The Israeli public channel has reversed its previous position and will request a change to the lyrics of a song being studied for this year Eurovision competition.
Eurovision banned the song last week for violating rules on political neutrality in song lyrics. Artist Eden Golanthe entry of Israel, October raincontains references to the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7.
Israeli broadcaster Kan, which will determine which song enters Eurovision for the country, promised last week that it would not request any changes to the lyrics. But Israeli President Isaac Herzog today called for “necessary adjustments” to ensure Israel can enter the show.
Kan is also planning a song titled Dance forever.
Political messages have led to song bans in the past, such as Georgia's in 2009.
Israel has won the Eurovision Song Contest four times. This year's event will take place in Sweden in May.
Kan published a press release on Sunday indicating that he had asked the lyricists of the two songs studied to “readapt the texts, while preserving their artistic freedom”.
President Herzog, Kan said, “stressed that this is precisely at a time when those who hate us seek to suppress and boycott the State of Israel” and that the country “must raise its voice” in forums international.
The decision on which song Israel will submit will be confirmed next Sunday.
The original lyrics of October rain – written in English – were published on Kan's website last month.
They include the lines “They were all good children, every one of them” and “Who told you boys didn't cry / For hours and hours / And flowers / Life is not a game for cowards.”
Reference to flowers often evokes deaths due to war, Israeli media noted.
Artists have called for Israel to be excluded from Eurovision this year due to its treatment of Gaza. These include artists from Iceland, Finland, Norway, Denmark and Sweden, with several of them pointing out that Russia has been disqualified since its full-scale invasion of Ukraine two years ago years.
Eurovision organizers say the situations in Ukraine and Gaza are different.