Traffic on both lanes of California’s Golden Gate Bridge has been shut down Monday, the California Highway Patrol tells Fox News Digital, as images emerging from the scene showed anti-Israel protesters holding banners with the messages “Stop the world for Gaza” and “End the siege on Gaza now!”
A similar demonstration has also blocked traffic on Interstate-880 in Oakland.
“Golden Gate Bridge is closed in both directions for an undetermined amount of time,” the San Francisco Department of Emergency Management said in a statement, citing a “civic demonstration.”
Aerial images captured by KTVU later showed the Golden Gate Bridge protesters being taken into custody and the banners being put away.
CHP PIO Andrew Barclay told Fox News that seven protesters have been removed, and more could be removed. He also said officers are now trying to remove protesters who are chained to their cars and is unsure how long that action will take.
“These protesters are facing multiple charges of which can include, but are not limited to refusal to disperse, blocking traffic, blocking a bridge, which is a specific penal code in CA,” Barclay said. “While they do have the right to protest, the manner in which they are doing it is not only illegal but incredibly dangerous.”
In the Oakland protest, seven demonstrators were attached to concrete barrels that have been placed in the middle of the roadway, according to KRON.
A flag attached to a fence there says “A-15 economic blockade for a Free Palestine.”
The A15 Action group says on its website, “There is a sense in the streets in this recent and unprecedented movement for Palestine that escalation has become necessary: there is a need to shift from symbolic actions to those that cause pain to the economy.”
Hundreds of anti-Israeli protesters also wreaked havoc in Lower Manhattan on Monday, storming the Brooklyn Bridge and grinding traffic to a halt on its Manhattan-bound side as cops in riot gear fought to contain the unrest.
The marchers — including some who burned American flags while one yelled “Death to America,” according to social media posts — converged on the historic span around 3:45 p.m., immediately disrupting cars and prompting NYPD cops to swarm the area and begin cuffing at least two dozen of them.
Photos posted on social media showed the massive mob invading the span during the disruptive rally — only the latest in the Big Apple since the Oct. 7 Hamas terror attack on Israel and the subsequent counter-offensive by the Jewish state in the Gaza Strip.
“A bunch of people already got over,” a protester on the bridge told The Post. “They started arresting people here.”
Police in riot gear were prepared and took a zero-tolerance approach to the massive demonstration, blocking the bridge to keep the protesters away from City Hall.
Although only one arrest had been officially reported by late afternoon, at least two dozen people were placed in handcuffs at the scene — with many other marchers making a run for the subways when they spotted cops moving in.
Later on Monday evening, smoke could be seen billowing outside One Police Plaza at around 7:30 p.m. as a group of protesters lit flares and chanted pro-Palestinian slogans.
