New York City’s only Ethiopian-Israeli restaurant has closed its doors for regular dining, citing the backlash it faced during the war in Gaza.
Beejhy Barhany, who opened Tsion Cafe in Harlem in 2014, recently announced that she is reimagining her restaurant as an event venue for culturally immersive experiences. That means no walk-ins, only group bookings made in advance.
Barhany sees the new model as a prime opportunity to educate New Yorkers about her culture. But she said the change represents a sad concession to the realities of Jewish life in the city since Oct. 7, 2023.
“Everything kind of changed — so much animosity,” she said. Things got even worse, she said, when she dropped meat from the menu in February 2024 to go fully vegan and kosher — a move that drew plaudits from Jews in the city but also raised Tsion’s profile among critics of Israel.
“I was proud to be Jewish. I wanted to illuminate that,” she said. “But from the moment we pivoted to be kosher, it became worse and worse.”
People would call the restaurant and harass whoever picked up the phone, Barhany said. One day, she recalled, a server at the restaurant was standing outside and “a bunch of Gen Z’s” passing through said, “Don’t ever come to this place. It’s owned by Israelis. By Zionists.”
While some Israeli restaurants that faced harassment drew public attention and support, Tsion, located off the beaten track in Harlem, did not. Barhany said she did not seek to publicize the incidents, hoping that they would recede in prominence. But they took a toll.
“It’s kind of tiring,” she said. “You’re here to nourish the community and it feels like you are perceived like the enemy.”
Hosting groups of Jewish visitors had offered a respite. So when Barhany recently took part in “StoryCourse: Diaspora,” in which she and three other Jewish chefs shared their recipes and their stories of how they made their way to New York, she realized it pointed toward a model of dining as a cultural experience, rather than a traditional restaurant.
In Tsion’s new model, guests will register in advance for “curated, culturally immersive and experiential events” that, at least at first, will focus on Barhany’s own culture.
“You will come and be immersed in the culture,” she said. “You will have a hand wash, Ethiopian-style, and we will bring frankincense. We will have a coffee ceremony and I will talk about Jewish Ethiopian cuisine, culture and history.”
Guests will be served Ethiopian foods like messer wot (red lentil stew), gomen hamli (braised collard greens) or qey sir (braised beets).
“I am calling it The Gursha Experience. Gursha is the Amharic word for nourishment, feeding, story telling,” said Barhany. It is also the name of her recently published cookbook, named by The New York Times as one of the best cookbooks of 2025, that showcases recipes in the context of her life story.
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