Thom Yorke reveals ‘heavy' mental health toll after walking off stage during Melbourne show over silence on Gaza
Radiohead frontman Thom Yorke has revealed his mental health suffered a heavy blow after he stormed offstage during a solo show in Melbourne last October when he was heckled by a pro-Palestine protester.
Yorke on Saturday posted an eight-page statement on Instagram about the war in Gaza, saying he remained in shock that his 'supposed silence' was perceived by some as complicity with Israel. In the post he also called Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu an extremist.
Footage filmed of the fiery exchange on October 31, taken by a member of the audience during the encore of Yorke's second show at the Sidney Myer Music Bowl, showed a man in the crowd yelling about the 'Israeli genocide of Gaza' and the devastating death toll.
Yorke responded: 'Hop up on the f---ing stage and say what you wanna say. Don't stand there like a coward, come here and say it. You want to piss on everybody's night? OK, you do it, see you later then.'
The audience member screamed, in part, 'How many dead children will it take for you to condemn the genocide in Gaza?'
In the statement, the musician directly addressed the incident, saying 'some guy shouting at me from the dark last year … didn't really seem like the best moment to discuss the unfolding humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.'
Yorke said his silence had been an attempt to show respect for all those who were suffering and those who had died during the conflict.
However, he said this had allowed 'opportunistic groups to use intimidation and defamation to fill in the blanks'.
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