An emergency vote on Israel’s participation in the Eurovision Song Contest has been called off following developments in the Middle East, the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) has said.

Contest organisers had scheduled “an extraordinary meeting of [its] general assembly to be held online” in early November after several countries said they would no longer take part in Eurovision if Israel participated.

The EBU said in a statement that following “recent developments in the Middle East” the executive board had agreed on Monday that there should be an in-person discussion among members “on the issue of participation in the Eurovision Song Contest 2026”.

It said the matter had now been added to the agenda of its winter general assembly, which will take place in December.

Further details about the session would be shared with EBU members in the coming weeks, it added.

It is not clear if a vote will still take place at a later date.

Austria is hosting next year’s show in Vienna. The country’s national broadcaster, ORF, told Reuters news agency it welcomed the EBU’s decision.

Sky News has contacted Israeli broadcaster KAN for comment.

Faced with controversy over the conflict in Gaza, Eurovision – which labels itself a non-political event – had said member countries would vote on whether Israel should or shouldn’t take part.

Slovenia and broadcasters from Spain, the Netherlands, Ireland and Iceland had all issued statements saying if Israel was allowed to enter, they’d consider boycotting the contest.

As one of the “Big Five” backers of Eurovision, Spain’s decision to leave the competition would have a significant financial impact on the event – which is the world’s largest live singing competition.

In September, a letter from EBU president Delphine Ernotte Cunci, said “given that the union has never faced a divisive situation like this before” the board agreed it “merited a broader democratic basis for a decision”.

Read more:
Why Eurovision vote on Israel might not stop boycott
Could Eurovision boycott lead to a competition crisis?

On Monday, Palestinian militant group Hamas freed the last living Israeli hostages from Gaza, and Israel released busloads of Palestinian detainees, under a ceasefire deal aimed at bringing an end to the two-year war in the Middle East.

The war began when Hamas stormed into Israel on October 7 2023, killing around 1,200 people and taking 251 hostage.

Israel invaded Gaza in retaliation, with airstrikes and ground assaults devastating much of the enclave and killing more than 67,000, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.

Its figures do not differentiate between civilians and combatants but it says around half of those killed were women and children.

Actress Diane Keaton, who starred in films including The Godfather and Annie Hall, has died, reports have said.

People reported her death at the age of 79, citing a family spokesperson.

The magazine said she died in California with loved ones but no other details were immediately available, and representatives for Keaton did not immediately respond to inquiries from The Associated Press news agency.

Keaton’s death was also reported by the New York Times newspaper which said it has spoken to Dori Roth, who produced a number of Keaton’s most recent films, who confirmed she had died but did not provide any details about the circumstances.

With a long career, across a series of movies that are regarded as some of the best ever made, Keaton was widely admired.

She was awarded an Oscar, a BAFTA and two Golden Globe Awards, and was also nominated for two Emmys, and a Tony, as well as picking up a series of other Academy Award and BAFTA nominations.

Her best actress Oscar was for the Woody Allen film Annie Hall, which is said to be loosely based on her life.

She appeared in several other Allen projects, including Manhattan, as well as all three Godfather movies, in which she played Kay, the wife and then ex-wife of Marlon Brando’s son Michael Corleone, played by Al Pacino, opposite him as he descends into a life of crime and replaces his father in the family’s mafia empire.

‘Brilliant, beautiful’

The unexpected news was met with shock around the world.

Her First Wives Club co-star Bette Midler wrote on Instagram: “The brilliant, beautiful, extraordinary Diane Keaton has died. I cannot tell you how unbearably sad this makes me.

“She was hilarious, a complete original, and completely without guile, or any of the competitiveness one would have expected from such a star. What you saw was who she was … oh, la, lala!”

Actor Ben Stiller paid tribute on X, writing: “Diane Keaton. One of the greatest film actors ever. An icon of style, humor and comedy. Brilliant. What a person.”

Keaton was the kind of actor who helped make films iconic and timeless, from her “La-dee-da, la-dee-da” phrasing as Annie Hall, bedecked in the iconic necktie, bowler hat, vest and khakis, to her heartbreaking turn as Kay Adams, the woman unfortunate enough to join the Corleone family.

Keaton also frequently worked with Nancy Meyers, starting with 1987’s Baby Boom.

Their other films together included 1991’s Father of the Bride and its 1995 sequel, as well as 2003’s Something’s Gotta Give.

In 1996 she starred opposite Goldie Hawn and Midler in The First Wives Club, about three women whose husbands had left them for younger women.

More recently she collaborated with Jane Fonda, Mary Steenburgen and Candice Bergen on the Book Club films.

Keaton never married. She adopted a daughter, Dexter, in 1996 and a son, Duke, four years later.

Sky News has contacted Keaton’s agent for a comment.

Tom Hollander says he’s not worried about AI actors replacing real ones and thinks the creation of synthetic performers will only boost the value of authentic, live performance.

The 58-year-old plays entrepreneur Cameron Beck in The Iris Affair, a drama about the world’s most powerful quantum computer.

Dubbed “Charlie Big Potatoes” – it could eat ChatGPT for breakfast.

It’s a timely theme in a world where Artificial Intelligence is advancing at pace, and just last week, the world’s first AI starlet – Tilly Norwood – made her Hollywood debut.

Hollander is not impressed. He suggests rumours that Norwood is in talks with talent agencies are “a lot of old nonsense”, and questions the logistics of working with an AI actor, asking “Would it be, like a blue screen?”

Norwood – a pretty, 20-something brunette – is the creation of Dutch actor and comedian Eline Van der Velden and her AI production studio Particle6. It’s planning to launch its own AI talent studio, Xicoia, soon.

Hollander tells Sky News: “I’m perhaps not scared enough about it. I think the reaction against it is quite strong. And I think there’ll be some legal stuff. Also, it needs to be proven to be good. I mean, the little film that they did around her, I didn’t think was terribly interesting.”

The sketch – shared on social media and titled AI Commissioner – poked fun at the future of TV development in a post-AI world.

Stars including Emily Blunt, Natasha Lyonne and Whoopi Goldberg have objected to Norwood’s creation too, as has US actors’ union SAG-AFTRA.

Hollander compares watching an AI performer to watching a magic trick: “You know with your brain that you’re watching something that’s bullshit… If they don’t have to tell you, that would be difficult. But if they’ve told you it’s AI, then you’ll watch it with a different part of your brain.”

Always screen-ready, with no ego and low salary requirements, Norwood is being billed as a studio’s dream hire. In line with Hollywood’s exacting standards for female beauty, she’ll also never age.

Hollander’s Iris Affair co-star Niamh Algar, who plays genius codebreaker Iris Nixon in the show, doesn’t feel threatened by this new kid on the block, poking fun at Norwood’s girl-next-door persona: “She’s a nightmare to work with. She’s always late. Takes ages in her trailer.”

But Algar adds: “I don’t want to work with an AI. No.”

She goes on, “I don’t think you can replicate. She’s a character, she’s not an actor.”

Algar says the flaw in AI’s performance – scraped from the plethora of real performances that have come before it – is that we, as humans, are “excited by unpredictability”.

She says AI is “too perfect, we like flaws”.

Hollander agrees: “There’ll be a fight for authenticity. People will be going, ‘I refuse makeup. Give me less makeup, I want less makeup because AI can’t possibly mimic the blemishes on my face'”.

He even manages to pull a positive from the AI revolution: “It means that live performance will be more exciting than ever before…

“I think live performance is one antidote, and it’s certainly true in music, isn’t it? I mean, partly because they have to go on tour [to make money], but also because there’s just nothing like it and you can’t replace it.”

Algar enthusiastically adds: “Theatre’s going to kick off. It’s going to be so hot.”

As for using AI themselves, while Hollander admits he’s used it recently for “a bit of problem solving”, Algar says she tries to avoid it, worrying “part of my brain is going to go dormant”.

Indeed, the impact of technology on our brains is a source of constant inspiration – and torture – for The Iris Affair screenwriter Neil Cross.

Cross, who also created psychological crime thriller Luther, tells Sky News: “We are at a hinge point in history.”

He says: “I’m interested in what technological revolution does to people. I have 3am thoughts about the poor man who invented the like button.

“He came up with a simple invention whose only intention was to increase levels of human happiness. How could something as simple as a like button go wrong? And it went so disastrously wrong.

“It’s caused so much misery and anxiety and unhappiness in the human race entire. If something as simple as a small like button can have such dire, cascading, unexpected consequences, what is this moment of revolution going to lead to?”

Indeed, Cross says he lives in “a perpetual state of terror”.

He goes on: “I’m always going to be terrified of something. The world’s going to look very different. I think in 50 or 60 years’ time.

He takes a brief pause, then self-edits: “Probably 15 years’ time”.

With The Iris Affair’s central themes accelerating out of science fiction, and into reality, Cross’s examination of our instinctual fear of the unknown, coupled with our desire for knowledge that might destroy us is a powerful mix.

Cross concludes: “We’re in danger of creating God. And I think that’s the ultimate danger of AI. God doesn’t exist – yet.”

The Iris Affair is available from Thursday 16 October on Sky Atlantic and streaming service NOW