Regina Spektor tells pro-Palestine heckler ‘you’re just yelling at a Jew’

As another audience member told her the heckler was on their way out of the concert hall, the singer joked: “I thought this was different than the internet. This is real life.”

Just as things were settling down, another audience member shouted, “There’s a genocide happening,” to which the singer replied: “you can leave the show if you want. This is not an internet comment section.”

As the audience whooped and clapped in support, shouting “we love you” and “Am Yisrael Chai”, Spektor calmly added: “I think you should go because this is not the place for that conversation. I’m a real person who came here to play music. If anybody wants to walk out, this is your chance. Does anybody else want to take a walk? You can.”

Taking her up on the offer, several audience members walked out.

Understandably worked up, Spektor went on to say: “The only reason I even speak English is because I came here to escape this s**t. I only speak English because I came from a country where people were treating Jews as others, and now I’m being othered here, and it sucks.

"It’ll be nice if one of my family’s generation didn’t have to go to a new country and learn a new language, just stay put, have nice lives, you guys.”

Spektor moved to the US from Russia as a child and has been a vocal supporter of Israel, never more so than in the wake of the October 7 massacre. Last October, on the anniversary of the attack, Spektor performed at a pro-Israel gathering in New York.

This isn't the first time she has publicly criticised pro-Palestine supporters. In 2023, she responded to a social media post by Icelandic singer Bjork, which featured a series of maps of Israel and Palestine over the years with the caption: "Is this what you call sharing?"

In response, Spektor wrote: "How does one go from being silent about the worst pogrom of innocent Jewish life, rapes, murder, and torture … and jump right in with only a false info graphic based on the imagination of propaganda pushers?

"I don’t envy this level of disheartedness mixed with ignorance. To have it displayed by one of my heroes is just extra painful on top of the sorrow of mourning our dead and worrying for family and friends in Israel and the world over.

"May we stay strong in the face of lies and may we destroy Hamas, so that the Palestinians in Gaza, and the rest of the world can breathe easier."