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A Jewish-led anti-war protest in front of the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in the United States surprised share-traders and finance capital figures on October 14.

Organised by Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP), the protest was held to “demand that the US government stop sending bombs to Israel and stop profiting off of Israel’s genocide against Palestinians in Gaza,” said JVP’s political director Beth Miller.

Protesters wearing red shirts saying “Jews say stop arming Israel” and “Not in our name” ran to the NYSE minutes before the opening bell.

Organisers estimate that 500 people took part in the protest to demand an arms embargo and immediate ceasefire.

Some protesters sat on the ground; others held signs that read “Fund FEMA [the federal disaster management agency] not genocide”. A few chained themselves to a police security fence outside the building.

Protesters chanted: “Let Gaza live! Stop arming Israel!”

Participants included descendants of Holocaust survivors and other allies of the Palestinian resistance.

October 14 was chosen because it is a national holiday honouring Indigenous peoples massacred and exterminated by European settlers during and after the colonisation of the Americas. It was previously known as Columbus Day.

The following morning, Elena Stein, JVP’s director of organising strategy — who was arrested and held by the police for more than eight hours — told Democracy Now! that the Israeli Defence Force is massacring civilians with bombs and fighter jets supplied by the US.

“It is being done with US bombs, with US weapons and with US cover … shielding Israel from accountability at any international institution.

“[T]he Biden administration wants you to believe that the reason the US is arming, funding and covering [for] the Israeli government like this is for the sake of Jewish safety.

“[But] we are there to say we reject this myth, this sick myth, with every fibre of our beings. We refuse to let our histories, our identities, our traditions be used to torture, to starve, to massacre, to erase Palestinians.”

Stein said the reason the US is backing Israel is that the US government is protecting “its own imperial and financial interests”.

Protesters did not get inside the NYSE or disrupt trading, but about 206 people were arrested, according to police.

The protest took place following the US government announcement of a new US$8.7 billion (A$13 billion) military grant to Israel and the deployment of 100 troops to Israel to operate a missile defence system supplied by the US.

"[T]he United States is not arming Israel to protect Jews. The United States is arming Israel for its own profit and control of the region,” JVP said.

“Israel is using US bombs to massacre communities in Gaza while simultaneously weapons manufacturers on Wall Street are seeing their stock prices skyrocket,” Miller added.