Radiohead singer Thom Yorke briefly left the stage during his solo tour of Australia after an exchange with an audience member who heckled him while protesting the deaths in Gaza.
Videos posted online by spectators at the Melbourne concert on Wednesday showed a man in the crowd shouting at Yorke. Even if not all of his words are heard, he calls on the singer to “condemn the Israeli genocide in Gaza”.
Yorke responds by telling the heckler to “get on stage” to make his remarks.
“Don't stand there like a coward, come here and say it. Do you want to piss on everyone at night? Okay, you do it, see you later,” Yorke continues, before removing his guitar and stopping his set.
His exit came after the heckler repeated his call and added “how many dead children will it take”.
Segments of the crowd could be heard booing the disruption, and Yorke returned to applause shortly after to play Radiohead's song Karma Police.
Elly Brus, a concert regular, said the protester “didn't have the support” of the crowd at the Sidney Myer Music Bowl.
“He was escorted by security. He then continued to engage with people outside the room,” she told the BBC.
Israel launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to the group's unprecedented attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023, which killed around 1,200 people and saw another 251 taken hostage.
Since then, more than 43,160 people have been killed in Gaza, including thousands of women and children, according to the Hamas-run territory's health ministry.
Both sides deny accusations that they violated the laws of war.
In the past, Radiohead has faced pressure to cancel shows in Israel and participate in a cultural boycott of the country over its policies towards the Palestinians.
Yorke pushed back against this pressure, saying that “playing in a country is not the same as supporting its government.”
“We have been playing in Israel for over 20 years through a succession of governments, some more liberal than others,” Yorke said in a statement in 2017, defending the decision to go ahead with a planned concert in Tel Aviv.
“We don't support (Israeli Prime Minister) Netanyahu any more than we support Trump, but we still play in America. Music, art and academia are about crossing borders, not building them,” he added. the era.
Earlier this year, pro-Palestinian activists also accused Yorke's band member Jonny Greenwood of “art washing” for performing alongside Israeli-Arab musician Dudu Tassa in Tel Aviv.
“No art is as 'important' as ending all the death and suffering around us,” Greenwood said in a statement on X.
“But… silencing Israeli artists because they were born Jewish in Israel does not seem to be a way to reach an agreement between the two sides in this seemingly endless conflict.”
The BBC has contacted representatives for Yorke's Australian tour. Arts Center Melbourne, which oversees the Sidney Myer Music Bowl, declined to comment.
