By Ellen Moynihan
New York Daily News
(New York Daily News) — Pro-Palestinian protesters briefly disrupted and blocked the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade Thursday, leading to 21 arrests, police said.
Activists poured onto the parade route on Fifth Ave. at W. 55th St., blocking a Ronald McDonald float, about 9:25 a.m., about an hour after the beloved world-famous parade kicked off.
The demonstrators, some holding a banner reading “Don’t celebrate genocide” and “Arms embargo now” blocked the path of the procession, now in its 98th year, for several minutes.
One protestor could be seen on the ground surrounded by members of the NYPD, while another went limp as he was dragged away by two cops. Police arrested 21 protesters. Charges against them were pending.
Mayor Eric Adams vowed Wednesday there would be no interruptions of the festivities by “grinches” on the parade route due to an increased police presence.
“I want to take the moment to tell those grinches that believe they are going disrupt the parade, it’s not going to happen,” the mayor said at a press conference. “Just as we responded last year, we are going to be on top of those who attempt to interrupt the parade in anyway possible.”
NYPD Chief of Department Jeffrey Maddrey said Wednesday cops would be prepared to head off any protest and there would not be a repeat of 2023’s spectacle.
“Last year we had to deal with it and we didn’t allow it to stop the parade. We were able to push the parade over. We allowed the parade to continue and we were able to take the protestors in,” Maddrey said, adding that there were some 40 arrests last year.
During last year’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, demonstrators jumped the barricades at Sixth Ave. near W. 45th St. around 10 a.m. Some demonstrators glued their hands to the asphalt, making it more challenging for police trying to round them up.
Also in November 2023, 7 were arrested during a pro-Palestinian protest two blocks from the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree-lighting ceremony.
About 1,000 took part in last year’s tree-lighting protest, and about half the group were left in the crowd when there was a faceoff with police near W. 47th St. and Sixth Ave., near Fox News headquarters. Multiple people were pepper-sprayed by officers in the ensuing melee.
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