Ceasefire Protesters Shut Down San Francisco's Bay Bridge, Dozens Arrested

(AP Photo/Ben Margot, File)

For those not familiar with the area, the Bay Bridge is not the famous Golden Gate Bridge which runs north and south between San Francisco and Sausalito. The Bay Bridge runs east and west between San Francisco and Oakland.

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Today, a group of about 100 pro-Palestinian protesters drove onto the bridge and shut down the westbound lanes, meaning the lanes headed into San Francisco. Some allegedly threw their own keys into the bay to prevent their cars from being moved.

“What they’ve done is put people’s lives at risk,” said a CHP officer at the scene, who added that they support First Amendment rights but said blocking the bridge was “100% wrong.”…

Some drivers abandoned their cars and threw their keys into the bay, according to the officer, who repeated this information twice. CHP said it had been videotaping the entire demonstration to identify people and vehicles involved in the protest…

CHP officers on loudspeakers asked the demonstrators to leave the bridge at 8:45 a.m., declaring the protest an unlawful assembly. Officers have started to confiscate some of the banners. Two buses from the San Francisco Sheriff’s Department were on the bridge, apparently to transport detained protesters.

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Protesters used other tactics to drag this out.

Some of the protesters chained themselves together on the roadway. Images showed their protesters’ arms locked together through the open windows of several stopped vehicles.

The Arab Resource and Organizing Center (AROC) said on social media that the action by about 200 protesters was to highlight what it called a genocide happening in Gaza while President Joe Biden was hosting cocktail parties in San Francisco.

The group unfurled a banner reading, “Biden Harris: Ceasefire Now” across the lanes while others held a banner reading “No to US military aid to Israel. Still other protesters held a “die-in” on the roadway, covering their bodies in white sheets and placards that read “11,000 dead.”

You can see in this clip how they chained themselves together through car windows.

The group that organized this, the Arab Resource and Organizing Center (AROC), is the same one that organized an attempt to block the loading of a military ship headed to Israel earlier this month.

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Jeryl Bier points out who this group is.

More video:

Police moved in pretty quickly and at least 50 people have been arrested.

They were put on buses and taken away.

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About 15 vehicles have been towed away and the backup is said to be 20 miles long.

The police are about to open at least two lanes of the bridge as I write this. But I guess the protesters achieved their goals by getting lots of media attention and creating a bit of chaos near where President Biden is staying at the moment. And because these protesters are all leftists, they will probably be given a mild slap on the wrist and released.

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David Strom 4:40 PM | October 07, 2024
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