The Salon du Livre, an international book fair in Paris, opened today despite the protests of several Arab nations over the selection of Israel as the festival's guest of honor. The Islamic Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization encouraged its fifty member nations to boycott because of "crimes against humanity that Israel is perpetrating in the Palestinian territories." Many publishers, booksellers, and authors from Saudi Arabia, Iran, Lebanon, Tunisia, Yemen, Morocco, and Algeria withdrew from the festival, though some participants from those countries may still attend.
The annual fair, which honors a different country each year, invited thirty-nine writers from Israel, including Amos Oz, Aharon Appelfeld, and David Grossman, all of whom write in Hebrew, but no Palestinian authors who write in Arabic. According to Martine Heissler of the French Jewish journal Tribune Juive, the invited authors generally represent the political left, which supports Palestinian statehood, the Associated Press reported.
Serge Eyrolles, president of event sponsor Syndicat National du Livre (National Book Syndicate), said that the honor was intended for Israeli literature, not Israel as a state. Israeli president Shimon Peres delivered opening remarks at the festival, calling books "living organisms" and referring to boycotters as "those who want to burn books, boycott wisdom, prevent reflection, block freedom, condemn themselves to blindness, ignorance, to lack of reflection, loss of freedom."
The event has also come under scrutiny for honoring Israel during the country's sixtieth anniversary, though organizers claim the coincidence is unintentional. In an article published yesterday in Publishers Weekly, Rüdiger Wischenbart wrote, "With official politics taking over much of these celebrations for their goals, the literary events tend to lose their innocence."
Similar calls for a boycott have been issued for an Italian book festival, to be held this May in Turin, which has also invited Israel to participate.
