Arutz Sheva reported that an Israeli couple was expelled from a restaurant in downtown Naples, Italy, after the owner told them, “You’re Israelis, you’re not welcome here.”
By Rachel Avraham
Arutz Sheva reported that an Israeli couple was expelled from a restaurant in downtown Naples, Italy, after the owner told them, “You’re Israelis, you’re not welcome here.” According to the report, the incident was documented in a video that went viral on social media and was widely covered in the Italian press.
The video of the incident depicts an exchange between the restaurant worker and an Israeli couple in which the worker can be heard blaming the customers for deaths in Gaza, the Jerusalem Post reported. Yedioth Achronot added that the restaurant owner allegedly called on them to support a protest against “Israeli apartheid and the Palestinian genocide.” When they refused, the restaurant owner demanded they leave the premises, Yedioth Achronot stressed. According to the Jerusalem Post, the couple claimed they were turned away solely because they are Jewish-Israelis, and called the incident an act of discrimination.
The restaurant – La Taverna di Santa Chiara – posted a statement on its Facebook page in defense of its actions, the Jerusalem Post emphasized. According to the report, it wrote that the customers had implied “support for the crimes of the Israeli government against the Palestinian people.”
“As conscientious citizens, we condemn the ongoing Palestinian genocide as a crime against humanity,” the post read, the Jerusalem Post noted. According to the report, it added that it had a responsibility to take a stand “within the campaign of free zones from Israeli apartheid against the ongoing Palestinian genocide.”
The Jerusalem Post reported that the restaurant owner, Nives Monda, said on Facebook that the incident was sparked by a conversation between the Israeli couple and the couple seated at the table next to them about the beauty of Israel and the recommendation that the other couple visit. According to the report, Monda said she intervened to state her restaurant’s choice to stand against “Israeli apartheid.”
“We experienced antisemitism firsthand. We never imagined this could happen in Naples, a city that promotes freedom,” said Gili Moses, one of the Israeli tourists who was targeted in Naples, who described the event as “embarrassing” and added that the couple is considering filing an official complaint, Arutz Sheva reported.
The incident drew a wave of reactions in Italy, with some voicing support for the couple and condemning the restaurant owner’s conduct, while others expressed solidarity with her political stance, Yedioth Achronot reported. According to the report, the restaurant released a statement denying any antisemitic motive and reaffirmed its support for the Spazi Liberi dall’Apartheid Israeliana campaign, which translates loosely as “Spaces Free from Israeli Apartheid.”
According to the recent report on antisemitism that was put out by Tel Aviv University, the Observatory of Antisemitism of the Contemporary Jewish Documentation Center (CDEC) recorded 877 incidents in Italy in 2024 (600 incidents online, 277 in the “real-world”) compared to 454 incidents in 2023 (259 incidents online, 195 in the “real-world”) and 241 incidents in 2022 (164 online, 77 in the “real-world”). This means that antisemitism in Italy is on the ascent as the Gaza War progresses.
According to the report, the 277 “real-world” incidents included eight physical assaults, compared to one incident in 2023, two in 2022, five in 2021, one in 2020, and two in 2019. In one case, in April 2024 in Milan’s Corso Indipendenza, an elderly Jewish man wearing a kippah was walking his dog past an anti-immigration protest when one of the protestors lunged at him, knocking him down, and then tore off his kippah and trampled it while calling him a “dirty Jew.”
The Tel Aviv University report also added that in 2024, CDEC recorded 11 acts of vandalism and 99 acts of graffiti compared to 10 acts of vandalism and 67 acts of graffiti in 2023 and six and 28 in 2022. According to the report, one act of graffiti in May 2024 in Lido di Venezia read, “Damn Jews, we will search for you house by house all over the world to slaughter you and your children.”
Photo from Richard Nevell: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naples#/media/File:Napoli_-_Maschio_Angioino_-_202209302342_3.jpg