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Former Jewish Press editor charged with interfering with law enforcement during Jan. 6 Capitol riot
(JTA) — When video emerged in 2021 of Elliot Resnick, the then-editor of the Jewish Press, among the rioters at the deadly Jan. 6 riot at the U.S, Capitol that year, his publishers had a ready explanation: He was working as a journalist, covering history.
Now an FBI charging document says that Resnick was taking part in that history — in other words, that he was a member of the mob that stormed the Capitol.
The FBI arrest warrant for Resnick, signed Tuesday by a U.S. magistrate, lays out why authorities believe he was involved in the rioting, and not just reporting on it. Resnick left the Jewish Press, a politically conservative Brooklyn-based newspaper that serves the Orthodox Jewish community, in 2021.
Inner City Press, which covers the federal courts in New York City, reported that Resnick was due to appear in court on Thursday. Resnick has been charged with interfering with law enforcement during a civil disorder, along with three charges related to entering and engaging in disruptive conduct while on restricted grounds. The charges may incur prison time.
The riot was spurred by former President Donald Trump’s false claims that he won the presidential election — claims that Resnick echoed on social media.
Using video evidence and the testimony of police, Erica Dobin, the FBI agent who authored the charging document, wrote that Resnick held the arm of a police officer attempting to use chemical irritant to repel the rioters. The agent alleges that Resnick attempted to open doors for rioters to follow him, even when a police officer was trying to keep the door closed, and that he beckoned rioters to follow him and that he pulled rioters in through an open door.
The charging document also quotes at least one policeman who instructed Resnick to leave.
The charge of interfering with law enforcement carries a possible sentence of up to three years. Resnick did not reply to requests for comment made through social media direct messages. He was active on social media hours before being contacted.
There have been more than 1,000 arrests related to the insurrection. Of those arrested, more than 500 have pleaded guilty and another 69 have been convicted in the courts. Of those sentenced, roughly half have been sentenced to prison for periods ranging from seven days to more than ten years.
The document notes that Resnick was employed by the Jewish Press at the time of the riot and that he left in May 2021. The FBI launched its investigation in June 2021. Dobin indicates in the charging document that she was sensitive to Resnick’s status as a journalist on the day of the insurrection. She says in a footnote that she “complied with the U.S. Department of Justice’s News Media Policy in consultation and coordination with DOJ’s Policy and Statutory Enforcement Unit.”
The charging document notes Resnick’s social media posts at the time, which repeatedly called for people to face unspecified “consequences” because of his contention that the election was stolen from Trump.
When Politico first revealed in April 2021 that Resnick’s presence at the riot was captured on video, the Jewish Press said that Resnick was “covering the rally and the rest of the day’s terrible events for The Jewish Press.” It noted Resnick’s past expressions of support for Trump.
“The Jewish Press does not see why Elliot’s personal views on former President Trump should make him any different from the dozens of other journalists covering the events, including many inside the Capitol building during the riots, nor why his presence justifies an article in Politico while the presence of other reporters inside the building does not,” his newspaper said.
When Resnick left the paper a few months later, in May, the paper did not provide an explanation for the decision.
The FBI charging document says the investigation was launched based on two tips called into the FBI, one from someone who had read the article on Politico’s website and another who “indicated they had known Resnick since childhood and recognized him in video footage showing the storming of the U.S. Capitol which had been posted online.”
Resnick, who worked at the Jewish Press beginning in 2006 and was its editor-in-chief from 2018-2021, has a history of using incendiary language and has called the gay rights movement “evil.” Under Resnick’s editorship, the Jewish Press was criticized by the Anti-Defamation League in 2019 after publishing an op-ed titled “The Pride Parade: What Are They Proud Of?” which compared marchers in the New York City event to animals, adulterers and thieves.
He also has a history of derogatory statements about Black people.
“If blacks resent America’s [sic] so much, let them discard Christianity (which the ‘white man’ gave them) and re-embrace the primitive religions they practiced in Africa,” Resnick wrote in a tweet in 2019.
“Can someone give me a coherent reason why blackface is racist?” he wrote in another tweet that year.
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The post Former Jewish Press editor charged with interfering with law enforcement during Jan. 6 Capitol riot appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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In Rare Messages from Iran, Protesters ask West for Help, Speak of ‘Very High’ Death Toll
Protests in Tehran. Photo: Iran Photo from social media used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law, via i24 News
i24 News – Speaking to Western media from beyond the nationwide internet blackout imposed by the Islamic regime, Iranian protesters said they needed support amid a brutal crackdown.
“We’re standing up for a revolution, but we need help. Snipers have been stationed behind the Tajrish Arg area [a neighborhood in Tehran],” said a protester in Tehran speaking to the Guardian on the condition of anonymity. He added that “We saw hundreds of bodies.”
Another activist in Tehran spoke of witnessing security forces firing live ammunition at protesters resulting in a “very high” number killed.
On Friday, TIME magazine cited a Tehran doctor speaking on condition of anonymity that just six hospitals in the capital recorded at least 217 killed protesters, “most by live ammunition.”
Speaking to Reuters on Saturday, Setare Ghorbani, a French-Iranian national living in the suburbs of Paris, said that she became ill from worry for her friends inside Iran. She read out one of her friends’ last messages before losing contact: “I saw two government agents and they grabbed people, they fought so much, and I don’t know if they died or not.”
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Report: US Increasingly Regards Iran Protests as Having Potential to Overthrow Regime
United States President Donald J Trump in White House in Washington, DC, USA, on Thursday, December 18, 2025. Photo: Aaron Schwartz via Reuters Connect.
i24 News – The assessment in Washington of the strength and scope of the Iran protests has shifted after Thursday’s turnout, with US officials now inclined to grant the possibility that this could be a game changer, Axios reported on Friday.
“The protests are serious, and we will continue to monitor them,” an unnamed senior US official was quoted as saying in the report.
Iran was largely cut off from the outside world on Friday after the Islamic regime blacked out the internet to curb growing unrest, as videos circulating on social media showed buildings ablaze in anti-government protests raging across the country.
US President Donald Trump warned the Ayatollahs of a strong response if security forces escalate violence against protesters.
“We’re watching it very closely. If they start killing people like they have in the past, I think they’re going to get hit very hard by the United States,” Trump told reporters when asked about the unrest in Iran.
The latest reported death toll is at 51 protesters, including nine children.
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Iran’s Guards Declare ‘Red Line’ on Security as Tehran Seeks to Quell Unrest
FILE PHOTO: Protesters gather as vehicles burn, amid evolving anti-government unrest, in Tehran, Iran, in this screen grab obtained from a social media video released on January 9, 2026. Social Media/via REUTERS/File Photo
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards warned on Saturday that safeguarding security was a “red line” and the military vowed to protect public property, as the clerical establishment stepped up efforts to quell the most widespread protests in years.
The statements came after US President Donald Trump issued a new warning to Iran’s leaders on Friday, and after Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Saturday declared: “The United States supports the brave people of Iran.”
Unrest continued overnight. State media said a municipal building was set on fire in Karaj, west of Tehran, and blamed “rioters.” State TV broadcast footage of funerals of members of the security forces it said were killed in protests in the cities of Shiraz, Qom and Hamedan.
Protests have spread across much of Iran over the last two weeks, beginning in response to soaring inflation, but quickly turned political with protesters demanding an end to clerical rule. Authorities accuse the US and Israel of fomenting “the riots.” Rights groups have documented dozens of deaths of protesters.
ARMY SAYS ‘TERRORIST GROUPS’ SEEK TO UNDERMINE SECURITY
Authorities continued to impose an internet blackout.
A witness in western Iran reached by phone said the Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) were deployed and opening fire in the area from which they were speaking, declining to be identified for their safety.
In a statement broadcast by state TV, the IRGC – an elite force which has suppressed previous bouts of unrest – accused terrorists of targeting military and law enforcement bases over the past two nights, killing several citizens and security personnel and saying property had been set on fire.
Safeguarding the achievements of the 1979 Islamic revolution and maintaining security was “a red line,” it added, saying the continuation of the situation was unacceptable.
The military, which operates separately to the IRGC but is also commanded by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, announced it would “protect and safeguard national interests, the country’s strategic infrastructure, and public property.”
In a country with a history of fragmented opposition to clerical rule, the son of the last shah of Iran who was toppled in the 1979 Islamic revolution has emerged as a prominent voice abroad spurring on the protests.
PAHLAVI SAYS GOAL IS TO PREPARE TO ‘SEIZE CITY CENTRES’
In his latest appeal on the X social media platform, US-based Reza Pahlavi said: “Our goal is no longer merely to come into the streets; the goal is to prepare to seize city centres and hold them.”
He also called on “workers and employees in key sectors of the economy, especially transportation, and oil, and gas and energy,” to begin a nationwide strike.
Trump said on Thursday he was not inclined to meet Pahlavi, a sign that he was waiting to see how the crisis plays out before backing an opposition leader.
Trump, who bombed Iran last summer and warned Tehran last week the US could come to the protesters’ aid, issued another warning on Friday, saying: “You better not start shooting because we’ll start shooting too.”
“I just hope the protesters in Iran are going to be safe, because that’s a very dangerous place right now,” he added.
Some protesters on the streets have shouted slogans in support of Pahlavi, such as “Long live the shah,” although most chants have called for an end to rule by the clerics or demanded action to fix an economy hammered by years of US and other international sanctions and pummeled by the 12-day war in June, when Israel and the US launched air strikes on Iran.
A doctor in northwestern Iran said that since Friday, large numbers of injured protesters had been brought to hospitals. Some were badly beaten, suffering head injuries and broken legs and arms, as well as deep cuts.
At least 20 people in one hospital had been shot with live ammunition, five of whom later died.
On Friday, Khamenei accused protesters of acting on behalf of Trump, saying rioters were attacking public properties and warning that Tehran would not tolerate people acting as “mercenaries for foreigners.”
The Revolutionary Guards’ public relations office said three members of the Basij security force were killed and five wounded during clashes with what it described as “armed rioters” in Gachsaran, in the southwest.
Another security officer was stabbed to death in Hamedan, in western Iran. The son of a senior officer, Brigadier General Martyr Nourali Shoushtari, was killed in the Ahmadabad area of Mashhad, in the northeast. Two other security personnel were killed over the past two nights in Shushtar, in Khuzestan province.
The protests pose the biggest internal challenge in at least three years to Iran’s clerical rulers, who look more vulnerable than during past bouts of unrest amid a dire economic situation and after last year’s war.
The leaders of France, Britain and Germany issued a joint statement on Friday condemning the killing of protesters and urged the Iranian authorities to refrain from violence.
Authorities have described protests over the economy as legitimate while condemning what they call violent rioters and cracking down with security forces.
Iran’s clerical establishment has weathered repeated past bouts of unrest, including student protests in 1999, over a disputed election in 2009, against economic hardships in 2019, and the 2022 Woman, Life, Freedom protests.
Iranian rights group HRANA said it had documented 65 deaths including 50 protesters and 15 security personnel as of January 9. The Norway-based human rights group Hengaw said more than 2,500 people had been arrested over the past two weeks.