A popular Upper West Side restaurant that proudly proclaims its support for Israel has been vandalized multiple times, leaving its owner on guard if anyone walks through the door.
Ghazala Halabi, a member of Israel’s fervently patriotic Druze community, told Side Dish on Monday that someone had scrawled “Liberate Palestine” in the restaurant’s bathroom. This is the second time this restaurant has been covered in graffiti.
She said this latest incident occurred after the restaurant’s front door was shattered after Israel launched a war with Hamas following the Oct. 7 massacre.
Halabi’s restaurant, Ghazala’s (447 Amsterdam Ave.), is perhaps the only Druze restaurant in New York City and the United States, serving traditional dishes like hummus and signature burkas and mankoshas.
In front of the Gazala are Israeli and Druze flags.
That’s why some Palestinian supporters leave when they see the national flag, and others when they look at the menu and see Israel on a map of the Middle East.
“One couple yelled at the waiter, ‘Please tell the host that Israel has no right to exist!'” Halabi said.
“Excuse me, but didn’t they see the Israeli flag when they came in?”
Halabi was born in Dariat el-Carmel, a village near Haifa with a large Druze population, an ancient religion with descendants primarily from Israel, Syria and Egypt. He is also a Lebanese Druze, like Amal Clooney’s father.
There are approximately 800,000 Druze people worldwide, including approximately 150,000 in Israel. Israeli Druze are deeply patriotic and fight in the Israeli military.
Halabi has been serving Israeli Druze cuisine based on family recipes on the Upper West Side since 2007.
But since October 7, when Hamas terrorists massacred 1,200 people and abducted about 240 in Israel, she has seen some of the local hatred flare up in her neighborhood restaurant.
“It’s like someone coming into your house,” Halabi, a divorced mother of two, said of people desecrating her restaurant.
“What a bold group of people! If you want to fight, fight in Gaza. Not here,” she added.
For example, if anti-Israel demonstrators gather outside a nearby natural history museum, some of the demonstrators may eat in the neighborhood.
Halabi said she worries that employees will become so scared that some will quit. But they remain, some wearing yellow ribbons as a sign of support for the return of Israeli hostages.
“I’m still worried because I can see that they’re worried,” she said.
Regarding the war, Halabi said he sympathizes with civilians everywhere, but that Israel “will do what it takes to defend itself, just like any other country.”
That includes bringing back all the hostages.
“I wonder what other countries would do if terrorists came and killed or kidnapped their citizens, including babies and children. The world needs to understand that,” she said.
Halabi, who has lived in New York since 2001, was in Israel to visit family on October 7, when the attacks began.
“The whole country went crazy. It felt like September 11th was happening all over again. It was unthinkable. Like the rest of the country, I was in shock.” said Halabi, adding that members of her Druze community immediately began volunteering for the fight.
A few weeks later, she returned to New York and was surprised to see how much had changed in the city she knew and loved.
“I was so sad and angry when it happened to me, [when the restaurant door was shattered] That made me even more angry. Who has the rights? What, are you planning on liberating Palestine from here? ” Halabi said.
But along with the hatred, there was also love.
Some social media campaigns encourage people to patronize Gazala’s and show their support.
On a recent weekday afternoon, Joanne Marino, a mother of 13-year-old twins, stopped for lunch before a nearby doctor’s appointment.
“I don’t live in that neighborhood anymore, but I was nearby, and I saw this morning on one of the Facebook groups that help was available, so I showed up,” Marino said. “We live in such a crazy world. We try to do as little as we can.”
As an Israeli, “Ghazala is under immense threat. When you go inside the walls, you see Israeli and Druze flags. It’s a powerful statement that they are together in public.” ,” said Maxine Dauber, executive director of Friends of OHR, the Druze Foundation for the Advancement of Academic Culture in Israel, over coffee at Gazala’s.
“She works tirelessly, preparing the food and running the restaurant. The food is amazing. The recipes are hers, as is the actual preparation.”
