NEW YORK (1010 WINS) -- For Jewish comedian Erik Angel, growing up in Israel, he was no stranger to Muslims or Arabs -- after all, about 21 percent of the country's 9 million people are Arab citizens.
But Angel, who moved from Tel Aviv to New York about seven years ago, told 1010 WINS that even though he "listened to a lot of Arab music that I liked and watched movies and [ate] the food, of course," he felt a connection was still missing.
Fast forward to Angel leaving Israel and founding Comedy For Peace -- his initiative to bring comics of different religions, particularly Jews and Muslims -- began to take root. (Its next show is Sat. Nov. 9 as part of the New York Comedy Festival at Comic Strip Live on the Upper East Side.)
"I actually started to meet people when I started to travel in the world," Angel, who has performed at L.A.'s The Laugh Factory and NYC's The Stand, told 1010 WINS, "and the meetings were very friendly with Muslims that we were supposed to be enemies, but no, we were very curious about each other. We're very friendly and generous and I thought to myself that one day I want to do something together. I came to New York, became part of the comedy scene here, met great Muslim comedians, also Arab Christians, decided to do the first one, they were on board. We did the first show and it was a huge success. More than 250 people came to support us."
He added, "It was so much fun. So I decided just to keep going. And since then we did almost 50 cities and two countries and we keep going."
It's important to understand that the Comedy For Peace performance are about comedy -- not about war, terrorism or other geopolitical issues.
"It's important for me for people to know that first of all, Comedy For Peace is a great, funny evening of standup comedians," Angel said. "I'm working with wonderful, talented people ... this is not a political event. It's not about Israel, Palestine or any other war zone in the world. It's about being together under one roof and having fun just to show people how easy that can be to sit there, to have fun, to laugh, to learn about each other, to understand how we are more alike than different. And this is, I think, the benefit that people can understand. That it doesn't matter if somebody is different than me, I can just sit near him and still enjoy very."
As for coping with Hamas' Oct. 7 terrorist attack, during which more than 1,200 people were murdered and about 250 people kidnapped to Gaza, Angel said, "the tool of comedy really saved my soul, it's so hard. There's so many tears and so much pain. And then to go into the evening and bring people together ... [but] we are not really talking about what happened."
Angel told 1010 WINS he doesn't know if Comedy For Peace will solve conflicts in the Middle East, but he told 1010 WINS, "So to bring the peace in the world, I don't know, but to change few minds -- to send back the Muslim guy to his community when he knows a little bit more about the Jewish people that he never met and look at them in more human way. And the next time he will hear some antisemitic comment and say, 'Hey guys, maybe we should not speak like that.' And vice versa with Jews and Muslims -- Jews are also afraid of Muslims. We need to meet, we need to talk because when we talk, and of course if we're laughing, it's the best ... And I love those shows that in the end, the crowds from the different communities are taking pictures together and with the comedians. So we're not changing the world but we're changing slowly, slowly every night."