Javier Bardem has shared a petition seeking the removal of Pink as a UNICEF ambassador following her response to Macklemore’s recent comments about Palestine.
On Monday (September 21), the actor reposted several Instagram Stories urging people to sign a Change.org petition calling on UNICEF to end Pink’s ambassador role.
The petition was started on September 11 by a group named Swifties Against Genocide. At the time of the report, it had received more than 179,000 signatures.
Its organisers argue that Pink’s comments are “incompatible with the role of a UNICEF Ambassador” and ask the organisation to take “decisive action” to remove her.
Pink became a UNICEF ambassador in 2015 and has helped draw attention to its programmes supporting children’s health and nutrition worldwide.
The dispute followed a speech Macklemore gave while opening for Ed Sheeran at New Jersey’s MetLife Stadium earlier this month.
At shows on September 4 and 5, Macklemore called for “all human beings to be treated with dignity, respect, and equality”. He said he wanted people in Gaza and the West Bank to know “they have not been forgotten”, then said “Free Palestine” before performing ‘Hind’s Hall’ with footage from Gaza displayed behind him.
Pink later reposted a message from StopAntisemitism that objected to the performance. The group called it “anti-Israel propaganda” and challenged Macklemore’s description of Israel’s actions in Gaza as genocide.
Responding to criticism afterward, Pink said she did not endorse every word of the message she had reposted.
“A repost isn’t a statement, and a meme isn’t a spine,” she wrote. “Social media makes all of us cheap and fast, and we all know it.”
She said she had no objection to Macklemore saying “Free Palestine” or expressing that view, and denied asking for him to be taken off Sheeran’s tour.
“I have never asked for another artist to be silenced and I’m not asking now,” Pink said. “I don’t need anyone fired, and I don’t need a refund.”
Macklemore later stood by his remarks in New Jersey, saying: “Wanting all humans to be treated equal should never be controversial.”
Separately, the Israeli-American Council urged Sheeran’s tour to remove Macklemore, alleging that he had used the shows to “advance a one-sided political agenda”.
Macklemore was subsequently removed from the remaining concerts. Robert Kraft, who owns Gillette Stadium, said he considered the rapper’s remarks “deeply offensive and hurtful to the Jewish community”.
Sheeran said he was “not complicit” in that decision. According to Sheeran, promoter Messina Touring Group made the final call after venues raised objections. The remaining opening acts and Sheeran’s backing band later withdrew from the tour in response.
Macklemore said he would give his full $1 million earnings from the tour to six organisations helping Palestinians. Kraft said Sheeran had asked him to match a $2 million humanitarian donation.
Bardem has spoken publicly in support of Palestinians on several previous occasions.
Last year, he joined thousands of people working in film who signed a Film Workers For Palestine pledge. Signatories committed to avoiding work with Israeli film institutions the group said were implicated in the war in Gaza.
Bardem later explained that the boycott targeted “companies and institutions”, not individuals from Israel. “We do not discriminate against any person based on their nationality, race, religion, or gender,” he said.
While presenting Best International Film at the 2026 Oscars, Bardem said “no to war and free Palestine”. He also argued that film industry figures have a responsibility as citizens to use their public voices to “denounce injustice”.
At Cannes in May, he warned that people in Hollywood who tried to blacklist actors for speaking about Palestine would “be exposed”.
