Roger Waters Insists He Isn’t Antisemitic, But…

The squalid spewer of hatred Rogers Waters is at it again: “Roger Waters Calls Israel ‘Extremely Evil,’ Pushes Antisemitic Tropes While Denying He’s Antisemitic,” by Shiryn Ghermezian, Algemeiner, October 11, 2024:

“What is incredible is how lots of our brothers and sisters in the student movement all over the world, but particularly where I live in the United States, the students at Columbia University in New York for instance, decided to protest the genocide,” Waters said. “They’re saying there’s a genocide going on … so we’re going to occupy lawns and maybe even a hall somewhere in Columbia. They [the Israeli lobby] sent the Gestapo in to beat them up … the a–holes at the top of Columbia University who are trying to bolster the Gestapo to come in and beat anybody up who wants to stand up for the love of our brothers and sisters and for truth.”

The Israel “lobby” sent no one to “beat up” the protesters. The only people being beaten up on the Columbia campus were Jewish students trying to cross the campus to attend class. The NYPD did remove anti-Israel protesters who had taken over a college building, Hamilton Hall, and were trashing much of it, but no one was beaten up.

“When that happened we thought, ‘Oh my goodness. Here it is, in front of our very eyes, how much that system has been imposed by the Israeli lobby — by AIPAC [the American Israel Public Affairs Committee] and the ADL [Anti-Defamation League] and all those, in my view, misguided religious supremacists,” Rogers added. “You can see it’s endemic in the whole of the political system of the United States of America and that is terrifying because the United States of America is the most terrifying henchmen at the moment.”

What was in front “of our very eyes”? Neither AIPAC nor the ADL had anything to do with the New York Police removing the protesters from campus buildings. The police were called in by the Columbia University administrators. Waters wants us to believe that all across America — “endemic in the whole of the political system” — the “religious supremacists”are calling the shots. Who are those “religious supremacists”? Why it’s the Jews. Jews control the country. Jews control the world. Waters doesn’t say a word about the true supremacists, the Muslims, who know from the Qur’an they are the “best of peoples” and non-Muslims “the worst of created beings.” But even if he did know about those Qur’anic passages, he would not discuss them. No use, in Waters’ view, taking attention away from the perfidious Jews.

The musician also talked about an Israeli “lobby” trying to cancel his concerts in Europe last year as part of his “This Is Not a Drill” tour. However, he did not explain that local politicians, city councils, and Jewish groups pushed for the cancellation of several concerts because of his remarks and behavior, which include supporting the boycotts, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel; pressuring other musicians not to perform in Israel; and his use of antisemitic and Holocaust-related imagery and content in past concerts, such as a balloon shaped like a pig and that was embossed with a Star of David….

It was not mainly Jews who tried to shut down Roger Waters’ “This Is Not A Drill” tour. Local officials, appalled at his antisemitic remarks and behavior, his support for BDS, his attempt to persuade other musicians not to perform in Israel, and his antisemitic and Holocaust-related imagery, including wearing a Nazi uniform, and having a giant balloon shaped like a pig with a Star of David affixed, were quite enough for non-Jewish officials to try to prevent his appearances, but they had scant success. The attempt by the city fathers in Frankfurt to cancel his performance was undone by the German court that described it a violation of free speech. The attempt to persuade Andrew Lloyd Webber, the owner of the London Palladium, to cancel Waters’ performance, was unsuccessful. In short, no one “shut up” Waters, though he presents himself as having had to bravely fight off those who would cancel him because of his views on “supremacist” Jews.

Last year, an explosive documentary, The Dark Side of Roger Waters, showed fellow musicians detailing Waters’ long record of anti-Jewish barbs. In one instance, a former colleague, the saxophonist Norbert Sachel, recalled Waters at a restaurant yelling at the wait staff to “take away the Jew food.” The producer of the Pink Floyd album The Wall, Bob Ezrin, claimed that he heard Waters compose a ditty describing the group’s agent, Bryan Morrison, as a “f***ing Jew.”

Also in the documentary were accounts of Waters proposing to write a derogatory term for Jewish people on an inflatable pig that floats above his concerts — Kike? Yid? — and “bombing” his audiences with confetti in the shape of swastikas.

But remember: Roger Waters is quite clear about the purity of his intentions. He is not an antisemite but a fighter for justice. Asked if he was an antisemite he replied “Never was, never will be. Not an antisemitic thought ever in my whole life. What I am is somebody who fights for human rights and that is what they cannot allow.”

Who are “they”? Oh, the Jews, of course. They are the people who cannot allow Roger Waters to “fight for justice.” But remember, he’s never had an antisemitic thought in his whole life.

Not everyone will be convinced. There is, for example, Polly Samson, the wife of his former Pink Floyd mate, the guitarist David Gilmour. Samson wrote lyrics for some of the Pink Floyd songs, and has known Roger Waters for decades. Here is how, in a tweet, she sums up Roger Waters:

Sadly @rogerwaters you are antisemitic to your rotten core. Also a Putin apologist and a lying, thieving, hypocritical, tax-avoiding, lip-synching, misogynistic, sick-with-envy, megalomaniac. Enough of your nonsense.

I think that says it all. Any further comment would only dilute the force of Polly Samson’s passionate condemnation.