Kneecap member to face terror charge in court next month
Kneecap rapper Mo Chara has been charged with a terror offence and is due to appear at Westminster Magistrates’ Court next month on Wednesday, June 18.
The charge relates to the rapper, real name Liam Óg Ó hAnnaidh, allegedly displaying a flag supporting Lebanese political party and paramilitary group Hezbollah at a concert at the O2 Forum in Kentish Town, London, on November 21, 2024.
Hezbollah are a banned organisation in the UK and it is a criminal offence to support them. He has been charged under the name Liam O’Hanna.
The Met Police were alerted to the alleged incident on April 22 this year, the same month Kneecap made headlines worldwide at at Coachella for displaying messages such as “Fuck Israel, Free Palestine” and “Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinian people” during their performance at the Californian festival.
Afterwards, Kneecap accused Coachella of censoring a pro-Palestine message from the livestream of their set, before they were dropped by their US visa sponsor amid fallout from the performance, with a series of other international gigs then cancelled.
The group faced more criticism after footage resurfaced from a 2023 performance that appeared to show a member of the trio shouting: “The only good Tory is a dead Tory. Kill your local MP”.
Line-ups the trio were removed from include a performance at the Eden Project, shows in Hamburg, Berlin, and Cologne, and appearances at Germany’s Hurricane and Southside sister festivals.
Kneecap have since denied they support Hezbollah, and claimed they would not incite violence against individuals. They also apologised to the families of murdered British politicians.
Earlier this month, more than 40 musicians signed an open letter offering solidarity to Kneecap.
Among their defenders were Massive Attack, who issued a statement saying: “Kneecap are not the story. Gaza is the story. Genocide is the story.”
Massive Attack reflected: “Language matters of course. The hideous murders of elected politicians Jo Cox and David Amess means there’s no scope for flippancy or recklessness. But do politicians and right-wing journalists strategically concocting moral outrage over the stage utterings of a young punk band, while simultaneously obfuscating or even ignoring a genocide happening in real time (including the killing of journalists in unprecedented numbers) have any right to intimidate festival events into acts of political censorship?”
[Via: BBC]
