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Yuval Raphael, Survivor of Nova Music Festival Massacre to Represent Israel at 2025 Eurovision Song Contest
Yuval Raphael, a survivor of the 2023 Nova Music Festival massacre will represent Israel at the 2025 Eurovision Song Contest.
“Every time we [those who were still alive] raised our heads, we couldn’t understand why there were less and less people in the bomb shelter,” Raphael said in a March 2024 speech in front of the UN Human Rights Council on behalf of the Jerusalem Institute of Justice. Typically averse to any displays of political speech or nationalism, the European Broadcasting Union defended the inclusion of an Israeli contestant last year in the midst of the war that Palestinian authorities said resulted in the death of more than 46,000 residents of Gaza. As some called for Israeli contestant Eden Golan to be left off the stage in much the same way that Russia was uninvited in 2022 following its unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, the singer faced boos when she sang “Hurricane” on the show.
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