No, Netanyahu wasn’t arrested during his UN visit, but those protesting against him were
Dozens of people were arrested in New York City while protesting against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's participation in the United Nations General Assembly on Thursday.
Thousands of people took part in protests held across the city, including a march organised by Jewish Voice for Peace and the Palestinian Youth Movement outside the UN headquarters.
Actors Susan Sarandon and Hannah Einbinder, as well as activist and whistleblower Chelsea Manning, were among the protesters arrested during a sit-in that blocked a main road leading to the UN.
Handcuffed and escorted by a New York Police Department (NYPD) officer, Einbinder was recorded in a video shared on social media saying, “Netanyahu out of New York, no bombs on Lebanon, no bombs on Iran, stop the genocide.”
Police also arrested politicians and political candidates, including New York City Council members Alexa Avilés, Linda Sarsour, Jennifer Gutiérrez, Chi Ossé, Darializa Avila-Chevalier, and Aber Kawas.
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Jewish Voice for Peace and the Democratic Socialists of America blocked traffic near the UN wearing shirts reading “Fund people, not bombs,” calling out Israel’s genocide in Gaza, and the ongoing US-Israeli war on Iran.
“I believe that everybody should be out in the streets,” New York State Senate candidate Kawas told Middle East Eye, hours following her arrest.
“I think there are more elected officials who need to speak out about Benjamin Netanyahu, a war criminal’s presence in New York State, in New York City," she said.
“I was proud to be out in protest, to even face arrest… because I think we're sending a message that we need more people to stand up for what is morally right in this moment.”
The International Criminal Court (ICC), located in The Hague in the Netherlands, issued an arrest warrant for Netanyahu in November 2024, with charges including using starvation as a weapon of war, murder, persecution, and directing attacks against civilians, dating from "at least 8 October 2023".
Arrested alongside Kawas was Ibtehal, a prominent New York City organiser with the Palestinian Youth movement.
“We were protesting the fact that a war criminal, Benjamin Netanyahu, hasn't been held to account, that the international community hasn't arrested this war criminal and hasn't enacted sanctions and an arms embargo for the crimes that he's committed,” Ibtehal told MEE.
Mamdani’s ‘performative nonsense’
Some of the public’s criticism was also directed at New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who had vowed during his campaign that his administration would use city police to arrest Netanyahu.
But in July, about eight months after his election, he announced that the city lacked the legal authority to execute the arrest warrant issued by the ICC.
While protests were held, Mamdani shared a video of himself planting an olive tree with Palestinian families from Gaza at Gracie Mansion, the mayor’s residence.
Nerdeen Kiswani, founder of Within Our Lifetime, a Palestinian-led community organisation, criticised Mamdani’s video, saying it was “a far cry from campaigning on arresting Netanyahu.
“So this performative nonsense is meant to distract from the fact that hundreds of NYPD vehicles escorted Netanyahu to the UN today, giving him a grander welcome than most, if not all, heads of state,” she wrote.
Instead of arresting Netanyahu, the NYPD arrested the protesters.
“This is the exact opposite of what Mamdani ran on,” she wrote.
‘Expel Israel from the United Nations’
Demonstrators who participated in the protests told MEE that the UN should not be giving Netanyahu a platform to speak, but he should be in The Hague on trial.
Thaer Ahmed, a doctor who volunteered in Gaza, told MEE people in Gaza were simply “trying to sleep at night and having 2,000-pound American bombs dropped on their homes.
“We were deprived of the supplies that we needed to be able to treat them, and we just had to watch one by one, brought in dead, killed by the Israeli military,” he said.
He added that the UN had lost its moral authority.
“I don't think that we should be listening to what anybody at the UN General Assembly has to say, especially not listening to a child murderer by the name of Benjamin Netanyahu.”
Carol Choke, a Jewish woman who has relatives who died in the Holocaust, told MEE that there’s a distinction between Judaism and Zionism, and that what’s being done in the name of Judaism does not reflect her religion.
“We take care of people, we tithe (give charity). We leave the edges of the fields for people to gather who don't have; we don't go destroying a whole culture,” she said.
Just as there were protests on the streets, there were also protests within the UN’s building on Thursday, as Netanyahu made his way to the podium to give his speech. Dozens of delegations stood up and walked towards the door, boycotting Netanyahu’s speech, with boos and jeers directed at him.
But Medea Benjamin, co-founder of Code Pink, a feminist grassroots anti-war organisation, told MEE that delegates walking out during Netanyahu's speech was not enough.
“What they have to do is say that we're going to sanction Israel first, then expel Israel from the United Nations. It shouldn't be allowed to participate,” she said.
Regarding Netanyahu’s statement during his speech that Israel has “no greater partner than President Trump”, Benjamin said she is outraged by the sale of US weapons to Israel.
“I think that any country that is still selling weapons to Israel should be overthrown by their people," Benjamin said.
“It shows that this country is not a democracy, because if it were, we would not be selling those weapons to Israel, and we would not have in our National Defense Authorization Act right now a section that says that we're going to intertwine the US and the Israeli militaries even further than they are now.
“That goes against everything that the majority of the American people want.”
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