NY Jewish groups, Israelis protest against Netanyahu as he addresses UN

NEW YORK — Jewish groups protested against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in New York City on Thursday, with dozens arrested, as the Israeli premier addressed the United Nations General Assembly.

The protests by an array of Jewish groups representing different political views toward Israel and Netanyahu took place throughout the day around the city.

On Thursday morning, in Union Square in lower Manhattan, the Israeli-led expat activist group UnXeptable held a protest calling on Israelis to vote Netanyahu out of office in the election next month and distancing themselves from the Israeli government.

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Several dozen demonstrators held a banner that said, “Netanyahu, your time is up,” and chanted, “Throw him out.”

Organizer Offir Gutelzon told The Times of Israel that the protest was meant “to make a statement that on October 27, we have a huge opportunity for the Israeli people, for our brothers and sisters in Israel, to vote Netanyahu out.”

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“And our hope is to send a message to the world that will know that we are not our government,” he said.

The US-based Union for Reform Judaism cosponsored the rally, he said.

Many of the protesters waved Israeli flags and some held pictures of Israeli soldiers who were killed during Hamas’s October 2023 attack.

UnXeptable gained prominence in New York during mass demonstrations against the Israeli government’s judicial overhaul in 2023, before the start of the Gaza war. During the war, the activists shifted to advocating for the Israeli hostages in Gaza. Their attention has turned back to domestic Israeli politics since the hostages’ release.

During the rally, Tarek Bazrouk, a prominent anti-Zionist activist imprisoned last year for antisemitic assaults at protests, disrupted the event, shouting, “You guys kill thousands of babies,” and, “Free Palestine.”

Bazrouk became a cause célèbre among anti-Zionist activists in New York and was released in July.

In the afternoon, pro- and anti-Netanyahu Jewish groups gathered in Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza, across from the UN headquarters, in midtown Manhattan.

The two groups were adjacent to each other, separated by police barricades. There were several hundred anti-Netanyahu demonstrators and around two dozen pro-Netanyahu protesters.

The Netanyahu supporters blew whistles to drown out anti-Netanyahu speakers, shouted “shame” in English, and chanted “Bibi.”

The anti-Netanyahu crowd largely ignored them. They held signs saying “stop settler terror” and showing images of Palestinian war casualties. They chanted “shame” in Hebrew, a common chant of anti-government protesters in Israel.

The crowd held a moment of silence to “honor all the victims of violence,” while the prime minister’s supporters chanted, “Am Yisrael chai,” Hebrew for “The people of Israel live.”

While the Israeli-led anti-Netanyahu protest focused on domestic Israeli politics, the American Jewish leftists discussed both the upcoming Israeli elections and the Palestinian people.

The left-wing anti-Netanyahu event was organized by T’ruah: The Rabbinic Call for Human Rights, J Street, New Israel Fund, New Jewish Narrative, New York Jewish Agenda, Smol Emuni US, and Partners for Progressive Israel.

Two anti-Zionist protesters approached the groups. One got into a fight with a pro-Netanyahu protester and both were arrested.

A smaller group of around a dozen Israeli leftists, from a group called Israelis for Peace, gathered outside the Israeli consulate, chanting, “There is no military solution.”

The previous night, on Wednesday, hundreds rallied in the plaza, led by mainstream Jewish groups, to call on world leaders to prioritize the fight against antisemitism. The protest focused on the United Nations General Assembly, but not Netanyahu.

Eric Goldstein, the head of the UJA-Federation of New York, said that, while world leaders were gathered in the city to discuss global challenges, “We know they are not addressing the rampant proliferation of antisemitism around the world.”

“The United Nations, created out of the ashes of the Holocaust,” he said, “has allowed its sacred mission to be hijacked by a singular focus on condemning Israel. This must end.”

He demanded global leaders condemn antisemitism, without any equivocations, and create “serious national action plans” to oppose discrimination against Jews.”

The protest was organized by groups including the UJA-Federation of New York, the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York, the Anti-Defamation League, the American Jewish Committee and the Conference of Presidents and the Union for Reform Judaism.

There was overlap between the different events. Attendees of Wednesday night’s protest attended both the pro- and anti-Netanyahu rallies the following day.

Some of the activists from the UnXeptable rally joined the anti-Netanyahu protest at Dag Hammarskjöld Plaza, holding up their anti-Netanyahu banner to block out the opposing, pro-Netanyahu protest.

A member of the Chabad Hasidic movement milled between the pro- and anti-Netanyahu camps to wrap tefillin on attendees on both sides.

Hillary Barr, 67, hired two private security guards for the day of protests at the insistence of her son. She first went to the Israeli consulate on her own, holding an Israeli and a US flag, to show support for Israel.

After that, she joined the pro-Netanyahu rally, then crossed the line to speak with the anti-Netanyahu crowd.

“Everybody bleeds the same. Everybody has one heart, two lungs, a stomach. And I’m originally a nurse, so I take care of anybody that needs help,” she said. “People are taught to hate. They’re taught to hate. So we are lucky that we can speak. Let’s try to have a dialogue.”

Separately, the anti-Zionist Jewish Voice for Peace led a rally on First Avenue, just south of UN Headquarters.

The activists, wearing white shirts that said, “Fund people not bombs,” blocked traffic in an act of civil disobedience.

Police arrested 104 of the demonstrators who refused to clear the roadway, organizers said in a statement. Officers led a long line of handcuffed demonstrators onto a police bus, as protesters on the sidelines chanted, “None of us are free until all of us are free,” and “Free Palestine.”

The activists included several far-left politicians who won Congressional House primaries earlier this year and are expected to enter Congress — Darializa Avila Chevalier and Brad Lander of New York, Melat Kiros of Colorado, Adam Hamawy of New Jersey, and Chris Rabb of Pennsylvania.

Celebrities at the protest included actors Elliot Page, Susan Sarandon, Cynthia Nixon and Hannah Einbinder.

Chevalier and several New York City politicians were arrested, as well as Einbinder and Sarandon.