The government has “strongly condemned” chants at Glastonbury Festival from rap punk duo Bob Vylan calling for “death” to the Israeli military and broadcast live on the BBC.
Rapper Bobby Vylan led chants of “free, free Palestine” and “death, death to the IDF [Israel Defense Forces]” during their set, which came just before Belfast rap trio Kneecap.
A BBC spokesperson said some of the comments were “deeply offensive”, adding it had issued a warning on screen about “very strong and discriminatory language”. The set will not be available to rewatch on BBC iPlayer.
Police said they were reviewing videos of comments made by Bob Vylan and Kneecap to decide whether any offences had been committed.
For some balance: the UK hate speech laws despite what the daily mail push have been applied relatively evenly with the intent of preventing violence which has been a problem in the UK in several cases where innocents were unfairly targeted then attacked.
I’m not really one way or the other regarding the BBC decision, I can see it both ways and the footage will be out there regardless of their choice. I personally support the message being free speech and for the public to make their judgement.
Re the police reviewing it. This can often happen with high profile stuff even if it’s to officially class it as free speech, so no one can say it was ignored and the were discriminated against. However if the police find it to be anything other than free speech based on current events, I would find that highly concerning. He didn’t say death to Jews, or Israel, it was specific to the IDF.
And we strongly condemn these governments that keep protecting genocidal maniacs
Of course, everybody knows that “free, free Palestine” is “very strong and discriminatory language” if you are member of genocidal IDF.
💀💀2IDF
FUCK THE ISRAELI DEFENSE FORCE
IDF are a bunch of genocidal terrorist fascist fucks
Starmer, fall on a stake.
Please show me where the UK Government condemned “death to the Arabs” chants from Israelis.
The British Government considers being Arab as synonymous with being a terrorist. Not, incidentally, any differently than how Israelis see them.
Of course, the Brits were a colonial power that spent centuries quelling domestic revolts in order to extract natural resources and exploiting cheap labor. Also, not that different from their Israeli peers.
Just chiming in with some lyrics from the great musician, Tim Minchin
And if you look into your motherfucking heart and tell me true
If this motherfucking stupid fucking song offended you
With its filthy fucking language and its fucking disrespect
If it made you feel angry, go ahead and write a letter
But if you find me more offensive than the fucking possibility
The pope protected priests when they were getting fucking fiddlyThe IDF shot civilians when they were getting hungryThen listen to me, motherfucker, this here is a fact:
You are just as morally misguided as that motherfucking
Power-hungry, self-aggrandised bigot in the
stupid fucking hatIsraeli governmentFuck the IDF, and fuck every single piece of shit making excuses for murdering civilians for the unholy crime of being born somewhere.
This is the energy I like to see.
Fuck everybody who goes along with, denies, or minimizes terrorism and genocide, no matter who they are.
80k dead and 130k injured, starvation, displacement, murdered by settlers.
But a chant is “deeply offensive”. Take your fucking offense, fold it until it’s all sharp corners and shove it up your ass, BBC.
and being a nazi isn’t.
Ah, good old New Labour, siding with the modern day Nazis committing their very own Holocaust in Gaza.
The UK is almost as fucked up as the US.
(Though, judging by the march of 600k people against the Genocide, most Brits are not, and it’s the power and money elites that, as usual, can’t stop themselves from loving the most violent Fascism and Fascists same as when a young princess Elizabeth was being taught by her uncle and then King how to do a Nazi salute - the whole ubermenschen vs untermenshen view of the World seems to have massive appeal amongst British elites).
Far more. Starmer is a ponce and a WEF puppet.
Comparing Israel to Nazi-Germany is antisemitic and comparing the war crimes in Gaza to the Holocaust is at least Holocaust minimization.
Also criticizing people for supporting islamistic terrorists like Hamas or Hezbollah doesn’t imply support for Israel.
Lol I can’t take you seriously. Sorry but when Israel is literally doing nazi shit you can’t claim their critics are antisemitic for calling them out for doing nazi shit. Get real.
Fun little tidbit to tighten your trolling knickers: The finance minister of Israel said they intend to “entirely destroy” Gaza. They are doing this by raining fire upon it, from the White Phosphorus attacks going years before October 7th, to bombing hospitals and schools, and burning aid convoys and covering the ashes with sand so they don’t have to look at their crimes.
Did you know that we have a word in the English language (and most others with Greek roots) that means, literally, “to entirely destroy by fire”?
That’s right, the word is fucking “Holocaust”.
True that, Israel has been brutalizing Palestinians for decades, they surpassed the teacher by far.
Comparisons don’t need to be 100% equivalent. Nazism was about the supremacy of the pseudo race called Aryan, zionism is about jewish supremacy
The nazis was doing mass shooting, the idf do mass shooting and mass bombing. Both the nazis and the idf are starving people. The Nazis used gas chambers, the idf is shooting at people seeking aids with the new terrorist organization claiming to be an aid organization Just because holocaust killed a lot more people doesn’t mean we can’t compare it with the genocide is gaza.
You make the antisemitism worse by using it for any criticism of Israel. The fact that you call resistance group terrorism terrorism but say nothing about Israel terrorism being a lot more brutal for 77 years show that you are not neutral
If criticizing Israel for committing a genocide and maintaining an apartheid state is anti-Semitic then I guess you consider genocide and racism Jewish tenets
Israel is a fascist apartheid state that is currently carrying out ethnic cleansing. I think it’s rather fitting.
Israel is a democracy with a far-right government, not fascism. Even though the situation in the Westbank might be similar to Apartheid. Nazi-Germany executed an industrial murder of over 6 million Jews, this is not the same!
Sorry no. You can’t be an apartheid state and call yourself a democracy. That’s not how words work.
Whoever told you Israel is a democracy lied to you. Israel is a democracy the way Apartheid South Africa was a democracy.
Sure, there is democracy in Israel, but it is more similar to the one that existed among whites in apartheid South Africa than it is to the democracy that currently exists in the United Kingdom or France.
UNICEF has reported more than 50,000 children have been killed or injured in Gaza. At what number do you become comfortable with the comparison? 1 million? 2 million?
In terms of being accurate with our history, dont forget that 17 million people died in those camps, not just 6 million jewish people. In the movies its always solely jewish people being murdered. Russian citizens, soldier, catholics, gypsies, gays, disabled. we never talk about that extra 11 million dead, and each of those lives was as precious as your own life, or any other humans life. The takeaway from that should be that no genocide will ever be allowed again, of any race or any people. That obviously includes Palestinians and Muslims.
What do you think datadroplet, do you agree?
Don’t forget the millions of Poles
Dang. Good call, yes.
Israel is a democracy with a far-right government,
IOW - people actually fucking voted for this. That’s even worse, since that means that the general populace shares greater culpability.
Reminder that it is Israeli right wingers themselves that have opened that door by saying that Hamas are worse than Nazis and comparing the October 7th attacks to the Holocaust.
This is satire, right?
Comparing Israel to Nazi-Germany is antisemitic
I no longer subscribe to people telling me what is and what is not antisemitic. I’ll use my own brain for that, thanks.
We’ve seen too much abuse and restriction of language and crybullying from zionists to let that language be defined by you lot anymore. Hey did you see this one? The very word “Palestine” is itself a “genocide” against the zionists.
https://www.jns.org/the-word-palestine-is-genocide/
And heres one of Netenyahu calling IDF soldiers antisemitic who talk about their atrocities. I guess its “semitic” to keep crimes secret? Is that what you personally require to keep that “antisemitic” accusation from being thrown out?
https://caitlinjohnstone.com.au/2025/06/28/netanyahu-says-its-antisemitic-for-israeli-soldiers-to-describe-their-own-atrocities/I think the fact that you zionists wrung the holocaust for all the marketing value it was worth in order to commit your own gencocide on innocents is disgusting and wildly criminal. You belong in prison.
If this was the 40s, that person would have def be defending the nazis
It’s not anti-Semitic to simply state reality.
Only a rabid racist would - through claiming that anything critical said about that nation is anti-semitism - imply that a nation station state whose actions approach those of the Nazis in their depravity represents all the Jewish People.
It’s hard to be more anti-semite than conflation a nation mass murdering children with the Jewish People as a whole.
UK and US thought police on patrol. Bought and owned by the rich fatcats to promote their personal religious agenda using the state monopoly of the use of force on protestors not doing any harm to anyone. Disgusting.
Any negative statements toward Isreal are considered antisemitism by the right. What a joke
The right, who are outright Nazis claiming to be against “anti-semitism” is such a fucking ludicrous joke.
Because Israel validates their ethnostate ideas.
If i could invent a time machine and send them to a wwii internment camps I would. That way they could see what real antisemitism looks like. Not this scapegoat bs they are doing today
“I don’t give a fuck if you speak on my name. Just make sure when you fucking speak on it, you speak it in capitals V-Y-L-A-N”
“Death to the IDF” is not what I would chant, but it’s honestly mild compared to the kinds of slogans (eg. “Death to Arabs” and “Let your village burn”) West-funded, West-supported, West-armed, and West-protected-from-accountability Israeli fanatics chant before committing actual fucking atrocities. Hell, it’s mild compared to the Amalek rhetoric of Israeli state leadership.
Edit: why is “death to the IDF” mild compared to “death to Arabs”? You can choose to not join or to leave the IDF (it might cost you some jail time, but if that’s the price for keeping one’s soul, so be it). You can at the very least not self-identify with it and distance yourself from what it has become. Basically, there are many off ramps out of the IDF. There are no ramps off of existing as an Arab.
It’s about as narrowly targeted a chant as you can get.
It’s not about jews. It’s not about israelis. It’s specifically the army of israel. If that’s not narrowly targeted enough, what’s acceptable? “Down with the members of the IDF who intentionally target civilians but not those members of the IDF who are willing to risk a court martial to make sure that they only attack valid military targets?” Doesn’t make a very good chant.
Good point, the IDF, being an occupying army, under international law is absolutely a legitimate target for violent armed Palestinian resistance
Absolutely! It’s in the choice. You consciously choose to be part of the IDF, you aren’t born into it, and thus it’s not a hateful statement. You know, except for BBC weaklings
You can choose to not join or to leave the IDF (it might cost you some jail time, but if that’s the price for keeping one’s soul, so be it). You can’t choose to not be an Arab.
I see this delusional and out of touch argument being made all over the internet, and it’s so damn annoying. These takes are always from chronically online larpers who never leave the comfort of their house, they always say shit like:
“why don’t people of Iran just overthrow the theocracy?”
“why don’t the people of North Korea just topple the Kim dynasty?”
“why don’t Russian conscripts just refuse to fight in Ukraine?”
“why don’t Israelis just refuse to be in the IDF?”
“why don’t Americans just have a revolution?”
Could it be because that reality is not that simple? It’s easy to sit there in your dark room all day dreaming about being a heroic revolutionary, but in reality? You wouldn’t do shit because you understand that the consequences are a lot harsher in reality than in your imagination. This over simplistic view of the world just boils away the complexity and nuance of humanity. Nobody is willing to risk their freedom, stability, future, or life to appear moral or have a “clean soul”. When shit gets real and you’re in the same position as all these people, you’ll end up doing the same as them. If reality was that easy then we wouldn’t have tyrannical regimes or wars or exploitation, but we do. Trying to blame a 20 year conscript for being forced to serve in the military by extremist leaders is stupid and unhelpful. They’re not making the situation better, but it’s also not their fault they’re in that position in the first place.
Uh, I think taking a jail sentence by not joining a fascist military is a little easier than toppling your government. That’s not even a remotely equivalent comparison.
Many of the Russian invasion forces have desserted/defected to Ukraine. IDF could do the same. I mean like just run far away, never look back.
It wont be easy to desert, but like, if you are part of the russian invasion force, you’re gonna get shot, same with the IDF. If its “not your fault” for being conscripted, is also “not their fault” for the opposing side to shooting the invaders, the opposing side is also “just doing their job”.
You’re saying it as if this is common, it’s absolutely not. Russian defections and desertions to Ukraine and vice versa are very rare, and for good reason. The chances of you successfully running away are slim compared to failing and getting killed by either Russia or Ukraine. If it was as easy as you think it is then number of causalities among troops in this war wouldn’t be in the millions.
But this also ignores how these are not comparable situations at all. The Gaza war is nothing like the Ukraine war, where are IDF conscripts supposed to defect to? It’s not like there’s anything in Gaza, they can’t leave through legal channels, and all their neighboring countries will kill them the moment they find out they’re in the IDF. It’s a difficult situation to be in.
This is just not true. In apartheid Israel if you’re Jewish you are very privileged and you can deny service. Also, no one is gonna kill you, Israelis travel to Egypt, Jordan, etc. just fine unfortunately. And most of them are either still in the IDF or were part of it at some point. They join the IDF because they want to and because they are Zionists, not because they are forced to.
Idk what kind of bs this is you’re spreading, but just because they’re not the incarnation of Ben Gurion it doesn’t mean they’re innocent. If you are part of an entity that commits war crimes you are complicit.
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I’m so tired about people only criticizing Netanyahu. Sure he is the worst of worst for Palestinians but every single goddamn prime was oppressing Palestinians . The problem is the fundamental ideology that run Israel zionism
No it’s not. Because Netanyahu alone isn’t responsible for Gaza, everyone supporting Zionism is and especially those who are in the Zionist army that is the one carrying out the genocide.
Love that the “just following orders” defense is making a comeback. Just as valid today as during the Nuremberg trials.
The big takeaway from WWII is that the Nazis were evil and responsible for the atrocities that they committed, not the German people. Low ranking soldiers being complacent through coercion is not the same thing as being a leader who has influence over the situation. That’s why we condemn Hitler and the Nazi leaders, and not the foot soldiers.
Your takeaway from WWII is that the guy shoving the kids into the gas chambers should not be condemned? What the fuck is wrong with you?
We absolutely do condemn the foot soldiers and it’s a shame that they have never been held responsible. And we condemn Zionist foot soldiers as well and there needs to be some kind of Jerusalem trials or whatever next where Israelis need to be de-Nazified, Zionism is irredeemable.
Its not though. Do you think a few years in prison will make you a better person? Or having to find a job as a felon or whatever the Israeli equivalent is? you are asking people to do shit no one will ever ask of you and you will never be put in a similar situation. Fuck the IDF, but if you want this to end you have to see the whole picture.
So this is pretty much exactly the line of reasoning that the nazis used to defend their participation in the holocaust. It wasn’t convincing then, and no, it isn’t convincing for the current genocide either.
Then we should be thinking hard about how these countries recruit. I am not saying defend the war criminals, but if you want to fight them you have to see how they work.
Look at all these countries that fought the nazis long ago and how they became more and more fascist afterward. you would think they would be smarter then this, but it is clear all the wrong lessons have been learned.
Sure, but that’s a whole different convo from finding “your honor, I had to murder the 5 year old; the alternative was a couple of months in prison and flipping burgers for the rest of my life” at all agreeable.
Agreed. But it sure does not feel like people here want to make that distinction.
I think we should disallow any travelers or trade from Israel into my country. No currency of fascists should be traded with dollars, until as a state they atone for their crimes.
Maybe? Isreal would still have the better weapon platforms then its regional neighbors and i think will more likely use a nuke in a situation like that if it feels desperate enough.
You can totally not join the IDF there are many people not doing it it just strips you off the opportunity to get lucrative army jobs and you are definitely being stigmatized in Israeli society and potentially even your own family, but you are not risking your personal safety by not joining this genocidal apartheid occupation force. It’s a question of taking a stand. Do you want to be at the very least complicit in war crimes being committed, yes or no?
AFAIK you can also not join the IDF by simply being extremely religious.
Yea, Orthodox Jews have total exemption from joining the armed forces. If you really don’t want to murder children and steal land, go study the Talmud. No excuse.
For some of them it’s “if you don’t want to risk your life in the armed forces, but really, really want other people to go and murder children and steal land so you can benefit, go study the Talmud”.
There are plenty of people refusing to join the idf, its not some mystical heroicism. Regardless of how people joined it, a military occupying land and committing a genocide is a legitimate target under international law.
I edited my comment since I made it. Here is the newer version. Bold the bit that I think adresses your concern.
Edit: why is “death to the IDF” mild compared to “death to Arabs”? You can choose to not join or to leave the IDF (it might cost you some jail time, but if that’s the price for keeping one’s soul, so be it). You can at the very least not self-identify with it and distance yourself from what it has become. Basically, there are many off ramps out of the IDF. There are no ramps off of existing as an Arab.
I agree with this.
And yet we are all accountable for our actions.
This is true, but we also have to acknowledge that things aren’t simple or as black and white as they seem.
And yet, genocide and ethnic cleansing of innocent people absolutely is a black and white issue. Its not subject to debate and its not a grey area. The commitments were made and the treaty documents signed.
any of the results of the recent polling in Israel seem very grey to you? https://archive.ph/Tjoj3. (Haaratz poll, architve.todayed it because its behind a paywall)
47% of Israelis want to murder every living non jewish human in Palestine.
56% want to expel Israeli citizens who arent Jewish.
93% say that the biblical command to kill every descendent of the tribe of Amalek still applies today somehow.
82% want to ethnically cleanse the Palestinian territories.
Ethnic cleansing and genocide based on ethnicity are not compatible with modern society and that’s black and white. There is no wiggle room.
Yet you don’t use this excuse for hamas. It suck that they had to do a terrorist act for people to talk again about 77 years of oppresion by israel. The idf leaving gaza to control it from outside and continuing occupying the west bank, demolishing house, torturing paleatinians , raping them and killing them make it hard for hamas to resist following international law.
Would you have use the same argument for nazis to follow hitler?
Don’t you also see how many idf soldiers are filming themselves mocking plaestinians and having fun?
My point is universal. Actually A lot pro Israelis use this very argument a lot:
“Why don’t Gazans just rise up and overthrow Hamas?”
As if that simple. People talk about Israel on here a lot, but they constantly overlook that Hamas is a tyrannical terrorist group against Gazans as well. They rule through fear and violence. People who talk about them being a legitimate resistance group forget that these are the same people who have systematically chased out the Christian minority in Gaza, killed their opposition in the strip, banned free speech, and they killed/kidnapped/torutured anybody they don’t like by saying they work for the enemy. Netanyahu was literally funding them in their early years, so you know that they don’t have the best interests of Palestinians in mind.
It’s really hard for people to rise against tyranny. It’s really hard for people to stand up to the powerful. Things like bravery and morally right no matter what are cute ideas that people can talk about on the internet, but in the real world nobody is going to give up their lives.
Also keep in mind, calling out this stupid point doesn’t mean that someone is now magically a Hamas supporter who advocates for terrorism nor does the opposite make someone an Israeli supporter who advocates for war crimes.
I can use the same excuse and say Hamas has no choice but to persecute who oppose them because they fear that the resistance will simply die and Israel will continue it’s occupation with nobody stopping them. Also Israel kicked more charitarians than Hamas ever will . At least 50k of the nekba refugees was Christians . I don’t deny anything Hamas did that is terrible and criminal
All your mental gymnastic won’t change the fact , Palestinians has the right to fight and kill idf soldiers that are in Gaza committing a genocide . The only place where idf can die is in gaza or the west bank where Palestinians has the right to armed resistance . So yeah death to the IDF
Israel just allow funds to enter Gaza they didn’t fund Hamas it was Qatar who id , it’s the same Israel who allow funds to goes to the Palestinians authority. Israel control everything in and out of gaza . The Palestinian authority is the one collaborating with Israel, crushing west bank resistance and do nothing against illegal settlers . So i wonder for you who is the real resistance? Please don’t tell me there is none because it never happened in history
I would to a degree. I was alive when the ‘war on terror’ started, the recruiting starts at childhood and you can join at 17 that is no where near enough to make an entirely informed choice like that. And in the US if you are poor and want to go to college or get healthcare you really do not have many other options.
Hamas and the taliban are absolutly evil organizations. But if your country is being occupied and they are the only ones you seem to be fighting back then what do you do?
You don’t need to be informed to know that you shouldn’t kill civilians purposely in wars and torture people lie it happened in Guantanamo bay and Abu Ghraib. There is still a big difference between the aggressor war crimes in position of power and resistance groups trying to do everything to end occupation including atrocities like in 7 of October.
I think if Palestine is ever liberated , war crimes from both side should be held accountable
I agree. But we also need to look at the lies they are told and how pervasive those lies are recruiters are basically child groomers. Very few people join because they think they are going to get to kill civilians.
Again plenty and plenty of idf soldiers are filming themselves enjoying and being proud of their crimes you can’t claim that they didn’t know what they are doing. IDF is pure pure pure evil a lot worse than Hamas
The people filming it would be the absolute worst of them or maybe the IDF only uses the most absolute sociopaths for their combat roles. The dude cleaning floors or whatever to avoid going to prison should not be held in the same regard as the dude executing children.
By the way, do apply the same logic to the Hamas fighters.
Weren’t some of the attackers on Oct 7th literal children? I remember reading reports of some of them being teenagers… and yes, the same thing applies to them. A leader like Sinwar and a child soldier should not get the same blame, that’s just silly.
BBC is a bunch of smegheads from the past.
Clearly you are not a bot if you can say smeeeee… Smeeehhhh… Smeeeeeee… Heeeeeeeaaaa…
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