Israeli artist Noga Erez took a moment during her Coachella concert over the weekend to express gratitude to her fans amid Israel’s ongoing conflicts in the Middle East.
Erez performed a 45-minute show at the California Festival’s Gobi Theater on Saturday to a capacity crowd.
At some point, I stopped talking about what was happening at home. “I just want to say one thing: You can’t play theater like this every day,” she said in an emotional speech. “I come from a very, very, very complicated part of the planet, and to have all of us here doing this was a strength I didn’t know I had.”
“I’m so grateful to be here,” she continued as her fans cheered. “At the same time, I feel sad and sad because of the things that are happening at home and around it. I love this music thing so much, and now, doing this thing is exactly what I do it for, [which] It is bringing a group of strangers together and making them feel like a family united around something. Thank you so much for giving me this.”
Erez’s emotions likely heightened during her performance at the major music festival in California, because one of the major attacks during the October 7, 2023 attack on Israel occurred during the Nova Music Festival, where hundreds were killed by Hamas militants.
Since that day, Israel has been engaged in an ongoing, multi-front war that has expanded into a broader crisis in the Middle East. In addition to Gaza, military confrontations have also intensified between Israel, Lebanon, Yemen, Syria, the West Bank, and Iran, the latter of which has also engaged in a military conflict with the United States in recent months.
Erez’s performance at Coachella also came a month before the Eurovision Song Contest, which was met with controversy over Israel’s participation in the world music competition. Some countries and participants objected to Israel’s participation in the competition due to the devastating war in Gaza.
The Eurovision contest has implemented new rules around its voting system after Israeli entrant Yuval Rafael, who finished second in last year’s final, caused an uproar and accusations of vote-rigging.
