Hundreds of pro-Palestinian protesters gathered and marched near the Met Gala in New York City on Monday night, with several arrested by the New York Police Department (NYPD).
Amid a heavy police presence, protesters marched down Madison Avenue one block east of the gala venue, carrying Palestinian flags, banging drums, and chanting “free, free Palestine!”
Videos and photos from the scene also showed protesters walking through Central Park and being arrested by police officers, as well as filling the street and blocking traffic on nearby Park Avenue.
The NYPD confirmed to The Independent that it had arrested multiple people, but did not provide additional details.
According to The New York Post, which put the numbers at more than a thousand, protesters were stopped at the East 79th St Transverse in Central Park by a double line of police officers in riot gear.
The protest occurred despite a heavy police presence outside of the event this year, including steel barricades and street closures. NYPD deputies were also spotted near the event with masks and zip tie handcuffs.
In recent years Protesters have frequently used the glittering event, in which celebrities don surreal and extravagant gowns to raise money for the Metropolitan Museum of Art, as a platform for social causes.
In 2021, nine Black Lives Matter demonstrators were arrested outside of the event while calling on officials to defund and abolish the NYPD and taking apart barricades set up by police.
This year, numerous protests relating to the Israel-Hamas War were scheduled throughout New York City on Monday, with demonstrations taking place at Columbia and New York University in what’s been dubbed a “Citywide Day of Rage for Gaza”.
New York mayor Eric Adams, along with other NYC officials, has blamed “outside agitators” for the protests at Columbia University in Manhattan, but academics and journalists have questioned his evidence for those claims.
