Acclaimed film director Spike Lee is at the center of a video that went viral online yesterday, showing him being restrained by security at Yankee Stadium after confronting a fan who allegedly asked him to say “F— Palestine” while taking a selfie.
The situation occurred before Game 2 of the wild card series between the New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox on Wednesday evening (September 30), with Spike Lee enjoying his usual routine of dining in the Legends Suite section of the stadium before the playoff game began.
“Why’d you come over to me?”, the Malcolm X director is heard yelling out at the alleged perpetrator in the brief video, still wearing his signature red New Era Yankees hat.
The Person Recording Allegedly Tried To Get Spike Lee To Say “F*** Palestine”
According to Fox Sports contributor Andy Slater, who shared the video in a post on X, formerly Twitter, people near the table told him the person had been recording Lee while he ate and asking him what he felt about Palestine.
But the situation escalated as someone asked Lee for a selfie and allegedly said “F— Palestine” while trying to take it. That prompted the 69-year-old director to angrily get up from his seat and call for security.
Toward the end of the video, a man in a checkered blue sport jacket is seen pointing at someone off camera, telling them: “You’ve gotta go. You’ve gotta go.” That person was kicked out. Another source said that the unidentified person was “absolutely wrong,” and “ruined our f–king meal.”
Before the verbal altercation, Spike Lee was in a good mood, according to reporting by The New York Post, keeping a seat open at his table for those looking to dine in the area and agreeing to take photos with other fans after arriving at 6:30 P.M.
Spike Lee has addressed the furor surrounding the war in Gaza and related public sentiment. He defended himself for wearing a bag adorned with the Palestinian flag and a keffiyeh while attending the NBA All-Star Weekend festivities in Los Angeles earlier this year. In an Instagram post, he explained that the bag was “not intended as a gesture of hostility to Jewish people… nor was it intended as a comment on the significance of Deni being an All-Star.”
