U2’s Bono pays tribute to ‘beautiful kids’ slain at Israeli desert rave
At Las Vegas show, singer changes words in ‘Pride’ to refer to festival goers, 260 of whom were massacred by Hamas terrorists and other of whom were kidnapped to Gaza
Jessica Steinberg, The Times of Israel's culture and lifestyles editor, covers the Sabra scene from south to north and back to the center
Bono, the frontman of U2, paid a moving tribute Sunday night to hundreds of young Israelis massacred Saturday by Hamas terrorists during a desert rave in Israel.
At a show at the Las Vegas Sphere, Bono dedicated the song “Pride” to “those beautiful kids at that music festival,” speaking and singing about the hundreds of dead, missing and captured participants in the Supernova music event near Re’im. At least 260 of the 3,000 festival participants were killed.
“In the light of what’s happened in Israel and Gaza, a song about non-violence seems somewhat ridiculous, even laughable, but our prayers have always been for peace and for non-violence,” said Bono.
“But our hearts and our anger, you know where that’s pointed,” said the U2 frontman. “So sing with us… and those beautiful kids at that music festival,” he continued, before launching into “Pride (In the Name of Love).”
The audience began humming the opening chords, as Bono added new words to the opening stanzas of the 1984 song that is a tribute to Martin Luther King:
“Early morning, October 7, as the sun is rising in the desert sky, Stars of David, they took your life, but they could not take your pride, could not take your pride…”
“Let’s sing for our brothers and sisters who themselves were singing for the Supernova Sukkot festival in Israel. We sing for our kind of people, music people, playful experimental people, our kind of people, we sing for them,” he added.
U2 last performed in Israel at Yarkon Park in Tel Aviv in 1997, but turned down an invitation to play in Israel a decade later.
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In 2009, he sang “Pride” at a January 2009 concert at Washington, DC’s Lincoln Memorial, changing the words that are a tribute to Martin Luther King, and said, “This is not just an American dream,” he said, adding that it was “also an Irish dream, a European dream, an African dream… an Israeli dream… and also a Palestinian dream.”
