Despite the UN this week declaring that Israel is committing genocide in Palestine – trailing in the footsteps of similar declarations by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and indeed Israel’s own Information Center for Human Rights in the Occupied Territories – it is still jolting to witness someone stand up on a packed stage in front of thousands and call a spade a spade. At London’s Ovo Wembley Arena on Wednesday night, as part of a Palestinian fundraising concert spearheaded by Brian Eno, this is a regular occurrence. “Genocide”. “War crime”. “A slow, grinding, relentless violence.” That last one courtesy of Louis Theroux, I should say. He is just one of a stacked line-up of speakers tonight (Florence Pugh, Riz Ahmed, Benedict Cumberbatch and Richard Gere among them), all of whom express solidarity, horror and righteous fury firmly and plainly. Discussion of Palestine, particularly in the wake of 7 October 2023, has tended to be couched in caveats, or at least very careful language. An estimated 64,000 Palestinian killings later, it is undeniable now that something has shifted.
This is a classic fundraising event, with tonally appropriate musical performances (ballads, soft electronica, musicians who are actually from Palestine) slotted between poetry, speeches and calls to action. Cillian Murphy, Penélope Cruz, Billie Eilish, Joaquin Phoenix and Malala Yousafzai offer support in a pre-recorded video message, but ultimately the celebrities tonight are window dressing. The biggest cheers are reserved for those on the front lines of the crisis: Palestinian journalist Yara Eid, who proclaims “Israel will never silence me… even if they kill me”; plastic surgeons who have operated on wounded Gazans; Francesca Albanese, the UN’s special rapporteur for the occupied territories, who has long advocated for the Palestinian people and was recently sanctioned by the Trump administration for her apparent “virulent antisemitism and unrelenting anti-Israel bias”. On stage, she calls this a distraction. “They silence dissent by labelling it antisemitism, and they criminalise us [as] terrorists – those who stand against genocide.”
