Ben Pawlowski
A LEADING government minister has warned that Spain could withdraw from the 2026 Eurovision Song Contest if Israel is allowed to participate.
Speaking to TVE, culture minister Ernest Urtasun called on the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) – the producers and organisers of Eurovision – to expel Israel over its ongoing military offensive in Gaza, and raised the possibility that next year’s competition could go ahead without Spain unless action is taken.
“I don’t think we can normalise Israel’s participation in international events as if nothing is happening,” he said.
“Events like Eurovision or the Vuelta a España bring a certain representation of a country,” Urtasun added, referring to the Spanish equivalent of the Tour de France currently overshadowed by mass protests against the participation of the Israel-Premier Tech cycling team.
He continued: “In Eurovision’s case, it is not an individual artist who participates but someone who participates on behalf of that country’s citizens.”
If Israel participates in next year’s song contest and ‘we fail to expel them, measures will have to be taken’, Urtasun said, hinting that Spain could launch a boycott already mooted by Slovenia’s national broadcaster.
READ MORE: Spain’s Pedro Sanchez demands Israel be kicked out of Eurovision ‘like Russia was’
However, the ultimate decision on whether to take part will lie with RTVE, the Spanish state broadcaster.
Israel’s participation in the 2025 edition of Eurovision, held in Basel and watched by over 150 million people, was a source of immense controversy.
A number of Palestinian flags were seen in the crowd during the final, two pro-Palestinian protesters were pinned down by security after attempting to disrupt proceedings, and BBC broadcaster Graham Norton, who provides commentary for Eurovision coverage in the UK, suggested that crowd noise had been edited to mask boos and jeers during Israel’s performance.
Following the contest, RTVE asked the EBU for an audit to clarify how the Spanish televote was distributed. Spain handed the maximum twelve points to Israel.
According to El País, officials at RTVE expressed ‘doubts’ over the validity of the results.
The broadcaster also issued a message of support for Palestinians ahead of its coverage. The message, ‘In the face of human rights, silence is not an option. Peace and justice for Palestine,’ was shown on televisions across Spain.
Even prime minister Pedro Sanchez weighed in on the debate over Israel’s participation, accusing the EBU of perpetuating a ‘double standard’ by allowing Israel to compete.
READ MORE: UK Eurovision entry sparks controversy in Spain for appearing to endorse ‘balconing’
Sanchez compared the situation in 2022 when Russia was booted out of the song contest following the invasion of Ukraine.
“Nobody put their hands to their heads when Russia’s invasion of Ukraine began three years ago and they were asked to leave international competitions and also not to participate, as we have seen recently, in Eurovision. Therefore, neither should Israel,” Sanchez said.
He added: “Israel should not be allowed [to participate] because what we cannot allow is double standards.”
On Monday, Sanchez ramped up his criticism of Israel, unveiling nine measures designed to force Binyamin Netanyahu to call a halt to military activity in Gaza.
He said: “Protecting your country and your society is one thing, but bombing hospitals and killing innocent boys and girls with hunger is another thing entirely.”
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Frankly, I never understood how Israel ever qualified to enter the Eurovision contest. Same goes for a number of other countries which are also not in Europe.
Disgusting by the Spanish. Israel is just looking after his country and if you support hamas is disgraceful, the kidnapped hostages for there own purposes we feel that the Spanish should not be doing this.
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One has to wonder, Mr Pawlowski, where your true sympathies lie, and how committed you might be to delivering a balanced view of any given situation. Your article falls heavily on the side of those demonising every aspect of the Jewish state, and I’m left still expecting your input – you as a respected professional journalist, explaining to us the many counter arguments which are so obvious to anybody with any clear understanding of the situation. So many international commentators have remarked upon the dubious strategy of the corruption-beleagured Señor Sanchez to create a diversionary smoke screen and shore up his ultra-left supporters by attacking Israel. Many have raised the question that, if attacking Gaza is collective punishment, and thus despicable, why is the same collective and violent punishment being meted out to innocent Jewish grannies in Canada and equally innocent Jewish toddlers in Marseille. The Eurovision boycott is just the same old tropes dressed up in different clothing. Señor Sanchez couldn’t believe how many Spanish people voted for Israel, but then again the Left only ever believe in Democracy when they win. One doesn’t expect the righteous members of the Spanish Government to spare a thought for the dying, innocent hostages, nor the innocent music festival teenagers literally torn apart, but I frankly did hope for a little more from you, with your self-appointed adrenalin filled quest for the truth. The best thing about your article was the rare, and correct use of the subjunctive in the title.
PS. Above comment. Frankly, Mark, maybe you should do some homework before appearing so dumb in public.
Chris, good points raised but you don’t need to get personal.
There’s an equally good argument, used by the likes of Radiohead and Nick Cave that by completely boycotting a country, you are cutting off all hope of influence and keeping the moderate people within the pale.
The facts are, by far the majority of Israelis are now horrified and angry about what is happening in Gaza, and are regularly protesting and increasing more violently… expect a Poll Tax-type threshold moment, sometime soon.
While it is abhorrent what Israel is doing in Gaza/West Bank, I know there are many many reasonable and rational people within the country that will eventually be heard.
As soon as Netanyahu has moved on there will be a very necessary reckoning… and they’ll need to be, because they have just sown another two decades of blind hatred from thousands and thousands of angry young Palestinians.
Hi Jon, thank you for your reasoned reply. Re-reading my post I don’t feel that your accusation of my getting personal to be justified. I was critical, but not insulting in any way.
Israel doesn’t need to embark upon any military action to, as you put it, sow another two decades of blind hatred. Whatever Israel does, the blind hatred is already instilled from birth in many a Palestinian Arab child , who is given his little para military uniform and toy AK47 at the age of three and then shown videos of how to kill Jews at after-school recruitment sessions.
You have obviously completely bought in to the generally accepted narrative surrounding the conflict, without digging a bit deeper, which surprises me. In this construct Hamas is transformed from a hate-filled band of savage murderers into a group of idealistic resistance fighters struggling to free their homeland from oppressors. (And if you give credence to the “Gaza open air prison” lie you might want to look at several Arab produced videos of the enclave before the war, complete with luxury shopping malls and five star hotels.)
No, Israel doesn’t have to do anything to provoke the kind of attack suffered on Oct 7. Your supremely confident use of “the facts are” accompanied by the assertions of “reasonable and rational people ” ring particularly hollow when one takes the time and effort to actually examine the facts on the ground. You have convinced yourself that the majority of Israelis are against a continuation of the war in order to completely destroy Hamas. This is demonstrably false. Israel is a small and fragile country, and there is virtually nobody who was not touched personally by the massacre on the 7th. There is, of course, a boisterous group, making a lot of noise, who is eagerly inflated in importance by the Western press, and joined by opponents of the Netanyahu government, but the majority of normal Israelis are crystal clear about what would happen to their country in the future should any element of Hamas be left in power. The “horrified and angry” Israelis actually inhabit a world that you have constructed with European eyes. Israelis are still horrified and angry at what they remember from the unprovoked massacre. Ironically, the mutilated and dead in the attacked kibbutzim were mostly the great idealists who chose to live there to build bridges and help the Palestinians -give them work, drive them to hospitals across the border, improve their kids schooling. These idealists were the first to die.
Israel is a tiny country fighting for its survival. Hamas is just a tool of Iran. If there is anything abhorrent I find in your reply it is the wish for “a very necessary reckoning” and the need for it. More dead Jews externally, I take it, and a huge political witch hunt internally to wipe out any trace of the last government .
I sincerely hope your wishes don’t come true….
Hi Chris
Nothing of the sort … when I write about a ‘necessary reckoning’… I don’t do it in an Old Testament sort of way. I do it in the sense of being an absolute need to crack heads together and get people to talk, sensible people to work out if killing children and massacring families in the Kibbutz’s is the way forward.
And yes, the bitter irony, being that most of those Kibbutzim were exactly the people who wanted a change and hoped to make Gaza a happier better place, and not the poorest, most unhealthy, and most dangerous country in the entire world!