Recommendations of the Editorial team
Earlier this summer, during London rap duo Bob Vylan’s performance at the Glastonbury Festival in England, rapper Bobby Vylan led the massive crowd in chants of “Freedom, freedom for Palestine” and “Death, death to the IDF [Israelische Verteidigungskräfte, Anm. d. Red.]“ on.
The chant led to strong reactions, with Prime Minister Starmer saying at the time: “There is no excuse for this kind of vile hate speech,” and the incident sparked a police investigation. The US State Department also revoked the duo’s US visas ahead of their fall tour. The group was also banned from Radar Festival and France’s Kave Fest.
Vylan later defended his onstage comments in an Instagram post captioned, “I said what I had to say.”
Bobby Vylan would do it again
The rapper was a guest on October 1st – before news of a ceasefire in Gaza broke on October 9th “The Louis Theroux Podcast” in a studio in Central London to speak further about the events during the controversial concert and the associated socio-political implications. The episode will air this week.
When Theroux asked him if he still stood by the promotion and would repeat it on stage today, Vylan replied: “Oh yes. If I were to perform at Glastonbury again tomorrow I would do it again. I have no regrets. I would do it again tomorrow, even twice on Sunday.”
The musician continued: “I don’t regret it at all, including the negative reactions I faced. This is minimal. It’s minimal compared to what the people of Palestine are going through. If that can be my contribution and if I can get my Palestinian friends and people I know from Palestine who have had to flee, who have lost dozens of family members, to say, ‘Yo, yours “I love him” slogan, then it’s worth it.”
Vylan added: “I don’t want to overstate the importance of the chant. That’s not my intention, but if I have their support, if they’re the people I’m doing this for, if they’re the people I’m advocating for, then what is there to regret? Oh, for upsetting a right-wing politician or right-wing media?”
Elsewhere in the interview, the podcast host addressed the choice of words behind the chant, saying, “What do you think that means, because you’re saying that the people recording this should kill an IDF soldier if they see one. There were a lot of commentators who would have interpreted it that way.” Theroux then asked, “I invite you to explain your version of what that means… Can you understand why some people might have seen this differently?”
Vylan said: “My whole problem with this is that the slogan is so unimportant. It’s so unimportant and the reaction to it has been so disproportionate.” He continued: “What is important are the conditions that make it possible for this chant to take place on this stage in the first place. And by that I mean the conditions that exist in Palestine. Where Palestinian people are being killed in alarming numbers. Who cares about the chant? It’s about what makes it possible for this chant to exist in the first place. That should always have been the focus.”