Anti-Israel protesters swarm The Post, NY Times printing plant before 124 are arrested while shutting down Gray Lady’s Midtown HQ
Anti-Israel protesters tried to stop the New York Times from rolling out of its Queens printing facility early Thursday — before 124 were later arrested while shutting down the Gray Lady’s Midtown HQ, sources told The Post.
The mob first descended just before 1 a.m. on the 300,000-square-foot printing hub in College Point — which also prints The Post — littering the access road to prevent trucks from collecting newspapers for delivery.
The protesters — many masked and wearing traditional Palestinian keffiyeh scarves — laid down, linked together with tubes to create a human chain, blocking one of the largest printing facilities in the country, which also produces the Wall Street Journal, Newsday, and USA Today.
They carried anti-Israel signs reading, “Stop the presses. Free Palestine” and “Consent for genocide is manufactured here.”
Police warned them that they could either leave “freely” — or, “If you refuse to leave, you’ll be subject to arrest for trespassing.”
It ended peacefully around 3:30 a.m. with no arrests, the NYPD said. The trucks were eventually able to gain access and pick up the newspapers, with the Times saying it had not “experienced any meaningful disruption to operations.”
However, within hours, more than 100 swarmed the lobby of the Times, chanting almost identical anti-Israel slogans.
The group barged into the Times building on Eighth Avenue and 41st Street at around 10 a.m. — again carrying huge signs reading, “Stop the Press. Free Palestine.”
Other signs replaced the Times” in the paper’s name with “war crimes.”
Videos circulating on X showed hordes of protesters clapping and chanting “free Palestine” and “from the river to the sea,” a slogan widely condemned as calling for the eradication of Israel.
Another outlandish chant said, “New York Times, you can’t hide — we charge you with genocide.”
Other footage showed officers rounding up protesters as they refused orders to leave — with police sources telling The Post there were 124 arrests for criminal trespass.
The Times told The Post that Thursday’s mass protests — just the latest at the Gray Lady’s office — will not sway its coverage.
“The Israel-Hamas war is one of the most divisive global events in recent history,” a Times spokesperson said.
“As an independent news organization, we receive criticism regularly from those representing entrenched perspectives, hoping to change our reporting to buttress their positions.
While we support the right of groups and individuals to express their point of view, we will not let critics or advocacy groups sway us from covering the conflict fully and fairly.”
Thursday’s protest comes a month after a group of anti-Israel agitators blocked traffic on the Brooklyn Bridge and in the Holland Tunnel and Queens-Midtown Tunnel during rush hours.
The February incident led to multiple arrests on charges of interfering with transportation and disorderly conduct.
In early January, hundreds of demonstrators swarmed the Brooklyn, Manhattan and Williamsburg bridges, sawing chaos by snarling traffic.
