Ahead of the New York City mayoral election, over 1,000 rabbis, cantors, and yeshiva students in the United States signed a petition warning against the “rise in anti-Zionism and its political normalization” in the campaign.
The petition specifically mentioned the Democratic candidate Zohran Mamdani by name, the Washington Post noted.
According to the petition, “When public figures like New York mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani refuse to condemn violent slogans, deny Israel’s legitimacy, and accuse the Jewish state of genocide, they, in the words of New York Board of Rabbis president Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch, ‘Delegitimize the Jewish community and encourage and exacerbate hostility toward Judaism and Jews.’”
Mamdani has said Israel has a right to exist as a state with “with equal rights for all”; he has also claimed he would “discourage” the phrase “globalize the intifada,” acknowledging that it makes some Jews scared, and would arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he visited New York.
“We will not accept a culture that treats Jewish self-determination as a negotiable ideal or Jewish inclusion as something to be ‘granted,’” the letter says. “The safety and dignity of Jews in every city depend on rejecting that false choice.”
The petition was organized by the group “Jewish Majority,” which describes itself as a response to anti-Zionist Jewish organizations. The group’s director, Jonathan Schulman, said the letter emerged from concern among rabbis nationwide over the growing presence of anti-Zionism in American politics.