EXCLUSIVE...Pink Floyd's Roger Waters Speaks Out in Support of GFM March, Blasts Israeli-Egyptian "Siege" of Gaza

EXCLUSIVE...Pink Floyd's Roger Waters Speaks Out in Support of Gaza Freedom March, Blasts Israeli-Egyptian "Siege" of Gaza

In a Democracy Now! exclusive interview, British musician Roger Waters of the iconic rock band Pink Floyd speaks out about the Gaza Freedom March. “I actually would be very interested to hear what the President of the United States has to say about this nonviolent, democratic demonstration of ordinary people from forty-two countries all over the world,” says Waters. “They feel solidarity with their brothers and sisters, other human beings who are living in conditions that none of us would stand for, for a single second, in any of our countries.” [includes rush transcript]

Guest:

Roger Waters, Pink Floyd band member. Recorded by Miguel Nogueira of Multimind inc

AMY GOODMAN: We turn now to the world famous British musician Roger Waters. He’s best known as a founding member, bassist, singer, songwriter for the iconic rock band called Pink Floyd. The band is perhaps best known for their record The Wall.

Well, Roger Waters is also a supporter of the Gaza Freedom March and an outspoken critic of Israel’s separation wall with the West Bank and the underground wall Egypt’s building with Gaza that Ali Abunimah was just talking about.

Democracy Now!’s Miguel Nogueira spoke with Roger Waters this weekend and asked him about Gaza.

ROGER WATERS: We implore the Egyptian government to allow this peaceful, nonviolent protest at the siege of this country to proceed. I have a feeling they will. This again points to the power, or the potential power, of this demonstration. I think the Egyptian government may find that if they deny this due process of the rights of human beings to peacefully protest when they see a crime being committed, then they will find themselves on very dangerous shifting sands and put into a very difficult position themselves. So this again speaks to the fact that the organizing committee of the Freedom March on Gaza have already achieved—even before they start, they’ve achieved, to some extent, their aim, because this is becoming big news around the world, and it will become bigger and bigger news.


And if, as we all hope, they actually make it across the border and they meet with Palestinians, I think it’s hard to imagine what an amazing surge of hope that could engender in the hearts of the Palestinian people who actually meet with them and get to talk to people from the outside, and so on and so forth, and for them to understand that we have not forgotten them.


We saw a year ago, when the Israelis invaded and razed Gaza practically to the ground, although I know what happened there, as well as it is possible, because I pay attention, most of the media in the US and in the UK really played it down. Otherwise, if they hadn’t played it down, it seems impossible that the uprising of shock and horror at what was done to the Palestinians in Gaza a year ago would have entirely demanded that the US government and the UK government take action and impose some kind of sanctions on the Israelis, or something, or at least say something, deplore the action, or do something. What actually happened, of course, is that when the Goldstone report came out, they sort of went, “Oh, well, maybe this guy is a bit strange, and we don’t”—you know? There is a huge and unfathomable tendency to want this problem to go away. And this is too difficult for us to deal with, and it would mean us actually confronting our Israeli allies.


I actually would be very interested to hear what the President of the United States has to say about this nonviolent, democratic demonstration of ordinary people from forty-two countries all over the world marching into a very uncomfortable place because they feel solidarity with their brothers and sisters, other human beings who are living in conditions that none of us would stand for, for a single second, in any of our countries. So I hope Barack Obama will respond to this, and I hope he makes a statement about it. And I hope he will come out and support this march. And I hope he will come out and say, “Listen, this siege of this country is illegal, and we must support—we must support the law. We must support the rights that human beings have under the law.”

AMY GOODMAN: Roger Waters of Pink Floyd.

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