Hamas ‘day of jihad’ security fears: NYPD braces for pro-Palestine rally in Times Square as cops in every other major American city are put on high alert

Calls by Hamas for a ‘global day of jihad’ have put every US major city police department on heightened alert today with protests planned in New York City, Washington DC, LA and beyond.

In New York, the NYPD canceled the officers’ planned vacation and put every one of its 33,500 uniformed police officers on duty.

Dozens of officers prepare for unrest near Times Square, where a pro-Palestine rally is scheduled for this afternoon.

In Chicago, police increased their presence around synagogues and Jewish schools after a bomb threat earlier this week. White House officials maintain there is no specific domestic threat, but say police and intelligence systems will continue to be on high alert.

In France, a teacher was killed and others wounded in a suspected terrorist-fueled knife attack.

Lt. Randy Sutton, a 34-year police veteran and founder of The Wounded Blue, an organization that assists officers injured in the line of duty, told DailyMail.com the threat was unprecedented.

‘There is a great risk at this moment. We have cities across not just the US, but the entire world, that are facing something that we’ve basically never faced before.

“A call from a terrorist organization that effectively attacked the country of Israel, now they are trying to use that attack to bring threats to the rest of the world, the unfortunate reality is because of the mass migrations across not only Europe, but also the us, we now run an incredible risk of violence happening,’ he said.

Despite local officials saying there was no “specific” threat to any individual city, Lt. Sutton said the call for a ‘global day of rage’ or jihad is specific enough.

‘There are specific threats. There is no doubt about it. When there is a call for jihad around the world, it is a specific threat.

“We’ve seen a crowd of people spitting on police officers, calling for violence … if there’s a mob mentality like – with the looting that’s happened in American cities – then you’ve got religion involved … we’ve seen not only an acceptance of these cruel bloody massacres, but also the encouragement of them by thousands of people around the world.

‘If you can accept that type of violence – manic, irrational violence – then you’ve put every citizen in our country and around the world at risk.’

In Baghdad, tens of thousands of demonstrators gathered peacefully in protest, while others in Malaysia burned Israeli flags.

There are a number of pro-Palestine rallies scheduled for today in New York City, the largest of which will take place this afternoon in Times Square.

Nearby office buildings received security alerts about the protest.

“Every member of the New York Police Department will be ready and in uniform tomorrow,” NYPD Chief of Patrol John Chell told reporters last night ahead of the event.

“We will not tolerate any hate, any acts of disorder, it will be quickly suppressed and we will be ready.”

Hochul said the New York National Guard has already been ordered to patrol key transportation hubs.

Across the country, the Los Angeles Police Department issued a statement saying its officers will adopt a higher profile around Jewish and Muslim communities “during this unimaginable time.”

Federal law enforcement agencies were also on alert.

“The FBI is aware of open-source reports about calls for global action on Friday, October 13, which could lead to protests in communities across the United States,” the agency said in a statement.

“The FBI encourages members of the public to remain vigilant.”

At least one Arab-American advocacy group has pointed to a more hostile attitude American law enforcement takes toward Muslim groups than Jews.

The Arab American Anti-Discrimination Committee said Thursday that FBI agents had visited a number of mosques in different states and individual American residents with Palestinian roots, calling it a “disturbing trend.”

“We received several calls today about Palestinian citizens detained by ICE and/or visited by the FBI,” the organization’s national executive director, Abed Ayoub, said on X, previously called Twitter.

Rabbi Yoni Fein, who heads a large Jewish day school in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, the Brauser Maimonides Academy, said “higher alerts of operations are definitely in place” in anticipation of global protests on Friday.

He said the FBI, US Homeland Security officials and other federal authorities have held online security ‘webinars’ with Jewish institutions across the country.

But Fein said the school is trying to reassure students they are safe and to move on with their lives.

Rather than pandering to the heightened anxiety that Fein acknowledged gripped the Jewish community, he said the academy’s message to its students and their families was to reassure them that “their homes are safe, their schools are safe and that their trusted adults keep them. safe.’