Canadian pop singer Shawn Mendes took a moment during his concert in Lisbon, Portugal, to lament over the devastation in Gaza and to warn that those troubles are no excuse to target Israelis with antisemitic hatred.
The “If I Can’t Have You” singer has never spoken out about these issues before and has generally avoided making political pronouncements in his career. But he told fans that he finally felt the need to speak out.
“What’s been happening in Gaza has been absolutely breaking my heart, and turning pain and suffering into hatred towards Jewish people as a whole is wrong,” he told his fans. “Turning pain and suffering into hatred, period, is wrong and it’s not the way.”
The singer is a Portuguese native and is not Jewish.
“I really believe in our generation,” Mendes added. “I feel like it’s our generation’s job to learn from the wisdom of our parents and grandparents but also learn from the mistakes of those generations. The future is truly in our hands and I feel like it’s our responsibility to stop these cycles of pain and to choose love.”
The singer is a Portuguese native and is not Jewish.
The singer also said he feels positive over the future.
“I gotta be honest, I’m feeling like the future is in really good hands when I look around at these shows,” he said.
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