MADRID: Spain will boycott next year’s Eurovision Song Contest if Israel takes part, public broadcaster RTVE, which is charged with selecting the country’s entry for the event, said Tuesday.
While other European nations have threatened to pull out of the contest, Spain is the first of the so-called “big five” nations which provide the most funding for the event to do so.
The European Broadcasting Union (EBU), the organizer of Eurovision, is set to decide whether Israel will take part in the 2026 edition at its general assembly in December.
If EBU members decide to keep Israeli public broadcaster KAN as a participant, “RTVE would have to carry out the threat of withdrawing from the contest for the first time in history,” the Spanish broadcaster said in a statement.
The decision comes a day after Spanish Culture Minister Ernest Urtasun said Spain should boycott the event if Israel takes part due to its devastating military offensive in Gaza.
Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez said in May after the last edition of Eurovision that Israel should be excluded because of its military campaign in Gaza, just as Russia has been left out since its 2022 invasion of Ukraine.
“What we cannot allow is double standards in culture,” he said at the time.
Sanchez on Monday called for Israel to be barred from international sport over the Gaza war after pro-Palestinian protesters in Madrid forced one of the biggest cycling races to be abandoned, the Vuelta a Espana, over the weekend.
Demonstrators denounced the participation of the Israel-Premier Tech team in one of the top three races in the international cycling calendar.
Eurovision is the world’s largest live televised music event. This year’s edition in Basel drew in 166 million viewers across 37 countries.
Austrian singer JJ won that competition, securing Vienna the right to host the 2026 edition.
Ireland, Slovenia, Iceland and the Netherlands have also threatened not to take part in next year’s event if Israel does.
Five countries — Britain, France, Germany, Italy and Spain — that make the biggest financial contributions to the EBU get an automatic qualification for the Eurovision final.
The EBU said in July it was launching a consultation with all members of the organization over the issue of Israel’s participation.
It said it would discuss “how we manage participation, geopolitical tensions, and how other organizations have approached similar challenges.”
Pro-Palestinian activists protested in Malmo, Sweden in 2024 and in Basel, Switzerland in May over Israel’s participation in the contest.