Eurovision organisers have said that Israel will be allowed to compete in this year’s song contest, amid pressure for the nation to be excluded over the ongoing conflict in Gaza.

“The Eurovision song contest is a non-political music event and a competition between public service broadcasters who are members of the EBU. It is not a contest between governments,” said European Broadcasting Union director general Noel Curran in a statement.

“Our governing bodies did review the participants list for the 2024 contest and agreed that the Israeli public broadcaster Kan met all the competition rules for this year and can participate, as it has for the past 50 years.”

Since Hamas’s October 7 attacks on Israel, during which 1,160 mostly civilian people were killed, Israel’s military response has caused further deaths of an estimated 28,663 Gazans, the majority of whom are women and children.

In 2022, Russia were banned from the Eurovision Song Contest following their invasion of Ukraine – with the EBU saying that Russian participation” would bring the competition into disrepute”.

“In the case of Russia, the Russian broadcasters themselves were suspended from the EBU due to their persistent breaches of membership obligations and the violation of public service values,” added Curran.

“The relationship between Kan and the Israeli government is fundamentally different to the relationship that exists between those Russian members and the state, with the Israeli government in recent years threatening to close down the broadcaster.”