Sep 26 2008
Paul McCartney Performs in Tel Aviv
I’m not a big Paul McCartney fan. After, all, rock-n-roll’s been going downhill since Buddy Holley died, right? (I think he was in a few bands and did a few albums since his glory days with the Beatles, but I may be wrong.)
Anyway, Sir Paul braved the death threats from whacko islamists and gave a concert in Israel:
There have already been specific threats against McCartney’s concert in Israel. Omar Bakri Mohammed, the radical Muslim preacher based in Lebanon after being banned from Britain, said recently that suicide bombers could attack the gig in protest against the singer’s patronage of Israel. He declared McCartney to be “the enemy of every Muslim”.
“If he values his life, Mr McCartney must not come to Israel. He will not be safe there. The sacrifice operatives will be waiting for him,” the hardline preacher told the Sunday Express.
Gotta love those ’sacrifice operatives’ from the religion of peace. But he held firm and performed in Tel Aviv in honor of Israel’s 60th anniversary as a free and sovereign nation.
Paul McCartney gave his first concert in Israel on Thursday before tens of thousands of cheering fans, 43 years after the Beatles were barred from singing there because of fears they could corrupt youngsters. McCartney opened the Tel Aviv gig with Beatles song “Hello Goodbye,” and addressed the 40,000 fans in Hebrew and Arabic as well as English throughout the evening. “Shalom Tel Aviv!” he said, using the Hebrew word for “peace” and “hello.” The ex-Beatle also wished the crowd a happy new year in Hebrew ahead of Jewish celebrations next week and wished Muslims a good Ramadan, the month of fasting, in Arabic.
Among the favorites were “Give Peace a Chance” and “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band,” the closing number. McCartney’s visit to Israel prompted a fresh wave of Beatlemania, with radio stations playing the band’s tunes almost non-stop in the past few days. “All we need is peace in the region and a two-state solution,” McCartney told reporters and tourists outside the Bethlehem shrine revered as the site of Jesus’s birth. “I am bringing a message of peace and I think that’s what the region needs. It’s my own small way I can bring my message.”
I guess he’s trying to be a politician as well, but he deserves credit for not letting himself be railroaded by the anti-Israel crowd.
