ORLANDO, Fla. – Two people were arrested and several others pepper sprayed by Orlando police at Lake Eola Park during a pro-Palestine protest on Saturday afternoon.
The protest was held by pro-Palestine organizations from across the state, according to a news release.
Police said an estimated 1,200 people were in downtown Orlando for the protest.
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Officials said that while most demonstrated peacefully, the two people that were arrested face charges of battery on a law enforcement officer. No other details about their arrest was released.
“The Orlando Police Department is committed to keeping everyone safe who chooses to peacefully assemble in the City of Orlando, while also maintaining the safety of residents and businesses,” the department said in part in a statement.
A News 6 viewer shared a video of what appears to show Orlando police carrying away a protestor:
According to the organizer’s release, the protest was held to “commemorate the start of the Nakba,” referring to the mass exodus of an estimated 700,000 Palestinians from what is now Israel during the 1948 war surrounding its creation.
“Officers also deployed a handheld chemical agent at a group that became disruptive. No injuries were reported,” Orlando police said during their statement regarding the use of pepper spray.
News 6 photojournalist DJ McCathran was feet away from the scuffle when it broke out.
“At all times, I wanted to make sure that I was safe and kept a respectable distance from the cops and the protesters,” McCathran said. “When the pepper spray came out, it was a little abrupt. It seemed like everything went from 0 to 100 like really fast, and I did my best to capture what I could, but also not be affected by what was going on.
News 6 has asked police what started the scuffle and why were people sprayed?
McCathran recorded a woman using a megaphone during the demonstration.
“The only thing that I was told was that before the protest happened, and I was not there, they were told that they could not use the megaphone. That it was that it was not allowed, and so in the video that I shot, before the pepper spray came out, the lady was talking into a microphone that was blaring, and you could see also in that video that one of the protesters was also swinging a sign at one of the officer,” McCathran said. “So I’m assuming the one swinging the sign was the other guy arrested.”
A demonstrator before the arrests were made told News 6 why he attended Saturday’s rally.
“I witnessed my own cousins starving and having no access to any basic life necessities,” Monear Shaer said.
Another demonstrator talked about getting pepper sprayed.
“For the most part we were peaceful,” Fatima I said. “We started feeling pepper spray, or I guess tear gas sprayed. Everyone’s coughing and everyone’s confused. Why are they spraying tear gas?”
Stick with News 6 and ClickOrlando.com for updates to this story.
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