Dear Rabbi Gross & Members of the Rabbinical Committee of Keystone-K,

We are writing to you to express our extreme disappointment in your representation of our Jewish community with regards to your handling of New York Bagels. We, the Jewish Community of Greater Philadelphia, joined by members of Jewish communities all over the world, stand firmly with the state of Israel (the Jewish homeland) and against antisemitism and we expect our leadership to reflect this stance in every action it takes.

Due to the fact that there was never any clear and direct communication from you to our community at large, leading to many different rumors being dangerously spread, we feel it necessary to start by restating the indisputable facts.

For more than a decade, Mr. Naser Irsen Abdallah (aka “Nick Sammoudi”) and/or close relatives of his, have owned and operated New York Bagels, located at 7555 Haverford Avenue in Philadelphia. For the large majority of this time New York Bagels received Kosher Certification from the Keystone-K and currently still does.

In October 2024, a member of our community discovered that Nick had an Arabic Facebook Profile (separate from his English Facebook Profile known to his Jewish customers) with a different name – Naser Irsen. The Arabic profile was filled with antisemitic posts, both by Nick and his Facebook friend connections, glorifying the killing of Jews and promoting the destruction of Israel (the Jewish homeland), including, but by no means limited to, the following:

• On the day after October 7, 2023, the deadliest day in Jewish history since the Holocaust, Nick posted a celebratory Facebook post quoting a verse from the Quran stating “A promise fulfilled!”, along with the caption “The truth of G-d is great!”.

• On October 12, 2023, Nick posted a screenshot of a private text between himself and his landlord, in which Nick mocked his landlord for having asked him to put up an Israeli flag in his store window in solidarity with Israel, and rather in response, Nick wrote "Hahaha" and sent his landlord a video of Israel bombing civilians in Gaza.

• On July 4, 2024, Nick posted Surah Al-Isra (The Night Journey), verse 5 in the Quran to his Arabic account. This Surah begins by mentioning the blessings given to the Children of Israel and their subsequent corruption and disobedience. The verse he posted states that when the first promise of punishment came to pass, Allah sent against them servants of His who were mighty in warfare, and that these servants invaded Jewish homes and fulfilled the divine promise of retribution. Later, in the comments section of the post, when one of Nick’s Facebook friends questioned him as to how he reconciled being for violent resistance against Jews despite local Jews being his “friends”, he replied “I swear to G-d, Abu Ahmed, I am following and observing these people [local Jews] greatly, and just for the record, I cut contact with them permanently.”

On Nick’s English Facebook profile there are no posts in anyway similar or comparable to the posts on his Arabic Facebook profile. Nick only used his English Facebook profile to be friends with Jews in our community, keeping his Arabic Facebook profile and true vile antisemitic views separate and secret from us and intentionally leading a “double life” online.

When this was uncovered in October 2024, several members of our community brought this information to the Keystone-K and at your request, these community members consulted with law enforcement and multiple intelligence groups who analyzed Nick’s Arabic Facebook profile and confirmed that the profile clearly displayed extremist views that were pro-violence toward Jews. Moreover, they found that Nick had direct connections on Facebook to known radical Islamic extremists.

After these community members provided all of this information to you, it was assumed and implied that the next steps would be straightforward. The Keystone-K would (i) undoubtedly revoke or at the very least, not renew, the Kashrus Certification on the grounds that the owner/operator could no longer be trusted, and (ii) clearly communicate directly with all leaders of our Jewish community to enable them to inform and protect their individual members.

Not only were none of these steps taken, instead, on November 8, 2024, the Keystone-K issued a letter that grossly misrepresented the gravity of the situation by stating it was aware of the Facebook page of “an employee at New York Bagels.” This was a blatant and disingenuous whitewashing of the facts. The individual in question was not merely an employee but an owner/operator of the bagel store for over a decade, who had an account filled with vile antisemitic content. Then, in an utterly baffling move, the Keystone-K elected to renew the Kashrus Certification for New York Bagels on January 1, 2025. This decision is not only inexplicable but also a profound betrayal of our community’s safety and trust. Moreover, when contrasting the Keystone-K’s response to that taken by several local synagogues and Jewish day schools (of which certain of you also hold leadership roles) who decided to take immediate safety measures of banning Nick and New York Bagel products from its premises, your actions and decisions become even more dangerously incomprehensible.

We, the Jewish Community of Greater Philadelphia, joined by members of Jewish communities all over the world, are unwavering in our commitment when we proudly proclaim “We stand with our brothers and sisters in Israel” and “Never Again is Now.” Not only are we pouring our hearts and souls into the Tehillim prayers we read daily storming the heavens and beseeching G-d to protect the soldiers of the IDF, but we jump at the opportunity to loudly confront any notion that Israel and the Jewish people do not deserve to exist. Here, at our front door, was the easiest opportunity to back up our words with actions and demonstrate to the world that anyone who chooses to celebrate the murder, rape, mutilation and kidnapping of our people cannot be accepted by our community. In October, we approached Keystone-K in a collaborative and respectful way. We are now six months post these conversations, and we cannot continue to sit back quietly waiting for you to take action.

Therefore, we hereby demand that you immediately (i) revoke the Keystone-K’s Kashrus Certification of New York Bagels and (ii) clearly communicate directly with all leaders of our Jewish community enabling them to inform and protect their individual members.

Sincerely,