The election of an avowed anti-Zionist as New York’s mayor signals not merely a political upset—it’s a moral and civilizational warning to Jews everywhere that anti-Israel ideology now wears the mantle of power.
For more than a century, New York City has been the beating heart of the Jewish Diaspora—a city whose mayors, whether liberal or conservative, shared an instinctive respect for Jewish life and Israel’s legitimacy. That era ended Tuesday night with the victory of Zohran Mamdani, a man who proudly identifies as anti-Zionist, who refuses to recognize Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state, and who once justified the slogan “Globalize the Intifada.”
Mamdani’s election is not just a change in city politics. It marks a dangerous normalization of hostility toward Israel and, inevitably, toward Jews. It signals that the most influential Jewish community outside Israel—more than one million strong—now lives under a mayor who regards their homeland as a moral stain and their solidarity with it as suspect.
Some commentators argue that his win was all about rent, transit, and day care, not Israel. They claim New Yorkers voted for local competence, not foreign-policy crusades. But Mamdani himself dispels that illusion. “It is Palestine that brought me into organizing, and it is Palestine that I will always organize for,” he said long before the election. His anti-Zionism is not a footnote—it is his political faith.
Whoever made this, it’s brilliant 😆
— Chaya’s Clan (@ChayasClan) November 5, 2025
RIP New York pic.twitter.com/T9BFKg38mN
And that faith has real consequences. In his first statement after Hamas’s October 7, 2023, massacre of Israeli civilians, Mamdani offered a grotesque equivalence: mourning “those killed across Israel and Palestine” while accusing Israel of apartheid. Since then, he has repeatedly charged Israel with genocide, refused to condemn the “intifada” chant that glorifies violence, and vowed to arrest Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he ever visits New York. These are not slips of the tongue—they are the signature beliefs of an ideologue.
When a man like that becomes mayor of the world’s most Jewish city, Jews everywhere must pay attention. Because New York’s cultural power reverberates globally. What becomes mainstream here soon becomes fashionable elsewhere. If anti-Zionism is sanctified at City Hall, expect it to spread through schools, nonprofits, and universities with new legitimacy.
Already, Jewish organizations are bracing for impact. The UJA-Federation of New York, careful but clear, warned that the new mayor “holds core beliefs fundamentally at odds with our community’s deepest convictions and most cherished values.” Rabbi Elliot Cosgrove of Park Avenue Synagogue said Mamdani “poses a danger to the security of the New York Jewish community.” The Anti-Defamation League has announced a “Mamdani monitor.” And the anxiety is palpable in Jewish neighborhoods from Riverdale to Borough Park, where voters fear a surge of emboldened hate.
That fear is not abstract. Jews are the most targeted victims of hate crimes in New York City. When the mayor-elect blames Israel for NYPD behavior—saying “when the boot of the NYPD is on your neck, it’s been laced by the IDF”—he feeds the same conspiratorial poison that has justified persecution for generations: that Jews, or now the Jewish state, secretly manipulate power to oppress others.
The danger is not only rhetorical. As mayor, Mamdani will wield immense influence over education, public appointments, and funding priorities. He will shape how the next generation understands justice, conflict, and identity. As Moshe Spern, who represents Jewish teachers, warned: “I’m worried about the indoctrination of kids hating Israel, thinking that Israel is a pariah, thinking that Israel commits genocide—something that Zohran has gone around saying for two years.” If those narratives enter classrooms, they will outlast any single administration.
Supporters insist Mamdani will protect Jews as citizens. Perhaps. But it is not enough to guard synagogues while demonizing the Jewish state. To pretend one can separate Jewish safety from Israel’s legitimacy is to deny the lesson of the last seventy-five years: when Israel is defamed, Jews are endangered.
It is telling that even left-leaning Jewish institutions hesitated to congratulate him. Reform and Conservative rabbis who once championed social progressivism now warn that the far-left has become morally unmoored, transforming anti-Zionism into a fashionable hatred. Rabbi Angela Buchdahl of Central Synagogue called it “abhorrent antisemitism,” lamenting the “fracture in our Jewish family.” That fracture now sits at the center of civic power.
Mamdani’s victory also marks a sharp break with his predecessor. Mayor Eric Adams stood shoulder to shoulder with Israel after October 7, describing Hamas’s atrocities as “pure evil” and working closely with the Israeli consulate to combat antisemitism. Mamdani, by contrast, co-sponsored rallies that celebrated those same atrocities. Adams left office saying, “I’m leaving you a good city. Don’t fuck it up.” His warning was more prophetic than he knew.
The implications extend far beyond New York. In Paris, London, Los Angeles, and Toronto, radical movements are watching closely. If an anti-Zionist can lead New York and be feted by elites, why not everywhere else? This is why Mamdani’s win endangers Jews globally: it erases the firewall that once separated legitimate criticism of Israel from ideological hostility to Jewish existence.
For decades, Jews believed that antisemitism would never again find official sanctuary in the institutions of liberal democracy. That assumption has now been tested. The world’s largest Diaspora community will live under an administration whose guiding creed denies Jewish nationhood. The question is not whether Mamdani personally harbors hatred of Jews—it is whether his worldview, once normalized, will make hatred inevitable.
History offers no comfort. Whenever societies turned “anti-Zionist,” from Moscow to Tehran, Jewish life withered. New York’s Jews have endured pogroms, quotas, and boycotts elsewhere; they came here to escape them. Now, as one city resident put it, “I’m frightened about antisemitism on my street corner.”
Mamdani promises a “new dawn for humanity.” But for Jews who remember what darkness looks like, his victory feels ominously familiar.
Sadly,this election marks a serious threat not only Jews, but all non-Muslms, with Christians close behind the Jews! And it won’t stay in the 5 Burroughs of NYC!