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Toronto Star

Performers pushing hate need to face the music

By Contributing Columnist Michael Levitt, a Toronto-based freelance contributing columnist for the Star, is the president and CEO of Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies (FSWC). @LevittMichael. True to a time-honoured tradition, the summer air is filled with the sound of music emanating from the many festivals at this time of year. Sadly, some performers are singing out of tune with dangerous anti-Israel tirades as part of their performance. Increasingly, since the Hamas atrocities of Oct. 7, 2023 and the ensuing spike in antisemitism, certain musicians have added extreme anti-Israel and anti-Jewish invective to their repertoire. Latest case in point: In southwest England, at the Glastonbury Festival, Britain's largest such musical gathering which attracts some 200,000 fans each year, the punk-rap duo, Bob Vylan, recently led crowds in chants that included 'Death, death to the IDF,' calling for the killing of members of the Israel Defense Forces. Less covered in the media were the vile comments by the duo's frontman, Pascal Robinson-Foster, which included him referring to 'working for [expletive] Zionists.' He also told the audience: 'Sometimes we have to get our message across with violence, because that's the only language some people speak, unfortunately.' Opinion articles are based on the author's interpretations and judgments of facts, data and events. More details