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A new walking tour of NYC Israeli restaurants becomes an exercise in togetherness
(New York Jewish Week) — It was a damp, dreary Tuesday evening in Manhattan, but inside the Greenwich Village outpost of Caffe Aronne, the vibe was warm and friendly as a group of 10 people, nearly all of them women, shook off their umbrellas and introduced themselves to one another.
Most of us were strangers, but we became fast friends over the next few hours as we walked from one downtown Israeli restaurant to the next, sharing details of our lives with one another alongside plates of food. The 10 of us had assembled for the first-ever Delicious Cities tour in New York, a new domestic food tour initiative from Inbal Baum, the founder of Delicious Israel, a company that specializes in food tours of Israel.
Baum, who founded Delicious Israel in 2011, had made a lightning-quick business pivot to New York City-based tours after the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas terrorists and the subsequent war in Gaza brought tourism in Israel to a standstill. “Besides the incredible trauma, incredible heartache, incredible pain of everything going on, as a tourism business, and as a tourism business owner, it’s another layer of trauma,” Baum told me.
“Interestingly, in the pandemic, the entire world was shut down,” she added, referring to a previous massive blow to her business. “Now it’s just Israel.”
But Baum quickly clarified her remark: Day-to-day life in Israel is not shut down, it’s just that the tourists have stopped coming. “Everything is open — well, not everything, but things are open,” she said. “We can do tours, our guides would be happy to show someone something positive and be part of the positivity that we love so much to share.”
She also thinks there is an appetite not only for Israeli food but for supporting Israelis, wherever they live. “The enthusiasm that I saw when we did a virtual cooking event with The Nosher and 250 people showed up to be together, and to share that moment together around food, was so inspirational and so powerful,” she said, referring to the Oct. 25 gathering as well as other online, food-focused gatherings she’s hosted since the war began. “I knew that that was the direction we had to go: how to bring people together in a way that speaks to what’s happening right now.” (The Nosher and the New York Jewish Week have the same parent company, 70 Faces Media.)
Baum — who said she considers herself American-Israeli when she’s in Israel and Israeli-American when she’s stateside — currently lives with her family in Park City, Utah but lived and worked as a lawyer in New York for six years. In October, she assembled a small team of Delicious Israel guides in New York City and began creating a strategy around tours. “We spent a day running — literally knocking on doors,” Baum said about how she got restaurants to participate. “In the doors that we knocked on where people answered, they were like, ‘We want to be a part of this, we want to support this.’”
Now working in the fickle business of Manhattan restaurants, Baum and her team are still figuring out the details: Since the test tour this reporter attended ahead of Thanksgiving, the itinerary has changed slightly, Baum said. But, for now, Delicious Cities is running an approximately three-hour Manhattan tour of West Village Israeli restaurants for $160 — with an optional addition of $40 for alcoholic beverages — on Tuesday and Wednesday afternoons. There are also tours being planned for Brooklyn and Philadelphia.
When asked why it was meaningful for her to support Israeli restaurants stateside, Baum said she’s always cared about the industry and added, “Now just happens to be a time where we are, unfortunately, having to explain our existence. And so, in my eyes, food has always been the way that we’re able to come together, provide support, provide love.”
That feeling of togetherness was palpable last month as our group — which included a few of Baum’s old friends, some Delicious Israel regulars and two New York Jewish Week journalists — toured Israeli eateries downtown. We began our time together with an icebreaker: Standing in a tight circle inside the tiny Caffe Aronne, participants took turns introducing themselves to the group and sharing a favorite food memory of Israel. Two people mentioned a kubeh selek, a beet soup with meat-filled dumplings, and one woman shared an entertaining story of consuming a few too many shots of arak on a trip to Israel at age 15.
At the time of our visit, Caffe Aronne had just been in the news for the outpouring of support it received from local Jews when employees allegedly quit the cafe’s Upper East Side branch in protest of the business’s pro-Israel stance. (The story, it turned out, was a bit more nuanced than it first seemed.) Barista Luis, who did not provide a last name, was employed at a different cafe on the day the story broke. He volunteered to pitch in, serving some 500-600 customers that day, he said, and he has stayed with the Israel-inspired cafe since.
“I like the vibe, the people,” he told us.
At Aronne, the tour participants had a choice between two special lattes: cardamom pistachio or almond rose. Neither of these drinks were on the compact menu, a reporter pointed out — and that’s by design, explained Baum, as many of the offerings presented on the tour are off-menu or specially curated for the group.
Tour guide Jordana Meyer gave us a quick rundown of the evening. Explaining that New York is a “chik-chak city” — a Hebrew phrase akin to “pronto” or “chop chop” — she said we would be keeping a brisk pace.
Getting to know one another is a key part of the Delicious Cities experience; here, guide Jordana Meyer shares with a tour group. (Shai Hansav, courtesy Delicious Israel)
Our next stop was Kubeh, Chef Melanie Shurka’s Sixth Avenue restaurant that’s dedicated to “lesser-known cuisines of the Middle East,” per its website — hand-rolled dumplings, or kubeh, in particular. As we sipped on a wickedly good, almost healthy-tasting cocktail called The Persian — with gin, Persian cucumber and zaatar — and snacked on hummus, muhammara and pita, Shurka told us a bit about her passion for the dumplings. “Kubeh, kibbeh, kabbah — they’re all the same,” she said, explaining that the word comes from the Arabic verb meaning “to roll, make something round.”
Shurka, whose father is Israeli and mother is a Jewish New Yorker, told us how she learned her techniques from Israeli grandmothers. “This is a special place,” she said of her six-year-old restaurant as she served the group both fried kubeh and kubeh in broth. “It’s my first baby. My second was born a year ago.”
Next, it was a short, drizzly walk to Einat Admony’s Balaboosta, where a bartender had laid out a spread that included whipped feta with silan (date syrup), hummus, fresh pita and the restaurant’s signature fried olives. Participants drank Israeli wine and milled about.
“This is Israeli and Jewish spirit and resilience at its finest,” said Eilon Gigi, who had worked for celebrity Israeli-American chef Michael Solomonov in Philadelphia for several years before joining the Delicious Israel team.
Admony — wearing a bright-orange cap emblazoned with the word “Yalla!” — greeted the group as well. Later, when a reporter asked her how her business was faring in a time of unrest and increased antisemitism throughout the city, the chef responded that Balaboosta has been “very busy.”
“Our community is stronger than hate — we are all doing fine,” Admony said of Israeli and Jewish restaurants in the city.
And yet, Admony said she unabashedly welcomes the extra business brought in by a Delicious Cities group. “It’s New York,” she said. “We always need business.”
Our fourth and final stop was for dessert at Port Sa’id, a restaurant from freshly Michelin-starred Israeli chef Eyal Shani that opened just north of Tribeca over the summer. Chef Victor Gothelf greeted us warmly and gave a short spiel about the restaurant, where dishes are “prepared today, made today, salads cut today.”
Then, in true Shani style, Gothelf glopped a mess of desserts — including Basque cheesecake, apple crumble and a vegan malabi — directly onto a table covered with butcher paper, then topped the whole thing with strawberry sauce, blackberries, powdered sugar and more. It was a visual feast, as well as an actual one, and Gothelf encouraged us to dig in and share. As he stepped away, he said to our group, in Hebrew, “Am yisrael chai” — the Jewish people live.
With its combination of “really good food — pure, not complicated — and really good music,” Port Sa’id aims to “bring people together,” Gothelf told me later in the evening.
“People are afraid,” he said when asked about the highly charged climate in the city, “but we won’t back down.”
Gothelf added that he jumped at the chance to add Port Sa’id as a part of the new Delicious Cities tour. “Especially because of the situation right now, I was so happy and eager to be a part of it,” he said.
As the evening drew to a close, tour participants gathered again in a tight circle, this time with our bellies full and glasses of wine in our hands. We took turns sharing a personal highlight of the experience — several people homed in on the the feelings of camaraderie within the group, saying that at a time of so much turmoil in Israel, it felt good to gather with other Jews in Israeli spaces and break bread. Business cards and hugs were exchanged and, solo or in pairs, participants departed the bustling restaurant and headed out into the dark, rainy New York night.
Looking ahead, Baum hopes to attract “anyone who is interested in good food, in supporting these restaurants and learning something new and doing something fun.”
“I’m a Jewish mom,” she explained. “I’ve been a Jewish mom way before I was a Jewish mom. I have an instinctual desire to feed people and to have them fed.”
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The post A new walking tour of NYC Israeli restaurants becomes an exercise in togetherness appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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As Gaza War Continues, Hamas Calls for Global Protests While Israel Marks Breakthroughs in Medical Innovation
A pro-Hamas march in London, United Kingdom, Feb. 17, 2024. Photo: Chrissa Giannakoudi via Reuters Connect
As the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas calls for global protests amid stalled Gaza ceasefire talks, Israel has broken new ground despite the ongoing conflict, achieving a major medical breakthrough in synthetic human kidney development.
The contrast illustrates a stark contrast between the priorities of Hamas, an international designated terrorist group that has ruled Gaza for nearly two decades, and Israel, the lone democracy in the Middle East that has long been a leader in tech and medical innovation.
On Wednesday, Hamas urged worldwide protests in support of Palestinians, calling on the international community “to denounce Israel’s genocidal war and starvation policy in Gaza.”
“We call for continuing and escalating the popular pressure in all cities and squares on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday … through rallies, demonstrations and sit-ins outside the embassies of the Israeli regime and its allies, particularly in the US,” the statement read.
The Palestinian terrorist group also called to expose what it described as “the terrorism of the Zio-Nazi occupation against defenseless civilians.”
Hamas’s latest move against Israel comes amid stalled indirect negotiations over a proposed 60-day ceasefire and hostage release deal, which collapsed last month after the group vowed it would not disarm unless an independent Palestinian state is established — rejecting a key Israeli demand to end the war in Gaza.
In its statement, Hamas demanded the opening of all border crossings to allow immediate aid into the war-torn enclave and urged a global condemnation of “the international community’s inaction on the Israeli crimes.”
Amid mounting international pressure to address the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, Israel announced new measures to facilitate the delivery of aid, including temporary pauses in fighting in certain areas and the creation of protected routes for aid convoys.
Israeli officials have previously accused Hamas of diverting aid for terrorist activities and selling supplies at inflated prices to civilians, while also blaming the United Nations and other foreign organizations for enabling this diversion.
Hamas’s statement also emphasized that the “global resistance movement must continue until Israeli aggression on Gaza ends and the siege on the coastal strip is lifted.”
Meanwhile, as Israel faces escalating hostilities and the heavy toll of war, the Jewish state continues to push the boundaries of innovation and resilience, achieving new medical breakthroughs while confronting ongoing challenges.
In a major medical breakthrough, scientists at Sheba Medical Center and Tel Aviv University have successfully grown a synthetic 3D miniature human kidney in a lab using specialized stem cells derived from kidney tissue — one of the most promising advances in regenerative medicine.
Dr. Dror Harats, chairman of Sheba’s Research Authority, described this achievement as a reflection of Israel’s leading role in global medical innovation.
“Despite growing efforts to isolate Israel from international science, breakthroughs like this prove our impact is both lasting and essential,” he said.
In a landmark study, a team from Sheba’s Safra Children’s Hospital and Tel Aviv University’s Sagol Center for Regenerative Medicine created synthetic kidney organs that matured and remained stable for 34 weeks — the longest-lasting and most refined kidney organoids developed to date.
Nearly a decade ago, the research team became the first to successfully isolate human kidney tissue stem cells — the cells responsible for the organ’s development and growth.
Previous attempts to grow kidneys in a lab using general-purpose stem cells were short-lived, typically lasting only a few weeks and often producing unwanted cell types that compromised research accuracy.
However, this Israeli research team used stem cells taken directly from kidney tissue — cells that naturally develop into kidney parts — allowing them to create a much purer and more stable model with key features found in real kidneys.
This medical breakthrough could have far-reaching implications, redefining the current understanding of kidney diseases and advancing the development of innovative treatments.
Researchers believe the model could help assess how medications impact fetal kidneys during pregnancy and move science closer to repairing or replacing damaged kidney tissue with lab-grown cells.
The discovery came days after researchers from Hebrew University of Jerusalem and international partners discovered a way to boost the immune system’s cancer-fighting ability by reprogramming how T cells, which are white blood cells critical to the immune system, produce energy.
The researchers explained in a study published in the peer-reviewed Nature Communications that disabling a protein known as Ant2 in T cells greatly enhances their effectiveness against tumors.
“By disabling Ant2, we triggered a complete shift in how T cells produce and use energy,” Prof. Michael Berger of Hebrew University’s Faculty of Medicine, who co-led the study with doctorate student Omri Yosef, told the Tazpit Press Service. “This reprogramming made them significantly better at recognizing and killing cancer cells.”
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Netherlands to Push EU to Suspend Israel Trade Deal but Won’t Recognize Palestinian State ‘At This Time’
Netherlands Foreign Affairs Minister Caspar Veldkamp addresses a press conference, in New Delhi on April 1, 2025. Photo: ANI Photo/Sanjay Sharma via Reuters Connect
The Netherlands is spearheading efforts to suspend the European Union-Israel trade agreement amid rising EU criticism of Israel’s actions in Gaza, while simultaneously refusing to recognize a Palestinian state, contrasting with other member states as international pressure mounts.
On Thursday, Dutch Foreign Minister Caspar Veldkamp announced that the Netherlands will push the EU to suspend the trade component of the EU-Israel Association Agreement — a pact governing the EU’s political and economic ties with the Jewish state.
This latest anti-Israel initiative follows a recent EU-commissioned report accusing Israel of committing “indiscriminate attacks … starvation … torture … [and] apartheid” against Palestinians in Gaza during its military campaign against Hamas, an internationally designated terrorist group.
Following calls from a majority of EU member states for a formal investigation, this report built on Belgium’s recent decision to review Israel’s compliance with the trade agreement, a process initiated by the Netherlands and led by EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Kaja Kallas.
According to the report, “there are indications that Israel would be in breach of its human rights obligations” under the 25-year-old EU-Israel Association Agreement.
While the document acknowledges the reality of violence by Hamas, it states that this issue lies outside its scope — failing to address the Palestinian terrorist group’s role in sparking the current war with its bloody rampage across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
Israeli officials have slammed the report as factually incorrect and morally flawed, noting that Hamas embeds its military infrastructure within civilian targets and Israel’s army takes extensive precautions to try and avoid civilian casualties.
In a Dutch parliamentary debate on Gaza on Thursday, Veldkamp also announced that the government would not recognize a Palestinian state for now — a position that stands in sharp contrast to the recent moves by several other EU member states to extend recognition.
“The Netherlands is not planning to recognize a Palestinian state at this time,” the Dutch diplomat said.
“This war has ceased to be a just war and is now leading to the erosion of Israel’s own security and identity,” he continued.
This latest decision goes against the position of several EU member states, including France, which has committed to recognizing Palestinian statehood in September.
The United Kingdom has likewise indicated it will do so unless Israel acts to ease the humanitarian crisis in Gaza and agrees to a ceasefire.
For its part, Germany said it was not planning to recognize a Palestinian state in the short term, and Italy argued that recognition must occur simultaneously with the recognition of Israel by the new entity.
Spain, Norway, Ireland, and Slovenia all recognized a Palestinian state last year.
Israel has been facing growing pressure from several EU member states seeking to undermine its defensive campaign against the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas in Gaza.
On Thursday, European Commission Vice President Teresa Ribera strongly condemned Israel’s actions in the war-torn enclave, describing the situation as a “grave violation of human dignity.”
“What we are seeing is a concrete population being targeted, killed and condemned to starve to death,” Ribera told Politico. “If it is not genocide, it looks very much like the definition used to express its meaning.”
Until now, the European Commission has refrained from accusing Israel of genocide, but Ribera’s comments mark one of the strongest European condemnations since the outbreak of the war in Gaza.
She also called on the EU to take decisive action by considering the suspension of its trade agreement with Israel and the implementation of sanctions, while emphasizing that such measures would require unanimous approval from all member states.
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Graduate Student Unions Promoting Antisemitism, Reform Group Says
Students listen to a speech at a protest encampment at Stanford University in Stanford, California US, on April 26, 2024. Photo: Carlos Barria via Reuters Connect.
Higher-education-based unions controlled by United Electrical, Radio, and Machine Workers of America (UE) are rife with antisemitism and anti-Zionist discrimination, according to a new letter imploring the US Congress’s House Committee on Education and the Workforce to address the matter.
“Tracing its roots to communism in the 1930s, the UE is a radical, pro-Hamas labor union that has a long history of antisemitism,” the National Right to Work Foundation (NRTW), one of the US’s leading labor reform groups, wrote on July 30 in a message obtained by The Algemeiner. “The UE openly supports the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement, which is designed to cripple and destroy Israel economically. Today, the UE furthers its antisemitic agenda by unionizing graduate students on college campuses and using its exclusive representation powers to create a hostile environment for Jewish students. The hostile environment includes demanding compulsory dues to fund the UE’s abhorrent activities.”
NRTW went on to describe a litany of alleged injustices to which UE members subject Jewish student-employees in the US’s most prestigious institutions of higher education, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) to Cornell University. At MIT, the letter said, “union officers” aided a riotous group which illegally occupied a section of campus with a “Gaza Solidarity Encampment,” participating in the demonstration and even denying access to campus buildings. UE members at Stanford University, meanwhile, allegedly denied religious accommodations to Jewish students who requested exemption from union dues over that branch’s supporting the BDS movement. And Cornell University UE was accused of denying religious exemptions in several cases as well and followed up the rejection with an intrusive “questionnaire” which probed Jewish students for “legally-irrelevant information.”
The situation requires federal oversight and intervention, NRTW said, including Congress’s possibly clarifying that student-employees are not traditional employees and are therefore afforded protections under sections of the Civil Rights Act which apply to the campus.
“These continuing patterns of antisemitism are illegal, immoral, and must be stopped,” the letter continued. “We encourage you to do all that is in your power to investigate and help bring an end to the UE and its affiliates’ nonstop harassment and intimidation of Jewish students … The Trump administration can also use tools available to it under Title VI and Title VI of the Civil Rights Act against colleges who work with unions to create a hostile environment for Jewish students.”
July’s letter is not the first time NRTW has publicized alleged antisemitic abuse in unions representing higher education employees.
In 2024, it represented a group of six City University of New York (CUNY) professors, five of whom are Jewish, who sued to be “freed” from CUNY’s Professional Staff Congress (PSC-CUNY) over its passing a resolution during Israel’s May 2021 war with Hamas which declared solidarity with Palestinians and accused the Jewish state of ethnic cleansing, apartheid, and crimes against humanity. The group contested New York State’s “Taylor Law,” which it said chained the professors to the union’s “bargaining unit” and denied their right to freedom of speech and association by forcing them to be represented in negotiations by an organization they claim holds antisemitic views.
That same year, NRTW prevailed in a discrimination suit filed to exempt another cohort of Jewish MIT students from paying dues to the Graduate Student Union (GSU). The students had attempted to resist financially supporting GSU’s anti-Zionism, but the union bosses attempted to coerce their compliance, telling them that “no principles, teachings, or tenets of Judaism prohibit membership in or the payment of dues or fees” to the union.
“All Americans should have a right to protect their money from going to union bosses they don’t support, whether those objections are based on religion, politics, or any other reason,” NRTW said at the time.
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.