Zohran Mamdani’s victory in NYC days ago confirms what we all know to be true - the flagship organizations and nonprofits that are supposed to represent us are glaringly absent.
Mamdani’s career, even preceding his role as a public official, has been characterized by an obsessive hostility towards Israel. As the founder of SJP (Students for Justice in Palestine) on his own university campus, and as a man who has glorified and promoted the phrase “Globalize the Intifada” - comparing the concept of “intifida” to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising - Mamdani has not been shy about his hatred of Israel and its people.
Perhaps somebody should remind Mamdani that the Jews of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising did not participate in the targeted, and brutally violent, mass murder of civilians, like participants of both intifadas did. Rather, the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising - which resulted in the torturous murders of 13,000 brave Jews - was an act of heartbreaking resistance. A refusal by Warsaw’s Jews “to allow the Germans alone to pick the time and place of our deaths" as Marek Edelman, the last surviving ŻOB commander, put it.
This commandeering and outright manipulation of Jewish trauma for the Palestinian cause is not new. It is a familiar and oft-employed tactic designed to erase the true history of the Holocaust and weaponize its painful memory to hurt today’s Jewish community. But it should come as no surprise that, Mamdani, a self-described socialist, does not care for history’s true face.
What should come as a surprise and an outrage, is that not only has he has been allowed to get away with his many libels; he has been rewarded for them.
What can be made of his victory?
It is certain that the once-cohesive identity of the U.S. Democratic Party continues to fracture. And that the radical progressivism which has played out on American campuses for the best part of a decade is now finding a stronghold in American public office. But what is perhaps most striking about Mamdani’s win in the mayoral primary is that his campaign, and accompanying popularity among the youth, unfolded practically unabated by true contest.
Why?
Our legacy organizations receive billions of dollars a year, and with the state of New York containing almost a quarter of the total American Jewish population, a substantial portion of this funding finds itself directed to New York City. It is certainly enough money to put together a compelling campaign for the right opposition. Such a campaign could have taken the battle for truth straight to Mamdani’s doorstep.
Alas, his lies, disinformation, and manipulations of the voter population went unchallenged. And we are forced to ask that most important question once again - where is the money going?
We know where it isn’t going.
It isn’t going towards educating the public about Islamic antisemitism which poses an increasing danger to the American Jewish community.
It isn’t going towards diffusing the radical marxist-fascist paid-for ideologies that have captured our youth deliberately.
It isn’t providing support for our Jewish youth on their campuses, which are becoming steadily more hostile to their mere existence.
And, manifestly, it is not subsidizing sensible and humane candidates in New York City.
That’s why we, at the Jewish Leadership Project, are dedicating our efforts towards incubating and amplifying effective and intelligent solutions to the problems modern-day Jews face.
As our founder, Dr. Charles Jacobs, says in this video: don’t lose hope, we have lost this battle, but the war is not over yet. WE CAN WIN.
With each victory like Mamdani’s, we are fighting harder to protect the community, building stronger alliances with allied communities, and developing more innovative approaches.
Subscribe to our Substack to keep up to date with what we are doing.
And visit our website to learn more about how you can contribute to this fight. As always, our community is our strength. And that can never be taken from us.
Thank you,
The Jewish Leadership Project Team
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