Mamdani draws bipartisan backlash for criticizing Israel on Oct. 7 anniversary

Por Joe Anuta and Chris Sommerfeldt — POLITICO – TOP Stories

NEW YORK — Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s statement marking the third anniversary of Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack on Israel sparked outrage Wednesday — and racked up millions of views on social media.

Mamdani is a longtime critic of Israel and has been especially fervent in decrying its treatment of Palestinians since the 2023 attack. But his anniversary statement garnered particularly pointed pushback because of its timing, with critics arguing Wednesday was the kind of occasion when elected leaders should avoid divisiveness.

Mamdani started his statement by condemning Hamas’ attack as a “horrific war crime” but then devoted the bulk of it to characterizing Israel’s ensuing military campaign as a genocide.

“The suffering did not begin nor end that day,” he wrote of Oct. 7, 2023. “It instead continued through the Israeli government’s devastating, ongoing genocide in Gaza in which it has killed more than 74,000 Palestinians — including more than 21,000 children.”

The statement had garnered more than 11 million views on X by Wednesday evening — and the backlash was broad, sparking condemnations even from some fellow Democrats who hold differing views on the conflict.

Rep. Dan Goldman, a New York Democrat, called it “egregious and insulting.”

“There are 364 days of the year to focus on that. This is a day that should just be focused on what was by all agreement a horrific terror attack,” Goldman, who’s Jewish, told POLITICO. “What the mayor’s statement did today was to blame Israelis for the attack that they suffered three years ago. Regardless of what you actually think of the conflict and what’s happened either since or before, there’s no excuse for victim blaming.”

Mamdani got his political start in pro-Palestinian activism and his critiques of Israel energized elements of his base to come out for him in last year’s mayoral election. That’s a trend mirrored on the national stage, with Democrats across the country holding increasingly negative views of the U.S.’s Middle East ally as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu continues to face an International Criminal Court arrest warrant over his government’s military campaign in Gaza (Israel denies it is committing a genocide).

Conversely, Goldman is about to leave Congress at the end of this year after being defeated in this past summer’s Democratic primary by a Mamdani-backed challenger, former City Comptroller Brad Lander, who made his embrace of the Palestinian cause a key plank of his campaign.

Goldman was far from alone in knocking the mayor for his Oct. 7 statement.

Conservative critics from around the world also quickly pounced, including Israeli government officials and Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders. Huckabee Sanders’ father, Mike Huckabee, President Donald Trump’s U.S. ambassador to Israel, wrote on X that the mayor’s statement was a “disgusting rant” akin to condemning the American military response after 9/11.

Mamdani’s office declined to comment on the wave of pushback. He denies harboring any antisemitic views and has pointed to his decision to boost city funding for hate crimes prevention programs in arguing he’s committed to stamping out anti-Jewish attacks.

Prominent Jewish groups in New York City, though, have cycled through near constant outrage at the mayor’s criticism of Israel, arguing it has inflamed antisemitism and hate crimes against local Jews.

Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch, president of the New York Board of Rabbis, said Mamdani’s statement was “morally perverse” and “like sticking a knife into the pain of the Jewish community in New York and in America.”

“It is so offensive to so many Jews that it is hard to describe how offensive it is,” he said. “And it exacerbated the feeling that American Jews and New York Jews have had since he first came to prominence, which is that he has a problem with collective Jewish empowerment and he hates the state of Israel.”

Mamdani’s rhetoric stood out from more moderate Democratic elected officials in New York like Gov. Kathy Hochul, who raised an Israeli flag above the State Capitol in Albany and issued a statement focused only on remembering the victims of the Oct. 7 attack.

But the mayor’s message was consistent with his strong and long-running views on the conflict — a position that helped galvanize young voters to back him in last year’s Democratic primary and vanquish former Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

Recent polling has shown Americans, and Democrats in particular, souring on the Israeli government and the U.S.’s financial backing of it as the war in Gaza enters its fourth year. And leftists running in New York City primaries made the Middle Eastern conflict a top litmus test that resulted in Rep. Adriano Espaillat losing reelection to Darializa Avila Chevalier, a Mamdani-endorsed member of the Democratic Socialists of America.

The mayor’s statement was also generally in line with others affiliated with the Democratic Party’s left flank, including Sen. Bernie Sanders, an independent who is a close adviser to the mayor.

“Like any country facing a terrorist attack, Israel had the right to defend itself and go after Hamas,” Sanders, who’s Jewish, said in a statement. “Tragically, the Netanyahu government in Israel did not wage a war against Hamas alone. It waged a genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza.”

But more extreme elements of the left believe Mamdani didn’t go far enough.

On Wednesday evening, about 200 anti-Israel protesters, some donning Hamas headbands and waving Hezbollah flags, gathered outside City Hall to blast Mamdani for what they see as his betrayal of the Palestinian cause. Several protesters who spoke to POLITICO said they voted for Mamdani last year, but will not back him for reelection because they’re disappointed he hasn’t fired NYPD Commissioner Jessica Tisch, a self-described Zionist, or stopped some local synagogues from hosting events promoting land sales in the occupied West Bank.

“Mayor Mamdani, you can’t hide,” the crowd chanted at one point. “We charge you with genocide.”

Fonte: POLITICO – TOP Stories