“Jewish communities are not oppressed”: CAA interviews Roger Waters’ fans to disturbing results
Campaign Against Antisemitism has published an interview with fans of Roger Waters, the Jew-baiting musician and former Pink Floyd member, about their thoughts on Mr Waters’ recent comments, resulting in accusations of antisemitism being “weaponised” and admiration expressed for the antisemitic former Labour Party leader, Jeremy Corbyn.
The interview, filmed outside of London’s O2 Arena, can be watched here.
One interviewee said that “the weaponisation of antisemitism has gone too far…not just [with] Roger Waters. With everybody. Especially with Jeremy Corbyn as well.”
The man continued: “There was a problem with antisemitism in the Labour Party. Jeremy Corbyn was not a part of that.”
Another person echoed those sentiments, claiming: “They’re trying to Corbynise Roger Waters.”
A woman who was asked if she felt Mr Waters had crossed a line in his comments or actions, which has included repeated comparisons between Israelis to Nazis, responded that he was not antisemitic as he was the “voice of the oppressed”.
Asked whether that included Jews, she said: “No, the voice of the people from the Jewish communities are not oppressed.”
Another interviewee bizarrely blamed the outrage at Mr Waters on “Jerusalem’s power”.
“Because Jerusalem has lots of power,” she said, “no one tells anything because, unfortunately, those are like, kind of very political agreements and if you have enough power, no one will say anything if you are putting your power above another community.”
She confirmed that she felt that “because of Israeli power, people are afraid to speak out”.
Campaign Against Antisemitism and other communal groups have placed pressure on the venues hosting Mr Waters.
On Tuesday at London’s O2 Arena, the musician railed against Labour Party MP Christian Wakeford, who last month posted a letter to Twitter in which he said that Mr Waters’ upcoming Manchester performance should be called off. Mr Waters, stopping during his performance to embark on a rant to the thousands of paying concert-goers, said that Mr Wakeford was “working for his “masters in the Foreign Office in Tel Aviv”, before calling him a “cripple”.
Mr Waters went on to defend Mr Corbyn, shouting: “I’ve watched other people be cancelled. I watched Jeremy Corbyn be cancelled by the Israeli lobby. That was what happened in 2019 and if it hadn’t happened we might have had the first decent Labour prime minister for f***ing 50 years, because he cared about the working classes.”
This echoed sentiments expressed by Mr Waters’ during a recent concert at Birmingham’s Utilita Arena, when he claimed that “They’re trying to cancel me like they cancelled Jeremy Corbyn and Julian Assange” and that the furore was “all coming from Tel Aviv, promise you”.
On Wednesday, members of Campaign Against Antisemitism captured evidence of the former Pink Floyd star comparing Anne Frank, one of the most famous child victims of the Holocaust, to Rachel Corrie, a person killed accidentally by the Israeli Defence Forces. Under the International Definition of Antisemitism, “Drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis” is antisemitic.
This is not the first instance of Mr Waters breaching the definition in this way. He recently drew criticism for brandishing the name of Frank next to Shireen Abu Akleh, a Palestinian-American journalist who was killed in crossfire between terrorists and Israeli security forces last year in the Palestinian Authority.
Towards the end of Wednesday’s performance, Mr Waters’ plunged into another unhinged rant, for which he seems to have become known, this time declaring that he loves all of his “brothers and sisters…irrespective of their ethnicity, or religion or nationality…well with one possible exception.” He then responded to former Pink Floyd lyricist Polly Samson’s charge that he is “antisemitic to [his] rotten core” in a tweet from February, telling his laughing fans: “All I have to say about Polly Samson is: imagine waking up to that every morning.”
In 2022, in an October episode of The Joe Rogan Experience podcast, Mr Waters denied being an antisemite, before going on to address a past concert in which he unveiled a balloon pig with a Star of David, alongside other various symbols, emblazoned on its side. He said: “Well, it’s a symbol of an oppressive state. I am lumping you in but it’s not just you.”
He continued: “But that is just me criticising the policies of your government and I’m afraid the Star of David does represent the nation that is committing the crime of apartheid every day, and murdering Palestinians every day. Men women and children, every single day. So yeah, I did [put the Star of David on the side of a pig], and I’m unapologetic about it.” Mr Waters openly criticised the International Definition of Antisemitism, complaining that “It’s not just me…they smear anyone, anyone, who dares to suggest there’s something bad about their policies. So that’s why the [Definition] is so bad, and so dangerous.”
Taking issue with one of the examples in the Definition, the musician went on to say that the Definition “can’t mean” that the State of Israel should not be criticised for behaving “like people in the past…towards Jews in Northern Europe.”
In 2021, Mr Waters claimed that antisemitism is a “smear sword wielded at the behest of the Israeli Government”, stating: “The antisemitism smear sword that was wielded at the behest of the Israeli government, [was] specifically aimed at Jeremy Corbyn because he was left wing and he might turn into a political leader on the left in the United Kingdom who would actually stand up for human rights in general but specifically the rights of working people to represent themselves and have unions.”
In 2020, the musician said that Zionism needs to be “removed” and also said that American leaders are puppets of the Jewish billionaire Sheldon Adelson. Mr Waters has also claimed that Israel teaches America how to “murder the blacks”. He later apologised for this latter remark.
In 2013, he reportedly claimed that there is a “Jewish lobby” in the music industry.
