Jewish group calls on New York lawmakers to address ‘dangerous power grabs’ by anti-Israel protesters

A group of New York Jews wants the City Council to do something about the out-of-control anti-Israel protests ravaging the Big Apple, saying the noisy demonstrations have Jews fearing for their lives.

“I feel safer in Tel Aviv – which is currently a war zone – than in New York,” Shai Davidai, a professor at Columbia University, said at a news conference on the steps of City Hall on Wednesday. “For the past two weeks, there has been an area in Morningside Heights where Jews are not allowed.

“For six months, Jews have been withdrawing their ID cards from New York public schools,” he said. “Jews changed their names on ride-sharing apps so as not to be recognized as Jewish. The Jews tore down the mezuzahs, they hid stars of David to avoid being attacked.

“This is not a university problem. It’s a city problem.

The group is calling on lawmakers to toughen penalties for hate crimes, strengthen enforcement of protest permits, pass new laws against anti-Semitism and give police officers more leeway to act.

The comments come a day after NYPD officers in riot gear stormed the Columbia campus to destroy a pro-Palestinian encampment and flush out students who broke in and occupied historic Hamilton Hall.

Around a hundred demonstrators were arrested during the raid, the latest chapter in the anti-Israeli unrest that has rocked the five boroughs in recent months.

“They vandalized my window,” said Chen Levy, owner of a Jewish jewelry store in Manhattan. “They spray painted my front and they came and they tried to break my door, my glass door. Just telling these stories still makes me tremble.

Levy said she and her husband were once surrounded by a pro-Palestinian crowd while standing in front of their store “and tried to stick me with the flagpole.”

“Then they started showing up almost daily,” she said.

Anti-Israel protest on and around Columbia’s campus has been repeated across the country, as hordes of pro-Palestinian students – sometimes egged on by professional agitators – attack the Jewish state over of the war in the Gaza Strip.

Israel launched a counter-offensive in Gaza following a sneak attack by Hamas terrorists on October 7.

“We have these terrorist takeovers that are dangerous, that endanger the public safety of New Yorkers,” Jeanne Sprenger, a Jewish resident of the city, said outside City Hall. “They are dangerous, they are violent. They block interstate commerce. All of these things are against the law.

“Anarchy must have consequences,” she added. “It’s common sense.”