I suppose that is a fair comment and a possible reason, along with those who boycotted the event will have diminished all votes going to other acts.
I still think there is a likelihood that Israel tried to play the game on public votes, because it would be a minimal spend for a big PR boost for them. Having a big Israeli company sponsor bought them a lot of the judge votes, then this move would have topped it up. It was just my initial thought when the 300+ points came up. The majority of the crowd did not take that well, along with all of the other stories about booing at the semis, the canned applause on the TV coverage to cover it up, the vote swing just seemed like too big a massive juxtaposition to global sentiment for it to carry weight.
I saw an article on the Torygraph titled something like “I voted for Israel in Eurovision to spite the woke”, and there were people in the comments talking about how they’d sent in 20 votes for Israel. And others talking about how “the left” are relentless bullies for making the Israeli singer cry, etc.
I’m wouldn’t be surprised if Israel did try to influence the votes, but I think there are plenty of right-wingers willing do do it for free, too.
I suppose that is a fair comment and a possible reason, along with those who boycotted the event will have diminished all votes going to other acts.
I still think there is a likelihood that Israel tried to play the game on public votes, because it would be a minimal spend for a big PR boost for them. Having a big Israeli company sponsor bought them a lot of the judge votes, then this move would have topped it up. It was just my initial thought when the 300+ points came up. The majority of the crowd did not take that well, along with all of the other stories about booing at the semis, the canned applause on the TV coverage to cover it up, the vote swing just seemed like too big a massive juxtaposition to global sentiment for it to carry weight.
I saw an article on the Torygraph titled something like “I voted for Israel in Eurovision to spite the woke”, and there were people in the comments talking about how they’d sent in 20 votes for Israel. And others talking about how “the left” are relentless bullies for making the Israeli singer cry, etc.
I’m wouldn’t be surprised if Israel did try to influence the votes, but I think there are plenty of right-wingers willing do do it for free, too.