Grand Final | 23rd Place | 35 points | Prequalification
Kobi Marimi will represent Israel after winning the reality music competition and national selection process HaKokhav HaBa L’Eurovizion and will defend the country’s winning title with the song “Home”. His foray into music began when he took singing lessons as a teenager and his talent has driven him ever since.
“Home” is highly symbolic both for both Marimi and Israel. For Marimi the song is based around how singing brought him “home”, how he gained confidence in himself through music. For Israel, the “home” lyric is poignant for bringing Eurovision back to the often embattled and serially endangered nation.
Though he largely trained to become an actor, performing in several musicals and productions, Marimi hadn’t had a true professional start until HaKokhav HaBa L’Eurovizion.
Tel Aviv 2019 will be hosted by (from left to right) Assi Azar, Bar Refaeli, Erez Tal, and Lucy Ayoub. The four presenters represent a range of entertainment media and are significant celebrities in the Israeli public eye. Refaeli and Tal will host on-stage, while Azar and Ayoub will serve as the green room hosts.
Assi Azar
Photograph by Daniel Kaminsky
Azar is a well-known media personality and activist in Israel, being the presenter and screenwriter on a number of television shows. Most notably, he is one of the hosts for Israel’s national selection process, HaKokhav HaBa L’Eurovizion and has co-hosted the Israeli edition of Big Brother with fellow presenter Erez Tal. He is openly gay, and created the documentaryMom and Dad: I Have Something to Tell You about the journey parents go through when their kids come out to them.
Bar Refaeli
Photograph by Eyal Nevo
Refaeli is a supermodel, television host, and actress who has appeared in numerous fashion and men’s magazines and has been the host of the Israeli edition of the X Factor since 2013. She also starred in a number of commercials and small screen productions, and is the highest paid Israeli model.
Erez Tal
Photograph by Ohad Romano
Tal is a former radio and current television host, having a long career in broadcast media. Beyond co-hosting Big Brother with Azar, Tal was also one of the commentators for Israel’s showing of Eurovision at Lisbon 2018, the first time in 25 years that Israel provided a commentated broadcast of the contest. He is credited with the creation of the television series The Vault, the rights to which have been sold to over 23 countries and thus has made it Israel’s most successful television export.
Lucy Ayoub
Photograph by Ido Izsak
Ayoub, in contrast to her fellow hosts, is relatively new, having first gotten major attention in 2016 for her poetry slam performance and since began hosting several public broadcast programs. She is of both Arabic and Jewish descent, and served as the spokesperson for Israel at Lisbon 2018.
Tel Aviv-Yafo, often just referred to as Tel Aviv, is the second largest city of Israel, founded in the early twentieth century just north of the ancient port city of Jaffa (often referred to as Yafo.) Tel Aviv has since combined with Jaffa, and has become the technological, economic, and cultural hub of Israel and their gate to the Mediterranean Sea and to Europe. The metropolitan area of the city accounts for approximately two-fifths of the entirety of Israel’s population.
Originally founded as a separate settlement by and for Jewish immigrants in the early twentieth century, Tel Aviv faced slow growth through its early decades, in strong part due to Ottoman deportation carried out in 1917. When the British took over the region and established Mandatory Palestine, Tel Aviv again saw growth and was the de facto capital of the Jewish people in the region. Through Israel’s founding in 1948 with the partition plan and the short-yet-complex history of the nation, Tel Aviv has stood as a cultural exemplar of the Israeli people.
Tel Aviv, which means the “Ancient Hill of Spring“, was designated by UNESCO as a World Heritage site in 2003. Tel Aviv also serves as the primary diplomatic hub of Israel, with most foreign embassies being located in the city alongside many governmental offices and ministries of Israel.
The city, as being Israel’s connecting city to the world, is diverse and inclusive. Often described as being youthful and full of energy, the city serves as a major cornerstone city of the Mediterranean and promises to be a rewarding host city for the Eurovision Song Contest.
