{"id":234675,"date":"2026-08-03T22:23:22","date_gmt":"2026-08-03T22:23:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/234675\/"},"modified":"2026-08-03T22:23:22","modified_gmt":"2026-08-03T22:23:22","slug":"opinion-conflating-american-jews-with-israel-is-wrong-and-dangerous","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/234675\/","title":{"rendered":"Opinion | Conflating American Jews With Israel Is Wrong and Dangerous"},"content":{"rendered":"

Does criticizing actions of the Israeli government or the behavior of its prime minister fuel antisemitism<\/a>? Despite the stretch of logic required to make this argument and the danger its bizarre conflation presents to American Jews, some US pro-Israel organizations are working overtime to establish the case that criticizing Israel puts American Jews at risk. Their view on this matter has now been echoed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu<\/a> who, before leaving Israel for his meeting with US President Donald Trump<\/a>, used an interview with an American TV network to level this very charge against New York City<\/a> Mayor Zohran Mamdani<\/a>. <\/p>\n

While tensions between Mamdani and pro-Israel groups have been brewing since his 2025 election campaign, it was recently reignited in the lead up to Netanyahu\u2019s announced visit to the US. Mayor Mamdani was asked by a reporter whether he would fulfill a campaign pledge to arrest the Israeli prime minister as a war criminal, as per the indictment issued by the International Criminal Court<\/a> (ICC<\/a>). <\/p>\n

In response, the mayor convened a group of legal experts who concluded that the city, on its own, did not have the authority to make an arrest\u2014only the federal government could do that. In an effort to put the matter to rest, Mamdani released a short video in which he acknowledged that he lacked the power to order an arrest but nevertheless called out Netanyahu as a war criminal responsible for the deaths of \u201cmore than 73,000 people\u201d and stated that he would not welcome him in New York City. In his video, Mamdani did not mention Israel, nor did he mention the Jewish people or the citizens of Israel. This was, he observed, simply about Netanyahu\u2019s crimes cited in the ICC arrest warrant. <\/p>\n

Some pro-Israel groups immediately denounced Mamdani\u2019s video and charges against the Israeli prime minister. They accused him of \u201crepeatedly singling out the world\u2019s only Jewish state\u2026leaving many Jewish New Yorkers feeling targeted and unwelcome.\u201d One group characterized the video as \u201cblood libel and outrageous lies.\u201d While still another charged Mamdani with \u201cfomenting antisemitism.\u201d <\/p>\n

A few days later, a Hispanic man, whom police said had mental health issues, allegedly stabbed two people, one was Asian and another Jewish. In both instances, observers said they heard the attacker shouting \u201cAllahu Akbar.\u201d <\/p>\n

The same pro-Israel groups that have been conflating Israel with American Jews and relentlessly condemning Mamdani leapt into the fray, blaming the mayor for making New York unsafe for Jews by \u201cusing his platform to viciously attack Israel.\u201d One prominent Jewish leader called on the mayor to resign, charging him with \u201cdereliction of duty.\u201d <\/p>\n

Mamdani immediately responded to these charges condemning the stabbings as \u201chateful and despicable attacks that have no place in our city\u201d and noted that his administration had already dramatically increased investment in hate crime prevention \u201cso that we can start to address the root causes of this bigotry and hatred, as we look to root out the scourge of antisemitism.\u201d <\/p>\n

The mayor added: \u201cWhen it comes to my comments about Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, they are critiques based not on my personal analysis, but rather on objective facts. They are critiques of a political leader, not of people of a specific faith or religion<\/a> or background. And my responsibility as mayor of the city is to keep every New Yorker safe, no matter where they come from, what they believe in or frankly, even if they agree with my politics. My job is to keep them safe.\u201d <\/p>\n

The mayor was not without defenders in the Jewish community. Brad Lander, who describes himself as a liberal Zionist and who recently defeated a pro-Israel congressman, described the attacks as \u201calmost certainly an antisemitic hate crime and quite likely an anti-Asian hate crime, but they are not the fault of the mayor for calling Netanyahu a war criminal.\u201d Lander added, \u201cThe effort to connect the mayor to that\u2026 is a political effort to shut down criticism of Israel,\u201d and called it \u201cweaponizing antisemitism.\u201d <\/p>\n

Peter Beinart, one of America\u2019s most thoughtful progressive Jewish thinkers, directly took on the pro-Israel Jewish establishment by noting that it was they, not the mayor, who are conflating Israel with the Jewish community. Beinart wrote: \u201cZohran Mamdani keeps saying again and again that his critique of Israel\u2026 has nothing to do with his feelings toward Jews in New York, because he separates Israel, as a state, from Jewish New Yorkers. The people who are making this conflation\u2026 are the very establishment Jewish leaders who are now attacking Mamdani.\u201d <\/p>\n

The problem here is two-fold. Antisemitism is real, and conflating American Jews with Israel is wrong and dangerous whether it is done by pro-Israel advocates who want to identify all Jews with Israel for political purposes, or by haters of Jews who want to hold Jewish people, in general, responsible for the crimes committed by that state. In the first instance the effort is designed, as Lander notes, to silence criticism of Israel claiming that charges leveled against that state put all Jews at risk. In the second instance, the conflation serves to fuel the preexisting bigotry of some by holding all Jews responsible for the crimes committed by others. <\/p>\n

The bottom line is Mamdani, Lander, and Beinart are right, and the pro-Israel establishment is wrong. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Does criticizing actions of the Israeli government or the behavior of its prime minister fuel antisemitism? Despite the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":234676,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[33],"tags":[2492,41,45962,35827,9102,37,8983],"class_list":["post-234675","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-israel","tag-antisemitism","tag-benjamin-netanyahu","tag-brad-lander","tag-hate-crimes","tag-international-criminal-court","tag-israel","tag-zohran-mamdani"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/117033920256611889","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234675","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=234675"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234675\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/234676"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=234675"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=234675"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=234675"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}