U2 Says Conflict in Gaza Has Reached ‘Uncharted Territory': ‘We Are Not Experts' but ‘We Want Our Audience to Know Where We Stand'
In a joint message posted on U2's website and social media on Sunday, the band wrote: 'Everyone has long been horrified by what is unfolding in Gaza — but the blocking of humanitarian aid and now plans for a military takeover of Gaza City has taken the conflict into uncharted territory. We are not experts in the politics of the region, but we want our audience to know where we each stand.'
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Each member of the iconic band — Bono, The Edge, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen Jr. — then penned their own individual statements expressing complex emotions about the long-running conflict in the Middle East. In addition, the band has pledged to donate to Medical Aid for Palestinians.
In his statement, frontman and activist Bono first acknowledged the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks on Israel, which killed about 1,200 people with 251 hostages being taken, writing that 'the rape, murder, and abduction of Israelis at the Nova music festival was evil.' However, he added that as time went on, 'Israel's revenge for the Hamas attack appeared more and more disproportionate and disinterested in the equally innocent civilian lives in Gaza.'
According to the United Nations, which cites Gaza's Hamas-run Health Ministry, over 61,000 Palestinians have been killed in the conflict as of Aug. 6. On Friday, Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government approved a plan to take over Gaza City, the capital of the Gaza Strip, which senior UN officials have warned against.
'When did a just war to defend the country turn into an unjust land grab? I hoped Israel would return to reason. I was making excuses for a people seared and shaped by the experience of Holocaust… who understood the threat of extermination is not simply a fear but a fact… I re-read Hamas' charter of 1988[3]… it's an evil read (Article Seven!),' Bono continued. 'But I also understood that Hamas are not the Palestinian people… a people who have for decades endured and continue to endure marginalization, oppression, occupation, and the systematic stealing of the land that is rightfully theirs. Given our own historic experience of oppression and occupation, it's little wonder so many here in Ireland have campaigned for decades for justice for the Palestinian people.'
Bono then slammed Netanyahu, writing: 'The Government of Israel is not the nation of Israel, but the Government of Israel led by Benjamin Netanyahu today deserves our categorical and unequivocal condemnation. There is no justification for the brutality he and his far right government have inflicted on the Palestinian people… in Gaza… in the West Bank. And not just since October 7, well before it too… though the level of depravity and lawlessness we are seeing now feels like uncharted territory.'
The Edge addressed his statement to Netanyahu, asking him several questions 'in the hope of engaging the conscience and sanity of the people of Israel.'
'Do you truly believe that such devastation — inflicted so intentionally and relentlessly on a civilian population — can happen without heaping generational shame upon those responsible?' The Edge wrote in part, ending his statement with: 'We know from our own experience in Ireland that peace is not made through dominance. Peace is made when people sit down with their opponents — when they recognize the equal dignity of all, even those they once feared or despised.'
Bassist Clayton said, 'If Israel moves to colonize the Gaza Strip, it will permanently undo any possibility of lasting peace or solution for hostilities. Forgetting the morality of the situation for a moment, doesn't the technical superiority of Israel's modern army make a boast of its precision targeting of individuals from thousands of miles away? And if so why are the IDF bombarding a civilian population from the skies indiscriminately destroying any bit of shelter and infrastructure? Preserving civilian life is a choice in this war.'
Mullen Jr. added that Israel's response to the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks was 'expected,' as was a 'ground war' and 'aerial bombardment and destruction.' However, the drummer said that what was not expected was 'the indiscriminate decimation of most homes and hospitals in Gaza, with a majority of those killed being women and children' and 'imposing famine.'
'The power to change this obscenity is in the hands of Israel,' he added. 'I undoubtedly support Israel's right to exist and I also believe Palestinians deserve the same right and a state of their own. Silence serves none of us.'
Read each member of U2's full statements here.
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