By JNS
At the largest music festival in the United Kingdom on June 28, thousands chanted “Death to the IDF,” echoing a performer who also told them to “not give up your dreams” even when they’re “working for Zionists,” JNS reported.
A British government spokesperson condemned the rhetoric used on stage by Bobby Vylan, which was aired on the BBC, as did the organizers of the Glastonbury music festival on June 29.
(The Bob Vylan punk duo consists of singer/guitarist Bobby Vylan and drummer Bobbie Vylan. They use stage names to hide their real names.)
An Israeli Cabinet minister subsequently cited the hate-fest as further evidence for why British Jews should leave Britain.
Police officers are looking into the actions of the performer and others to see if they are in violation of laws against incitement, according to the BBC, which has removed the segment from its streaming platform.
Vylan encouraged the crowd at Glastonbury, in Somerset, southwestern England, which drew about 200,000 revelers this year, to chant “Free Palestine,” adding, “Alright, but have you heard this one though?” before shouting: “Death, death to the IDF.”
Thousands chanted it back, some waving PLO and Lebanese flags.
“Hell, yeah, from the river to the sea, Palestine must be, will be, inshallah, free,” he added, using the Arabic word for “God willing.”
The BBC neither broadcast nor streamed the Glastonbury performance of Kneecap, a rap band whose performer, Liam O’Hanna, is on trial for wearing a Hezbollah flag on stage, which is a proscribed terrorist group in the U.K.
In a statement, the organizers wrote on June 29: “With almost 4,000 performances at Glastonbury 2025, there will inevitably be artists and speakers appearing on our stages whose views we do not share, and a performer’s presence here should never be seen as a tacit endorsement of their opinions and beliefs.”
However, they added: “We are appalled by statements made from the West Holts stage by Bob Vylan yesterday. Their chants very much crossed a line…there is no place at Glastonbury for antisemitism, hate speech or incitement to violence.”
Amichai Chikli, Israel’s minister for the Diaspora and combating antisemitism, wrote on X: “The BBC has a long history of severe bias against Israel, but today a dark line was crossed by broadcasting calls for the murder of IDF soldiers. This is a new low.”
Chikli said he was “deeply disturbed by what is happening in Britain. In a place where antisemitism flourishes, society sinks into dark and dangerous depths.”
I think you’ll find the chant was referring to the ‘death’ of the organisation, not individual people. And the fact that people are more worried about a few ‘hurty words’ than the mass killing of women and children in Gaza is, quite frankly, repugnant.