{"id":142691,"date":"2025-11-19T08:58:13","date_gmt":"2025-11-19T08:58:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/142691\/"},"modified":"2025-11-19T08:58:13","modified_gmt":"2025-11-19T08:58:13","slug":"lorde-fans-palestine-shirts-confiscated-in-london-venue-apologizes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/142691\/","title":{"rendered":"Lorde Fans’ Palestine Shirts Confiscated In London, Venue Apologizes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Considering Lorde has quite literally yelled “free fucking Palestine<\/a>” mid-song during her Ultrasound world tour, I don’t think she has an issue when fans show up to her shows wearing Palestine shirts. And yet, at the singer’s show at London’s O2 Arena Sunday night, two attendees had shirts reading “Palestine” confiscated by venue security, who said they were in violation of venue policy. <\/p>\n

The Guardian<\/a> reports that two concertgoers, Francesca Humi and Chloe Grace Laws, each attended Lorde’s show separately, but both of them happened to be wearing shirts from FC Palestina<\/a>, a UK brand that makes soccer-inspired merch in support of Palestine. In a blog post<\/a>, Laws said that she was admitted through security without any issues before a security guard approached her inside the venue and told her she needed to take the jersey off or be escorted out. Laws added that when she asked why she was being asked to take the shirt off, the guard said it was a matter of “making sure everyone can have a nice time”; later, another security guard told her that he “obviously agreed” with her, but that this was “policy.”<\/p>\n

In an Instagram post following the incident, Humi wrote about her similar experience. She said that an O2 staff member told her “no football tops” were allowed \u2014 a weird rule for a multi-use arena! \u2014 although she saw plenty of non-Palestine jerseys in the crowd.<\/p>\n

Today, the O2 shared this statement:<\/p>\n

We sincerely apologise. The safety and security of our staff, visitors, and artists is always our paramount priority. In light of this incident, we are reviewing our procedures [and] will revisit training to prevent this happening again, and wish to extend our apologies once more for any offence this incident may have caused.<\/p>\n

Last month, Lorde joined the No Music For Genocide<\/a> boycott, geo-blocking her music from streaming in Israel. <\/p>\n