U2 broke his silence on the massacre in Gaza on Sunday with an extensive statement, which includes individual statements of his four members, in which they condemn the military actions of the Israeli government of Benjamin Netanyahu. The Irish band, who until now had remained outside the conflict and had received criticism for it, denounces the blockade of humanitarian aid, warns against the possible “military take” of Gaza City and accuses the Israeli executive of carrying out “categorically immoral” and “brutal” actions against the Palestinian population. “We are not experts in the region’s policy, but we want our audience to know our position,” the text begins.
The most eloquent and hard is the leader, bonus. In the statement he acknowledges having remained “away from the policy of the Middle East” and having “surrounded the issue” for his “uncertainty in the face of an obvious complexity.” “The Israel government led by Benjamin Netanyahu deserves our categorical and unequivocal conviction today. There is no justification for the brutality that he and his extreme right government have inflicted on the Palestinian people … in Gaza …”, writes the vocalist. He also condemns Hamas’s attack on October 7, 2023, which qualifies as “diabolical”, but makes a distinction between the Islamist group and the Palestinian people, “a people that for decades have suffered marginalization, oppression, occupation and systematic robbery of the earth.”
Take advantage of the text to make a fierce criticism of the thought of the extreme right that can end, he explains, in “World War and millenarism.” “The Government of Israel is not the nation of Israel,” continues Bono, but warns that the current political drift can be isolated and morally degraded to the country: “Is what in its day an oasis of innovation and free thought is now subject to a fundamentalism as blunt as a machete? Are the Israelis really willing to let Benjamin Netanya do with Israel what their enemies did not achieve in Israel the last 77 years? “
The singer also reaffirms his support for Israel’s right to already exist a solution of two states, while expressing solidarity with the hostages that still remain in the hands of Hamas. The band, in addition, announces a donation to the NGO Medical AID for Palestinians and urges to allow the entry of hundreds of daily help trucks to meet the most urgent needs and thus weaken the black market.
The texts of the other three members, The Edge, Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen Jr, support the vocalist’s thinking. The Edge interpens directly to Netanyahu with three questions about devastation in Gaza, the risk of ethnic cleaning and the absence of a political plan beyond occupation, remembering that peace is not imposed by force. Clayton criticizes that an army capable of precision attacks bombarded indiscriminately civil areas and warns that colonizing the strip would close any way for peace forever. And Mullen Jr. denounces famine and the destruction of hospitals as “inhuman and criminal”, regrets the low international outrage and reaffirms that both Israeli and Palestinians have the right to their own state.
The U2 statement is framed in a context in which the almost total blocking of food, medicines and fuel leaves the strip in a situation of criticism, which United Nations experts and other international organizations have described as intentionally induced. At least 127 people have starved and more than 100,000 children, including 40,000 babies, are in “death threat”, according to Gaza’s government information. In addition, Netanyahu’s recent announcement about the military occupation of Ciudad de Gaza, which threatens to expel a million civilians and with which the humanitarian sector provides catastrophic consequences, including a boom in civil deaths, has intensified international criticism.
The intervention of the Irish band resonates not only because of the cultural weight of its members, but because they had maintained a more than discreet position that had raised criticism, especially addressed to the leader, bonus. In its history, U2 has linked its music to causes such as the fight against apartheidthe foronation of the external debt of poor countries or awareness of AIDS, and has used its visibility to promote political and social debates. His entry into the discussion about Gaza adds an influential voice to a global choir of criticism that includes religious leaders, artists, academics and more than 100,000 Israeli protesters who, on August 9, asked the end of the war in Tel Aviv.