The Shawarma Connection (Conexión Shawarma) is an Arab-Muslim brotherhood of the Bronx in the alternate New York of MYM, a known neighborhood institution: food delivery, a source of work and, beneath both, a channel for the distilled power of the gods.
| Type | Organization |
| Leader | Habibi, “the kebab” |
| Spanish entry | La Conexión Shawarma |
Members
- The Habibi family is the core. Jadir Habibi became linked to the mission “through a shawarma”: food is the contact protocol.
- His cousin, a member, keeps the stand where things are left: “Cousin Habibi has a lamb… It’s his first shawarma.”
- Habibi, “the kebab”, leads the whole; the Connection is also described as an organization of Islamic superheroes.
- Kabil, who wears a turban, “is from the Shawarma Connection”.
- Hired delivery workers, the Shawarma Nation shop (“the business across the street”), the stand used as a depot, and a truck route.
Entry is by kinship and community.
Three layers
- Food: home delivery of Arab food from a legitimate shop.
- Brotherhood: “thanks to the Shawarma Connection there is work for people who can make a quick delivery”. Delivery is how anything urgent is hired and moved, and how newcomers find work.
- Traffic: “Habibi’s shawarma post” is a dead drop for the drug, and the Connection reportedly “took a truck to go fetch some of this distilled power”, the divine essences.
Territory
Another business stands across from Shawarma Nation. Muslims and Italians have had “problems over generations”, so the brotherhood holds ground disputed since before it became a trafficking network.
Co-option
The Connection is named as an enemy (“they have an enemy… the Shawarma Connection”) and has been co-opted: someone uses it from inside, so its deliveries and jobs no longer answer only to the brotherhood. Whoever controls it holds a distribution channel with legal cover, available labor and access to the distilled power, which makes it central in the Bronx and the city.
Conflicting accounts
- It is called the Shawarma “Connection”, “Commission” and “Operation”; whether “Operation Shawarma” is a specific action within it is open.
- Shawarma Nation may be its headquarters, a franchise, or the rival business across the street.
Open questions
- Who co-opted it, and when, is not recorded.
- What a “quick delivery” pays, and how it differs from a food delivery, is unknown.
- Whether its Islamic superheroes have powers, and whether these come from the trafficked essences, is not stated.
- Size, entry by contract, headquarters, vehicles beyond “a truck” and recognition signs are not recorded.