War on Gaza: Berlin's Berghain cancels Arabian Panther gig over DJ's pro-Palestine views
The world-famous German nightclub Berghain, renowned on the global techno scene, has been accused of cancelling a gig by an artist for holding pro-Palestinian views.
The French-Lebanese DJ Arabian Panther was due to appear at Berghain in Berlin on Friday last week when he was told that the event would be cancelled.
The DJ took to Instagram to express his frustration at being silenced over his views.
"I was supposed to make my Berghain debut tonight for a Ritmo Fatale label’s night. Berghain decided to cancel my appearance as Arabian Panther due to my pro-Palestine stance," said the DJ.
"In order to avoid any negative publicity, Berghain has chosen to cancel the party & close the club this Friday, January 12, 2024 and provided ‘renovation work’ as the official reason to all the booking agencies.
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"They never [got] back with concern until a week after the public announcement."
The DJ’s work reflects and speaks about the pursuit of peace and justice and is infused with Arabic scales and Middle Eastern instruments.
Arabian Panther, who often performs on stage veiled behind a black Middle Eastern keffiyeh, said that his agent had been told the real reason for the cancellation. Because Berghain couldn’t be seen to cancel the event of a pro-Palestinian artist, it told the other artists that due to "unforeseen construction work" part of the club would be closed. The club opened as normal on Saturday and Sunday night.
'I believe that, given the context since October 7th, they faced some pressure from customers or potential threats from above, possibly from government officials or internally'
– DJ Arabian Panther
Berghain reportedly told the Arabian Panther’s agent not to tell him the real reason for the cancellation, instructions the agents refused to comply with.
Despite his repeated attempts to speak with Berghain, to discuss the issue directly, the club refused to engage with the artist.
"I believe that, given the context since October 7th, they faced some pressure from customers or potential threats from above, possibly from government officials or internally," Arabian Panther told the Resident Advisor, an online music magazine and community platform dedicated to electronic music.
"However, the way they handled the entire situation, instructing Kendal [his agent] to lie and not responding to my proposal for talks, is a disgrace.
"Perhaps they made this decision to 'protect' (I'm the one in danger with them, not the other way around) a portion of their audience that they favour at the expense of Arabs and Palestinians present in the club, for whom it would have been a powerful symbol for me to play in this place."
DJs against apartheid
This is not the first time that clubs in Berlin have banned musicians from performing their music over their pro-Palestinian stances.
In 2020, another of Berlin’s famous clubs, ://about blank, cancelled an event by a music collective who refused to retract a statement supporting the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement.
Such pro-Israeli sentiment isn’t confined to Berlin. In May 2021, Leipzig’s Institut fur Zukunft, a self-dubbed "progressive club for electronic music", promoted a Solidarity With Israel rally.
This has often pitted the established club scene in Germany against its increasingly international community of DJs and party goers.
In 2021, ://about blank’s most popular event series, Buttons, announced it would be ending its relationship with the venue over its pro-Israel stance.
"There has always been something lingering underneath the surface that does not fit with our ethos of radical acceptance," Buttons said. "It has no longer been possible to welcome the communities into ://about blank we’d like to welcome given their stance on Israel," adding that, in their view, Palestinians and DJs and collectives of colour had been mistreated by the club.
Events like Buttons, Gegen, Cocktail d'Amore, Room 4 Resistance and Lecken are leading Germany’s music scene to be more politically conscious.
In 2021, they set up a campaign called Berlin Nightlife Workers Against Apartheid to highlight Germany’s complicity with the systemic oppression of Palestinian people.
Many artists in the electronic music scene in Germany have been leading a cultural boycott of Israel.
In 2018, #DJsForPalestine was established and found support from high-profile artists, including Ben UFO, The Black Madonna, Call Super, Caribou and Ciel, who committed to boycotting Israel for its ongoing apartheid.
'It needs to come to a point where more artists, specifically from the Global South, think about boycotting other German institutions that don't have a clear stance on colonialism'
– DJ Zuhour
In September last year, ://about blank helped launch a controversial new book of essays on "antisemitism".
The book, Judenhass Underground (Jew-Hate Underground), said that "accusations of antisemitism are reflexively shot down" in the electronic music scene "because they collide with the self-image of a progressive party world".
The book reflects Germany’s dominant political position, which supports Israeli actions unconditionally. In the electronic music scene, however, such views are not going unchallenged.
"It needs to come to a point where more artists, specifically from the Global South, think about boycotting other German institutions that don't have a clear stance on colonialism, racism and censorship," the Palestinian artist DJ Zuhour recently noted in an interview. "This is the tool anti-racist and anti-fascist artists have."
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