Roger Waters and Nick Mason of Pink Floyd are urging all artists, especially the Rolling Stones, to cancel concerts in Israel.
The artists have written an editorial for Salon in support of BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions), a nonviolent movement that is claimed to end the Jim Crow in the U.S. south and apartheid in South Africa. They went on to explain “we call for a resolution that upholds freedom, justice and equal rights for all, irrespective of identity, and does not cause additional suffering for either people.”
In reference to the Palestine/Israel situation, “BDS offers us all a way to nonviolently pressure the Israeli government to fully realize that its injustices against the Palestinian people are legally and morally unacceptable and unsustainable.”
Specifically to the Rolling Stones:
With the recent news that the Rolling Stones will be playing their first-ever concert in Israel, and at what is a critical time in the global struggle for Palestinian freedom and equal rights, we, the two surviving founders of Pink Floyd, have united in support of Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS), a growing, nonviolent global human rights movement initiated by Palestinian civil society in 2005 to end Israel’s occupation, racial discrimination and denial of basic Palestinian rights.
So, to the bands that intend to play Israel in 2014, we urge you to reconsider. Playing Israel now is the moral equivalent of playing Sun City at the height of South African apartheid; regardless of your intentions, crossing the picket line provides propaganda that the Israeli government will use in its attempts to whitewash the policies of its unjust and racist regime.
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