‘What’s Wrong With You, You Antisemitic Freaks?’ Anti-Israel Activists Denounced for Disruption at New York Airport Train Station

A group of pro-Palestinian activists descended on the AirTrain terminal at Jamaica Station in Queens Wednesday to protest a reported Tel Aviv-bound shipment of armaments. The protesters angered passersby and commuters in the process. Footage posted on X showed the activists, many shielding their faces with masks and keffiyehs, standing outside the entrance to the AirTrain, which connects nearby subway stations to John F. Kennedy Airport, holding signs and chanting, “JFK, you can’t hide. You’re supporting genocide.”The group was protesting what was believed to be a shipment bound for an Israeli defense technology company, Elbit Systems, of 22,000 pounds of weapons and ammunition that was said to be departing from JFK. “JFK IS SHIPPING WEAPONS FROM ELBIT SYSTEMS THAT THE ISRAELI OCCUPATION FORCES WILL USE TO BOMB HOSPITALS, SCHOOLS, MOSQUES, AND REFUGEE CENTERS IN GAZA,” an anti-Israel activist group, Within Our Lifetime, said in a post promoting the rally on X.An anti-Israel demonstrator holds up a flyer listing allegations of an arms shipment passing through JFK airport. InstagramThe protest forced the Port Authority, which oversees the AirTrain, to restrict access at Jamaica Station to ticketed passengers only. Videos on X showed frustrated commuters carrying large rolling suitcases, confronting the keffiyeh-clad activists, many of them wearing face masks to conceal their identities, as the commuters waited in the long, slow line to the AirTrain.“You’re chanting to kill Jews like myself! What is wrong with you, you antisemitic freaks?” a man said to the protesters.“Show your faces if you’re proud of what you’re saying. Why are you hiding your faces?” a woman walking toward the AirTrain said to the group. Members of law enforcement engage with the anti-Israel demonstrators. InstagramIn the same video, a man and a woman are seen confronting a protester hiding behind a sign reading “JFK Ships Genocide.”“Let me see your double chin,” the woman tells the protester as she attempts to photograph his face with her smartphone. At the end of the video, the woman is escorted away from the group by her male friend, but not without saying, “You can put lipstick on a pig, but you’re still ugly f—ing pigs.”Sharing footage of the protest was Joel Petlin, the superintendent of schools for Kiryas Joel, the Jewish community in Orange County, New York. Mr. Petlin wondered how similar protests would be tolerated by a New York City mayoral hopeful, Zohran Mamdani, a vocal opponent of Israel. “Does anyone really believe that a ‘Mayor Mamdani” would direct the NYPD to arrest the protesters at JFK airport who are disrupting travelers – while they are proclaiming their desire to globalize the intifada?” Mr. Petlin posted on X.Mr. Mamdani has notably declined to condemn the phrase “globalize the intifada,” defending the slogan as “a desperate desire for equality and equal rights in standing up for Palestinian human rights.”Mr. Mamdani added that the U.S. Holocaust Museum used “intifada” in its Arabic translation of an article about the Warsaw Ghetto uprising on its website. The Holocaust Museum criticized Mr. Mamdani for exploiting the museum and the Warsaw Ghetto uprising to “sanitize ‘globalize the intifada.’”“Since 1987 Jews have been attacked and murdered under its banner. All leaders must condemn its use and the abuse of history,” the Holocaust Museum said on X.

‘What’s Wrong With You, You Antisemitic Freaks?’ Anti-Israel Activists Denounced for Disruption at New York Airport Train Station

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