Tel Aviv - As 'Eurovision Song Contest
2019' banners go up across Tel Aviv, behind the glitz of the
songfest is the latest manifestation of a bitter row between
Israel and an international pro-Palestinian boycott movement.
When Israel was selected last year to host the 2019
Eurovision finals, the high-profile, 42-nation event was
identified by the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) campaign
as a target for its campaign to pressure governments, companies,
performers and academics to isolate Israel.
Even as Israeli workers erect stages and lighting rigs along
Tel Aviv's Mediterranean seafront, some fear that the live
broadcasts of the May 14-18 event may be used by boycott
activists to mount protests in front of millions watching live.
BDS has called on artists and broadcasters to withdraw from
the event, arguing that holding it in Tel Aviv amounts to
"artwashing - whitewashing through arts" Israel's policies
towards Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza.
The event's local television hosts, Israel's public
broadcaster Kan, said it does not know what to expect. But
Israeli media reports have raised concerns that activists might
try to disrupt the contest from the audience, or that a
performer may mount a protest on-stage.
The competition - semi-finals followed by a final - will
take place at the Expo Tel Aviv convention centre, with a "fan
zone" with big viewing screens at the beachfront Eurovision
Village.
Security costs are expected to account for 10 percent of the
expenditure on the event by Kan. A spokeswoman for the
broadcaster said she believed the figure was unusually high.
"There is something big here," Tzahi Gavrieli, head of the
Israeli government's anti-BDS taskforce within the Strategic
Affairs Ministry, told Reuters about the event. "It is a major
brand, and there is definitely an attempt under way by the other
side to take it down."
BDS, which was launched in 2005 and is led by Palestinian
campaigners, describes itself as a global movement to pressure
Israel to end the occupation of Palestinian territories.
Israel claims that some boycott activists call for the
dismantling of Israel itself, and the government has mounted a
vigorous counter-campaign, rebutting BDS attacks and accusing
some supporters of being anti-Semitic or having ties to militant
groups such as Hamas and the Popular Front for the Liberation of
Palestine.
BDS leaders reject the Israeli accusations, saying that
their campaign is a non-violent protest movement opposed to all
forms of discrimination, including anti-Semitism. They deny
having any links to militant groups.
BOTS AND TROLLS
On social media, pro-Palestinian activists have urged
supporters to "join us in disrupting Israel's latest PR stunt"
and to participate in a 'Week of Action Against Eurovision in
Tel Aviv'. This, they said, would involve "loud, visible, mass
non violent actions and protests".
Gavrieli's office issued a report on Thursday saying that
BDS activists had used 232 fake Twitter accounts, including bots
and trolls which, it says, engaged in "coordinated inauthentic
behaviour", to drum up opposition to the event.
The BDS dismissed the allegations as "propaganda lies"
intended to cover up "Israel's war crimes against Palestinians
and decades-old system of military occupation".
"This edition of Eurovision will be remembered ... as a
dismal failure for Israel's propaganda machine," said Alia
Malak, of the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural
Boycott of Israel, a BDS member group.
A spokesman for Twitter, when asked about the accounts in
question, told Reuters on Thursday that it had "suspended a
small group of accounts for violating regular spam rules,
in line with commitment to improving healthy conversations
on the service".
The song contest's umbrella organiser, the European
Broadcasting Union (EBU), is vetting all lyrics and host
narrations - a standard practice for Eurovision.
No participating countries or broadcasters have heeded the
BDS calls to pull out of the event.
Eurovision is promoting the 2019 contest under the slogan
"Dare to Dream". Its website said the motto and artwork of the
event "symbolise inclusion, diversity and unity, resonating with
the core values of the Eurovision Song Contest".
Eurovision has the support of the reigning winner, Netta
Barzilai. It was the Israeli singer's victory last year with the
song "Toy" that brought this year's competition to Israel.
"Being on the same stage, no matter what your religion is,
your ethnicity, your colour, from all these countries, all these
cultures combined together, this is a festival of light," she
said in Jerusalem on Monday.
BITTER CAMPAIGN
Palestinians seek a state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip,
with East Jerusalem as its capital. More than 400,000 Israeli
settlers live in the West Bank in settlements that Palestinians
and many countries consider to be illegal under the Geneva
conventions that bar settling on land captured in war.
Israel disputes this, citing security needs and biblical,
historical and political connections to the land.
The Eurovision battle is just the latest in a bitter
campaign by both the BDS and the Israeli government to convince
an international audience of the justice of their cause.
The boycott movement claimed victories last year after the
New Zealand pop singer Lorde cancelled a planned trip to Israel,
and the Argentina football team, with its star player Lionel
Messi, called off a friendly match against Israel.
But some artists and organisations have defied boycott
calls: Madonna will be a guest performer at Eurovision. And the
online home-renting company Airbnb, which delisted properties in
Israeli settlements in the West Bank in November, last month
partially backtracked amid legal and political pressure.
Israel has sought to deport or deny entry to international
activists over their alleged support for BDS.
An Israeli court last month ordered the deportation of Omar
Shakir, a US citizen who is Human Rights Watch's Israel and
Palestine director, over claims that he supports the movement.
Shakir has appealed the order to Israel's Supreme Court.