Sinn Féin politician Pearse Doherty has called upon Ireland to boycott the Eurovision competition due to it being held in Israel next year.
Doherty has suggested that the party is due to pass a motion proposing Ireland withdraw from the song contest amid the circumstances around the Palestinian conflict. He believes that the state-sponsored oppression of the Palestinian state by Israel is enough grounds for boycotting the host country.
One motion at the @sinnfeinireland Ard Fheis calls on RTE to boycott the Eurovision Song Contest in Israel next year @rtenews
— Martina Fitzgerald (@MartinaFitzg) June 13, 2018
According to The Irish Post, this feeling has been echoed by Dublin Lord Mayor Mícheál Mac Donncha who believes that Ireland should not even send a representative for the contest at all. Mac Donncha cited that the plight of the Palestinians amid Israeli state violence is sufficient for blocking an Irish entry.
“There needs to be solidarity just as there was with the people of South Africa with the apartheid regime,” Mac Donncha added.
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Doherty argued that this is the right time for Ireland to stand “on the right side of history” by sending this message to Israel that their treatment of Palestine will not be tolerated. He compared the motion to the boycotts of the Olympic Games in Germany in 1936 and the South African Rugby World Cup during the apartheid regime.
.@sinnfeinireland to consider motion urging Irish boycott of #Eurovision in #Israelhttps://t.co/O9KIlseeP9
— Middle East Monitor (@MiddleEastMnt) June 15, 2018
Currently, as the Lord Mayor stated, “The Irish-Palestine solidarity campaign has collected the names of 500 artists who have said they would not work in the state of Israel, that they would boycott it in the protest and the treatment of the Palestinian people.”
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