Two members of Pink Floyd — vocalist Roger Waters and drummer Nick Mason — have criticized fellow rockers with the Rolling Stones for a planned show in Tel Aviv and said playing Israel is akin to playing South Africa during apartheid days.
They say the Stones should instead stay home and support the Boycott, Divest and Sanction movement started by Palestinians in 2005 to protest what they say is Israel’s illegal “occupation” of Palestinian territories.
“The BDS movement is modeled on the successful nonviolent movements that helped end Jim Crow in the American South and apartheid in South Africa,” Mr. Rogers and Mr. Mason wrote in a column for Salon.com. “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.”
Mr. Waters has on previous occasions likened the treatment of Israel toward the Palestinians to the Nazis’ view of Jews during World War II, Raw Story reported. A few months ago, Mr. Waters also said that the United States media has been taken over by the “Israeli propaganda machine.”
He said in late 2013, Raw Story reported: “The Jewish lobby is extraordinarily powerful here and particularly in the industry that I work in, the music industry and in rock and roll.”
In his Salon.com piece, Mr. Waters and Mr. Mason said musicians should boycott Israel.
“To the bands that intend to play Israel in 2014, we urge you to reconsider,” they wrote. “Playing Israel now is the moral equivalent of playing Sun City at the height of South African apartheid, regardless of your intentions. We encourage you, fellow artists, to ask yourselves what you would do if forced to live under military rule and discriminatory laws for decades.”
The Stones are set to play their first show ever in Israel in June.
• Cheryl K. Chumley can be reached at cchumley@washingtontimes.com.
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