[Jon]

Yes, it’s a positive vote so if 15% of the voting audience are massively in favour of Isreal in the current situation, they could end up doing alright, particularly if it’s a good song (not heard it, so can’t comment) a lot of non political people might vote for it too. Of course that also assumes a lot of things about how those people would choose to vote.

I think with the juries it would be more difficult as you’d assume music industry types would be more likely to be on the pro-Palestine side. But then again their votes aren’t meant to be clouded politics.

So all in all that situation might make no difference at all.

[James2001]

To celebrate the 50th anniversary of ABBA's win, BBC Four will be rebroadcasting the 1974 Grand Final on Sunday 7th April - complete with a special introduction from Hannah Waddingham

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I've seen a lot of people confused about the Dutch commentary and translation suddenly cutting in for the last 20 minutes (at around the 88 minute mark on the iPlayer, just after the UK jury results are announced)- seems for some reason BBC didn't mention this or offer any explanation to viewers, either on air or the iPlayer, which you would have expected them to do as it's understandably confusing, especially as it drowns out what the hosts are saying at some points (the reason is the last 20 or so minutes of the BBC broadcast are missing, and the Dutch one is all that exists, but they can't expect many viewers to know that).

Considering the iPlayer has a lengthy blurb including information about why France withdrew and mentioning controversy about the Italian and Portuguese entries, you'd think they'd have put something there.

[gottago]

Yes, it’s a positive vote so if 15% of the voting audience are massively in favour of Isreal in the current situation, they could end up doing alright, particularly if it’s a good song (not heard it, so can’t comment) a lot of non political people might vote for it too. Of course that also assumes a lot of things about how those people would choose to vote.

I think with the juries it would be more difficult as you’d assume music industry types would be more likely to be on the pro-Palestine side. But then again their votes aren’t meant to be clouded politics.

So all in all that situation might make no difference at all.

It is a good song and a typical jury-pleaser. It's also a very open year with no clear winner which could also work to Israel's advantage a lot.

If Iceland had chosen the Palestinian who entered their NF this year and came second having won the first round of votes - with a legitimately very good song and performance that's far better than the Jet2 Holidays track they've chosen instead - then it may well have ended up as an Israel vs Iceland fight for televotes. But as it is there's no 'protest vote' song which could again very much work to Israel's advantage.

If they were to win then that would open a whole new can of worms as to where it would be held next year. I can't imagine Israel being considered safe enough to stage it and even if it was I'm sure a lot of artists and perhaps even broadcasters would refuse to go. I can't imagine any second placed country wanting to showcase Israel in anywhere near the same manner that the UK did with Ukraine.

[JMT1985]

"votes aren’t meant to be clouded politics" - a sentence which really does not apply to Eurovision anymore in any sense - politics is always in the show, which is why we always get countries giving whopping points to their best buddies next door - this was one of the reasons why Sir Terry Wogan quit the show, he really got annoyed at the points/voting system and felt the show was becoming too political.

[UTVLifer]

Petra has just announced a show number called We Just Love Eurovision Too Much

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[Jon]

"votes aren’t meant to be clouded politics" - a sentence which really does not apply to Eurovision anymore in any sense - politics is always in the show, which is why we always get countries giving whopping points to their best buddies next door - this was one of the reasons why Sir Terry Wogan quit the show, he really got annoyed at the points/voting system and felt the show was becoming too political.

So a lot to unpack there. I also remember Wogan saying a lot of the block voting was done more down to cultural similarities, or people voting for the songs that might have heard on their radio stations. Ukraine winning and Greece and Cyprus until recently always exchanging 12 points proves there is some political voting to an extent. But ultimately it’s unusual these days it’s a dominate factor. Anyway the whole point I was making is that jury voting was bought in with an intention to reduce the effect of that.

[Stooky Bill]

Yes it's mostly down to connections between countries, both cultural and historical. Cyprus and Greece being the best example, nothing political its just the countries are very closely affiliated, half of Cyprus is Greek. It used to be the case with Ireland and the UK too

In a lot of cases the links between countries are very strong because in living memory they were the same country. It's not political its just like if England and Scotland put in different songs, both countries would probably know the singer and the song would appeal to both populations

[Earlie37]

There's no doubt that certain voting has always been part of Eurovision - even back in the days when there was no public vote and it was just a jury. However, the impact of it has always been quite insignificant and towards the end of his reign, I felt that Wogan was becoming way too obsessed over it. If it was that significant, you would see the same countries continually winning and at the top of the board which isn't the case. It also makes me laugh when people moan about the political/historic voting but then also expect Ireland, Australia and Malta to give us lots of points. I think they only exception to when perhaps political voting was really apparent in recent years was when Ukraine won in 2022 but that was certainly an unusual set of circumstances.

At the end of the day, when the UK has performed badly, it's not politics or cultural links that have caused us to underperform. It was either because we made it obvious that we weren't trying to take it seriously, putting in a very weak song or performance or in some cases, sadly just putting in a song similar to a stronger entry that year (Jamilia, for example). But using the 'no one likes us', 'all the others vote for each other' excuses were easier to use than admit that we simply weren't showing any love for the contest. Whilst I respected Wogan for what he did as a broadcaster, I do think he also seriously didn't help our attitude to the contest in his latter years and perhaps should have handed over the reigns a lot earlier that he did - he became way too cynical with it all from around 2003 onwards. I think we also started to struggle with understanding that as more countries enter, of course it is inevitably going to be more difficult to get points, let alone win - that's the basics of maths!

I think that's why in Eurovision circles, the rest of Europe does see us a turning a corner in recent years. Yes... Mae did under-perform last year but that wasn't politics again... we had a good song but the staging and her performance of it on the night just fell flat. But unlike before, they respected the fact that we tried to make a good effort and also proved that by hosting the concert in such a great way, the UK is trying to give a lot of love back to the contest again.

One thing that will always be the barrier for us is that we don't need the contest as much as many other countries - our music industry is still one of the world leaders and doesn't always need the promotion that Eurovision can bring. We've always had this problem - it wasn't until we entered the like of Sandy Shaw, Cliff and Lulu that Europe saw we could enter music artists that represented the music industry of the UK at the time and songs that you would expect to see in the charts of the time. Whilst I don't think it's a winner, that's the pleasing thing about seeing Ollie this year. Yes... he's no longer necessarily a massive artist in the UK but he's still well known and puts out songs which you'd expect to feature in our charts.

[Earlie37]

or in some cases, sadly just putting in a song similar to a stronger entry that year (Jamilia, for example).

Whoops - getting my 00s artists starting with J confused. I meant Javine!

[UTVLifer]

Another change from the EBU announced

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