PUBLISHED
July 06, 2025
KARACHI:
Glastonbury 2025 was always going to be charged, but few expected the seismic waves sent rippling through the global cultural sphere when Bob Vylan, mid-performance on the Left Field stage, roared out the chant “Death, death to the IDF” to a crowd erupting in cheers.
The moment, aired uncut by the BBC, was joined hours later by Belfast rap group Kneecap voicing support for Palestine from the West Holts stage. Mo Chara, one of the trio’s frontmen, wore a Palestinian keffiyeh as he led chants of “Free Palestine” and “F*ck Keir Starmer”, calling out the UK prime minister for his support of Israel and demanding the release of Mo Chara from pending terrorism charges over a previous protest. The group’s set also projected slogans declaring Israel guilty of genocide, and encouraged solidarity with Palestine Action. The crowd responded with a sea of Palestinian flags, and their performance quickly went viral on TikTok, where unofficial streams racked up over 1.8 million views.
Within days, Glastonbury organisers quietly cancelled Kneecap’s planned encore appearances, citing security and “operational risk” after complaints flooded in. The move only inflamed supporters, who accused the festival of bowing to political pressure.
In the hours after both performances, social media combusted. Outrage and solidarity, condemnation and defence flooded in equal measure. The BBC found itself in the crosshairs for platforming, however accidentally, what many called “incendiary” messages, while others framed them as essential acts of resistance.
This was an unwelcome addition to the BBC’s already fraying relationship with audiences over coverage of the Palestine-Israel war. The broadcaster has been criticised repeatedly for a toothless coverage of the genocide in Gaza, under the pretext of maintaining a policy of both-sides reporting. The media corporation has failed to contextualise Israel’s onslaught in Gaza as a humanitarian disaster. Only weeks ago, it quietly pulled from its schedule a harrowing documentary about Israel carrying out target killings of doctors in Gaza, prompting fierce accusations of self-censorship. That film is now being independently released, a damning testament to how far even a public broadcaster has retreated from its stated mission to inform without fear or partiality.
Glastonbury, Britain’s most hallowed musical gathering, has long occupied a space where counterculture and establishment jostle for attention. From Banksy installations to the rants of politically-minded performers, Glasto has provided a literal stage for dissent. This year, as the war in Gaza stretched into its most horrifying months, the festival became a universal platform for moral urgency. Bob Vylan’s blunt invocation of “Death to the IDF” — the Israel Defence Forces — was for many a cry of rage against a military juggernaut seen as responsible for tens of thousands of civilian deaths. For others, it crossed a line, interpreted as a violent incitement or an antisemitic attack. While cancelling Kneecap, for their chants and slogans for Palestine, was reminiscent of US campuses clamping down peaceful protests supporting freedom for Palestine.
This is where art collides with politics in its rawest form. These artists did not arrive at their words casually, or in a vacuum. Bob Vylan and Kneecap belong to communities shaped by a history of state violence, their art will inevitably echo the strains of protest music. As punk rock and rap artists, their invective does not adopt the polite language of policymakers but the fury of the disenfranchised, the language of those who see no recourse in a world that ignores their pain. That is what protest music is meant to do: to jolt and provoke. It goes against being palatable by its very nature.
But Glastonbury is also a vast commercial machine, broadcast to millions and now somewhat even a middle-class rite of passage. That friction between raw protest and the festival’s curated, corporate-backed spectacle has come into sharp focus this year. Sure — here’s a clearer rewording while keeping the same idea:
The BBC, once again, finds itself at the centre of this tension. Some saw it as dangerous and a lapse of judgment that BBC cameras and live broadcast didn’t censor Bob Vylan. Others see as these acts of protest as necessary. That is the challenge of public broadcasting: to reflect a divided society where one person’s incitement is another person’s cry for freedom.
In the aftermath, politicians, pundits, and public figures lined up with their ritual condemnations. Some accused the performers of stoking hate, arguing that calls for the destruction of the IDF risked inflaming anti-Jewish sentiment at a time of rising antisemitism in Britain. Others pointed out that Gaza had become an open-air graveyard, with entire families obliterated by bombs. Where, they asked, was the outrage for them? It is a question echoing far beyond Glastonbury’s rolling hills — one that cuts to the heart of how freedom of expression is measured, and whose pain is seen as legitimate.
What this moment reveals, above all, is a generational chasm in how cultural resistance is framed. The younger festivalgoers, many of them radicalised by images of Gaza’s devastation, heard in Bob Vylan a truth-telling. Of course — here’s a rewrite that focuses on a more conservative view of free speech rather than historical trauma:
Their elders, often holding more conservative views on the limits of free speech, heard the chants as crossing a dangerous line into hate speech. No festival as storied as Glastonbury can accommodate both these perspectives without deep fractures.
And yet, these ruptures are essential. Political art is meant to disturb. It is meant to pick at scabs we might prefer to leave alone. From the Vietnam-era protest songs of Bob Dylan and Joan Baez, to the anthems of Public Enemy railing against systemic racism, artists have always tested the boundaries of what the public is willing to hear. In the 2000s, even pop acts like the Pussycat Dolls ventured into protest, most notably with “I Don’t Need a Man” becoming an accidental feminist rallying cry at a time when women were pushing back against media sexism — a small but significant statement about agency.
Major political movements have always found a soundtrack. The anti-apartheid struggle had the power of Miriam Makeba, while Rage Against the Machine raged against American imperialism with blistering verses that still echo on protest lines today. Beyoncé brought the imagery of Black Panther resistance to the Super Bowl, in front of millions, and paid the price of conservative outrage. After 9/11, artists from System of a Down to the Dixie Chicks challenged America’s wars, at enormous personal and commercial cost.
From “Ohio” protesting the Kent State shootings to today’s chants for Palestinian liberation, artists have given language to anger and solidarity in ways politicians cannot. Across the Muslim world, musicians like Tunisia’s Emel Mathlouthi, Palestine’s DAM, and Iran’s Shahin Najafi have carried this same tradition forward, using song to challenge oppression and demand justice, often at great personal risk.
The challenge, then, is for the rest of us — audiences, institutions, and broadcasters — to grapple honestly with that discomfort rather than try to erase it. Protest music and performance will continue to break through polite silence, because as long as injustice persists, someone will step on a stage and name it, whether we are ready to hear it or not.
Placing a finger on the pulse of a world standing at the precipice of political fracture, Bob Vylan and Kneecap have cracked open the most vital question for all of us really: how many civilian deaths must a war rack up before outrage is no longer taboo? And who gets to decide whether that outrage is acceptable speech or criminal incitement?
Upon having his US visa revoked, Bob Vylan reiterated his unwavering solidarity to the cause of Palestine. This is now perhaps the most audacious slap in the face of Israel’s heinous despotism by one person who grabbed the chance to raise his voice against genocide.
Glastonbury 2025 will be remembered not just for its music, but for sending message to the global society forced to look itself in the mirror. Amid the anthems and encore sets, that mirror reflected a nation divided by history, by fear, and delusions.
