{"id":182940,"date":"2025-12-09T13:13:07","date_gmt":"2025-12-09T13:13:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/182940\/"},"modified":"2025-12-09T13:13:07","modified_gmt":"2025-12-09T13:13:07","slug":"bob-vylan-issue-defamation-proceedings-against-rte-over-glastonbury-controversy-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/182940\/","title":{"rendered":"Bob Vylan issue defamation proceedings against RT\u00c9 over Glastonbury controversy \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

The punk-rap group Bob Vylan<\/a> have issued defamation proceedings against RT\u00c9<\/a> over its reporting of the duo\u2019s performance at the Glastonbury music festival this summer.<\/p>\n

Bob Vylan courted controversy this summer when, during a performance at Glastonbury, they led chants of \u201cdeath, death to the IDF\u201d, a reference to the Israel Defense Forces<\/a> and the war in Gaza<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Band members Pascal Robinson-Foster and Wade Laurence George allege that an RT\u00c9 report on the performance stated that the lead singer of band led \u201canti-Semitic chants\u201d.<\/p>\n

They say the reporting is categorically untrue, and are now seeking damages to compensate for injury to their reputation they say arises from the reporting. <\/p>\n

Belfast legal firm Phoenix Law, which is representing both men, on Monday filed two sets of defamation proceedings at the High Court.<\/p>\n

In a statement, the firm said: \u201cOur clients are no stranger to utilising their freedom of expression to speak out against the genocide in Gaza. There is however a fundamental distinction between speaking critically about the role of the Israeli state forces, and being anti-Semitic. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe former is speech within the confines of political expression, whereas the latter is a form of hatred directed towards Jewish people,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt no stage have our clients ever engaged in conduct that is remotely anti-Semitic and to that end, have had no option but to seek the formal correction of same via the remedies available within this litigation,\u201d it added.<\/p>\n

A spokeswoman for RT\u00c9 said: \u201cRT\u00c9 does not comment on legal matters.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The punk-rap group Bob Vylan have issued defamation proceedings against RT\u00c9 over its reporting of the duo\u2019s performance…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":182941,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[72,99235,61,60,15449],"class_list":["post-182940","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-glastonbury-festival-2025","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-pa2025"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182940","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=182940"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182940\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/182941"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=182940"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=182940"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=182940"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}