{"id":309271,"date":"2025-12-08T12:00:07","date_gmt":"2025-12-08T12:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=309271"},"modified":"2025-12-06T07:32:40","modified_gmt":"2025-12-06T07:32:40","slug":"public-broadcasters-quit-eurovision-2026-over-participation-of-israel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2025\/12\/public-broadcasters-quit-eurovision-2026-over-participation-of-israel\/","title":{"rendered":"Public Broadcasters Quit Eurovision 2026 over Participation of Israel"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Source: Ireland Palestine Solidarity Campaign\/X<\/p><\/div>\n

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Broadcasters from at least four countries plan to exit Eurovision 2026 after the European Broadcasting Union decided to allow Israel to participate.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

5 Dec 2025\u00a0<\/em>–\u00a0At least four countries will withdraw from next year\u2019s Eurovision Song Contest following a decision to allow Israel <\/a>to compete. After a European Broadcasting Union (EBU) discussion in Switzerland this week, public broadcasters from Slovenia, Spain, Ireland<\/a>, and the Netherlands<\/a> issued statements denouncing the failure to address concerns over Israel\u2019s participation in the contest, while Palestine solidarity movements elsewhere in Europe are demanding from more broadcasters to follow suit.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor more than a year, we have been warning that we cannot stand on the same stage with a representative of a country that has committed genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza,\u201d said Ksenija Horvat, head of national broadcaster RTV Slovenija\u2019s <\/i>television program.<\/i><\/a> \u201cOur message is: we will not participate in Eurovision if Israel is there,\u201d added Natalija Gor\u0161\u010dak from the same media organization. \u201cThis is on behalf of the 20,000 children who died in Gaza.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Read more: <\/i><\/b>UN adopts resolutions to end Israel\u2019s occupation of Palestinian Territories and Syria\u2019s Golan Heights<\/i><\/b><\/a><\/h3>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Broadcasters highlighted the targeted killing of hundreds of journalists<\/a> in Gaza as part of their rationale for insisting that Israel be suspended from the competition. They argued that EBU leadership had succumbed to pressure and was hiding behind procedural maneuvers. Rather than hold a vote on Israel\u2019s participation in Eurovision 2026, as requested by several members, including Montenegro, Algeria, T\u00fcrkiye, and Iceland, the EBU proposed a new set of rules<\/a> aimed at limiting political influence in contestants\u2019 promotional campaigns. Aggressive messaging by Israel\u2019s representatives has been a recurring issue for EBU members, but Spanish and other broadcasters stressed that technical fixes do not address the actual problem.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe situation in Gaza, despite the ceasefire and the approval of the peace process, and Israel\u2019s use of the contest for political purposes, make it increasingly difficult to maintain Eurovision as a neutral cultural event,\u201d Spain\u2019s RTVE <\/i><\/a>stated.<\/p>\n

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Watch: <\/i><\/b>Breaking the silence: Roger Waters on Palestine, censorship, and self-censorship<\/i><\/b><\/a><\/h3>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Artists and networks campaigning for Israel\u2019s cultural boycott<\/a> welcomed the decision by the four broadcasters. The Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI), a founding member of the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) National Committee, wrote<\/a>: \u201cWe welcome the European broadcasters heeding our call and boycotting Eurovision rather than participating alongside genocidal Israel. By helping to enable and whitewash Israel\u2019s ongoing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza, Eurovision organizers, the EBU, are presiding over what is already the most disastrous edition of the contest ever.\u201d<\/p>\n

More EBU members are expected to discuss their plans for the 2026 contest as public pressure mounts. In Belgium, Workers\u2019 Party of Belgium (PTB-PVDA) parliamentarian Nabil Boukili<\/a> called the EBU decision \u201cproof of boundless hypocrisy\u201d and urged Belgian broadcasters to withdraw and refuse to air the event. \u201cRussia was excluded the day after the war in Ukraine began,\u201d Boukili said. \u201cBut even after two years of genocide in Gaza, with the bombing continuing, the EBU continues to treat Israel as if nothing had happened.\u201d<\/p>\n

Go to Original – peoplesdispatch.org<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

5 Dec 2025 – Broadcasters from Slovenia, Spain, Ireland and the Netherlands plan to exit Eurovision 2026 after the European Broadcasting Union decided to allow Israel to participate.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":309274,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[51],"tags":[928,1268,3763,865,1762,88,129,2756,3764,250],"class_list":["post-309271","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-europe","tag-bds-boycott-divestment-sanctions","tag-european-union","tag-eurovision","tag-genocide","tag-ireland","tag-israel","tag-music","tag-netherlands","tag-slovenia","tag-spain"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309271","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=309271"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309271\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":309275,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309271\/revisions\/309275"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/309274"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=309271"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=309271"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=309271"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}