Episode Transcript
36. Stand-up for Gaza w/ Nour Hadidi
Matthew Remski: Hello everyone. This is Matthew Remski, host of Antifascist Dad Podcast. And this is episode 36, Stand Up for Gaza with Nour Hadidi.
Nour Hadidi: Palestine has freed us all. Palestine has shown us the limits of our own selves, our own freedom. It's shown me the limits of my own industry.
When people say I support you, I just didn't like it because I still want to get work. Oh, so you're telling me that your ability to make money under capitalism is more important to you than the lives of 2 million people stuck in a concentration camp who are being murdered every day? That's what you're telling me. You're telling me on some level that people like me, our lives are less worthy of people like you. That's what you're telling me. You're not saying it directly, but that's what I'm hearing.
Matthew Remski: Nour is a Jordanian Canadian comedian, writer and podcaster based here in my hometown of Toronto. She was born in Amman and she studied at McGill and has written for This Hour Has 22 Minutes, the Beaverton and the CBC. Her work spans standup, political satire and Palestinian solidarity activism. And that's all documented in her Substack newsletter and podcast. So that's coming up.
For housekeeping, you can find me on Bluesky and Instagram under my name. I'm at YouTube and TikTok as Antifascistdad and the Patreon for this show is Antifascist Dad Podcast, where subscribers get early access to a second weekly episode.
Today I've got a brief coda for you on a key theme of this upcoming interview, which is how Palestinian speakers and their comrades are usually put on the defensive at the start of every mainstream conversation about the genocide and how they overcome it. So that's up on Patreon now. But remember, if you can't afford to support the show, those Patreon episodes all eventually get unlocked.
Also, once again, I'll point you to the link to my new book, Antifascist Dad: Urgent Conversations with Young People in Chaotic Times. That's in the show notes. If you've got the book, please consider leaving a review. Also, if you're listening to this podcast, you can leave a review for the podcast. It helps people find it. You know that.
In the fall of 2025, Canadian Jewish News, which is Canada's main English language Jewish community newspaper, was founded here in Toronto in 1960. It started getting variations of an email I have one copy of and the email carries the subject line Platforming of Antisemitic Voices by CJN Urgent Review Needed.
Now this letter hits the ground running. Quote: I'm writing to express serious concern about the In Good Faith comedy event being presented by the Canadian Jewish News at the Koffler Centre for the Arts. Two featured performers, Foad HP and Nour Hadidi, have extensive public records of antisemitic and eliminationist statements. Evidence of this activity, 26 screenshots, is available here, and the here has a link to a zip drive which I was able to review.
Eight of those screenshots come from the Instagram account of my guest today, Nour Hadidi. Now this is a long letter, and it's long enough that it starts to buzz and whine a little bit like a drone.
In one post detailed by the letter, Nour is promoting a Palestinian Youth Movement Toronto event and the event is framed as two years of genocide. Rise up. The image is a standard solidarity march poster marking the two year anniversary of October 7th, and the complaint letter characterizes this as promoting a pro October 7 rally, treating the anniversary framing as endorsement of the attack rather than activism against the genocide that followed.
In another post, Hadidi shares a video of journalist Wael Al-Dahdouh. He is Al Jazeera's bureau chief in Gaza and the most prominent Palestinian journalist to have covered the war from inside the Strip. He lost his wife, son, daughter and grandson to Israeli strikes and he's on CNN in September of 2025. And Christiane Amanpour asks him: do you ever wish Hamas had not committed October 7th because it's brought hell down on you on Gaza?
In Arabic, Al-Dahdouh calmly answers, now I'm abridging here. This is truly injustice and a distortion of facts, an inversion of truth. Because we before this date were not living a rosy and stable life. We were paying prices before this — five wars, military occupations that rose to the level of wars, and we paid with our relatives and colleagues. It did not begin on October 7th. This is a chain of extended suffering, truly, regardless of whether you are with or against, reserved or not reserved. These become details when we see the truth in its totality and the whole picture.
But to focus on this issue alone, without its extension. Well, what is this issue? If it caused this suffering, then what was the previous suffering that caused this issue? The occupation. I mean, today I have paid a heavy price in this war, an unexpected and costly price that perhaps no one has paid. But I tell you with complete rationality and with my full will, my problem, I am speaking now, my problem is not with Jews. And I mean you understand me. My problem is with the occupation.
Now Nour captioned her post: seen here, patience and strength in the face of demeaning lines of questioning by someone who benefits from the empire. But the complaint letter sent to the CJN says that Hadidi's caption defended October 7th and called Palestinian terrorists patient and strong, not the journalist who just lost his whole family. So this is just completely unhinged, shameless lying from the letter writers.
But wait, Hadidi's antisemitic and eliminationist statements didn't end there. She also posted memes, memes about Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift where Nour says I'm Taylor and in one meme, Travis is Kneecap, the Irish rap band that took a strong pro Palestine stance and in the other Travis is labeled as Roger Waters. Nour's caption is I am a millennial and I made some memes because like I said, I am a millennial.
She also reposted a Parks and Rec meme where in the first frame a nurse asks Ron Swanson, do you have any history of mental illness in your family? And in the second frame he says, I have an uncle who believes Israel's version of events. Imagine the gall. Next thing we're going to find out Nour even liked that Macklemore song.
But more seriously, the zip file also contained a post from Nour of a video selfie posted from Egypt during the Global March for Gaza. This was a civilian led international initiative organized by the Coalition Against Israeli Occupation with marchers from over 50 countries and their plan was to meet in Cairo, bus to the north Sinai, then walk 33 miles to the Rafah border crossing to deliver aid and symbolically break Israel's blockade of Gaza. So up to 4,000 people had planned to participate with arrival at Rafah set for June 15, but under threat from Israel, Egypt suppressed the march before it reached the border. They smeared organizers as Muslim Brotherhood operatives, they confiscated passports, they held convoys in the heat. Nour was detained for hours in the sun.
And then back here in Canada, the Fox News-like National Post made fun of her and her 40 Canadian compatriots for appealing to the government for help. In Nour's post, the caption read: please remember the story is Gaza, not the march. We must lift the inhumane siege and end the illegal occupation, have medicine, food and water enter the Strip and free Palestine.
Now how did the kibitzers to the CJN put it? Attending anti-Israel Global March for Gaza in Egypt.
In part of her standup response, Nour satirically appealed for peace and solidarity over the march. After all, she said, there's nothing more Jewish than wandering the Egyptian desert.
So I didn't know any of this story before I interviewed Nour. I'd reached out on the basis of her standup, her hilarious Noursletter Substack that I'll link to, and then this amazing idea of hosting comedy nights for Gaza as fundraisers. And so you'll hear me learn all about this in the interview.
And she'll also describe that to their credit, CJN weathered the storm. They stood by their guests, and they provided increased security at the event, and that was good on them. But it was still a difficult event because, as you'll hear Nour describe, the comedy night served as a fundraiser with proceeds supporting the Vivian Silver Impact Award. This award is granted to two women, one Arab and one Jewish, who are actively working toward peace in Israel and Palestine. And as noble as that sounds, that framework landed Nour and her jokes in a space of liberal Zionism. And I'll let her describe that after she lays out how comedy helped her discover who she was and what her values are and what solidarity costs and why it's worth it.
Nour Hadidi, welcome to Antifascist Dad Podcast. Thanks so much for taking the time.
Nour Hadidi: Thank you for having me. I'm so happy to be here.
Matthew Remski: So I wanted to start by saying that, you know, as a white person, whenever I'm talking to a non white person, I like to do something you talk about in your Noursletter, which is to present myself as a Canadian who means well. So what advice do you have for me so that I don't screw up this interview?
Nour Hadidi: So right off the bat, I have to tell you, the fact that you're asking means you're on the right track. Yes. I don't think you need any pointers yet. I think you're doing great. I think you're showing up as an ally. You're asking me what makes me comfortable. You're already ahead of the game.
Matthew Remski: Okay. All right. Well, you will let me know?
Nour Hadidi: Yes.
Matthew Remski: I mean, because if I take some sort of right turn or, I don't know, what might I do? Like, what would the first warning sign be?
Nour Hadidi: You would start centering your experience when talking about mine, I would suppose. You would say, oh, you grew up so and so. Well, you know, when I was young. And then you would go off on a tangent about your thoughts and your feelings and your life experience when talking about mine.
Matthew Remski: You know, getting this advice kind of reminds me of the time when I was younger. Specifically —
Nour Hadidi: Like a year ago. Like, what do you mean? Like, younger?
Matthew Remski: I was starting to do the thing you were warning me against.
Nour Hadidi: Oh, sorry, I didn't pick up on that. These are the dangers of booking a comic before noon. I can show up as much as I can, but you know what? I'm still. Give me a few minutes to fire up.
Matthew Remski: You know, many comedians talk about developing standup skills out of a sense of survival instincts. And so maybe that's the more serious way to begin, which is like — is that part of your story?
Nour Hadidi: I think so. I think standup was the first time I felt really heard in my life. I think growing up in, like, a lot of non white cultures, the group is kind of put before the self. And so to be a good daughter, to be a good person, you know, means kind of sticking by the rules. And, like, all my family are doctors, so I thought I wanted to be a doctor. And then I realized that I was scared of blood and needles. I was like, okay, maybe that's not for me.
So I got into McGill, did an undergrad there. You know, you're not really given the capacity to try music or the arts. It's never seen as a real career. And so I started standup the summer I graduated undergrad because I think that that was the first time in my life where I had a little bit of freedom because I was looking for a job and I hadn't found one yet. So I was like, well, what's the harm if I try this now? It's not like it's infringing on my career or quest to be an adult.
And yeah, I tried standup twice that summer. I'm aging myself here, but I don't care. I think we shouldn't be afraid of our ages. So it was the summer of 2010. That's when I graduated undergrad. And I did standup twice. And the first time actually went well. And the second time I bombed so hard, I did not get on stage for another two years.
Matthew Remski: Wow.
Nour Hadidi: Yeah. And it was always there. It was always like, oh my God, I did it. I want to do it again. But I had gotten a job, so I'd gotten a job in the fall at a bank. And I was like, I need. This is it. This is my job. Because if I hadn't gotten that job, I would have moved back home to Jordan.
So I was like, oh, okay. Like, I want to. Because I did my undergrad in Montreal. I loved the city. I was so young. I was like, I want to be independent. And when you move back home, you usually move in with your parents. It's a cultural thing. And I was like, I wanna still live alone, and I wanna do all these things. And so the job was the way for me to do that, so I wasn't gonna mess around with it.
And then two years into the job, I was like, okay, like, they're not gonna. If they wanted to fire me, they would have by now. And I was doing this exam. I was in finance, and there's this certification called the CFA. And it was so boring, Matthew. Like, oh my God. It was like so much. It was like, when you're done four years of an undergrad at McGill, you're like, okay, I'm done. I'm done studying. And then you find out, no, like, there's still more.
So it was like, I think an act of rebellion, where it was like, oh, I'm supposed to be studying, but I want to do something fun. So then I started standup again in April of 2012, and I haven't stopped since.
Matthew Remski: Getting back on stage after the bomb — was that really terrifying?
Nour Hadidi: Enough time had passed that I had built up a want to do it, that the want superseded the fear. And I made all my friends come so that I could have a good showing. My comeback on an open mic night on a Monday or a Wednesday at the Comedy Nest, which is inside a mall in Montreal.
Matthew Remski: So you're talking about a culture in which, as you said, the identification with a group can precede identification as an individual. And so standup is obviously this clear step into a different kind of self. But I'm wondering, like, were there bits and pieces of that at home? Like, were you gonna be the critic standing outside or any kind of black sheep person or — you're shaking your head. No.
Nour Hadidi: Yeah. No. I was very shy, actually. I was very outgoing. But then in the sixth grade, things kind of changed for me. Without getting into too much detail, my parents got divorced and we moved to a new school where I was really like a fish out of water. And, like, for the whole next six years, I was a fish out of water. Like, I did not belong in that school. And so I just was very introverted and kept to myself. I didn't want to get bullied more. It was more of a self preservation.
And then to get love from my family, I pursued science because they're all doctors. So I was like, yeah, I'm going to be like you. And that's the way I'll get more love, you know.
But I think my dad is very funny. He's like one of the funniest people I know. He's now, as adults, we have a very different relationship and it's truly based in humor. Like, I love hanging out with him, talking with him, telling him about things that happen in my day because he'll make a joke out of it. So I do think that it's a language I learned and that it's kind of brought me closer to my dad.
And yeah, I think because I was so bullied and felt alone when I would watch comedy, like when I would watch sitcoms or Robin Williams, like Mrs. Doubtfire, I would laugh and I think it was a physical release. Like, my nervous system was relieved. And I think that's when I started kind of liking it. Like, it was that high school time in my life where when I would watch the Fresh Prince or Mad About You or, you know, Father of the Bride, like those classic comedies, oh, I would forget my problems and the world would disappear and I would just laugh and be happy by myself. So I think it was the first time I really felt safe or relieved in life at such a young age.
Matthew Remski: You're also describing, I think, shows that take the normative situation and find some kind of absurdity in it. But you've taken a different turn now. Like, you've gone into a kind of politicized comedy. And I'm wondering how that happened and how much time it took you to go full political in your sets.
Nour Hadidi: Yeah, that's a great question. Definitely not at first. At first, when you're starting comedy, you just want people to like you when you still don't know who you are. And so this is something all comics do is that you say anything in the hopes of it getting a laugh until you learn. It's like you're learning and then you learn, okay, so this is how a joke works. It takes a while to understand. Okay, what is it that I'm saying on stage? Like, what are these people laughing at? Are they laughing at me? Are they laughing with me?
And you slowly get to a point where you figure out that I would rather write what I think is funny and not what I think other people will find funny, because the latter is a losing game. The target's always moving, and it's not as satisfying. And it's a lot more satisfying to write a joke that I genuinely think is funny. And even if half the time the audience laughs, it feels better than the entire audience laughing at something I just wrote because I want them to like me.
And it was a really slow process for me to find out who I am. It's like standup helped me find my voice, and find out who I really am as a person.
Matthew Remski: That's incredible.
Nour Hadidi: Thank you. It really is. And I think that our society doesn't allow people to do that. Like, we're all stuck in these day jobs. We're all stuck under capitalism. We're all stuck under the system. And I really wish people had the space to follow whatever little thing that brought them joy. Like, whether it's working with horses or painting or writing poetry, or even if it's like building. It's just the way our society is built. It's so judgmental. It's so based on money and earnings and how you present to the world, as opposed to how you really feel on the inside.
And that's the thing. Whatever it is in life, it's something that makes me feel like I love and accept myself. Like, wherever you put me in life, wherever country or situation you put me, if I love and accept myself from the inside, that's where I'm going to shine. To get to a point where I'm saying things that I know people will hate, but it's fine on stage because I love and accept myself. And I know that when I talk about what Israel is doing, it's not coming from a place of hate, it's coming from a place of justice and putting up a mirror to the world. That's what true art does.
A lot of comedians, all they want to do is get a laugh, get a clip, go viral, get a Netflix special. It's still under the corporate umbrella of comedy. But it was like two transformations in my life happened at once. During COVID I was going through a lot of mental health issues, and I really had to get a new therapist and really work on loving and accepting myself for who I was. And then when the genocide started, I think a lot of us felt this way, where we were numb, and I felt like I couldn't do anything. And so at the time, my comedy was my only voice in life. I didn't have my newsletter. I didn't have Comedians for Palestine. I didn't have all these other things. So it was the only funnel I had in life.
And so I started writing jokes that were pro Palestine through that. And it was really hard. I wouldn't allow myself to do any jokes that were not about it. You know, it was such an angry time in my life. And since then, I've grown a lot, and I've realized that my art is for me. And whether I want to do jokes about it or not, that's okay, because my activism is presenting itself in a lot of different ways, and comedy is only one of them.
Matthew Remski: There's so many things I want to pick up on, but the first is that this transition that you're describing from a kind of audience capture, where you have learned what an audience wants to hear almost by rote, and maybe you've peeled it off from — well, that's how they did it on Fresh Prince a bunch of times. Or that's what Robin Williams was up to, even though he's bizarrely creative and so shocking in so many ways, but the form. And then it's dissatisfying because it's not you. And there's something about your sort of personal circumstance or your understanding of political suffering or your own suffering that you have to deliver. And maybe it's only to a portion of the audience. That's kind of extraordinary. And I'm wondering, like, does it happen bit by bit? Do you just try one thing at a time, or did you slam right into it with one set?
Nour Hadidi: You know, it happened gradually over the years. There would be a joke about being an immigrant, you know, and that felt right to me. And there would be a joke about an experience with a white woman. And so it was like these pockets of political jokes that were still based in real life, that were still based in my point of view of the world. And I think those were the small stepping stones over the years that got me to the point.
And also another thing that was kind of transformative is during the pandemic, I was going crazy at home. So Second City reached out and they were like, do you want to teach standup online? So I said, I have nothing going on. This could be a good experience for me. And the entire class, with the exception of one person, were all people of color.
Matthew Remski: Wow.
Nour Hadidi: Yeah. And I think that was the time when they would ask me questions and I was like, oh my God. If a white comic was teaching this class, they would not be able to answer these questions. They would not be able to help these bits.
And one guy, he's Indian and he wrote a joke about being profiled at the border. And I was like, oh my God. Like I had instinctively, and not realizing it, I was like, you gotta ease them into it. You can't start with this. Like, things I had learned over the years that would make it a more palatable joke. And I don't say more palatable to the white people, just to anyone listening. It's like when you're talking about charged topics, you kind of ease people in.
So now what I do is, unless it's a fundraiser, because at my fundraisers, people know that they're coming there to support Gaza. So I don't really have to ease them in or give a disclaimer. But at other shows I'll actually open with non political stuff. So I get them on board, they get to know who I am, and then I actually give a warning. I say, okay, we're going to move on to the political portion of the set. And it's kind of preparing them, right, because sometimes people come to shows and they want to escape the world, which I completely understand.
But for me, I've decided that even though I'm going to lose out on so many opportunities, the point of my comedy now is to alleviate the nervous systems and help the people in this struggle. I want to give them hope, I want to give them strength, I want to help them process what we've been through. There's nothing really helping us besides that.
Matthew Remski: Well, I mean, you said that you needed to change therapists. You know, I can just say that my partner is a psychotherapist and she tells me that the cross cultural blinders that can exist in professional therapy are like a real barrier for people of color who may not typically be used to or have it in their family cultures to access therapy and might not need the same things that folks who are part of the dominant culture are coming to therapy to ask for. And I think that's kind of an amazing thing. And suddenly you're in this position on Zoom through Second City of doing something that's kind of therapeutic a little bit where you're listening to people's new jokes and you're probably giving validation or you're saying, well, you know, you might want to try it this way or ease the audience in this particular way. And that brings up this question of like you're telling your Indian student, well, you know, don't hit them with this up front. But of course, that is part of your experience, right? Like, that's your learning curve that you're using to advise them with, which is just incredible.
Nour Hadidi: Thank you. I do think I'm an anomaly and I wish more people of color, more women, more Muslims just went into the arts. I understand their responsibility as well. I think I want to bring them back. I used to have writing workshops for people of color where I would teach them how to write just the basics of comedy and have people meet each other and do that.
And just as a fun fact, my new therapist is actually Jewish.
Matthew Remski: Okay.
Nour Hadidi: She's an anti-Zionist Jewish person. And she's incredible. The reason I switched to her is because she was a lot. I'm just gonna be so honest on this podcast. I was having a lot of suicidal ideation and my therapist. I'm so. Thank you. I'm a lot better now. I thank the Lord, thank Allah for my therapist, Eleanor. She was a lot more equipped to handle what I was going through. You know, it was just a different skill set, different kind of therapy, as opposed to talk therapy.
Matthew Remski: Yeah.
Nour Hadidi: And so it's like she wasn't necessarily from my culture, but we did have a lot of the same values. And I think that in another life, maybe I would have been a therapist. I think I chose comedy, like, not knowing the full potential of it. I chose it because it was self serving when I chose it. And a lot of comics are self serving when they go on stage.
But I think going through the pandemic, my own mental health struggles, and then bearing witness to the genocide really transformed me as a person and I had to dig for purpose in life. And I think the biggest purpose of life is human connection and helping others. And if I can do that through my comedy, then I think that I feel like that's become my new purpose.
Matthew Remski: I really have to wonder how many of these alliances since the genocide began have actually formed quietly in the margins or the shadows of society, where you have, you know, the Muslim comic and their anti-Zionist Jewish therapist actually doing work together. And then you have, I mean, as part of your fundraising sort of schedule, isn't there a, you know, either we're laughing or we're crying together, which was an event that was actually cross cultural that way.
Nour Hadidi: That was a very hard event, actually. I had a lot of hate come my way from that event. There was an email campaign to get me off the podcast and off the show. Yeah, that was really hard.
Basically, okay, so we'll backtrack a little bit.
Matthew Remski: By the way, Nour. I'm editing all of this and if this is something you don't want to talk about —
Nour Hadidi: No, I'm fine. I would like people to know what the cost of advocating for a free Palestine in Canada is, because it's not easy.
Matthew Remski: Okay, good.
Nour Hadidi: Right, so let's backtrack a little bit. Last year, in June 2025, I went on the Global March to Gaza, which was a civil society attempt to establish a humanitarian corridor to get food, water and medicine into Gaza. I don't know if people remember because the horrors have been nonstop. It's so hard to keep track.
But back in June, for about three or four months, no food had entered Gaza. People were literally dying of starvation. Like, the images we saw were just so horrible. And my friend had sent me this post by the Global March that there was a Canada chapter. And I just felt in my bones that I had to go. I had to go and do something.
So I went. And unfortunately, we were not able to break the siege. We were detained by the Egyptian government, who are just as complicit in this genocide. I just want to say that. And there was a really horrible National Post article written about me. They had taken my image because I was asking people to help us reach consulates, like, help our consulates help us, because we were being detained, our passports were taken. We were going to be deported.
And so as part of that, my image was taken. And there was this really horrible National Post article written about me, mocking me, making fun of me and the other activists. And there was also this account on X called the Leviathan, which is just a really Islamophobic hateful account that was mocking me and making fun of me. Then people were leaving, like, after going through a really physically traumatic experience, people were leaving comments like, oh, did you meet any Hamas men that you want to love or date? Or whatever. Just people making fun of me. So that in itself was a really hard experience.
And I had said yes to the CJN podcast before that.
Matthew Remski: Right.
Nour Hadidi: And so when the CJN podcast came around and my name was announced, I guess people dug up my name and the National Post article. And then there was an entire email campaign against me saying the CJN was platforming antisemitic voices.
The email was a bit insane, to be honest with you. Like, there were screenshots of my social media taking memes, jokes, and using them as — combined with the National Post article, using them as fodder to prove that I was a hateful person. And some of it, the language used was very similar to the Canary Mission, where it's a real inversion of reality. Attended a pro October 7th rally — this was like two years after October 7th happened. The inversion of reality is really what struck me.
And saying I promoted jihadist propaganda. I invoked blood libels. I denied Jewish peoplehood. It was wild. It was really wild. And I thought about dropping off the podcast. I really did.
Matthew Remski: They didn't quote you directly, so they're all paraphrasing. They're turning things upside down. Just sort of like a hasbara inversion of whatever it is you had said. Okay.
Nour Hadidi: Post celebrating Roger Waters. Cause I made a meme slide. And one of them was how much I love Roger Waters when he speaks during interviews.
Matthew Remski: Right.
Nour Hadidi: Things like that. Nothing I had said personally. Thank you. Yeah, that's a good point.
I went for a walk before the podcast, and I just felt all this hate coming at me from the universe. And that was one of the things where I was like, I love and accept myself. Like, through the work I had done in therapy, I love and accept myself. I know I'm not a hateful person. I know I did nothing wrong.
Matthew Remski: Yeah.
Nour Hadidi: And the CJN called and they were like, we're going to beef up security, we're going to ask for IDs. Like, they had two bodyguards.
And, you know, the people who had bought tickets were people who are still Zionists, but they're liberal Zionists. Because the event was going to support the Vivian Silver Fund. She was murdered on October 7. But she was very pro human rights for all. And she would help children in Gaza access medical help in Israel.
Matthew Remski: Was she one of the kibbutz residents murdered that day?
Nour Hadidi: Yes.
Matthew Remski: Because there were many progressive communities along that border.
Nour Hadidi: And even though when you go to the Vivian Silver Fund, it's like, it's an award to give a Palestinian woman and a Jewish woman who are working towards coexistence or peace, but even the language of the Vivian Silver Fund is that of Zionism, because prior to 1948, there was no distinction between a Palestinian and a Jew in that area. You know, and so as progressive as the New Israel Fund is, as progressive as all these structures are, they still operate under the umbrella of Zionism or the umbrella of Israel. And I was the only probably anti-Zionist on the stage. There were some anti-Zionists in the audience. But I think a lot of those people love this idea of Israel according to 67 borders. I think for them, if we have 67 borders, two state solution, then everything will be fine and dandy.
Matthew Remski: And it's like, we're good, right?
Nour Hadidi: Yeah. But then it's like, well, it kind of discounts the pain in how that came to be. And they still don't believe in the right of return, which I think is so painful. They want to keep it a Jewish majority state. And it's like, I still think their pain and fear is being weaponized.
Matthew Remski: I wasn't aware of the difficulty of this particular event, but now I'm understanding that, you know, either we laugh together or we cry together is kind of a liberal Zionist framing actually.
Nour Hadidi: I actually. Yes.
Matthew Remski: Where the emotions are actually made equal and we're all in this together. And this is kind of like a shared suffering. And you know, if we can psychologically bond, then we can sort of solve the problems that are material in basis. Right.
Nour Hadidi: Thank you for saying that. Thank you exactly for saying that.
Matthew Remski: And were you the person who was supposed to, like, laugh along or else everybody would be crying? Was that the position you were in kind of?
Nour Hadidi: I did all my jokes. I did all my jokes about how I'm very lucky my best friend is Jewish and not Zionist, because when she comes over, I know she'll leave. So that's nice.
Matthew Remski: You know, it's like there's something really simple about that. It's really direct, you know. Because you could just throw in some other sort of completely anodyne things, like after tea or, you know, after a few hours or, you know, they know when it's over.
Nour Hadidi: You know, I was myself. I was my true anti-Zionist self. I spoke about the Global March. I spoke about everything.
And there was a moment in the podcast where they say, where do you get your hope for the future? And I said something that really silenced the room. I said, I get my strength from the Palestinian people who get up and go to school and go to work every day on an empty stomach, not knowing if they're going to see their family at the end of the day. And that really silenced the room. They are not used to humanizing Palestinians.
And my friend Adrienne, I love her so much. Adrienne Fish, fellow comedian. She showed up with a Jews Say No to Genocide T-shirt and that really ruffled some feathers. And the photos that you see from the event, they're from the side, so they don't show Adrienne's T-shirt. And when the episode was aired, there was a note like CJN board or whatever. Do not agree with all the views in this podcast. And it's like, well, then why would you invite me on? You know?
Matthew Remski: Right.
Nour Hadidi: So it was a very. I learned a lot from that experience. I mainly learned that the Jewish community is not ready to hear from non-Jewish voices. I think there's a lot of Islamophobia and hate that came my way. And I don't think I changed anyone's mind. I think that the liberal Zionists are going to continue to be liberal Zionists regardless of what I say to them. And I think it's the work of Jewish activists to do the talks in those spaces.
And do I regret doing it? I don't think so, because I learned and I grew a lot. My life energy expanded. And I think that's the point of life, is to learn and to grow and to know who you really are. And I think I found out who I was through a lot of pain, a lot of heartache. But at the end of the day, I was who I was in that space, and I learned that I'm not going to re-enter a space like that.
Matthew Remski: You learned what you learned in what seems to me to be the hardest space of all, which is the space of partial welcome. It reminds me of Malcolm X and the white liberal being the primary kind of enemy of the civil rights movement — these are the people who will smile through their fangs and they will want you there to get along, but on their own terms.
Nour Hadidi: On their own terms.
Matthew Remski: If you start actually challenging the structure of how you're living or what brings you actually into the same place together. And it seems like a podcast in a studio in North America is this place apart from where the actual conflict is happening, as though people aren't carrying it in their bodies, as if it's not sort of real for everybody all the time. And so it would be the place in which — well, you know, let's see if we can all get along. And to be able to sort of do your jokes anyway and cut through that. That just sounds like a really important moment.
Nour Hadidi: Thank you. It wasn't easy in the aftermath. I was really down on myself and I was like, I hope I didn't let anyone in the movement down by entering or placating a liberal Zionist space. Because real blood is being spilt.
Matthew Remski: Right.
Nour Hadidi: And the difference between me and the people in the room is that I'm guided by the images and videos I see on the ground. And they're guided by their emotions and their idea of what the world should be. You know, one is reality, one is fantasy. And those people have been told that their emotions are just as real. In fact, they supersede anything else. That's the problem. We center Jewish feelings of discomfort and pain and trauma over the real life reality of blood being spilt.
Matthew Remski: Right.
Nour Hadidi: And I think Jewish Zionist institutions have done a really good job at getting Jewish people to feel good about themselves while doing that.
Matthew Remski: It seems that that makes comedy particularly sharp because it's already going to point directly into the feeling space. Right.
Nour Hadidi: This is one of my favorite podcasts I've done. I just want you to know. I feel so seen. And I feel like you're actually helping me process something I went through last October through your lens. So I really appreciate it.
Matthew Remski: Well, it's a real pleasure. I did not expect. I did not know this story, and I'm glad that you were able to tell it. It's crucial, I think, for anybody who is navigating their own leftist, antifascist, decolonial attitudes within a liberal culture, they're gonna find some resonance there. And then for your situation, in this particular moment, it's just ratcheted way up.
I wanted to come back to one thing that you mentioned about how the political material begins to enter into, and I think this is connected to what we've just been talking about, into this liberal space, which is we all want to feel good. We want to feel good about our lives. We want to laugh, we want to blow off steam a little bit. And then you bring the new Nour in and there's a joke that is uncomfortable. And you said, you know, maybe half of the audience laughs and the other half doesn't. And it just occurs to me that that is a dialectical moment, because the people who aren't laughing, they know that people are laughing. And then they have to negotiate — well, am I not having a good time anymore? Why are they laughing? Are they able to laugh? Why am I? I think that's an amazing moment. So not only do you get to become more of yourself, but also the audience gets to sort each other out and really look at what they find tolerable and intolerable or, you know, matters for self reflection or matters for deflection.
Nour Hadidi: I mean, if like a handful of liberal Zionists get to question or sit with themselves, then maybe it was worth it, you know? It's like comedy has, it truly does, a way of cutting through to the reality of how people feel and what they allow themselves to laugh at because it challenges their own belief system.
And that's been a journey throughout. Since October 2023 until now. Back then, it was taboo. I don't know if you remember, you weren't even allowed to challenge the mainstream narrative of Hamas, hostages, October 7th, terrorists, blood libel. That was it. You could not deviate.
Matthew Remski: Right.
Nour Hadidi: People were getting fired, people were getting blacklisted. And so when I would tell my jokes, I would be heckled by Israelis. I would be just told by boomers or Gen X that's not funny. You're not being funny right now.
Matthew Remski: See, that's probably funny, though. You have a certain sort of — the boomer peanut gallery saying you're not being funny right now. That might have — did that ever get a laugh itself?
Nour Hadidi: People were genuinely saying that.
Matthew Remski: No, no. But did it get a laugh from other people in the audience?
Nour Hadidi: No. They were so tense. White liberals.
Matthew Remski: They were disciplined.
Nour Hadidi: They've been taught by the systems to stay quiet.
Matthew Remski: Right.
Nour Hadidi: Palestine has freed us all. Palestine has shown us the limits of our own selves, our own freedom. It's shown me the limits of my own industry.
When people say I support you, I just didn't like it because I still want to get work. Oh, so you're telling me that your ability to make money under capitalism is more important to you than the lives of 2 million people stuck in a concentration camp who are being murdered every day? That's what you're telling me. You're telling me on some level that people like me, our lives are less worthy of people like you. That's what you're telling me. You're not saying it directly, but that's what I'm hearing.
Matthew Remski: What's so amazing to me is that not being able to recognize that means that you can't really laugh. The position that you have to take in order to maintain a kind of status quo view around Zionist reality means that some things cannot be funny. The assumptions that one makes, one's grandiosity, one's view of history. Like, I feel like you're speaking into a room of taboos. Is that what it is?
Nour Hadidi: Yes, absolutely. When I first started, now it's changed. Now it's to the point where I'll go watch the improv show before mine on a Monday night. And Palestine comes up. It's become part of the lexicon of our society.
Matthew Remski: Right.
Nour Hadidi: I'm so shocked. I'm genuinely shocked at the transformation we've gone through in two years.
Matthew Remski: Right.
Nour Hadidi: I just redownloaded a dating app yesterday.
Matthew Remski: Okay.
Nour Hadidi: And literally every white man has a watermelon in his profile.
Matthew Remski: Uh, oh, I'm a little bit worried about that.
Nour Hadidi: Of course they want to appear. They're white liberals. They want to appear to be part of the cause. But I would, if I match with one of them, I'd actually be interested in what they've done. What have you done? Have you spoken out? Have you donated? Have you gone to a protest? What have you lost for this watermelon or are you just putting it there because it's an emoji?
Matthew Remski: Right. You know, like, I see your watermelon, I raise you a protest.
Nour Hadidi: Oh, no, babe. I see your watermelon, I raise you from a river to the sea. Right.
Matthew Remski: One thing that I wanted to say about the joke about the friend who knows when to leave, that's really straightforward, but you also do some weird things too.
Nour Hadidi: Okay.
Matthew Remski: There was one set, and that's just because comedy can be really weird. There's one set on YouTube. You're at the Rivoli years ago, and you're making jokes about Air Canada being a terrible airline. And then, seemingly out of nowhere, you start slipping in jokes about how at least ISIS, they have really dedicated pilots who, like, follow through on their missions. And it was this incredible, strange juxtaposition of, like, oh my God, what is she actually saying? It's so — there was this macabre aspect. So many levels in which strange things can be going on there. Like, you know, you're talking about the privilege of being able to fly Air Canada in kind of like a pokey nationalized airline, which involves all kinds of consumerism and all kinds of, I don't know, just being of a certain class level. But that's all built on the kind of oil imperialism that causes such global conflict. So, anyway, I just wanted to say you also are able to juxtapose these very strange things that kind of work a very particular angle.
Nour Hadidi: Thank you so much. I need you to be on a podcast with me every day so I feel good about myself.
I wish I could say it was as deep as the oil imperialism layer. I was just looking for — so basically, the bit started because I had become a Canadian citizen, and I was writing a joke about taking the citizenship test. And I was like, what's a question that could be on the test that a lot of Canadians could pass? Right? And it really started there.
And then, as every Air Canada traveler knows, you are frustrated with our national carrier, because they just drive you nuts. They can drive you to the ends of lunacy and back. And I was like, how can I show how frustrating Air Canada is? And it's like, well, it's like, at least I say I think Air Canada is worse than ISIS, because at least ISIS takes responsibility, you know. At least they say, yes, we did this, we caused pain and havoc. Whereas Air Canada will be like, we're so sorry. It's a delay. You understand.
Matthew Remski: That is such an incredible anti-colonial joke, though.
Nour Hadidi: Thank you.
Matthew Remski: You're saying, oh, it's not so deep, but like, but that's there, that's there. And maybe the weirdness of comedy is that, like, you can train yourself to put strange things together and then something happens.
Nour Hadidi: I think it's — in a lot of ways the art form is restrictive. It is. But in some ways you're able to get through to people through humor. So I think there are small pockets of real radicalism that you can inject in there. But I think now I have a really — as I grow, my relationship with comedy also changes.
And being a leftist in a lot of liberal spaces as a comedian can be very frustrating. If you could imagine, like, if you're already frustrated as a leftist, imagine every day at your job you have to deal with liberals. It's so demotivating, you know.
Matthew Remski: Right.
Nour Hadidi: And it's like when Trump won and the white women in the audience were sad that day. And it's like, well, where the fuck have you been the past two years where people were dying. We're only sad on this day where Trump won again. Second Trump term. That's the hardest thing in your life.
Matthew Remski: Right.
Nour Hadidi: It's the mirrors and smoke and mirrors and the facades and the layers in between you and them that really are just frustrating. As an artist, just as a person in this world, I just want to wake liberals the fuck up. I just want to shake them. You know, maybe we could start that like a Shake a Liberal day. Like you identify a liberal and we shake them all at the same time.
Matthew Remski: I've had a lot of guests on who say that, you know, for instance, fascists are bullies, but ultimately bullies are fragile and cowardly. And I'm wondering whether, you know, even though this has been so hard and you've gotten such blowback, have you seen standup expose that kind of cowardliness?
Nour Hadidi: Well, I think, like, if you look at all the late night shows and what's happening, there was no comedian at the White House Correspondents' Dinner. It was a mentalist. Right. No, like, he's such a fragile coward. You're absolutely right. He can't handle any criticism.
He got Stephen Colbert fired. Melania wanted Jimmy Kimmel to be fired. Jimmy Kimmel was fired for a minute and a half. So yes, obviously they are cowards and they can't handle anything. And the sad thing is that those shows are liberal shows. Like, they're not even going at him that hard. Even Stephen Colbert, who got fired — didn't he ask Mamdani a really horrible question, like, does Israel have a right to exist? Didn't he ask him that?
Matthew Remski: Oh, yeah, right, right. That was right out there.
Nour Hadidi: That made me hate. And that's the other thing. I've lost so many heroes. I've lost so many dreams. I've unfollowed so many comedians who just made me love comedy or get through life. It's been so hard to lose so much. It's almost like, I'm telling you, my whole life has been flipped upside down. My goals, my heroes, it's all gone. I've had to start from scratch again.
Matthew Remski: I mean, is part of starting from scratch working with Stand Up for Gaza? I mean, you're selling out every show, but was it hard to get off the ground? Has that been a healing thing for you?
Nour Hadidi: It has been.
I started them as one offs in 2024 as a way to raise money for people. Like, when they canceled UNRWA funding, I was like, I'm gonna have a fundraiser for UNRWA. I don't give a shit. For Anera, the Gaza soup kitchen. We've also fundraised for specific families in Gaza.
My friend Adrienne Fish, who I mentioned earlier, her sister Suzanne has been financially sponsoring 10 families in the north of Gaza for two years.
Matthew Remski: What, like a sole sponsor? Like, these are my ten families.
Nour Hadidi: And Adrienne reached out. She's like, listen, we've run out of fundraising ideas. Can you help us? I was like, done. Next show we're gonna. It's gonna be for these 10 families.
When I was in London, England, I also put on a fundraiser for a family I personally sponsor every month. It was a top up over that to help them buy clothes. Because there's a really big mice and rat problem in Gaza right now.
Matthew Remski: Yes, I've heard that.
Nour Hadidi: And so they have no clothes. The mice eat through all the clothes. They actually bite the children in their sleep.
Matthew Remski: Yeah, yeah.
Nour Hadidi: It's really horrible. So comedy, like, it started off as that, and I think initially it was like a safe space. We were being gaslit so bad by everyone and everything. And so I think it was like a space to be able to say the things out loud that we knew were true, but we weren't allowed to say anywhere. You know, I would still say them online, but I mean in social settings.
And it's been really wonderful to see that we're selling out ahead of time. These, like, we're selling out a week in advance, which is unheard of in the summer, especially when people want to be out on patios.
Matthew Remski: Right.
Nour Hadidi: And I think we might want to look at getting a bigger venue, actually, because it's only 50 tickets that we sell each month.
Yeah, it's been good. I also — there's a lot more I want to do with Comedians for Palestine. So as I mentioned to you personally, I write on a show and it takes up a lot of my time and energy and I travel with it, but once I have more downtime, I really want to dedicate more of my energy into Comedians for Palestine and just grow. We just hit 1,000 followers on Instagram, which is amazing. I'm so grateful.
And I think that it's also, like I said, I try to do different things each show. Last show I wasn't able to, but the show before, I wrote Weekend Update style jokes for what was happening. I also had a PowerPoint presentation of, like, if Western media covered historical atrocities the way they cover Gaza.
Matthew Remski: Right. So passive voice. The mushroom cloud is some sort of weather event.
Nour Hadidi: Yes, exactly. It's really unfortunate. It's a humanitarian issue, you know.
Matthew Remski: Yeah. We didn't intentionally. We never intentionally target civilians.
Nour Hadidi: No. We are so moral. How dare you.
So yeah, there's pieces I want to write. I will say that, like, there are times where sometimes I — like, even with all that I've done, there is still fear around Zionist backlash. Like, if I post what I want, what else are they gonna do to me? Because someone called the cops on the fundraiser two months ago and they tried to shut it down.
Matthew Remski: The cops showed up to the event? Yes, they came to the event. Did they ask you questions? What happened there?
Nour Hadidi: So I wasn't there because I had literally just flown in from England that night, and my friend Isabel Zhoutun was guest hosting for me. So what happened was I had a call with Isabel just to make sure she was okay and get everything that happened from her. So I know she wouldn't mind me saying what happened.
Basically, the cops showed up literally two minutes before she was supposed to go on stage and host, and they said, okay, so how many people are at this rally? She said, this isn't a rally. This is a standup show. They said, what's the purpose of the rally? She said, this isn't a rally. We're raising money to feed starving children in Gaza.
Okay, so where are you guys going to start and where are you going to end? We're not leaving. This is standup comedy. We are not leaving the venue. People are sitting down. We're about to have a show.
Oh, okay. Well, we just got to check up on this Hamas stuff, is what they said. Even though on the marquee it just says Stand Up for Gaza. That's what it said.
Matthew Remski: I don't have the bill in front of me, but there's new legislation that basically hands over more authority to cops on the street to be able to make charter decisions in the middle of an investigation, in the middle of a stop, basically. So if there's a suspicion that you might be doing pro Hamas jokes or something like that, or that you couldn't actually do a Hamas joke without being pro Hamas or giving material aid to Hamas or something like that, you know, that would be their call to shut it down in the moment.
Nour Hadidi: Yeah, no, I'll stop giving money to my local Hamas member. You're right. I sponsor a couple of Hamas people, and so I'll stop doing that. Thank you, Matthew.
You know, I just want to talk about Carney for a bit because way to go, Carney. He's done the impossible. He has made me miss Justin Trudeau. I didn't think this day would come. I did not think that was even possible.
I think what Carney understands more than Trudeau did is that Canada is part of the empire. And what we're seeing in the silencing of Arab voices, what we're seeing when it comes to him standing in front of an Israel flag literally last week in Toronto, giving a speech at a temple — what that is, is Carney making the calculation that being part of the empire is better than not being part of it for Canada. And if we're going to be part of it, if we're going to get Five Eyes intelligence, if we're going to get money through selling weapons, if we're going to get diplomatic benefits, then we're going to have to go along with this. We're going to have to go along with Israel supporting us, no matter what they do.
Matthew Remski: We'll have to increase it.
Nour Hadidi: Actually, that's true. We're going to defund UNRWA. What happens is, like, this climate, it's from Israeli and US pressure, and then Carney upholds it. And so when Carney upholds it, what happens is it seeps through all of our institutions, universities, police actions. That's what's happening. It's being seeped in.
And that's what gives — that's basically what's been happening. That's why the cops are called. That's why I received this hate. It trickles down. It's not that — it's such bullshit. When they say diversity is our strength, it's like diversity is accepted as long as it doesn't ruffle any of our imperialist winnings or cost something. You know, we are imperialist first, diverse second. Like, we are a junior partner in the empire. That is who we are. We've just never seen the hypocrisy exposed at this level before.
Matthew Remski: Nour, it's taken you all of these years to be able to articulate what you articulate. And I had the sense that it's been a long journey with many chapters. And because the focus of this podcast is about intergenerational solidarity and communication, I'm just wondering, like, what would be your best advice to the group of kids who showed up to your standup class, you know, not on Zoom, but in person, who were between 12 and 15 or something like that, all people of color. What would you tell them about going forward in discovering themselves?
Nour Hadidi: Wow, that is really beautiful. I mean, I just want to tell them that they're loved and that I am so lucky to be in their company.
Matthew Remski: And that's a good place to start.
Nour Hadidi: Yeah. Really? Yeah. They are so loved beyond measure, regardless of what the world has told them about themselves up to that point, you know.
Matthew Remski: Yeah.
Nour Hadidi: And that nothing they say or do is wrong. Because when expressing themselves, all standup is is basically an extension of your soul and yourself and the way you see the world. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that. So I would say, be yourself, be honest.
You really can do anything. Like, if me, an immigrant who moved to Canada at 17 and never thought she'd ever be in the arts — like, if I could ditch my finance degree, my finance background, and make writing jokes the way I make a living in one of the most expensive cities in Canada, then they can too. Honestly, like, there is a way for you to reach your dream. I know it's so hard under the systems we live under, but if you do it, I promise the universe will help you find a way. Live your dream. It's not going to be easy. Like, there were years where I didn't sleep between doing my job and then going to do two shows after my job. Like, it's not going to come easy. You're going to have to work hard for it. But there is a way forward.
There is a way for all of us to not live under capitalism and to be ourselves. Whatever it is, doesn't have to be comedy. Like, truly, whatever the thing that makes you feel a spark, makes you feel alive, go do that. Go do that thing. Because you have something to add to that thing. You don't have to be famous, you don't have to make an invention. But you, your soul, your essence, your spirit can add something to it. And it is important that you do.
Matthew Remski: Nour Hadidi, thank you so much for your time. It's a pleasure to speak with you.
Nour Hadidi: Likewise. Thank you. Matthew Remski, for having me on your Antifascist Dad Podcast. I had the best time.
Matthew Remski: So that's the show for today, folks. Up on Patreon now is a coda to this episode. It's called Asking Liberals: Do You Condemn Imperialism? Because I'm kind of haunted by Amanpour's question to Al-Dahdouh, do you wish Hamas had not committed October 7th? And how he dismantled its premise entirely. And so I look at some research on these adversarial interviews and what they force interviewees to do, especially in this settler colonial context. And I also flag Fanon's analysis of colonized intellectuals who have to perform Western values in order to just be heard. So that's available now for subscribers and if you can't support the show at this point, thank you for listening. Thank you for reviewing the show. Thank you for telling your friends.
And next week my guest is Emily Lowan, the 25 year old leader of the BC Green Party who's doing great work to expose the US oligarch land grabs and AI centre bids in our own Pacific Northwest.
Take care of each other.
