Rapper Macklemore says he will donate the entire $1m he earned from singer Ed Sheeran’s Loop Tour to organisations supporting Palestinians, days after he was dropped from the tour over his support for Palestine. Macklemore, whose real name is Ben Haggerty, announced the donation on Instagram on Wednesday, saying the money would go to six groups working directly to support Palestinians. He also called on pro-Israel billionaire Robert Kraft, owner of the New England Patriots, to match it after Kraft confirmed on Tuesday that he had barred Macklemore from performing at Gillette Stadium in the US state of Massachusetts.
Kraft said Sheeran now planned to approach other venue owners in an effort to raise more money. Macklemore’s announcement comes as the fallout over his removal from Sheeran’s tour continues to grow. Macklemore said on Monday that he was dropped from the remaining United States dates after using his performances at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey to speak in support of Palestinians.
All of the supporting acts for Sheeran’s upcoming US Loop Tour have now pulled out in solidarity with the rapper. Some of the artists are Irish and pointed to their own country’s history of occupation in explaining their decision to withdraw. Sheeran has said the decision to remove Macklemore was ultimately made not by him but by the tour promoter.
Kraft later said he had opposed allowing the rapper to perform, citing what he described as Macklemore’s history of “antisemitic rhetoric and imagery”. Kraft, in a statement to Al Jazeera, said the decision to ban Macklemore from his venue wasn’t about “diminishing the suffering of innocent Palestinians” but argued that “advocacy should not come at the expense of the Jewish community or obscure the responsibility of Hamas”. In his latest statement on Wednesday, Macklemore said he wanted to pull the conversation away from himself and the controversy surrounding the tour.
Not the headlines or the controversy,” he wrote.
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