Israel in the Eurovision Song Contest 2025

Israel will be represented at the Eurovision Song Contest 2025 with the song "New Day Will Rise", written by Keren Peles and performed by Yuval Raphael. The Israeli participating broadcaster, the Israeli Public Broadcasting Corporation (IPBC/Kan), selected Raphael as its representative through the show HaKokhav HaBa (Rising Star), in collaboration with commercial broadcaster Keshet and Tedy Productions, while the song "New Day Will Rise" was internally selected.
Prior to the 2025 contest, the Israel Broadcasting Authority (IBA) until 2017, and the Israeli Public Broadcasting Corporation (IPBC/Kan) since 2018, had participated in the Eurovision Song Contest representing Israel forty-six times since the IBA's first entry in 1973. They had won the contest on four occasions: in 1978 with the song "A-Ba-Ni-Bi" by Izhar Cohen and the Alphabeta, in 1979 with the song "Hallelujah" by Milk and Honey, in 1998 with the song "Diva" by Dana International, and in 2018 with the song "Toy" by Netta. Since the introduction of semi-finals in 2004, they had, to this point, managed to qualify to the final 13 times, achieving, besides its 2018 victory, five top ten results: in 2005 with "Hasheket Shenish'ar" by Shiri Maimon placing fourth, in 2008 with "The Fire in Your Eyes" by Boaz placing ninth, in 2015 with "Golden Boy" by Nadav Guedj placing ninth, in 2023 with "Unicorn" by Noa Kirel placing third, and in 2024 with "Hurricane" by Eden Golan placing fifth.
As part of its duties as a participating broadcaster, Kan selects an entry to represent Israel in the Eurovision Song Contest and broadcasts the event in the country. Kan confirmed its intention to participate in the 2025 contest on 31 May 2024, announcing on 23 July that its representative would continue to be selected through the reality singing competition HaKokhav HaBa (Rising Star).
The Israeli representative for the Eurovision Song Contest 2025 was selected through the reality singing competition HaKokhav HaBa, produced by Tedy Productions and Keshet Media Group, and broadcast on Keshet 12 as well as online via mako.co.il. The shows took place at the Neve Ilan Communications Center [he] in Neve Ilan, and were hosted by Assi Azar and Rotem Sela. The judging panel for the competition was composed of Assaf Amdursky, Keren Peles, Shiri Maimon (who represented Israel in 2005), Ran Danker, Itay Levi [he] and Eden Hason. Nasrin Kadri and Static [he] joined as guest judges.
Preliminary casting rounds began in late July 2024 and ended in early October. Qualifiers from the preliminary casting phase proceeded to the auditions proper, which began filming on 10 October.
Candidates were required to get a score of at least 70% of the votes from the judges and the studio audience in order to advance.
From the 66 advanced candidates, the judges picked 21 to proceed in a non-televised shortlisting round. Those candidates were: Kler, Yuval Raphael, Ori Saban, Ido Malka, Natalie Zafar, Renana Boaziza, Daniel Wais, Yuval Gold, Udi Schneider, Amit Sade, Alma Maimon de Razon, Dolev Mendelbaum, Valerie Hamaty, Hamsa, Nati Livian, Itay Paz, Perfylove Mongoza, Aviad Klein, Ilay Avidani, Shira Knopp, and Red Band and Moran Aharoni.
In the top 21 round, the votes of the judges and an audience determine one or two contestants to be eliminated from each show. In each of the first three shows, the artist to be eliminated was the one getting the lowest overall score. In the fourth and fifth shows, the artists were coupled to perform duets, with the eliminee selected between the lowest scoring duo in the fifth show. In the sixth, seventh, fifteenth and sixteenth shows, the artists were paired in duels, with the winners directly qualifying to the next round; the judges then selected one or two eliminee per show among the others. In the eighth, ninth and tenth shows, each contestant performed a duet with a surprise guest artist. The lowest scoring contestant across both the eleventh and twelfth shows combined was eliminated. In the thirteenth and fourteenth shows, the judges decided which of the bottom two scoring contestants to be eliminated.
In the quarterfinal, which featured Rita as a guest act and had the contestants performing her songs, the artists were paired in duels with the winners directly qualifying to the next round; the judges then determined which contestant to eliminate from the losers of each duel.
In the semi-final, the votes of the judges and the audience determined a qualifier to the final. Afterwards, the scores were reset and an additional round took place, in which the judges individually awarded 12, 10, 8, and 7 points for the remaining four acts. The three acts that received the highest accumulated score from the judges and the studio audience proceeded to the final.
The final was held on 22 January 2025 and was divided into a first round, eliminating one finalist, and a superfinal among the remaining three artists, determining the winner. On 21 January, a special broadcast was aired featuring performances by guest artists and the finalists, each of whom announced which song they would perform in the first round of the final. A public vote, held via the Mako and Kan apps and determining 30% of the results of the first round, was opened after the performances in the first round of the final. In the superfinal, a 50/50 combination of jury and public votes selected Yuval Raphael as the winner.
The song that Yuval Raphael will perform in the contest was internally selected by a professional committee, which consisted of Barak Itzkovitz [he] (director of Kan's music stations), Tal Argaman and Maya Druckman (DJs and music editors at Kan 88), Sharon Drix (Kan's culture and entertainment director); Tali Katz (Kan's culture and entertainment editor-in-chief), Tamira Yardeni [he] (owner of Tedy Productions), and Yoav Tzafir [he] (editor-in-chief of HaKokhav HaBa and Israeli head of delegation at Eurovision). On 30 December 2024, Kan and Keshet opened a window for specially selected songwriters to submit their entries until 2 February 2025; submissions were required to include at least two lines of lyric in Hebrew. Raphael also had the option to submit her own entry. 54 submissions were received at the closing of the deadline. The selected song, titled "New Day Will Rise" and written by Keren Peles, was presented on 9 March during a special broadcast on Kan 11, aired from the Yitzhak Rabin Center in Tel Aviv and hosted by Hila Korach.
Due to the continuing Gaza war, calls were made for the exclusion of Israel, albeit at a smaller scale than in the lead-up to and during the 2024 contest. The Slovenian broadcaster RTVSLO submitted a demand for the EBU to exclude Israel in December 2024. RTVSLO had also considered withdrawing from the contest and censorship of Israel's performance if Israel is not excluded. The Finnish broadcaster Yle received a petition signed by over 500 Finnish artists in March 2025, demanding that the broadcaster boycotts the contest if Israel is allowed to compete; among the signatories were Eija Ahvo [fi], Eero Ritala, and Sara Melleri. Later that month, José Pablo López, chairman of the Spanish broadcaster RTVE, stated that he would put the issue of Israel's participation to a vote in the broadcaster's board of directors in March.