Ireland, Slovenia, and Spain are not going to broadcast the 2026 Eurovision Song Contest as part of the ongoing boycott over Israel’s participation. RTÉ will screen alternative shows instead, including a Eurovision-themed episode of Irish sitcom Father Ted.

This year, only 35 countries are set to take part in the Eurovision Song Contest, the fewest since the competition was expanded in 2004. A total of five countries, including Ireland, Iceland, the Netherlands, Slovenia, and Spain, are boycotting the contest following the European Broadcasting Union (EBU)’s decision to allow Israel to participate despite its genocidal actions in Gaza.

Iceland and the Netherlands will still be screening the event, despite pulling out of the competition. Instead, Ireland, Slovenia, and Spain have decided not to broadcast Eurovision at all as part of the boycott.

In place of the contest final on Saturday night, RTÉ will air the Eurovision episode of Father Ted, titled ‘A Song For Europe’, where priests Ted and Dougal perform the song ‘My Lovely Horse’. Other shows screened as an alternative to Eurovision include the animated family comedy Mummies and the John McGahern adaptation That They May Face the Rising Sun.

Slovenia is taking the boycott a step further, as the country’s national broadcaster will air a programme of films and documentaries about Palestine on the days when Eurovision is set to take place. “We will not be broadcasting the Eurovision song contest. We will be airing the film series ‘Voices of Palestine’, featuring Palestinian documentaries and feature films,” RTV Slovenia’s director Ksenija Horvat announced.

A number of demonstrations are also expected to take place in Vienna on the days of the contest. Police said they are expecting “blockades and disruption attempts” as around 3,000 people are set to take part in a protest on the day of the final, with the slogan ‘Solidarity with Palestine’.

Another high-profile event is a pro-Palestine concert which will take place in the Austrian capital on Friday. Organised to coincide with Nakba Day, an annual commemoration of when around 760,000 Palestinians were forced to flee their homes during the 1948 wartime creation of Israel, the concert is billed as a “political event featuring music”.

Since 2024, Eurovision has faced widespread condemnation over its failure to suspend Israel’s participation in the contest. In a recent statement, Amnesty International denounced the EBU’s decision as “an act of cowardice and an illustration of blatant double standards”, compared to the move to ban Russia from the competition after its 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

Israel’s participation “offers the country a platform to try to deflect attention from and normalise its ongoing genocide in the occupied Gaza Strip”, Amnesty’s Secretary General Agnes Callamard said.

“Songs and sequins must not be allowed to drown out or distract from Israel’s atrocities or Palestinian suffering.”

Since Israel launched its genocidal assault in October 2023, over 72,300 Palestinians have been killed in Gaza, where famine and starvation are widespread as a result of the war.