Ian Anderson of Jethro Tull visits, donates to WAS-NS

In August 2010, the veteran British rock group Jethro Tull gave a round of concerts in Israel. Ian Anderson, the musical dynamo behind Tull, made an advance decision to donate all of his personal income from these concerts:

From the statement on his website:

“Having long maintained the position that culture and the arts should be free of political and religious censorship and a distance kept between them, I took a decision in February of 2009 that any future concerts in Israel by me or Jethro Tull would result in charitable donations to bodies representing the development of peaceful co-existence between Muslims, Jews and Christians, and the fostering of better Palestinian/Israeli relations.”

After careful research, he picked the Primary School of Wahat al-Salam - Neve Shalom as one of three recipients for this funding. According to the statement on his website:

“All of the above are engaged in initiatives to bring together children of different faiths and backgrounds from the Jewish Israeli, Muslim Arab and Christian communities to further, through joint education, better understanding and appreciation of the different faiths and their cultures.

I hope that some visitors to this site will wish to support these bodies in their work to build a more tolerant, respectful and peace-loving new generational society at the heart of an area where there still exists so much bigotry, distrust and conflict.”

Wishing to see WAS-NS for himself, during his short stay in the region he also paid a personal visit to the village, and was shown around by members of the village. Afterwards he wrote in the guest book: "Great work: I hope for all due success for many years to come. Inspirational!"

During his visit and all his correspondence, everyone who came into contact with him was impressed by Anderson’s friendly sincerity and personal integrity. We can only hope this will be the beginning of a long friendship.

See also the Jerusalem Post article from the time of his visit.