An alternative concert movement is unfolding across Europe this week in direct response to the Eurovision Song Contest in Vienna, where Israel’s participation has drawn organized boycotts and renewed calls for the country’s expulsion from the 70-year-old pop music competition.
Five countries — Spain, Ireland, the Netherlands, Slovenia, and Iceland — are formally boycotting the event, which is being held under the motto “United by Music.” The boycotts come as the European Broadcasting Union, the Geneva-based body that runs Eurovision, declined for a third consecutive year to bar Israel from the contest.
At the “United for Palestine” concert in Brussels on Tuesday, Palestinian songwriter Bashar Murad performed Nina Simone’s “I Wish I Knew How It Would Feel to Be Free” in English and Arabic before a crowd of hundreds at an ornate concert hall. Murad, who nearly became Iceland’s Eurovision competitor in 2024, told the audience that the alternative events are intended to pressure the contest to return to its founding mission.
“The purpose of these alternative programs that are happening is to remind Eurovision what it’s actually about and to try to hopefully bring it back, to correct its course and make it actually live up to the things that it claims to be about,” Murad said. “A lot of people in the world feel that the competition has lost its meaning.”
Katrien De Ruysscher, founder of the activist group SOS Gaza, which organized the Brussels event with the rights group 11.11.11, said creating an alternative was necessary. “We have to create an alternative because the participation of Israel is problematic,” De Ruysscher said.
Similar events are being held in Austria, Germany, Slovenia, Italy, and Spain, organizers said. Spanish public television, which broadcast Eurovision in past years, plans to air an alternative program titled “La Casa de la Música” on Saturday evening, marking the broadcaster’s own 70th anniversary with performances by 20 veteran and newcomer musicians. None of the alternative events is expected to draw an audience approaching the 166 million viewers the Eurovision contest attracted in 2025.
Amnesty International secretary general Agnès Callamard called for Israel’s expulsion from the competition, citing the precedent of Russia’s removal in 2022 after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. “Songs and sequins must not be allowed to drown out or distract from Israel’s atrocities or Palestinian suffering,” Callamard said.
Israel has participated in Eurovision since 1973 and has won four times. Many Israelis have said they feel the boycotts and protests reflect unfair ostracism. President Isaac Herzog welcomed the broadcasting union’s decision to keep Israel in the contest, saying “Israel deserves to be represented on every stage around the world.”
The 2024 contest in Malmo, Sweden, and the 2025 event in Basel, Switzerland, also saw pro-Palestinian protests calling for Israel’s expulsion and allegations that Israel’s government broke contest rules to support its contestant. This year, the European Broadcasting Union tightened voting rules in response to the vote-rigging allegations. Ten countries, including Israel, won places in Saturday’s final during Tuesday’s semifinal round.
Murad’s connection to the contest runs through his family: his father, a founding member of the Palestinian music group Sabreen, unsuccessfully petitioned the European Broadcasting Union to admit Palestine to Eurovision in 2007.
“It’s always amazing to be in the same room with people who believe in the same things as you and people who believe that we can’t just let the show go on,” Murad said of the Brussels event.