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Famed YouTuber Pauses Interview to Confront Anti-Israel Protesters Outside NYC Office With Israeli Flag

Casey Neistat rolling up an Israeli flag he displayed outside his office window as anti-Israel protesters marched outside his building in New York City. Photo: Screenshot
YouTube star Casey Neistat stopped his interview with a fellow Jewish YouTuber and content creator at his office building in New York City recently to wave an Israeli flag outside a window of his office as anti-Israel protesters demonstrated outside.
Neistat, who has 12.6 million subscribers on YouTube, is a Jewish New York-based filmmaker, writer, blogger, director, and star of the 2010 HBO documentary series “The Neistat Brothers.” He co-founded a multimedia company called Beme that CNN purchased in 2016 for $25 million. He has talked openly on social media about being Jewish and his support for the Jewish community and Israel. He also condemned the “barbarism” carried out by Hamas-led terrorists during their deadly rampage across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, in a YouTube video titled “Jew” that he published four days after the terrorist attack.
On Nov. 2, the Connecticut-born veteran YouTuber was a guest on the YouTube show “Created,” which is hosted by Jewish content creator Jon Youshaei. The interview took place in Neistat’s office in New York City, and toward the end of their conversation, anti-Israel protesters began loudly demonstrating outside the building. The noise interrupted the interview, and Youshaei addressed the situation on air.
“There’s a protest outside; we hear a lot of the noise,” said the host of “Created.” A second later, Neistat got up from his chair, grabbed an oversized Israeli flag he had in his office, opened the window in the room, and then proceeded to wave the flag outside as the anti-Israel protesters walked by. After the demonstrators left the street, Neistat brought his Israeli flag back inside.
“It’s always something in this city,” Neistat stated. “I think that was some sort of pro-Palestine march. They like to go down [the road] Broadway.” Explaining his decision to wave the Israeli flag outside of his window right as anti-Israel protesters walked by, he said, “You gotta show the love, you know … That was an anti-Israel march going down Broadway and when that happens I like to wave either my American flag, or an Israeli flag, or some combination of both.”
Youshaei afterwards asked Neistat how he feels speaking publicly about Israel despite how “polarizing” the subject is. Neistat replied that it is “challenging” at times.
“I’ve never been one to hold my tongue. I think that exasperates for me the frustration in speaking out against antisemitism,” Neistat added. “Because long before I spoke out against antisemitism, I was quick to speak out for pro-LGBTQ rights. And I was very loud in speaking out in my support of African Americans and why it’s important that we stand up if there’s a moment in this country when our fellow Black Americans are feeling like they’re being unfairly. I’ve never held my tongue. So when it becomes about antisemitism, for me it’s certainly different because I think one is only able to truly understand prejudice-ness through which the lens they experience it … I know what it’s like to be treated differently because I’m Jewish and I feel like I can speak on that in a different way.”
Neistat then reiterated his support for Israel, talked about loving the country and its people, and visiting the Jewish state. He noted that while it’s “fair” to criticize Israeli politics and leaders, he gets upset when people try to deny Israel’s right to exist and defend its borders.
“I think what’s so frustrating about this conversation is you’re not allowed to say, ‘I want innocent people living in Palestine to not be suffering and I want them to have good lives. But I also believe — I don’t just believe, I’m convicted in the fact — that Israel has every right to exist and when attacked, Israel has every right to protect itself and to fight back.’ And you’re not allowed to say those two things,” Neistat told Youshaei. “You’re not allowed to say that you think there are good people in Palestine and that you support the state of Israel.”
He then referred to the anti-Israel demonstrators who were just outside his office building and told Youshaei: “If I went down there and tried to say that to those people screaming, marching down the street, they would not be receptive to that conversation. And that is really hard. It’s super hard to have that conversation and it’s frustrating. So it’s not hard to speak up. It’s hard to try to reconcile that we can’t be civil and have an honest conversation about such a volatile, dangerous, personal matter.”
“Realistically, there would be violence if I went down there with an Israeli flag,” he added. “I don’t mean to generalize; perhaps there would be people down there willing to engage in conversation. But in my experience, because I go to a lot of counter-protests, there’s no willingness to engage in a conversation.”
The post Famed YouTuber Pauses Interview to Confront Anti-Israel Protesters Outside NYC Office With Israeli Flag first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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‘Fine Scholar’: UC Berkeley Chancellor Praises Professor Who Expressed Solidarity With Oct. 7 Attacks

University of California, Berkeley chancellor Dr. Rich Lyons, testifies at a Congressional hearing on antisemitism, in Washington, D.C., U.S., on July 15, 2025. Photo: Allison Bailey via Reuters Connect.
The chancellor of University of California, Berkeley described a professor who cheered the Oct. 7 Hamas massacre across southern Israel a “fine scholar” during a congressional hearing held at Capitol Hill on Tuesday.
Richard K. Lyons, who assumed the chancellorship in July 2024 issued the unmitigated praise while being questioned by members of the House of Representatives Committee on Education and the Workforce, which summoned him and the chief administrators of two other major universities to interrogate their handling of the campus antisemitism crisis.
Lyons stumbled into the statement while being questioned by Rep. Lisa McClain (R-MI), who asked Lyons to describe the extent of his relationship and correspondence with Professor Ussama Makdisi, who tweeted in Feb. 2024 that he “could have been one of those who broke through the siege on October 7.”
“What do you think the professor meant,” McClain asked Lyons, to which the chancellor responded, “I believe it was a celebration of the terrorist attack on October 7.” McClain proceeded to ask if Lyons discussed the tweet with Makdisi or personally reprimanded him, prompting an exchange of remarks which concluded with Lyons’s saying, “He is a fine scholar.”
Lyon’s comment came after nearly three hours in which the group of university leaders — which included Dr. Robert Groves, president of Georgetown University, and Dr. Felix V. Matos Rodriguez, chancellor of the City University of New York (CUNY) — offered gaffe-free, deliberately worded answers to the members’ questions to avoid eliciting the kind of public relations ordeal which prematurely ended the tenures of two Ivy League presidents in 2024 following an education committee held in Dec. 2023.
Rep. McClain later criticized Lyons on social media, calling his comment “totally disgraceful.” She added, “Faculty must be held accountable and Jewish students deserve better.”
CUNY chancellor Rodriguez also triggered a rebuke from the committee members in which he was also described as a “disgrace.”
As previously reported by The Algemeiner, CUNY campuses have been lambasted by critics as some of the most antisemitic institutions of higher education in the United States. Last year, the US Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights (OCR) resolved half a dozen investigations of antisemitism on CUNY campuses, one of which involved Jewish students who were pressured into saying that Jews are White people who should be excluded from discussions about social justice.
During Tuesday’s hearing Rodriguez acknowledged that antisemitic incidents continue to disrupt Jewish academic life, disclosing that 84 complaints of antisemitism have been formally reported to CUNY administrators since 2024. 15 were filed in 2025 alone, but CUNY, he said, has published only 18 students for antisemitic conduct. Rodriguez went on to denounce efforts to pressure CUNY into adopting the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel, saying, “I have repudiated BDS and I have said there’s no place for BDS at the City University of New York.”
Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-NC) remarked, however, that Rodriguez has allegedly done little to address antisemitism in the CUNY faculty union, the Professional Staff Congress (PSC), which has passed several resolutions endorsing BDS and whose members, according to 2021 ruling rendered by the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), discriminated against Professor Jeffrey Lax by holding meetings on Shabbat to prevent him and other Jews from attending them.
“The PSC does not speak for the City University of New York,” Rodriquez protested. “We’ve been clear on our commitment against antisemitism and against BDS.”
Later, Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY), whose grilling of higher education officials who appear before the committee has created several viral moments, rejected Rodriguez’s responses as disingenuous.
“It’s all words, no action. You have failed the people of New York,” she told the chancellor. “You have failed Jewish students in New York State, and it is a disgrace.”
Following the hearing, The Lawfare Project, legal nonprofit which provides legal services free of charge to Jewish victims of civil rights violations, applauded the education committee for publicizing antisemitism at CUNY.
“I am thankful for the many members of Congress who worked with us to ensure that the deeply disturbing facts about antisemitism at CUNY were brought forward in this hearing,” Lawfare Project litigation director Zipora Reich said in a press release. “While it is deeply frustrating to hear more platitudes and vague promises from CUNY’s leadership, we are encouraged to see federal lawmakers demanding accountability.”
Follow Dion J. Pierre @DionJPierre.
The post ‘Fine Scholar’: UC Berkeley Chancellor Praises Professor Who Expressed Solidarity With Oct. 7 Attacks first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Huckabee Calls for Israeli Investigation Into ‘Criminal and Terrorist’ Killing of Palestinian-American in West Bank
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Scandal-Plagued UN Commission Disbands Amid Increasing US Pressure Against Anti-Israel International Organizations

Miloon Kothari, member of the United Nations Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem, and Israel, briefs reporters on the first report of the Commission. UN Photo/Jean Marc Ferré
The Commission of Inquiry (COI), a controversial United Nations commission investigating Israel for nearly five years, has collapsed after all three of its members abruptly resigned days after the United States sanctioned a senior UN official over antisemitism.
Commission chair Navi Pillay resigned on July 8, citing health concerns and scheduling conflicts. Her fellow commissioners, Chris Sidoti and Miloon Kothari, followed suit days later. While none of the commissioners directly linked their resignations to the U.S. sanctions, the timing suggests mounting American pressure played a decisive role.
The resignations came just one day before the Trump administration announced sanctions on Francesca Albanese, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Palestinian territories. Albanese was sanctioned over what the State Department called a “pattern of antisemitic and inflammatory rhetoric.” She had previously claimed that the U.S. was controlled by a “Jewish lobby” and questioned Israel’s right to self-defense. The sanctions bar her from entering the U.S. and freeze any assets under American jurisdiction.
The resignations mark a major victory for critics who have long viewed the inquiry as biased and politically motivated.
Watchdog groups, including Geneva-based UN Watch, celebrated the swift collapse of the Commission of Inquiry (COI), which they say had long operated with an open mandate to target Israel. “This is a watershed moment of accountability,” said UN Watch Executive Director Hillel Neuer. “The COI was built on bias and sustained by hatred. Its fall is a victory for human rights, not a defeat.”
The COI had faced heavy criticism since its formation in 2021. In July 2022, Commissioner Miloon Kothari, made comments about the undue influence of a so-called “Jewish lobby” on the media, said the COI would “have to look at issues of settler colonialism.”
“Apartheid itself is a very useful paradigm, so we have a slightly different approach, but we will definitely get to it,” he added.
The Commission was established in 2021 year following the 11-day war between Israel and Gaza’s ruling Hamas group in May. COI is the first UN commission to ever be granted an indefinite period of investigation, which has drawn criticism from the US State Department, members of US Congress, and Jewish leaders across the world.
Following the resignations, Council President Jürg Lauber invited member states to nominate replacements by August 31. However, it is unclear whether the commission will be reconstituted or quietly shelved. UN Watch and other groups have urged the council to disband the COI entirely, calling it irreparably biased.
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