Protesters Arrested At Chuck Schumer's Midtown Office

MIDTOWN MANHATTAN, NY — Seven people were arrested Monday morning during a protest at the Midtown Manhattan offices of Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer.

The protesters who were arrested blocked the doors to Schumer's office building, located on Third Avenue between West 48th and 49th streets, for 90 minutes, activist group IfNotNow said in a press release. Forty members of the group — a coalition of American Jews against Israel's occupation of Palestine — entered Schumer's office building around 9 a.m. and called on the senator to condemn Israel's violent response to protests along the border of Gaza and Israel.

"Senator Schumer claims to be a progressive champion and leader in the American Jewish community, so his silence in the face of Israel’s use of deadly force against Palestinian protesters is deafening. As American Jews and as constituents, we demand that Senator Schumer live up to both progressive and Jewish values and do the bare minimum that we could expect from any moral leader: condemn the use of live fire against protesters,” Becca Kahn-Bloch, one of seven protesters arrested Monday, said in a statement.

The protesters launched their demonstration by reading the names of the people killed during protests in Gaza since March 30 and reciting the Mourner’s Kaddish, IfNotNow said in a press release. After Schumer's staffers refused demands to release a statement condemning Israel, seven protesters attempted to block entrances to the building to disrupt "business as usual," the group said.

About 30,000 protesters flocked to the border of Gaza and Israel on March 30 for an event called the "Great Return March," the New York Times reported. During that march, an estimated 20 people were killed by Israeli soldiers, the Times reported. One week later, protesters again returned to the border and nine more were killed, the Times reported.

The protests are expected to continue every Friday until May 15, the Times reported. May 15 marks Nakba Day, which commemorates the expulsion of Palestinians from Israel during the Israeli war for independence in 1948, the Times reported.

Photos courtesy Gili Getz