Ermal Meta competes at the 2026 Sanremo Italian Music Festival with "Stella Stellina", a song of resistance and hope that brings to the Ariston stage the story of a Palestinian girl who intentionally remains nameless, thus becoming a representation of all the innocent children affected by the violence in the Gaza Strip. The words and music that aim to give voice to all the Palestinian girls killed during the war are reinforced by the artist's appearance.
Ermali performed on stage on the opening night with the name of a girl sewn into the collar of his shirt: Amal. A name chosen not by chance, which in Arabic means hope. "Amal" is the name chosen for the first night because the names, in fact, will change every night the artist will perform on stage. Ermali has revealed that he wrote the song inspired by his 1-year-old daughter, Fortuna.
"The protagonist of 'Stella Stellina' is a girl without a name, but maybe she has all the names. Aysha, Amal, Layla, Nour, Hind, who cares, maybe nothing, maybe everything. Nobody's daughters, everyone's daughters. I wanted their names sewn onto my clothes, written in my own hand," the singer-songwriter wrote under his Instagram post.
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In his work "Stella stellina", Ermal Meta imagines finding the doll of a little Palestinian girl who was murdered.
Part of the song lyrics:
"I found your doll
I thought I saw you again
You were so small
You held it until the evening
An eternity has passed
Or just an hour
Since a cloud in the sky
rises From your house
From my house"
In the dark night, "anger and prayer will no longer be enough" because nothing will bring back to life the nameless little girl who represents all the children killed throughout the war in Gaza.
"Flower in a stone courtyard
Like a butterfly you lived one day
Daughter of no one, melody of a song
Of the people who loved you so muchOh, my little girl, the night is black black
Anger and prayer will no longer be enough
From the hill a spring will come
In the evening breeze you will be there tooStar, little star
The night is coming
One prayer is not enough
To stop thinking about it
From the hill a spring will come
In the evening breeze you will be there too"
The song tells the story of a man - perhaps a father, a neighbor, a man - who observes and offers an intimate and human perspective on a collective tragedy.
The song, which mixes Latin, Balkan and Arabic sounds, touches on a delicate topic of the time and Ermal Meta has made it clear that he is not afraid of controversy, quite the opposite.
"I want to stay away from those who believe that we cannot talk about a people that has been massacred continuously for 70 years," Ermali told Corriere della Sera.
"A people that is on everyone's lips, but no one talks about it, a crazy oxymoron. But I'm not talking about war; war is between two armies, and in this case I see only one."
After the performance, Carlo Conti, the Festival's presenter, took the opportunity to send a message regarding the topic:
"Let flowers be only for celebrations and never on the graves of children who have nothing to do with people's foolishness."
