A Jewish mother led a charge of Jewish New Yorkers to save her son’s coffee shop from shutting after its anti-Israel baristas walked out.
Aaron Dahan, owner of Caffe Aronne in Manhattan, called his mother, Peggy, to tell her that he would have to close because his staff had quit over his support of Israel.
But Peggy, who had no experience of working in a shop, told him he would do such thing - and came to run it herself.
Word got out amongst the Jewish community in New York and soon many more were volunteering to work and even more were customers queuing around the block.
Aaron, 25, said two of his staff members walked out on Tuesday after he spoke to them about their Free Palestine pins. Three had already quit.
"Our staff was young. They think they know everything, liberal, college-educated,’ Dahan told The New York Post.
"They think we’re supporting genocide, we’re supporting colonialism. They know the keywords but they don’t really know what they mean.
"We knew our staff. We knew they were thinking these things. I said, “Let’s go for dinner. Let’s sit. Let’s ask questions. Let’s learn. Let’s realize that we’re not all here trying to kill each other”’.
Aaron had put up an Israeli flag in the shop and started a fundraiser to help Magen David Adom, the Israeli Red Cross.
Peggy, 50, received a call from her son asking her to shut the shop, which has only been open for 10 months.
"He called me up. He said, “Mom, I’m doing a private event. I need to close the shop. I said, ‘Aaron, I’m not letting anybody close your shop.”’
Peggy had to quickly learn how to work the cash register and how to use the espresso machine.
Word got out and soon around 70 people lined up outside the shop.
"I got all these texts from people I don’t even know saying, ‘Peggy, we’re coming.’ I walk in, two people were hugging me at 8:30 a.m. It just shows what an amazing community we have."
