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Pink fired back at critics after she accused woke rapper Macklemore of crossing a line over his anti-Israel tirade while opening for Ed Sheeran at MetLife Stadium last weekend.
Macklemore, whose real name is Benjamin Hammond Haggerty, called to “Free Palestine” and accused Israel of committing genocide before he performed his song “Hind’s Hall” during the Sept. 4 and 5 concerts in New Jersey.
Macklemore’s performance also featured a slideshow played on the screen behind him, showing footage from the war in Gaza.
Pink reshared a video that featured the “Thrift Shop” rapper’s set from StopAntisemitism on Instagram, which criticized Macklemore and called for him to be removed from Sheeran’s Loop Tour.
The post sparked a backlash against Pink, as fans accused her of seemingly being pro-Israel. The “Just Give Me a Reason” singer responded in a powerful statement on Instagram Friday.
“I’ve been quiet in my own words for a week, which you know isn’t like me. So here they are,” the “Just Give Me a Reason” singer wrote on Instagram Friday.
“I was born a Jew,” she said. “I didn’t pick it, and I’ve never hidden it. And this week a whole lot of people decided what I believe without asking me, without checking a single thing I’ve ever said or done, because a repost and the word ‘Jew’ were apparently enough to fill in the rest. But let me fill it in… myself.”
Pink, real name Alecia Moore, clarified where she stood on the Gaza war.
“Of course I don’t speak for Israel, or for any government. I never have,” she said.
“What I said in October 2023 is still exactly what I believe: Hamas is a terrorist organization. Palestinians deserve a future that honors their humanity and their aspirations. Protecting innocent life comes first, everywhere, and nobody should ever celebrate the death of a child. Anybody’s child.”
Pink stressed that her objection was not to the phrase “Free Palestine,” but to Macklemore himself.
She recalled cheering him on when he performed “Same Love” at the 2014 Grammys, but said that four months later, “Macklemore put on a hooked nose, a black beard and a bowl cut, performed in it, and called it a ‘random costume.’”
“Every Jew I know knew exactly what it was. The same love, it turned out, had a guest list, and we weren’t on it. But he apologized, and I let it go, because that’s what we do. We let it go,” she said.
“Then last weekend he stood in front of a stadium full of music-loving families, with violent images from a war on the screens, dedicated a song to the movement of his choice, and then took the mic to tell all of the Jews in the stadium that it wasn’t about them.”
“You don’t get to decide that for us,” she added.
Pink said she was “scared” by Macklemore’s comments and wanted to say so as a Jewish mother.
“What I need is to be able to say, as a Jewish mom, ‘that scared me, and it scared people I love,’ without being told our fear is just propaganda, and without being told I’m somehow cool with genocide because I noticed?” she said.
Pink stressed that she does not want Macklemore fired or silenced.
“I have never asked for another artist to be silenced and I’m not asking now,” she wrote. “I don’t need anyone fired, and I don’t need a refund.”
The pop star also pointed to her history of political activism, including her 2006 song “Dear Mr. President,” which addressed the Iraq War.
“I have stood up for other people’s people my whole career, and I know exactly what it costs,” she said. “And now I’m standing up for my own people, and I thought I knew going in how lonely that would be. And it’s lonelier than that. But I’m doing it anyway.”
“Something has changed in this country, and I can read it in my own comments. ‘From the river to the sea.’ ‘Zionist,’ spat like it’s a slur, by people who couldn’t tell you the details of what I believe, because I hadn’t told them yet. I wasn’t asked. I was told. I don’t think most of them hate Jews. I think somebody handed them a story where the Jew who won’t apologize for existing must be the villain, and they’ve been putting words in my mouth ever since.”
Pink said she would continue speaking out.
“To the ones who are furious with me: you don’t have to agree with me,” she wrote. “You never did. That’s been our unspoken agreement for twenty-five years, and it still stands, and so do I.
“You don’t have to agree with one thing Israel’s government does to not want the Jewish family two rows down from you to be scared or targeted at a concert. That’s the only thing I’m asking anybody for.”
Macklemore has stood by his remarks, sharing a video of his speech on Instagram and explaining that he chose to tour with Sheeran partly so he could say “Free Palestine” in front of a large audience.
“Wanting all humans to be treated equal should never be controversial,” he wrote in his caption.
The Israeli-American Council also launched a petition calling for Macklemore to be removed from the next eight US stadium shows he is scheduled to open for Sheeran through early November.
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