PACBI renews its call to boycott Radiohead's tour

The Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI), a founding member of the BDS movement, has renewed its call for a boycott of Radiohead's European tour, and now asks for peaceful protest at the shows too. It still wants a boycott until the band distance themselves, at a minimum, from Jonny Greenwood crossing its picket line, and accuses him of artwashing by playing Tel Aviv with an Israeli artist who has entertained the Israeli military.

It is the campaign's reply to the band's interview in last weekend's Sunday Times Magazine, where Phil Selway said What BDS are asking of us is impossible. They want us to distance ourselves from Jonny, but that would mean the end of the band². Greenwood argued there that a boycott was more likely to help the Israeli government. Thom Yorke said he would not play Israel under the Netanyahu government, but that he understood Greenwood, who has roots there. Of Greenwood's shameful stance, Thom Yorke says 'I get it.' Well, Palestinians don't.²

PACBI first asked for a boycott of the band's future concerts in June, when a tour was only rumoured, and dismissed Yorke's statement of late May as damage control. It repeated the call on 3 September, the day Radiohead announced 20 arena dates for November and December, accusing the band of a complicit silence over Gaza while one member crossed its picket line.

The campaign points to Greenwood's concerts in Tel Aviv with the Israeli musician Dudu Tassa in May 2024 and March 2025, and to Radiohead's Tel Aviv show of 2017, for which it says the band never apologised. Greenwood answered the campaign against the 2024 show at the time.

Greenwood and Tassa's group also includes musicians from Syria, Lebanon, Kuwait and Iraq. Its June concerts in Bristol and London were called off in early May after the venues received threats, and Greenwood said they had faced enough credible threats to conclude it was not safe to go ahead.

The three calls