More than 400 artists launch the cultural boycott “No Music for Genocide”

More than 400 artists and labels-including Massive Attack, Rina Sawayama, Fontaines DC, Primal Scream, Mike or Japanese Breakfast-participate in No Music for Genocide, an international campaign calling for geo-blocating the dissemination of their music in Israel. Objective: to denounce the “genocide in Gaza”, the occupation in the West Bank and the “Art-Washing” of a state accused of crimes against humanity.

Independent or under major, the signatories have either restricted their exit territories, or asked their labels to do so. They also urge Sony, Universal and Warner to follow the example, recalling that these giants had suspended their activities in Russia in 2022. The list of supports illustrates the extent of the movement: from the independent scene (Eartheater, Kneecap, Nadah El Shazly) to the figures established as a massive Attack or Primal Scream. All say they want to transform their anger into a concrete gesture. “Culture cannot stop the bombs, but it can refuse the normalization of the unacceptable,” sums up the collective.

This mobilization echoes other international actions: in Spain, ships and planes to Israel have been prohibited; In Morocco, dockers have refused to load weapons. It also extends the commitment of film and theater artists, such as the film Workers for Palestine, which calls for a collaboration with Israeli institutions.

This cultural boycott revives the memory of anti-apartheid struggles against South Africa in the 1980s, when music, sport and cinema had helped to isolate the racist regime. At a time when bombing on Gaza arouses a feeling of helplessness, this gesture of artists from around the world aims to break the ordinary of cultural consumption. This initiative underlines the ethical dimension of the artistic gesture: to refuse that art serves as a showcase for a state leading a genocidal war. It is also an invitation to coherence: what the large platforms and majors had deemed legitimate against Moscow must be just as much against Tel Aviv.