Eurovision Song Contest 2026

How would a neutral flag work? Everyone would still know it's Israel.

Israel would still buy votes off national telcos like in the last contest.

”And the winner…with 656 points is…NEUTRAL FLAG!!”

I believe the notion is that they would perform under the flag of KAN and the point would be to dissociate the performance and performers from the country.

I'm not sure how voting would work as it's never been done in Eurovision before to my knowledge

I still don't seem to know who in RTE put forward this to withdraw…. management seem very reticent on this

Hmmmm….

I think this has been denied this morning. To be honest, they're both terrible ideas.

The first proposal: no matter how much the EBU butters Israel up, they will never withdraw voluntarily. The propaganda value of Eurovision is massive for Israel. As other posters on this thread have said, Israel has no sporting stars, it's never going to win the World Cup, etc., but Eurovision is an event it can win (and has.) It's never going to walk away voluntarily.

The second proposal: how would that work exactly? We'd all know it's Israel, the televote (and juries) can still be manipulated to vote for it. All it would mean is there would be no Israeli flags on display. But we'd all know who it is.

Mark my words, Israel will NEVER withdraw voluntarily and it will never accept competing "anonymously." And as I've said previously, there are certain groups and individuals who will be happy to let Eurovision die to protect Israel from any embarrassment.

Personally, I don't think anything can stop an Israeli victory in 2026 anyway, unless they do what Azerbaijan does - cheat, be accused of cheating, avoid punishment, lie low for a while until it blows over, then try again. Azerbaijan had a great set of results (8th-3rd-5th-1st-4th-2nd) between their debut and 2013, when the first allegations of their vote manipulation emerged, then their results slumped a bit before picking back up in 2019. Allegations then emerged again after the 2022 contest, and their results have slumped again since. So it's possible Israel might consider lying low in 2026 to take the heat off a bit before trying again in 2027.

Giving up is only going to further improve Israel's chances of winning though. Why would RTE want to allow that to happen?

Looking further then into the future, where will the Eurovision be hosted in 2027? Will Ireland be sending a representative in 2027 to Tel Aviv or Jerusalem?

I don't think there's any apology necessary. Google translate is our friend here. I think this is the most important line in that article (translated)

The RTVE Board of Directors will meet at 9:30 a.m. to decide whether Spain will participate in the European competition if Israel participates

As has been mentioned before, there is no mechanism for the EBU to force Israel out of the competition so they will have to suck it up if Spain, or any of the other big 5, withdraws. That will make 5 broadcasters in total to have pulled out and I've a sneaky suspicion the French broadcaster will do similar

From a financial point of view that makes no sense. Let 3 of the big 5 walk instead of 1 (perhaps 2 - depending on what happens with France) and watch the money float away?

If KAN was removed the German, British or Italian broadcasters would likely not have an issue with that considering the only way of suspending or expelling a broadcaster is from that broadcaster breaking the rules. The EBU has shown zero tolerance to this in the past and they would be expected to do the same in the future

The potential reason for cancelling would be financial though. Nothing at all to do with Israel