Radiohead’s Thom Yorke briefly halted his Australian solo performance following a tense exchange with a concertgoer protesting about Gaza.
During the Melbourne show on Wednesday, a man shouted at Yorke, urging him to “condemn the Israeli genocide of Gaza,” as heard in video clips posted online.
Yorke replied, inviting the heckler to “hop up on stage” and speak out openly. “Don’t stand there like a coward, come here and say it.
You want to piss on everybody’s night? Okay, you do it, see you later,” he said, before removing his guitar and leaving the stage.
The protester repeated his remarks, adding, “how many dead children will it take?” which drew boos from some crowd members. Yorke returned moments later to cheers and resumed his set with Radiohead’s “Karma Police.”
Attendee Elly Brus observed that the protester “did not have support” from the crowd and was escorted away by security, later engaging with people outside the venue.
The protest comes amid heightened global scrutiny following Israel’s military campaign against Hamas in Gaza, launched after an unprecedented attack on southern Israel by Hamas on October 7, 2023, which killed approximately 1,200 people and resulted in 251 hostages.
In recent years, Yorke and Radiohead have faced calls to cancel performances in Israel as part of a cultural boycott over its policies toward Palestinians.
Yorke has previously defended performing in Israel, clarifying in 2017 that “playing in a country isn’t the same as endorsing its government” and emphasizing that “music, art, and academia is about crossing borders, not building them.”
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