By BI: URTH CAFFE, a popular cafe in Laguna Beach is under massive social media attacks right now allegedly for asking a group of 12 Muslim women wearing Islamic headgear to leave the restaurant for no reason other than they were Muslims. What they didn’t know is that the cafe is owned by a Muslim woman and she approved of the action, which had nothing whatsoever to do with what they were wearing on their heads.

Imgur  Essentially, one of the women, Sara Farasakh, is claiming it is islamophobia and “racism” because they were wearing traditional jijabs and no other tables were asked to leave. Original FB post and videos here:

https://www.facebook.com/sara.farsakh.7/posts/10153865780844667

What Farasakh fails to include is the Caffe’s side of the story:

The restaurant’s response is that it was simply because they needed the table: “To be clear; they had been there for 4 hours. We gave them a 10 minute warning to either order more food or share their table with guests who needed it.

They were a party of 12, however only 4 of them ordered meals. They yelled at us, made a scene called us racist, so we asked them again to leave, they didn’t. We called the police only after our security stepped in and they refused to leave, the whole ordeal of getting them to leave took an additional hour.

They are now attacking us on Facebook and Yelp. I answer the phones to people calling me racist which is absurd. I was not even involved in the incident. I think our side of the story should be given equal weight.

Our seating policy is clearly posted as well as mentioned to you as your being sat. We gave them more time then we usually do, however they had more girls join them later on in the evening. Our owner is Muslim! She knew of the entire event and agreed that after they started yelling we needed to get the police involved!

After speaking to the Laguna Beach Police Department, OC Weekly has learned that Corporal Derek Short and Officer Zack Fillers arrived to Urth Caffé on Friday evening at 8:40 p.m. for a call made by an Urth Caffé manager about 12  women refusing to leave the cafe’s property.

“A business can refuse service if they want,” says Sargeant Kleiser, Laguna Beach Police Department’s Public Information Officer. “We usually advise people to cooperate first and deal with the issue later.” he says. Kleiser says if trespassing charges are pressed it would be initiated by Urth Caffé not the Laguna Beach Police Department but the department would have to enforce them.