Madonna, U2 is expressed on the humanitarian crisis in Gaza

Madonna and U2 each drew attention to the Gaza humanitarian crisis, among the biggest music stars to do so since the war in the Palestinian enclave began at the end of 2023 after the deadly outburst of Hamas in southern Israel.

Interval statements have taken different forms.

Madonna’s post on Instagram was an open letter to Pope Leo XIV, calling the American pontiff to “please go to Gaza and bring your light to children before it is too late”.

“The children of the world belong to everyone,” said the Superstar Pop. “You are the only one of us not to be denied entry. We need the humanitarian doors to be completely open to save these innocent children.”

U2, on the other hand, in a joint statement published on Sunday, said that “the blocking of humanitarian aid and now provides for military control of Gaza City has put the conflict in an unexplored territory”.

The press release was accompanied by declarations of each member of the group, with the man with a bono front saying that the “images of hungry children” recalled his stay in Ethiopia 40 years ago in the middle of the famine of this country. He also condemned the attack led by Hamas against the Nova Music Festival as “evil”.

Israel launched its air and land offensive on Gaza after Hamas activists broke into southern Israel on October 7, 2023, killing 1,200 people and taking 251 others hostage. After previous repatriations and deaths, the government of Benjamin Netanyahu thinks that some 50 Israeli hostages remain in Gaza, with around twenty people still alive.

The subsequent military aggression of Israel saw more than 61,000 Palestinians killed, according to the Gaza Ministry of Health.

The ministry said last week that around 200 Palestinians died of hunger in Gaza since the start of the war, almost half of whom were children. And the World Health Organization recently declared that in July only almost 12,000 children under the age of five were identified as acute malnutrition in Gaza – the highest registered monthly figure.

Governments and aid organizations have also condemned the murders increasingly seen this summer from the Palestinians gathered in the aid distribution places.

‘Everyone suffers’

In her comments, Madonna stressed that she was not “taking sides” in the conflict.

“Everyone suffers. Including mothers of hostages,” she wrote. “I also pray for them to be released. I just try to do what I can to prevent these children from starving.”

The Pope recently renewed his appeal to an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, asking the international community to respect humanitarian laws and the obligation to protect civilians.

U2 – The singer Bono, guitarist The Edge, the bass player Adam Clayton and the drummer Larry Mullen – are not foreign to the use of music to promote the causes, having participated in the 1980s in Aid Live for famine relief in Africa, artists united against apartheid in South Africa and various international concerts of Amnesty.

In his individual declaration, The Edge directed his comments to Netanyahu, claiming that the more war had continued, Israel was likely to become isolated, of distrust and not to remember as a paradise of persecution, but as a state which, when it provoked, systematically persecuted a neighboring civilian population “.

“We know by our own experience in Ireland that peace is not made by domination,” he said, a reference to the problems of several decades in Northern Ireland who killed more than 3,500 people in Great Britain and Ireland between the late 1960s and the late 1990s, including civilian and British military staff.

Bono added that the group was in solidarity with “the people of Palestine who really seek a path to peace and coexistence with Israel and with their legitimate and legitimate request of state”, as well as “the remaining hostages and argue that someone rational negotiates his release”.

While a certain number of musicians were one of the artists calling for a ceasefire just a few weeks after Israel began his military campaign, when the war has dragged, he became more and more vocal, with the provocative statements of the ball joint and Bob Vylan this year leading to a vigorous debate on freedom of expression.

Other acts have struggled not to cause. Recognizing the “humanitarian catastrophe that takes place in Gaza” in May, the singer of Radiohead, Thom Yorke, said that he was dismayed by “the witch hunters of social media on each side, to pressurize the artists and from whom they feel … To make declarations, etc., do very little, except to increase tension, fear and over-simplification of what are complex problems”.

Music producer Brian Eno is part of a group of artists, including members of the Palestinian diaspora, organizing a concert at the Wembley stadium in London on September 17. The Ensemble for Palestine has announced its first program last week, with all the profits that support the organizations led by the Palestinian offering humanitarian relief in Gaza.