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Liam Og O Hannaidh, second right, a member of Kneecap, speaks to supporters as he departs Westminster Magistrates Court in London on Aug. 20. In May, British police charged Og O Hannaidh with a terrorism offence for allegedly waving a Hezbollah flag at a 2024 concert. The rapper denied the offence.Joanna Chan/The Associated Press
The Carney government is barring the Belfast rap group Kneecap from entering Canada, saying the group has endorsed political violence and terrorism.
Liberal MP Vince Gasparro, parliamentary secretary for combatting crime, made an announcement in a video posted Friday morning to social media. He said Kneecap has “publicly displayed support for terrorist organizations such as Hezbollah and Hamas” and said that goes beyond artistic expression.
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Jewish groups had been asking Ottawa since June to ban the group, along with the British punk-rap duo Bob Vylan, over comments they argued served to incite antisemitism.
Kneecap, the trio of Liam Og O Hannaidh, Naoise O Caireallain and JJ O Dochartaigh, are known for controversial songs that mock authority figures including the police and the British government.
The trio had been scheduled to perform two concerts next month at Toronto’s History club and two more at Vancouver’s Vogue Theatre. The Toronto shows were moved from the smaller Danforth Music Hall to accommodate ticket demand.
In April, Kneecap closed its performance at the annual Coachella music festival in California with pro-Palestinian messages. In May, British police charged Og O Hannaidh, 27, with a terrorism offence for allegedly waving a Hezbollah flag at a London concert in 2024. The rapper denied the offence and the band said its members do not support Hamas or Hezbollah.
A petition was started earlier this year in Vancouver to call off the Vogue Theatre concerts.
Kneecap responded to Gasparro’s video with a post on their X account, saying they have instructed their lawyers to initiate legal action.
“Your comments about us are wholly untrue and deeply malicious,” the group wrote. “We will be relentless in defending ourselves against baseless accusations to silence our opposition to a genocide being committed by Israel.”
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If successful in their legal action, Kneecap said they would donate “every cent to assist some of the thousands of child amputees in Gaza.”
Last month, Kneecap cancelled all 15 of their U.S. tour dates scheduled for October owing to “the close proximity of our next court hearing in London on Sept. 26,” the group said in a statement.
The Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs called the decision by the Canadian government a stand against “incitement, hate and radicalization,” while B’nai Brith declared “victory.”
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London punk duo Bob Vylan perform in the Netherlands, on Sept. 15.MARCEL KRIJGSMAN/AFP/Getty Images
Gasparro did not mention the London-based Bob Vylan, which has no current Canadian dates on its tour itinerary. The duo is banned from appearing in the U.S., after front man Bobby Vylan led anti-Israeli military chants during a live radio broadcast from the Glastonbury Festival of Contemporary Performing Arts in Somerset, England.
This week, a Bob Vylan concert was cancelled in Tilburg, the Netherlands, after Vylan denigrated slain far-right U.S. commentator Charlie Kirk while performing in Amsterdam.
The Kneecap banning follows another series of cancelled concerts this summer. In July, park operators across Eastern Canada revoked and withheld permits for American musician Sean Feucht’s tour across the region, after a surge of local concerns about the Make America Great Again affiliate’s activism against the LGBTQ community, abortion rights and “woke ideology.”
Feucht is a self-described missionary and proponent of Christian nationalism.
With reports from The Canadian Press and Josh O’Kane
