“I respect those who oppose me, but I think that to be able to move forward, we have to listen to each other, we have to be able to dialogue. My only response to hatred is art and music. Because we’re all here together tonight, I’d like us to sing with one voice, and for that song to rise above the tumult,” Amir said.
French-Israeli singer Amir’s concert at a festival in the city of Spa, Belgium, was marked by high tension on Friday following accusations of “support for Israeli military action in Gaza” by a dozen artists, including French-Swiss Yoa, who cancelled her performance.
They denounced the fact that Amir expressed support for the Israeli army after the Hamas attacks against Israel on October 7, 2023. He himself has made military service in Israel.
“My social, political, and humanist convictions are incompatible with sharing the stage with an artist who denies the ongoing genocide in Palestine and has participated in events backing the Israeli army,” Yao decmared on social media .
Hostile tags, such as “Spa complice” (‘’Spa accomplice’’)and “Amir machine à tuer” (Amir killing machine), were sprayed across the city. Despite the controversy, the organizers decided to go ahead with the show.
During the concert, a teenager carrying a Palestinian flag was briefly removed by security, as was an Israeli flag confiscated earlier, according to Marc Radelet, the festival’s press officer.
No other incidents were reported.
Amir didn’t let it get him down and set the record straight during his concer. “It’s been a few days since I discovered that love can divide people. Yet I’ve always felt close to those who suffer, those who cry, those who doubt, those who apologize. The pains of the world pass through you as they pass through me,” he said.
He continued: “I respect those who oppose me, but I think that to be able to move forward, we have to listen to each other, we have to be able to dialogue. Dialogue is clearly preferable to anathemas and boycotts. I think it’s important to use our position as artists to set an example.’’
He concluded: “My only response to hatred is art and music. Because we’re all here together tonight, I’d like us to sing with one voice, and for that song to rise above the tumult”.
His fans, present en masse, called for music to be separated from political debates. “Let’s leave opinions aside and enjoy ourselves,” one of them told Belgian media outlet RTBF.
The organizers defended their decision to keep Amir performing as scheduled.
They argued that, as far as Amir is concerned, they had never “witnessed any propaganda on stage”. They added they were not in a position “to morally assess his personal trajectory” other than through his songs dealing with “universal and consensual themes such as love, celebration, the quest for self and resilience”.
Another music festival in Belgium, scheduled this weekend, Rock Herk, also drew controversy earlier this week when the European Jewish Association urged the organizers to remove punk-rap duo Bob Vylan from its programme following the band’s controversials statements at the Glastonbury Festival in the U.K.
During the performance, the duo shouted cries such as “Death, death to the IDF” (“Death, death to the Israeli army”) and “Free, free Palestine” and “From the river to the sea”. Behind them, political messaging referenced the “genocide”.
“This is not about silencing criticism of Israel, this is about silencing a proud and unbowed proponent of hate speech against Jews,” wrote EJA Chairman Rabbi Menachem Margolin, in a letter to the festival organiser.
“You do not have to support Israel. You can, even if you choose to do so, support the Palestinian cause. We live in a democracy. But hate speech is entirely different. What Bob Vylan is doing is calling for murder,’’ he added.
But the organizer maintained Vylan’s concert.