The British singer-songwriter and former frontman of the band The Smiths, Morrissey has evoked the 2019 fire at Notre Dame in Paris in lyrics that infer that the 850-year-old cathedral was intentionally burned down, contrary to official statements.
Morrissey premiered his new song titled “Notre Dame” while performing in Israel over the weekend. The song’s lyrics question the narrative that the fire which consumed the cathedral was purely accidental.
“Notre Dame, we know who tried to kill you. Notre Dame, we will not be silent. Before investigation, they said, this is not terrorism. They said there is nothing to see here,” Morrissey declared to the crowd as the usually secular singer kissed a pair of Rosary beads while on stage in the Israeli city of Binyamina Sunday night.
The lyrics appear in his latest album Without Music The World Dies, which has struggled to garner the public limelight following the singer’s mysterious schism with the LA-based label Capitol Records earlier this year.
While French authorities have been keen to assure the population that the burning of Notre Dame Cathedral was accidental, this has not stopped many right-wing pundits from speculating that it was, in fact, an Islamic attack that was covered up for political convenience. France has witnessed a spike in anti-Christian attacks in recent years including multiple church burnings.
Hardly the first time the 64-year-old Manchester-born music star has stirred the pot on politically correct issues, Morrissey has rattled both fans and the music establishment alike for his vocal condemnations of mass immigration (going back to the 1980s), and diehard support of Brexit.
A disgruntled UKIP voter, Morrissey openly endorsed the now-defunct anti-immigration ‘For Britain’ party and has previously been in hot water for alleged sympathies for the ultra-nationalist National Front, a party at one time popular among white working-class voters in Britain during its heyday in the 1970s.
In a controversial interview, the singer famously lamented that the England he grew up in had already disappeared due to mass immigration, though he has strongly rejected being labelled as racist or far Right, saying that he merely “recognises realities.”
The artist recently slammed the band Oasis and mainstream British society for minimising the murder of children during the Manchester Arena bombing in a song sardonically titled “Bonfire of Teenagers,” released in 2022.
An outspoken Zionist much to the chagrin of left-wing fans, Morrissey spoke of his personal delight of being in “God’s country” while performing in Israel over the weekend, after clashing with pro-BDS groups calling on sanctions for Israel.
