{"id":75697,"date":"2023-07-28T11:01:01","date_gmt":"2023-07-28T16:01:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/?p=75697"},"modified":"2023-07-28T11:01:01","modified_gmt":"2023-07-28T16:01:01","slug":"sinead-oconnor-was-once-attacked-by-itamar-ben-gvir-over-a-planned-israel-concert-for-peace","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/sinead-oconnor-was-once-attacked-by-itamar-ben-gvir-over-a-planned-israel-concert-for-peace\/","title":{"rendered":"Sinead O\u2019Connor was once attacked by Itamar Ben-Gvir over a planned Israel concert for peace"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By ANDREW LAPIN<\/p>\n<p>(JTA) \u2013 Over the course of Irish pop singer Sinead O\u2019Connor\u2019s career, she made her fair share of enemies \u2014 most notably the Catholic Church, after she ripped up a picture of the pope on \u201cSaturday Night Live.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>But five years after that incident, she also found herself in the crosshairs of Israel\u2019s future national security minister.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_75698\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/GettyImages-1735317-scaled.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-75698\" class=\"wp-image-75698 size-medium lazyload\" data-src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/GettyImages-1735317-300x195.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"195\" data-srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/GettyImages-1735317-300x195.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/GettyImages-1735317-1024x666.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/GettyImages-1735317-768x500.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/GettyImages-1735317-1536x999.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/GettyImages-1735317-2048x1333.jpg 2048w\" data-sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" style=\"--smush-placeholder-width: 300px; --smush-placeholder-aspect-ratio: 300\/195;\" \/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-75698\" class=\"wp-image-75698 size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/GettyImages-1735317-300x195.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"195\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/GettyImages-1735317-300x195.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/GettyImages-1735317-1024x666.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/GettyImages-1735317-768x500.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/GettyImages-1735317-1536x999.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/07\/GettyImages-1735317-2048x1333.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/noscript><\/a><\/p>\n<p id=\"caption-attachment-75698\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Irish singer Sinead O&#8217;Connor sings in concert January 18, 2003 at The Point Theatre in Dublin, Ireland. (Getty Images)<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>O\u2019Connor, who died this week at age 56, had in 1997 planned to perform a concert in Jerusalem sponsored by a women-led activist group promoting peace between Israel and the Palestinians. But she canceled the show after receiving scores of death threats from right-wing Israelis \u2014 led by Itamar Ben-Gvir, who today is a key figure in the country\u2019s far-right coalition pushing a contentious series of judicial reforms into law.<\/p>\n<p>At the time, Ben-Gvir was not accepted in mainstream Israeli politics but was instead an anti-Arab provocateur and protege of extremist Rabbi Meir Kahane, who advocated for racist policies. The 21-year-old was also an outspoken admirer of Baruch Goldstein, the U.S.-born physician who had murdered 29 Palestinians in Hebron three years prior.<\/p>\n<p>Ben-Gvir and his cohort, who believed Israel should give no land to the Palestinians, opposed O\u2019Connor\u2019s concert (part of a festival called \u201cSharing Jerusalem: Two Capitals for Two States\u201d to be performed in the aftermath of the Oslo Accords) for its promotion of coexistence. And he insulted the singer in colorful, vulgar terms on Israeli radio.<\/p>\n<p>O\u2019Connor, he said, was a \u201csinger who preaches and calls for the division of Jerusalem and who spreads gentile culture,\u201d adding that she \u201chas no place in Israel.\u201d While Ben-Gvir denied issuing the death threats, he viewed his group\u2019s pressure campaign on the singer as successful after she pulled out of the festival.<\/p>\n<p>Also opposing the festival was then-Jerusalem mayor Ehud Olmert, who would later go on to become Israel\u2019s prime minister from 2006-09. Olmert called it a \u201cprovocation\u201d and suggested that the concert had actually been canceled due to poor ticket sales, according to a Jewish Telegraphic Agency report at the time.<\/p>\n<p>O\u2019Connor later went after Ben-Gvir directly in an open letter. \u201cGod does not reward those who bring terror to the children of the world,\u201d she wrote. \u201cSo you have succeeded in nothing but your soul\u2019s failure.\u201d Supporters of hers in Israel also took to the streets to back her over Ben-Gvir.<\/p>\n<p>Fifteen years later, O\u2019Connor was again conflicted over a scheduled performance in Israel after learning that pro-Palestinian activists were pressuring her and other artists to boycott the country. But she criticized both sides of the debate, noting that she was the sole breadwinner for her family and had a responsibility to support them.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI do not appreciate being bullied by anyone on either side of this debate any more than I appreciate not being properly informed by my booking agent of the potential ramifications of accepting work in war zones,\u201d she wrote in a statement on her website that she later deleted.<\/p>\n<p>After her death, Ben-Gvir\u2019s office denied this week he had ever threatened her and said he would remember her \u201cfavorably because of the difficult life she lived.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>O\u2019Connor, whose biggest hit was her 1990 cover of Prince\u2019s \u201cNothing Compares 2 U,\u201d struggled with mental health issues throughout her life. After speaking out against abuse in the Catholic Church, she later converted to Islam.<\/p>\n<div style=\"padding-bottom:20px; padding-top:10px;\" class=\"hupso-share-buttons\"><!-- Hupso Share Buttons - https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/ --><a class=\"hupso_toolbar\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" data-src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" class=\"lazyload\" \/><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\"\/><\/noscript><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">var hupso_services_t=new Array(\"Twitter\",\"Facebook\",\"Google Plus\",\"Pinterest\",\"Linkedin\",\"Tumblr\",\"Email\");var hupso_background_t=\"#EAF4FF\";var hupso_border_t=\"#66CCFF\";var hupso_toolbar_size_t=\"medium\";var hupso_image_folder_url = \"\";var hupso_url_t=\"\";var hupso_title_t=\"Sinead%20O%E2%80%99Connor%20was%20once%20attacked%20by%20Itamar%20Ben-Gvir%20over%20a%20planned%20Israel%20concert%20for%20peace\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/js\/share_toolbar.js\"><\/script><!-- Hupso Share Buttons --><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":75698,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,7137],"tags":[8790,8795,8788,13234],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75697"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75697"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75697\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":75699,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75697\/revisions\/75699"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/75698"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75697"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75697"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75697"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}