OAN Staff Katherine Mosack and
2:45 PM – Thursday, November 20, 2025
A mob of around 200 anti-Israel protesters surrounded a prominent New York City Synagogue on Wednesday, loudly chanting “Globalize the intifada” — seemingly inciting global violence against Jews and Israelis — echoing the deadly tactics of past intifadas such as stabbings and bombings.
The phrase has been labeled as hate speech, linked to rising antisemitic incidents post-2023, according to the ADL. The phrase also gained more traction in 2023 amid the Israel-Hamas war, and it is part of broader anti-Israel slogans such as “From the River to the Sea,” often used in encampments and protests.
On the flip side, pro-Palestine voices argue that the phrase is merely “metaphorical” and empowering, despite critics pointing to its correlations with violence.
The demonstrators gathered on Wednesday outside the Park East Synagogue in Manhattan. At the time, an event was being held by Nefesh B’nefesh, a Zionist organization that assists American Jews immigrating to Israel.
“It is our duty to make them think twice before holding these events,” one angry protester told the crowd. “We need to make them scared. We need to make them scared. We need to make them scared.”
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Video footage also shows the group of 200 chanting, “Resistance you make us proud, take another settler out,” and “From New York to Gaza, globalize the intifada!” to the beat of a drum.
On Thursday, Park East Synagogue Cantor Benny Rogosnitzky referred to the display as “very disturbing.”
“While the right to protest is an inherent right, last night was very disturbing, because the chants that were made by the pro-Palestinian group were chants like ‘Kill the Jews,’ ‘Destroy Israel,’ ‘No Jews in America,’ — the sort of language that you never want to hear at a protest on either side,” he told The New York Post. “And a lot of people were very, very concerned in the community about those protests and about what was being chanted at them.”
A Jewish counter-protest also gathered soon after, yelling, “You’re cowards” at the anti-Israel group.
New York Police Department (NYPD) officers separated the two groups with a metal barricade, though no arrests or injuries were reported.
Rabbi Rogosnitzky thanked the police for their strong presence, saying he was grateful for the “full force” response. He added that he hopes the NYPD will continue to answer such calls just as swiftly when Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani takes office in January.
“We hope that the incoming mayor will continue the same line of reinforcing the NYPD, supporting them while allowing peaceful protests, not allowing protests where people are attacked or feel threatened in any way,” he said.
Mamdani has faced scrutiny over both his Muslim faith and his “progressive” stance on policing. He has made statements in the past explicitly calling to “defund the police,” which in the context of his remarks implied cutting budgets and reducing the NYPD’s size or role.
Mamdani also previously argued on social media that the police should be defunded and dismantled in 2020 after George Floyd’s death led to widespread Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests and riots. One of his plans even involves replacing police officers with social workers for picking up certain 911 calls—an approach that has so far proven unsuccessful in New York City.
When Mamdani takes office next year, he will become New York City’s first Muslim mayor. In a city with the largest Jewish population of any metropolis outside Israel, his past refusal to condemn the slogan “Globalize the intifada” has sparked significant concern as well.
Meanwhile, members of the community condemned the scene near the synagogue on Wednesday and later on Thursday, with ADL New York bluntly labeling it “a display of blatant antisemitism.”
“No one going to a house of worship or walking the streets of New York City should face such hatred,” the ADL said in its statement.
Incumbent New York City Mayor Eric Adams (D-N.Y.) also chimed in on X, saying that what happened at the place or worship “was totally unacceptable no matter your faith or background.”
“This type of protest and vile language should concern us all. When you desecrate one house of worship, you desecrate them all. I’ll be visiting Park East Synagogue to stand with our Jewish community when I am back in town,” he wrote.
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