{"id":899834,"date":"2026-09-18T01:12:10","date_gmt":"2026-09-18T01:12:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/899834\/"},"modified":"2026-09-18T01:12:10","modified_gmt":"2026-09-18T01:12:10","slug":"ireland-boycotts-eurovision-for-second-year-over-israels-inclusion-israel-palestine-conflict-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/899834\/","title":{"rendered":"Ireland boycotts Eurovision for second year over Israel\u2019s inclusion | Israel-Palestine conflict News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Public broadcaster RTE says the country\u2019s participation cannot be justified amid \u2018appalling and ongoing loss of lives in Gaza\u2019.<\/p>\n

Ireland has become the second country, after the Netherlands, to announce a boycott of next year\u2019s Eurovision Song Contest<\/a> over Israel\u2019s participation.<\/p>\n

Irish public broadcaster RTE said in a statement on Thursday that the country\u2019s participation could not be justified \u201cgiven the appalling and ongoing loss of lives in Gaza\u201d and that the humanitarian crisis in the enclave \u201ccontinues to put the lives of so many civilians at risk\u201d.<\/p>\n

Recommended Stories list of 3 itemsend of list<\/p>\n

RTE, which manages Ireland\u2019s selection and participation in Eurovision, added that it remained \u201cdeeply concerned by the continued denial of independent access [for] international journalists to the territory\u201d.<\/p>\n

The decision marks the second consecutive year that Ireland will neither participate in nor broadcast the competition, which is the world\u2019s most popular television music show.<\/p>\n

Earlier this month, Eurovision organisers said they would exclude any country involved in an armed conflict from hosting the competition.<\/p>\n

However, Dutch public broadcaster AVROTROS said the measure was not \u201csufficient\u201d.<\/p>\n

AVROTROS announced<\/a> last month that it was withdrawing from the 2027 competition.<\/p>\n

It said Eurovision could \u201cno longer be considered neutral\u201d given Israel\u2019s participation in \u201ca large-scale military conflict\u201d in Gaza.<\/p>\n

Both Ireland and the Netherlands were among five countries that withdrew from Eurovision 2026 in Vienna earlier this year. Spain, Slovenia and Iceland also decided not to participate.<\/p>\n

\u2018The correct and principled decision\u2019<\/p>\n

Sinn Fein, Ireland\u2019s main opposition party, welcomed RTE\u2019s decision. The party\u2019s spokesperson for Culture, Communications and Sport, Joanna Byrne, told Al Jazeera that Israel\u2019s behaviour \u201ccannot be normalised\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cRTE\u2019s decision to again boycott the Eurovision Song Contest is the correct and principled decision in the face of Israel\u2019s ongoing genocide against the Palestinian people,\u201d Byrne said.<\/p>\n

She added that Israel is an \u201capartheid state\u201d and accused it of engaging in \u201cethnic cleansing\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cIsrael, as an aggressor nation just like Russia, should have been banned when they engaged in genocidal actions, just like Russia.\u201d<\/p>\n

The European Broadcasting Union organises the annual music competition. It has faced accusations of applying a double standard for refusing to exclude Israel, despite banning Russia following its invasion of Ukraine in 2022.<\/p>\n

Eurovision Director Martin Green said on Thursday that organisers \u201cfully respect\u201d Ireland\u2019s decision and that they \u201cwill be missed\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Eurovision Song Contest is at its best when broadcasters and their artists from different countries come together to share music, celebrate creativity and create connections between audiences,\u201d Green said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat power to bring people together is at the heart of what makes the Contest so special, and is even more important now in an increasingly difficult and divided world.\u201d<\/p>\n

The 2026 show, which Bulgaria won, attracted 132 million viewers, 34 million fewer than its 2025 edition.<\/p>\n

Thousands of protesters had gathered outside the venue in the Austrian capital during the final in mid-May to oppose Israel\u2019s participation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Public broadcaster RTE says the country\u2019s participation cannot be justified amid \u2018appalling and ongoing loss of lives in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":899835,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[6175,49,48,75,3456,6816,8766,37472,13199,23285,1258,21751,1259,341,22265,44],"class_list":["post-899834","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-arts-and-culture","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-entertainment","tag-europe","tag-european-union","tag-gaza","tag-human-rights","tag-humanitarian-crises","tag-ireland","tag-israel","tag-israel-palestine-conflict","tag-middle-east","tag-music","tag-netherlands","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/899834","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=899834"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/899834\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/899835"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=899834"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=899834"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=899834"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}