The prosecution of Kneecap’s Liam Óg Ó hAnnaidh – stage name Mo Chara – under British terrorism laws is one of the clearest signs that the ideological architecture that maintains a level of support, or at least acceptance, for Israel, is crumbling. It comes in the same week that Mahmoud Khalil appeared in a US immigration court after a month in detention, threatened with deportation for his Palestine solidarity activism. In the same month, Germany has ordered the deportation of four Palestine solidarity activists – again, none of them have been convicted of a crime. And this week, a number of activists appeared in court in Ennis for taking direct action against US military aircraft in Shannon. Judge Gabbett refused to allow the passport of one of the activists, Nell Buckley, to be returned to her, meaning that she will not be able to travel to London for a work trip. This follows a long-running pattern of Garda heavy-handedness, a particularly egregious example being the strip searching and cavity searching of Mothers Against Genocideactivists arrested after peacefully protesting outside Dáil Éireann.
The intensification of repression is a sign that the establishment’s narrative – all the talk of “both sides”, the demands for condemnation of Hamas, the spurious accusations of anti-semitism – simply does not wash anymore. Israel is committing a genocide in Gaza. The world knows Israel is committing a genocide in Gaza. And the world knows the genocide is being supported politically, economically and militarily by the United States, the European Union and the United Kingdom.
The scale of horror in Gaza continues to reach new, unimaginable levels. Last week Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said, “We are annihilating everything that remains in the strip.” Whatever aid is being allowed in is purely for the sake of optics, “so the world does not accuse us of war crimes”. Half a million people in Gaza now face starvation – not a famine; a genocide. Israel continues to bomb hospitals, homes and tents. The people of Gaza – long the subject of new military technologies that are later sold as “battle-tested” – face ever more dystopian forms of brutality, such as the use of quadcopter drones to shoot children.
Meanwhile, the Western political establishment is scrambling to make this about anything other than its complicity with the genocide. We’re hearing the first murmurings about sanctions from the EU and the UK, even as they continue to arm Israel. The Irish government continues to pretend that it doesn’t know that weapons are being transported through Irish airspace. On Friday, a FedEx flight flew through Irish airspace carrying F-35 fighter jet parts destined for Nevatim air base in Israel.
Bono has seen fit, after 20 months of genocide, to come out and call for Israel to “be released from Netanyahu”. The call, which came on the same day that a poll showed that 82% of Israelis support the ethnic cleansing of Gaza, is not some courageous stand for peace. By essentialising Netanyahu and separating him from the Zionist project, Bono is merely continuing his long-standing crusade in service of empire.
This is the story – not Kneecap, as the band themselves have said: “Gaza is the story. Genocide is the story.”
However, what is happening with Kneecap tells us a lot about the story of Gaza. It shows the deep hypocrisy of a Western political establishment that is outraged by the alleged flying of a so-called “terrorist” flag, while it arms a terrorist state that is committing a genocide.
The British establishment is pulling out all the stops to silence Kneecap and their message, because the message they are carrying is that of a global mass movement that, if it deepens, could threaten the entire western imperialist order. Kneecap and other artists have come to the fore, not as artists standing above the political struggle, but as a part of it – influenced by the movement and in turn helping to deepen and shape that movement with their art. They have filled a gap that has been left by a political establishment that is deeply complicit in genocide – from Trump’s full-throated support of the ethnic cleansing of Gaza, to Keir Starmer’s support for Israel’s right to withold water and electricity from Gaza, to the Irish government allowing weapons through Irish airspace and the US military through Shannon Airport.
Kneecap are being targeted precisely because the message they are carrying is so political. It is grounded in an unapologetic opposition to Israel, from the blunt “Fuck Israel”, to the statement of fact played at all their gigs: “Israel is committing a genocide against the Palestinian people.”
It doesn’t stop there, however. It was Kneecap’s message at Coachella that was the tipping point for the establishment and what provoked the backlash they are currently facing. There, they directly called out US imperialism: “It [the genocide] is being enabled by the US government who arm and fund Israel despite their war crimes.”
This goes to the heart of what needs to be done to stop the genocide. This is a US genocide just as much as it is an Israeli one. The US has supplied the bombs, the bullets and the billions of dollars Israel needs to inflict this genocide. The US is currently working with Israel to use aid as bait, drawing people further South in order to facilitate the total ethnic cleansing of Gaza. There isn’t a world where Israel can be confronted without confronting US imperialism. Kneecap are clear on this, not just with their message at Coachella, but elsewhere. In a recently aired RTÉ documentary, Liam Óg spoke about how some people believe their stance on Palestine may have prevented them being nominated for the Oscars:
“If it comes down to awards or breaking America by sacrificing what you believe in, then America can go and fuck itself.”
This is no liberal, hand-wringing humanitarianism. It is a radical politics that is rooted in anti-imperialism – a politics that is gaining in support. And for this reason, the political establishment wants to silence not just Kneecap, but huge numbers of activists who are taking action against their genocide. In some ways, this is a sign of progress for the Palestine solidarity movement. The hauling of activists through the courts, the deportations and threats of deportation, the brute force that is being inflicted on protesters – the power of states to inflict this repression has always been there, but it hasn’t been necessary on this scale until now. Now, since the beginning of the genocide in October 2023, cracks have begun to appear in the political hegemony.
As western states crack down, it is imperative that the global solidarity movement responds with a deepening of the political struggle. The idea that Israel must be isolated diplomatically, politically and economically in order for it to be defeated might be a clear idea for many people. Artists like Kneecap can push this idea and win more people to it. The next step is to use the wider support for Kneecap to invigorate the mass movement and raise the level of the political struggle; to bring the tens of thousands who are chanting Free Palestine at gigs or sharing ‘Solidarity with Mo Chara’ posts back out onto the streets, back into the heart of the movement to drive the murderous Western establishment onto the back foot.
