Members of the Rap Punk Bob Vylan British duo have seen their visas revoked by the United States and are being investigated by local police after taking a crowd to chant “death” to the Israeli military at a UK music festival last weekend.
On Monday, US Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau stated that the State Department “revoked the visas of members of Bob Vylan in the light of their hateful tirad in Glastonbury, including leading the crowd in death chants.”
He added to social network X that “foreigners who glorify violence and hatred are not visitors welcome to our country.”
According to an Instagram post, the group was scheduled to digest the US from the end of October.
The US Department of State has established an aggressive policy of restricting and revocation of visas by alleged support for terrorism and anti-Semitism.
Rapper Bobby Vylan took the West Holts stage, the third largest at the Glastonbury festival on Saturday, shouting “Free, Free Palestine” before leading the crowd to sing songs against the Israeli military. The video shows the rapper shouting at the microphone: “Very well, but have you heard this? Death, death to the IDF (Israel’s defense forces).”
The artist also acted in front of a screen that displayed a message with the following words: “The United Nations called her Genocide. The BBC calls him ‘conflict’,” referring to the UK public broadcaster who exhibited the festival live.
In a publication on Sunday through Instagram, titled “I said what I said,” Bobby Vylan said he received “messages of support and hatred” following his performance.
“Teaching our children to defend the change they want and need is the only way to make this world a better place,” reads the publication. “As we get older and our fire begins to erase under the suffocation of adulthood and all its responsibilities, it is extremely important that we will inspire future generations to take the torch that has been passed on to us.”
CNN contacted Vylan to comment on the matter, but did not respond to the publication of this article.
Bob Vylan’s songs at the festival have also raised protests between the main British authorities, and the British police are analyzing the video images of their show. United Kingdom Prime Minister Keir Strmer said that “there is no excuse for this kind of terrible hatred speech.”
The Embassy of Israel in the United Kingdom said it was “deeply disturbed” with what it called “inflammatory and hateful” rhetoric at the festival.
A BBC spokesman told CNN that some of the comments made during Vylan’s performance were “deeply offensive.” The broadcaster broadcast the role of rapper live, but said she had no plans to make available on request through her Iplayer streaming platform.
This Monday, the BBC admitted that, “in retrospective”, Vylan’s performance should have been removed from the air during the performance, stating that the company “respects freedom of expression, but firmly opposes incitement to violence.”
“The anti -Semitic feelings expressed by Bob Vylan were totally unacceptable and have no place in our radio waves,” the station added.
Bob Vylan’s music incorporates a variety of genres with lyrics that often confront social issues such as racism, sexism and economic inequality.
KNECAP ACTION
Prior to the five -day music festival, all attention was facing Irish hip -hop trio Kneecap, after the band member Liam O’Hanna – who operates under the stage name of Mo Chara – was accused in the last month of terrorism crime following a London Metropolitan Police investigation.
The accusation, which the artist denied, is related to a London concert in November 2024, in which he allegedly exhibited a Hezbollah flag – a terrorist organization forbidden by British legislation. Prior to the Worthy Farm festival, Stmerer said it was not “appropriate” that the group will work.
During the performance on the same stage, on Saturday afternoon, Chara told the public that recent events had been “stressful”, but that they were nothing compared to “what the Palestinian people are going through.”
Rapper Nonaise O Carealláin, who gives the stage name of Móglaí Bap, responded to Stmerer’s comment during Saturday’s performance: “The Prime Minister of your country, not mine, said we did not want us to touch, so to sand the Keir Stmerer.”
Somerset police, where the festival is held, said that, after analyzing the video and audio images of the acts of the two bands, determined that “more inquiries are needed” and opened a criminal investigation on the subject.
The investigation is still at an early stage, the police reiterated, adding that the authorities “will consider closely all appropriate legislation, including the regard to hate crimes.”
