According to Rai News, Israeli singer Michael Ben David was disqualified from the Eurovision Song Contest after kissing host Alessandro Cattelan on the cheek during this year's second semi final. Apparently Cattelan said he found the kiss funny, but I guess that didn't matter. The article doesn't really make it clear whether he was disqualified and therefore didn't make it to the final or if he's not allowed to participate in future Eurovisions anymore.
Anyway... vote for Romania/Spain/Serbia on Saturday!
Edit: apparently he’s been behaving inappropriately for a while with journalists and contestants, see
milankam’s comments in this post. While the article doesn’t mention any of those instances as the reason for his disqualification, he’s definitely done more than the kiss on the cheek.Update
It seems like Rai News misunderstood what was said during the press conference according to an article from ESCXTRA. ESCXTRA.com reached out to the EBU to ask for clarification on the matter. They have responded as follows:
“We can clarify that Israel has not been disqualified from the Eurovision Song Contest; they did not qualify from the semi-finals and so will not perform in the Grand Final. There was a misunderstanding in a press conference yesterday (13 May) featuring the Eurovision Song Contest show hosts. A journalist asked a question referencing Michael Ben David, at the conference and used the term ‘disqualified’ whereas what he meant was that Michael Ben David had not qualified for the final. The hosts understandably misunderstood his question and hence why this has been reported as such.”
Source: 1, 2
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