Late last year, the new owners of a venerable restaurant in the main street of our little Tasmanian town decided to fly a ‘Palestinian’ flag from their upper floor. A week or so later, they posted in the local Facebook ‘chit chat’ group begging for customers, because they’d had ‘an unusual number of cancellations’.
The flag disappeared the same day.
Life comes at you fast, as they say. Or, as they also say, ‘fuck around and find out’.
Another restaurateur may be about to learn the same lesson, on an even bigger scale.
The wealthy owner of the Nomad restaurants in Sydney and Melbourne has been revealed as the protester arrested after allegedly holding up a swastika sign superimposed over an Israeli flag at Sunday’s pro-Palestine rally in Sydney.
Alan Yazbek has been charged with knowingly displaying a Nazi symbol in public after he allegedly held the sign, which bore the words “Stop Nazi Israel”.
Surprise, surprise, an Arabic surname. Even bigger surprise, peddling textbook anti-Semitism.
Yazbek and wife Rebecca, an interior architect, have run the popular Surry Hills restaurant Nomad since 2013.
Surry Hills was once the center of the Sydney rag trade, which attracted thousands of post-war Jewish refugees. While the epicentre of Jewish Sydney has moved a couple of kilometre east, smearing the Jewish state as ‘Nazis’ when so many of your prospective local clientele are Jewish doesn’t exactly seem a smart business move.
The Australian understands several patrons rushed to cancel bookings on Tuesday night after news of the charges spread among the Jewish community.
Not to mention that it’s completely and utterly morally bankrupt – and against the law.
Nomad’s sister restaurant, Beau, closed this year after only 18 months, with the Yazbeks citing the downturn in restaurant trading.
Let’s see if his career takes the same turn as other hateful ‘protesters’, like ‘Tomato Boy’, aka Eli Rubashkyn, aka Eliana Golberstein and aka Sasha Rubashkina, (this fellow changes his name more often than he changes his panties).
On Sunday, Mr Yazbek joined the crowd of 10,000 pro-Palestine protesters who had been given permission to march through the streets of Sydney’s CBD, but police allege the 56-year-old failed to heed warnings not to display offensive material.
After being placed under arrest, Mr Yazbek was taken to Surry Hills Police Station where he was charged and granted bail, under which he is prohibited from going within two kilometres of Town Hall, except to attend his restaurant and various business offices for work.
Or even better, International Departures at Kingsford Smith airport.
Fuck around and find out, pal.
Update:
Mass cancellations have been reported at his restaurants, and it has further emerged that Yazbek also waved a mock-Hezbollah flag, as protesters tried to evade a ban on symbols of the proscribed terror group.
The future of the Nomad restaurant empire built by Al Yazbek could be under threat following the revelation the 56-year-old founder is facing charges after allegedly holding a Nazi sign at a pro-Palestine rally, with the group’s social media pages flooded with hundreds of messages of disgust and a boycott threatened by long-time patrons [...]
Mass cancellations have been reported at Mr Yazbek’s popular Nomad restaurants in Sydney and Melbourne, as well as at the French-inspired Reine & La Rue in Melbourne’s CBD [...]
The Herald Sun reports on Wednesday that at least five of Melbourne’s most well-known corporations had cancelled their events at Reine & La Rue, with several others saying they’re re-evaluating their plans. Late last month G.H. Mumm proudly announced their collaboration with Reine & La Rue as the caterers in their lavish Birdcage marquee during the Melbourne Cup Carnival.
The French champagne house confirmed: “G.H. Mumm is reviewing its partnership.”
