Many used to be anti-gun but their world has changed since October 7
The small sign on the door of Nature’s Delight kosher restaurant in the shadow of the Catskill Mountains in upstate New York is easy to miss: “Firearms Permitted On These Premises”.
As a wave of fear spreads throughout the US Jewish community triggered by October 7, such signs are becoming much more common as Jews have started arming themselves.
Many who were staunchly anti-gun the day before the terror attack are now applying for their own firearms licences as they look on in horror at an exponential rise in antisemitism.
More of them are women, by some accounts, than men. They fear that, in a country where there are more guns than people and mass shootings are so common they rarely make a dent in the daily news cycle, something very bad is coming.
David Khan, the owner of Nature’s Delight in the village of Monticello, needs only to reflect on his own family’s history, as he pours steaming coffee from a big diner-style pot, to explain why. And why he is making his 20-year-old son, Adir, get a handgun permit.