For New York's Haitian community, annual West Indian Day Parade means more in trying times

NEW YORK (AP) — Steel drums, flag-draped floats, and the smell of jerk chicken will fill Brooklyn’s Eastern Parkway on Monday, as hundreds of thousands turn out for the West Indian Day Parade, one of the largest celebrations of Caribbean culture in the country.

This year, Haitians are marching under more solemn circumstances than in prior years. Federal immigration enforcement has intensified against Caribbean and other Black immigrant communities over the past year, and Haitians have lost a key protection — temporary protected status. Known as TPS, it let hundreds of thousands remain in the U.S. legally.

Organizers say the parade has become both a defiant assertion of pride and a rare bright spot in a traumatic year.

“There’s a somber cloud over it with everything that has happened from last year to this year with TPS ... what’s happening in detention centers, and those who are being sent back with no valid way of living or supporting themselves,” said Natalie Lafontant, a Brooklyn native who organizes Lespri Ayiti, or “Spirit of Haiti,” the largest Haitian “mas” — short for masquerade — or marching community in Monday’s parade.

Still, she said, the response to hardship is not surrender.

“But if you know anything about the Caribbean, especially about Haiti, we use music, dance, art, to continue to strive and push through,” Lafontant said while taking stock of parade costumes at a community center.

In June, the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 in Mullin v. Doe that federal courts cannot review the Trump administration’s decision to end temporary protected status for Haitian and Syrian immigrants, clearing the way for roughly 350,000 Haitians to lose the protection. A federal judge finalized the order in early August, and work permits tied to Haitian TPS expired July 27.

Lafontant’s group, comprising about 180 artists, designers, musicians and residents, is marching in the parade for the second year. The group struggled to find float sponsors this year.

“All the insurances that we’ve got to cover, the people who walk, you’ve got to take care of them, the costumes, the designers. You add that all up, it’s a very hefty bill. But we continue to do it because we love our country,” said Lafontant.

Lafontant is part of a Haitian community that numbers roughly 163,000 in the New York metropolitan area, according to the Migration Policy Institute — the second-largest Haitian population in the U.S. after the Miami metropolitan area.

Most Haitian migrants settled in Brooklyn neighborhoods including Flatbush, East Flatbush and Crown Heights.

Haitians arrived in New York in waves beginning under the dictatorship of Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier, whose regime’s repression and economic collapse drove many to leave the island in the 1970s and 1980s. The migration continued after his 1986 ouster.

Haiti’s history of resistance runs deeper still, back to the Haitian Revolution, when enslaved and free Black people overthrew French colonial rule in what is widely regarded as the only successful slave revolt in modern history, culminating in the 1803 Battle of Vertières. The victory paved the way for Haiti’s independence the following year.

That history of resistance remains a source of pride for Haitians far beyond the country’s shores, even among generations who have built new lives abroad.

Edwina Paul, founder of SPM, or “Fanm Se Poto Mitan” — “Women Are the Pillar of Society” — left Haiti in 1993 to start a new life with her husband in the Brooklyn neighborhood of Canarsie. Paul, whose coalition of Haitian women leaders and organizers is marching Monday, said conditions in Haiti are what pushed people to leave.

“It’s not safe there. Coming here is like an umbrella for us to be safe from that,” she said of those fleeing the country’s gang violence and instability. “We don’t come here to sin, we don’t come here to kill. We come here to work, to have a better education.”

SPM's resilience is stitched into its costumes this year. Clara Poteau, a fashion designer and an alumna of the Fashion Institute of Technology, designed royal blue emperor robes in the image of Jean-Jacques Dessalines, a lieutenant and leader of the Haitian Revolution and the first leader of an independent Haiti.

A total of six designers and one painter spent a month hand-painting costumes that commemorate Haitian achievements, working through the weekend before the parade: dresses covered in miniature Haitian flags, skirts bearing the faces of Duckens Nazon and Emmanuel Sanon, the national football players who hold Haiti’s international scoring records, at 44 and 47 goals, respectively.

One orange T-shirt, dubbed the “Freedom” tee, carries the flags of nations Haitian revolutionary leaders helped liberate with shelter, money, weapons, and troops, including Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Panama, Mexico and Greece.

The sound of the mas, the first taste of Haitian energy parade attendees will experience before seeing the group, is carried forward by Jesus Luc, a Harlem native and Lespri Ayiti’s band manager. Luc coordinated a lineup built around “Raboday,” a popular genre of contemporary Haitian and Caribbean sounds, and Kompa, Haiti’s signature native dance music.

Headlining is DJ Comix of the band Team Madada, dubbed by Luc as “probably the most popular group in Haiti,” part of a new generation of sound defining the country’s youth.

“It’s electrifying. It’s music that will touch your soul. Between the music and the costumes... it’s the heart of the people that’s going to be there.”

Haitian-American Jesus Luc poses for a portrait ahead of the West Indian Day Parade, Thursday, Sept. 3, 2026, in the Brooklyn borough of New York. (AP Photo/Adam Gray)

Haitian-born Edwina Paul holds Haitian flag ahead of the West Indian Day Parade, Thursday, Sept. 3, 2026, in the Brooklyn borough of New York. (AP Photo/Adam Gray)

Haitian-born Edwina Paul points at a Haitian independence-themed costume for Lespri Ayiti Mas Camp ahead of the West Indian Day Parade on Thursday, Sept. 3, 2026, in the Brooklyn borough of New York. (AP Photo/Adam Gray)

Haitian-born Clara Poteau holds up a Haitian costume for Lespri Ayiti Mas Camp, ahead of the West Indian Day Parade, Thursday, Sept. 3, 2026, in the Brooklyn borough of New York. (AP Photo/Adam Gray)

Haitian costumes for Lespri Ayiti Mas Camp are displayed ahead of the West Indian Day Parade, Thursday, Sept. 3, 2026, in the Brooklyn borough of New York. (AP Photo/Adam Gray)

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — Germany on Monday will challenge claims at the United Nations’ top court that it is “facilitating” acts of genocide in Gaza by providing arms and other military support to Israel.

Nicaragua, which launched the case at the International Court of Justice, accuses Berlin of violating the Genocide Convention and international humanitarian law. While the case centers on Germany, it indirectly takes aim at Israel’s campaign in Gaza in response to the deadly Oct. 7, 2023 attacks by Hamas.

Israel, which isn’t a party in the proceedings, strongly denies that its actions amount to acts of genocide.

Monday’s hearing at the court in The Hague will address questions raised by Germany over whether the court has jurisdiction in the case.

The conflict left tens of thousands of Palestinians dead and devastated the enclave. Despite a fragile ceasefire brokered by the United States last year, violence has continued. Since the ceasefire was announced, Israeli fire has killed more than 1,300 Palestinians in Gaza. Five Israeli soldiers have also been killed.

Germany has been a staunch supporter of Israel for decades and is the second-largest supplier of arms to Israel after the United States.

Berlin denies Nicaragua's allegations. The head of Germany’s legal team, Tania von Uslar-Gleichen, told judges during an earlier hearing that Nicaragua’s claims “have no basis in fact or law.”

Last year, Germany stopped authorizing any exports of military equipment to Israel that could be used in Gaza but later lifted those restrictions.

In 2024, the court rejected an emergency request from Nicaragua to order Germany to halt military and other aid to Israel in Gaza, but the 16-judge panel declined to throw out the case altogether.

The proceedings are the latest legal attempt to rein in Israel’s military campaign by a country with historic ties to the Palestinian people, after South Africa accused Israel of genocide at the same court in 2023.

In January 2024, judges at the ICJ ordered Israel to do all it can to prevent death, destruction and any acts of genocide in Gaza. Two months later, the court told Israel to take measures to improve the humanitarian situation in Gaza, including opening more land crossings to allow food, water, fuel and other supplies.

South Africa says that Israel largely ignored those orders.

Both South Africa’s case against Israel and Nicaragua’s case against Germany allege violations of the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. The convention was drawn up in the wake of the Holocaust to codify a new crime: genocide.

A team of independent experts commissioned by the United Nations’ Human Rights Council and the largest professional organization of scholars studying genocide have both concluded that Israel is violating the treaty but only an international court can make a legal determination.

Proceedings at the ICJ can drag on for years. In 2007, the court ruled that Serbia “violated the obligation to prevent genocide” in the 1995 Srebrenica massacre, when Bosnian Serb forces rounded up and murdered some 8,000 mostly Muslim men and boys in eastern Bosnia.

In May, the court set a November 2027 deadline for South Africa to file its written pleadings and gave Israel until May 2029 to reply. Hearings on the core question of the case — whether Israel committed genocide in Gaza — likely won’t be heard until late 2029 at the earliest.

In separate proceedings at the International Criminal Court, also in The Hague, which tries cases against individuals rather than between nations, judges have issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant in connection with the conflict.

The pair are charged with crimes against humanity, not genocide. The court said it found that there was reason to believe they used “starvation as a method of warfare” by restricting humanitarian aid and intentionally targeted civilians in Israel’s campaign against Hamas in Gaza — charges Israeli officials deny.

In response, the United States has issued sanctions against many senior court staff, including nine of the ICC’s 18 judges.

FILE - The logo of the International Court of Justice displayed on the judges' bench, in The Hague, Netherlands, May 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Peter Dejong, File)