Maybe not verbally, but if someone pulls out a knife and waves it in your direction, and the direction of your wife, I think that counts.
I think a lot of parallels can be drawn.
There is certainly no doubt that if he'd taken the knife away and then him and his mates kicked the living hell out of him, we would probably have never been told the story because the poster would be spending christmas looking at four walls of a sweedish prison.
Yes, an interesting and relevant story.