New York City police arrested 40 people at an anti-Israel mob-like protest in Brooklyn’s Bay Ridge neighborhood on Saturday.
The New York Post described a scene in which activists pushed back against New York City Police Department (NYPD) officers, who were forced to tackle some of them.
Protesters continued to fight with police as they were dragged away. One threw a water bottle at them.
“Don’t talk to the pigs, they don’t deserve our attention,” a woman shouted from the top of a U-Haul truck to loud applause.
Within Our Lifetime, a group that advocates the elimination of Israel and whose top activists have been linked to attacks on Jews, organized the “Flood Brooklyn for Gaza Rally.” About 250 attended.
The name given to the rally by the organizers suggests they identify with Hamas, a U.S.-designated terrorist group, as it appears to be a take-off on Hamas’s name for its Oct. 7 attack on Israel, “Operation Al-Aqsa Flood,” an assault characterized by torture, rape and the killing of civilians, including babies.
Handcuffed protesters were loaded into a police vehicle.
“The NYPD has spent over 400 million on Palestine protest alone,” the demonstrators chanted. “They told us to stop. But we will not rest. Until this city divests. Free, free Palestine,” they said.
Local residents expressed annoyance.
“Stupid, childish, just a bunch of people running around like assholes causing disruption. Selfish,” one man told the Post.
Within Our Lifetime is based in Bay Ridge in southwestern Brooklyn, a neighborhood that is home to the majority of Palestinians in New York City.
A week ago on Saturday, the NYPD arrested 150 anti-Israel protesters who took over the Manhattan Bridge and blocked traffic.
That rally was to commemorate the 76th anniversary of the “Nakba’” or catastrophe, better known as Israel’s War of Independence, when the nascent Jewish state beat back five invading Arab armies in 1948.
