The Ariel Performing Arts Center is an Israel

Israel

The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...

i performing arts

Performing arts

The performing arts are those forms art which differ from the plastic arts insofar as the former uses the artist's own body, face, and presence as a medium, and the latter uses materials such as clay, metal or paint which can be molded or transformed to create some physical art object...

 complex, established in 2010 in Ariel

Ariel (city)

Ariel is an Israeli settlement and a city in the West Bank. Ariel was established in 1978. Its population at the end of 2009 was 17,600, including 7,000 immigrants who came to Israel after 1990. It is the fourth largest Jewish settlement city in the West Bank., after Modi'in Illit, Beitar Illit,...

 on the West Bank

West Bank

The West Bank ) of the Jordan River is the landlocked geographical eastern part of the Palestinian territories located in Western Asia. To the west, north, and south, the West Bank shares borders with the state of Israel. To the east, across the Jordan River, lies the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan...

. It opened on November 8, 2010 with an acclaimed performance of Piaf

Piaf (play)

Piaf is a play by Pam Gems that focuses on the life and career of French chanteuse Edith Piaf. The biographical drama with music portrays the singer in a most unflattering light...

 by the Beersheba Theater company.

The opening was mired by an intended boycott by sixty actors, writers, and directors, including Joshua Sobol, who refuse to perform in settlements because it would "strengthen the settlement enterprise". Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other right-wing commentators characterized this as a "boycott... against Israel's citizens". The boycott is being supported by other Israeli artists such as Amos Oz

Amos Oz

Amos Oz is an Israeli writer, novelist, and journalist. He is also a professor of literature at Ben-Gurion University in Be'er Sheva....

, David Grossman

David Grossman

David Grossman is an Israeli author. His books have been translated into more than 30 languages, and have won numerous prizes.He is also a noted activist and critic of Israeli policy toward Palestinians. The Yellow Wind, his non-fiction study of the life of Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied...

, and Dani Caravan,; 150 U.S. actors have supported them in an open letter. though none of them have actually been invited to perform.