Daniel Barenboim calls on Israel to lift siege of Gaza
NewsThe veteran musician tonight issued a notably one-sided statement:
I have followed the events of the weekend with horror and the utmost worry as I see the situation in Israel/Palestine worsening to unimaginable depths. Hamas’ attack on the Israeli civilian population is an outrageous crime which I condemn fiercely. The death of so many in southern Israel and Gaza is a tragedy that will loom for a long time to come. The extent of this human tragedy is not only in lives lost but also hostages taken, homes destroyed, and communities devastated. An Israeli siege on Gaza constitutes a policy of collective punishment, which is a violation of human rights.
Edward Said and I always believed that the only path to peace between Israel and Palestine is a path based on humanism, justice, equality and an end to the occupation rather than military action, and I find myself today grounded in this belief more strongly than ever. In these trying times and with these words I stand in solidarity with all victims and their families.
Barenboim makes no appeal to the Gaza authorities to release 150 innocent hostages, including several children. His bias has never been clearer in relation to the Israel-Palestine conflict. This ill-considered statement of his does nothing for the cause of peace or for the prospect of a ceasefire.
COMMENT: Why Barenboim is tone-deaf on Gaza
Barenboim’s photo is in Wikipedia under “self hating jew”. This should come as no surprise. I don’t think he will be making any appearances with the Israel Phil after the war…he would be booed off the stage.
Daniel Barenboim is a great musician and Edward Said was a music critic. As for their opinions, I care not.
“Edward Said was a music critic”? Seriously? Run that one by Columbia or Yale where he was a tenured professor. Do you have any idea of his body of work as an author and scholar? Trust me, nothing to do with music criticism.
He was a published music critic as well, though it was never anything more than a sideline.
He wrote classical music reviews for the Nation and possibly elsewhere.
Albert Einstein played the violin. It’s not why he won the Nobel Prize.
Peace between Israel and Palestine is now officially dead. The Palestinians brought all this on themselves (by getting behind Hamas) and now have no right to go about whimpering. Es ist vorbei and Barenboim knows it.
Yes, the Palestinian children really did bring extermination upon themselves – you think? And perhaps the Israelis who have treated the Palestinians with contempt might also have perhaps brought something on themselves?
He is only a musician of course, but still – his incredible naïveté and his apparent ignorance (unless it is willful perversion) of that region’s history, much of which is quite recent, are astonishing.
While I appreciate the posting, I disagree with the conclusion. Daniel Barenboim is asking for PEACE and protection of human beings, whether they are artificially classified as “Israelis” or “Palestinians”. They are still human beings.
There are innocent humans in both sides of this war, and they all deserve the protections of the international community, on both sides of that border.
Barenboim is not addressing details of military and paramilitary actions from either side, except where expectations tied to a major country with international respect are concerned.
As is the case with Russia v Ukraine, there are far too many people jumping at the opportunity to exercise their hate for others, and see this new situation as justifying their bigotry.
Barenboim is correct to remind us that we all must support peace and a permanent resolution to this conflict, and did so within the confines of a Facebook post, not an comprehensive article or encyclopedic book which could cover all details.
Long live the peace makers.
Putting it in capital letters doesn’t make it any more naive. There are times when peace is neither possible nor desirable. We can all list plenty of other such historical instances if we try hard enough. I don’t need to do it for you.
Daniel Barenboim is towering figure in the world of classical music. His efforts in organizing the very competent West-Divan orchestra is an example of his humanism and world citizenship. If one has never walked in his shoes then their criticism has little weight. He is a fine human regardless of his views by these shallow critics.
Equating himself with Edward Said speaks volumes about how he sees himself. Just shut up. You’re a musician, not God.
Barenboim and Said were good friends, they found the West-Eastern Divan orchestra together. You can blame DB of lot of things, but he is perfectly justified to quote Said here.
How on earth is this one sided, he literally said he condemns the Hamas attacks AND them having taken hostages. His plea is not for forgiveness of Hamas but for the senseless killing to come to an end. That obviously includes Hamas’ violence and terrorism. In no way is he suggesting that Israel acquiesce and let their citizens be slaughtered. Put more effort in next time, this is not journalism.
Daniel Barenboim has a deeper understanding and more moral authority to discuss the situation than almost anyone else.
No surprise here, it is typical of the equivocal statements with which Mr. Barenboim has entertained us for the past 40 years. I wish he would have had the backbone to actually clearly distinguish between the pure evil that Hamas represents and Israel’s sovereign right to defend itself against these forces of brutal obscurantism.
It is indeed a one-sided statement. A statement that’s on the right side. We’re not seeing many of those.
Well spoken, Maestro Barenboim.
Your voice of wisdom, understanding and humanity is needed more than ever.
Maestro Barenboim is a magnanimous, magnificent musician and a much needed elder statesman for our times.
This is actually one of the least one-sided statements on the matter that I’ve seen, condemning the attack by Hamas (which is indeed an outrageous crime) whilst also condemning the occupation by Israel (which is indeed, according to UN standards, a violiation of human rights). The fact that his statement doesn’t align with general (/your) opinion, doesn’t make it one-sided, does it?
How is Israel occupying Gaza? They withdrew in 2005 including 9,000 Israeli settlers. Gaza has had 15 years to improve their infrastructure, repair power plants, repair the airport, work on developing beach resorts for tourism. Instead most of their money goes into attacking Israel. As to the blockade, they have a border with Egypt. Why can’t they get everything from that border crossing?
I’m not following this closely but even I know that Israeli settlers are now aggressively trying to take over Palestinian lands. Israelis are not respecting the border.
How I wish artists would stop making statements regarding world affairs. They’re in such a bubble, they just can’t think properly.
Rubbish. You hear this all the time about actors and others whose work tends to be high profile. Everyone who has an opinion tends to have a job. Why are members of this career path excluded from being allowed to express their views? People are as informed as they are. And, agree or disagree with Barenboim, he does offer a considered view, not one just off the top of his head. He has as much right to weigh in on this or any other issue he has considered as anyone else.
Respectfully, EU authorities agree with Barenboim. Israel’s blockade of Gaza is a violation of international law.
https://www.reuters.com/world/eus-borrell-israel-has-adhere-international-law-2023-10-10/
Daniel Barenboim is a citizen of both Palestine and of Israel. Much of his life’s work has been dedicated to understanding both sides & to mediating this conflict with music. He gives neither side a free pass here.
I’d expect no less from him than this statement. Bravo.
I have never understood why people who are great musicians/actors/artists/etc. think they are wiser than the rest of us.
Who says they do? But they have just as much right to a point of view as “the rest of us,” and if their expressions get picked up, so be it.
Who says they do? But they have just as much right to a point of view as “the rest of us,” and if their expressions get picked up, so be it.
Edward Said and Daniel Barenboim. Yeah right. What about Hamas and Hezbollah? (Sound of crickets)
Listen up; the two-state solution is now dead and buried.
“only path to peace between Israel and Palestine is a path based on humanism, justice, equality”.
This is the infantile naivete of the western liberal, and westerners in general. It’s also suicidal against a mortal enemy that rejects all notions of western norms of behavior n warfare. You can’t defeat Attila the Hun through negotiations n wishing “can’t we all get along?” Unfortunately Israel’s hands are tied n can’t use Arab/Muslim methods to deal with Hamas, which is the only method they understand, n expect if they deal with other Arab/Muslims.
“Hamas’ attack on the Israeli civilian population is an outrageous crime which I condemn fiercely.”
“The extent of this human tragedy is not only in lives lost but also **hostages taken,** homes destroyed, and communities devastated.”
A clear condemnation of hostage-taking and with the implicit view that they should be released and all acts of violence ceased. So it seems relatively balanced to me. I’m sure that if specifically asked, he would advocate for the release of hostages along with an end to all acts of violence.
Barenboim should stay in his lane. His “path” has not avoided the untold human suffering of this past week and for the uncertain future.
Condolences, heartfelt as they may be, don’t fix anything. They are more for the conscience of consoler.
Barenboim is absolutely right.
The siege of Gaza and voluntary destruction of buildings will do sweet zilch to flush out the Hamas militia which commited those exactions in Israel & which have been fuelled by decades of abuse.
He can’t return the hostages so why should he comment on an issue which he can do nothing about?
+
It’s clear Israel has learnt nothing at all from many conflicts.
Bombing the daylights out of cities has only ever INCREASED resistance, as it did in England in 1940, Germany in 1944-45 & Leningrad in 1941-43.
A siege of Gaza will be totally counterproductive, and will bring other actors from all sides into the conflict.
It’s militarily just playing to the band leaders singing the songs of military hardware industrial complex, and will not return a single hostage.
Actually it’s a very balanced statement, unlike your commentary. Not everyone lives in a Zionist bubble, Norman. There is horror on both sides today and I’m glad a prominent Jewish cultural ambassador like Barenboim is saying that.
I remember last week, when Barenboim was merely a useful idiot, and not a full-blown traitor.
Good luck with that. His arrogance knows no bounds!
“Hamas’ attack on the Israeli civilian population is an outrageous crime which I condemn fiercely. The death of so many in southern Israel and Gaza is a tragedy that will loom for a long time to come”. i.e. NOT one-sided at all! Gaza has been an open-air prison for Palestinians for decades now, not justifying Hamas crimes but certainly guaranteeing them. That is all that Barenboim has ever said.
“Hamas’ attack on the Israeli civilian population is an outrageous crime which I condemn fiercely.”
That’s literally the second sentence. That you’re willing to lie about the statement everybody can read with their own eyes is quite something.
He’s a terrifically principled man. Unlike the editors of this page, he is able to see beyond his own cultual identity and recognize fiendishness where ever it exerts itself. Whether this post of mine will ever see the light if day, given the bias of NL and cohorts, matters little. At least some gatekeeper will see it and, before hitting delete, perhaps reflect for a second or two on the absence of rage on this site–on the zero calls for boycott of Israeli musicians–in the face of Israel’s systematic displacement, detainment and murder of the residents of Gaza over the decades.
Edward Said was a hate-filled anti-Semite. Barenboim’s relationship with him speaks volumes about his character. Great musician, appalling human being.
Edward Said was one of the great intellectuals of our generation. I’ve read much of his work & heard his lectures & my impression has been that of a brilliant mind seeking a feasible solution to this crisis.
And yes, of course, Edward Said was Palestinian/American. He often presented his views from that perspective. Such a voice is refreshing and gives balance to the very one-sided US media.
Just wait until you read about his love life.
One-sided?
He makes clear at the outset, “Hamas’ attack on the Israeli civilian population is an outrageous crime which I condemn fiercely.”
It’s unlikely the hundreds of thousands of ordinary Palestinians in Gaza had any foreknowledge or part in this surprise attack that eluded detection even by Israel’s immense security establishment, so “An Israeli siege on Gaza constitutes a policy of collective punishment, which is a violation of human rights” is a true statement.
It’s a balanced statement where no one involved wants balance. It doesn’t do anything to bring peace but it is silly to expect a statement by a symphony orchestra conductor to do that.
I can’t imagine what Hamas expected to accomplish with this attack that can’t possibly achieve any policy goal for the Palestinians… unless their hope, like that of the 9/11 planners, is to lure the West into a wider and exhausting quagmire.
Will we fall for it again?
Withholding food, water, and power from 2.3 million people is collective punishment and a violation of the Geneva Conventions. Hamas’ atrocities doesn’t create a permission structure for Israel to also ignore fundamental principals of human rights. And it’s also politically shortsighted of Israel. This week the whole world stands with them, but the world will eventually turn on them if civilian casualties surge.
Wait until you hear what the Americans did in Japan, if you think that’s outrageous! But it brought an end to the war and saved countless lives.
Why can’t they get their supplies via Egypt? Gaza has a border with Egypt & a border crossing there? Why is this never mentioned. It’s always “an Israeli blockade”.
Egypt wants nothing to do with the Palestinians, as Sissi has just made clear. They are always trouble.
Certainly his statement is no more ill-considered than your barely literate response. I am no particular fan of Barenboim (the one week I played under him he was a tremendous ass), but you’d have to engage in highly motivated analysis to perceive his statement as one-sided – you’ll hopefully notice that he condemns that he condemns the Hamas attack before mentioning the Israeli response. It’s plainly obvious that he is taking issue not with the fact that Israel responded but the nature of the response (and collective punishment is in fact against international human rights law). As to the Israeli hostages, surely when he referred to them as part of the human tragedy he was not suggesting that they continue to be held. Even if he did appeal directly to Hamas there is no reason to believe they’d care all that much if they even took notice. The only bias he could reasonably be convicted of here is a bias towards a systemic political solution rather than a military one. If that strikes you as an anti-Israeli bias, seeking help is advisable.
“Edward Said and I always believed”. Blather.
He’s right though: collective punishment is immoral, illegal and on top of that, ineffective. That is not a close call, but blatantly obvious. There is not a single credible ethical, legal, or political theory that supports it.
And all this coming from an army that claims to be among the most ethical and legally-minded in the world.
As for Hamas, same thing: the deliberate targeting of civilians is immoral and wrong. It’s not hard to condemn both…and Barenboim does.
Gaza authorities haven’t taken anyone hostage, Hamas has. Probably good to check your own bias and get your facts right before you accuse anyone of being one sided.
Hamas governs Gaza.
That’s correct Norman, the Hamas leaders do govern Gaza–
But they don’t live in Gaza! :
https://thearabweekly.com/hamas-leaders-seen-living-luxury-while-gazans-suffer
Indeed, Hamas won — with a plurality, not a majority — one election in Gaza, in 2006 and has never allowed another one.
A disgusting and revolting biased Barenboim. A great musician with political views and approach that with his experience can be either very naïf or extremely hypocrite, you choose. He declared again and again how Zionism is based on lies, how Israel has no right to exist and consequently no right to defense. His case is not the typical so called “self hating Jew”- it is merely self “GiudeoNazism”. It does not take a professional psychologist to see how his hate has first evolved simply because in Israel’s rich musical life the “sheriff” of classical music field has always been Zubin Mehta and not Barenboim. All the lies of his mentor for hate Edward Said are clearly debunked in this link of myth and facts regarding the Palestinian narrative https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/myths-and-facts-toc
Israel has no one to blame but itself. It’s all self-inflicted.
Of course Hamas and Hezbollah are terrorists, but Israel was complacent, lazy, and derailed.
Let’s go from the general to the specific:
1) For maintaining apartheid
Well, if you’re going to set up an apartheid system, then your intelligence and operational defenses better be top notch.
2) For systematic intelligence and operational failure.
It WAS top notch, Mossad was feared, then Israel got lazy and complacent.
I mean look at the photos, Hamas just went right up to the fence and rammed their way in. It’s like Medieval times when the enemy just marched up to your fort and started battering down your door.
If your billion dollar intelligence system couldn’t see an earth-mover truck driving down the road towards your fence, that is the very definition of systematic failure.
3) For electing Bibi.
When the citizens prefer a crooked corrupt politician who is focusing his entire energy only on weakening the judiciary so he can’t get prosecuted, he is not devoting energy to securing the defense of the country.
Please. Barenboim and Said worked out a nice little mutual aid society to build their cultural cachet and reputations as “Ambassadors” (Barf), with a conveniently unassailable little orchestra (underpaid) attached. Neither are/were qualified to comment on anything outside their bubble, and the polar reactions here are the exact, intended, and only possible product of such pompous blather. He should stick to what he’s good at – which at this point amounts to abusing musicians and extreme narcissism – and keep his fat, overpaid, liver-spotted mouth shut.
Barenboim has been a good musician but a consistently immoral, pompous, both cynical and naive self-hating Jew who is coddling anti-Semites and whitewashing terrorism. Any decent human being should shun him.
“An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth leaves everyone blind an toothless” comes to mind. Frightening to see that there are so many people, including Norman, who can twist a clear statement to suit their own bias and small-mindedness. This is exactly what has caused this kind of situation in the first place and what will continue to feed the flames! Someone who is unable to see human suffering on both sides of a conflict but rather think of monolithic blocks of people is just plain war mongering.
No more than 30% of Germans supported the Nazis, yet the allies bombed 100% of them. So it goes in Gaza – the majority of Gazans probably don’t support Hamas, but 100% of them will be starved under the siege. 2,000,000 people without food, water or electricity – all paying for the sins of their leaders.
I’m doubtful about the 30%, in Germany like in Gaza.
The majority of Gazans voted for Hamas. It is an immensely popular movement in the Arab world. A pizzeria owner in hawara displayed a huge picture of an elderly holocaust survivor – a hostage kept in gaza – next to his pizza as sense of humor for promoting his business in support of hammas.
His establishment is no longer.
Barenboim is irrelevant as a public speaker. Has been an irrelevant musician in the past decade. He should have vacated the stage gracefully. I liked his mozart piano recordings but that’s pretty much it.
His “biggest achievement”, the Divan “orchestra” is a failed experiment because it sounds like two orchestras playing together- a good one a bad one. All the hype he and Said drummed up never changed it. The audience couldn’t tell the difference and money poured in.
Yes, but you have to start somewhere, and that’s what the Divan orchestra is meant to do. The goal wasn’t to create another Vienna Philharmonic. It was to plant seeds of peace.
Spot on. The orchestra was no more than average but how they fawned over it…. a nice sacred cow for the tin-eared bien-pensant liberal
What makes Norman L a greater authority Than Daniel Barenboim on what is right and wrong? Daniel B takes a broad view of the situation, Norman L’s opinion is narrow and one sided. Meeting outrageous atrocity with more outrageous atrocity is hopeless.
And this is different from Nazi aspirations regarding the Jews how…?
Hamas spokesman Saleh al-Arouri said: “We do not target civilians, but there are ordinary individuals from Gaza who were able to enter settlements and capture civilians, but this was not part of our plan.”
So Hamas who usually uses children as human shield took it one step further and blamed the ordinary people of Gaza for the slaughter of women and children.
Such cowardice, at least Isis were proud of their crimes.
I hope former maestro Barenboim would try to wrap his corrupted head around that.
And why shouldn’t he. The world’s western media and Israeli media are happy to present a continuing one-sided version of events. Israel are not without fault in the horrific scenes we are witnessing in Gaza. A little more balance in coverage and comments would be appreciated. For instance, how many Brits know that the Israelis funded and armed the Argies to the teeth to kill British Servicemen in the Falklands War? These facts are always suppressed. Truth matters!
And why shouldn’t he? I respect Barenboim’s outlook and opinions on this matter more than anyone else commenting here. For the Israelis to insist that their aerial destruction of Gaza is to destroy Hamas is such an obvious lie when they are killing innocent Palestinians. Why are Israels deeds always covered up? Like the fact that they armed the Argies to the teeth to kill British Troops in the Falklands War? I think a little balance and accuracy is called for.
I admire you, Norman Lebrecht, for pointing out Barenboim’s idiotic reasoning. By writing from the heart, NL, you show you see the big picture. How can one make peace with someone who is intent in murdering you. If hamas and the PA want peace and disarm themselves, there will be peace. If Israel disarms, it ceases to exist. DB is plain wrong. He just wants a Nobel prize. A big name for himself- like the ridiculous megalomaniac piano he named after himself. Pathetic
Would be nice to hear Palestinian voices acknowledge Israel… They would be cast away…You need a few people step up and aknnowledge the opposite part, as Dany did. If everyone stays in his corner, nothing moves, and everything get worse. He s not the only voice but his minority position deserves to exist.
“But do you condemn Hamas and the taking of hostages? Oh, that was the first thing you did… Well let me tell you why your statement is still one-sided.”
How does one find the confidence to publish such an empty, yet so mistaken, single paragraph?
Dabiel Barenboim è una speranza per l’umanità. La nota a conclusione di questo articolo è offensiva