Episode 103: The AH"M crew is joined by Israeli government spokesman Elyon Levy as part of his recent trip to NYC.
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Episode 103: The AH"M crew is joined by Israeli government spokesman Elyon Levy as part of his recent trip to NYC.
Modi's 'Know Your Audience' Tour is on sale now!
For information about upcoming shows visit www.modilive.com.
Follow Modi on Instagram at @modi_live.
Welcome to Ani's Modi.
Speaker 2:We're good to go. I understand this is going to be very serious.
Speaker 1:It's very serious. Ready and we're on.
Speaker 3:We're on.
Speaker 1:Welcome back to Ani's Modi. Wow, do we have a special guest here in the audience. Who, who? What's the name?
Speaker 3:Elon Levy.
Speaker 1:Elon, not Elon Elon Levy, the I'm just saying it the spokesman of the state of Israel. Whether it's official or not, I think it is no.
Speaker 3:It's official.
Speaker 1:Those of you who don't know, I mean there's a million other things to his introduction besides going to Oxford and Cambridge, and he was a news anchor and he lived in London and then lived to Israel. But the best thing is, he's the spokesman of Israel and so whenever Israel needs to be represented, he's speaking, and I cannot tell you those of you who are younger and I know you just did a whole thing for Gen Z what a breath of fresh air you are. Those of you who don't know whenever Israel's in the news, they always find someone who should never be speaking English, some disaster zone who start first of all. Whose tie is off? Is my tie right? Is that right? Who's got is out and he starts to speak.
Speaker 4:Usually, this is the because of the reaction of the issue or the issues we are looking at, something that is not for the regular.
Speaker 1:And you think to yourself why is this person representing Israel?
Speaker 2:I've done so many interviews and I don't think I've seen any interviewer be as rude about Israelis as you are right now Not.
Speaker 1:Israelis. This guy that's doing this speaking is probably an amazing politician and but should not be representing Israel. Someone who speaks English well should be representing, and that's you, a breath of fresh air. You are, is that not what it? Have you been caught up before or no?
Speaker 2:That's a very kind of view, and you're certainly trying to shake things up and be as creative and versatile as possible to get Israel's message out in this world.
Speaker 1:It's 100% mushiachanagi to see you on Instagram, on social media, on television, representing Israel, speaking with like. You know you have a debating background. Yes, so you know when to not go, not to be excited, not to be your statesman. I will say it you are definitely a statesman.
Speaker 2:No, that's very kind. I mean, we are trying to be as creative and shake things up as much as possible and really redefine what it means to be a spokesman and to do political messaging. So you know, in addition to all the interviews I'm doing, we have all the content we're producing, especially for social media, toying the line between being government spokesman and content creator and the podcast as well, but you're in your autopilot mode right now. Drop it, so you need to get me out of it?
Speaker 4:No, this is not the interesting thing where we are looking for the how horrible have whenever you saw Israel.
Speaker 1:Whenever there's a war or some conflict, you just bring someone that can't speak English on it's mind, boggling no.
Speaker 3:I think that one of the things that has happened post October 7th is that we have seen what we thought were Israelis, or what the world perceived as Israelis, or as they called us white colonizers. No, that that's not actually what it means to be in Israeli.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 3:And I think that one of the things that Elon is showing the world is that that character that really is kind of a caricature. The caricature. Is not accurate.
Speaker 1:Amazing. Well said, periel. That character is not. It's right. It's right, you know. I will say, in my eyes, a predecessor of that was a Sabz Amir. If you are a friend of mine, he was the Israeli counsel general, whatever the title is. Counsel general. Yeah, basically, going to restaurants in it's called. It should be called going to restaurants in New York City. That's what it should be called in a Sabz.
Speaker 1:Amir, nice work, if you can get it A Sabz Amir killed it. He spoke English with the grammar of an American or someone of an English speaker and he was just like he had this gig in New York. His wife is filming in Israel, coming in and out, but he was like so relatable it wasn't.
Speaker 4:Israeli, surrounded by its enemy, and we are in a situation oh my.
Speaker 1:God, and it was another, like a breath of fresh air, and you just I mean wow, wow, I'm honored to be sitting here with you representing you. Know, it's just. You see Israel being represented, but in a comical way. I feel like I'm doing that job.
Speaker 2:You're doing it in a very comical way. Absolutely, you know, in to show the anger of Jews.
Speaker 1:Michael Rappaport is showing the anger we have inside of us and I think that's critical too.
Speaker 2:First of all, show anger. It's okay to be angry sometimes If you channel that into something productive and helpful and don't let that rage control you. But, at the same time, humor as well. We know, as the Jewish people, that history gives you two options you either laugh or cry. So you make an effort to laugh because otherwise you're going to be in floods of tears. And humor plays such a critical role, as you know, in shining a light on what is so absurd about the situation and also picking up morale for people who are still still licking their wounds from October 7th and, with the hostages still trapped there, need to get through the day.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and you, you know it's. It's just, I'm just so happy that there's a representation of of of Israel. You know, there's another representation of Israel. I'm not sure exactly what his title was, but he was running the Instagram, or TikTok, of the Israeli IDF. His name is Yohanan Twina Twina. I don't know, I'm not familiar. He is this, um, he somehow is a little bit related to me, but he was running the TikTok of the IDF and he is a flaming homosexual flaming, and it was the funniest TikTok I had ever seen in the world. And he's like hi, I'm going to be a little bit more, I'm going to be a little bit more. It was so brilliant.
Speaker 2:And I think that's what really riles up the pro Hamas crowd that these people are whipping our asses right now.
Speaker 1:So they, they, they, they said that when the war began, they that the Hamas was sending around his, his um his tweets.
Speaker 2:Oh, they think the joke is on us. They don't realize the joke is on them. The joke is on them, yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so you got to this position. Obviously it's not over. I hate when they hear the word overnight success, like someone says how did you all of a sudden become a big comedian? It's been 30 years doing comedy.
Speaker 2:You'll say you did 30 years of hard work before people noticed.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but you you have a background, wow, and then you have Oxford and Cambridge.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's a brand name. Small community colleges in England, wow.
Speaker 1:That's so impressive and the accent obviously was great. But before that you you were, um, uh, news anchor or yes, I was a.
Speaker 2:I was a news anchor on television in Israel at the public broadcaster and I 24 news as well. And then I spent two years working with president. I took a pile of books, put them on the living room table, took the bottle of protein powder I haven't been to the gym since this war started, but a nice banker's lamp on top of it took a picture, tweeted it saying I'm a former advisor to the president, I'll do interviews. And I started doing interviews. Powder I haven't been to the gym since this war started but a nice banker's lamp on top of it. Took a picture, tweeted it saying I'm a former advisor to the president, I'll do interviews. And I started doing interviews from my living room and then, within a week, found myself getting called to the Kiri-Ara Defense Compound in Tel Aviv putting on a suit and tie and overnight being interviewed as an Israeli government spokesman. It was a very surprising twist, a week after the war started.
Speaker 1:It's basically what happened to me during COVID. During COVID, we're stuck at home. My husband and I start doing the characters Nir Natfar and Yoely, and we did a whole. I ran for president as Yoely I was a sitting guy. In the living room we created a studio and I was doing Zoom shows. Just like the war was your COVID, the war was your call to action, you know, and it's just been it's, but you were perfect for it, you were poised for it and we needed it.
Speaker 3:You were in Israel.
Speaker 2:Yes, I was in Israel on October 7th. The sirens started at 7.30 in the morning. Where else was I? Obviously in bed, because it was a Saturday morning, simchat, torah, every reason to think that you'd be able to sleep in. And suddenly the sirens go off. And in Israel, if you're lucky and live in a building built in the last 30 years, you have your own rocket shelter. At home, every apartment has a fortified concrete room. But if you're in an older building, then if you're lucky, there's a rocket shelter on the ground floor or the basement, and if you're not, you wait in the stairwell. So I jump out of bed, run downstairs with all the neighbors, all half naked, carrying their kids. They look at me asking is it from the north, is it from the south? As if, because I used to work for the president, I'm supposed to know.
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 2:And, yeah, just ripped out of bed in the morning into the chaos and horror of what was unfolding on TV.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we were in bed. It was at 6.30,. It was in Tel Aviv, I was in Yaffo and the alarm went off and Leo and I were in bed. And I mean, it's the first night I've ever been in Israel during the sirens. You've never heard the sirens before. I never heard the sirens before. What was that like for you the first time?
Speaker 1:So, I was like this is not good but it's. I guess the missiles will catch them, the patriot missiles I set. And we were. We'd been out the night before. Friday night. We were out, we were laughing and joking till two in the morning and so our sleeping pills were just about to hit. So I said, I said I think you can go on the hallway to Leo, but I'm going to stay right here and wait this out. And then in 1030, when we got up to go to breakfast, we began to all came together.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's slowly. People started to realize we've been through so many of these rounds of conflict with Hamas and you assume, ok, it'll be another round of conflict, rocket sirens for a week and then things will get back to normal and quickly realized, as we saw the massacre unfolding in the Kibbutzim and the Nova Festival News didn't start coming until the afternoon that this was a completely different story. This was not another round of conflict. We had just been invaded, invaded by Hamas, by air, land and sea, and we were now at war, something we hadn't seen in a long time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we, we same. We didn't know what was happening to later on the afternoon we were driving. I've told the story on the podcast before that we we had a driver in Israel who always spoke to us in English and while we were with him, because he wanted Leo to understand what's happening and whatever we were talking about and he was beginning to have.
Speaker 2:Got his.
Speaker 1:Hebrew up to scratch yet? No, but he, are you working on it? He speaks Yiddish better than he speaks Hebrew. Ok, but you need to work on the Hebrew as well. It's very yeah. So we, and he was telling us you know that he was talking to people in the in the Kibbutzim that were in the bomb shelters, hearing the, the banging of Hamas on the, on the out, on the out. So I mean people who follow you, go and they can see your interviews, and it's I want to ask you outside, kind of like what you've been asked, and we thought what's happening with the government of Israel?
Speaker 4:What happened?
Speaker 1:I mean, we understand what's happening in Israel. Well, there's a war. There's a war and Israel is. In my opinion, I think it's very hard for the world to see Jews as heroes as as warriors.
Speaker 2:It's not. I think it was minister Ron Derma who said very early on in the war, after the initial sympathy began to fade, that it's easy to side with the Jews when they're victims. It's harder to side with them when they become victors.
Speaker 1:Right, that's a very well said, yes, he's, he talks good.
Speaker 2:I'm talking about, five months into the war, the sound bites of Polish.
Speaker 1:Yeah, but don't do sound bites.
Speaker 2:No, no, no no, I can give you an advice.
Speaker 1:Don't make it, even if I tell the same joke over and over, it sounds like I just came up with it, so I'll try to make the sound bites, don't.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's not Sound bites, are it's? I don't like sound bites, but that's a good one. That's a good one it's. The world can't see Jews as big. They need to see Jews as the victims, like Schindler's List. Who's the who's the hero, oscar Schindler. You know I I'm not a big Curb your Enthusiasm fan, but I watch it when it's for some reason. Whenever I'm jogging in the gym, it's on the screen. I just look at it and the world is OK seeing Larry David as the representative of Jews. You know.
Speaker 3:But because he's insufferable, even if you love him. I recognize that he is insufferable.
Speaker 1:Right Built in his body. I mean it's funny for me to think that these are.
Speaker 2:These are the main Jewish icons, because they are a country that is just producing everyday heroes. I was talking about your country, israel. I was talking about this just now when I went to speak with Jewish students in Atlanta for the Hillel conference.
Speaker 2:I made a speech about what it means to make Gen Z Gen Zionist. And I said kids your age didn't wait for orders to run back into the fire at the Nova Festival and save people and to talk about their trauma as a way of processing it and to set up civil society initiatives to support displaced families. They are taking responsibility and they are proving themselves to be greater than anyone can imagine. I really think the like the incredible resilience of Israeli society, the way they came together after this war, the way people are taking responsibility and acting. And you know, we talk about all the reservists, all the reservists who are in this war.
Speaker 2:Sometimes I get the impression from people who are interviewing me that they think somehow we want this war, that we're enjoying it, that we want this to go on. When you have 350,000 people in reserves, forget 700,000 parents who aren't sleeping. These have been ripped away from their wives, husbands, boyfriends, girlfriends, children, from their jobs. They're not working, they don't want to be there. They woke up on October 7th with plans for the next vacation or the next start up. They're doing and have now found themselves OK, you take a gun, helmet, go into war. And God said they don't want to do this, they want to go home, but they realize that they can't go home until we have dismantled Hamas and brought back the hostages, because otherwise it's going to happen again and again, as Hamas Absolutely.
Speaker 2:We do not have the luxury to retreat somewhere safe and say, oh OK, if it explodes, it'll explode in someone else's face. If we do not bring back the hostages and destroy Hamas, it will explode in our faces, and I mean literally explode. That's how things explode in your face in the Middle East literally, yeah.
Speaker 3:They don't care, or they don't want to believe it, or it's like I don't know what is so difficult for people who To understand when Hamas has said that over and over. Yeah, but I'm talking about this.
Speaker 1:So the amazing part about you is, yes, at least to the Jews, you are reaching and your reach is within the Jewish and, and God willing, it pops out a little bit into the non-Jewish world. I should hope it's popping out.
Speaker 2:I mean I'm done. But, but it's. I've done about 300 interviews since this war began, not for Jewish media, for the top international networks as well, and I really hope it's cutting through that's what's important.
Speaker 1:They need to see you. I'm just saying for the Jews, for the Jews, we understand that could be Jewish heroes. We know everybody knows somebody that's somehow in the war fighting with a gun and taking a picture and all that. But you know, the outside world needs to see the Jews are heroes as well. Yeah, the way the Jews have come together is unbelievable. I don't know if you know, like what's happening in America, their missions or the American solidarity missions, I don't know if you call it. They're called missions. Every Yenta in Long Island I'm going on a mission.
Speaker 2:I know I've had lunch with most of them and they all take me to the same restaurant.
Speaker 1:And they say these missions are taken to the same restaurant. Yes, they say we're going on a mission. A mission, you could think they're flying F 16s over targets.
Speaker 2:Well, you know what, when they are flying, even if it's a dreamliner, but there are rockets firing overhead, I think I'm not.
Speaker 1:I'm not taking it away, but they're saying they're going on missions like they're flying F 16s over targets. Then they sit there talking Where's your mission? We're at the King David. Where's yours? We're at the Citadel. We're going to be barbecuing with the soldiers in the front line. We're barbecuing in the tunnels. I'm actually going to make my daughter's butt mitzvah in the tunnel. It's become such a thing that's definitely a creative thing.
Speaker 1:They were telling me that they, the soldiers, as they were going, they were handing them $20 bills. I was like they're going into Gaza, not into a casino. You want to hear an amazing story.
Speaker 2:You want to hear an amazing story. I was on the train back from Jerusalem meeting another one of these missions and a woman walked over me and she said introduce herself, she was from New Jersey and she was very moved Thank you for all the work you do. And she explained that she'd flown into Israel with a suitcase full of gold, jewelry and diamonds. I thought that she was lucky not to have been stopped at customs. She'd done a hand around to all her friends asking them for their jewelry. She was now donating, handing them out to the wives in displaced families and military wives whose husbands were in reserves.
Speaker 1:That's where I got this watch from.
Speaker 2:And then she went and sat down and came back to me a few minutes later and said here's $200. I want you to give it to someone who needs it. And immediately I knew one chap who was a survivor of the Nova Festival Festival and has been zipping around the country doing Hasbara, talking about what happened with zero support, paying for the gas for his car from his own pocket. I called him that afternoon. I said here's $200 from this lovely lady from New Jersey. So, like you belittle it, but it means a huge amount. I did not say belittle it.
Speaker 1:I love it. It's the most amazing thing. No, not belittle it. First of all, she made you a mitzvah-schluch a schluch for a mitzvah. Yes, it makes you a big thing and it's amazing that we're doing it. Who in America is going missions to Tegazza? And we're amazing. It's an amazing thing what's happening.
Speaker 3:It's an incredible thing because I think that, at the end of the day and maybe this is along the lines of what you just said not everybody can do what you're doing or what you do or what I do, but everybody has the responsibility to do something.
Speaker 1:Right.
Speaker 2:And that's the bottom line, by the way, not just the Jewish community. For us, it is very clear 100%. We are fighting for humanity on the front lines of humanity. You said no sandbites, but here's one that I've willing Give it up now. No, we need friends and allies, because this was an attack. This was an attack on the world 100%.
Speaker 3:How many people from how many countries were kidnapped in Tegazza?
Speaker 2:I think about over 40 countries were either murdered, injured or abducted, and I know that, as betrayed as people felt on October 7th looking around, especially in left liberal circles, seeing how people were either, in best case scenario, being silent about the atrocities or excusing them, condoning them or even glorifying them, a lot of Jewish communities, and especially students, are feeling completely isolated and alone and they don't feel that they have the alliances to reach out to other groups.
Speaker 2:And it's because I only understood this talking to the students just now the basic dynamics of peer pressure, when you have so many Muslim and Arab students who are saying we're not talking to the Israelis, we're not talking to the Jews, if you're any of the other minorities, even if you haven't drunk the Hamas Kool-Aid just yet, you're like well, do I want to be with the popular kids or do I want to be with the nerds who are getting picked on? And that's why it's so important With what I was saying to the students as well. Being a Zionist has always been about standing up to the bullies, and people will only respect you at all when you stand up to the bullies and demand self-respect.
Speaker 1:I don't usually refer to Hamas as Hamas. I'll just say barbarians, they're barbarians. It defines what it is, because people it's just like the word Zionist and the word anti-Semite I use Brooke Jew-hater, jewish hatred.
Speaker 2:No, Jewish hatred is not no, because it sounds like the Jews are doing the hating.
Speaker 1:How does she say it, jew-hater?
Speaker 2:Jewish hatred. No, that's not good Jew-hate or Jew-hater, jewish hatred sounds like it's the Jews are doing the hating. We had it on the podcast. We're the ones doing the loving.
Speaker 1:And Hamas. I call them barbarians. It's just so true. You understand what you're dealing with. It's barbarians. What? Jew-hater? Jew-hatred, jew-hatred.
Speaker 3:Jew-hater.
Speaker 2:And Jew-hater, which I wonder whether that's a more effective phrase than anti-Semitism. I 100%. Sometimes it goes over people's head and you have the people saying I can't be a Arab, saying I can't be an anti-Semite because I'm a Semiite, and it's like saying I can't be homophobic because I'm homo sapiens, right, Right. This is not what the word means.
Speaker 1:So then you agree that that's a better way to say it? I think so. Yeah, okay, so we're in agreement on that. Yeah, I mean, I've seen comedians try to do jokes with Semiite and that could be Arab too, and it could be a whole thing. It's too complicated and Zionists no one knows what the hell that means. But, okay, I have a request for you. Okay, I have a cousin in Ramat-e-Sauron and she is Mimiro Cohen-Maitar and she's been dying to get you. She understands that your work is to explain Israel's situation to the world, but she, as a mother of three, has no idea how to explain to her own children what's happening in Israel, and she wants you to come speak to the kids and try to explain to them with your charisma, with your charm, with your uniqueness, your talent to explain to the kids of Israel what's happening.
Speaker 2:You know, that's actually an idea for a post-war plan. The book has Barafa Children. Abc of has Barafa Children.
Speaker 1:She absolutely said to me I've been trying to reach him as people and they don't know how to explain to their kids what's happening in Israel.
Speaker 2:It's a huge challenge for parents to try to shield their children from what is happening, because you cannot live with that constant hysteria and trauma all the time. But you can't shield the kids, no, from a certain age. They're hearing, they're hearing and you can't.
Speaker 1:I think, In Israel, whenever people are sitting together, they're always talking about who they know is here and who they know is there, and who is captive and who's.
Speaker 2:Because it's such a small country, right.
Speaker 3:You know six degrees of separation two degrees from six different angles?
Speaker 2:Yes, but even here like I'm.
Speaker 3:I have a child, like a young child, and my community is Israeli and Jewish and everybody has somebody Like. The kids are nine and 10 years old. We just had them write letters to one of the released hostages. Wow, because we, you know, know somebody who was going and is close with somebody who was just released.
Speaker 2:That's such a beautiful gesture.
Speaker 3:It was really amazing, but they're. They wrote yeah, it was beautiful. They wrote their letters. Stella Moran, stella Yanae and Michael Rapaport actually just interviewed her. It was really sweet, but they know, you know they're writing her like we're so happy that you're safe back in Israel now, but it is. It's impossible to shield them and they hear, and they. But that is a good book.
Speaker 1:Hasbara for kids. Hasbara for kids. Yeah, no, it's, it's. You know. You have to tell the kids that this is the future of Israel. Tell them what happened on October 7th, what happened with the government, what happened that led to this. You know?
Speaker 3:A hundred percent. They're going to grow up with this the way that, you know, we grew up with the stories of the Holocaust.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 3:That's yeah.
Speaker 2:It definitely feels like a, you know, while the scale is obviously completely different and incomparable to the Holocaust, that sort of once in a century watershed moment that redefines people's lives and the trajectory of their lives and I see that, by the way, here in New York as well, with the number of people who didn't feel connected to the community or to Israel. But then October 7th was a punch in the face, a punch in the gut. They looked around, they felt betrayed by friends and allies and they felt it so emotionally that it just reminded them vitrally who their people were, who their friends were, who their real allies are, and changes people's.
Speaker 2:Makes them look at the world differently and just realize the world is not the place they thought it was before, but they also saw the definition of the never again.
Speaker 1:That never again is now the never again I don't know what that means.
Speaker 1:I don't know. I hear the never again to me. I think never again to Everybody means something else. People used to think never again would meet, never would there be a Holocaust again, and I have spoken about this Whenever you speak to a Holocaust survivor and I do I have them in my life on daily basis almost they never thought there was never going to be never again. They knew it would happen something like that again. The never again is, as I always say if you come after the Jews, there's going to be repercussions. Yep, you've lost your land You've lost.
Speaker 2:This land, nobody gets to burn Jews alive and no way with it anymore.
Speaker 1:This is not 1935 anymore. You attack a Jew. Be ready for the repercussions. You say, as a president of a college campus, that it's okay to say genocide for Jews is okay. You lose your job. They didn't say it was okay.
Speaker 2:They said it depended on the context. To be fair, let's quote them fairly.
Speaker 1:It's on the content. Kishin tuchas, all three of those ugly women, they can all kishin tuchas, each and every single one of them Ugly on the inside. My part, I can say whatever.
Speaker 2:I want. You can say whatever you want, my part.
Speaker 1:Ugly on the inside, ugly on the outside. All three of them in all colors and all creeds and all religion, one of them even Jewish. Just ugly, ugly, ugly. That's all that was. And they, they, they hopped it. They had their jobs, they're teaching, but they lost their jobs as president, and one of them really had a big fall from grace. You, that's, that's, that's the never again. That's what I'm saying, that's the never again.
Speaker 3:I hope you're right. I don't know. I see there was some. I see so much stuff on social media like what just happened in Berkeley, my happened in Berkeley. There was a Jewish student that was assaulted yesterday, that they had like some meeting and somebody physically assaulted her.
Speaker 2:This is what globalized the Interferdon. Yeah, this is it. It's a cool flyer.
Speaker 3:My piece, who I talk about all the time, who's a student at Harvard and is Israeli. I mean, the stories that she tells me are insane. Yeah, I don't know, like Paris or France is trying to pass a law that the law that you can't put the Israeli flags up at, like Eurovision or something. I mean this is how the Holocaust begins, right Like it doesn't just start with.
Speaker 1:But the Holocaust, but there is a state of Israel. Now there's also, there's some kind of it's a different situation than World War II and I had dinner with.
Speaker 1:I had dinner with with a first year students. I was at a dinner with a whole bunch of first year students of medical school and they were telling us how, right after October 7th, all the students it like it veered off, like the ones that are pro Hamas, pro barbarians, pro pro palace time, whatever that that you want to call that they no longer are associating with the Jewish kids, the ones that are so short support for the Jewish kids. They're not associating with them. It's little things like that, but you know they're not throwing them out of medical school. I'm just saying I don't know if you know this phenomenon living in Israel, but Americans are arming themselves. I don't know if you know this. This is in. I've heard, I've heard stories, anecdotes. They have gotten their permits, they've gotten their licenses, they've gotten their training and they are buying arsenals. I mean the Hermes of shotguns, the Gucci's of all the gear I mean.
Speaker 2:that's disturbing and terrifying, because American Jews should feel that they can continue to live in safety and security in what is still the greatest country in the world Correct.
Speaker 1:I'm not a gunman, I'm not a fan, I'm not an array or any of that stuff, but I get it. We're living in a Jewish neighborhood where almost every house is Jewish and there's no gates and guards in the front of the house and you have a family and some of the crazy, crazy Muslims have a holiday killer Jew day. Right, there's a holiday killer Jew day no. Not that I'm familiar with he's so scared of God. No, there's some holiday. It's like I have not worked this hard.
Speaker 4:He's like yeah, please don't.
Speaker 2:I don't think that's real, it's gonna be the worst career move of my life. I don't think that's a real festival.
Speaker 3:There was an international Jihad day.
Speaker 2:Ah, yes, yes, it was a global day of great I don't make things up.
Speaker 1:believe me, I'm not. So imagine on global Jihad day, as opposed to the global days of meditation. Yes, on a global Jihad day, they go into a Jewish neighborhood where they know every house is Jewish. There's a Mazzuzah everywhere. They kick a door down and let's Jihad this house. The owner of the house wants to have a shotgun to put them to an end.
Speaker 2:When you see protests taking place outside cancer hospitals and you see the chanting becoming increasingly vicious and calling for overt violence and these cases of violence as well, you can't fault people for feeling unsafe and I think the you know. I don't know whether arming themselves is the right choice, but the awakening that we are seeing in the diaspora of people saying whoa, maybe there is a danger to Jewish life that we weren't aware of before and we need to organize and rethink our priorities and build those alliances, which is absolutely critical, not just be within ourselves.
Speaker 2:Build alliances and insist on our place and our right to live in this society, and freedom and security is absolutely critical.
Speaker 3:That's it.
Speaker 1:Don't he talk, good, don't he talk good. That's an old show Before my time, before your time was an amazing show. And he just go, don't he talk good. He had a Jewish lawyer. Archie Pank had a Jewish lawyer, rabinowitz, rabinowitz and Rabinowitz. Wow, it was so funny. And Archie would sit there and go, don't he talk, good? And so that's literally that she was brilliant.
Speaker 3:That show would never get on there.
Speaker 1:So let me just you, you, you, you with you, I know off of how do you drink your coffee.
Speaker 2:Extra strong yeah. I think I know if there are fewer than three shots. I actually cannot taste the coffee, let alone feel the caffeine.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's, that's an energy, that's like a Celsius energy.
Speaker 2:Definitely having an unhealthy amount of coffee, but I like a like a small, strong cappuccino.
Speaker 4:Yeah.
Speaker 2:Funny thing coming to America you ask for a small coffee and they bring you something in like a popcorn bucket. Yeah, I said I wanted a small one.
Speaker 1:Oh, I see, everything here is on a different scale when you go outside of America and you ask for a large coffee and they give you this thimble of of of.
Speaker 3:where's the how much can you drink? No, no, no, the coffee in America is disgusting. I only drink espresso, okay.
Speaker 2:But no, no, no, no. This maybe is the best reason to make aliyah. We have great coffee you live in Tel Aviv. I live in Tel.
Speaker 1:Aviv. I live alone. You married dating. I'm alone, I'm single, you're single. Wow, you would blow up on J-Date. You would be the bomb on J-Date. He fits everything by the way he looks. He looks Jewish. He could also pass as like a Talion.
Speaker 2:What does it mean to look Jewish?
Speaker 1:You know you got the dark the eyes when you speak. Your eyebrows talk a lot for you when? Are your parents from. You could easily pass as gay In London. No, he could easily pass as gay. You know he's attractive. Put together, the beard is better than mine. The beard is more perfect than mine. You're, yeah, you're-.
Speaker 3:The only guy in Israel who wears a suit.
Speaker 2:Yes, and one that fits Because even New Zech is-.
Speaker 1:And one that's because Even New Zech?
Speaker 2:do you see them wearing suits?
Speaker 1:Horrible. It's only from the waist up, it's jeans below and it's, and they make the knot not well and it's a hot mess. It's in no, you have a body for a suit too. You can't get a little gut out.
Speaker 2:I'm doing, I'm doing my best to try to sit up and yeah, do you work out, do you do camera?
Speaker 1:Do you exercise?
Speaker 2:Wow, you know I managed to get myself into such a good routine before this war started and then on the cover something happened and it's like, okay well, do you want to go to the gym or do you want to do a CNN interview? Okay, well, what's going to save the Jewish people? So so I can't see a-.
Speaker 3:Were you always this way or did something-?
Speaker 2:What do you mean by this way?
Speaker 3:I mean like, I feel like I became extremely passionate about being a Zionist after October 7th. Hey look, I made Aliyah.
Speaker 2:I. I grew up in the UK and then, at the age of 23, after I finished university at the two community colleges you mentioned, I got on a plane, flew to Israel because I wanted to serve in the army. So it's always been in my kishkis and I hadn't quite found the right role in which to make an impact. And then October 7th happened in the most horrific, tragic circumstances. I found myself now on the front lines fighting fighting this war on the media front.
Speaker 1:Yeah, okay, back to this. This everybody can see on all of you in the views. So where do you get your suits from? Where do I get my suits from? Yeah, because you're an easy guy to buy suits for.
Speaker 2:Well, thankfully, I had a weekend before this started to do a little bit of shopping in New York. You did, okay, and where'd you get your?
Speaker 1:suit from, I went to Macy's. Macy's Okay. Okay, those of you listening, reach out to him. Those of you who always send me, he will do suits for you, custom made suits. Send him suits. Arthur would take him. Yes, arthur would take him and get him the nicest suits in the world in the world.
Speaker 3:Who's the friend who works at Dior Dior?
Speaker 1:whatever, it doesn't matter, but we yeah, you got to kill the suit game.
Speaker 2:You got to kill it.
Speaker 1:Problem is.
Speaker 2:You know, this war started in the beginning of October, when just the weather started to drip off. I'm worried what happens if this war continues and we start going into the summer, because it's going to be impossible to wear a suit. I'm going to have to start giving interviews in shorts and a tank top.
Speaker 1:You have to make sure the looks are important. Make sure someone on your team is gay.
Speaker 3:Make sure someone it's not a joke, no, no, you need a guy.
Speaker 1:Make sure someone has an eye that your looks are right, the camera's, the light is right For a stylist, we'll work on it.
Speaker 2:You know so many people want to volunteer and help with the operation. So if anyone wants to come and volunteer and be like, responsible for like, volunteer stuff then that too. Yeah, that's also a way to contribute to the Jewish community. We can vet them for you?
Speaker 3:No, Leo can vet them for you.
Speaker 4:Leo's good at that stuff it's amazing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I. What else is about so the extra? I'm just it's a breath of fresh air, is what I want this to be called. This episode should be called a breath of fresh air. It's really what you are. It's a shame that a war brought you to the spotlight. Yeah, it's a shame that a war brought you to the spotlight. I think you're you're doing an unbelievable job, thank you. What's your message to anybody listening to this? I don't want to drag this, this to this out. You probably have 17 more things going on today.
Speaker 2:That we need everyone to take action, that you know Hasbara fighting for the state of Israel when he says Hasbara, it means it's not Hasbara, it's Hasbara. Oh, that's a good one. That's a good one. Explanation that's a good one. I don't say Hasbara.
Speaker 1:I don't say Hamas barbarians. It's easier to define what they are rather than the name they gave themselves.
Speaker 2:Listen, the bottom line, the bottom line. This isn't a war that we started. It's not a war we wanted. It's not a war we expected, but it's a war we've got to win Right. It's a war that Hamas declared on us.
Speaker 2:It's now holding 134 hostages and threatening to do this over and over again. We have to win this war because otherwise it will happen again and it will be worse. So if you are out there on the streets chanting ceasefire now, ceasefire now, either you're a complete scumbag because you want to abandon the hostages in the terror tunnels where they are being starved and tortured and raped and enslaved, or you think there's some sort of magic solution that's going to get the hostages back, but you want to leave Hamas free and on its feet to do this again and again. You know what? If Hamas emerges free and emboldened and attacks us again, it will be on you, because it will have learned that it has support from people like you that will restrain Israel and tell itself your Jewish heroes don't have a right to defend themselves. You get to burn Jews and get away with it. We're not going to let that happen.
Speaker 1:Right In five years from now. Where are you sitting In five years from now? Where are you?
Speaker 2:sitting In five years from now.
Speaker 4:Hopefully we'll have wrapped up the war and I'll be on vacation as of as of leave the war, I don't mean okay, the war is the war On a sun lounger and on a sun lounger taking a welder.
Speaker 1:You'll never be on a sun lounger anywhere. You don't have that in you, oh no, I definitely need to vacation you are going to be where In the parliament, one of those people screaming no, no, no, no, no.
Speaker 2:I don't see that.
Speaker 1:No, prime minister of Israel. No, no, no, no, god, no, you say that now, for sure, for sure. I can't wait. I'm so happy we're doing this interview, so when he's running for prime minister, we have to meet, so it's a clip, that's never going to happen.
Speaker 4:I could never be.
Speaker 2:Oh dear you're trying to get me in trouble.
Speaker 1:It's never getting you in trouble. Motok, I'm your biggest fan. I'm telling you, I'm representing the Jewish humor, you're representing the statesmanship. I don't know.
Speaker 2:I think I'm trying to inject a good dose of humor myself.
Speaker 1:What's your favorite joke?
Speaker 2:Oh no, you can't put me on the spot.
Speaker 4:No. So then what I'm like?
Speaker 2:oh, it's not like I have a favorite joke to pull out. But I think humor is a coping mechanism.
Speaker 1:He definitely has one. He definitely has. What's your favorite?
Speaker 2:joke, you're the comedian here.
Speaker 1:Two gay guys are playing hide and go seek. One says to the other I'm gonna hide, if you find me, I'll give you a blow job. The other guy says what, if I don't find you, I'll be behind the piano. There you go. He's so scared that this is coming out Everything I've built up to in my career. He's used to all the brook. What's her?
Speaker 2:name. That's okay, we agree that we get to edit the episode and go over it before the full material goes on, we're gonna cut this up, nice Motec.
Speaker 1:Anybody listening to this? Our fans love you and love Israel and call to action. Go on the mission, Go fly those F-16s, go hand the soldiers money, go do what you can, exactly, come barbecue for soldiers.
Speaker 2:Come, pick avocados and mangoes and bear witness. Hug the hostage families. And when you go back, put the hostage posters back up. I know it's tough. It's been 104. It's difficult to count how many days the anti-seemites tear down a poster, put up two. If they tear down two, put up four. Burn down the whole rainforest for all the paper you need, I don't care when you need to get the hostages out.
Speaker 3:Every time I see a hostage poster ripped down, I walk around with these Am Israel Chai stickers and I put a sticker up every time I see a poster.
Speaker 1:We had for our 100th podcast and they you know the question that kept me kept saying who would be the live. We did it live. We did it live in front of the 92nd Street Y and they asked who's your number one guest you'd want on the show Besides you?
Speaker 2:That's it. Your podcast has peaked. Now I want you on my podcast though Omer Shemtov.
Speaker 1:Oh man, I don't know. For some reason his picture is everywhere I go, everywhere I go.
Speaker 2:I see you your lips to God's ears that that poor kid gets out.
Speaker 1:And then that and then the poster that was by our house that was taken down and I thought, okay, and I'm not going to see this face anymore. And then I was invited to the candle lighting in the mayor's house and his family was there.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And it was. I was like, wow, this is great.
Speaker 2:I met his cousin yesterday Omer Shemtov, by the way, one of the Gen Zionist heroes because he was at the Nova party and had a chance to escape and he went back to try to save total strangers. He met an hour earlier, five o'clock in the morning, dancing at that trance party and then got abducted into Garzhan. It's really tragic how these people like you mentioned this name, which obviously is supposed to mean something to someone, because these hostages have become household names in the most horrific circumstances that people throw their names out and it's as if they're celebrities or reality. Yes, that's what.
Speaker 2:Everyone knows who they are because their faces are everywhere at least in Israel, and I'm proud to live in the only country where no one tears down hostage posters.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I want to tell you just on a side note. This weekend a friend of mine called me up and he had a table, a house of yes. House of yes is a place where you have a Canova festival every weekend. There was amazing DJs that were there. He said, mory, I know you haven't been out in a while. Come, you're in town. And we were out. Then I was in, we were in it, we were doing, we were in a very good place, we were dancing, we had our friends together with us and we were just like the music was amazing, we were just and then it hits you. Could you imagine being in this state and all of a sudden, terrorists flying in and being shot at and you're in a zone where you're a very you know?
Speaker 2:Yeah, they were in the zone, they were having a time.
Speaker 3:And you're thinking about that Peace festival. I mean, that's what it was.
Speaker 1:But you know, everybody's in their zone.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And all of a sudden it just hits me. I'm like, oh my God, this is what they were experiencing right before this. This, this it happened. Where's the best place to give me a website, an Instagram account, somewhere where you think is the best place for people to help? What's one of your favorites?
Speaker 2:First of all, they should be helping the hostage families. They need help. We have to keep reminding the whole world about the hostages.
Speaker 4:It's amazing how hostage families bring them home.
Speaker 1:What would say?
Speaker 2:Yeah, the families forum of the hostages. The way that civil society came together and they are fighting to bring back their children and their parents is truly inspirational. They could definitely use a lot of help to continue raising awareness. I know it is exhausting when people tear down posters to put them back up, but we have to do it and you have to call up your elected representatives and pressure the Red Cross and pressure Qatar, because we have to get these people out. This is it's a humanitarian issue. These are people who are snatched from their beds from music festivals, a third of them with chronic conditions. If they weren't in health danger when they were abducted, they're in serious danger now after being starved for so long.
Speaker 3:Matisse Ahoud just said he's like if a kid gets kidnapped in America it's bad, like it's a problem. Everybody goes and tries to get the kidnapper and rescue the kid. But if you think that you can kidnap Jews and nobody's going to do anything about it, like it's fucked up.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah. We can't go through one podcast with her not cursing it's every, every time there's a diner in Huntington, one island called the Golden Globe Diner, which is owned by Peter, who is not Jewish, he's Greek, and his entire front of the diner is papered in the pictures of the hostages.
Speaker 1:And we had a show in Huntington around the corner, two sold out shows. Periel was on and we bought him. We gave him a yarmulke from the stage. I've been seeing Hatikva at the end of every show Amazing, Everywhere. I'm going to be seeing Hatikva at the Kennedy Center. I'm going to, I'm going to. How's your singing voice? Amazing.
Speaker 3:He's a cancer, he's, he is killing it.
Speaker 2:So you do it with all the time, him and the Hatikva. Yeah, you do it like Cantorial style, or?
Speaker 1:No, I do it just so. I said I found a soundtrack where everybody can sing along. It's like in the nice lower range. So I want everybody to, even if they don't know the words, you know you wanted them, and so that's just after. It's funny because I'm doing a show an hour and a half. People are cracking up and laughing with energy and then you got to remind them Don't forget what's happening in Israel. So please, rise and let's do it. Take a look, and that's. And for some reason, I just I'm on tour, I'm going to about to go to Boston, to San Diego, la, denver, kennedy Center, all over Pittsburgh, pennsylvania, and you know it. Just I feel like that's where I'm my calling is I for some reason I don't feel like I need to go to Israel right now. I need to go to the Jews of America and help them unite through laughter and and do that.
Speaker 2:And that's so important raising morale, but laughter in a way not that lets people escape from what is happening. A little bit of escapism is fine, but you bring them back down to earth and remind them they have a mission, they have a job. This is a moment for the Jewish world to come together and act for a very specific mission that has just never been clearer to us. Then really you're doing your dogma, masiya Hennig. Then God's work that's.
Speaker 1:Masiya Hennig, that's it.
Speaker 3:Ilan has a podcast, of course.
Speaker 1:No, I'm getting, I'm getting to the.
Speaker 4:This was the deal.
Speaker 1:I come on your To plug my podcast with whites and Luxembourg and A&H. We're good, OK. We love our sponsors and they help make you be here and talk to the people. How do they reach you? How do they watch you? What's your?
Speaker 2:first of all, follow me on Instagram and Twitter, which is a lot of a leavey. We've lost the podcast. Why, why and a LEVY. We've launched a podcast as well. State of a Nation.
Speaker 2:Amazing We've built a whole studio in Tel Aviv. The idea is, I'm a spokesman. How do I know what to say when I go on TV? It's because I'm having long, in-depth conversations with journalists and policymakers and activists and learn from them. So I'm inviting people to be a fly on the wall as I talk to the people who know what they're talking about, so that I can know what to say. And it's available on YouTube, apple podcasts, spotify, wherever else you get your podcast. I say that at the end of every episode wherever else, to get your podcast. I don't know where else people get their podcast, but it's the thing you say at the end. If I had to find this, podcast.
Speaker 1:I wouldn't know. Leo runs it. Are you crazy? I wouldn't know where to find my podcast.
Speaker 2:I haven't, so YouTube, apple podcast and Spotify.
Speaker 1:And that's it you are. I can't thank you enough for reaching out to us and coming to you. It's a big honor.
Speaker 2:Yeah Me, my first media appearance in New York as well. Is it really? No, she's a fan of the game.
Speaker 4:I mean, I mean hold on, Hold on.
Speaker 3:Now Nobody can hear you.
Speaker 2:I am a cop I was going to bring you. Oh, thank you, I'm a shieh energy. You want to make the brahman again. What brahman is?
Speaker 4:that she, he had him. Boa, I tell you, I don't know how long she's been with us, because we're going to be here as long as they.
Speaker 1:thank you so much for being your first, your first interview in New York and my pleasure, and it's really.
Speaker 1:You are creating machine energy, representing the Jews the way you do. I am on tour. Boston, the Wilbur to sold out shows the 29th and 28th not sold out. There's a few seats left on the 29th. San Diego the matinee has a few seats. Two shows on the third of March. Then we are in the improv at in LA. Those shows are sold out but some releases might be happening, so just keep your eye on that. Then we are in St Louis. If you know anyone in St Louis, let them know I'm going to be there. Be the friend that brings the friend to the comedy show. Not only get tickets for your friends. Let them know I'm going to be there and a whole bunch of other shows. Modi livecom Say hi. Let us know what you thought of this interview, periel.
Speaker 3:I'm at Periel Ashenbrand and you can find all of my comedy shows and you can also DM me. If you want to help with rebuilding the Kibbutzim in Israel, you can shoot me a message on Instagram for that project.
Speaker 1:Thank you very much. Thank you for coming, thank you very much.
Speaker 3:Thank you, buddy. Thank you for helping me.