Matisyahu Pushes Teen Girl Off Stage During Birmingham Concert

BIRMINGHAM, AL - Popular Jewish musician Matisyahu opened the 2017 JCC Maccabi games at the University of Alabama at Birmingham's Bartow Arena Sunday with a performance that ended in what many are calling an inappropriate reaction by the singer to fans joining him on stage. Reports say that several fans jumped on the stage during the performance without any resistance from security, and Matisyahu became angry and grabbed a 16-year-old girl by the shirt and pushed her off the stage.

The girl in question is the daughter of Rabbi Barry Leff of Temple Beth El in Birmingham, and the rabbi referred to the incident as “wildly inappropriate.”

Leff’s daughter was one of hundreds of athletes aged 13-16 from JCCs around the US as well as delegations from Israel and the Ukraine who gathered at UAB's Bartow Arena for the opening event of the Birmingham-hosted 2017 JCC Maccabi Games. The Games were organized by the world’s Jewish Community Centers as an Olympic-style international sports competition which runs through the first week of August.

According to a story from the Jerusalem Post, a video of the event surfaced, showing several teens dancing on stage with the singer, and the singer becoming angry. (For more updates on this story and free news alerts for your neighborhood, sign up for your local Birmingham Patch morning newsletter.)

In a statement to the New York Post’s Page Six, the JCC Association of North America wrote: “We are disappointed and dismayed that our opening concert performer, Matisyahu, forcibly removed some of our teen participants from the stage, and we will cooperate with any police investigation. Violence is never acceptable … This is contrary to what we instill in our participants and in what we believe. We are relieved that the participants involved were not seriously injured.”