GLASTONBURY: A British punk-rap group faced growing criticism on Sunday for making anti-Israel remarks at the Glastonbury music festival that have sparked a police inquiry.
\nBob Vylan led crowds in chants of \u201cDeath, death to the IDF,\u201d a reference to the acronym for the Israeli military, during their set on Saturday.
\nBritish police officers are also examining comments by the Irish rap trio Kneecap, whose members have likewise been highly critical of Israel and its military campaign against the Palestinian militant group Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
\nOne of Kneecap\u2019s members wore a T-shirt dedicated to the Palestine Action Group, which is about to be banned under UK terror laws.
\nThe UK government has \u201cstrongly condemned\u201d Bob Vylan\u2019s chants, which festival organizers said had \u201cvery much crossed a line.\u201d
\n\u201cWe are urgently reminding everyone involved in the production of the festival that there is no place at Glastonbury for antisemitism, hate speech or incitement to violence,\u201d the festival said in a statement.
\nAvon and Somerset police said Saturday that video evidence would be assessed by officers \u201cto determine whether any offenses may have been committed that would require a criminal investigation.\u201d
\nIsraeli embassy
\nThe chants about Israel\u2019s military, condemned by the Israeli embassy in London, were led by Bob Vylan\u2019s frontman Bobby Vylan.
\nThey were broadcast live on the BBC, which airs coverage of Britain\u2019s most popular music festival.
\n\u201cI thought it\u2019s appalling, to be honest,\u201d Wes Streeting, the Labour\u2019s government\u2019s health secretary, said of the chants, adding that \u201call life is sacred.\u201d
\n\u201cI think the BBC and Glastonbury have got questions to answer about how we saw such a spectacle on our screens,\u201d he told Sky News.
\nThe Israel embassy said in a statement late Saturday that \u201cit was \u201cdeeply disturbed by the inflammatory and hateful rhetoric expressed on stage at the Glastonbury Festival.\u201d
\nBut Streeting also took aim at the embassy, telling it to \u201cget your own house in order.\u201d
\n\u201cI think there\u2019s a serious point there by the Israeli embassy. I wish they\u2019d take the violence of their own citizens toward Palestinians more seriously,\u201d he said, citing Israeli settler violence in the West Bank.
\nA spokesperson for the BBC said Vylan\u2019s comments were \u201cdeeply offensive\u201d and the broadcaster had \u201cno plans\u201d to make the performance available on its on-demand service.
\nFestival-goer Joe McCabe, 31, told AFP that while he did not necessarily agree with Vylan\u2019s statement, \u201cI certainly think the message of questioning what\u2019s going on there (in Gaza) is right.\u201d
\nChants of \u2018Free Palestine\u2019
\nKneecap, which has made headlines in recent months with its pro-Palestinian and anti-Israel stance, also led crowds in chanting abuse against UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
\nStarmer and other politicians had said the band should not perform after its member Liam O\u2019Hanna, known by his stage name Mo Chara, was charged with a terror offense.
\nHe appeared in court this month accused of having displayed a Hezbollah flag while saying \u201cUp Hamas, Up Hezbollah\u201d after a video resurfaced of a London concert last year.
\nThe Iran-backed Lebanese force Hezbollah and the Palestinian militant group Hamas are banned in the UK, and it is an offense to express support for them.
\nO\u2019Hanna has denied the charge and told the Guardian newspaper in an interview published Friday that \u201cit was a joke \u2014 we\u2019re playing characters.\u201d
\nKneecap regularly lead crowds in chants of \u201cFree Palestine\u201d during its concerts, and fans revere them for their anti-establishment stance and criticism of British imperialism, while detractors call them extremists.
\nThe group apologized this year after a 2023 video emerged appearing to show one singer calling for the death of British Conservative lawmakers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
GLASTONBURY: A British punk-rap group faced growing criticism on Sunday for making anti-Israel remarks at the Glastonbury music festival that have sparked a police inquiry. Bob Vylan led crowds in chants of \u201cDeath, death to the IDF,\u201d a reference to the acronym for the Israeli military, during their set on Saturday. British police officers are …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":83031,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-83020","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83020","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=83020"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83020\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":83033,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/83020\/revisions\/83033"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/83031"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=83020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=83020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=83020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}