The winner of this year’s Eurovision song contest, Austrian Johannes Pietsch—whose stage name is J.J.—has sparked controversy by suggesting that Israel should be excluded from next year’s event in Austria.
The performer joins a host of left-wing European leaders, such as Spanish PM Pedro Sánchez, and pro-Hamas activists, who have called for Israel to be expelled due to the nation’s military offensive against Palestinian terror group Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
The Israeli contestant, Yuval Raphael, a survivor of the October 7th Hamas pogrom at the Nova music festival, had to endure anti-Israeli hatred spewed at her during the event in Basel, Switzerland.
Twenty-four-year-old Austrian performer J.J. has joined this chorus of critics, saying in an interview: “It is very disappointing to see Israel still participating in the contest. I would like the next Eurovision to be held in Vienna and without Israel.”
Josef Pröll, a state secretary at the Austrian chancellor’s office, reacted by saying that “terror and antisemitism have no place in our free, pluralistic society.”
Commenting on the Spanish PM’s words, who equated Russia’s invasion of Ukraine with Israel’s self-defence against Hamas terrorists, he said:
The attempt to equate Russia and Israel is tantamount to a falsification of history, which I reject in the strongest possible terms. I am against the exclusion of Israel from the European Song Contest.
“J.J. is a great singer—but apparently politically dangerously ill-advised,” the state of Lower Austria’s conservative Governor Johanna Mikl-Leitner said.
The performer later tried to apologise for his words, saying he condemns “all forms of violence against civilians anywhere in the world, be it against Israelis or Palestinians.”
But the damage has been done.
