Press release 12th August

Mayors across the country welcome young UK and Palestinian musicians

Sixteen young Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza are making preparations for the longest of journey their lives so far.  This week they will begin the complicated  journey via Amman (from the West Bank) and Cairo (from Gaza), through Gatwick and then on a lengthy coach ride to the sleepy town of Knighton on the Welsh Marches.

The young Palestinians will be travelling out of the West Bank or the Gaza Strip for the first time in their lives, and joining with the young people from the UK in a music project.  For two weeks the young people aged between 13 and 25 will explore new places, meet young people from Wales and England and make music together in Knighton, Aberystwyth, Worcester, Oxford, Northampton and London.

The project, ‘Common Ground’ is the tenth children’s  visit from Palestine organised by Camden Abu Dis Friendship Association, a human rights charity based in London.  2013 has been a very active year for CADFA. This will be the fourth CADFA  visit this year funded by Youth in Action, together with active fundraising by supporters across the country.

This visit will give a great opportunity for young people from different parts of the same country to meet each other, as well as to learn from the young people from across the world.

‘It’s exciting to bring young people from different places in the same country together as well as those from different countries’ explained Nandita Dowson from CADFA. ‘ For young people from London it will be amazing to be in the green of Wales and for young people from the countryside, London will be a strange world.  And for the children from the West Bank and Gaza, it will definitely be the first time to meet children from the other place because the Israeli occupation has made this impossible for them at home.’

The young people will take part in concerts together across the country: Aberystwyth on 19^th August, Knighton on 20^th, Worcester on 22^nd, Oxford on 23^rd,  Northampton on 24^th and Waltham Forest on 28^th. The major London concert together with Nizar al-Issa (oud) and Kefaya Collective, will be at Rosslyn Hill Chapel in Hampstead on Tuesday 27^th August at 7pm. Tickets available in advance from www.camdenabudis.net or on the door.

The Mayor of Worcester will meet the group of young people during their visit on 22^nd August and the Mayor of Waltham Forest will meet them on 28^th. The Mayor of Camden has been invited to open the concert at Rosslyn Hill Chapel, where Haya al-Farra from the Palestinian Mission will also give words of encouragement.