New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani on Monday defended his decision to use official municipal channels to mark "Nakba Day", the Arab term for what they view as the "catastrophe" of Israel's establishment, JNS reported.
Speaking at a press conference in the Bronx intended to announce a new municipally operated grocery store, the mayor refused to back down from the controversial May 15 social media post.
Mamdani stated that the post “commemorates the expulsion of more than 700,000 Palestinians from 1947 to 1949 during the creation of the State of Israel and for the year that followed."
Dismissing the sharp criticism leveled against his administration by New York's Jewish community for erasing the context of Arab military aggression in 1948, the mayor claimed his stance was about inclusivity.
“I firmly believe that acknowledging any one people’s pain does not preclude you from the acknowledgment of another people’s," the mayor said, as quoted by JNS. “When it comes to New Yorkers like Inea and so many others, not only has their pain never been acknowledged, but so often we have seen that even their identity is up for debate."
The "Inea" referenced by the mayor was the central figure in the Nakba Day video he shared, in which she recounted her family leaving Jerusalem during the War of Independence.
“My message to Jewish leaders across the city is that my door is always open, that I look forward to welcoming a number of those leaders to Gracie Mansion this evening through Shavuot," Mamdani said, in a reference to an event he held on Monday evening ahead of Shavuot, which begins at sundown on Thursday.
The UJA-Federation of New York issued a sharp rebuke of Mamdani’s original post, highlighting the historical distortions embedded in the Mayor's messaging. The organization noted that Mamdani completely erased the fact that "22 Arab states launched a war to destroy Israel on May 15, 1948" after Arab leadership rejected the United Nations partition plan, an aggressive campaign that ultimately led to the retaliatory expulsion of 800,000 Jewish refugees from Arab nations across the region.
Addressing the calculated release time, the UJA-Federation added, "You chose 5:40 p.m. on Friday to post it, as Jewish New Yorkers prepare to light Shabbat candles. We noticed."
Meanwhile, major Jewish organizations and mainstream rabbinic leaders announced they would completely skip Mamdani’s Shavuot event on Monday, coinciding with Jewish American Heritage Month.
The UJA-Federation of New York released a scathing statement explaining their absence, noting that the organization “will not be attending the Jewish American Heritage Month celebration at Gracie Mansion being hosted by a mayor who denies a core pillar of our heritage-the State of Israel as the homeland of the Jewish people."
Mark Treyger, CEO of the Jewish Community Relations Council of New York (JCRC-NY), told the New York Post that “it’s a really telling and concerning sign of where things stand in New York City right now" and confirmed his organization would refuse to participate.
Mamdani has long come under fire for his anti-Israel views. During his election campaign, he refused to disavow the phrase “globalize the intifada". He was also called out for criticizing Israel on October 8, 2023 - just one day after the Hamas massacre in southern Israel.
He has repeatedly accused Israel of war crimes in its battle against Hamas in Gaza, and has vowed to arrest Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he visits New York City.
Mamdani then caused an uproar on his first day in office when he cancelled executive orders related to Israel, which were issued by his predecessor, Eric Adams.
The move cancelled an order signed by Adams in June of 2025 formally recognizing the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism.
Another executive order which was cancelled prohibited mayoral appointees and agency staff from boycotting and disinvesting from Israel.
Mamdani has faced multiple antisemitism controversies since taking office. A recent report indicated that Mamdani's wife, Rama Dawaji, liked several social media posts that praised or appeared supportive of Hamas’s October 7, 2023, massacre.
More recently, Mamdani was introduced at a Ramadan event by a man who called for Hamas to bomb Tel Aviv.