A group of pro-Palestinian demonstrators tried to disrupt Christmas weekend shopping in San Francisco’s Union Square on Saturday in the latest attack on the Christian holiday, seen by radical leftists as an example of bourgeois complacency.
The San Francisco Chronicle reported:
Hundreds of protesters gathered among holiday crowds in San Francisco’s central shopping district Saturday to call for an end to hostilities between Hamas and Israel, as well as for charges to be dropped against demonstrators who shut down the Bay Bridge last month.
Chanting “free Palestine” and “cease-fire now” while holding yellow protest signs that read “No Xmas as usual in a genocide” and “DA Jenkins drop all charges on the Bay Bridge 78,” the protesters — many of them representing the Party for Socialism and Liberation — stood outside the former Westfield mall on Market Street as holiday shopping was underway with Christmas just two days away.
By 1:30 p.m., protesters had blocked traffic on Market Street between Powell and Ellis streets. About 30 minutes later protesters marched down Market Street and confronted police, leading to the arrest of one demonstrator. It was not immediately clear why the protester was arrested. Later, protesters marched to Union Square and surrounded the Christmas tree and ice skating rink.
The “Bay Bridge 78” refers to the 78 people who were arrested for blocking the San Francisco Bay Bridge last month during an anti-Israel protest. As Breitbart News later noted, that protest temporarily blocked a number of ambulances from delivering organs to waiting transplant patients.
The Union Square protest is only the latest attempt by pro-Palestinian protesters to disrupt Christmas across the nation. Past efforts have included disrupting the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree lighting in New York City, and forcing California’s state Christmas tree lighting to be moved indoors, to a “virtual” format.
The San Francisco protest is also another blow to retail shopping in Union Square, which has been hit hard by crime and has seen a recent exodus of retailers.
Update: The protesters removed ornaments from the Christmas tree in Union Square, causing it to shut off and possibly damaging it:
Pro-Palestinian protesters climb, toss ornaments off Union Square tree. It remains dark, potentially broken as @SFPD investigates @KPIXtv pic.twitter.com/NEGsjDK67m
— Betty Yu (@bett_yu) December 24, 2023
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the new biography, Rhoda: ‘Comrade Kadalie, You Are Out of Order’. He is also the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
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