In case anyone wasn’t sure of it, Elon Gold made sure the audience knew the sold-out show at Sony Hall on West 46th Street would be pro-Israel. “You might see your bubbe or zayde but you will not see a Bella or a Gigi,” Gold told the audience at the December 26 show, referring to the Hadid sisters, who have posted against Israel online.
Gold, who appeared on several episodes of “Curb Your Enthusiasm” as a Hulu executive, thanked the crowd for not going into two buildings nearby rather than his show. “You could have gone to see ‘Hamilton’ or joined Scientology,” he quipped.
He did a standout impersonation of former President Donald Trump and said he is working on an impression of President Joe Biden. “You can’t kick a man while he’s falling down,” Gold said in reference to times the president has fallen, but has gotten up.
And he is not impressed by men who boast of randomly hooking up with women who don’t know them. “I got a woman I’ve been disappointing for three decades,” Gold said of his prior evening’s activities, referring to his wife of 29 years.
He loves Israel but not like how the world is negatively obsessed with it, describing the Jewish state as a little dot on the map of the Midde East that is, to a certain extent, is like a nipple. “Think about it, it is the most sensitive area of the region,” he said. “They don’t call it the land of milk and honey for nothing …”
Gold was surprised people had time to protest against Israel every day, chanting “End The Occupation.” “Here’s an idea, get an occupation,” Gold said. People have falsely said Israel is a colonizer by admitted that Jews were bungalow colonizers in the Catskills, and that calling Israel Palestine was like calling Caitlyn Jenner, “Bruce.”
Plus, he added, it’s not true the Jews have all the money, otherwise they would not have fundraisers with gut wrenching videos and would just binge-watch “Shtisel.”
He also said Seth Rogen, Jeff Goldblum and Jackie Mason could have played Jesus. “I got a better idea, why don’t you die for my sins?” he said, sounding exactly like Mason. “I’ll make you a deal, you die for my sins, I’ll die for your sins, but you go first.”
Or Mash, a comic from Israel who splits time between Los Angeles and New York said she looks like “Cher if she sold falafel.” A cast member of VH1’s hit show “Wild ‘N Out,” Mash brought high energy to the show. She told the crowd that she served in the Israeli military but wasn’t the best solider and was told if they were all like her, Israel would lose all the wars. She came to America a few years ago to pursue comedy, and enjoys smoking weed and being paranoid at Target. “In Israel, you’re paranoid because you are the target,” she said.
She said she was disappointed that the Houthis in Yemen’s song against Israel was weak. “It didn’t even rhyme, it had no beat,” she said, adding that the song was trash. She wondered who in the terrorists’ morning meeting decided that since they weren’t scaring the Jews enough, a song would.
Turning to the hostages in Gaza, she said not a day goes by that she doesn’t think about them. She put up a poster and was upset to know that people were tearing them down. When someone told her “there are people fighting for their life in Palestine,” she replied “do you believe in a two-poster solution?”
Mash told the Journal that she is quick-witted and always knows what to say. “The Army taught me to always be prepared, so that’s why I am good with battle rap,” Mash said. But the first thing I do is I pray to Hashem, and he gives me the right energy.” She also got advice from some Israeli friends that she did not follow. “They said not to make jokes about Israel and instead to make jokes about dating,” she said. “But I figured what’s the sense in only doing that? I was born this way and Hashem have me this gift to bless people with my comedy.”
Kosha Dillz, who real name is Rami Matan Even-Esh, was also a cast member on “Wild ‘N Out.” He performed “Schmoozing” and “Bring The Family Home,” the latter a song calling for the release of the hostages. “It was great to talk to different people, connect and show support,” he said. “I went to areas that were attacked and spoke with family members of hostages.” . He also freestyled, including things about members of the audience he could see.
The rapper, who lives in Brooklyn, told the Journal his two trips to Israel in the last month were meaningful “It was great to talk to different people, connect and show support,” he said. “I went to areas that were attacked and spoke with family members of hostages.” He recently went viral, getting millions of views for videos of anti-Israel protests. In one, a French woman admitted if her family was kidnapped she would do anything to get them back; in another, two young women showed an extreme lack of knowledge, saying that Jews in Israel all came from another country and said they should go there, but cited places that Jews were already thrown out of.
Singer/songwriter Ada Pasternak performed a rousing version of “Hatikva” on the violin and the crowd sang along with toward the end.
Comedian Eli Lebowicz, who performs at synagogues across the country, had the crowd laughing with a joke that has truth to it. “You know when you’re peeing, and you sneeze, and your yarmulke falls in the toilet?” He also explained that Orthodox Jews have a hard time explaining certain things, like what a lulav is to someone checking passengers in at an airport and might ask what you do with it.
Ami Kozak, a comic who moved from Los Angeles to New Jersey, does masterful impressions, and had the audience in hysterics with an impression of former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak doing interviews defending Israel without possessing the best English skills. He had the crowd laughing with an original R&B song about going to the mikveh, and spoke about an attractive El-Al security guard who asked if he packed his bags or someone packed for him and he imagined what it would be like to go on a date with her. “You picked this restaurant or did someone pick for you,” Kozak said in her voice and accent.
Lebowicz, Kozak and comedian Mikey Greenblatt have combined to form J-Sketch, which produces humorous Jewish videos that have occasionally included Gold.
After the show, Gold said it was a great night of Jewish pride and a mix of comedy and music. Asked about Kanye West’s apology in Hebrew, on Instagram, he said he has a theory. “He likes to go against the trend, so now that the trend is to hate Jews, he wants to go the opposite way,” Gold told the Journal.
Told that the ADL welcomed the apology as a first step with no declaration of forgiveness, Gold said he would show West (now called Ye) an important place. “If he asks me, I would take him to the (Simon) Wiesenthal Center next week,” Gold said.
