we have to do is concentrate on one performance of the Apartheid artists from Israel!   At least the message is getting through, racist performers aren't welcome anywhere.

And although the Zionists will scream and kick up about it, the fact is that when Soviet artists performed abroad, the Zionists did their best to disrupt the Bolshoi Ballet and others in the name of Soviet Jewry.  Strange how they will Boycott Gaza and Iran but Israel is off limits.  Wonder why?

Brighton Dome cuts short Israeli dance visit for security reasons

 From Ben James Evening Argus of 17.10.12.

Security at the Brighton Dome is to be beefed up for the arrival of a controversial Israeli dance group.
Bosses contacted ticket holders yesterday to inform them that one of the two Batsheva Ensembles performances in November is to be cancelled in an attempt to concentrate security resources.
The move comes after the Don’t Dance With Israel Apartheid group called on members to “link up” and disrupt the Brighton performance.

In a statement on its website, the group claims the ensemble is part of the Israeli government’s “Brand Israel” initiative which it says sees cultural groups promoted to help whitewash the country’s human rights abuses.

It adds: “Batsheva’s explicit ties with the state of Israel make it impossible to describe the group as apolitical. This is why we will be protesting against Batsheva.” 

The group, which is made up of a number of pro-Palestine organisations, is also calling on supporters to write letters to venues urging them to cancel performances as well as producing leaflets, banners and posters.

The dance company, set up in Tel Aviv in 1964, often attracts trouble when it tours.
In August this year, protestors burnt tickets and chanted outside a performance at the Edinburgh Festival.

However Dome bosses have defended their decision to book the group. Chief executive Andrew Comben said: “Freedom of expression is fundamental in the arts and Brighton Dome and Festival exists so that ideas of all varieties can be expressed and explored.

“We support the right to protest and encourage debate but we welcome artists from all over the world and will continue to do so.

“However, we have a duty to ensure that our audiences have a safe and enjoyable experience and are disappointed that their enjoyment of this company’s work may be disturbed.” 

Following extensive talks with Sussex Police and the ensemble, the Dome decided a “higher level of security” would be appropriate.

A spokeswoman added that everybody who had bought tickets for the cancelled Saturday November 10 show would have a seat for the November 9 performance.

In May members of Brighton and Hove Palestine Solidarity Campaign snuck into the Dome’s Corn Exchange to disrupt a performance by Israeli group The Jerusalem Quartet.