{"id":45289,"date":"2026-05-17T14:14:23","date_gmt":"2026-05-17T14:14:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/45289\/"},"modified":"2026-05-17T14:14:23","modified_gmt":"2026-05-17T14:14:23","slug":"defying-predictions-eurovision-juries-gave-israel-a-boost-amid-voting-reforms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/45289\/","title":{"rendered":"Defying predictions, Eurovision juries gave Israel a boost amid voting reforms"},"content":{"rendered":"

For the second year in a row, Israel finished in second place at the Eurovision Song Contest. But the paths it took with Noam Bettan\u2019s \u201cMichelle\u201d this year, and Yuval Raphael\u2019s \u201cNew Day Will Rise\u201d last year, were markedly different.<\/p>\n

Saturday night\u2019s achievement came after months of speculation, hand-wringing, allegations, and reforms surrounding the Eurovision voting process. Which begs the questions: How did Israel actually fare in the voting breakdown, and did the changes introduced this year affect the outcome?<\/p>\n

Israel still did notably well in the voting from the public, coming in third place in the televote. But, bucking predictions, it was actually the jury votes that pushed Bettan to a second-place finish<\/a>, after he picked up support from the majority of the professional panels at the grand final.<\/p>\n

All 35 countries taking part in the Eurovision select a seven-member jury made up of music professionals, who each rank every performance, are instructed to vote solely based on artistic merit, and are forbidden from discussing or coordinating their votes with each other. Enforcement of those rules, of course, is largely impossible.<\/p>\n

The European Broadcasting Union appeared to want the juries to have a cooling effect on the more volatile popular vote \u2014 bringing them back this year in the semifinal rounds after they were scrapped in 2023. But when it came to support for Israel, Bettan appeared to win over many on the juries with his smooth vocals, solid performance, and unwavering stage presence.<\/p>\n

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Last year, Raphael received<\/a> only 60 votes from the juries, coming in a middling 14th, but she topped the televote to send Israel soaring to second overall. This year, Bettan received 123 points from the professional panels, putting Israel in eighth place after he received at least some jury points from 22 of the 34 voting countries. Last year, Raphael got jury points from only 14 of the 36 nations.<\/p>\n

\t\"\"<\/a>
\n\t\tIsrael\u2019s Yuval Raphael performs \u2018New Day Will Rise\u2019 during the grand final of the Eurovision Song Contest 2025, at the St. Jakobshalle arena in Basel, Switzerland, on May 17, 2025. (Fabrice COFFRINI \/ AFP)<\/p>\n

While the Eurovision odds this year were resoundingly inaccurate (and have been wrong on the winner for three years running), they notably predicted Israel would finish only 16th in the jury vote but first in the televote. In addition, most Eurovision analysts predicted a low jury vote for Israel, simply because another runaway televote was expected, and avoiding an uncomfortable Israel win was seen as the ideal outcome for all involved.<\/p>\n

So what about that public vote? The EBU releases data showing how each country allocated its points in the semifinals and grand final, but not how many votes were cast. Therefore, the ability to judge the impact of the voting reforms is limited. And as always, assigning motivations to any votes is wildly speculative at best.<\/p>\n

Did the UK get zero televote points this year because of a long-running tradition of punishing the nation post-Brexit (with one exception), or because it sent a quirky YouTuber with a synthesizer, Boris Johnson-esque hair, the stage name \u201cLook Mum No Computer\u201d and a song inexplicably about counting to three in German? The world will truly never know.<\/p>\n

\t\"\"<\/a>
\n\t\tLook Mum No Computer from United Kingdom arrives on stage ahead of the dress rehearsal for the Grand Final of the 70th Eurovision Song Contest in Vienna, Austria, May 15, 2026. (AP\/Martin Meissner)<\/p>\n

One of the major changes this year was capping votes per person at 10 instead of 20, aiming to tamp down on the phenomenon of Israel supporters maxing out their votes for political reasons.<\/p>\n

The reform may have had an effect, as Israel received significantly fewer top rankings from countries\u2019 televotes. This year, six countries maxed out public support for Israel \u2014 Azerbaijan, Portugal, Switzerland, Germany, France, and Finland. But last year, when voters could cast 20 votes each for Israel, 12 countries all gave the Jewish state the top score of 12 points, prompting a number of allegations of voter<\/a> fraud.<\/p>\n

The only countries that did not give any audience votes to Israel in the grand final this year were Australia, Croatia, and Lithuania.<\/p>\n

And for the first time since it was introduced in 2023, Israel did not win the \u201crest of the world\u201d vote, amalgamated from all non-participating countries. It didn\u2019t even come second, but rather fifth, picking up just six points there. The EBU has never released a full breakdown of the countries that participate, but has said that the US, Canada, Mexico, and Turkey are among the highest-voting countries.<\/p>\n

In the semifinal round, Israel came second with the \u201crest of the world,\u201d getting 10 points, after the 12 points went to Moldova.<\/p>\n

\t\"\"<\/a>
\n\t\tNoam Bettan from Israel performs the song \u2018Michelle\u2019 during the Grand Final of the 70th Eurovision Song Contest in Vienna, Austria, May 16, 2026. (AP Photo\/Martin Meissner)<\/p>\n

Nobody is denying the power of Eurovision voting blocs and geopolitical influence \u2014 they have played a major role in the contest since its inception, and certainly not only when it comes to Israel. And as always, the contest is set up for fans to vote for, rather than against<\/a>, countries they feel strongly about. Israel haters would have to rally around one particular competitor in order to have an impact, and we have not seen that happen so far.<\/p>\n

Israel haters would have to rally around one particular competitor in order to have an impact, and we haven\u2019t seen that happen so far<\/p>\n

In Saturday\u2019s grand final, Greece and Cyprus continued the deeply predictable tradition of awarding the highest points possible \u2014 24 from juries and the public \u2014 directly to each other. And Poland, which currently hosts a large Ukrainian diaspora who have fled war at home, gave its 12 televote points to \u2014 you guessed it \u2014 Ukraine. But it\u2019s purely about the music, right?\n<\/p>\n

Eurovision organizers brought back the jury votes in the semifinal rounds this year in another bid to balance Israel\u2019s popular vote support, but the results would not have been drastically different either way.<\/p>\n

Israel won the first semifinal, coming top in the televote but still third overall in the jury vote, trailing only Poland and Finland when it came to support from the professional juries.<\/p>\n

\t\"\"<\/a>
\n\t\tDara from Bulgaria holds up the trophy after winning the Grand Final of the 70th Eurovision Song Contest in Vienna, Austria, in the early hours of May 17, 2026. (AP\/Martin Meissner)<\/p>\n

And who did Israel give its points to?<\/p>\n

The professional jury \u2014 made up this year of Ido Porath, Noy Ben Haim, Ohad Hitman, Roi Delmedigo, Lihi Mayra Toledano, Mei Finegold, and Michaela Hazani \u2014 gave its top points to Australia, followed by Denmark, then Bulgaria, Finland, Moldova, and Greece.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the Israeli public awarded 12 points to Bulgaria, 10 to Australia, eight to Moldova, seven to Italy, and six to Denmark.<\/p>\n

In the semifinal, Israel\u2019s top jury points went to Poland, Finland, Belgium, and Greece, while public voters awarded Moldova, Greece, San Marino, Croatia, and then Poland.<\/p>\n

Above all, musical tastes are subjective, diverse, and often unpredictable.<\/p>\n

Nobody has introduced politics into the Eurovision in recent years \u2014 politics have always been a major behind-the-scenes factor in the competition, both in who takes part and how the voting plays out.<\/p>\n

Three years ago, the countries that began lobbying for Israel to be kicked out in the wake of the October 7 attack and subsequent war in Gaza were the ones who introduced the backlash that drove Israel supporters to turn out en masse.<\/p>\n

And last year, when those countries \u2014 Ireland, Iceland, Slovenia, the Netherlands and Spain \u2014 dropped out in protest, many predicted the end of the Eurovision Song Contest.<\/p>\n

But Saturday night proved that there is still a significant appetite for floating Australians, screaming Serbians, silver Lithuanians, and a night of musical adventure. And for a multilingual angsty pop song from Israel, outscored only by an earworm dance banger from Bulgaria.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For the second year in a row, Israel finished in second place at the Eurovision Song Contest. But…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":45290,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20858],"tags":[23139,20859,20863,20860,21215],"class_list":{"0":"post-45289","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-eurovision","8":"tag-ebu-european-broadcasting-union","9":"tag-eurovision","10":"tag-eurovision-song-contest","11":"tag-eurovision-song-contest-2026","12":"tag-noam-bettan"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45289","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45289"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45289\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45290"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45289"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45289"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/europe\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45289"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}