The dignity of Eden Golan

Two questions dominated last night’s Eurovision Song Contest final in Malmo, Sweden. First, whether 20-year-old Eden Golan, Israel’s entrant, would defy the odds and actually win. And secondly, whether some kind of security breach involving pro-Palestinian protesters would result in the final being disrupted. In the end, proceedings passed off relatively peacefully.

The eventual winner was Switzerland’s Nemo with ‘The Code’, a song mixing rap, pop and opera. A huge public vote helped lift Golan’s entry ‘Hurricane’ into fifth place. The winning song will be forgotten soon enough, suffering the same fate as the vast majority of entries into the Eurovision Song Contest – a competition that has always been treated as a bit of a joke, a high camp homage to musical nothingness.  

This year’s Eurovision (official motto: ‘United by Music’) is unfortunately destined to linger much longer in the memory for reasons that have little to do with the music. It will go down in history for being overshadowed by pro-Palestinian protests over Israel’s inclusion in the competition amid the war in Gaza, and in particular a remorseless campaign of abuse directed at Golan, who the protesters wished would pack her bags and return home to Israel.

They didn’t get their wish. Israel is a fixture at Eurovision: the country has won the competition – which started in 1956 – four times, most recently in 2018. The European Broadcasting Union, which runs the contest, dismissed attempts to get Israel barred, pointing out that Eurovision is ‘not a competition between governments’.

The event inevitably became all about Golan, who was confined to her hotel room when she was not on stage. She was given extra protection – including police stationed outside the hotel where she was staying – having reportedly received death threats. She was taken to rehearsals in a convoy of cars, a security escort more in keeping with the level of protection offered to political leaders rather than Eurovision contestants.

To add to her sense of isolation and vulnerability, few of her fellow participants appeared willing to publicly volunteer anything in the way of solidarity or support for her plight. Golan, who is barely more than a teenager, was turned into the public face of Israel’s war in Gaza and effectively deemed personally responsible and publicly accountable for Israel’s conduct of the war. What qualifies a street mob to rule that she should carry the blame for everything that has happened in Gaza? She is a performer, who was there on behalf of her country’s public broadcaster, not the Israeli government. Such distinctions appear lost on the protesting mob, infused with its own brand of fanatical certitude.

More broadly, it is a mystery what exactly the protesters hoped to achieve by their actions this week against Israel’s participation at Eurovision. The spectacle of angry crowds haranguing a young woman is hardly the best way of winning people over. Why would anyone deem this a sensible tactic or strategy? The only explanation is that the protesters inhabit a parallel world of moral purity and self-righteousness, one that leaves them incapable of comprehending or indeed caring how their actions might look to others.

They make much of how strongly they feel about human suffering and injustice, even as they go about trampling on the feelings of anyone who stands in their way. Shame – which is what they should feel at their antics this week – escapes them altogether. Their actions do their cause no good whatsoever. Yet they are too blind to see this, too wrapped up in their own narcissistic delusions that their protests will shape the future course of events in the Middle East. The more mundane truth is that finding a peaceful resolution to the Gaza conflict involves hard slog, working through details and arriving at compromises that can be agreed upon by all sides. Shouting slogans and insults – a less taxing line of work altogether – achieves nothing.

Israel’s entry was never the favourite to win Eurovision this year. Even so, the dignity with which Eden Golan behaved is a lesson to those who tried but failed to turn her into a hate figure. It amounts to a symbolic and ultimately more lasting victory than winning Eurovision itself.