DOZENS of pro-Palestinian protesters in the United States charged a line of police in an intense standoff with officers outside the Israeli consulate on the second night of the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Chicago.
Protesters on Tuesday chanted “Let them go!” as police handcuffed at least four people and led them away from the demonstration. Officers carrying wooden clubs shouted “move” and penned the demonstrators in on the street, preventing them from marching.
Some demonstrators set a US flag on fire in the street as the celebratory roll call for Vice President Kamala Harris took place inside the United Center about 3.2km (2 miles) away. Others carried Palestinian flags, while many others wore black and covered their faces.
As protesters regrouped and approached a line of police in riot gear in front of a Chicago skyscraper that houses the Israeli consulate, an officer said into a megaphone, “You are ordered to immediately disburse.”
A woman in the front of the march shouted back with her own megaphone: “We’re not scared of you.”
A man in a Chicago Bulls hat, his face covered by a balaclava, called on protesters to “shut down the DNC”.
The group, which is not affiliated with the coalition of more than 200 groups that organised Monday’s protests, advertised the demonstration on Tuesday under the slogan, “Make it great like ’68”, invoking the anti-Vietnam War protests that seized the city during the 1968 Democratic National Convention.
The atmosphere with rows of police in riot gear was a stark contrast to a day earlier when thousands of pro-Palestinian activists, including families pushing babies in strollers, marched near the convention site calling for a ceasefire.
The consulate has been the site of numerous demonstrations since Israel’s war on Gaza began in October.
Mohammed Ismail, a 29-year-old psychiatry resident who lives in Chicago, described the police presence as “excessive” and questioned why the group had been blocked from marching.
