"Rock is the best way I have to express what is happening to the Palestinians."

Barcelona"We must play, we must sing, we must express ourselves because, if we don't, we could die at any moment without having said what we wanted to say. Music is the best tool to bring out everything you feel inside and shout it loud so that everyone can hear it," explains Raji al-Jaru, vocalist and guitarist. from the Palestinian group Osprey VOriginally from the Gaza Strip, the musician has been living as a refugee in Jordan with his wife and three-year-old daughter since May 2025. The Israeli genocide led to the dispersal and exile of all the band members who, at the time of the interview, were trying to obtain visas to come to Barcelona and play at the concert on January 2nd.

"We have six invitations from institutions and activists, but the Spanish embassy is asking us for residency. How do they expect us to have residency? Isn't it our fault we don't have it? We didn't cause a genocide. I can't go back to Gaza; as an artist, I'm threatened. My friend and I were hit by a missile. My friend, who had helped me make the music video for..."Angels Kneel"He died," he explains. "They don't want someone telling everything that's happening in English, like we do with our songs," he adds.

Linkin Park, Evanescence, and Metallica

Osprey V is the first rock band to literally emerge from nowhere in the Gaza Strip. When he started playing with his cousins, Raji had neither instruments, nor a studio to record in, nor the tools to do so, and he hadn't had the opportunity to study music. "Twenty-five years ago, I heard rock music for the first time in my life. My cousin, Moamin al Jaru, showed it to me, and I experienced a culture shock. Linkin Park, Evanescence, Metallica... It was the perfect music to convey our pain, the oppression, the war. I decided I would create the first rock band in Gaza," he says. And so it was: in 2017, he founded Osprey V with his cousins. "I learned to play by watching YouTube videos, pausing them constantly to see how they positioned their fingers, and now I play five instruments," he explains.

His father, who is still in Gaza with his mother, owned an electronics store, and he took advantage of every opportunity he could. "I had to learn how to record sound, how to set up a recording studio... It was a long journey, but it was worth it. I opened the first music shop and the first studio in Gaza, and many people learned to play rock. I managed to bring very good instruments and the best microphones to Gaza..." It was a small...

Recording music under the bombs

The musician lived through the genocide in Gaza for two years until he left last May. "Going to Spain is very important because we'll be able to get together again and play in a safe place, with electricity. If they give us that, we can work magic," he says. The band is currently working on a new album. "Some songs are dark and depressing; others are powerful and hopeful. It's complicated because we're in exile and we have to coordinate everything online, with very limited internet service," the musician explains. He recorded some of the songs in Gaza. "We had to keep stopping and resuming the recording when the bombs fell," he recalls. When they were displaced to the south, he had to use his car as a recording studio. Securing resources isn't easy, and that's why the band has also launched... a crowdfunding campaign

"It's important to come to Spain because we make songs for you. There's a biased narrative about the Palestinian people of Gaza. Constantly, and especially after the war, the media tries to portray the people of Gaza as people who live in tents, illiterate, and uncivilized. And that's exactly the opposite of the truth. The final stage is cultural. That's why our existence and our trip to Barcelona are fundamental, because we're not just a rock band or the first rock band from Gaza. "It's an unprecedented number. They are defenseless children, they suffer terribly. They are our treasure and our future. We want to help them grow and create. Instead of hatred, bombs, and death, we want to send the world messages of mercy and humanity, and show that we do not accept criminal and genocidal mentalities." ManFor example, he speaks of "my home, this universe is my home," and reminds us that you and I are no different. We are all here to make the world a better place," he says.