Reigning Eurovision Winner Nemo Backs Calls For Israel To Be Excluded From This Year's Contest

Nemo performing at the Eurovision 2024 final in Malmö, SwedenEurovision champion Nemo has said that they do not support Israel’s continued presence in the contest.Nemo won Eurovision on behalf of Switzerland in 2024 with their song The Code, in what proved to be an especially controversial year for the competition.Amid the ongoing conflict in the Middle East, many critics last year called for a boycott of Eurovision if Israel were allowed to remain. Around this time, Nemo was also one of nine acts involved in the broadcast that issued a group statement expressing solidarity with Palestine prior to the event.In the run-up to this year’s Eurovision, the contest is once again facing scrutiny over Israel’s participation, with more than 70 artists and performers associated with the contest in the past – including two former winners – sharing an open letter this week calling for Israel to be excluded from the upcoming event.Asked during an interview with HuffPost UK if this is a subject they have an opinion on, Nemo responded: “Yeah, I do. I personally feel like it doesn’t make sense that Israel is a part of this Eurovision. And of Eurovision in general right now. “I don’t know how much I want to get into detail, but I would say, I don’t support the fact that Israel is part of Eurovision at the moment.”Nemo later supplied HuffPost UK with an additional statement, which read: “I support the call for Israel’s exclusion from the Eurovision Song Contest.“Israel’s actions are fundamentally at odds with the values that Eurovision claims to uphold — peace, unity, and respect for human rights.”Nemo celebrating their Eurovision win in May 2024Responding to the artists’ calls for Israel to be banned from Eurovision, the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) said in a statement earlier this week: “We understand the concerns and deeply held views around the current conflict in the Middle East.“The EBU is not immune to global events but, together, with our members, it is our role to ensure the Contest remains – at its heart – a universal event that promotes connections, diversity and inclusion through music.“We all aspire to keep the Eurovision Song Contest positive and inclusive and aspire to show the world as it could be, rather than how it necessarily is.”Their response continued: “As a reminder, the EBU is an association of public service broadcasters, not governments, who are all eligible to participate in the Eurovision Song Contest every year if they meet the requisite requirements.“It is not our role to make comparisons between conflicts. As part of its mission to secure a sustainable future for public service media, the EBU is supporting our Israeli Member KAN against the threat from being privatised or shut down by the Israeli government.“The EBU remains aligned with other international organisations that have similarly maintained their inclusive stance towards Israeli participants in major competitions at this time.”Last week, Eurovision bosses issued a similarly-worded statement to HuffPost UK in response to questions from three competing countries’ national broadcasters about whether Israel should remain part of the contest.Eurovision took place in Malmö, Sweden last yearDespite their past support for Palestine, Nemo said elsewhere in the conversation that there was “never” a question of them withdrawing from last year’s competition, as they wanted to use the Eurovision stage to tell their personal story through their song, The Code.“It was very much just me realising that this story is important to tell. And if I’m not there to tell it, and to say it, then no one else will,” they claimed.Nemo continued: “I think I could have not gone through all of that if I was just singing kind of a song that was a cute song, and I would feel happy singing it. I needed this sense of direction and purpose, and that was what never made me even question being there.”“And that’s how it feels for me this year, as well,” they added, looking ahead to their performance at the upcoming contest.Meanwhile, Nemo also spoke about the changes to the rules around permitted flags at this year’s Eurovision Song Contest.These changes mean audience members are allowed to wave any flags or emblems they like (as long as they don’t violate any Swiss laws), while acts on stage or in “official spaces” are forbidden from holding any flag other than that of their own country.As a result, this means that Pride flags are effectively banned from the Eurovision stage this year, a move which Nemo branded “stupid as fuck”.Nemo brought the non-binary flag with them on stage at last year's Eurovision“That’s so dumb,” they said. “I don’t get it. It’s so random sometimes. I just feel like… why? You know what I mean?“You can’t be known for like the queerest thing in the world, basically, a contest that has been associated with queerness and gay culture for so long, and then be like, ‘oh, we don’t allow Pride flags for the artists’.“And especially after last year, when I had to smuggle in the non-binary flag, and they were like, ‘you can’t have it on stage’, they told me. And then after the contest, the official statement was like, ‘it was never forbidden’. But then this year, they’re pro-actively [forbidding flags on stage]. I don’t know, it’s very strange to me.”“I don’t know, it feels a bit confusing to me,” Nemo continued. “Also, this rule feels not thought through, at all. I don’t know who decided that, and how they decided it, and what was the reason for it, especially after last year, but it just feels strange. It feels not really thought through. I don’t know.”They added: “It doesn’t even feel ill-intended. I don’t know, I’m confused by it. I think that’s the only thing I can say. I don’t think it makes sense at all. “And it’s harming, I feel like, the cause of Eurovision. I don’t know, it’s just weird to me.”Following their win at Eurovision in 2024, Nemo is among the guest performers at this year’s contest, which is due to take place in Basel later this month.They also recently unveiled their latest single Casanova, the music video for which you can watch below.Read HuffPost UK’s full interview with Nemo next week.MORE EUROVISION:Have Flags Actually Been Banned At Eurovision 2025? Here's What's Really Going OnEurovision Bosses Stand Their Ground Amid Backlash Over New Pride Flag RuleEurovision Bosses Respond To Former Contestants' Calls For Israel To Be Removed From Contest

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