Dark side of the Moon... yup still got that album... yup, that figures...
Roger Waters, Alas
Oct 14, 2024 4:00 pm
By Hugh Fitzgerald
17 Comments
He’s the antisemitic gift that keeps on giving, managing to do so despite, or more likely because of, his drink-and-drug addled mind. He’s just given another of those interviews where he solemnly declares he hasn’t “ever had an antisemitic thought in my entire life,” while spewing his hatred for the “supremacist” Jews and the power they have to run the world. Yet it seems they haven’t managed, despite that vast power, to silence Roger Waters. More on this squalid spewer of hatred can be found here: “Roger Waters Calls Israel ‘Extremely Evil,’ Pushes Antisemitic Tropes While Denying He’s Antisemitic,” by Shiryn Ghermezian, Algemeiner, October 11, 2024:
Former Pink Floyd lead singer Roger Waters made a slew of anti-Israel remarks, promoted antisemitic tropes about Jewish power, and made inappropriate Holocaust comparisons in a new interview with Turkey’s TRT World published on Wednesday.
Well, he found the right outlet — a Turkish broadcaster. For under Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey has become one of the most antisemitic countries in the world, and Roger Waters’ views about Jews will be warmly welcomed by the Turkish audience that listens to TRT World.
Waters’ interview with TRT World presenter Paul Salvatori focused on the ongoing Israel-Hamas war raging in the Gaza Strip and was conducted ahead of the one-year anniversary of the deadly Hamas terrorist attacks in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, that started the conflict. Salvatori began by asking the British musician to reflect on how he has changed in the last year, since the launch of the Israel-Hamas war.
“I wake up desperately disturbed every morning,” Rogers replied, before talking about wanting to fight against the “evil” in the world including Israel, of which he has been a longtime critic.
“Supremacy of all kinds is the key to understanding why people behave in these extremely evil ways, like the Israelis have done for the last 75 years and are continuing to do so with the support of the American empire including my country, the United Kingdom, which is part of the American empire,” he said. “And it’s deeply, deeply depressing to me.”
If “supremacy of all kinds” is the “key to understanding why people behave in these extremely evil ways like the Israelis have done,” perhaps someone should let Waters know that Islam is the most supremacist of faiths. In the Qur’an, Muslims are told that they are the “best of peoples” (3:110), while non-Muslims are “the most vile of created beings.” (98:6). Non-Muslims under Muslim rule are offered only three alternatives: to convert to Islam, or to be killed, or to accept the permanent status of “dhimmi,” which includes a host of social, economic, and political disabilities including, most famously, the duty of paying an onerous capitation tax known as the jizyah.
Waters said Israel “pretends” to believe in human rights and freedom of speech, just like the United States, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Holland “and all the rest of them.” He added that US and UK leaders — such as US President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, former US President Donald Trump, former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, and current British Prime Minister Keir Stamer — “represent pure evil.”
But neither Israel, nor any of the other Western democracies Waters lists — the U.S., U.K., France, Germany, Holland “and all the rest of them” — merely “pretend to believe in human rights and free speech.” They really do believe in them, and exhibit number one might be the odious Roger Waters himself, who is free to express his noxious views in all of the countries he names.
An accurate list of countries that are police states should include Russia (Waters is a great fan of Vladimir Putin), China, Iran, Turkey, and many Arab countries, including Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Syria. But about those countries, and their human rights records, Roger Waters has nothing to say.
The ex-Pink Floyd vocalist additionally expressed support for anti-Israel protesters on college and university campuses, specifically the “brave students” at Columbia University, who are protesting against Israel’s “genocide.” He compared efforts to stop these anti-Israel campus protests to the Gestapo, the Nazi secret police during World War II, and promoted antisemitic tropes about an “Israeli lobby.”
What kind of “bravery” did it take for antisemites and pro-Hamas demonstrators to surround and harass and even beat up Jewish students on the Columbia campus? What kind of “bravery” was necessary to enter campus buildings and vandalize them, secure in the knowledge that the pusillanimous administration would only as a last resort call in the NYPD to remove them? Roger Waters is proud of those protesters who condemn Israel for committing “genocide,” a grotesque charge given the IDF’s heroic efforts to minimize civilian casualties by warning civilians in Gaza away from places about to be targeted, with leaflets, text messages, and robocalls, and by having Israeli pilots abort their missions whenever they detect civilians too close to the intended target — about half of the Israeli airstrikes are called off for that reason at the last moment. The only call for “genocide” is that of the anti-Israel protesters who, in chanting “From the river to the sea/Palestine will be free,” are calling for the destruction of the Jewish state and the expulsion, or killing, of all of its Jewish inhabitants. |
