Earlier this week, we reported on an open letter pushing back on calls for Israel to be kicked out of the Eurovision Song Contest.
We predicted (not that riskily, let’s be honest) at the time that “as Eurovision draws nearer, criticism of Israel’s participation, as well as defences of it, will only get louder.”
That didn’t take long. The ‘No Music For Genocide’ campaign has now published its own open letter calling for Eurovision itself to be boycotted by “public broadcasters, performers, screening party organisers, crew, and fans”.
The movement’s key argument is that Russia was kicked out of the contest in 2022 due to its invasion of Ukraine, and is still barred by event-organiser the European Broadcasting Union (EBU).
“Yet more than 30 months of genocide in Gaza – alongside ethnic cleansing and land theft in the besieged West Bank – aren’t considered sufficient to apply the same policy to Israel,” argues the letter.
Brian Eno, Sigur Rós, Paul Weller, Kneecap, Peter Gabriel, Massive Attack, Hot Chip and two former Eurovision winners – Charlie McGettigan and Emmelie de Forest – are among the musicians who have signed the letter.
