As usual, singer-songwriter Roger Waters voiced his hatred for Israel and urged his fans to boycott the Jewish state.
Roger Waters made his feelings of hatred towards Donald Trump and Israel abundantly clear during a politically-charged concert at the Desert Trip music festival Sunday night.
The 73-year-old singer-songwriter also denounced war and addressed the Black Lives Matter movement in his 2 ½-hour set that closed out the three-day classic rock concert in Indio, California.
Waters blasted the Republican presidential candidate in music and images. Trump’s face appeared on the massive video screen above the stage with the word “Charade” across it as Waters performed the Pink Floyd song “Pigs (Three Different Ones).” Subsequent images showed Trump wearing a Ku Klux Klan hood.
Meanwhile, a parade-sized balloon shaped like a pig floated above the audience. It had Trump’s face painted on the side with the words “Ignorant, lying, racist, sexist pig.” And in case that wasn’t straightforward enough, giant letters flashed across the big screen reading “Trump is a pig.”
Waters followed up with “Another Brick in the Wall (Part II),” during which 15 school-age children came onstage wearing T-shirts that read, “Derriba el muro” — Spanish for “Take down the wall.”
While other Desert Trip performers mentioned the presidential election, Waters was the only one who brought up the Black Lives Matter movement in front of the overwhelmingly white audience. As he performed “Us and Them,” the big screen showed pictures of protest signs. “White silence is violence,” read one. “I cannot believe I still have to protest this (expletive),” another said.
Support for Boycotts against Israel
The former Pink Floyd frontman waited until near the end of his performance to voice his support for the anti-Israel BDS (Boycott, Divest, Sanction) movement, which calls for boycotts and sanctions against the Israeli government.
The BDS movement promotes financial, academic and cultural boycotts against Israel, ostensibly as a nonviolent struggle against the so-called “Israeli occupation.”
Critics say its activities are a modern form of anti-Semitism, and its true objective is to destroy the State of Israel.
“I’m going to send out all of my most heartfelt love and support to all those young people on the campuses of the universities of California who are standing up for their brothers and sisters in Palestine and supporting the BDS movement,” he said, “in the hope that we may encourage the government of Israel to end the occupation.”
Waters is notoriously anti-Israel, and some say, an anti-Semite. He regularly utilizes his venues to blast the Jewish State and promote actions against it.
He has voiced support for the Hamas terror organization. He regularly exerts public pressure on performers who are slated to perform in Israel and demands that they refrain from doing so, claiming it would generate pressure on Israel’s “Apartheid” and “criminal” government.
By: United with Israel Staff
AP contributed to this report.