{"id":103585,"date":"2025-10-27T14:40:10","date_gmt":"2025-10-27T14:40:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/103585\/"},"modified":"2025-10-27T14:40:10","modified_gmt":"2025-10-27T14:40:10","slug":"thom-yorke-says-radiohead-wont-play-israel-under-netanyahu-regime","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/103585\/","title":{"rendered":"Thom Yorke Says Radiohead Won\u2019t Play Israel Under Netanyahu Regime"},"content":{"rendered":"

Greenwood, who\u2019s faced particular scrutiny for performing<\/a> in Tel Aviv at the height of the war in 2024, said, \u201cIt\u2019s the embodiment of the left.\u201d He continued, \u201cThe left look for traitors, the right for converts and it\u2019s depressing that we are the closest they can get.\u201d Greenwood added that he\u2019s working on a new album with Israeli and Middle Eastern musicians (something seemingly in the vein of 2023\u2019s Jarak Qaribak<\/a>) and that he feels \u201cfrightened to admit that.\u201d But, he said, \u201cthat feels progressive to me\u2014booing at a concert does not strike me as brave or progressive.\u201d<\/p>\n

Yorke, who was with Greenwood at the time of the interview, responded with a deadpan remark: \u201cBut you are whitewashing genocide, mate. And so am I, apparently, by sitting next to you on this sofa.\u201d<\/p>\n

Greenwood also spoke about protesting the Israeli government and many citizens\u2019 despisal of the country\u2019s far-right national security minister, Itamar Ben-Gvir. \u201cLook, I have been to antigovernment protests in Israel and you cannot move for all the \u2018F*** Ben-Gvir\u2019 stickers,\u2019\u201d he said. \u201cI spend a lot of time there with family and cannot just say, \u2018I\u2019m not making music with you f***ers because of the government.\u2019 It makes no sense to me. I have no loyalty\u2014or respect, obviously\u2014to their government, but I have both for the artists born there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Philip Selway<\/a> and Ed O\u2019Brien<\/a> also spoke with The Sunday Times about Israel and Palestine. O\u2019Brien said, regarding the band\u2019s 2017 Tel Aviv concert, \u201cWe should have played Ramallah in the West Bank as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

And Selway remarked, \u201cWhat BDS are asking of us is impossible. They want us to distance ourselves from Jonny, but that would mean the end of the band and Jonny is coming from a very principled place. But it\u2019s odd to be ostracised by artists we generally felt quite aligned to.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jonny Greenwood\u2019s brother and bandmate, Colin Greenwood<\/a>, did not address the Middle East, but he recalled a show that Radiohead played in Berlin on the night of September 11, 2001. According to the article, some Americans in the crowd shouted at Yorke to \u201csay something,\u201d and the singer eventually asked, \u201cWhat do you want me to say?\u201d<\/p>\n

Radiohead\u2019s interview with Jonathan Dean for The Sunday Times comes ahead of the band\u2019s first tour<\/a> since 2018. The tour is scheduled to begin next week, on November 4, in Madrid.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Greenwood, who\u2019s faced particular scrutiny for performing in Tel Aviv at the height of the war in 2024,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":103586,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[156,594,157,111,139,69,135],"class_list":{"0":"post-103585","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-entertainment","9":"tag-interviews","10":"tag-music","11":"tag-new-zealand","12":"tag-newzealand","13":"tag-nz","14":"tag-politics"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103585","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=103585"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103585\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/103586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=103585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=103585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=103585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}