Several of Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s progressive allies were arrested on Thursday blocking First Avenue hours before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was due to address the United Nations.
Darializa Avila Chevalier — who won a Democratic congressional primary earlier this year highlighting her opposition to Israel’s war in Gaza — City Councilmember Chi Osse, Assemblymember Emily Gallagher, and Gustavo Gordillo, the co-chair of the Democratic Socialist of America's New York City chapter, joined several dozen protesters blocking the street and carrying “End the Genocide” banners.
“You cannot enact a genocide and walk freely through the streets of New York,” Avila Chevalier told reporters as police assembled around the protesters.
The protest, organized by Jewish Voice for Peace, came as Netanyahu and Mamdani, who once vowed to arrest the Israeli prime minister for war crimes, traded attacks.
In a video previewing his remarks earlier this week, Netanyahu took direct shots at Mamdani, falsely accusing the city’s first Muslim mayor of inciting “riots” against Jewish New Yorkers.
“I'm coming to the U.N.,” Netanyahu said. “I'm going to tell the truth about our heroic soldiers and I'm going to tell the truth about you.”
Mamdani, who has become one of Netanyahu’s most prominent critics, has said he would not be out on the streets protesting Netanyahu's visit. Instead, he held a meeting with the prime minister of the Netherlands.
Public opinion has shifted sharply away from Netanyahu in the nearly three years since he unleashed a war in Gaza following Hamas' Oct. 7, 2023 attack on Israel. B’Tselem, a leading Israeli human rights monitor, and Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, have both said that Israel is committing a genocide in Gaza, joining Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International, the International Association of Genocide Scholars in making that determination.
In 2024, the International Criminal Court issued arrest warrants for Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, accusing them of war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.
Several blocks west of the protest, posters with Netanyahu's face appeared with the words "Wanted for Genocide."
Brad Lander, the former city comptroller who also won a Democratic congressional primary this year with Mamdani’s backing, attended the protest but moved out of the way when police started ordering people to clear the roadway. Lander told Gothamist he had a conflict later that afternoon and chose not to be detained.
" You try to figure out at each moment what's the best way you can contribute," he said.
More pro-Palestinian protesters are expected to gather later on Thursday to march from Bryant Park to the U.N. headquarters. On Wednesday, some of New York's largest Jewish organizations joined together for a rally against antisemitism.
Gustave Kerndt, a 25-year-old activist who traveled to New York City from Washington, D.C., to protest Netanyahu's speech, was visibly moved as Avila Chevalier was led onto a police bus in cuffs.
" It just shows how far we've come. I would've never guessed that members of Congress would be sitting in opposition to Benjamin Netanyahu coming to the United Nations," he said. "They're going to need bigger and bigger buses every single time a war criminal shows up in the United States."
