Kneecap on stage at Glastonbury 2025

After weeks of controversy, Kneecap delivered one of the stand-out sets at Glastonbury this weekend.

For the last few weeks, Kneecap have maintained that they’ve been the victims of a “witch-hunt” and “smear campaign” ever since their set at the Coachella music festival in April, where they expressed solidarity with Palestine amid the current conflict in the Middle East.

At the time, the band led the crowd in a chant of “free Palestine’ and projected the message “fuck Israel” onto the screens behind them.

Days after Coachella, it was first reported that counter-terrorism officers were assessing resurfaced videos recorded months earlier, one of which reportedly saw the group declaring “up Hamas, up Hezbollah” at a gig in London.

It was subsequently confirmed that rapper Liam Óg Ó hAnnaidh – better known to fans of the group by his stage name Mo Chara – had been charged with a terror offence, for allegedly brandishing the flag of the proscribed terrorist group Hezbollah, after being handed the flag at a Kneecap show in London in November 2024.

Responding to Ó hAnnaidh being charged with a terror offence, Kneecap said: “We deny this ‘offence’ and will vehemently defend ourselves. This is political policing. This is a carnival of distraction.........

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