Boycott Ride Ends With 3 Arrests
About 200 counterprotesters turned out in Rittenhouse Square on Sunday to oppose a bicycle “boycott ride” targeting six Jewish owned restaurants, and police reported three arrests and no property damage before the crowds dispersed just after 1 p.m.
The Philadelphia Police Department said about 500 people took part in all. Roughly 300 pro-Palestinian demonstrators, about 200 of them on bicycles, rode through the neighborhood, while about 200 counterprotesters gathered to oppose them, according to police figures reported by Fox News and NBC10.
The ride, organized by Philly Bike On Your Left, set out Sunday morning from Rittenhouse Square. The group, which describes itself as an anti-fascist and anti-Zionist cycling collective, named six restaurants it said should be boycotted over their owners’ support for Israel: Mac Mart, K’Far Cafe, Huda, Goldie, Dizengoff, and Schlesinger’s.
Counterprotesters waving Israeli flags filled the square, and dozens of diners lined up outside the targeted restaurants in a show of solidarity, Fox News reported. NBC10 reported at least one physical altercation, with police pulling one protester away from another. 6abc reported clashes, including one at 18th and Walnut streets. A female counterprotester told police she was assaulted by an unknown individual, according to Fox News.
Police arrested three people, the department said: a woman accused of assault, a man accused of disorderly conduct, and a 17-year-old accused of assaulting police. Two officers suffered minor injuries while detaining one person, and neither needed medical treatment, Fox News reported. CNN, citing the department, reported that all demonstrators had dispersed just after 1 p.m.
The organizers pushed back on the criticism before and after the ride. The group said it had been “grossly misrepresented” and that it is “firmly against racism and oppression of all forms, including fascism, antisemitism, islamophobia, and colonialism,” CNN reported. “The reason we are calling for a boycott of these businesses is because of their support for Israel,” the group said in a statement. The Philadelphia Democratic Socialists of America said politicians had “joined a chorus of bad-faith and dangerous conflation of antisemitism with anti-Zionism,” while adding that “Jewish businesses and shops belong in Philadelphia.”
City and state leaders condemned the ride. Mayor Cherelle Parker said “singling out businesses because their owners are Jewish is unacceptable and has no place in our city,” CNN reported. Gov. Josh Shapiro’s office said the ride was “designed to intimidate and drive Jewish businesses out of our communities,” and on Sunday afternoon Shapiro thanked Philadelphia police and Pennsylvania State Police, saying “the City of Brotherly Love showed up to support our neighborhood businesses and prove once again that hate has no place in our Commonwealth.”
The ride fell on the eve of the 88th anniversary of Kristallnacht, the November 1938 Nazi attacks on Jewish homes, synagogues, and businesses in Germany and Austria. The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum said in a social media post that “antisemites chose that anniversary to terrorize Philadelphia’s Jewish community.” The nonprofit JewBelong put up more than a dozen billboards around the region ahead of the ride, including one reading “Running over Jewish businesses isn’t a peace plan,” according to WPVI.
Michael Balaban, president and CEO of the Jewish Federation of Greater Philadelphia, told WPVI, “When people come to attack the Jewish community, we want to meet those attacks tenfold, a hundredfold with people.” He told 6abc, “The only way to push back at hate is to show love.”
Organizers say a second ride is planned. FOX 29 reported the group promoted a “ride of return” for November 15, and 6abc reported a second ride next Sunday. Philly Rhino covered the planned ride on November 5, when the mayor condemned the boycott before it took place.
