Image by getty images

Two founding members of the Pink Floyd rock band called on their colleagues from The Rolling Stones to cancel a concert in Israel.

Roger Waters and Nick Mason made the call in an op-ed that was published Thursday on Salon.com.

“Playing Israel now is the moral equivalent of playing Sun City at the height of South African apartheid,” wrote the men, who described themselves as “the two surviving founders of Pink Floyd.”

Forwarding the News

Thoughtful, balanced reporting from the Forward and around the web, bringing you updated news and analysis each day.

Terms(Required)

I agree to the Forward's Terms of Service and Privacy Policy

Email(Required)

The op-ed says it was written in light of “the recent news that the Rolling Stones will be playing their first-ever concert in Israel, and at what is a critical time in the global struggle for Palestinian freedom and equal rights.”

The Stones are scheduled to perform June 4 at Tel Aviv’s Hayarkon Park.

Roger Waters is a longtime advocate of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign. Over the past year, he has come under criticism from several Jewish groups, including the Anti-Defamation League, which accused him of anti- Semitism – an accusation he has denied.

Waters has used a pig-shaped balloon emblazoned with the Star of David at his concerts.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center said the pig display was a symbol of “Jew hatred” but the ADL said it was merely disquieting and not necessarily anti-Semitic. Waters said the Star of David was meant to signify what he called Israeli oppression, not Judaism.

He later said: “The Jewish lobby is extraordinarily powerful here and particularly in the industry that I work in, the music industry and in rock ‘n’ roll, as they say.”

The Forward is free to read, but it isn’t free to produce

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward.

Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.

At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and polarized discourse.

Readers like you make it all possible. We’ve started our Passover Fundraising Drive, and we need 1,800 readers like you to step up to support the Forward by April 21. Members of the Forward board are even matching the first 1,000 gifts, up to $70,000.

This is a great time to support independent Jewish journalism, because every dollar goes twice as far.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

2X match on all Passover gifts!

$90 → $180 $180 → $360

$360 → $720

Other amount