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| Israel’s Yuval Raphael advances to Eurovision grand final after soaring performance |
| 2025-05-16 |
| [IsraelTimes] Singer, a survivor of the Nova festival massacre, says she managed to spot in the crowd the friends she made in the roadside bomb shelter, and ‘it gave me so much strength’. Israel’s Yuval Raphael advanced to the grand final of the 2025 Eurovision following her performance in Thursday night’s semifinal. The 24-year-old from Ra’anana, a survivor of the October 7 Nova music festival massacre, turned in a strong performance of her emotional ballad, “New Day Will Rise,” in front of the crowd in Basel, Switzerland. While those in the arena said a smattering of boos could be heard during her performance, only cheers could be heard on the live TV broadcast. There were also only a small number of Palestinian flags visible in the audience, despite fears of a strong presence. During her performance, Raphael ascended a staircase in an enormous chandelier and stood on a balcony that Israeli producers said was meant to be a “symbolic nod” to the famed image of Zionist visionary Theodor Herzl on a balcony in Basel during the Fifth Zionist Congress in 1901. It also could refer to the hostages going up the stairs out of the Hamas tunnels, among the wartime images the Israeli candidate is forbidden to mention lest she politicize her entry to the competition. After exiting the stage, Raphael said she somehow spotted in the crowd her fellow survivors from the roadside bomb shelter where she hid under dead bodies for hours on October 7 until she was rescued.“I looked to the side, I said hi to the crowd, and I spotted my friends from the shelter,” Raphael said in a video shared by the Kan public broadcaster. “Suddenly I saw my best friend waving, way up high, and somehow I spotted them, I was in shock. It gave me so much strength.” Raphael qualified on Thursday along with Lithuania, Denmark, Malta, Latvia, Armenia, Austria, Greece, Luxembourg and Finland. She will compete during Saturday night’s grand final against those acts and the qualifiers from Tuesday’s semifinal — Iceland, Poland, Estonia, Sweden, Ukraine, Portugal, Norway, San Marino, Albania and the Netherlands — plus the Eurovision “Big Five,” the UK, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, and last year’s winner, Switzerland. The full results of the semifinals — which are based solely on a public vote — are only released by producers after the grand final. Unlike the semifinals, the results of the grand final will be based on a 50/50 mix of the televote and the jury vote — in which professional juries from all 37 participating countries pick their favorites. Small dueling pro-Israel and anti-Israel protests were held in Basel on Thursday evening, and a larger anti-Israel protest is slated for Saturday night, though efforts appear to pale in comparison to demonstrations last year in Malmo, Sweden.
Translated from Hebrew by A New Day Will Rise 🇮🇱 🌟 Yuval Rafael's full performance in the Eurovision 2025 semi-final. It seems there is love as well as hate among Eurovision voters, or at least there is fairness — which is really all that’s needed. Survey: 82% of Europeans don’t consider fighting antisemitism a priority [IsraelTimes] Poll by the European Jewish Association finds that more than 20% blame Jews in their own countries for the war between Israel and Hamas |
| Posted by:trailing wife |
| #1 Beautiful woman, beautiful song, Top 3 material. |
| Posted by: European Conservative 2025-05-16 14:30 |