A new book artfully explains how the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement has infected the entertainment industry and turned art into a political cudgel––and how to fight back against it… And Melman does so with humor and wit while highlighting the importance of the issue, as artists help control our society’s civil discourse. All in all, Melman does a masterful job in succinctly summarizing the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
By countering falsehoods disseminated by the movement and laying out facts and figures, this book urges everyone, including BDS followers, to question its motives and intentions... Melman also provides a picture of how the movement operates across the board, detailing each of the boycott, divestment and sanctions aspects of its activities. Essentially an activist, Melman provides a step-by-step action plan at the end of each chapter for helping to counter it. Artists Under Fire is more than informative and thought-provoking, it is positively stimulating.
Artists Under Fire: The BDS War Against Celebrities, Jews, and Israel, belongs on the bookshelf of everyone who cares about Israel... The book takes readers behind the scenes in a fascinating yet sobering journey. Chock-full of valuable information and written in an engaging style, Artists Under Fire is well researched, as evidenced by its 27-page bibliography. However, Lana is a remarkable source in her own right, opening doors for her readers into a world of glamour and celebrity, with her personal stories about a bold and necessary movement she is leading… Artists Under Fire is a great read.'
Melman is an industry insider who has been on the frontline of the fight to educate celebrities and try to insulate them from the global assault waged against them by BDS advocates through relentless social-media campaigns, threats and disinformation. She does not mince words in defining antisemitism as 'demonizing Israel.' The BDS campaign, she writes, 'seeks to use the celebrity of artists a tool to destroy Israel and stir up hate against Jews worldwide.'
In “Artists Under Fire” (Lioncrest, 2022), author and activist Lana Melman lays out clearly and succinctly just how big a threat BDS and its cultural boycott of Israel have become — not only to Israel, and not even only to Jews worldwide, but to the flourishing of the arts everywhere... Chapter by chapter, step by step, Melman’s powerful writing builds her argument with eye-opening insights into the history of the Jews, of Israel, and accordingly, the BDS movement. Throughout, her perspective remains clear-eyed and balanced; she is willing to criticize actions of Israel’s government without criticizing Israel itself or questioning its right to exist.
As someone who pays close attention to the BDS movement and celebrities, I knew much (but not all) of what the book describes. Yet Lana has a knack for putting it in very clear terms. Of course, Lana, being a Hollywood insider, is able to provide information that even close followers like me had no idea about, and this makes the book even more credible and interesting. Another strength of the book is that it provides insight into the impact of the boycott not just on Israel, but also the artists who are not Israel-haters. This was something I had not really thought about before... Lana clearly gets it, and I found myself on numerous occasions nodding my head in agreement... I highly recommend Artists Under Fire: The BDS War Against Celebrities, Jews, and Israel...
The book opens with a reminder of how the author’s parents’ generation grew up in Los Angeles, where there were shop and restaurant signs that said, ‘No Negroes … No Jews … No dogs allowed’. Whilst working in Hollywood as an entertainment attorney and then creative executive-turned-writer-producer, Melman hoped those days had passed, only to have to deal with the effects of the BDS movement. Through her work, first in the non-profit Creative Community for Peace and then in Liberate Art, which she set up in 2015, numerous artists and their representatives have been contacted, averting many cancelled performances in Israel.
The full extent of the intimidation facing actors and musicians who support Israel is laid bare in a new book by a veteran Hollywood insider. Artists Under Fire, by former CBS and Warner Bros producer Lana Melman, presents the BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) campaign as an “illiberal ideology” driven by virulent antisemitism, 'a virus that destroys societies and souls.'
The book is an essential read and eye-opener, especially for folks who really want to understand what BDS is all about, what it stands for and its impact on the cultural arts. It is well laid out and clearly refutes all the lies about Israel and the BDS movement. It offered excellent rebuttals to all the accusations that the movement says about Israel. After reading the book, you will be surprised that so many artists, other than Roger Waters, support this rhetoric against Israel. If you have limited knowledge on the ideological position Roger Waters has on Israel, this book will clear that up. At the same time, you’ll read about all the artists that have fought back against this movement, nor did they succumb to the pressures to not perform in Israel.
