Tell PEN America -- respect the Palestinian call for boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS)! Stand up for human rights, and end your partnership with the Israeli Embassy!
We, the undersigned, ask the PEN America Center World Voices Festival to reject support from the Embassy of Israel. The Embassy of Israel is listed among the “Champions” of the World Voices Festival, and as a sponsor of a panel.
Given PEN America’s mission of supporting freedom of expression, it is deeply regrettable that the Festival has chosen to accept sponsorship from the Israeli government, even as it intensifies its decades-long denial of basic rights to the Palestinian people, including the frequent targeting of Palestinian writers and journalists.
Sustaining a partnership with the Israeli government amounts to a tacit endorsement of its systematic violations of international law and Palestinian human rights, including the right to freedom of expression for writers and journalists.