Brian Eno & Israel

Posted on the website belonging to his friend and sometime collaborator David Byrne, Eno questions America’s continuing support of Israel.

“What is going on in America,” Eno writes.  “I know from my own experience how slanted your news is, and how little you get to hear about the other side of this story.  But – for Christ’s sake! – it’s not that hard to find out.  Why does America continue its blind support of this one-sided exercise in ethnic cleansing?  WHY? I just don’t get it.  I really hate to think it’s just the power of AIPAC (American Israel Public Affairs Committee) … for if that’s the case, then your government really is fundamentally corrupt.  No, I don’t think that’s the reason … but I have no idea what it could be.”

Eno describes a trip to Israel in 2013 in which he was shown through the country by a Palestinian who was also a professional guide, and an Israel Defense Forces ex-major who, according to the musician, “left the service under a cloud for refusing to beat up Palestinians.”

“Between the two of them we got to see some harrowing things – Palestinian houses hemmed in by wire mesh and boards to prevent settlers throwing shit and piss and used sanitary towels at the inhabitants; Palestinian kids on their way to school being beaten by Israeli kids with baseball bats to parental applause and laughter; a whole village evicted and living in caves while three settler families moved onto their land; an Israeli settlement on top of a hill diverting its sewage directly down onto Palestinian farmland below; The Wall; the checkpoints … and all the endless daily humiliations.  I kept thinking, “Do Americans really condone this?  Do they really think this is OK?  Or do they just not know about it?”

But it’s Eno’s Ku Klux Klan comparison that’s getting most of the attention.

“And the settler militias are always happy to lend a fist or rip up someone’s olive grove while the army looks the other way.  By the way, most of them are not ethnic Israelis – they’re  ‘right of return’ Jews from Russia and Ukraine and Moravia and South Africa and Brooklyn who came to Israel recently with the notion that they had an inviolable (God-given!) right to the land, and that ‘Arab’ equates with ‘vermin’ – straightforward old-school racism delivered with the same arrogant, shameless swagger that the good ole boys of Louisiana used to affect.  That is the culture our taxes are defending.  It’s like sending money to the Klan.”

Eno’s letter is rapidly getting coverage on news channels and political websites that, depending on ideologies, are proclaiming him a hero or denouncing him as a neo-Nazi. 

Suggesting that Eno might be a “Hamas stooge,” a NationalPost.com reader wrote, “I thought Brits a tad smarter than that … then again Eno’s Mansion has no rockets lobbed at it daily … and he can safely get away with his own helicopter and private jet!  HYPOCRITE!” 

Meanwhile, a Newsweek reader has little love for Eno or any celebrity expressing an opinion.

“It’s amazing to me how these narcissistic celebrities can invest so much passion and energy on publicizing their ill-informed opinions and spend no time or energy on actually learning something about the facts and nuances of the cause they’re opining on.”

 Check out Eno’s complete letter via this link.