Since calling to “free Palestine” while performing at Coachella earlier this month, outspoken Irish rap group Kneecap have faced a lot blowback from everyone from FOX News, Sharon Osbourne and infamous spoon-bending mentalist Uri Geller. The band said last week they’re were being hit by a “coordinated smear campaign.”
Things have heated up even more since. The UK government also joined the condemnation, with PM Keir Starmer saying today “individuals expressing those views should be receiving government funding” after footage of the group performing in 2023 was circulated on social media where they appeared to say “The only good Tory is a dead Tory. Kill your local MP.” Kneecap have never had much love for the British government — they released “Get Your Brits Out” as a 2019 single — and said that “For over a year, we have used our shows to call out the British and Irish governments’ complicity in war crimes.”
Things got hotter when footage of Kneecap from 2024, where they allegedly told the crowd at a show “Up Hamas, up Hezbollah,” began circulating. It is a crime to show support for Hamas and Hezbollah in the UK where they are both banned. They’ve been dropped from connected German Festivals Southside and Hurricane, and parted ways with their booking agency, Independent Artist Group, who were also the sponsors of their visas (they’re supposed to tour this fall, including two sold-out NYC shows).
Kneecap have now issued a new statement:
They want you to believe words are more harmful than genocide.
Establishment figures, desperate to silence us, have combed through hundreds of hours of footage and interviews, extracting a handful of words from months or years ago to manufacture moral hysteria.
Let us be unequivocal: we do not, and have never, supported Hamas or Hezbollah. We condemn all attacks on civilians, always. It is never okay. We know this more than anyone, given our nation’s history.
We also reject any suggestion that we would seek to incite violence against any MP or individual. Ever. An extract of footage, deliberately taken out of all context, is now being exploited and weaponised, as if it were a call to action. This distortion is not only absurd – it is a transparent effort to derail the real conversation.
All two million Palestinian people in Gaza are currently being starved to death by Israel. At least 20,000 children in Gaza have been killed. The British government continues to supply arms to Israel, even after scores of NHS doctors warned Keir Starmer in August that children were being systematically executed with sniper shots to the head.
Instead of defending innocent people or the principles of international law, the powerful in Britain have abetted slaughter and famine.
This is where real anger and outrage should be directed towards.
To the Amess and Cox families, we send our heartfelt apologies, we never intended to cause you hurt.
Kneecap’s message has always been — and remains — one of love, inclusion, and hope. This is why our music resonates across generations, countries, classes and cultures and has brought hundreds of thousands of people to our gigs.
No smear campaign will change that.
Suddenly, days after calling out the US administration at Coachella to applause and solidarity, there is an avalanche of outrage and condemnation by the political classes of Britain.
The real crimes are not in our performances; the real crimes are the silence and complicity of those in power.
Shame on them.
KNEECAP STATEMENT:
They want you to believe words are more harmful than genocide.
Establishment figures, desperate to silence us, have combed through hundreds of hours of footage and interviews, extracting a handful of words from months or years ago to manufacture moral… pic.twitter.com/qZht5532Zf
— KNEECAP (@KNEECAPCEOL) April 28, 2025
