Representative appearances

• Several countries boycott Eurovision after Israel allowed to compete | BBC

  Well, with me is our media and arts correspondent, David Silito. So David, just uh bring us up to date with what we know so far about next year's contest and all the controversy that we've seen today. Let's start with the countries that have said they were going to be boycotting. Got a list here. Netherlands, Spain, Ireland, and Slovenia will not be taking part next year in Austria in Eurovvision 2026. Um, other countries have expressed concern in the weeks leading up to this and we're awaiting announcements in the days to come from Belgium and Iceland in particular because of comments they've made in the past. There is a deadline of next Wednesday uh for countries to confirm that they'll be taking part in the Eurovvision Song Contest. Of course, if there had been a vote um about Israel's participation and if Israel had been removed from uh the contest um countries for instance such as Germany said that they would have not taken part. So this is massively divided um the European Broadcasting Union. Um and of course the background to all of this is Israel, the war in Gaza and before that the decision to expel Russia after the invasion of Ukraine. um and all the comparisons were being made. If Russia's gone, um if Israel is involved in a war, why is it not? So that is those are the um the concerns from these countries that are boycotted. Um the issue of course is that it's not countries, it's broadcasters who are members. Um and the argument that the EU has always made is that um they felt that the Russian public broadcasters had completely contravened all the rules of public service broadcasters had essentially become voice pieces for the government and they say can um has not broken the rules and should be allowed to take part. Um Israel has said that um the countries that are boycotting um they take this as a cultural boycott. Um a very strong statement has been made this afternoon. um in response to all of this, but um it looks that the um compromises that the EBU or essentially the addressing of the concerns about for instance voting um was there um essentially an organized vote that was behind Israel? Uh was there a third party? Was government funding going in towards supporting all of these things? This is what they were discussing this afternoon and it seems that the majority of members have said we accept that this is this is addressed our concerns the contest will go ahead and it will go ahead with Israel.