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In Manhattan’s Washington Square Park, a vigil meant to honor the late Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei turned violent on Friday. The chaos was captured on video, showing a man being attacked while he tried to remove a poster of Khamenei.
Footage revealed the moment the man attempted to take down the dictator’s poster—who was reportedly killed in an Israeli airstrike last week—only to be punched in the face by an individual dressed in a SpongeBob sweatshirt, sending him sprawling to the ground.
The altercation quickly escalated as more people joined in the fray, prompting the New York City Police Department (NYPD) to step in and restore order.
Amid the unfolding melee, the crowd erupted with shouts and profanity.
A table set up in New York City to commemorate Khamenei—blamed for the deaths of thousands of Iranians—stood as a backdrop to the unrest. (Rashid Umar Abbasi for Fox News Digital)
Multiple people were captured on video being detained by police.
The vigil featured a makeshift memorial table covered with Palestinian keffiyeh scarves, candles and photos of Khamenei, with an observer describing the scene as the “People’s Republic of New York.”
Meanwhile, nearby counter-protesters waved Iranian, American and Israeli flags while chanting “U.S.A.”
Khomeni supporters waved a large flag donning his portrait. (Rashid Umar Abbasi for Fox News Digital)
In a flyer announcing the event, organizers called Khamenei’s death an “assassination by U.S. government forces.”
Saturday’s downtown Tehran strike that killed Khamenei and other regime leaders was carried out by the Israeli military.
U.S. officials have denied any involvement.
“Throughout his life, Khamenei defended the dignity of the Iranian people and stood firmly against zionism [sic] and the criminal American regime,” organizers wrote on the flyer. “Since the Islamic Revolution in 1979 overthrew the U.S.-backed puppet government, the Iranian people have resisted Western domination and the exploitation of their land, labor, and resources.
“In that time, Iran severed all ties with the zionist [sic] regime and was the first country to host a Palestinian embassy on its soil, all while materially supporting Palestinian resistance and national liberation movements across the world.”
Among Khamenei’s supporters were a group of counter-protesters who slammed the vigil while holding American flags and pre-1979 Islamic Revolution Iranian Lion and Sun flags.
“We’re here to show everyone that Iranians don’t like the regime,” a man at the vigil told Fox News contributor Nicole Parker on “Hannity.”
Protesters and counter-protesters gathered inside Washington Square Park in New York, New York, on Friday afternoon. (Rashid Umar Abbasi for Fox News Digital)
“My family is in Iran, but all of them are fighting against the regime,” another woman told Parker. “They’re happy about this, they want this war — this war is not about [the] Iranian people, this war is against the Islamic Republic.”
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