Suzanne Harrington: Ireland stays on the right side of history when it comes to Palestine
Kneecap performing on the West Holts Stage during the Glastonbury Festival at Worthy Farm in Somerset. Photo: Yui Mok/PA Wire
As a fan of both Bob Vylan and Kneecap, I seem to be making a habit of going to performances whose aftermaths generate steaming piles of manufactured outrage by institutions keen to prop up genocide.
First that London gig which landed Mo Chara in court, now Bob Vylan at Glastonbury. (‘Sir’ Rod Stewart can, however, express heartfelt support for far-right racist Nigel Farage, with zero consequences. Almost as if far-right racism is fine now).
Bob Vylan and Kneecap performed back to back at Glastonbury on a blazing Saturday afternoon amid a sea of Palestinian flags; earlier on the Pyramid stage, magnificent Irish pop queen CMAT led chants of Free Palestine.
But all eyes were on Kneecap. While everyone from Keir Starmer to the Daily Mail had been pressuring Glastonbury’s Eavis family to drop Kneecap from their line-up, and the BBC was clutching its pearls about broadcasting the West Belfast trio live on the West Holts stage, Bob Vylan stepped up. They seized the moment.
‘Death, death to the IDF’ may not be the subtlest of words, but neither is the Israel Defense Forces subtle in its genocidal deeds.
A reported 372 Palestinian people were murdered by the IDF over the same few days we were soaking up the music on a peaceful Somerset farm.
Bob Vylan — two unarmed vegans from Ipswich, Bobby and Bobbie — voiced what so many of us helpless bystanders wish to see: the disbanding of a death squad.
To call their words antisemitic is like calling the condemnation of Islamic death squads Islamophobic — except the IDF are ‘legitimate’. The BBC continues to call the genocide a ‘conflict’.
Hence the police investigation, revoked visas, and cancellation — of the two musicians, not the death machine.
For their trouble, Bob Vylan have been dropped by their agent, dropped from headlining a forthcoming music event, and reported with zero accuracy by the Daily Mail on its front page in banner headlines as saying — with quotation marks — ‘Death to Israelis’.
This headline was extraordinary in its blatant untruth, and so easily checkable. Almost as though the truth doesn’t matter anymore.
Yet when an Israeli rap duo called Ness & Stilla released a track titled Harbu Darbu [translated as ‘war strike’/ ‘mayhem’], praising the IDF and calling for the mass murder of Palestinians, whom they termed “rats”, and for the death of anyone opposed to Palestinian genocide — specifically Dua Lipa and Bella Hadid — there was zero outrage. Just millions of YouTube views.
In the UK, a Labour MP, Zarah Sultana, has been expelled from the party for speaking up against the genocide. A protest group, Palestine Action, has just been proscribed as ‘terrorist’— a bit like Mo Chara — which means you could get up to 14 years in jail if you support them.
A disabled man, dressed as Charlie Chaplin’s Great Dictator character, was dragged off his mobility scooter and bundled into a police van at a Palestine Action support protest this week. Mo Chara is back at Westminster Magistrates Court on August 20.
Unlike in Ireland, the dominant UK narrative is that supporting Palestinians is supporting terrorism. Bob Vylan used their platform to non-violently criticise mass murder, and are being hung out to dry for their trouble. How can words be terrorist, while state terrorism gets off scot-free?
Once again, bravo Ireland for being on the right side of history. A lone cry of sanity amid the crushing silence of collusion.
