On the eve of the 48th Mardi Gras, Pride in Protest has been told by the Mardi Gras Board that it will not be allowed in the parade unless it removes a social media post which commented favourably on a Zionist group deciding to withdraw.
Dayenu announced it would pull out of Mardi Gras after thousands of people protested the visit by war criminal Israel President Isaac Herzog. It said it was concerned about “safety”.
PiP had protested Dayenu participating in Mardi Gras in January 2024. It said: “Mardi Gras is and should be a place to be proud of our sexualities, our genders, our bodies, and the fact that we are not only surviving but thriving as a community. Mardi Gras is not a place to be proud of genocide or the mass murder of children.”
This statement came after the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras backed PiP’s push for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and the West Bank.
Dayenu opposed this. At the time, LGBTIQ Jews of Tzedek Collective criticised Dayenu’s “anti-Palestinian” statement. Dayenu paid for the then-director of Mardi Gras Louis Hudson to visit Israel.
After Dayenu said it had “concerns” about participating in this Mardi Gras and Fair Day, PiP explained its stand on social media, saying that Zionism is a form of racism and white supremacy and that “most people of faith do not support genocide”.
It said Zionists do not represent most ordinary Jewish people, adding: “Vast numbers of Jewish people around the world and here in our communities and activists space in Sydney are fighting or a ceasefire”
PiP said any claim that being Jewish and being Zionist are the same thing is wrong and that “this assertion is deeply antisemitic”. It also said Jews are welcome to join its contingent if they not want to be “pressured by Zionists to support genocide”.
Dr Amanda Cohn, Member of the NSW Legislative Council criticised the Board for its “extraordinary act of censorship ... especially when the organisers are happy to include the Liberal Party which has called for the parade’s funding to be reviewed and continue to vote against LGBTQIA+ rights in Parliament.”
Evan Gray from PiP said on February 28 that the Board is “destroying the organisation with their vendettas”. They said “ordering groups to remove social media posts criticising support for the genocide, regardless of the truth, is a way of equating Jewishness with genocide. It is Zionism.” These are the same people who say it is “unfair to encourage floats to support trans rights as that would be an ‘imposition’.
“PiP refuses to comply with this authoritarian censorship that silences speaking out about genocide.”
Mardi Gras brings big money to NSW. While it costs an estimated $2.4 million, it generates $39 million. However, the board overspent and, and last year, the NSW government and Sydney City Council delivered it a $1.1 million rescue package.
In early February, the Board cancelled its corporate end-of-parade party for which tickets ranged from $189-$273. Pressure from the pro-Palestine boycott, divest, sanction (BDS) campaign may have played a role.
The post-parade party had been outsourced to Kicks Entertainment, a subsidiary of Live Nation Entertainment (LNE), which is on the Palestinian Academic and Cultural Boycott Divestment of Israel list.
Live Nation Israel, part of LNE, supports Israel’s genocide in Gaza, saying in 2023: “We stand with the residents of Israel, IDF [Israeli Defense Force] fighters and the security forces in these difficult moments.”
Chris Rath, the NSW Liberal’s Shadow Minister for the Arts, has demanded the Board be defunded, saying it had been “hijacked” by “left-wing extremists who are using their positions to import foreign conflicts to our city”.
PiP spokesperson Miles Carter told Green Left that the Board broke its contract with party event Mighty Hoopla which, last year became a subsidiary to the private equity firm KKR, which invests in Israeli weapons, surveillance and illegal settlement projects.
However, even without Mardi Gras advertising, Mighty Hoopla’s day-long festival went ahead on Bondi Beach on February 21. It was the first private “celebration” since the terror attacks on December 14 last year. PiP leafletted the event to inform party-goers of Mighty Hoopla’s ties to Israel’s genocide.
[Rachel Evans is a long-term LGBTIQ activist and Socialist Alliance Gadigal Country/Sydney organiser.]