I’ll confess right now: I have never watched a Eurovision anything. I fucking hate Eurovision and always have. When I were a lad it just represented the absolute worst of overly-commercialised plink-plonk Euro-bollox sounds. Whilst England was the absolute pinnacle of good music in the 60s and 70s, way above America even, the rest of Europe produced music only fit for lifts in the offices of the Society fo the Deaf. It produced chocolate box advert music, stupid music, silly music and generally music so poor that the guilty party (what we termed the producers of such sounds) had to use gimmicks in failed attempts to make it somehow more palatable. Like; if you dress up as a hedge-hog, the shit you’re singing will sound better. Obviously music has moved along considerably since then but Eurovision has always been about ‘the show’, verging on and merging with ‘the pantomime’. And unfortunately, as European ‘humour’ always lacked any subtlety or class, adding such a thing to ‘enhance’ music just made it even more pathetic.

And that is what Eurovision ‘celebrates’. But heh, if it makes people happy, let ‘em enjoy.

And enjoy they do. The whole thing, the whole razzmatazz, the whole spectacle, the whole competitive thing.

Until it arrived in Israel. Then everything changed. Not the abysmal music, nor the over-the-top show and the massive celebration of awful sounds, that went on as usual. But it was in Israel. The only country on the planet which cannot be named without some kind of qualifying adjective or accompanying political statement.

Thus the mighty BBC have been referring all week to ‘the controversial Eurovision song contest’ just because its in Tel Aviv. If it was in Damascus, where they’re still in the process of committing mass murder every day, no-one would care. If it was in Sanaa, there’d be no comment, despite the civil war causing death and immense suffering daily. Unlikely it would be in Caracas (though if Australia is part of ‘Euro’ anything, then why not Venezuela?) but if it was no-one would mention the country was in total economic collapse. But Israel cannot be mentioned, in any context whatsoever, however trivial, banal or superficial, and you can’t get beyond Eurovision to find more of those, there has to be a presumption of conflict, of outrage, of at least protest. Which no other country has to endure, regardless of the evils they perpetrate.

If people, institutions, even rock stars from Primal fucking Scream, adhere to the left-wing rhetoric against Israel and ISRAEL ONLY, it is not anti-Zionism. It is anti-semitism. If you deem Israel as ‘evil’, which they do and they’re allowed to do, the line is crossed when its the only country perceived as such.

Tossers from rock bands and Labour supporters don’t know any better. But the BBC should. It has a duty of impartiality yet flaunts it daily where Israel is concerned.

Otherwise, Happy post-Eurovision Sunday

A xxxx