The Israeli band Teapacks continue to make world-wide headlines at the centre of one of this year's biggest Eurovision Song Contest controversies. With the deadline for song submission only days away some are already calling for the song's disqualification based on its perceived political content. However, others believe the contest's viewers should decide on the song's fate by televoting during the competition. Now English speakers can hear what the band has to say about their song, they claim “disqualification will only make us stronger” in an English interview posted on the Israeli broadcaster's website.

In the video taped interview, which is available here, the band's front man Kobi Oz says, "The idea of making music is having an opinion – having … a spine." However this may be in conflict with the Eurovision Broadcasting Union (EBU) rules which say that a performance in the competition is not allowed to make a political statement. Many believe the "opinion" contained in lyrics such as "The world is full of terror; If someone makes an error; He’s gonna blow us up to biddy biddy kingdom come," is in conflict with those EBU rules. If that is the case the bandsays they will notchange the song, but they say the competition would be "boring" without their participation.

It's unclear where the idea came from, but theband says in the interview which was taped more than a week ago that a decision on the song would be taken last Sunday. However that was not the case; the contest's executive supervisor Svante Stockselious said that the EBU will begin looking at all the songs only next week after the submission deadline. Kobi says, "For us the discussion itself is something we accomplished. It's a great thing that people are speaking about the borders of art." He also says that the contest is outdated and often boring. The band claims they are doing their best to make the Eurovision Song Contest more relevant. After crediting last year's monster-costumed rock winners Lordi for starting something new, Kobi says the EBU should "do themselves a favor and let us perform because the Eurovision next year will be more interesting".

But is the song political? The band says, "It's more a humane song then a political song." Theysaythat terror is everywhere including Israel. They claim, "You can stay in the nice polite European bubble and not talk about it, or you can be mature like the Israeli's are and laugh in the face of danger. We are taking the power out of terror because terrorists – they disappear when you laugh at them."

See the full interview on IBA's Eurovision site here.