PALESTINE campaigners celebrated a “huge” victory at the weekend after Barclays bank was forced to pull out of sponsorship of music festivals across Britain.

Dozens of performers said they would not play at festivals sponsored by Barclays, including Isle of Wight, Download and Latitude, over the bank’s involvement with arms firms supplying Israel.

The withdrawal was claimed as evidence of the success of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign which was instigated by Palestinian groups.

The Palestine Solidarity Campaign called for the BDS campaign to be intensified.

“Israel can only carry out its devastating attacks on Palestinians across their homeland because of the support of corporations, financial institutions, and governments around the world,” it said. 

“Divestment campaigns aim to break this complicity by urging institutions to withdraw investments from companies that sustain Israeli apartheid, such as those producing weapons for Israel’s attacks.”

Art Against The Arms Trade organiser Samuel Sweek said: “This is an absolutely massive victory for our movement and shows the incredible power we have if we stand together against the profiteers of war.”

He said the victory sent a message to festival organisers worldwide: “If they don’t stand on the side of humanity and cut ties with the war machine, we will continue to organise in solidarity with the Palestinian people — and we will win.”

Former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn said: “UK festivals cutting ties with Barclays is a huge victory for the Palestinian and artist-led campaign to remove the financiers of war from our cultural events.”

He called on other festival organisers to cut ties with Barclays and “stand on the side of humanity and peace.”