Charges dismissed against NY rabbi accused of hitting Columbia protesters with his car

All charges have been dismissed against a Manhattan rabbi and real estate developer who had been accused of ramming his vehicle into pro-Palestinian protesters in May.

Charges were also dropped against two protesters who were arrested at the scene.

Reuven Kahane had been arrested and accused of assault after the altercation with the demonstrators, who were protesting outside the Upper East Side home of a Columbia University trustee.

The protesters were affiliated with Columbia University Apartheid Divest, an alliance of anti-Israel student groups that had characterized the incident in a press release as “Zionist driver runs down peaceful pro-Palestinian demonstration.” 

Police said at the time that an argument had broken out between Kahane and the protesters as the protesters were leaving the scene, and that Kahane had “tapped” one of the demonstrators with his car. Kahane said he had shouted at protesters banging on his car.

Police arrived a few minutes later and arrested Kahane and two of the activists, Maryellen Novak, 55, and John Rozendaal, 63, for criminal mischief. 

Case dismissed

Now, the case against Kahane has been dismissed. The New York State Unified Court System confirmed that the case had been dismissed last month pursuant to speedy trial limitations that stipulate a trial must take place within a certain amount of time after the incident. The case no longer appears in court records.

Kahane says that the charges against him were baseless.

“Nothing whatsoever that they accused me of happened,” he said in an interview on Wednesday, saying that the case had been “completely dismissed and sealed.”

Novak and Rozendaal also had their charges dropped. Following the May arrest, a fundraiser for Novak, identifying her as a “safety marshal” for protesters, raised more than $11,000.

Rozendaal had previously been arrested in March for disrupting an Easter service at St. Patrick’s Cathedral as part of a pro-Palestinian protest. None of the student protesters on the scene were charged. 

At the time of the incident, Columbia was being rocked by anti-Israel demonstrations, and city officials, including Mayor Eric Adams, repeatedly said that “outside agitators” were responsible for much of the unrest.

The Upper East Side protest took place days after a group of pro-Palestinian protesters on the university’s Morningside Heights campus had forcibly occupied a building. Police arrested dozens while clearing out the building, and many of those charges were ultimately dismissed as well. More than 25% of those arrested were also not affiliated with the university.

Kahane, an ordained rabbi who heads a real estate firm, believes that the May altercation and his arrest drew widespread attention because he shares a name with his second cousin, the late extremist rabbi Meir Kahane. He said he met Meir Kahane “numerous times” while the two were living in New York but that he is “not a Kahanist.” While in New York, Meir Kahane led the Jewish Defense League, a far-right group, and his political party was later barred from the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, for racism. He was assassinated in New York City in 1990.

“I think if my name was Joe Smith, I don’t think anybody would have picked this up,” Reuven Kahane said.