But tonight Iglesias is playing in a country that has killed thousands of Palestinians. This country has a population that is majority Palestinian but they are ruled by a minority group that discriminates against them. While many of the Palestinians are citizens, hundreds of thousands of them had their citizenship stripped from them some 25 years ago, and many others who have lived there for over four decades are still barred from citizenship. Even today many some have lost their citizenship - and what rights they had.
The country, of course, is Jordan.
More recently, Jordan has either placed severe restrictions specifically on Palestinian Syria refugees from entering or traveling around the country, while allowing non-Palestinian Syrians to have more freedoms.
(Jordan also ethnically cleansed Jews from its territory and its law specifically banned Jews who had lived in Judea and Samaria before 1948 from becoming citizens. Jordan is probably the only country to specifically exclude a class of Jews from being citizens in its nationality law. Just sayin'.)
But there has not been one peep of protest to Iglesias from the people who claim to be pro-Palestinian, those who claim to be against apartheid and discrimination. No letters, no Facebook campaigns, nothing. Jordanian apartheid doesn't matter to them. On his Facebook page, under the announcement of the concert, not a single person protested.
Even worse, Jordan is seemingly using Iglesias to whitewash their own awful human rights record:
"Through the Amman Citadel Festival… we hope to promote Jordan as a hub for art and culture… and make it a world class destination," an FJF statement quoted the NGO's chairman, Isam Salfiti, as saying.How can these paragons of human rights who support boycotting Israel be silent when a country that treats its Palestinian Arab citizens worse than Israel does is hosting such a prominent concert?
Oh, I forgot. King Abdullah isn't Jewish.