Sinead O’Connor performing at the Cambridge Folk Festival 50th Anniversary in 2014. Photo: Bryan Ledgard via Wikimedia Commons

Sinead O’Connor, the famed Irish singer and songwriter who died on Wednesday in London at age 56, wrote in her memoir published last year that she had a “Jewish period” in her life when she was interested in learning about Judaism.

O’Connor’s family released a statement to the Irish publication RTE on Wednesday confirming the singer’s death. “It is with great sadness that we announce the passing of our beloved Sinead,” the statement said. “Her family and friends are devastated and have requested privacy at this very difficult time.”

A cause of death was not given but London’s Metropolitan Police said in a statement that she was pronounced dead at the scene after officers were called on Wednesday to her residential address in South London. She is survived by three children. Her 17-year-old son, Nevi’im Nesta Ali Shane O’Connor, committed suicide in 2022. Nevi’im meaning “prophets” in Hebrew.

The eight-time Grammy nominee, who was born a Roman Catholic but announced in 2018 that she had converted to Islam, has a chapter in her 2022 memoir Remembrances titled “Sheviti Adonai L’negdi Tamid,” which is a Hebrew passage taken from the Book of Psalms that translates to “I place God before me always.”

“I tried to get lessons in Jewish ways of understanding the Scriptures, but no one would take me because I’m not Jewish,” she wrote in her memoir, as reported by The Jewish Chronicle.

O’Connor, best known for her cover of Prince’s Nothing Compares 2 U, added that she eventually took Kabbalah classes with a “very kind teacher” named Z’ev Ben Shimon Halevi.

Sinéad Marie Bernadette O’Connor was born on Dec. 8, 1966, in Dublin, Ireland. She was one of five children and had spoken openly about facing physical abuse by her mother. O’Connor openly discussed her struggle with addiction and mental health issues, having suicidal thoughts and admitted in 2007 that she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder.

She released her first album, The Lion And The Cobra, in 1987 followed by the 1990 album I Do Not Want What I Haven’t Got. Her version of Nothing Compares 2 U earned her multiple Grammy Award nominations and won her both MTV video of the year and best video by a female artist. In 1991, she was named artist of the year by Rolling Stone magazine. She recorded 10 solo albums throughout her career.

In her memoir, the singer praised Jewish musician Bob Dylan, writing that “his voice is like a blanket. He’s as beautiful as if God blew a breath from Lebanon and it became a man,” The JC reported.

O’Connor performed at Dylan’s 30th Anniversary Concert Celebration but was booed off stage. The performance took place just 13 days after she tore up a photo of Pope John Paul II on Saturday Night Live in 1992 in protest of the Catholic Church’s stance toward clerical sexual abuse. Because of her SNL stunt, which she received a lot of pushback for throughout the remainder of her career, she was banned from NBC for life. She later become a priest of an Independent Catholic group, and in October 2018 announced she converted to Islam and changed her name to Shuhada’ Davitt.

O’Connor dedicated her 1997 album Gospel Oak to the people of “Israel, Rwanda, and Northern Ireland.” She revealed in her memoir that the album was named after the neighborhood in England she visited six days a week to see her Jewish psychiatrist. She was “madly in love with him in lots of ways,” she wrote, according to The JC.

She performed in Israel in 1995 and was scheduled to do so again in the summer of 1997 for a peace concert organized by Israeli and Palestinian women’s groups that wanted to promote Jerusalem as the capital for both people. However, she cancelled her show after receiving death threats from extremists.

Itamar Ben Gvir, now Israel’s security minister, was at the time an activist in the Ideological Front, an extension of the extremist Kahanist movement, the Associated Press reported. He told Israeli radio at the time that his efforts resulted in O’Connor cancelling her concert and said, “due to us she is not arriving. We are calling the pressure we put on her not to arrive a success.” Furious with his comments, O’Connor sent a letter to the AP and other media outlets addressing Ben Gvir.

“God does not reward those who bring terror to children of the world. So you have succeeded in nothing but your soul’s failure,” she wrote in the letter. She added, “I have always had the most passionate love for the Jewish people,” and asked: “How can there be peace anywhere on Earth if there is no peace in Jerusalem?”

Ben-Gvir’s office on Thursday denied that he had ever threatened O’Connor, the AP reported.

O’Connor wanted to cancel her 2014 concert in Israel following what she said was a request by “the Palestinian people” to not perform in the country.