LIKE some sort of present day Captain Renault in Casablanca, the Prime Minister, the BBC, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, countless other politicians and even the irrelevancy that is Sharon Osbourne (who?), pronounced themselves “shocked — shocked — to find that pro-Palestine actions are going on” at Glastonbury and across the country.

After draconian efforts to shut down the performance of Irish rap trio Kneecap at Glastonbury and to proscribe the direct action group Palestine Action, the government and the BBC have instead emerged with considerable egg on their faces, becoming the object of widespread ridicule.

Before the venerated Glastonbury music festival got underway last weekend, Keir Starmer told his favourite news outlet, the Sun, that a performance by Kneecap there would be “inappropriate.” But event organisers refused to ban the group, and the venue was awash in Palestinian flags when the trio performed on Saturday.

Kneecap, which has consistently called for a free Palestine, shot back at Starmer’s comment before the festival: “You know what’s ‘not appropriate’ Keir?! Arming a f***ing genocide. F*** the Sun and solidarity with Palestine Action.”

Starmer’s favouring of the right-wing Sun newspaper had served as the platform for an earlier tactless comment during a televised discussion in the lead-up to last July’s general election. That was when the Labour leader outraged Britain’s longstanding Bangladeshi community when he said, “At the moment, people coming from countries like Bangladesh are not being removed because they’re not being processed,” suggesting they did not belong in the country.

Palestine Action, which Metropolitan Police commissioner Mark Rowley called “an organised extremist criminal group, whose proscription as terrorists is being actively considered,” uses direct action to damage and disable British-based operations that support Israel’s genocide in Gaza. Among their targets is Elbit Systems, a major Israeli defence manufacturer with locations in Britain.

But it was the June 20 break-in by Palestine Action at RAF Brize Norton, where they spray painted two planes and departed undetected, that prompted Starmer to call Palestine Action “disgraceful” and their non-violent stunt “vandalism.” Home Secretary Yvette Cooper then moved to proscribe the group under the Terrorism Act.

That decision was met with widespread condemnation as an absurd government over-reach, and Palestine Action has now won the right to contest the decision in court, potentially delaying the government’s banning order.

But everything backfired beautifully in a collective own goal at Glastonbury when the BBC, which declined to stream Kneecap’s performance live, were instead skilfully ambushed by the London-based punk rap performers, Bob Vylan, whose set they did air. 
 

In front of a banner that read “Free Palestine. United Nations have called it a genocide. The BBC calls it a ‘conflict’,” the duo led chants of “death to the IDF,” resulting in an eruption of outrage from the zionist lobby and members of Parliament.

Shadow home secretary Chris Philp even called for the BBC itself to be prosecuted. “Our national broadcaster should not be transmitting hateful material designed to incite violence and conflict,” he said, forgetting the horrors perpetrated by the murderous Israel Defence Forces that we have all been watching live-streamed from Gaza for the past 21 months. Those atrocities include firebombing families in tents, hospitals and schools and the now routine shooting of desperate Palestinians queueing for food aid.
 

Starmer was also quick to condemn the Bob Vylan performance as “appalling hate speech.” It is a phrase Starmer has curiously never reserved for people such as Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, who said that blocking humanitarian aid to Gaza was a “justified and moral” tactic, even should it result in the entire population of two million Palestinian civilians dying of hunger.

Nor did Starmer condemn Yoav Gallant, who, while still Israeli Defence Minister, said, “We are fighting human animals and we are acting accordingly...There will be no electricity, no food, no fuel, everything is closed.”

“This is ACTUAL IDF chanting about burning Palestinian villages … but yeah, let’s talk about #BobVylan instead,” commented Nizar Mhani on X after the Glastonbury show, posting a video of IDF members singing and chanting “burn their villages!” Mhani is a British NHS consultant who has his own YouTube channel where he unravels Israeli propaganda about the Gaza genocide.

Government objections to Kneecap stem from charges brought against band member Liam og o hAnnaidh — who goes by the stage name Mo Chara — for a terror offence for allegedly showing a Hezbollah flag at a London gig last November. O hAnnaidh is due back in court on August 20 after an earlier hearing in June was adjourned.

At Glastonbury, o hAnnaidh wore a keffiyeh and a shirt in the colours of the Palestinian flag and called for a “free Palestine” as the audience enthusiastically chanted back. Kneecap’s popularity has grown exponentially, in large part due to government efforts to silence them. At the June court hearing, Kneecap’s supporters included people who had never heard of them or didn’t like their music but admired and respected the importance of their message.
When Culture Secretary Lisa Nandy recently claimed Kneecap “is a band that has thrived on the oxygen of publicity,” she simply fed them further air.

Meanwhile, the mainstream media has been flooded with commentary from members of the British public — at least those who don’t read the Sun — who have been quick to point out the hypocrisy of the crackdowns against Kneecap and Palestine Action.

“So now you’re a terrorist if you protest against the government supporting genocidal acts on innocent people?” asked Guardian reader Mary Gildea in her letter to the editor. “A small act of vandalism is hardly blowing people up, but this government is supporting murderous behaviour in Gaza in all our names.”
 

In a further backlash against the truth-tellers, Bob Vylan has been dropped by United Talent Agency, and the US State Department has revoked their visas. But the video of their Glastonbury set, now banned by the BBC, lives on via social media, as does Kneecap’s. 
 

And despite the Starmer government’s obsession with shutting down free speech at home rather than stopping illegal bombings abroad, those speaking up for truth and freedom refuse to be silenced.

“The British government has tried censorship in the past on Irish people,” said Sinn Fein MP Paul Maskey, who represents West Belfast where Mo Chara is from, when we spoke outside the courthouse in June. “It didn’t work then, it’s not going to work now.”

Linda Pentz Gunter is a writer based in Takoma Park, Maryland. She recently returned from covering events in London.