Spanish group banned from music festival for defacing Israeli flag, posting vulgarities online

Inbal Mittleman, an Israeli fan at the festival, told the Srugim website that this was not the only antisemitic incident that occurred.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

Organizers of a Hungarian international music festival have banned a Spanish hip-hop band from performing there again after the group posted online their defacement of an Israeli flag Sunday night.

“The actions of the group Tribade are against our cherished values of welcome and respect, and we deeply condemn this hateful stunt,” said the Sziget Music Festival’s statement. “They will, of course, not be invited back to our festivals in the future.”

Tribade’s Bittah and Masiva Lulla, LGTB rights activists, filmed themselves Sunday night, after their performance, walking through the sleeping area for fans staying on the grounds of the five-day music extravaganza. When they spotted a large Israeli flag hanging on some fans’ tent, they pull out black markers and scrawled on it in English, “Free Palestine,” “Israel doesn’t exist,” and drew a picture of male genitalia with the words “Eat this.”

The performers then uploaded the clip to their official Instagram Stories page, with a caption in Spanish saying, “Tribade does not go back on its word.”

Such stories are automatically deleted after 24 hours, but talkbacks criticizing the post from Israeli fans – many holding Israeli flags – have survived.

It was also more than enough time for the clip to be captured and condemned by various antisemitism watchdog groups. Israel’s foreign ministry denounced Tribade’s actions as “ugly” and said it would demand clarification from the festival coordinators, which was duly provided.

Inbal Mittleman, an Israeli fan at the festival, told the Srugim website that this was not the only antisemitic incident that occurred.

“I personally waved an Israeli flag during a performance and…people threw alcohol on me and yelled at me to put down the flag. They tried to grab it away from me,” she said.

The Zionist Israellycooler site commented: “Incidentally, ‘tribadism’ is apparently a lesbian sexual practice, and their Instagram account is named Tribade.dyke, so it appears the defacers are part of the LGBTQ community. So, while they write ‘Israel does not exist,’ what actually does not exist is rights for their community in the Palestinian-controlled territories. Let them try and perform there and see what happens!”

The annual Sziget festival, one of the largest cultural events in Europe, attracts tens of thousands of fans and had an international lineup of well over 100 performers this year. Israel was represented by singers Noga Erez, Echo, and Lola Marsh.