Almost 100 pro-Palestine protesters arrested after occupying Trump Tower

The New York Police Department has made multiple arrests after dozens of pro-Palestine supporters stormed Trump Tower to protest the immigration detention of a Columbia University activist.

Mahmoud Khalil, a 30-year-old permanent US resident who is married to an American citizen and who hasn't been charged with breaking any laws, was arrested outside his New York City apartment on Saturday and faces deportation. He's being held at an immigration detention centre in Louisiana.

Demonstrators from Jewish Voice for Peace wore red shirts reading "Jews say stop arming Israel" and held up banners as they chanted "Bring Mahmoud home now!" on the lower level of the Fifth Avenue building's public atrium on Thursday.

After warning the protesters to leave, police said they arrested 98 people who stayed on various charges, including trespassing, obstruction and resisting arrest.

President Donald Trump has said Khalil's arrest was the first "of many to come" and vowed on social media to deport students who he said engage in "pro-terrorist, anti-Semitic, anti-American activity."

The White House didn't immediately respond to a message seeking comment about the Trump Tower demonstration.

Among those who took part in Thursday's protest was actor Debra Winger, who wasn't arrested. She accused the Trump administration of having "no interest in Jewish safety" and "co-opting antisemitism."

"I'm just standing up for my rights, and I'm standing up for Mahmoud Khalil, who has been abducted illegally and taken to an undisclosed location," Winger told The Associated Press, referring to how Khalil's attorney didn't know his whereabouts immediately following his arrest.

"Does that sound like America to you?"

Founded in 1996, Jewish Voice for Peace describes itself as a grassroots movement of American Jews seeking to "end U.S. support for Israel's oppression of Palestinians."

It is one of a number of Jewish groups around the world advocating for the rights of Palestinians.

Protester Sophie Edelhart, a Barnard graduate who studies Yiddish as part of a PhD program in Canada, said the building — with its golden escalator that Trump rode before announcing his 2016 presidential run — was a symbolic target.

Trump Tower serves as headquarters for the Trump Organization and is where the president stays when he is in New York.