The Minister of Spanish Culture, Ernest Urtasun, estimated on Monday, September 15 that Spain should not participate in the next edition of the Eurovision of the song if Israel participated, a boycott already defended by other countries.
“We must ensure that Israel does not participate in the next Eurovision edition” and “if we are not successful, Spain should not participate” in the competition, said Ernest Urtasun during an interview on the public radio, a position already adopted by “Ireland, Slovenia, Iceland and the Netherlands,” he recalled.
The decision will return to the Eurovision organizer, the European Radio-Television Union (UER), he said. During the General Assembly of the UU in July, several countries had expressed concern about Israel’s participation in the edition that must be held in Vienna in 2026, and the UUr authorized them to withdraw from the competition until mid -December, without financial penalties.
Historical support of Palestine
Already last May, the socialist prime minister Pedro Sánchez said that Israel should be excluded from Eurovision, the largest view of the world, for “solidarity” with the “people of Palestine who (lives) the absurdity of war and bombings.”
Spain, which recognized the state of Palestine on May 28, 2024 with Ireland and Norway, has been imposed in recent months as one of the most critical votes in the EU with respect to the Benjamin Netanyahu government, and is a historical support of the Palestinian cause.
During the last edition of Eurovision, Spanish public television challenged the organization responsible for the organization of competition, which had summoned it to stop its references to the offensive in Gaza under the threat of sanctions, by transmitting a message of support to the Palestinians before its broadcast of the event.
“With respect to human rights, silence is not an option. Peace and justice for Palestine,” he wrote in White on a black background, the RTVE radio and television group, in a Spanish and English message, a few seconds before the official start of song competition.
On Sunday, the prime minister expressed his “admiration” for the demonstrations of propensions that interrupted the tour of the cycling of Spain of the Vuelta and forced to shorten the race, whose last stage was interrupted after the invasion of the course by thousands of protesters in the center of Madrid.
Source: BFM TV
