British music festival apologises to band who say they were ‘cut off’ for waving Palestinian flag
Organisers of a music festival in Portsmouth, England have apologised to Irish folk band The Mary Wallopers who claim they were muted during their set for displaying a Palestinian flag.
A string of other performers pulled out of the Victorious music festival over the spat, accusing organisers of stifling free speech.
After initially claiming that the band’s performance was stopped over a “discriminatory” chant, the festival issued a statement on Instagram saying sorry and pledging to donate to humanitarian efforts for Palestinians.
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By continuing you agree to our Terms and Privacy Policy.“We didn’t handle the explanation of our policies sensitively or far enough in advance to allow a sensible conclusion to be reached,” the statement seen by British news agency PA Media said.
“This put the band and our own team in a difficult situation which never should have arisen. We would like to sincerely apologise to all concerned.”
The statement continued, “We accept that, although mics remained live for longer, sound for The Mary Wallopers’ audience was cut as described in the band’s video and that comments after that were not audible to the public.”
In a post on Instagram, the band claimed that they were “cut off” at the festival, “for having a Palestinian flag on the stage,” and called Victorious’ initial explanation misleading.
The band’s statement continued, “We’ve been doing this for six years now and this has never happened before.”
Edited video from the concert posted by the band on Instagram show that the Mary Wallopers’ banjo player Andrew Hendy began the set by saying “Free Palestine, and f**k Israel” before the group launched into one of their songs.
Their playing continues for about a minute further, according to the video, when a stagehand appears to come on stage and remove a Palestinian flag that the band had affixed to one of its speakers.
Andrew Hendy tells the crowd that the band were instructed not to fly a Palestinian flag or they would be cut off, encouraging audience members to leave the festival grounds. The banjo player began chanting “Free Palestine” before his mic was cut.
Later, video from another angle shows the band’s guitarist Charles Hendy asking a person offscreen whether the band will be allowed to continue playing. The response is muffled, but the person appears to reply that the Palestinian flag needs to be removed.
“We’re not playing,” Charles Hendy responds.
“Fine,” the person offscreen says.
As the band waved to the crowd and left the stage, audience members began chanting “Free Palestine” and “Let them play!”
“People were upset and angry,” said Emma Gaynor, an audience member who attended the concert with her partner. “I didn’t hear anything discriminatory, it all happened very quickly.”
Jess Huxham, another attendee, said that other bands who played the festival that day had also said “Free Palestine” during their sets.
“From all I heard,” Huxham said in an email. “[The Mary Wallopers] did say ‘Free Palestine,’ which other bands on the main stage had said before their set.”
The incident comes amid fierce controversy around pro-Palestinian activism and free speech in the UK, with musicians often at the forefront.
After rap duo Bob Vylan chanted “death to the IDF” at their Glastonbury Festival set in June, police in the UK launched a criminal investigation. Even the United States government weighed in, revoking the band members’ visas ahead of their US tour.
Originally published on CNN
