As it happened: Sydney Harbour Bridge Palestine protest

Thanks for joining us today as we watched a monumental march unfold across the Sydney Harbour Bridge. To recap:

• Police estimate 90,000 people turned up for the event. Organisers put that figure much higher, at between 200,000 and 300,000 people. That’s despite the heavy rain, with Sydney recording 16mm since 9am.
• Protesters chanted “Netanyahu/Albanese you can’t hide. Stop supporting genocide” and carried signs calling for a ceasefire and the end to the starvation of children.
• Palestine Action Group organiser Josh Lees said the march was “even bigger than we dreamt” and lauded the event’s success, calling it a “huge display of democracy”.
• Those huge numbers meant police had to scramble to figure out how to get people off the bridge safety, sending geolocation texts asking protesters to halt, stay calm, and listen to police directions on when to turn around and head southbound on the bridge. The march was originally planned to end in North Sydney.
• NSW Police acting deputy commissioner Peter McKenna said the march came “very close” to a “catastrophic situation”, with police fearing a crowd crush due to the high turnout.
• Police have reiterated they are “not anti-protest” but requested more time to organise ahead of major events. More than 1000 officers were deployed.
• The march was attended by WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, former NSW premier Bob Carr, former federal government minister Ed Husic, Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore and former Socceroo and human rights activist Craig Foster.
• Despite Premier Chris Minns’ opposition to the march, many Labor figures braved the rain including state MPs Jihad Dib, Anthony D’Adam, Cameron Murphy and Lynda Voltz, and federal politicians Tony Sheldon and Alison Byrnes. Greens MPs including Mehreen Faruqi and the state MP Sue Higginson were also in attendance.

Palestine Action Group spokesperson, Josh Lees, has lauded the “March for Humanity” over the Sydney Harbour Bridge as a “monumental and historic” moment, but says there’s “no plans” for another demonstration over the landmark.

Lees estimated between 200,000 and 300,000 people participated in the mass demonstration on Sunday – considerably higher than police estimates of 90,000 – and said the event had been without incident.

“Today was just a huge display of democracy. If anyone thinks that’s a bad thing ... then I’d say they have a fundamentally undemocratic view of the world today,” he said.

PAG spokesperson, Amal Naser, said efforts by Premier Chris Minns and NSW Police to stop the event from going ahead fuelled the huge turnout by members of the public.

“The reason why that number quadrupled was because the police and the premier issued a co-ordinated campaign to attack the right to protest, and people took the urgency to come out today. They [Minns and NSW Police] gave us more publicity than we could have ever asked for this week,” she said.

Hannah Thomas, who was arrested and injured last month during a pro-Palestine protest, attended the march adorned with a Palestine flag eye patch.

“This astounding turnout in miserable conditions is a comprehensive victory for the movement for a Free Palestine in this country. And a humiliating defeat for Minns and his cop thugs,” she wrote in a post on Instagram.

This masthead revealed body-worn footage from the July arrest showed Thomas suffered a serious eye injury when an officer punched her in the face. She underwent emergency surgery and may lose vision. Police are now investigating whether she was assaulted.

Thomas ran for the Greens against Prime Minister Anthony Albanese in the seat of Grayndler.

Police and transport officials spoke to the media after tens of thousands of pro-Palestine protesters marched across the Sydney Harbour Bridge this afternoon.

Sydney Harbour Bridge has reopened, a little over an hour later than scheduled, as the masses of protesters disperse.

Live Traffic NSW warned that other roads in the Sydney CBD and North Sydney may also be closed at various times today.

Drivers are warned to expect a significant amount of congestion in the CBD, north system, and potentially surrounding areas.

Passengers are moving relatively smoothly through train stations in the Sydney CBD, which are far busier than normal due to the pro-Palestine march over the Harbour Bridge.

Wynyard has been the busiest station as a result of the protest, with passengers about three-people deep on platforms, followed by North Sydney station.

Sydney Trains said the rail network had coped well today considering the large numbers of people who had descended on the CBD for the march across the bridge.

Services on the M1 metro rail line between Sydenham and the city’s north west via the CBD have not been operating today due to essential trackwork planned well before the protest march.

Trackwork on the T4 eastern suburbs line has meant trains that would usually run to Bondi Junction have been diverting to North Sydney, resulting in a service every four to six minutes in each direction over the bridge.

Milsons Point station will be closed until around 5pm, while Martin Place has also been shut.

Protesters are still spilling off the Sydney Harbour Bridge in their thousands, with police directing demonstrators onto George Street in the Sydney CBD.

The area surrounding York St remains closed to cars as pedestrians rule the roads. Chants of “Palestine will live forever” are still going outside Wynyard Station.

A transport official has described the crowd at Wynyard as being “dangerously busy”. Unauthorised to speak publicly, the Sydney Trains employee was trying to manage the huge flow of demonstrators entering the station off George Street.

Over the intercom, travellers are being urged to be patient as Sunday services transport people home. Platform three, which is servicing trains heading west to St Marys, is completely packed already with another train not due for 9 minutes.