Arts of Resistance festival & fundraiser for Palestine

On Sunday June 2nd, Arts of Resistance and Paradiso are teaming up to organize a festival and fundraiser in solidarity with the Palestinian resistance against the Israeli colonial and apartheid regime, and the ongoing genocide in Gaza. Expect a packed program with poetry, talks and music.

Underground hip-hop legend Lowkey – one of the UK’s most potent and electrifying conscious rappers – headlines the night with live support by the Afrogrooves band. Palestina Robotica will be turning the tables and Dancer Amira al Rawi will perform alongside many others to be announced. For the panel, we’ve invited Lowkey and Dina Zbeidy, hosted by Chris Kaspar de Ploeg.

While providing a space for shared grief and anger, the aim is to celebrate resistance and to re-charge for solidarity. In line with this goal, all profits from ticket sales will be donated to the European Legal Support Center (ELSC), an organization that offers legal support for activists across mainland Europe and the UK who stand in solidarity with Palestinian rights. This is much needed as “individuals have faced repercussions for speaking out, including dismissal, disciplinary action or threats of deportation if they are foreign nationals,” according to Amnesty International.

The UN announced that there are over a million Palestinians facing famine, “the highest number of people facing catastrophic hunger ever recorded by the Integrated Food Security Classification system – anywhere, anytime.” For this reason, fundraising for food aid might seem the most urgent. Yet as the UN emphasizes in the same report, this is not a natural but "an entirely manmade" disaster. It is the Israëli government who prevents the food from entering Gaza, with the unwavering support of many Western governments. That is why Arts of Resistance and Paradiso are fund-raising for activism instead.

Join us for a night of resistance, rage and celebration at Paradiso.

About ELSC

The European Legal Support Center (ELSC) is the first and only independent organisation defending and empowering the Palestine solidarity movement in Europe through legal means. They provide free legal advice and assistance to associations, human rights NGOs, groups and individuals advocating for Palestinian rights in mainland Europe and the United Kingdom. The ELSC intervenes to end arbitrary restrictions and criminalization of advocacy. It also develops legal tools and engages in strategic litigation to support civil society advocacy and campaigns. The Center was established in January 2019 as a joint initiative of European jurists, the Palestinian civil society network PNGO and the Dutch NGO The Rights Forum, which has been hosting the ELSC in Amsterdam in the start-up phase.