Welsh singer and activist Charlotte Church has questioned “the full truth” of October 7 in an online post where she also claims she “will never be an antisemite”.
The former child star was responding to allegations of Jew-hate that were levelled against her after she sang “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” with a village hall choir and marched at a Stop the War rally on Saturday.
Two weeks after she was accused of antisemitism, Church marched at the front of the rally organised by the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) and addressed the crowd.
The singer said she marched for a future “which isn’t completely reliant upon or completely in submission to capitalist interest”.
Interviewed by Novara Media, the 38-year-old said, “Something that is happening here is striking at the very heart of all of our freedoms and our ability to call for something better.”
Church was interviewed by Novara Media and spoke about people being "in submission to capitalist interests" (Photo: Twitter/X)
According to Church, the “fight” for Palestinian liberation is “the biggest spiritual quest of our time”.
The classic music singer suggested other public figures were not speaking about Palestine because of “the risk of being labelled an antisemite almost immediately”.
In a blog post after the march, Church went on to cast doubt on the atrocities committed by Hamas on October 7, writing: “It is difficult to know the full truth of what happened that day, and hopefully with the fullness of time we will have a better perspective”. She also said she “condemned” Hamas and the attack on Israel.
The Welsh balladeer wrote: “Some Jews today think that I am antisemitic. I hope that my words here can reassure them that I am not.” She went on: “From the river to the sea is not an antisemitic statement”.
The Campaign Against Antisemitism accused her of using her “stardom to teach kids to sing extremist lyrics in a village hall” and called for the Charity Commission to investigate the incident.
Church at the controversial sing-song in Wales last month
Defending the song, Church wrote on her website, “I do not believe that the phrase ‘from the river to the sea’ is in any way a call for the ethnic cleansing or genocide of Israelis, and certainly, when I have used it or heard it used by other people, it has always been as a call for the liberation of Palestine".
“Often it is accompanied by the phrase ‘… we are all Palestinians’. A call for one group’s liberation does not imply another’s destruction”.She added: “At this point it becomes necessary for me to state that I do not support Hamas and condemn them for the attack on October 7th.
Church claimed the war in Gaza “is waking people up to the violent reality of what the West is built upon: inequality, exploitation, colonisation”.
She described the war as the “most grotesque show of power and domination”.
She called for people to “reject the fallacy of Western patriarchal moral authority. Feel and trust your feelings. Let us consciously bring about the coming of the deep maternal healing that must come.”
Singer and activist, Charlotte Church, raises her fist in the air after speaking during a rally in support of Gaza on March 9, 2024 in London.(Photo by Carl Court/Getty Images)
Famous from the age of 11, and the youngest musician to reach number one on the classical music charts, Church said she had recently been “ridiculed by powerful men in the media”.
The singer from Cardiff said police had visited her home to check on her safety after threats made by “some pretty scary people”.
“The threats to my safety have resulted in the police coming round to check in on us.”
She added: “My safety and the safety of my family has been threatened by some pretty scary people, emboldened by the rhetoric of frontline politicians, as well as cravenly irresponsible coverage by liberal legacy media outlets.”
When she’s not at anti-Israel rallies or singing for Palestine, Church runs a wellness retreat in rural Wales where people can stay in rooms called The Womb, The Moon, or The Mystic.
