At Brooklyn’s Palestinian-owned eatery Ayat, a Shabbat dinner and discourse around war

The free Shabbat dinner at the Palestinian-owned restaurant Ayat in Ditmas Park was billed as an evening for breaking bread and barriers. Many attendees Friday – hundreds of Jews, Arabs, and others grieving the war in Gaza and Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israelis – said the gathering was just that, though the night was not without discomfort.

“The whole idea of the event is to bring people together,” said owner Abdul Elenani, 31, who picked up what he said was the $40,000 bill, his thanks to those who stuck by the restaurant after it was deluged with one-star reviews following the Hamas attack. “F— politics. Let’s talk about life. Let’s talk about each other.”

Strangers struck up conversations in the around-the-block line, passed around Tupperware containing Middle Eastern sweets, and cheered each other on as they tore off hunks of bread from a 6-foot-long loaf of challah.

Several diners said they came in search of a glimpse of hope and connection, amid fear of a widening conflict in the region. They ate, talked, sang, prayed and mingled past midnight — a rare coming together in a city where so much of the discourse about the violence has come over megaphones.

Michael Hirschhorn, 64, of Prospect Heights, said he was looking for “any light in the dark.” Eli Sheba, 31, an Israeli living in Brooklyn, said she wanted to affirm “anything that could bring hope during a time where reality is kind of crushing.”

Prayers led by Middle Eastern and North African Jews

Dozens of Jewish volunteers pitched in to help, printing off handouts of Torah selections, singing passages in Hebrew, and ensuring there was kosher food and tech-free zones for those following Shabbat…