Eurovision song competition starts with the first semifinal after boycott over Israel

VIENNA (AP) — Competition starts Tuesday at the Eurovision Song Contest, with divisions over Israel's participation hanging over the 70th birthday of the over-the-top pop music extravaganza.

Host city Vienna has been bedecked in hearts and the contest’s “United by Music” motto for a week in which singers and bands from 35 countries will compete onstage for the continent’s musical crown. But five countries — Spain, Ireland, the Netherlands, Slovenia and Iceland — are boycotting to protest Israel's inclusion.

Several pro-Palestinian demonstrations are planned in Vienna during Eurovision week, and security is tight, with police officers from across Austria deployed in the capital, and support from forces in neighboring Germany.

Last month a 21-year-old Austrian man accused of pledging allegiance to the Islamic State group pleaded guilty to plotting to attack a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna in 2024, and the head of Austria’s DSN intelligence service, Sylvia Mayer, said “the terror threat posed by Islamist terror groups, as well as Iran-affiliated groups, is still at a high level.”

Israeli singer Noam Bettan is among 15 acts competing for votes from viewers and national juries in Tuesday’s semifinal at the Wiener Stadthalle arena. The top 10 will go through to Saturday’s grand final, along with 10 from Thursday’s second semifinal. The U.K., France, Germany and Italy automatically qualify because they are among the contest’s biggest funders. Austria, last year’s winner, goes through to the final as host country.

Bettan is seeking to get Israel, which came second in 2025, into Saturday’s final with the ballad “Michelle.” Like last year’s Israeli competitor, Yuval Raphael, he has practiced singing while being booed.

Hoping to cement its status as bookmakers’ favorite is Finland, with the intense “Liekinheitin” (“Flamethrower”) by violinist Linda Lampenius and pop singer Pete Parkkonen.

Other competitors in Tuesday’s semifinal include Greece’s Akylas with fan-favorite party-rap track “Ferto” (“Bring It”); Portuguese quintet Bandidos do Cante with the soulful “Rosa”; and singer Senhit, representing tiny San Marino with “Superstar,” a party anthem featuring a guest appearance by Boy George.

Long a forum for good-natured — and sometimes more pointed — national rivalries, Eurovision has found it hard to separate pop and politics in recent years. Russia was expelled in 2022 after its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

The 2024 contest in Malmo, Sweden, and last year’s event in Basel, Switzerland, saw pro-Palestinian protests that called for Israel to be expelled over its conduct of its war against Hamas in Gaza and allegations it ran a rule-breaking marketing campaign to get votes for its contestant.

When organizers declined to kick Israel out, five countries announced in December that they would not participate this year.

The European Broadcasting Union, which runs Eurovision, has toughened voting rules in response to the vote-rigging allegations, halving the number of votes per person to 10 and tightening safeguards against “suspicious or coordinated voting activity.”

Dean Vuletic, author of "Postwar Europe and the Eurovision Song Contest," is confident Eurovision can weather the latest storms.

“We’ll see demonstrations, but we’ll also see a lot of colorful events going on which will really represent what Eurovision is about, which is bringing Europeans together,” he said.

“If you look at the history of Eurovision, it’s gone through so many crises, so many political challenges, so many geopolitical changes in Europe, and it’s always managed to survive.”

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