Robert Kraft, the Jewish and pro-Israel billionaire, took credit Monday for helping to pressure Ed Sheeran to drop pro-Palestinian rapper Macklemore from his tour.
Kraft, who owns one of the stadiums where Macklemore was scheduled to perform, confirmed the rapper’s own account of the businessman’s involvement in a statement shared with the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
“Gillette Stadium has a longstanding commitment to providing a welcoming environment for all guests and ensuring that events held at our venue do not provide a platform for hate speech,” Kraft said.
His statement continued, “Based on Macklemore’s recent actions, material shared from the stage during Ed Sheeran’s shows in New Jersey, and a broader history of antisemitic rhetoric and imagery that we believe has been deeply offensive and hurtful to the Jewish community, we determined that his participation in the September 25th and 26th concerts at Gillette Stadium would cross that line.”
The controversy stemmed from a recent show at New Jersey’s MetLife stadium, where Macklemore upset some Jewish and pro-Israel groups by accusing Israel of genocide and saying “Free Palestine” onstage while showing images of the war in Gaza.
The Israeli-American Council called for the rapper, who has made his pro-Palestinian views a centerpiece of his act for the last few years, to be dropped from the tour. Pop star Pink, who is Jewish, also criticized the artist.
On Monday morning, Sheeran’s North American promoter told Rolling Stone that Macklemore had indeed been dropped, following pushback from unnamed venues that “will not allow a concert to take place with Macklemore on the lineup.”
Following the announcement, Macklemore took to social media to finger Kraft as the instigator of the venue boycott.
“Ed told me that Kraft said I would not be allowed to perform in his stadium,” the “Same Love” singer wrote on Instagram. “Ed also told me that Kraft had rallied some of the other stadium owners and collectively they gave him an ultimatum: if Macklemore stays on the tour, you will not be allowed to play in our venues.”
Kraft now confirms he played a role — but says his objections were not to the rapper’s pro-Palestinian views.
“This decision is not about diminishing the suffering of innocent Palestinians or denying anyone the right to advocate on their behalf. Their pain and loss are real,” the sports and private-equity mogul, who also owns the New England Patriots, said in his statement. “But that advocacy should not come at the expense of the Jewish community.”
Kraft added that he has “created athletic and entrepreneurial opportunities for Palestinians who I admire and respect,” adding, “Standing with the Palestinian people and standing against Hamas, antisemitism and hate should not be mutually exclusive.”
He ended by extending a hand to Macklemore: “I would welcome the opportunity to sit down with Macklemore and discuss the facts, because ultimately our goal is the same – peace for all people, an end to suffering, and an end to all hate.”
Kraft has been heavily involved in Jewish initiatives since the Oct. 7, 2023, deadly Hamas raids in Israel, including staffing a bunker under Gillette Stadium to monitor antisemitism on social media.
Macklemore called Sheeran “my friend” and said the singer “told me that the words ‘Free Palestine’ and the image of the Palestinian flag were hurtful to a lot of people he spoke with.”
“I told him if these words were more offensive than tens of thousands of Palestinian children being killed by Israel, then there was a fundamental disconnect between where those people stood and where I stood,” Macklemore said.
He accused his critics of seeking to “weaponize the accusation of antisemitism.”
Representatives for Sheeran did not immediately return (JR) requests for comment.
Macklemore, who has been vocally pro-Palestinian for the last few years, had been scheduled to play at eight remaining concert stops.
In her own post over the weekend, before Macklemore was dropped, Pink said why she was so upset by his injection of his opinion on the Gaza war into his performance.
“Last weekend he stood in front of a stadium full of music-loving families, with violent images from a war on the screens, dedicated a song to the movement of his choice, and then took the mic to tell all of the Jews in the stadium that it wasn’t about them,” Pink wrote. “You don’t get to decide that for us.”
Referencing an earlier controversy when Macklemore had dressed up in a costume with antisemitic signifiers, Pink said her objections were “not ‘Free Palestine,’ and not anyone’s right to say it.” She added, “I have never asked for another artist to be silenced and I’m not asking now.”
“You don’t have to agree with one thing Israel’s government does to not want the Jewish family two rows down from you to be scared or targeted at a concert,” the singer continued. “That’s the only thing I’m asking anybody for.”
In his own statement, Macklemore stated that neither he, nor Sheeran nor Pink were victims. “The victims are the Palestinian people.”
The IAC praised the decision to drop Macklemore.
“Freedom of speech is not freedom from responsibility,” a spokesperson for the group wrote in a statement to (JR). “Anyone who chooses to turn an 80,000-person concert into a vehicle for advancing a one-sided political agenda must stand behind that choice.”
Macklemore has been outspoken in his pro-Palestinian beliefs. In 2024 he released a single, “Hind’s Hall,” dedicated to the Columbia University encampment movement. In his Monday statement he said, “What I said at MetLife I have been saying on stages around the world for almost three years.”
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