By Hugh Fitzgerald (Front Page Magazine)

Zohran Mamdani’s hatred of Israel goes a long way back. As an undergraduate at Bowdoin, he founded the university’s chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine, a group behind many of the violent protests on American college campuses today. He opposes the idea of Israel “as a Jewish state.” He does not object to the slogan “Globalize the Intifada,” which is an unambiguous call for extending worldwide the Intifadas (“uprisings”) that Palestinians conducted against Israeli Jews — the first from 1987 to 1990, the second from 2000 to 2005 — in which more than one thousand Jewish men, women, and children were murdered. “Globalize the Intifada” is a call to kill Jews — not just Israelis — everywhere. He has promised that as mayor he would arrest Benjamin Netanyahu if Israel’s prime minister were to come to the city. Yet there are left-wing Jews who are supporting Mamdani, apparently impressed with his support of “democratic socialism,” and unfazed by, or even sharing, his antipathy to Israel.

Stephen Weiss, a rabbi in Israel, lays out what a Mamdani mayoralty would mean for the Jews of New York, in an article here: “Will the socialist, pro-intifada Mamdani make New York inhospitable for Jews? – opinion,” by Stewart Weiss, Jerusalem Post, July 13, 2025:

…Will Zohran Mamdani ruin New York?

Alas, it would seem so. Zohran Mamdani (the letters of the last name unscramble to “I, madman???) has won the New York Democratic primary and looks to be the front-runner in November’s general election. In capturing 56% of the vote – including no small number of deranged Jewish voters, no doubt former members of the “Indians for Custer” club – Zohran clearly defeated former governor Andrew Cuomo.

Though Cuomo and current mayor Eric Adams – an outspoken lover of Israel and friend of the Jewish community – are still in the race, Mamdani is expected to win the mayoral election. He has captured the fascination and touched the nerve of the young woke generation whose members love to focus on what they seemingly don’t have as they flash their “victimized, oppressed, and marginalized” card in demanding their piece of the Apple. Without paying, I should add. These are miscreant complainers who love free things, be it bus and train rides, college tuition, or rent-controlled apartments in the best parts of town.

And, of course, they rally around the Palestinian-Hamas-Iranian flags and see Israel as the epitome of racist, white-privileged (even the Ethiopian Jews, who somehow don’t qualify as “people of color”) monsters who personify everything that is wrong with society. They pretend to distinguish between Zionists and Jews, even as they seek the downfall of the Jewish state and the demise of the Jewish army, which keeps our Nazi-like enemies at bay.

What is unfolding right in front of our unbelieving eyes looks like the sequel to Sinclair Lewis’s brilliant, dystopian 1935 novel It Can’t Happen Here, whereby a totalitarian dictator systematically takes over the US on a platform of instituting dramatic social and economic reforms. Lewis’s portrayal of a charismatic leader whose campaign promise to “share the wealth” ultimately brings bigotry, oppression, and financial disaster to the nation is suddenly chilling.

While this should certainly shake every good citizen of New York – and certainly Wall Street, which has much to lose – the Jewish community is dead center of the bull’s-eye. We are the enemy….

And as the window of hate opens further, the damage will likely spread well beyond the city to the outlying Jewish outposts now considered “safe zones.” Monsey, the Five Towns, Scarsdale, Great Neck, et al. will need their own internal security forces to protect them….

A note of hysteria has crept into Weiss’ article. Why will “the damage likely spread well beyond the city”? On what basis does he claim that suburbs with large Jewish populations will “need their own internal security forces” to protect them? Why does he assume the regular police in those suburbs will not be equal to the task?

The resistible rise of Zohran Mamdani spells nothing good for the Jews of New York City, who for the first time will have as their mayor someone who is openly and unapologetically anti-Israel. The writer of the article suggests that Jews in the city don “their vagabond shoes” and make aliyah. But it may be that Mamdani won’t win, because the centrist Democrats will withhold their support of Mamdani in the hope that the “Mamdani whirlwind” will simply disappear. Or it may be, if he is elected, he will — as someone who has no experience as an executive — be so overwhelmed with instituting his domestic policies that “democratic socialism” that promises to mightily disrupt and harm the economy of the city, and cause an outflow of its highest earners, that he won’t have time for pushing his pro-Palestinian agenda. Besides, as the city’s mayor he can emote, but he has no real power to affect foreign policy. Jews of New York, don’t pack your bags yet. And you don’t have to go to Israel to find a refuge from Zohran Mamdani. You can move, instead, right across the state line to Connecticut or New Jersey, and be safe from his malign mayoralty.

Wait and see what happens in November before packing your bags. Each new revelation about Zohran Mamdani’s economic and political views, and those of his father (who has claimed that Abraham Lincoln’s instituting reservations for native Americans supplied a model for Hitler’s concentration camps) chip away at his support. His victory in the Democratic primary was a surprise. Now, I suspect, his defeat in the general election will be another.

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