A group of people blocked traffic Wednesday morning near Los Angeles International Airport, calling for a cease-fire in Gaza as the civilian death toll continues to rise amid the Israeli government’s intensive bombing campaigns.
Videos and photos shared on social media showed protesters gathered on West Century Boulevard shortly before 9:30 a.m. The Los Angeles Police Department said in a tweet it is aware of the protest and that “traffic is currently impacted.” A line of LAPD officers formed near the protesters, but it was not immediately clear whether any arrests had been made.
Elsewhere across the country, a group of protesters was arrested around the same time for blocking traffic at New York’s JFK Airport, according to social media posts from reporter Talia Jane.
On Dec. 15, hundreds of demonstrators gathered at South Sepulveda Boulevard and 92nd Street, just north of the airport entrance, and marched toward LAX, where they blocked traffic for hours. The group shut down all lanes and a bridge leading to the airport for a few hours.
Two days before that, a group of protesters shut down traffic on the 110 Freeway in downtown Los Angeles during rush-hour traffic. That protest escalated into violence as motorists tried to physically remove protesters from the freeway.
It has been more than two months since the Oct. 7 attack against Israel, when Hamas militants killed about 1,200 people and took more than 200 hostages . Since then, more than 21,000 Palestinian people have been killed in counter-attacks by Israeli forces, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, as protests across the globe have called for a cease-fire.