(Web-Desk)-A right-wing Israeli government minister urged New York’s Jewish residents on Wednesday to move to Israel following Zohran Mamdani’s victory in the city’s mayoral election, branding the leftist Democrat a “Hamas supporter”.
Mamdani, 34, will become the city’s first Muslim mayor when he takes office in January.
A long-standing supporter of the Palestinian cause, he has also made a point of vocally denouncing antisemitism in recent months — as well as the Islamophobia he himself has suffered.
“The city that once stood as a symbol of global freedom has handed over its keys to a Hamas supporter,” Israel’s right-wing Minister of Diaspora and Combating Antisemitism Amichai Chikli wrote on X.
“New York will never be the same again, especially not for its Jewish community,” he added.
“I invite the Jews of New York to seriously consider making their new home in the Land of Israel.”
Mamdani’s positions on Israel — which he has called an “apartheid regime” while branding the war in Gaza a “genocide” — have drawn the ire of some in the Jewish community.
Israeli National Security Minister and far-right firebrand Itamar Ben Gvir echoed Chikli’s accusation on Wednesday.
“Antisemitism has triumphed over common sense. Mamdani is a supporter of Hamas, an enemy of Israel, and an avowed antisemite,” he said in a statement.
Avigdor Lieberman, leader of the hawkish Yisrael Beytenu party, wrote on X that “New York has chosen as its mayor a racist, a populist, and an avowed Shiite Islamist.”
Mamdani’s decisive election victory came in the face of fierce attacks on his policies and Muslim heritage from business elites, conservative media commentators and US President Donald Trump.
Trump made an eleventh-hour intervention in the election race on Tuesday, smearing Mamdani as a “Jew hater” on his social media platform.
