A community centre in Hertfordshire is set to host a Palestinian kite making workshop amidst outrage from the local Jewish community.

The Palestinian flag themed kites are not only reminiscent of the kites sent into Israel in 2018, attached to burning material which set light to and destroyed thousands of acres of Israeli agricultural crops, but also a grim reminder of the horrific machine gun wielding terrorists who used paragliders to enter Israel where they slaughtered dozens of music festival goers on 7 October 2023.

UK Lawyers for Israel (UKLFI) were approached by concerned residents about the workshop, which is due to take place on 11 February 2023 at St John’s Community Centre in Hitchin. They have written to Anthony Roche, Managing Director of North Hertfordshire District Council, asking the Council, which owns community centre, to cancel the event.

UKLFI reminded Mr Roche of the link between the Palestinian kites workshop and the kites previously used as weapons to burn Israeli fields. By 7 July 2018 , the incendiary kites had resulted in 678 fires in farmlands and wooded areas in Israel, with 2,260 acres of mostly natural grove consumed.[1]

UKLFI also explained how the kites would recall the massacre on 7 October 2023 of around 1200 people in the same Israeli communities, as well as the torture, rape and mutilation of many victims and the kidnapping of around 240 people, including babies, children, women and senior citizens. More Jews were killed that day than had been killed on a single day since the Holocaust.

The paragliders were a significant and striking part of this onslaught. Creating Palestinian flags in a workshop while the Gaza war is still ongoing implies support for the Hamas terrorist group and their horrific recent activities.

UKLFI pointed out that, as a Local Authority, the Council is bound by the public sector equality duty in s.149 of the Equality Act 2010 to have due regard to the need to foster good relations between different religious and ethnic communities.

Caroline Turner, a director of UKLFI said: “By allowing a Palestinian kite workshop to take place in a Council owned property, we believe that North Hertfordshire District Council has failed in its public sector equality duty.  The Palestinian kite making workshop will certainly not foster good relations between different communities.”

[1] https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-5307517,00.html