In a recent ABC appearance, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani reiterated his conviction that he could not support “any state that privileges one religion over the other” in response to the question of whether he would support “Israel as a Jewish state.”
Variations of this question have been posed to him multiple times before, most notably during that infamous Democratic Party primary debate, where he was the only candidate on stage to refuse to name Israel as his “first foreign visit” if elected. Mamdani’s commitment to the fundamental principle of equality for all has thus earned him many adversaries, and some of them seem to have developed a habit of casually accusing him of using “blatant anti-Semitic language,” as Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations, Danny Danon, did just a couple of weeks ago, referring to Mamdani’s entirely accurate criticism of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).
Danon’s intervention to prevent anti-Semitism from taking hold in American politics in this manner is not unique. In fact, such interventions are ubiquitous. Israeli Cabinet ministers, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu himself, frequently invoke their “right to defend” themselves by attacking public figures from all around the world, blaming them for prejudicing the safety of the Jewish people living in their jurisdictions. And they utilize this fantastical right to intimidate their targets, often quite successfully. Governments generally respond to their capricious concerns, no matter how ridiculous those concerns may be.
