Jeremy Lebewohl, the owner of the iconic New York City 2nd Ave Deli says he was shocked that the eatery was vandalized with a swastika after expressing support for Israel on social media.
Vandals painted anti-Semitic graffiti on his Upper East Side storefront a day after a tenant alerted him the eatery was defaced with a swastika.
Jeremy Lebewohl spoke with OAN: My initial reaction was just being shocked. I couldn’t believe that it was there. And then you have all the other emotions that would be obvious to be upset and sad about it, but I just said, okay, it is what it is. And unfortunately, to a certain extent, I’m somewhat jaded when it comes to anti Semitism and just Jew hatred in general in New York and the world. So I just posted on social media, and the silver lining was that so many people immediately were just shocked and horrified by it, and they wanted to stand up and say, no, that this is horrible. We don’t want it in our city…
…I think everyone has to feel the courage to say what’s right and wrong, and especially the past couple of years with different movements and different people being canceled for saying things that other people disagreed with. I think now is a time where something so horrible and horrific happened, and nobody should be ashamed or scared to stand up and say that rape is bad, that killing babies is bad, mutilating bodies is bad. This is something that everybody can say very confidently. And anyone who then wants to question that, challenge that or even cancel that individual, that person’s clearly standing on the wrong side of history and clearly has something very, very wrong with their moral compass.
Sadly a second swastika was found across the street of the deli.
2nd Ave Deli Vandalized with Swastika; Second Swastika Found Across Street https://t.co/T5mntHgn8r pic.twitter.com/rRziTIQsYh
— eastsidefeed (@eastsidefeed) October 18, 2023
Jeremy Lebewohl spoke with OAN on Friday.
