Macklemore makes promise in new statement after Ed Sheeran’s support acts quit tour
Macklemore has issued a new statement after all of Ed Sheeran’s support acts and his own band quit his Loop Tour.
Macklemore previously shared on Instagram that he had been removed from the remaining US dates of Sheeran's string of concerts after he used the platform to draw attention to the atrocities taking place in Gaza, telling the crowd: "Free Palestine."
Sheeran, who has already lost hundreds of thousands of social media followers, later responded, saying he is 'appalled by the conflict between Israel and Palestine' and 'the suffering and pain caused on both sides is a human tragedy'.
He insisted that Macklemore's removal from the tour was not his own decision, but that of his promoters.
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Sheeran also said that venues hosting the upcoming shows had told him they would no longer allow the concerts to take place if Macklemore remained on the bill.
The singer added in his statement: "I am not complicit. I have my personal views on this devastating conflict. Just because I choose not to speak publicly, it doesn't mean I don't have them, and it doesn't mean I don't care.
"Nor does it mean I don't support causes in my own, personal way."
Macklemore has now issued a new statement to his 8.4 million followers on Instagram, sharing that he will be donating all of his earnings from Sheeran's tour to organisations working to support the Palestinian people.
The statement begins: "With everything that has happened over the last 48 hours, I want to bring the conversation back to where it belongs: to the Palestinian people who are still being killed, still living under military occupation, and still fighting for their freedom.
"I will be donating the entire $1 million of my net earnings from Ed Sheeran's Loop Tour to six organisations working directly to support the Palestinian people.
"And I invite Robert Kraft to match my donation. Whatever we disagree about, perhaps we can agree on this: Palestinian lives are worth protecting. A Palestinian life is no less valuable than any other life on this earth."
He continued: "That is what this has always been about. Not me. Not a tour. Not the headlines or the controversy. It is about Palestinians' right to freedom, dignity and safety in their own homeland.
"I want to centre the parents carrying their children into hospitals without the basic resources to treat them, and the physicians, paramedics, journalists and aid workers who keep going back in. I want to centre the organisers and activists who have paid real costs for standing with Palestine. Their risk is of a far different order than mine.
"Just yesterday, 15-year-old Muhammad al Zinati was killed in an Israeli strike while rushing to help aid worker Sherif Lubbad, who had already been injured. He was a child. Both were murdered. Both should be alive.
"And the ones still under the rubble, whose names exist only in the memories of people who may not have survived to speak them.
"Writing a check is one of the least costly forms of solidarity available to me. I am doing it because I can, and because these organisations are doing the work while much of the world debates it."
Macklemore then stressed that 'aid alone cannot address the conditions that make it necessary' and that this 'is a manmade injustice, and I believe it requires immediate political change'.
"Palestinians have lived for decades without basic rights and should not have to wait another day to be free," he added. "That is where my focus will remain. I will continue to stand with the Palestinian people and their fight for liberation."
He concluded: "When the news cycle moves on, which it will, don't move with it. Free Palestine."
In the caption of the statement post, Macklemore tagged the six organisations he donated to, inviting others to also do so if able to.
The organisations include:
- PCRF - Palestine Children’s Relief Fund
- HEAL Palestine
- Gaza Soup Kitchen
- Medical Aid for Palestinians
- UNRWA USA National Committee Inc.
- Anera
Sheeran's three other support acts on the US tour, as well as his backing band - Irish singer-songwriter Aaron Rowe, American musician Finneas, who is Billie Eilish’s brother, Lukas Graham, and Irish band Beoga - have issued their own respective social media statements.
"As Irish people, we know all too well about genocide, forced famine and violent occupation," Rowe wrote. "I cannot stand by and allow billionaires to use their position of power to silence the rightful voices of those who speak up against Israeli genocide and who highlight the savage murder of children."
"Artists must not be silenced when they speak up for the oppressed," Finneas added. "I have decided to withdraw from my upcoming tour dates with Ed Sheeran. I stand with Palestine and its people."
Graham penned: "Money doesn't give you the right to own the conversation. Nobody's bank balance should decide who gets to speak or which suffering we're allowed to acknowledge."
"We are a traditional Irish band who never saw ourselves playing in stadiums of that size, and that opportunity is not lost on us," Sheeran's backing band Beoga wrote.
"We believe in dialogue as a means of progressing the plight of the Palestinian people."
Rhiannon Ingle