Israel’s Yuval Raphael touches down in Israel after her second-place finish at the Eurovision grand final in Basel, Switzerland, last night.
“Thank you so much for granting me the privilege of being your voice, that you trusted me to share our message,” she tells reporters at Ben Gurion Airport following her arrival.
“I really hope I brought you a lot of pride because that’s all I wanted,” she continues. “I feel like we had a huge, huge victory, but we will never have a victory until all of our hostages return home.”
Raphael and her song, “New Day Will Rise,” brought Israel to an impressive second-place finish at the annual competition, coming first overall in the public vote but just 14th in the jury vote, which are combined for the final results.
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