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‘Jewish opinion on Israel is shifting’
While headlines would have you believe otherwise, Jewish New Yorkers supported Zohran Mamdani in the New York City mayoral Democratic primary in droves. We showed up because our communities want to live and thrive alongside our neighbors in an affordable city where no one is left behind, and because we want a mayor who believes in Palestinian human rights.
The organization I work for, Jewish Voice for Peace Action, endorsed Zohran the same day he launched his candidacy. Our volunteers knocked on more than 80,000 doors, made hundreds of thousands of calls, and raised tens of thousands in grassroots dollars.
While Zohran ran a unifying campaign, Andrew Cuomo used Islamophobic fearmongering, false accusations of antisemitism and unwavering support for Israel’s crimes in an attempt to divide our communities. It failed spectacularly.
The Jewish community’s opinion about Israel and US policy is diverse and shifting rapidly. A poll from last November showed 61% of Jews supported halting US weapons to Israel. Hundreds of thousands of Jews in the US are clear: the Israeli government is committing genocide and apartheid, and our government must stop funding it. Many Jewish New Yorkers alongside our neighbors are desperate for elected representatives brave enough to say the truth, and it is refreshing to see a politician like Zohran with consistent values, whose progressive politics do not stop at our city’s borders.
During a primary debate, every candidate was asked where they would first travel as mayor. Zohran replied that he would stay put in New York. When moderators bafflingly began interrogating him on visiting Israel, he replied that he need not travel abroad to understand Jewish New Yorkers. He would meet us in synagogues, on the subways and wherever else we are in the city.
For many Jews watching, we felt seen in our lives, in our diversity, and in our concerns right where we live. And we felt relief to hear a candidate refuse to position New York Jews as a proxy for a government committing genocide.
The Zohran campaign represents a broad coalition committed to justice and dignity. Progressive Jews are proudly part of this coalition and will fight alongside our neighbors for a New York for all.
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Beth Miller is the political director of Jewish Voice for Peace Action
‘Israel is more than a foreign policy issue’
Elections are about choices. I didn’t support Zohran Mamdani in the NYC democratic primary; I voted for Brad Lander for mayor. But now that Mamdani won, I am supporting him, despite some of his positions, particularly on Israel. I hope that he will understand that concerns like mine are real.
Israel is more than a foreign policy issue for many New Yorkers. Mamdani refuses to say that the chant “globalize the intifada” is dangerous, though he doesn’t use it. But it instills fear in many of us. He also is a staunch supporter of Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS), a movement that insists on cutting off Israeli institutions, which are considered “complicit”, even institutions or individuals who work with Arab citizens of Israel and those who oppose the occupation, as many artists and academics do.
Mamdani has an opportunity to detoxify the Israel/Palestine debate among the left and within the Democratic party. He should acknowledge that there are two national struggles – Jewish and Palestinian – in one sliver of land, both deserving lives in dignity and freedom. He can be true to democratic socialist values along with other parties in the world: French, Germans, Scandinavians, all have put political might and money behind ending the occupation and investing in civil society inside Israel and a future Palestine.
Of course, freedom of speech must be defended, but language that makes many of us feel unsafe – and has in fact led to violence and even deaths on US soil of innocent Jews, who were murdered simply because they were Jews, must not be excused.
I was a founder of the Democratic Socialists of America, resigning decades ago. I know that the democratic socialist movement can be one of liberation for all, and for certain, it can be one that promotes equity and fairness to all New Yorkers. I hope that Mamdani governs as his own person, inspired by the values for equality that propelled him to the mayoralty.
The Democratic party is a big tent, but to keep our tent inclusive we must seek dialogue and reconciliation, not incitement, to ensure that Mamdani achieves an extraordinary accomplishment at a time when our democratic underpinnings as a nation are at risk. This is an opportunity to forge a new path forward.
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Jo-Ann Mort is co-author of Our Hearts Invented a Place: Can Kibbutzim Survive in Today’s Israel? She writes frequently about Israel for US, UK, and Israeli publications
