As the Israel Festival continues with two more weeks of performances in Jerusalem and elsewhere around the country, the annual arts event once known as a showcase for global performers is proceeding this year without a single international act.

With artists the world over participating in an unofficial boycott of Israel since Hamas launched the Gaza war, festival organizers have found it increasingly difficult to bring anyone to Israel.

“The basis of the festival hasn’t changed, but the way of carrying it out has,” said Ori Vaknin, a native Jerusalemite who recently took over as festival CEO.

This year’s opening event, “Held by a String,” a free aerial performance that took place on July 28 above Jerusalem’s Guy Ben Hinnom Valley, seemed to embody the festival organizers’ ongoing frustration.

The spectacle was initially to be performed by a French cooperative of tightrope walkers who got cold feet when they realized the political pressures they might experience by coming to Israel.

Instead, said Vaknin, they helped the festival find an alternative group of Jerusalem colleagues who could perform a similar tightrope act.

In the end, 7,500 people streamed into the valley to watch the 20-minute performance, which was accompanied by the Jerusalem East and West Orchestra and the Jerusalem Youth Choir.

“That’s why you keep doing this,” said Vaknin. “There’s that moment when you open the event, and the art touches you, and you say, ‘This is why I do this.'”

Since the deadly October 7, 2023, Hamas onslaught and the years of continuous conflict that have followed, the Israel Festival has been repeatedly forced to adjust to events beyond its control. This includes shifting dates and production challenges caused by successive rounds of fighting — most recently this year’s war with........

© The Times of Israel