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Kiss rocker Gene Simmons watches PMQs with DUP MP Ian Paisley

The Jewish musician described the proceedings at 'controlled chaos'

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US Kiss band member Gene Simmons performs onstage during the Monsters of Rock Fest in Bogota on April 15, 2023. (Photo by Juan Pablo Pino / AFP) (Photo by JUAN PABLO PINO/AFP via Getty Images)

Kiss frontman Gene Simmons has described the House of Commons as "controlled chaos" after watching Prime Minister's Questions with a Northern Irish MP.

Simmons, who was born Chaim Witz to a Jewish family in Haifa, told PA: "What I just saw in there was controlled chaos.

"It was the clash of wills but respectful - the right honourable so and so, it was fascinating.

"I think Americans can take a big lesson in civility in how to make democracy actually work and still respect the other side."

Simmons added that he was also taken by the age of the Palace of Westminster, saying: "I will tell you, touching a piece of granite that's over 1,000 years old is insane.

"America is so young and has no sense of history, everything over there is just fast, immediate, instant gratification and there's no time to sit there and just gaze, I mean, look where you are - it's insane.

"We're standing on, in terms of democracy, hallowed ground."

Simmons, whose parents were Holocaust survivors who moved to Israel after the war, was raised in a traditional Jewish home and attended Yeshiva briefly in Brooklyn, New York.

The rock frontman was in the UK as part of a Kiss tour which is taking the band across the UK. Simmons has previously spoken out against musicians that boycott Israel saying in a 2011 interview that those who refused to perform in Israel for political reasons were “fools”.


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