The next threat to Israel at Eurovision is coming from inside the house |
You might think the Kan public broadcaster would breathe a sigh of relief with the news that Israel won’t be barred from next year’s Eurovision.
The looming threat of ousting Israel from the annual song contest has been removed. Or has it?
While one obstacle has been overcome, the next threat to Israel’s participation at the Eurovision is coming from inside the house.
Many anti-Israel activists have shouted online for years that Israel does not belong in the Eurovision because it isn’t even in Europe. True fans, however, understand that the criterion for partaking is not geographic, but membership in the European Broadcasting Union. (Australia, which has competed since 2015, is certainly not in Europe.)
In order to maintain EBU membership, Israel must have a functioning, independent public broadcaster that provides both news and entertainment programming. And there’s the rub.
For a number of years, allies of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have been making efforts to shut down or gut Israel’s public broadcaster beyond recognition. Such a move would make Israel ineligible to be an EBU member and end its 53-year run in the Eurovision.
While the government has not been successful so far in that goal, it took a sharp step forward this week with the establishment of an ad hoc committee designed to push through media reform legislation by circumventing the permanent committee that has stymied it.
Communications Minister Shlomo Karhi – a member of Netanyahu’s ruling Likud party – has, since taking office in late 2022, made no secret of his desire to