The Civic Leadership New York Needs Now
By Barbara Birch
Jan. 2, 2026 / JNS — In late November, as Jewish congregants and others walked into Park East Synagogue on Manhattan’s Upper East Side to attend an aliyah event held by the group Nefesh B’Nefesh, they were met with chants of “Globalize the intifada!” and “Death to the IDF!” Jewish organizations responded with understandable alarm. What unsettled many New Yorkers even more, however, was the subsequent response from the office of New York state assemblyman Zohran Mamdani, which suggested that the synagogue event itself had somehow misused a “sacred space” and broken international law.
This narrative matters; it signals how civic leaders interpret and respond to antisemitic intimidation.
Mamdani was sworn in as mayor on Jan. 1. Jewish New Yorkers will be listening to such statements carefully.
If that didn’t already strike a chord for New Yorkers, after the mass shooting during a Dec. 14 Chanukah event on Sydney’s Bondi Beach, the above framing should concern every New Yorker who cares about pluralism and religious freedom. We just saw where patterns of moral confusion and a lowered threshold for violence lead when left unchallenged. This is a moment when our local leaders should be carefully considering how they will avoid this path here at home.
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Source: The Simon Wiesenthal Center