State Department revokes visas for British rap group Bob Vylan for leading ‘Death to the IDF’ chants during festival
Bobby Vylan of British duo Bob Vylan crowd surfing while performing on the West Holts Stage on the fourth day of the Glastonbury festival at Worthy Farm in the village of Pilton in Somerset, south-west England, on June 28, 2025. (OLI SCARFF/AFP via Getty Images)
OAN Staff Blake Wolf 10:02 AM – Tuesday, July 1, 2025
The U.S. State Department announced that the visas issued to the British punk-rap duo Bob Vylan have been revoked after the band led a “death to the IDF” chant at a concert over the weekend.
“The State Department has revoked the US visas for the members of the Bob Vylan band in light of their hateful tirade at Glastonbury, including leading the crowd in death chants,” stated Deputy Secretary of State Christopher Landau on Monday.
“Foreigners who glorify violence and hatred are not welcome visitors to our country,” he added.
Advertisement
The @StateDept has revoked the US visas for the members of the Bob Vylan band in light of their hateful tirade at Glastonbury, including leading the crowd in death chants. Foreigners who glorify violence and hatred are not welcome visitors to our country.
— Christopher Landau (@DeputySecState) June 30, 2025
The duo performed chants of “Death, death to the IDF!” and “Free, free Palestine!” for tens of thousands of attendees at the Glastonbury festival in Somerset, England on Saturday.
The charged chants led local authorities to launch a criminal investigation into their conduct as local authorities explained: “This has been recorded as a public order incident at this time while our enquiries are at an early stage.”
Soon after, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer criticized Bob Vylan as well, calling the group’s chants “appalling hate speech.” Starmer also expressed criticism toward the Irish rap group “Kneecap,” who has previously led similar chants at shows.
“I said that Kneecap should not be given a platform and that goes for any other performers making threats or inciting violence,” Starmer stated.
As Kneecap performed at the Glastonbury festival, the group led a “f*** Keir Starmer” chant.
The BBC later expressed regret in not cutting the livestream feed during Bob Vylan’s set, stating: “The antisemitic sentiments expressed by Bob Vylan were utterly unacceptable and have no place on our airwaves.”
“The team were dealing with a live situation but with hindsight we should have pulled the stream during the performance. We regret this did not happen,” the BBC added.
Prior to having their visas revoked, Bob Vylan was set to tour the United States in October.
The group put out a statement following the backlash, writing: “Today, a good many people would have you believe a punk band is the number one threat to world peace.”
“We are not for the death of Jews, Arabs or any other race or group of people. We are for the dismantling of a violent military machine. A machine whose own soldiers were told to use ‘unnecessary lethal force’ against innocent civilians waiting for aid. A machine that has destroyed much of Gaza,” the statement continued.
Bob Vylan’s post was seemingly in reference to a recent Haaretz report, which allegedly quoted Israeli soldiers, claiming that commanders had ordered them to “shoot unarmed crowds of Palestinians” attempting to receive food at aid centers.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have since condemned the report as a false “blood libel.”
To provide the best experiences, we use technologies like cookies to store and/or access device information. Consenting to these technologies will allow us to process data such as browsing behavior or unique IDs on this site. Not consenting or withdrawing consent, may adversely affect certain features and functions.
Functional
Always active
The technical storage or access is strictly necessary for the legitimate purpose of enabling the use of a specific service explicitly requested by the subscriber or user, or for the sole purpose of carrying out the transmission of a communication over an electronic communications network.
Preferences
The technical storage or access is necessary for the legitimate purpose of storing preferences that are not requested by the subscriber or user.
Statistics
The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for statistical purposes.The technical storage or access that is used exclusively for anonymous statistical purposes. Without a subpoena, voluntary compliance on the part of your Internet Service Provider, or additional records from a third party, information stored or retrieved for this purpose alone cannot usually be used to identify you.
Marketing
The technical storage or access is required to create user profiles to send advertising, or to track the user on a website or across several websites for similar marketing purposes.
