More than 700 pro-Israel rabbis have signed onto an open letter published on Friday calling on New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani to retract his comments likening the pro-Israel lobbying group Aipac to “monsters”.
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee is among the most powerful advocacy groups working on foreign policy in the US, spending millions to oust political candidates who are critical of Israel.
The letter was organised by the relatively new advocacy group The Jewish Majority, founded by an Aipac veteran of nearly two decades, Jonathan Schulman.
“We are rabbis and cantors from across the United States. We serve different communities, hold different political views, and do not speak with one voice on every question concerning Israel, American politics or the war in Gaza,” the letter began. “But we are united in our belief that Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s recent speech about pro-Israel civic participation is dangerous, unacceptable and beneath the office he holds.”
In remarks at a rally with Democratic Senator Bernie Sanders on 18 June, Mamdani likened Aipac’s actions to “monsters” who use “millions in dark money to accomplish a single goal: to preserve their power, so that they can turn us against one another”.
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The rabbis called the rhetoric “an act of dehumanization” that furthers antisemitism in the US.
“History demonstrates that campaigns against Jews often begin with rhetoric portraying them as uniquely sinister, uniquely powerful and somehow less deserving of equal treatment,” the letter said. “Mr. Mamdani’s words invoke a familiar story about Jewish power, Jewish money and Jewish manipulation of public life.”
Mamdani has long maintained that anti-Zionism and criticism of Israel are not antisemitism.
Doubling down
On Monday, Mamdani was asked by a reporter to clarify his comments.
“I want to be very clear. We’re talking about a status quo where children are being killed on a daily basis. More than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed by the Israeli military since the so-called ceasefire, [including] Al Jazeera journalist Ahmed Wishah, who was killed this past Saturday by an Israeli strike,” the mayor said.
“When I am speaking about Aipac, I’m speaking about an organisation that has been supportive of the status quo, that has fought any attempt to actually deliver safety to people, not just in Palestine, but frankly, through much of the region – and it is a status quo for immorality,” he added.
“It is one that I will not accept.”
Pressed on whether he regretted using the term “monsters”, Mamdani said he was quoting the Italian Marxist philosopher Antonio Gramsci – though a deeper look suggests the quote itself is often bungled.
“The old world is dying and the new world struggles to be born. Now is the time of monsters,” Mamdani said. “I used the term to describe all those who are preventing the birth of a new world, not solely Aipac.”
The mayor was lambasted across right-wing media in the US for doubling down – rather than apologising – for his comments.
A battle of narratives emerges as Mamdani-backed candidates sweep New York primaries
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Friday’s letter follows a week in which Mamdani’s growing political machine passed its first major electoral test, after all three of his endorsed congressional candidates won closely watched Democratic primaries.
Those candidates have been openly and consistently critical of Israel.
Former city comptroller Brad Lander defeated incumbent Representative Dan Goldman, while state assembly member and former union organiser Claire Valdez defeated Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso in the race to replace retiring Representative Nydia Velazquez.
In the most dramatic upset, public defence investigator and first-time candidate Darializa Avila Chevalier defeated five-term Representative Adriano Espaillat, the chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.
The trio’s victories were quickly hailed by supporters as proof that Mamdani’s campaign was not a one-off, but the beginning of a broader shift in New York’s Democratic Party.
The Anti-Defamation League, a vocally pro-Israel organisation, referred to the electoral victories as antisemitic and “chilling” to Jewish New Yorkers.
On Friday, the ADL backed the rabbis’ open letter on its X account, while also condemning the United Nations for releasing a report that documents how Israeli soldiers intentionally target Palestinian children, and criticising President Donald Trump’s administration for signing a deal to end the war on Iran.
