Jewish-American reggae star Matisyahu spoke out on Sunday about his widely reported performance at the Rototom Sunsplash festival in Spain last week, saying he felt the audience was full of hatred.

“People were standing on each other’s shoulders with [Palestinian] flags giving me the middle finger. It was intense,” he said, in an interview with The Daily Beast. “It was not peaceful. It was like ‘F*** you, Matisyahu.’ I’ve never had the experience of anything like that, as a Jew or anything in my life.”

Rototom organizers originally canceled Matisyahu’s concert after he refused to publicly endorse the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement and sign a letter of support for Palestinian statehood. Later, at the behest of the Spanish government, and following outrage from Jewish groups, the concert organizers issued a public apology to the singer, and invited him back to perform.

Matisyahu was the only artist scheduled to perform at Rototom who was called on to make a public statement on a political issue. When asked if he thought being singled out with the demand constituted antisemitism, Matisyahu told The Daily Beast, “Absolutely. That was the first thing I said in the first email I wrote back to them.”

He said the incident was his first encounter with antisemitism.

 More here.

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