Pink Floyd reunite – but not to make music

David Gilmour, Nick Mason and Roger Waters issue statement in support of campaigners who oppose Israel’s ‘siege of Gaza’ and were arrested this week.

It’s 11 years since Pink Floyd reunited to play the Live 8 concert in London, but now the three remaining members have put their differences behind them in common cause. That cause, however, is not music.

Instead, David Gilmour, Nick Mason and Roger Waters have joined together – in word only – to offer their support for the Women’s Boat to Gaza, a group of women from around the world who set sail from Barcelona to Gaza last month, sponsored by the Freedom Flotilla Coalition, a group opposed to Israel’s “siege of Gaza”. The Women’s Boat was intercepted by the Israeli navy earlier this week, and the crew arrested. They are expected to be deported soon.

Roger Waters: 'I'm prepared to be wrong about everything'
 Read more
Pink Floyd’s Facebook page carried a post on Wednesday expressing the support of David Gilmour, Nick Mason and Roger Waters for the women. The same post appeared on Waters’s Facebook page, though not on Gilmour’s.

The Freedom Flotilla said it expected the women to be released quickly, not least because of the attention Pink Floyd’s support had drawn to their cause.

Roger Waters has campaigned on behalf of the Palestinian cause since visiting Israel in 2005. He has called for a cultural boycott of Israel and for institutions to divest themselves of their interests in the country.

Those fans for whom Pink Floyd’s music is of more interest than their politics will at least get some joy on 11 November, when the band release a colossal 27-disc box set, The Early Years 1965-1972, containing huge amounts of previously unreleased music, including the first official releases of Syd Barrett-era rarities such as Vegetable Man and Scream Thy Last Scream.