Jason Beeferman
Politico, June 24, 2025
“While running for City Hall, Mamdani has repeatedly defended using the term “genocide” to describe the events in Gaza, even as Jewish leaders object to the use of it as an inappropriate comparison of the Israel-Hamas war and the Holocaust.”
As his New York City mayoral candidacy surges, Zohran Mamdani has come under fire for his defiant stance against Israel, which critics say crosses into antisemitism.
The criticism, plastered across mailers funded by a super PAC backing Andrew Cuomo, took on a new life this week when Mamdani opted to do a lengthy podcast interview with The Bulwark during which he defended the use of the phrase “Globalize the Intifada.”
Now the issue of antisemitism, which remains central to the rhetoric in the mayor’s race as the U.S. joined Israel in its war against Iran, is on the ballot next Tuesday — even as New Yorkers say their top issues are affordability and public safety.
While Mamdani focuses his candidacy on the city’s rising costs, he also repeatedly condemns Israel while on the trail, and throughout his adult life he has organized against the country’s policies toward Palestinians.
The 33-year-old democratic socialist would become the city’s first Muslim mayor, and he recently teared up while publicly discussing bigotry he and his relatives have been subjected to.
Cuomo has tried to center antisemitism in the race, all but labeling Mamdani and his opponents as antisemitic in a synagogue speech and at other times when it’s seemingly irrelevant to the subject at hand: real estate laws, public safety and taxpayer-funded legal fees to defend him in scandals that forced his ouster as governor.
Mamdani in turn has criticized Cuomo for failing to visit a mosque during his first seven years as governor. He also firmly corrected Cuomo’s mispronunciation of his name while on the debate stage and said it demonstrated “an inability to understand that each and every New Yorker deserves the same dignity.” ….SOURCE