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Jewish Comic Leah Forster Is a Force On Stage
Leah Forster. Photo: provided.
It is the rarest of shows when a performer will make the Hebrew blessing over Gatorade, and then ask a woman in the front row if her coat is made of real fur.
But one should expect nothing less from Leah Forster, and her hilarious and inspirational show, That’s Yentatainment! at the Theater for the New City in Manhattan through December 15.
Forster sings a Yiddish version of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah,” and original comedic songs including “Shabbos Goy,” about how when she was growing up Hasidic in Borough Park, her father would ask if someone walking by was a gentile, and would then ask them to turn on a light.
Forster explains how she was a top comic in the Hasidic community performing for women only, and how a number of traumatic events that took place beginning about a decade ago changed her path.
She was outed as a lesbian online, fired from a teaching job at a yeshiva in Brooklyn, and made headlines in the New York City tabloids in 2018 when a restaurant cancelled a scheduled New Year’s show due to her being a lesbian.
While most performers would use their outrage at these events to make a scene in their shows, Forster doesn’t do that. Instead, she recounts some nice moments, as well as some tough ones, and breaks into some of her hilarious characters that she’s made famous on Instagram (including one with several businesses in her apartment), where she has 133,000 followers.
“I’m not p***ed off,” Forster told me in an interview before the show. “I took my anger, and I turned it into art.”
She said she feels a freedom to pursue any artistic vision she wants, unlike some influencers who fear backlash from fans.
“I don’t [care] about (losing) followers,” Forster said. “I was fired from my job, my parents stopped speaking to me, my community threw me away and threatened to take away my child. I’m not afraid. I love and appreciate my followers. The whole world focuses on engagement and algorithms. I got cancelled by my own mother. I keep getting cancelled because I’m a queer and I refuse to stick to one spectrum. I feel that way about my sexuality. I feel that way about my religion. I feel that way about entertainment … why can’t I be like what Hasidim do, which is we make a cholent with all kinds of beans and that’s what makes it so savory and there isn’t a need to fit into one category.”
While there is not a lot of glitz and glamor in the show, That’s Yentatainment has a palpable power of a Jewish soul wanting to speak out. Of the many shows I’ve reviewed, this one is likely the easiest to perform on a technical level, but the most difficult to perform on an emotional one.
While some performers make themselves vulnerable by jumping in the air or wearing strange clothing, Forster does so in a way that makes you feel like she is a member of your family.
It is clear that Forster has taken the “gam zu letova” approach — which essentially means that whatever happens is for the good. Forster, who will be releasing a book in January, has an authenticity that is hard to rival and a sharp wit that could cut through a turtle’s shell.
I would like to see her do more crowd-work, as she is a great kibitzer, but that may vary from night to night.
“Who goes to a theater?” Forster asks in her show, mimicking her mother’s voice, saying that’s not a heimish — or a properly Jewish thing to do.
Forster also jokes that in her community, for young women, there is the “getting married season” and “when are you getting married season.”
“What size is the girl?” she recalls in the show, as one of the questions that would be asked when setting up matches. She details several funny scenes, including how a woman who charged people to use a treadmill in her basement turned it into a bakery, selling wonderful rugelach on Thursdays.
Forster has done standup comedy for Jewish and secular audiences, but this is her first one-woman show. It will make you laugh, tap your foot, and think about the great power of being kind and sweet in a world where some are unsavory.
“They say that you can’t go home again,” Forster says near the end of her show. “But maybe home isn’t a place. Maybe home is just the courage to be yourself…”
The author is a writer based in New York.
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Antisemitic Incidents at Argentina Local Soccer Match Spark Official Investigations, Condemnations
Fans of Argentinian soccer club All Boys marched through the streets before their match against Atlanta soccer club, carrying a coffin draped with an Israeli flag alongside Iranian and Palestinian flags. Photo: Screenshot
Argentinian authorities and soccer officials have launched investigations following antisemitic incidents by Club Atlético All Boys fans during Sunday’s local match against Atlanta.
Atlanta, a soccer team based in the Villa Crespo neighborhood of Buenos Aires, has deep historical ties to Argentina’s Jewish community, which has long been a significant presence in the area.
This latest antisemitic incident took place outside the stadium before the game had even started.
All Boys fans were seen waving Palestinian and Iranian flags, carrying a coffin draped with an Israeli flag, and handing out flyers bearing messages like “Free Palestine” and “Israel and Atlanta are the same crap.”
Before a football match today against the Argentine sports club Atlanta, which is closely associated with the Jewish community, fans of the opposing team, All Boys, waved Islamic Republic and Palestinian flags while parading a coffin draped in an Israeli flag through the streets.… pic.twitter.com/IQs4v6eoFz
— Hen Mazzig (@HenMazzig) June 29, 2025
Then, during the match — which ended in a 0-0 draw — a drone carrying a Palestinian flag flew over the stadium, while some fans reportedly chanted anti-Israel slogans.
Local police confirmed they have issued citations to individuals accused of inciting public disorder and related offenses.
On Monday, the Argentine Football Association (AFA) condemned the incidents as “abhorrent” and confirmed the organization has opened a formal inquiry into the events.
“This is not folklore. This is discrimination,” the statement reads.
Argentina’s Security Minister Patricia Bullrich also announced that a criminal complaint has been filed, citing “acts of violence, expressions of racial and religious hatred, and public intimidation.”
In a post on X, the Delegation of Argentine Israelite Associations (DAIA), the country’s Jewish umbrella organization, condemned the incidents and called on both local authorities and the soccer officials to “take firm action against these acts of hatred.”
“We urge the authorities to take all necessary actions and apply the full force of the law,” the statement reads. “Violence and discrimination must have no place in our society.”
Repudiamos enérgicamente las expresiones antisemitas ocurridas hoy en las inmediaciones del estadio Malvinas Argentinas.
Exigimos a las autoridades correspondientes, a la AFA y al Club All Boys que actúen con firmeza ante estos hechos de odio.
La violencia y la discriminación no… pic.twitter.com/3AmY7IQscY— DAIA (@DAIAArgentina) June 29, 2025
Since the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, Argentina has experienced a surge in antisemitic incidents and anti-Jewish hate crimes.
According to a recent report by DAIA, Argentina experienced a 15 percent increase in antisemitic activity last year, with 687 anti-Jewish hate crimes recorded — up from 598 incidents in 2023 — marking a significant rise nationwide.
The study indicates that 66 percent of the antisemitic incidents originated in the digital realm, with a significant rise in Nazi symbols and conspiracy theories, but there was also a 34 percent increase in reported physical assaults, with such hate crimes rising in schools and neighborhoods.
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Iranian nuclear program degraded by up to two years, Pentagon says
A satellite image of Iran’s Fordow nuclear facility. Photo: File.
The Pentagon said on Wednesday that US strikes 10 days ago had degraded Iran’s nuclear program by up to two years, suggesting the U.S. military operation likely achieved its goals despite a far more cautious initial assessment that leaked to the public.
Sean Parnell, a Pentagon spokesman, offered the figure at a briefing to reporters, adding that the official estimate was “probably closer to two years.” Parnell did not provide evidence to back up his assessment.
“We have degraded their program by one to two years, at least intel assessments inside the Department [of Defense] assess that,” Parnell told a news briefing.
U.S. military bombers carried out strikes against three Iranian nuclear facilities on June 22 using more than a dozen 30,000-pound bunker-buster bombs and more than two dozen Tomahawk land attack cruise missiles.
The evolving U.S. intelligence about the impact of the strikes is being closely watched, after President Donald Trump said almost immediately after they took place that Iran’s program had been obliterated, language echoed by Parnell at Wednesday’s briefing.
Such conclusions often take the U.S. intelligence community weeks or more to determine.
“All of the intelligence that we’ve seen [has] led us to believe that Iran’s — those facilities especially, have been completely obliterated,” Parnell said.
Over the weekend, the head of the UN nuclear watchdog, Rafael Grossi, said that Iran could be producing enriched uranium in a few months, raising doubts about how effective US strikes to destroy Tehran’s nuclear program have been.
Several experts have also cautioned that Iran likely moved a stockpile of near weapons-grade highly enriched uranium out of the deeply buried Fordow site before the strikes and could be hiding it.
But US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said last week he was unaware of intelligence suggesting Iran had moved its highly enriched uranium to shield it from US strikes.
A preliminary assessment last week from the Defense Intelligence Agency suggested that the strikes may have only set back Iran’s nuclear program by months. But Trump administration officials said that assessment was low confidence and had been overtaken by intelligence showing Iran’s nuclear program was severely damaged.
According to Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi, the strikes on the Fordow nuclear site caused severe damage.
“No one exactly knows what has transpired in Fordow. That being said, what we know so far is that the facilities have been seriously and heavily damaged,” Araqchi said in the interview broadcast by CBS News on Tuesday.
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Switzerland Moves to Close Gaza Humanitarian Foundation’s Geneva Office Over Legal Irregularities
Palestinians carry aid supplies received from the US-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation in the central Gaza Strip, May 29, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ramadan Abed/File Photo
Switzerland has moved to shut down the Geneva office of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF), a US- and Israeli-backed aid group, citing legal irregularities in its establishment.
The GHF began distributing food packages in Gaza in late May, implementing a new aid delivery model aimed at preventing the diversion of supplies by Hamas, as Israel continues its defensive military campaign against the Palestinian terrorist group.
The initiative has drawn criticism from the UN and international organizations, some of which have claimed that Jerusalem is causing starvation in the war-torn enclave.
Israel has vehemently denied such accusations, noting that, until its recently imposed blockade, it had provided significant humanitarian aid in the enclave throughout the war.
Israeli officials have also said much of the aid that flows into Gaza is stolen by Hamas, which uses it for terrorist operations and sells the rest at high prices to Gazan civilians.
With a subsidiary registered in Geneva, the GHF — headquartered in Delaware — reports having delivered over 56 million meals to Palestinians in just one month.
According to a regulatory announcement published Wednesday in the Swiss Official Gazette of Commerce, the Federal Supervisory Authority for Foundations (ESA) may order the dissolution of the GHF if no creditors come forward within the legal 30-day period.
The Trump administration did not immediately respond to requests for comment on the Swiss decision to shut down its Geneva office.
“The GHF confirmed to the ESA that it had never carried out activities in Switzerland … and that it intends to dissolve the Geneva-registered branch,” the ESA said in a statement.
Last week, Geneva authorities gave the GHF a 30-day deadline to address legal shortcomings or risk facing enforcement measures.
Under local laws and regulations, the foundation failed to meet several requirements: it did not appoint a board member authorized to sign documents domiciled in Switzerland, did not have the minimum three board members, lacked a Swiss bank account and valid address, and operated without an auditing body.
The GHF operates independently from UN-backed mechanisms, which Hamas has sought to reinstate, arguing that these vehicles are more neutral.
Israeli and American officials have rejected those calls, saying Hamas previously exploited UN-run systems to siphon aid for its war effort.
The UN has denied those allegations while expressing concerns that the GHF’s approach forces civilians to risk their safety by traveling long distances across active conflict zones to reach food distribution points.
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