Mayor Zohran Mamdani helped propel three left-wing candidates with sharply critical views of Israel to primary victories in House races on Tuesday, reshaping New York City\u2019s political landscape and confronting pro-Israel Jewish leaders with the prospect of an increasingly pro-Palestinian congressional delegation.<\/p>\n
The candidates\u2019 success represented the continuation of a striking shift from the political status quo in New York, which is home to the world\u2019s largest Jewish population outside of Israel and where support for that country has for decades been the default for elected officials and office seekers.<\/p>\n
The war in Gaza and subsequent Israeli conflicts elsewhere in the Middle East have changed that political calculus, as was demonstrated by the candidates who won on Tuesday: the former city comptroller Brad Lander<\/a>, the activist Darializa Avila Chevalier<\/a> and the state lawmaker Claire Valdez<\/a>.<\/p>\n Beth Miller, the political director of Jewish Voice for Peace Action, which backed Ms. Valdez and Ms. Avila Chevalier, celebrated on Tuesday night.<\/p>\n \u201cTonight there was a pro-Palestine sweep of New York City,\u201d she said, adding, \u201cThe Democratic establishment would do well to pay attention.\u201d<\/p>\n Each of Mr. Mamdani\u2019s preferred candidates won a primary in a very progressive district, making them the heavy favorites to win the general election in November. Pro-Israel Jewish leaders in New York have said they are alarmed by the prospect of Mr. Lander, Ms. Valdez and Ms. Avila Chevalier representing New Yorkers in Washington.<\/p>\n Rabbi Ammiel Hirsch, the president of the New York Board of Rabbis and senior rabbi at the Stephen Wise Free Synagogue, a Reform temple on Manhattan\u2019s Upper West Side, said the political shifts in New York had made many pro-Israel Jews feel like \u201csomething about America that we so supported and so idealized is beginning to slip through our fingers.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cSomething a lot of American Jews are waking up to this morning is a sense of sadness, a sense that we\u2019re losing something important,\u201d the rabbi said on Wednesday.<\/p>\n Ms. Valdez defeated Antonio Reynoso, the Brooklyn borough president who has also criticized Israel, in a race that turned more on demographic shifts<\/a> than on ideology. But Mr. Lander and Ms. Avila Chevalier unseated incumbent House members, Dan Goldman and Adriano Espaillat, who both have records of voting in support of Israel and accepting donations from the American Israel Public Affairs Committee<\/a>, the hard line pro-Israel lobbying group that has been increasingly shunned by Democrats. Both of those challengers emphasized their opponents\u2019 friendliness to AIPAC<\/a> during the campaign.<\/p>\n All three winning candidates have said that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza, backing the findings of Israeli and international human rights groups and two United Nations commissions<\/a>, one of which released its report on Tuesday<\/a>.<\/p>\n Polls show a majority of Americans now hold a critical view of Israel; that includes 80 percent of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents, according to the Pew Research Center<\/a>.<\/p>\n Mr. Lander, who is Jewish, summarized the new political dynamic while canvassing voters in the East Village this month: \u201cThere\u2019s no doubt that the landscape has moved dramatically away from sympathy for Israel as Israel has acted in utterly unsympathetic ways.\u201d<\/p>\n On Tuesday, he directly addressed the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in a speech to his jubilant supporters, telling them that former President Joseph R. Biden Jr.\u2019s approach to Israel\u2019s war in Gaza was \u201ca catastrophic mistake\u201d that had \u201cmade us complicit in genocide.\u201d<\/p>\n He added, \u201cWe cannot keep paying for Netanyahu\u2019s wars with our tax dollars,\u201d referring to the Israeli prime minister. \u201cDemocratic voters are saying this, loud and clear.\u201d<\/p>\n When Ms. Valdez addressed supporters after her win on Tuesday, she said she would \u201ccontinue to call for Palestinian liberation.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe will stand up to the genocide, we will refuse to abide by apartheid and we will use our money to improve lives here instead of destroy them abroad,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n And at the victory party for Ms. Avila Chevalier, who helped lead protests at Columbia University<\/a> against the war in Gaza, chants of \u201cfree Palestine\u201d repeatedly broke out among the crowd.<\/p>\n When Mr. Mamdani introduced her from the stage, he described Ms. Avila Chevalier as someone who supports \u201ca foreign policy of investing in babies and not bombs.\u201d<\/p>\n Rabbi Sharon Kleinbaum, the rabbi emeritus of Congregation Beit Simchat Torah in Chelsea, said on Wednesday that she thought talk of an anti-Israel sweep of the primaries was overblown. She pointed out that both Mr. Lander and Micah Lasher, who won a Manhattan primary<\/a> without the mayor\u2019s endorsement, supported Israel as a Jewish and democratic state.<\/p>\n \u201cI am hopeful that the candidates who our mayor endorsed now go about doing the work of building coalitions,\u201d she said. \u201cWe need everybody to reach out beyond their comfort zones and figure out how we can bring New York together, and I am counting on elected officials to help do that.\u201d<\/p>\n Mr. Mamdani and his allies have rejected accusations from Jewish leaders and other supporters of Israel that their criticism of the country sometimes drifts into antisemitism.<\/p>\n