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Jewish and Muslim comedians team up to turn tension into titters
Comedian Gibran Saleem had never met a Jewish person until starting his graduate studies at New York University more than a decade ago. The child of Pakistani immigrants, Saleem was raised in a Muslim household in northern Virginia where, he said, he was mostly surrounded by people with a similar cultural background.
“I knew about the Holocaust, and that was it,” Saleem said. “I didn’t know anything about the [Jewish] religion, culture, any of that until I moved to New York [City], which is pretty wild to me.”
Things have changed drastically since then. Today, Saleem is part of a loose collective of about a dozen comedians known as Comedy for Peace, an international, interfaith comedy project that brings together Jewish, Muslim and Christian comedians. On Saturday, Saleem, along with four other comics, will perform a one-night-only show, “Comedy for Peace,” at the Upper East Side’s Comic Strip Live as part of the New York Comedy Festival.
“It’s a very simple idea,” said the group’s founder, Jewish Israeli comedian Erik Angel, who is also performing Saturday. “It’s to bring, under one roof, different communities and show how easy it is to have fun.”
A 10-year resident of the Upper West Side, Angel, 50, grew up in Petach Tikvah. He founded Comedy for Peace in 2019, just a few years after he entered the comedy circuit following a career as a musician. After two successful interfaith shows early that year, “Comedy for Peace” became a recurring event that aims to promote tolerance. Since then, the group has played more than 200 shows across North America, where they’ve helped raise money for various causes, including helping nurses during the COVID-19 pandemic and supporting the Parents Circle Families Forum, a joint Israeli-Palestinian group that brings together families who have lost relatives on both sides of the conflict.
And now, the group’s latest gig will take place in a tense New York City, with many local Jews worried about the forthcoming mayoral leadership of avowed anti-Zionist Zohran Mamdani. As such, Angel thinks Saturday’s show will be “very important,” adding that he hopes cross-cultural comedy will help alleviate “all the fear, all the things coming from this separation” between Mamdani’s supporters and detractors.
“Even in Israeli media, people online, and I think the panic is — I understand where they’re coming from, and I also have my concerns,” said Angel. “But on the other hand, it’s democracy.”
Despite their lofty ambitions, Angel sees “Comedy for Peace” as a brief respite from politics. “We say to you, ‘OK, you want to fight before? You want to fight after? With us, we’re gonna chill [for] two hours,’” he said. “’We’re gonna chill.’”
Saturday’s “Comedy for Peace” lineup includes Iranian comedian Tehran Ghasri, who is also Black and whose family is Muslim, Zoroastrian and Jewish; lesbian Jewish comedian Liz Glazer, who recently made her “Tonight Show” debut; and Texas-born Ashley Austin Morris, who is Christian.
“The ultimate goal is just unity and shared compassion,” Saleem said.
“Comedy for Peace” will take place on Saturday at 8 p.m. at Comic Strip Live, 1568 Second Ave. Get tickets, $36.60, here.
Other Jewish shows at the NY Comedy Festival
With more than 100 shows across the five boroughs, the annual New York Comedy Festival runs through Sunday, Nov. 16 this year. Here are a few Jewish highlights from the fest:
Anna Roisman co-hosts “Celebrity Drop-In” on Tuesday at 8 p.m. at The Stand West (407 West 15th St.). Roisman is the creator of the one-woman show “Jewish American Prodigy” and known for her impressions and characters on Instagram and TikTok. Get tickets from $29.
Eli Leonard presents “Good Showbiz,” an experimental show exploring the history of Jewish comedy, on Tuesday and Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. at iconic Jewish restaurant Barney Greengrass (541 Amsterdam Ave.). Tickets here from $72.
“Alex Borstein Is Thirsty” plays Wednesday at 7:30 p.m. at The Bell House (149 7th St., Brooklyn). The Jewish comedian and actress is best known for her voice work on “Family Guy” and as Susie Myerson in “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel,” and this solo show is part of her national tour. Tickets here from $38.
“The Jackie Mason Musical” will have three showings, on Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday at the Triad Theatre (158 West 72nd St.) on the Upper West Side. Mason’s daughter, Sheba, who was not publicly recognized by the late comedian until she was 18 years old, stars in this story about her parents’ relationship. Get your tickets here from $30.
“Good Neighbors: A Fundraiser for Jews for Racial and Economic Justice,” hosted by comedians Orli Matlow and Marcia Belsky, will be performed on Wednesday at 9 p.m. at Brooklyn Art Haus (24 Marcy Ave.). Tickets start at $23.
“Hysterical,” presented by stand-up comedian Hannah Lieberman, will be performed on Thursday at 7:30 p.m. at QED Astoria (27-16 23rd Ave.). The one-woman comedy musical is about Lieberman’s experience learning she has the BRCA-1 gene. Get tickets, $10, here.
“Natan Badalov: Chosen Fam” will be performed Friday at 8 p.m. at Astoria’s Grove 34 (31-83 34th St.). Badalov, a Bukharian comedian, debuted his first stand-up special, “Connect The Dots” at the New York Comedy Festival in 2023. Get your tickets for “Chosen Fam” here from $23.
“Alex Edelman: What Are You Going To Do” will be performed on Saturday at 6 p.m at Carnegie Hall (881 Seventh Ave.). Edelman is the creator of the very Jewish, award-winning special “Just for Us,” and now stars on the Peacock show “The Paper.” (Tickets for this show are sold out.)
“Talia Reese and Friends: Kosher Style” will be performed Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at Rodney’s Comedy Club (1118 First Ave.). Reese, an Orthodox Jewish woman and a former lawyer, is known for her insider-y Jewish comedy. Tickets here from $22.
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Tucker’s Ideas About Jews Come from Darkest Corners of the Internet, Says Huckabee After Combative Interview
US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee looks on during the day he visits the Western Wall, Judaism’s holiest prayer site, in Jerusalem’s Old City, April 18, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
i24 News – In a combative interview with US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee, right-wing firebrand Tucker Carlson made a host of contentious and often demonstrably false claims that quickly went viral online. Huckabee, who repeatedly challenged the former Fox News star during the interview, subsequently made a long post on X, identifying a pattern of bad-faith arguments, distortions and conspiracies in Carlson’s rhetorical style.
Huckabee pointed out his words were not accorded by Carlson the same degree of attention and curiosity the anchor evinced toward such unsavory characters as “the little Nazi sympathizer Nick Fuentes or the guy who thought Hitler was the good guy and Churchill the bad guy.”
“What I wasn’t anticipating was a lengthy series of questions where he seemed to be insinuating that the Jews of today aren’t really same people as the Jews of the Bible,” Huckabee wrote, adding that Tucker’s obsession with conspiracies regarding the provenance of Ashkenazi Jews obscured the fact that most Israeli Jews were refugees from the Arab and Muslim world.
The idea that Ashkenazi Jews are an Asiatic tribe who invented a false ancestry “gained traction in the 80’s and 90’s with David Duke and other Klansmen and neo-Nazis,” Huckabee wrote. “It has really caught fire in recent years on the Internet and social media, mostly from some of the most overt antisemites and Jew haters you can find.”
Carlson branded Israel “probably the most violent country on earth” and cited the false claim that Israel President Isaac Herzog had visited the infamous island of the late, disgraced sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.
“The current president of Israel, whom I know you know, apparently was at ‘pedo island.’ That’s what it says,” Carlson said, citing a debunked claim made by The Times reporter Gabrielle Weiniger. “Still-living, high-level Israeli officials are directly implicated in Epstein’s life, if not his crimes, so I think you’d be following this.”
Another misleading claim made by Carlson was that there were more Christians in Qatar than in Israel.
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Pezeshkian Says Iran Will Not Bow to Pressure Amid US Nuclear Talks
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian attends the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit 2025, in Tianjin, China, September 1, 2025. Iran’s Presidential website/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said on Saturday that his country would not bow its head to pressure from world powers amid nuclear talks with the United States.
“World powers are lining up to force us to bow our heads… but we will not bow our heads despite all the problems that they are creating for us,” Pezeshkian said in a speech carried live by state TV.
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Italy’s RAI Apologizes after Latest Gaffe Targets Israeli Bobsleigh Team
Milano Cortina 2026 Olympics – Bobsleigh – 4-man Heat 1 – Cortina Sliding Centre, Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy – February 21, 2026. Adam Edelman of Israel, Menachem Chen of Israel, Uri Zisman of Israel, Omer Katz of Israel in action during Heat 1. Photo: REUTERS/Athit Perawongmetha
Italy’s state broadcaster RAI was forced to apologize to the Jewish community on Saturday after an off‑air remark advising its producers to “avoid” the Israeli crew was broadcast before coverage of the Four-Man bobsleigh event at the Winter Olympics.
The head of RAI’s sports division had already resigned earlier in the week after his error-ridden commentary at the Milano Cortina 2026 opening ceremony two weeks ago triggered a revolt among its journalists.
On Saturday, viewers heard “Let’s avoid crew number 21, which is the Israeli one” and then “no, because …” before the sound was cut off.
RAI CEO Giampaolo Rossi said the incident represented a “serious” breach of the principles of impartiality, respect and inclusion that should guide the public broadcaster.
He added that RAI had opened an internal inquiry to swiftly determine any responsibility and any potential disciplinary procedures.
In a separate statement RAI’s board of directors condemned the remark as “unacceptable.”
The board apologized to the Jewish community, the athletes involved and all viewers who felt offended.
RAI is the country’s largest media organization and operates national television, radio and digital news services.
The union representing RAI journalists, Usigrai, had said Paolo Petrecca’s opening ceremony commentary had dealt “a serious blow” to the company’s credibility.
His missteps included misidentifying venues and public figures, and making comments about national teams that were widely criticized.