Israel

Israel Heads to Eurovision Final Despite Protests

MAY 10 2024·Updated MAY 11 2024

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Image credit: Kan 11/Israel Foreign Ministry [via X]

The Facts

Israeli singer Eden Golan has qualified after a public vote for the Eurovision Song Contest final, which will take place Saturday, despite being booed in the semifinal on Thursday and during dress rehearsals.
BBC News
This comes as thousands marched in Malmö, Sweden to protest Israel's participation in the competition while its campaign in Gaza continues. Further demonstrations are scheduled for Saturday.
guardian
Ahead of her performance in the semifinal, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a video message that Golan is "competing [successfully] not just in the Eurovision" but also "in the face of an ugly wave of antisemitism."
The Times of Israel
Her song, "Hurricane," is an adaptation of an earlier version named "October Rain" that had to be modified after contest organizers considered it to be too political due to alleged allusions to the Hamas Oct. 7 attack.
Al Jazeera
European bookmakers have put Golan among the five entries likely to win the contest, along with Joost Klein of the Netherlands, Ireland's Bambie Thug, Baby Lasagna of Croatia, and Ukraine's duo Alyona Alyona and Jerry Heil.
The New York Times
The popular European song contest attracted 216M viewers last year, nearly twice as many as this year's Super Bowl. According to the European Broadcasting Union (EBU), the music event is a competition between public service broadcasters, not governments.
ABC News

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The Spin

Pro-Palestine narrative

While the EBU claims that its annual song competition is apolitical, history shows that Eurovision is as political as it gets. Several countries have either been disqualified from or boycotted the contest for political reasons, including Russia, which has been banned for two years now due to its military campaign in Ukraine. Therefore, allowing Israel to compete while the country carries out brutal warfare in Gaza is nothing but a political choice.

Vox

Pro-Israel narrative

First and foremost, there is no equivalence between Russia and Israel. If anything, Israel should be compared to Ukraine, as the wars started when both countries were attacked, not the other way round. Perhaps even more concerning is the fact that mobs in Malmö are harassing and threatening a 20-year-old woman who has nothing to do with the conflict in Gaza just because she happens to be an Israeli national and a Jew.