The Jews for Jesus Cafe Caught in a Battle Over the Sabbath

On the morning of Saturday, August 1, Yoel Ben David peered out the window of Café Basimta, the coffee shop he manages in central Jerusalem, to see about 30 ultra-Orthodox Jews protesting outside. Counter-protesters arrived around the café’s opening at 10 a.m., followed by police officers ready to guard the store.nside, customers drank lattes and ate croissants. At issue is the coffee shop operating on the Sabbath, which many ultra-Orthodox Jews, also known as Haredi Jews, believe violates the Fourth Commandment. While other hotels and restaurants in the neighborhood also remain open on Saturdays, Café Basimta, which is run by Jews for Jesus, is one of the few coffee shops to do so. The protests are the latest example of a long-standing pattern in Jerusalem, where some ultra-Orthodox Jews use pressure tactics, demonstrations, and occasional vandalism to persuade businesses—and even parking lots—to close on Saturdays. Get the most recent headlines and stories from Christianity Today delivered to your inbox daily. Explore more newsletters—don’t forget to start your free 60-day trial of CT to get full access to all articles in every newsletter. About an hour after the coffee shop opened, around 250 members of the ultra-Orthodox community—most wearing the typical Haredi dress of suit and fedora—poured into the courtyard in front of the café from four different alleys and attempted to push past the crowd of supporters, Ben David said. In recent weeks, dozens of ultra-Orthodox Jewish men and youth have demonstrated outside the café, chanting in Yiddish, “Sabbath, sabbath!” and, “Whoever breaks the Sabbath has no part in the world to come!” Ben David said. Many are between the ages of 11 and 17. The crowd on Saturday morning was the largest yet, overwhelming the five police officers present. Counter-protesters—who numbered 300 to 400 throughout the day—linked arms and attempted to assist the officers. Ben David—a Messianic Jew who has worked for Jews for Jesus for 22 years—called his police contact to request backup units. After hanging up, his concern deepened as he saw some of the protesters advancing past the metal barricades police had erected around the building and getting within four feet of the café’s entrance. They’re going to push their way in, and we’re all going to die, he recalled thinking. “I was freaking out in my head,” he told Christianity Today. In prior weeks, the ultra-Orthodox crowd had turned over outdoor tables and banged on the widows. A small group of reinforcements soon arrived, but Ben David said the police continued to clash with protesters for two hours before a larger unit showed up to help contain the crowd. Ben David with his wife Adel in front of Cafe Basimta. Image courtesy of Hannah Moshe Yoel Ben David with his wife Adel in front of Cafe Basimta. Jews for Jesus CEO Aaron Abramson knew the decision to open a coffee shop in Jerusalem with Saturday business hours would cause a stir among the city’s ultra-Orthodox. But he didn’t anticipate Café Basimta becoming a major flashpoint in the clash between the country’s secular and religious communities. In Jerusalem, the Haredim comprise around 46 percent of its Jewish population and only 13 percent identify as secular, the reverse of Israel as a whole. Jews for Jesus intentionally avoided opening a café in one of Jerusalem’s ultra-Orthodox neighborhoods, Abramson said. Instead, the shop is located in the center of the city, where very few coffee shops risk opening on Saturday. It opened on June 1 and began adding Sabbath business hours on June 13. Since the protests began in early July, Saturdays have become noisier in this typically quiet Jerusalem neighborhood. “Every Friday, we start gearing up because on Saturday, the police are there, the protesters are there, and the counter-protesters are there,” said Abramson, who lives in London but has talked regularly with Ben David since the protests began. “In a lot of ways, we’re managing it, but it’s gotten a little crazy.” Meanwhile, hundreds of the café’s supporters—primarily secular Jews—arrive each Saturday. “There have been lines of people showing up because they feel that their religious freedoms have been curtailed in Jerusalem,” Abramson said. Even after supporters learned of the café’s Messianic Jewish connections, many have continued to come out to demonstrate. The Haredi community once made up a small fraction of Israel’s population. Due to their high birth rates, the community now comprises more than 14 percent of the population and is expected to reach 22–24 percent by 2050. Many Israelis are concerned that ultra-Orthodox Jews fail to contribute their share to the country’s security and economic sectors. Military service is compulsory for most Jewish Israelis, yet the government has historically granted the Haredim exemptions to study the Torah full-time. Israel’s Supreme Court ended the exemptions in 2024, yet ultra-Orthodox Jews have largely avoided conscription. In July, Israel’s parliament circumvented the 2024 ruling with new legislation freezing the arrests of ultra-Orthodox draft evaders and enshrining Torah study as a “foundational value.” The move is largely viewed as an attempt to shore up support from religious parties ahead of fall elections that could bring down Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s ruling coalition. Haredi men participate in the national workforce at significantly lower rates than other Jewish Israeli men, and some ultra-Orthodox groups have attempted to shut down public transportation and other businesses on the Sabbath. Ben David said the Haredim refuse to issue kosher licenses to restaurants that open on the Sabbath. “We’ve had people reaching out to us saying, ‘Jerusalem needs to be more than just a city for ultra-Orthodox Jews,’” Abramson said. Jews for Jesus operates three additional coffee shops in Israel—two in Tel Aviv and one in Haifa. Those remain closed on the Sabbath since those cities have ample options for a Saturday cup of coffee, he added. Some Israeli news stories have framed the Jews for Jesus café in a positive light, while others have mischaracterized the group’s intentions, Abramson said. Some media outlets have amplified claims that Jews for Jesus hides its religious identity from café visitors and actively proselytizes and converts Jews. He believes that Jewish anti-missionary groups, including Yad L’Achim, are partially to blame. Jerusalem’s professional soccer team initially expressed interest in putting the café’s name on their jerseys as a sign of support, but then retracted the offer after learning about the coffee shop’s Messianic Jewish ownership, according to local news reports. Jews for Jesus said it is transparent about the ministry coffee shops it operates around the world but only recently featured the Jerusalem café on social media since it is relatively new. Abramson said the staff do not push their beliefs on customers but instead are available to talk to those who are spiritually curious. Ben David said he would like his critics to come experience the café for themselves. “I’ve been making jokes with some of the media, telling them, ‘You know, I don’t put crosses in the espresso, and the Lord’s Supper is not mixed into the latte,’” he said. “We’re not hiding [our identity], but what we’re not doing is forcing every person who gets a cup of coffee to deal with a metaphysical question.” The conflict has also amplified divisions within Israel’s religious communities. Some want to limit Sabbath activity due to concerns about open businesses adversely affecting their own community. Others feel they shouldn’t impose their convictions upon nonreligious Israelis and people of other faiths. Among Café Basimta’s supporters are around ten Orthodox Jews who arrive to support the coffee shop on Saturdays. Ben David provides free pitchers of iced coffee when they call ahead. Some ultra-Orthodox Jews have stopped in during the week for a cup of coffee and shared with Ben David their frustration over the protesters’ tactics. Some have pointed out that their violent behavior violates Jewish oral laws about the Sabbath. The Jerusalem-based Rossing Center has documented a rise in cases of harassment and physical attacks against Christian communities in Israel during the past two years, with most occurring in Jerusalem and involving young Jewish extremists. It lists incidents of physical attacks against clergy, church vandalism, verbal harassment, and anti-Christian propaganda. (Christians comprise around 2 percent of Israel’s population.) Spitting at clergy has become a routine form of harassment in Jerusalem, and surveys show that Haredi communities have increasingly adopted negative perceptions of Christians. Abramson said the Sabbath controversy is part of biblical debate about the nature of Sabbath. The Pharisees repeatedly challenged Jesus for healing people and allowing his disciples to pick grain on the Sabbath. “In many ways, that same debate has surfaced once again in the very city where it first took place,” Abramson noted. He said Jesus addressed the heart of the issue in Mark 2 when he said, “The Sabbath was made for man, not man for Sabbath” (v. 27). The ongoing standoff has required Ben David to add extra preparations to his Friday routine. He touches base with local police units about anticipated crowds and makes sure all of the sunshades are taken down so the security cameras have a full range of view. He also purchases 11 gallons of milk and 20 large bags of ice—about four times what he purchases on other days. “While the ultra-Orthodox are trying to shut us down, all they’ve done is just bring tons of people to the coffee shop,” Ben David said. “So they’ve increased our business by a lot.” He is encouraged by the show of support in a city where religious disagreements can often produce contentious debates. “God has been amazing in the way that he’s provided [for] the people who care” about the right to open on Saturdays, Ben David said. “They want to be able to have a space, a country, in which they don’t have to fear this kind of behavior.”