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Nineteen people were arrested during the 'Flood Brooklyn for Palestine' rally in New York City over the weekend amid the ongoing conflict between Palestine and Israel, the New York Police Department said via the New York Post.
Sixteen protesters were arrested and issued criminal court summonses and three other individuals were detained but released on desk appearance tickets in relation to the rally, which authorities said escalated and became "pretty heated." The event shut down traffic in Bay Ridge for several hours and police said they struggled to contain the pro-Palestine protesters who were reported to have thrown eggs at officers and lit fires in the street.
A young woman who was seen trying to prohibit police from detaining another woman holding a "Zionism is Genocide sign."
“During the course of a planned protest for which a permit was not attained, officers encountered a mostly peaceful crowd,” an NYPD spokesperson said in a statement obtained by the New York Post. “Some demonstrators within the crowd chose to act in a combative and aggressive manner. Officers were pushed, shoved, and struck by some demonstrators within the crowd after the LRAD [long-range acoustic device] device was utilized.
“Officers were struck with flying debris which included eggs, fireworks, and bottles. Officers responded to this disruptive behavior and attempted to regain order by taking into custody those responsible for these actions,” the statement said. “The NYPD encourages peaceful protests but will not condone our officers being subjected to any form of violence.”
At least 1,400 people, including at least 31 American citizens, were killed and more than 3,400 were injured in the initial terror attacks on Israel by Hamas on October 7, ABC News reports. More than 4,300 people have died in retaliation attacks on Gaza as of Wednesday, the Hamas-run Health Ministry said via the Associated Press. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared, "we are in a war," in a video shared on social media after the attacks, which included land, air and sea as Hamas fighters infiltrated Israel's southern border and fired rockets from the Gaza Strip.
Netanyahu ordered an "extensive reserve mobilization" in retaliation for the unprecedented attacks. On October 11, the Gaza Ministry of Energy announced that the Gaza Strip's sole power plant has run out of fuel amid an Israeli blockade. The energy ministry said it was forced to shut down after supplies were cut off, leaving only generators to power the territory, while hundreds of thousands are displaced.