VIN News - New York - Police ejected dozens of disruptive anti-Israel protesters from the New York City Council chamber during a debate on whether to adopt a resolution condemning boycotts of the Jewish State on Thursday.
The resolution in question, proposed by Council Member Andrew Cohen and supported by 33 of the council’s 51 members, proposes “condemning all efforts to delegitimize the State of Israel and the global movement to boycott, divest from and sanction the people of Israel.”
Protesters, some identifying as pro-Palestinian, some associated with the Black Lives Matter movement and Neturei Karta, among others, continually disrupted the hours-long proceedings, waving Palestinian flags and shouting that “Zionism is racism,” and “Free Palestine,” to the point that police emptied out the Council chambers’ entire top-floor balcony.
Contracts Committee chairwoman Helen Rosenthal, who was presiding over the meeting, implored the crowd to take a “deep yoga breath” and counted to three, to no avail, the New York Daily News reported.
New York City Councilman David Greenfield (Brooklyn – D) said he was “shocked by the depth of anti-Israel sentiment and naked anti-Semitism on display” at the meeting.
“Shocked, but sadly unsurprised,” Greenfield added. “Any time you hold the BDS movement and its supporters up to any kind of scrutiny, you find either that they are simply ignorant, or that their motivations are rooted in bigotry and hatred. We saw both kinds of BDS supporters at today’s hearing.”
During the debate, Greenfield reprimanded the leader of the anti-Israel ultra-Orthodox Neturei Karta sect Rabbi Yisroel Dovid Weiss, who staged a sit-in on the chambers’ floor.
Friday, September 09, 2016
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