Midtown Food Vendor Stabs Rival Cart Owner

Midtown food vendor life is rough, as evidenced by a knife fight today between two rivaling carts. A 30-year-old halal cook stabbed a nearby 35-year-old fruit vendor in the abdomen with a cooking knife, sending the fruit vendor to the hospital, the Daily News reports.

The two men were in an argument over turf when the violence escalated to a knife “poke,” police said. The halal food vendor set up his cart in an area at 44th Street and Fifth Avenue normally used by the fruit vendor.

Turf wars are common in that part of town, where soft serve trucks have long battled for space. Longtime ice cream truck giant Mister Softee and young disruptor New York Ice Cream have been fighting for several years now in a saga that includes threats backed by metal pipes, baseball bats, and drawn-out lawsuits.

• Halal food vendor stabs rival with cooking knife in Midtown [NYDN]
• As Summer Begins, NYC’s Soft-Serve Turf War Reignites [ENY]