Mamdani Says He Supports Palestine, but Let the NYPD Arrest Anti-Netanyahu Protesters

While campaigning last year, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdami said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was a war criminal who should be arrested. Yesterday, Mamdani’s NYPD protected Netanyahu while arresting protesters — just days after the mayor said New Yorkers have the right to protest, but he “never encouraged” them to do so. 

Netanyahu was in the city for the UN General Assembly. Genocide-enabler Donald Trump was also in town, and got an even friendlier welcome by Mamdani, who invited the President to his home, Gracie Mansion, where the two exchanged compliments after a private meeting. 

The contrast was stark: protesters demanding an end to the genocide were arrested, while two far-right leaders were welcomed and protected by Mamdani’s NYPD — all without a single peep from the mayor.

In contrast, 200 people took to the streets in front of the United Nations on Thursday to demand an end to the genocide in Palestine and to reject the United States’ continued support for the Zionist state of Israel. Over 100 people were arrested in the protest organized by Jewish Voices for Peace, including actors Susan Sarandon and Hannah Einbinder, and comedian Caleb Hearon. Among those taken into custody were two DSA members: Democratic congressional candidate Darializa Avila Chevalier and New York City Council member Chi Ossé. 

These activists represent just a slice of the heroic movement against the genocide who have mobilize from below to demand liberation for the Palestinian people and an end to the United States’ unconditional support for Israel. Among them are those who campaigned and voted for Mamdani because of his open denunciation of Israel’s colonial project in the region. 

Yesterday’s scenes were a betrayal of all of those who protested as well as the hundreds of thousands of voters and activists who brought Mamdani to power — a growing sector of the population that is tired of the Far Right and becoming increasingly persuaded by socialism and progressive policies. Mamdani is also betraying the massive social movements who are demanding an end to Israel’s genocide in Palestine and an end to ICE’s brutality, part of Trump’s violent anti-immigration crack-down.

But Mamdani’s actions are not a mere character flaw, or a momentary lapse in judgment. They are also not, as some claim, a kind of four-dimensional chess — tactical maneuvering to secretly forward socialist goals and undermine the capitalist state, while merely giving the winking appearance of complicity. 

No, Mamdani’s actions are the predictable consequence of governing as a representative of a capitalist, imperialist party. For all their handwringing about Netanyahu, the Democrats are still a Zionist party, invested in propping up Israel as U.S. imperialism’s guard dog in the Middle East. To be sure, Mamdani’s stance on Palestine is far more progressive than his fellow Democrats. But in practice, his role as an elected Democrat results in a contradiction in which he must toe the Zionist, imperialist Democratic Party line and, as a result, sell out his base. 

The Democrats are no friends of the working class and oppressed, and when push comes to shove, they’ll brutalize us and co-opt our movements. As we saw repeatedly during the 2020 George Floyd uprising and movement for Black lives, Democrats have no problem siccing the violent arm of the state on protesters while draping themselves in kente cloth. Mamdani, too, as a member of that party and the executive of the capitalist financial center of the world, allows the NYPD to repress protests, thinking that planting an olive tree can buy patience from the millions of people outraged by the genocide. 

For many people who campaigned for Mamdani, the arrests raise a difficult question: where does the energy of a mass movement go when the Democrats and their institutions try to contain it? 

The protest outside the UN shows that people are still organizing and taking action — but they cannot rely on a Democrat in City Hall to carry that struggle forward.We have seen this dynamic before.  Like during Bernie Sanders’s presidential campaigns, which both ended in the democratic socialist channeling all that progressive energy into capitalist, imperialist politicians — including Biden, who facilitated Israel’s genocide against Palestine. 

This is a recipe for demobilization. These actions don’t just make it harder for the Left to organize. They actively set us back, bringing us further from winning our demands, like ending the genocide, defunding the police, or achieving a New York City that works for the masses, not just the wealthiest. 

No amount of Kente cloth or olive trees can change the fact that the Democrats are enemies of workers and the oppressed. They cannot be counted on to liberate us, let alone the international working class. And, as we saw this week as Trump and Netanyahu, the world’s two biggest war criminals, were protected in New York, the Democrats won’t stop the Far Right.

We need to organize independently, from below. We need to use our massive numbers as the working class to shut it down until Palestine is free, ICE is out of our cities, and the Right is defeated. And we must stop putting our faith in the graveyard of social movements: the Democrats.