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A gaggle of 400 actors, musicians and leisure execs together with Helen Mirren, Liev Schreiber and Gene Simmons have penned an open letter supporting the choice for Israel to stay within the Eurovision Song Contest.
Released by non-profit trade org Creative Community for Peace, the letter backs the choice of Eurovision organizer the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) to maintain Israel on this 12 months’s contest. The EBU has been below stress from detractors to ban the nation over the bombardment of Gaza in response to Hamas’ October 7 assaults.
Other signees embody Scooter Braun, Boy George, Mayim Bialik, Haim Saban, Julianna Margulies, Sharon Osbourne and Debra Messing.
Punishing Israel can be an “inversion of justice,” the letter says. “Israel is fighting a war against a European Union-designated terrorist group that once again broke a ceasefire that day, and then went on to slaughter over 1,200 people,” it provides. “This current round of fighting is not a war that Israel wanted or started.” Read it in full beneath.
The letter provides that Israel has a “storied” historical past on Eurovision, having received the competition 4 occasions most lately in 2018. “Those who are calling for Israel’s exclusion are subverting the spirit of the Contest and turning it from a celebration of unity into a tool of politics,” it reads.
Israel’s place at Eurovision has been challenged by The Finnish and Icelandic industries, with the previous pressuring its native broadcaster to drag its entry if Israel isn’t eliminated. But the EBU has repeatedly held agency and insists that Israel’s battle with Gaza is distinct from Russia’s with Ukraine, which has seen Russia banned for the previous couple of years.
This 12 months’s Eurovision will happen in Malmo in May. The UK shall be represented by Years and Years’ Ollie Alexander however that transfer has additionally proved controversial because the It’s a Sin star lately signed a letter describing Israel as an “apartheid” state. In response, the Campaign Against Antisemitism stated Alexander must be fired from his function because the UK’s Eurovision consultant.
The letter in full
We, the undersigned members of the leisure trade, are writing to precise our help for Israel’s continued inclusion within the 2024 Eurovision Song Contest.
We have been shocked and upset to see some members of the leisure neighborhood calling for Israel to be banished from the Contest for responding to the best bloodbath of Jews because the Holocaust.
October seventh was a day during which a music pageant meant to have a good time life was attacked by Hamas and noticed 364 harmless civilians killed, tons of maimed and brutalized, over 40 festivalgoers taken hostage, and plenty of raped.
Israel is combating a battle towards a European Union-designated terrorist group that when once more broke a ceasefire that day, after which went on to slaughter over 1,200 individuals. This present spherical of combating will not be a battle that Israel wished or began. To punish Israel can be an inversion of justice.
Israel additionally has an extended and storied historical past in Eurovision. This consists of successful the Contest in 1978, 1979, 1998, and 2018 and having a various group of contestants representing the nation, together with Palestinians, Ethiopians, and members of the LGBTQIA+ neighborhood.
Israel then hosted the Contest in 1979, 1999, and 2019. In truth, Eurovision followers voted “Dare to Dream,” the sixty fourth Eurovision Song Contest in Tel Aviv, the finest Eurovision manufacturing of the last decade.
Furthermore, we consider that unifying occasions reminiscent of singing competitions are essential to assist bridge our cultural divides and unite individuals of all backgrounds by their shared love of music.
The annual Eurovision Song Contest embodies this unifying spirit. Every 12 months, hundreds of thousands of individuals throughout Europe and world wide take part an enormous show of cultural change and celebration of music.
Those who’re calling for Israel’s exclusion are subverting the spirit of the Contest and turning it from a celebration of unity right into a device of politics.
We help all of this 12 months’s contestants in addition to your resolution to reject the calls to expel Israel from the Contest. We are trying ahead to a profitable and thrilling Eurovision 2024.
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