The following correction to the article below was printed in Issue 706 (Friday 13th November): In our article ‘Choir’s planned tour causing discord’ (issue 705) we wrote that during the 2008 Israel Palestine conflict “1,400 Palestinian people were massacred”. We would like to clarify that this number includes Hamas militants. In addition, we wrongly wrote that since the Six Day War, Israel “has continued a policy of military occupation in [Gaza].” Israel unilaterally disengaged from the Gaza Strip in 2005.

Clare College Choir’s proposed tour to Israel and Palestine during the Christmas period has prompted angry protest letters from pro-Palestinian activists.

The College Choir plans to visit Bethlehem, Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, Haifa and Karmiel, performing J.S. Bach’s Christmas Oratorio, during their tour, which will last from December 23rd to 29th. On Christmas Eve they will be singing in the Church of the Nativity, Bethlehem, followed by Midnight Mass in Jerusalem.

These plans have met with anger from pro-Palestinian activists, who claim that the proposed tour would signal acceptance of Israel’s political regime. Protest letters have been sent by seventeen members of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, the co-directors of the Choir of London John Harte and Michael Stevens, and Karl Sabbagh, a British journalist of Palestinian descent.

Signatories of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign include several notable figures, including the historian William Dalrymple, playwright Caryl Churchill, Oxford academic Karma Nabulsi, and Garth Hewitt, Honorary Canon of the Cathedral Church of St George the Martyr in Jerusalem.

Concerns revolve around the tour’s potential political implications. Signatory Dr Raymond Deane, an Irish composer and political activist, told Varsity, "Those of us involved in culture can’t stand back and pretend that we inhabit some ethereal realm remote from the real world. Tours by artists such as the Choir of Clare College will be exploited by the lavishly funded Israeli propaganda machine as proof of the ‘normality’ and ‘acceptability’ of the Israeli rogue state - which is neither normal nor acceptable."

Betty Hunter, General Secretary of the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, highlights in her letter that December 27th, mid-tour, will be the anniversary of Israel’s military onslaught on the trapped population of the Gaza Strip, in which 1,400 Palestinian people were massacred.

Meanwhile John Harte and Michael Stevens point out that Karmiel, a town on the proposed itinerary, is an exclusively Jewish town built on territory confiscated from Palestinian villages after the war of 1948, and is now a symbol of the expropriation of land by Israel.

Tim Brown, Director of Music at Clare, told Varsity that the Clare College Council had approved the proposed tour, having discussed it over a number of weeks. He pointed out that this 2009 tour is a repeat of a previous visit to Israel by Clare Choir made in September 2000, and notes that the 2000 tour did not raise any objections.

He also indicated that the Palestine Solidarity Campaign website encourages “study tours” and “travel programmes” to Palestine, which the Choir is fulfilling through its visit to Bethlehem. Pro-Palestinian protesters argue that this Bethlehem visit is merely tokenism and under the auspices of the Israeli government.

Israel invaded the West Bank and Gaza Strip during the Six Day War (1967) and has continued a policy of military occupation in these territories ever since. Since 2006, Palestinian artists, academics and cultural organisations have been calling on the international community to cease working with Israeli organisations that accept funding from the state.