After criticism of Israel: Ollie Alexander competes for Great Britain

Ally Alexander, born Oliver Alexander Thornton, has been the lead singer of the band Years and Years and has starred in award-winning plays such as “The Right Club” and “It's a Sin.”

Nowadays, he invests in a solo career as an artist and performs at Eurovision with the song “Dizzy”.

– It's about an overwhelming love for someone that makes you swoon, he says, adding that his relationship with a lover was an inspiration for the text.

But as the 33-year-old artist prepares for the competition, she finds herself in the middle of a storm of criticism.

wrote under an open letter

It all started last autumn when Olly Alexander signed an open letter from LGBTQ organization Voices4London. They demanded a cease-fire in Gaza and accused Israel of being ruled by an “apartheid regime,” among other things.

The letter drew harsh criticism from Jewish Organization Against Propaganda, a Jewish organization that wanted Ollie Alexander's participation in Eurovision to be stopped.

According to The Daily Telegraph, the BBC said the letter was published before it was clear Alexander would run. Neither the BBC nor the EBU reported that he had breached any guidelines.

I will not ignore

At the end of March, the group Queers for Palestine called on Oli Alexander to voluntarily boycott the pageant in solidarity with the Palestinians. Then Alexander He replied that he decided to compete anyway.

“I know some will choose to ignore Eurovision this year and I understand and respect their decision. As a participant, I spent a lot of time considering what I needed to do and what options I had. “My current belief is that withdrawing from the competition will not bring us any closer to our common goal,” he said. He writes in a log.

In the video, you can hear more from Guldarniheterna's interview with Oli Alexander on February 29.