A group of approximately eight people entered Cafe Istanbul, a restaurant serving customers for eight years in Beverly Hills, at about 9 p.m. and started throwing tables and chairs around. The attack caused material damage to the restaurant. A customer with the initials F.T., who preferred not to disclose their name due to safety concerns, was in the restaurant and escaped through the backdoor during the attack.

“A group entered the restaurant while I was sitting in with my family inside. They started to attack, and we tried to protect ourselves. We sheltered in a building nearby after escaping from the backdoor, where we called the police,” F.T. said.

F.T. noted the police who were dispatched to the area after the assault said that an investigation within the scope of a hate crime will be launched.

Turkey’s Los Angeles consul general, Can Oğuz, said the restaurant had previously informed authorities about threats.

“These attacks remind us of the assassinations of our diplomats in Los Angeles in the 80s. I urge all Turkish citizens to closely follow this case,” he noted.

In the 1970s and 1980s, a total of 31 Turkish diplomats and their family members were killed around the world by the Armenian Secret Army for the Liberation of Armenia (ASALA).

After Azerbaijan started a military operation to liberate the occupied Nagorno-Karabakh region in September, Armenians have mounted attacks against Turkish citizens abroad. Last month, members of the Armenian community wounded four Turkish citizens while demonstrating on the A-7 motorway, connecting France’s Lyon and Marseille./ DS