Roger Waters compares Israel to Nazi Germany
British rocker says parallels are 'so crushingly obvious'; blasts the 'powerful' US Jewish lobby
Former Pink Floyd front man Roger Waters compared the Israeli treatment of the Palestinians to Nazi Germany on Saturday and decried the “powerful” Jewish lobby in the US.
In an interview with CounterPunch magazine, Waters — a longtime supporter of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement — remarked, regarding the Palestinians, that the “parallels with what went on in the ’30s in Germany are so crushingly obvious.
“There were many people that pretended that the oppression of the Jews was not going on. From 1933 until 1946,” Waters said. “So this is not a new scenario. Except that this time it’s the Palestinian people being murdered.”
Waters, an outspoken critic of Israel, came under fire in July for using a pig-shaped balloon with Jewish symbols, including a Star of David, at his concerts.
However, the Anti-Defamation League said that Waters has a long history of using these symbols in his concerts. “While we wish that Mr. Waters would have avoided using the Star of David, we believe there is no anti-Semitic intent here,” an ADL spokesman said.
Speaking to CounterPunch, Waters slammed US policies toward the Palestinians, and attributed them to the “Israeli propaganda machine,” whose messages effectively trickled into the mainstream media. In a call to the public to join the BDS movement, Waters explained that the main deterrence for many Americans interested in the movement is the backlash anticipated from Jews in the United States.
“The Jewish lobby is extraordinary powerful here and particularly in the industry that I work in, the music industry and in rock ‘n’ roll, as they say,” Waters stated.
Last August, Waters issued a public letter to musicians to boycott Israel. A few months earlier, in an interview with The Huffington Post, Waters remarked that the US has a “knee-jerk” policy to support “anything” that Israel does.
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