Pa.: 3 arrested as protesters

 

On the eve of the anniversary of Kristallnacht, a protest bike ride and boycott targeting several Jewish-owned businesses at Rittenhouse Square in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, led to three arrests and left two police officers with minor injuries.

The event drew widespread condemnation after being scheduled on the eve of Kristallnacht — the 1938 Nazi pogrom against Jewish homes and businesses in Germany that killed over 90 Jews and the mass arrest of 30,000 others.

The bike ride was reportedly organized by “Philly Bike On Your Left” an anti-fascist and anti-Zionist cycling collective, with critics denouncing the boycott as a direct attempt to intimidate Jewish business owners.

In response to the boycott, massive crowds of counter-protesters and community members showed up to support the targeted businesses.

Three people were arrested and two officers sustained minor injuries during an apprehension. A man and a woman were also arrested for disorderly conduct and a 17-year-old boy arrested for assaulting police, according to authorities per CBS News.

Ahead of the boycott, Pennsylvania Republican Attorney General Dave Sunday condemned the planned event, posting on X that holding it on the eve of Kristallnacht was “deeply unsettling.”

“The planned bike ride boycott of Jewish-owned restaurants in and around Rittenhouse Square on the eve of the anniversary of Kristallnacht is deeply unsettling. By explicitly targeting businesses because their owners are Jewish, the organizers are engaging in a form of discrimination that falls back on some of the oldest antisemitic tropes and tactics in history,” the post read. “This is not simply a protest directed at the policies of Israel, rather it singles out our fellow Pennsylvanians based on their Jewish identity, targeting them for policies they have nothing to do with and no ability to affect because of their faith. That is unconscionable in our Commonwealth which was founded on religious tolerance and unacceptable in a city that prides itself on brotherly love.” 

Nevertheless, Philly Bike On Your Left claimed the event was “grossly misrepresented.” The group stated that they boycotted the businesses due to the owners’ support for Israel rather than their Jewish identity, and added that they were unaware of the timing of the Kristallnacht anniversary.