Transcript: Mayor Adams Holds Security Briefing On Israel Day Parade

May 31, 2024

Watch the video here at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YR-5J_dX4SA

Deputy Mayor Fabien Levy, Communications: Good afternoon, everybody. My name is Fabien Levy, and I serve as deputy mayor for Communications for the City of New York. 

First off, I want to thank the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York for organizing the Israel Day on Fifth Parade this Sunday, and thank you in particular to JCRC CEO Mark Treyger and to UJA Federation Community Securities Director Mitch Silber. Thank you to Commissioner Caban and the New York City Police Department for keeping the parade and our entire city safe. 

I also want to acknowledge all those that are here with us today. First, Deputy Mayor Phil Banks, deputy mayor for Public Safety, Rebecca Weiner, deputy commissioner of Intelligence and Counterterrorism, Kaz Daughtry, deputy commissioner of Operations, Michael Gerber, deputy commissioner of Legal Matters, and from the Mayor's Office, Fred Kreizman, commissioner of the Mayor's Community Affairs Unit, and Joel Eisdorfer, senior adviser to the mayor. 

Of course, we also have NYPD Commissioner Edward Caban and Chief of Department Jeffrey Maddrey. Every person has a right, a fundamental right, to celebrate their culture, their religion, and their identity. For nearly six decades, the Israel Day Parade has provided people a space to do just that. We've created a place for Jewish New Yorkers and people of all backgrounds to showcase their support for Israel. 

This year's parade comes at an urgent moment for not just Israel, but the entire world, which is why this year's theme is Bring the Hostages Home, Bring Them Home. It's a reminder of the more than 120 hostages still held captive to this day following Hamas's brutal attack on October 7th, and a commitment that we will not rest until they are home safe. We owe the NYPD a tremendous debt of gratitude for protecting the parade and the invaluable right of free expression, not only this Sunday, but every single day. 

Since October 7th, just to be clear, New York City has seen almost 2,800 protests across our city, almost 1,300 of which were related to the war in the Middle East. Many of these have been high profile. Many of them have been high stakes. Through them all, the NYPD has kept us safe, and I'm confident and we are all confident that they will do so again on Sunday. To tell us more about those efforts, first I'm pleased to turn it over to Mayor Eric Adams.

Mayor Eric Adams: Thank you, DM Levy, and thank you to the entire team. We thought it was important to do a briefing leading up to the parade this weekend. This is the first major large Jewish event since October 7th, and we are extremely conscious of the over 3,000 protests that took place in our city since that day. Many of them were orderly, but there have been a few that did not follow proper procedures. 

What we want to be sure to communicate, Chief Maddrey is going to go through some of the structures of the parade, as well as Commissioner Caban, but we wanted to show the unified force that we are not going to allow any unlawfulness and any disruption of any celebration of one's heritage in this city. 

We're looking forward to having a peaceful parade. We're looking forward for those who want to participate to do so, and those who want to peacefully protest, you have a right to do so. As we stated, we want to emphasize it's called peaceful protests. That is what we are calling on the people of this city to do as we acknowledge and celebrate all of our various heritages in this city. 

It was just crucial for the agencies to come and give you a briefing. I want to again thank Commissioner Caban and his entire team. When you think about it, the normal functioning of this city with 3,000 protests taking place throughout the city, it just really goes to show you, in addition to driving down crime and continuing to have this as the safest big city in America, they deal with the issues that may take place throughout the entire day in this city. A job well done.

Let's hear from the commissioner, and let's turn it over to the chief of department so he can give us a briefing. Commissioner?

Police Commissioner Edward Caban: Thank you very much, Mr. Mayor, and good afternoon, everyone. For 60 years, people from around the world have come to New York to celebrate our city's proud Jewish heritage. Sunday's parade is the largest celebration of its kind outside of Israel, and the NYPD will be there to make sure everything runs smoothly.

As you all know, our department handles large-scale events, both planned and unplanned, all the time, and no one does it better. It's all part of the work we do every day to make sure every New Yorker is safe, and this parade will be no different. Of course, we don't do this job alone. We've been working with the event organizers every step of the way, and I want to thank the Jewish Community Relations Council for their partnership, their dedicated staff and team of volunteers do an amazing job each year, and we truly appreciate all their efforts. 

As far as the security plan is concerned, we are taking everything into consideration. If you are at or around the parade, there will be certain measures that you will see, and there will be others that you don't see. Obviously, uniformed officers will be posted around the parade route. There will be an increased police presence in the surrounding area, including our screening checkpoints at points of entry, as well as bike teams, aviation, K-9, transit, and our other specialized units. Our Counterterrorism and Intelligence Bureau personnel will also be deployed, and we can tell you, as the mayor said, at this time, there is no specific or credible threats to the parade or to New York City in general. 

Your cops will be out there to keep you safe, but as always, please remain aware of your surroundings. The eyes and ears of New York play a vital role in protecting our city, so if something that doesn't feel right, please let a cop know. Lastly, we strongly urge everyone attending the parade to take public transportation there and back, because street closures will make it even more difficult to drive and park in and around the area. 

This Sunday kicks off our parade season, and every one of these events is an opportunity for people to celebrate the cultural diversity that makes our city great. We're all very proud of who we are, and the NYPD is here to protect the freedom of expression, so we look forward to a fun and safe event on Sunday. We want everyone to come out, have a great time, and celebrate. God bless.

Jeffrey Maddrey, Chief of Department, Police Department: Mr. Mayor, thank you, and I want to say to Mark Treyger, the Jewish Community Relations Council, the JCRC, thank you for your leadership and partnership during this time. I just want to speak briefly, not only to the members of the media, but more importantly to the community, the participants, the spectators, people who live and do business around the area. 

There will be increased security. There'll be more personnel out there, police personnel. You'll see more of our special operations and our counterterrorism assets on this particular day, the Israel Day Parade on Fifth Avenue. You'll see the aviation up. You'll see our drones out. You'll see our K-9 unit and mounted unit working in and around Central Park this day, all right. 

The parade route has been fortified. The parade route runs from 56th Street up to 74th Street, 18 blocks, and the route has been fortified. There's additional fencing up there for increased security. Spectators who want to enter onto the parade route can enter through Madison Avenue at five access points, 61st Street, 63rd Street, 66th Street, 70th Street, and 73rd Street. All spectators who enter will be wanded by school safety division or school safety agents with magnetometers, along with our counterterrorism units, and again, it's about safety. 

Participants in the parade will have to have proper credentials provided by the JCRC before they're allowed to step onto the parade route and walk. We will manage access around the parade for people who live there and for businesses, so we will make sure that they are not impeded too much and they'll be able to do their daily business, okay? 

Most importantly, we're asking everyone who comes out, do not bring any large bags, no flags, anything that can obstruct view, no coolers, no alcohol, anything of this nature. It will not be permitted onto the parade route. 

These security measures are a little bit more increased from last year, but these measures aren't new, a scaled down version of what we do. New Year's Eve, 4th of July, J'ouvert celebrations, these are security measures that we have implemented in the past. It's all about the safety of the communities, the participants, and the spectators. 

We ask everybody to come out, come enjoy themselves. If you come to protest, we respect your right to protest, but we will not tolerate any violence or disorder. We will address it accordingly. Thank you.

Deputy Mayor Levy: Thank you. We'll take some on topic questions.

Question: Commissioner Weiner, is there any reason to believe that the incident on Wednesday, man jumping the sidewalk outside a Jewish school, is in fact terror related or hate crime related, and does he have any nexus to the parade on Sunday?

Deputy Commissioner Rebecca Weiner, Intelligence and Counterterrorism, Police Department: That's still under investigation by this department and our federal partners. We see no nexus between what happened and the parade at all.

Question: Good afternoon, everyone. Good afternoon. Two questions for the panel. Number one, let's start with the mayor, if possible. I know that the NYPD, when everything was going on at Columbia, there was a lot of monitoring of external actors to come in and incite controversy. I think Carl was able to respond to that with regard to the parade. 

Secondly, with the terror alert that's going on with the cricket match on Long Island this weekend. There are two large gatherings, and we have the cricket match on Long Island, and we have the Israel Day Parade, even though there has been a terror alert for that one and not one for this one, it still seems to be a lot going on. If we could talk about both of those things, the external actors, and then any communication that's going to go from Long Island after that terror alert.

Mayor Adams: The commissioner can talk about the terror alerts, but I've made it clear from the beginning that even when people did not see what we saw, that there are outside agitators that are playing a major role in many of these events. They embed themselves into these large gatherings, and some of them see it as an opportunity to be disruptive. It's not going to happen. 

We're going to immediately respond to any inappropriate action that goes outside the boundaries of peacefully protesting or adding your voice to whatever concern. Listen, the conflict that's playing out on the stage of the Middle East has impacted all of us in one way or another. There's a lot of emotions that are involved, but those emotions should not be hijacked by those that are attempting to be violent and disruptive. 

We will monitor them in a traditional way, that intel, listen to the noise, and see what is taking place. At the same time, the police is going to respond accordingly and rapidly to anyone that thinks they're going to disrupt the parade. Commissioner, you want to talk about those services?

Deputy Commissioner Weiner: Thank you. Again, we've had extensive coordination with a wide range of partners around the cricket council, which is starting, as you said, this weekend and going for a number of days. 

As you mentioned, there have been a number of threats, particularly in the focus of propaganda by ISIS focusing on this event, which is, of course, all of the machinery that comes into play to protect all of these events is built for just that sort of thing. 

Again, this is propaganda. The mayor mentioned the word noise. There's a lot of digital noise out there. The goal of all this machinery is to look for any signal, but to make sure that the event is safe. We have no reason to believe that there is a signal there, but consequent to the noise, we'll do everything we can collectively to make sure it's safe for all.

Question: Hey, everybody, how you doing? I had a question just along the thread of outside agitators. At this point, have you seen there be movement from people outside of New York City that have arrived here, buses, trains, are they sort of occupying nearby hotels? Have you seen any of that movement? For instance, like January 6th comes to my mind, like in DC, there was a lot of folks that came into that area before that event. Have you seen something equivalent?

Deputy Commissioner Weiner: You mean regarding the Israeli Day Parade? No.

Question: As far as the outside agitators coming in, like they've done it themselves, has anybody come in?

Deputy Commissioner Weiner: No, I think there's been much discussion about this. I think it's important to remember that influence is complicated. There's a lot that's happening in the digital world encouraging people to escalate toward more and more violent tactics. We've been very clear consistently, peaceful protest is great. Violence, disorder, disruption, not permitted. 

There's a lot of competing elements that are trying to make some of these protests more violent and less peaceful. Along the lines of what you're describing, which is of course what happened pre-January 6th, that is not something that we're seeing.

Question: Shield memo to Jewish organizations and other folks, you noted an elevated risk of disruption. Is that just based off of what you've seen since October 6th? Is there anything else leading you to that belief of elevated risk of disruption?

Deputy Commissioner Weiner: That's based on everything that's happened in the city since October 7th and where we are right now geopolitically and everything that's happening around the world. I think it would be hard to argue that the circumstances around this event this year are not different from years past.

Question: Hi, can you detail how technology will be used and deployed to help keep the parade safe?

Deputy Commissioner Kaz Daughtry, Operations, Police Department: Thank you. We'll be using our existing technology, which is our ARGUS cameras. We have a couple ARGUS cameras located on the parade route. We also have our drones will be deployed strategically along the parade route. Also on the outer perimeter of the parade route. The drones will be looking for potential groups that may come to disrupt the parade. Did that answer your question? All right, thank you.

Mayor Adams: Before we depart, I want to turn it over to Mark Treyger, the sponsors of the parade. Just really thank you for your service to the city, not only as a councilperson, as a teacher and educator, but a member of the DOE staff. We just want to thank you and want to make sure we operate in partnership. Why don't you say a few words?

Mark Treyger, CEO, Jewish Community Relations Council: Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you to the greatest Police Department in the world. My name is Mark Treyger. I am the new and proud CEO of the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York. I am a proud Jewish New Yorker. Let me unpack that, why this parade is the most important parade in my lifetime.

I am a grandson of Holocaust survivors. Both my grandmothers were in camps. Both my grandfathers served in World War II fighting the Nazi regime. My parents fled the former Soviet Union mainly due to religious persecution. My Jewish identity means the world to me. 

I'm also a first-generation American, proud, born in Brooklyn, New York. I'm a New Yorker. The stories of resilience and strength that carried my family through from the former Soviet Union to America is the same story of resilience and strength that is in the DNA of New Yorkers. 

This parade, this Sunday, is an affirmation. It is not a rebuttal. It is an affirmation of our love and pride, unwavering pride in our Jewish identity, our Jewish heritage, our community, our unwavering support for Israel and for the immediate release of the hostages that they are returned home back to their loved ones and their families. It is a testament to the city that we are. New York is a city for all people, including the vibrant Jewish community that helped positively contribute to New York and to American rights. 

Mr. Mayor, thank you. Thank you for setting an example not just to New York but to the world that in New York, we're not going back. We're moving forward towards a more fair, just, secure society that respects all people, including the wonderful Jewish community here in New York. Thank you, Mr. Mayor.