From Moscow to Eurovision, Israel's rising star Golan chosen to compete in 2024
Eden Golan, Israel's Eurovision contender, spent over 13 years trying to make a name for herself as an artist in Moscow, but the Russians never accepted her.
Golan will reportedly represent Israel in the 2024 Eurovision Song Contest. However, her background reveals a controversial biography, with a mother of Ukrainian origin and a significant part of her life spent in the Russian Federation, including visits to Russia-occupied Crimea.
NV sheds light on Golan's story: a 20-year-old singer born in the Israeli city of Kfar Saba in 2003. With Ukrainian roots from her mother and a Latvian father, she spent a considerable portion of her life in Moscow due to her father's work. Golan returned to Israel in 2022, coinciding with Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Whether her departure from the aggressor country was linked to the hostilities in Ukraine remains unclear.
During her 13 years in Russia, the singer participated in local vocal competitions, including The Voice, and aimed for a spot in the Junior Eurovision Song Contest, though she fell short in the national selection. Seven years ago, Golan performed at the children's New Wave contest in occupied Crimea, sharing the stage with Russian singer Nyusha. Throughout her time, Golan has refrained from publicly addressing the war.
Recently crowned the winner of the talent show HaKokhav HaBa (Rising Star) in Israel, Golan expressed her excitement about representing her country in Eurovision 2024, saying that she was thrilled to represent her country in 2024 on the biggest stage in Europe. Golan promised to give it her all and bring Eurovision 2025 to Israel.
Eurovision 2024 will be held in Malmö, Sweden on May 7-11. Ukraine will perform in the first half of the first semi-final on May 7.
In total, 37 countries will participate, including Luxembourg, returning after a 31-year hiatus. Unusually, Romania will not compete this year.
The Grand Final will take place on May 11.
Jerry Heil and Alyona Alyona will represent Ukraine at the Eurovision 2024 with their song Teresa & Maria after winning the combined jury and audience vote during the National Selection contest on Feb. 3-4.
The three-judge jury, consisting of Eurovision 2016 winner Jamala, Eurovision 2007 runner-up Andriy Danylko (Verka Serduchka), and frontman for Bez Obmezhen (Without Limits) Serhiy Tanchynets, awarded 10 points to the winning act. The voting audience gave the duo 11 points, with over 1.1 million Ukrainians participating in the voting through the Diia app.
Voting was so popular that users crashed the Diia app, postponing the announcement of the winning act to the evening of Feb. 4. The app malfunctioned while attempting to handle 15,000 users per second, preventing many viewers from voting for their favorite artists, said Digital Transformation Minister Mykhailo Fedorov.
Competition producers extended the voting period for nearly 24 hours to allow all fans the opportunity to cast their votes.
The military war may be swinging in our favor, but the information war continues.
Just as an army needs soldiers, so does a free society need its journalists to ensure that people have access to honest, trustworthy voices to understand the world around them.
For the past five years, The New Voice of Ukraine has been working tirelessly to push back against Russian narratives and defend democracy. But we cannot do it alone.
Please consider supporting us on Patreon for just $5 a month – your donation does directly to supporting journalists and ensuring that this front of the infowar says solid and defended.
Thank you.
Follow us on Twitter, Facebook and Google News
