Eurovision 2024: Beloved contest becomes an ugly mess

Eurovision is supposed to be a celebration. Those lucky enough to bag tickets to the live shows are usually seen on TV dancing around the arena, cheering and having a fabulous time.

But during the jury show at this year’s song contest in Sweden, the atmosphere was anything but jubilant. Instead, the scenes inside the Malmö Arena were tense, and it’s not hard to guess why.

Clips shared online show how the usual cheers and applause were replaced by hostility, all of it directed at Eden Golan, Israel’s entry in this year’s competition. As she launched into her performance for the night, footage shows Golan being drowned out by booing and chants of “Free Palestine” from the audience. According to one attendee in the crowd, who shared their experience online, the “atmosphere inside the arena was horrible”.

In the UK this tension has been building ever since our entry, Olly Alexander, announced he would be competing, despite the LGBTQ+ activist group Queers for Palestine imploring the singer to withdraw from the competition.

Such antagonism at Eurovision contradicts the event’s now permanent slogan: “united by music”. Still, anyone involved this year who expected warmth and solidarity is either desperately naïve or deliberately obtuse.

Of course, the friction stems from Israel’s continued assault on Gaza in the wake of the October 7 Hamas attack and the country’s apartheid against Palestinians. This crisis, which UN rights experts have called a genocide, has led to the deaths of over 34,000 Palestinians, with Israel accused of committing war crimes and breaking international law. Israel recently launched further missile attacks on the southern city of Rafah, seizing the border crossing between Gaza and Egypt, thereby cutting off a vital aid route into the city, where 1.4 million people are currently trapped in an area roughly the same size as Heathrow.

Compared to this growing humanitarian crisis, a singing contest feels insignificant. However, as the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel (PACBI) points out, competing in Eurovision provides “propaganda value”, with Israel’s president, Isaac Herzog, suggesting that “it’s important for Israel to appear in Eurovision… because there are haters who try to drive us off every stage”. Israel’s entry for the competition, Eden Golan, echoed this sentiment. “It’s a dream, in particular this year, when it has even more meaning,” she said. “It’s to show the whole world who we really are, and to bring our country in three minutes to the stage, and to show our emotion and our strength and our people – that we are here, forever, together.”

Since it was confirmed that Israel would be invited to this year’s contest, Eurovision fans, musicians, European politicians, music industry professionals and pro-Palestine activists have repeatedly called for the country to be banned from competing.

There is a precedent for this: in 2022, following outcries from artists and international broadcasters, the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) made the decision to disqualify Russia from the song contest following the country’s invasion of Ukraine. In a statement at the time, the EBU said that based on meetings with Eurovision’s governing body, the rules of the event and “the values of the EBU… [that] the inclusion of a Russian entry… would bring the competition into disrepute”.

Such sentiments sour when considering the EBU’s attitude towards Israel and the organisation’s failure to consider experiences of those living in Palestine. It’s baffling that Russia’s assault on Ukraine is considered the antithesis of what Eurovision stands for but an ongoing genocide is permissible. Such hypocrisy has rightly been criticised, with a spokesperson from PACBI pointing out that “by sanctioning Russia for its then days-old invasion of Ukraine, while shielding apartheid Israel from accountability despite its decades-old regime of oppression against Palestinians, Eurovision organisers the EBU display utterly hypocritical, racist and colonial disregard for Palestinian life”.

Still, the EBU has remained steadfast in their decision to allow Israel to compete, with Director General Noel Curran emphasising the apparent apolitical nature of the competition. “We are aware of the many voices calling to exclude Israel from this year’s competition in the same way as we excluded the Russian broadcaster in 2022 following the invasion of Ukraine. Comparisons between wars and conflicts are complex and difficult and, as a non-political media organisation, not ours to make,” he said.

Calling Eurovision “non-political” is almost as maddening as dubbing those demanding Israel’s exclusion from the contest “haters”. As Tess Megginson, a PhD student studying central and eastern European history at the University of North Carolina, wrote in the Washington Post that the competition has always been rooted in politics. The song contest’s genesis in 1956 stemmed from a desire for post-war cooperation between European states, and the introduction of televoting in the late 90s had led to so-called “bloc voting” (where countries with strong ties engage in biased voting) has skewed the final results. “By 2009,” Megginson wrote, “the accusations of bloc voting became so loud – mainly from the United Kingdom – that the Eurovision Song Contest had to reintroduce juries alongside televoting.” 

The EBU’s hypocrisy regarding Israel is, of course, indicative of a double standard towards Palestine and the broader global dehumanisation of Palestinians themselves. What’s also egregious is how any protest against Israel has been smothered throughout the competition’s history. In 2019, when Israel themselves hosted Eurovision, anyone thought to be planning a disturbance at the show was banned from entering the country.

In a statement released after Queers for Palestine called for him to withdraw from Eurovision, Olly Alexander said that he didn’t believe that removing himself from the competition would lead to an end to the conflict in Gaza. The hope, he suggested, was that by taking part, those competing could use their platform to call for peace. However, this year in Malmö, the EBU has warned contestants about any displays of solidarity towards Palestine.

This has already led to pushback against certain performers. During his performance at the first semi-final, former Swedish Eurovision contestant, Eric Saade, wore the keffiyeh wrapped around his wrist, leading the EBU to issue a statement saying they “regret that Eric Saade chose to compromise the non-political nature of the event”. Similarly, this year’s Irish entry, Bambie Thug, told a press conference that the EBU had ordered them to remove the words “Freedom for Palestine” and “Ceasefire” from their costume.

These orders extend to the audience. According to various news reports, those attending the live shows in Malmö have been warned not to bring Palestinian flags or symbols into the arena. It’s a curious decision, especially considering the sea of Ukrainian flags wafted during last year’s competition, which was held in Liverpool, and the decision to change the colour of the Eurovision logo to represent the Ukrainian colours.

Still, protests are expected to take place outside of Malmö Arena this week, and viewers around the world have vowed to boycott the contest, an action supported by the BDS Movement. There have also been calls, petitions and open-letters directed at the competitors, begging them to withdraw from the competition in solidarity with Palestine (none, so far, have done so).

Bambie Thug’s attempts at showing solidarity, and Alexander’s hopes that artists competing might be able to use their platform to advocate for peace, have ultimately proved useless. With Eurovision still going ahead, and Israel still competing, it proves how the only effective way to protest would have been to withdraw. Real action, after all, speaks louder than words. 

Instead, empty gestures, performative victimhood and self-preservation from the EBU, broadcasters and those competing have left a stain on Eurovision. It’s one that’s unlikely to wash out. When next year’s competition comes around, the camp spectacle and joyfulness that give the song contest its enticing colour will remain dirtied. No lessons will be learned, no accountability will be taken, and the lives of countless Palestinians will still be lost.

It leaves the future of Eurovision in a mess. The hypocrisy of the EBU has brought its credibility into the question, as has its fraudulent claims of apoliticism; just as the decision to exclude Russia was political, so is the choice to allow Israel to participate. This year Eurovision has chosen to support violence over advocating for peace. Going forward, it’s going to be hard to feel united by music after that.