In the fragile silence that followed the Bondi terror attack, Australia was reminded of how quickly fear can rearrange public life. Fifteen people were murdered at a Hanukkah gathering in Sydney, an act of targeted violence that shocked a nation and left Jewish Australians grieving and anxious. The instinct to protect community cohesion in such moments is understandable. But when fear hardens into exclusion, it begins to corrode the democratic character it claims to defend.

That is why the decision by the Adelaide Writers Festival to remove Palestinian-Australian author Dr Randa Abdel-Fattah from its 2026 program has resonated far beyond a literary calendar. Officially justified on grounds of cultural sensitivity so soon after Bondi, the decision landed as a symbolic act: a Palestinian voice deemed too risky to hear in public, not because of anything said at the festival, but because of who she is and what she has previously argued.

The scale of the reaction reveals how deep the fault lines have become. Almost 50 writers withdrew in protest, including major Australian and international figures. The Australia Institute pulled its sponsorship, citing a betrayal of free exchange of ideas. First Nations writers described the move as racist and Islamophobic, drawing parallels with their own histories of silencing. This was not a fringe backlash; it was a collective warning from the country’s cultural and intellectual core.

At the heart of the controversy lies a troubling conflation. The Bondi attacker was a lone individual, later identified by authorities as acting alone. Yet the festival board’s language

© Middle East Monitor