Will you still love her when she’s no longer performing in Israel?
After facing a fierce backlash from fans and activists over her decision to remain one of the headline performers at Israeli music festival Meteor, American singer Lana del Rey has canceled her performance scheduled for next week.
“It’s important to me to perform in both Palestine and Israel and treat all my fans equally,” the singer said in a statement posted on Twitter announcing her decision to abandon the show in Tel Aviv next weekend.
Lana initially tried to defend her decision to appear at the Meteor festival, writing: “What I can tell you is I believe music is universal and should be used to bring us all together.” She further argued that performing in Israel was “not a political statement.”
People seemed to disagree with del Rey’s statement, with the Palestine Campaign for the Academy and Cultural Boycott of Israel saying: “We doubt that you would have played in apartheid South Africa; likewise, artists refuse to play in apartheid Israel.”
However, following her Friday tweet, the pressure group took to social media to welcome Lana’s decision to pull out form the festival and encourage the 50-plus acts on the Meteor bill, including A$SAP Ferg, Pusha T, Ariel Pink and Rhye, to “respect our nonviolent picket line.”
