By Basant El-Faramawy
Rapper Macklemore has alleged that nine major US arenas refused to host his Free Palestine fundraising tour, accusing the venues of “intimidation, manipulation and suppression” after they learned the shows were benefit events for Palestine.
Arenas named in refusal
The list includes New York’s Madison Square Garden, Brooklyn’s Barclays Center, Los Angeles’s Crypto.com Arena, Intuit Dome and Kia Forum, San Francisco’s Chase Center, Seattle’s Climate Pledge Arena, as well as UBS Arena and Prudential Center in the New York tri‑state area. Macklemore said that by mid‑September the venues had offered available dates through the end of the year, but once they discovered the shows were for Palestine, “those dates were suddenly off the table.”
Background: removal from Ed Sheeran tour
The controversy follows Macklemore’s removal as opening act for Ed Sheeran’s US tour in September after he made an onstage speech supporting the occupied West Bank. Sheeran stated that US venues had threatened to refuse hosting the tour if Macklemore remained. In solidarity, all four opening acts and Sheeran’s live band subsequently quit the tour.
European shows and political context
Macklemore’s Free Palestine tour played sold‑out arenas in Dublin, London and Paris in late October, drawing tens of thousands and featuring more than forty artists and speakers. In his Instagram post, the rapper linked the US venue refusals to a shifting political mood, noting Democrat gains in the midterm elections and the victory of Abdul El‑Sayed in a Senate race despite $42 million in spending by AIPAC to defeat him.
Promise of future shows
Macklemore vowed to continue organizing benefit concerts for Palestine, saying “there will be more shows” and that they would “take that shit outside where it belonged in the first place.” He concluded: “They may own the arenas. But they do not own the people who fill them. And they never will. FREE PALESTINE.”
