Rapper Macklemore dropped from Ed Sheeran tour after anti-Israel rhetoric at concerts

American rapper Macklemore was dropped from musician Ed Sheeran’s tour after anti-Israel rhetoric at previous concerts.

In a post on Instagram on Monday, he said: “Ed Sheeran and his team have made the decision to remove me from the Loop tour.”

Macklemore, 43, opened for the English singer-songwriter earlier this month at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey when he chanted “Free Palestine” and accused Israel of apartheid and genocide, the Jewish Journal of Greater Boston reported.

“There was a pre-planned video with IDF soldiers as Nazis,” concertgoer Lauren Chizner told CBS News.

In a video posted on X by Macklemore showing him speaking to the MetLife crowd, he said: “One of the reasons why I wanted to come on this tour was because I wanted to stand up here on stages and stadiums across America and say two words that are near and dear to my heart: Free Palestine.”

He told Jewish crowd members that criticizing Israel was not a criticism of the Jewish people.

The Israeli American Council called on Sheeran to remove Macklemore from his tour. “Do not allow your stage to be used to divide people or spread one-sided political propaganda,” the group wrote on Instagram.

The group started a petition to have Macklemore removed from the tour.

“The question is where the line should be drawn when an opening act uses a global concert platform to advance a one-sided political agenda,” it said online.

“This becomes even more troubling when the message relies on selective imagery, biased messaging, and disputed claims presented to a massive audience as fact, without context or complexity.”

American singer Pink, who is Jewish, later commented on what happened at MetLife.

“I have never asked for another artist to be silenced and I’m not asking now. I don’t need anyone fired, and I don’t need a refund,” she wrote.

“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 recalled when Macklemore dressed up as what appeared to be a caricature of a Jewish person in 2014, by putting on “a hooked nose, a black beard and a bowl cut, performed in it, and called it a ‘random costume.'”

It was slammed by critics at the time, who called it antisemitic. Macklemore later apologized.

Pink said she “let it go…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.”

She added: “You don’t get to decide that for us.”

In his Instagram post on Monday, the rapper said that neither he, Sheeran nor Pink were victims. He said the real victims are the Palestinian people.

Robert Kraft, the billionaire owner of Gillette Stadium in Massachusetts, called Sheeran to say that Macklemore would not be allowed to perform there, according to the rapper.

Kraft, who is Jewish, also told Sheeran that other stadium owners would likely follow suit, Macklemore said.

Macklemore said he has maintained his position on Palestine for years, but it was only getting attention now because he was sharing the stage with Sheeran.

The promoter of the tour’s U.S. leg, Messina Touring Group, confirmed to Rolling Stone in a statement that it had been notified by American venues “that they will not allow a concert to take place with Macklemore on the lineup, which would result in the cancellation of the tour and impact hundreds of thousands of fans.”

“After discussions with stakeholders, Macklemore will not be performing on the remaining support dates,” the statement said.

Macklemore had performed at two of the 10 shows he was scheduled to attend.