Regina Spektor tells pro-Palestine protesters at concert: ‘You’re just yelling at a Jew’

Singer-songwriter Regina Spektor’s concert in Portland, Oregon, was interrupted by pro-Palestine protesters at the weekend, prompting her to tell them they were “just yelling at a Jew”.

Spektor, who is Jewish and emigrated with her family to New York from the Soviet Union as a child, was filmed by a fan as she addressed an audience member who started shouting “free f***ing Palestine” during her performance at Revolution Hall on Saturday (26 July).

After the first audience member interrupted the show, another fan apparently began repeating: “Free, free Palestine”.

Other pro-Israel fans shouted “am Israel Chai” – Hebrew for “the people of Israel live” – according to The Hollywood Reporter.

Spektor, 45, has voiced her support of Israel in the past, including two days after the 7 October 2023 attack at Nova Music Festival. She wrote, in part: “If you’ve devalued Jewish life so much that mourning murdered Jewish children at a festival, raped women, and the largest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust has offended you – leave.”

Stereogum reported that one protester had charged the stage while shouting “free Palestine”, prompting Spektor to say: “I don’t know what he thinks he’s doing. I really appreciate the security.”

Spektor encouraged the pro-Palestine protesters to leave the show, remarking: “This is not an internet comment section… 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.”

In the fan video, some more attendees can be seen leaving the concert.

Spektor told her audience: “The only reason I even speak English is because I came here to escape this s***. I only speak English because I came from a country where people treated Jews as othered, and I’m being othered here and it sucks.

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

The Independent has contacted Spektor’s representative for comment.

The incident at her concert comes amid growing tensions in the music industry surrounding artists’ stances on the Israel-Gaza conflict.

In October last year, Radiohead’s Thom Yorke walked offstage after being confronted by a pro-Palestine protester, whom he branded a “coward”.

Last month, punk group Bob Vylan sparked controversy as they led Glastonbury crowds in chants of “death, death to the IDF [Israel Defense Forces]”, a moment that was broadcast live by the BBC.

The duo denied allegations of antisemitism, stating that their words were aimed at the Israeli government, not Jewish people.

“We are not for the death of Jews, Arabs, or any other race or group of people,” Bob Vylan said in a statement to Instagram. “We are for the dismantling of a violent military machine.”

Earlier this month, on 24 July, Irish hip-hop trio Kneecap were banned from Hungary for three years, forcing the band to cancel their scheduled performance at the country’s Sziget Festival.

Government spokesman Zoltán Kovács wrote on social media platform X that the decision to ban Kneecap was due to “antisemitic hate speech and open praise for Hamas and Hezbollah”.

In a statement on their social media channels, Kneecap blamed Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán for the ban, calling his government “authoritarian” and criticising him for welcoming Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Hungary in April this year, despite a warrant for his arrest from the International Criminal Court over accusations of war crimes and crimes against humanity.

“We stand against all hate crimes and Kneecap champions love and solidarity as well as calling out injustices where we see it,” the band said.

This week, humanitarian organisations said that starvation and malnutrition have reached a critical point in Gaza as Israel continues to block essential humanitarian aid from entering the area.