No one should be surprised that radical socialist New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani will be the first mayor in over 60 years to skip the city’s annual Israel Day Parade, which will be held on Sunday, May 31, despite attending other events that celebrate the city’s diverse cultural landscape.
As The Geller Report notes, “Mamdani’s hatred of the Jewish people is so consuming, it defines his mayoralty.”
Mamdani’s first veto in office jettisoned a bipartisan bill aimed at combatting antizemitism.
Further, he nullified pro-Israel executive orders signed by former Mayor Eric Adams, including overturning an order that adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of anti-Semitism.
He also scrapped an Adams order to oppose the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement, which banned any city contracting actions “that discriminate against the state of Israel, Israeli citizens based on their national origin, or individuals or entities based on their association with Israel.”
Before even taking office, he came under fire for his appointment of Catherine Almonte Da Costa to the role of Director of Appointments. Her resurfaced vile rants, including comments about “money-hungry Jews” and saying the Far Rockaway train “is the Jew train.” Following the firestorm, Da Costa resigned from the position before even starting it.
Since 1964, every mayor in the city has attended the Jewish celebration, which comes amid record levels of antisemitism and weeks of anti-Israel demonstrations outside synagogues and Jewish communal institutions across New York.
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Mamdani indicated that he would not attend as a matter of political principle. He has voiced frequent criticism of Israel following the Hamas Oct. 7, 2023, attack on the Jewish state and, upon taking office in January, scrapped an order that barred city agencies from participating in the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel.
“I look forward to joining and hosting many community events celebrating Jewish life in New York and the rich Jewish history and culture of our city,” Mamdani’s spokesman told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
His “principled” decision garnered widespread backlash.
When Mamdani marches in the Pakistan parade, it should be understood as an endorsement of the genocidal, Islamic supremacist government of Pakistan. https://t.co/lvHmJ7oxLe
— Max 📟 (@MaxNordau) May 29, 2026
Rabbi Marc Schneier, president of the Foundation for Ethnic Understanding, shared his blunt message to Mamdani in a Daily News op-ed noting, “The mayor was elected to lead all of us. He has decided that some of us are not worth his time. That is his right. It is also our right to remember it.”
Last weekend, just before the Jewish Sabbath began, Mamdani posted a four-minute propaganda video marking the “Nakba.” The “Nakba” translates to a “great catastrophe.” The “Nakba” was declared by the Palestinians on the day Israel became an independent state.
Not once does he acknowledge that the “Nakba” was the result of Israel’s neighbors declaring war on the Jewish state the moment it was born. Not once does he mention the 850,000 Jews who were expelled from their homes in Arab lands after Israel’s 1948 independence.
For the mayor of New York to invoke the “Nakba” during American Jewish Heritage Month shows a complete disregard and insensitivity for what his Jewish constituents are living through right now. Can you be more tone deaf, Mr. Mayor?
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