‘We need to make them scared’: NYC synagogue protest crosses new red lines

NEW YORK — At a protest on Wednesday night at the entrance to a New York City synagogue, a masked demonstrator stood above the crowd and urged attendees to intimidate Jews.

“It is our duty to make them think twice before holding these events,” he said, referring to a gathering held inside the synagogue by Nefesh B’nefesh, a group that helps Jews immigrate to Israel.

“We need to make them scared! We need to make them scared! We need to make them scared,” he shouted, with the roughly 200 protesters in the crowd repeating each sentence in unison, a tactic the activists use to amplify their speeches without the use of a loudspeaker, which requires an additional permit.

There have been more than 3,000 protests in New York City since the October 2023 Hamas invasion of Israel, but the Wednesday night demonstration at the Park East Synagogue was an escalation, highlighting the new normal for the city’s Jews, despite the ceasefire in Gaza.

Protests erupted in the city on October 8, 2023, the day after the Hamas invasion, as activists gathered to celebrate the slaughter, provoking shock and outrage in the Jewish community. While anti-Zionist protests were already common, the demonstrations at the start of the war set a new tenor in their celebration of violence.

In the following months, the activists kept crossing red lines as the death toll climbed in Gaza, targeting cancer patients, vandalizing museums and libraries, disrupting holiday events, and demonstrating against memorials to the dead. The leading activist groups make clear that they do not seek coexistence, two states, or a halt to the conflict, but the annihilation of the Jewish state.

Below: Audio of a protest leader addressing the crowd outside the Park East Synagogue on November 19, 2025.

Demonstrations at synagogues have been relatively rare, though. There were scattered protests at synagogues in New York and nearby towns in New Jersey after the start of the war to demonstrate against events marketing real estate in Israel. The synagogues do not organize the events; organizers rent out space in the buildings. The synagogue protests tend to be especially vitriolic, as are demonstrations in heavily Jewish neighborhoods.

The Wednesday night rally marked an escalation in that it was the first to target such a prominent synagogue, in the heart of Manhattan, that was not selling real estate, and was marked by more ugly, threatening and violent rhetoric than usual.

Chants at the protest included:

• “Death, death to the IDF”
• “From New York to Gaza, globalize the intifada”
• “Say it loud, say it clear, we don’t want no Zionists here”
• “Resistance, you make us proud, take another settler out”
• “We don’t want no two states, we want ’48”
• “Resistance is justified”
• “No peace on stolen land”
• “Settlers, settlers, go back home, Palestine is ours alone”

Demonstrators had not previously chanted “death to the IDF,” or for death to anyone, at the dozens of protests The Times of Israel has covered in recent years, but the chant broke out repeatedly on Wednesday night. The “take another settler out” slogan was also new.

The protest was organized and advertised by leading activist groups in the city, including several student organizations.

“No settlers on stolen land. Protest the settler recruiting fair,” said the posts advertising the event.

The protesters were allowed to gather right next to the synagogue’s school entrance, forcing attendees to walk past them to get inside. The activists later posted videos of Jews entering the synagogue, branding them “settlers” in the videos, while activists shouted “shame” in the background.

The NYPD did not address a question about why the protest was allowed so close to the synagogue entrance, only saying that “The demonstration concluded and no arrests were made.” There was a heavy police presence at the scene and officers kept the anti-Zionist protesters apart from Jewish counter-demonstrators. The Jewish community generally commends the police for their handling of protests.

The demonstration was organized with the veneer of political protest in that it targeted an event, not the synagogue itself, but the activists repeatedly veered into outright antisemitism that had no relation to the event and was more extreme than the rhetoric at most protests.

One woman shouted, “Fucking Jewish pricks,” at passersby, while another yelled, “You’re part of a death cult,” while arguing with a man in a kippah. Another protester held a sign that said, “Pedophiles & rapists are running our government to serve ‘Israel,'” the text overlaid on a photo of US President Donald Trump and Jeffrey Epstein. Others shouted about the Hannibal Directive, referring to a conspiracy theory that says the IDF was responsible for the Israeli civilian deaths on October 7.

“You fucking rapist cunts. You fucking pedophiles. You fucking Epstein pieces of shit,” one woman shouted.

The presence of the fringe, anti-Zionist Naturei Karta Jewish sect also helps the activists head off allegations of antisemitism. Members of the tiny, extremist group are at the front of nearly every anti-Israel protest in the city. On Wednesday night, members of the group, which has been condemned by other non-Zionist Hasidic movements, repeatedly stomped on an Israeli flag.

The animosity was not one-sided — right-wing Jewish activists had circulated calls to show up for the counter-demonstration, saying, “Silence is not an option.” The two sides berated each other, flashed obscene gestures across the police barricades, beamed bright flashlights in each other’s faces, and hurled a plastic coffee cup back and forth.

The protest followed other recent incidents of antisemitism in New York City despite the Gaza ceasefire last month, pointing to a new normal for the city’s Jews, who are targeted in hate crimes far more than any other group.

In some of the recent incidents since the ceasefire, a Jewish educator was assaulted on the street; vandals scrawled swastikas on a Brooklyn yeshiva; “Fuck Jews” was spray-painted on a sidewalk; and a Muslim religious leader led a walkout of a college interfaith event while condemning the Jewish community representative as a “Zionist.”

The incidents come amid trepidation in the mainstream Jewish community after the far-left Zohran Mamdani, a harsh critic of Israel, won the election to become the city’s next mayor. Jewish New Yorkers have repeatedly expressed concern over how Mamdani will respond to protests at synagogues and in Jewish neighborhoods, which he has pledged to protect and laid out a plan for combating antisemitism. Mamdani earlier this year defended the protest slogan “globalize the intifada,” used at Wednesday’s protest, then later said he would “discourage” its use after coming under heavy pressure.

A Mamdani spokesperson, Dora Pekec, told The Times of Israel on Thursday, “The Mayor-elect has discouraged the language used at last night’s protest and will continue to do so.”

“He believes every New Yorker should be free to enter a house of worship without intimidation, and that these sacred spaces should not be used to promote activities in violation of international law,” Pekec said.

The group that held the event, Nefesh B’nefesh, does not direct immigrants to settlements, which much of the international community considers a violation of international law, although the group has information on its website about a few coordinators in the West Bank blocs who help immigrants.

Anti-Zionist activists often brand all Jewish Israelis as “settlers” to delegitimize Jewish existence in Israel.

Other New York leaders issued forceful condemnations, including the mayor, governor, and Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine, who will serve as the city comptroller in the Mamdani administration.

Mamdani on Wednesday confirmed that he will keep the well-regarded NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch in place, fulfilling a campaign pledge that had calmed centrists, including Jews, who were fearful about their safety due to Mamdani’s past criticism of police and issues, including attributing NYPD violence to Israel.

His keeping Tisch in place provoked a backlash from leading anti-Zionist activists in the city, though. The activists are from the same camp that organized the synagogue protest, underlining Mamdani’s tightrope walk between his far-left base and the city’s moderates.

Inside the synagogue on Wednesday night, the Nefesh B’nefesh event went on, with staffers greeting attendees at a table inside the synagogue door, within sight of the protesters. A Nefesh B’nefesh staffer said around 150 participants attended the “open house” event to discuss options for immigrating to Israel.

“There was more serious discussion of aliyah as an option than in previous, similar events,” the staffer said.