Eurovision is a big cultural highlight for many people lots of songs of if we're going to be honest here

questionable quality some cracking costumes the thrill of the new poin lots of bitchy commentary as the geriatric millennial I can't disentangle

Eurovision from the late Terry Wogan and is ever increasingly barbed a

Serbian joke since he quit in 2008 saying I don't want to be presiding over yet another debacle. Well

calling Eurovision a debacle this year is putting it kindly. The last two years

I've gone myself to a big Eurovision party hosted by a leftist Israeli-American Brits,

but this year he's cancelled it and he's far from the only one.

The biggest Eurovision screening in London hosted by the Rio Cinema in Hackney, has also cancelled, which to be fair, is pretty big news.

Why have they cancelled?

Because Israel has been allowed to participate in the contest

despite the mass slaughter of Gaza

perpetrated by the Israeli state.

Now, when Russia invaded Ukraine in 2000 in 2022,

it was quite correctly excluded from participating in the tour in Italy contest

by the European Broadcasting Union who's in charge. Now let's be clear that Russia has committed

terrible crimes in Ukraine, so that decision is more than justifiable.

What Israel has done to Gaza is much worse, which isn't to diminish the horror of what Ukraine has suffered,

but to emphasize the scale of the crime being committed against the Palestinian

people of Gaza.

Now in their statement, the Rio Cinema says collectively with the organizers of Eurovision Party

London, they decided not to screen the grand final while Israel remains in the competition.

They ask we firmly believe that the European song contest has the power to bring people

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