New Zealand pop star Lorde gave into pressure from the anti-Israel activists and cancelled a planned concert in Tel Aviv this coming June. While the pop-star characterized herself as an “informed young citizen,” the truth is she sided with the bigots as two other news stories that emerged over the weekend show.
When news came out that Lorde planned to play in Tel Aviv, she was subjected to pressure to cancel by the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign to isolate Israel. BDS isn’t about Palestinian rights or statehood but rather, as Prof Jacobson has shown, it is “a direct and provable continuation of the Arab anti-Jewish boycotts in the 1920s and 1930s and subsequent Arab League Boycott, restructured through non-governmental entities to evade U.S. anti-boycott legislation and repackaged in the language of ‘social justice’ to appeal to Western liberals.”
Lorde’s own statement suggests that she doesn’t understand or care what it’s really about, “”i pride myself on being an informed young citizen, and i have done a lot of reading and sought a lot of opinions before deciding to book a show in tel aviv, but i’m not proud to admit i didn’t make the right call on this one.” If she did a lot of reading and were truly informed, she wouldn’t have made the decision she made. But it is interesting that she didn’t say anything specific about Israel and the Palestinians.
Amy Spiro, cultural reporter for The Jerusalem Post put together a wonderful string of tweets about Lorde’s decision. Two, in particular, stand out.
If Lorde were truly informed, she would surely notice the hypocrisy of taking a stand against Israel but not Russia.
And given two other news items this weekend, I can’t excuse Lorde’s decision as naiveté. She made the wrong choice to boycott Israel and it was immoral.
The Times of Israel reported that a two-day-old baby born to Syrian refugees in Cyprus was airlifted to Israel for emergency life-saving surgery on his heart. This isn’t exactly news as Israel has treated more than 3,000 Syrians who have been injured in the course of that country’s brutal civil war.
Though technically at a state of war with Syria, Israel has had limited goals in the war, the most significant of which is preventing Iran from establishing a base of operation in Syria. But that hasn’t stopped Israel from offering life-saving aid to many of its northern neighbors. Perhaps Israel had not other choice, but not every nation would necessarily show the same degree of compassion to declared enemies.
On the other hand Reuters reported that Israeli players would not receive visas to participate in an international chess tournament in Saudi Arabia. Given that it’s a tournament under the FIDE, the world’s chess federation, such bigotry should not be allowed. But as with other competitions, it is not uncommon for Israeli athletes to be barred from competing or from competing as members of Israel’s national team. This systemic discrimination is tolerated by our liberal elites. There is now hue and cry demanding the federations pull out of nations that practice institutional anti-Semitism.
Likewise the BDS movement only targets Israel. One of the few nations of the world seeking to save Syrians.
Lorde had an opportunity to choose, by choosing BDS, she chose bigotry.
[Photo: 60Minutes9 / YouTube ]
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