Mayor Mamdani doubled down amid ongoing criticism that he was too slow in denouncing pro-Hamas chants by demonstrators outside a Queens synagogue on Thursday, saying that demonstrators’ screams were “wrong” and have “no place in our city.”
“There’s no place for support for a terrorist organization in New York City. And I want to say that very clearly to New Yorkers,” Mamdani said Saturday at an unrelated press conference regarding the Thursday night protest outside of the Young Israel of Kew Gardens Hills, which is in a neighborhood with a sizable Jewish population.
Protesters were rallying against an event being held inside the synagogue where New Yorkers were being offered real estate opportunities in Jerusalem, which some argue includes disputed territory in the ongoing conflict between Israel and the Palestinians.
During the protest, Pro-Palestinian demonstrators were recorded waving Palestinian flags, screaming, “Say it loud, say it clear, we support Hamas here!”
Hamas launched the Oct. 7 terror attack on Israel.
Pro-Israeli counter-protesters were also at the synagogue and were recorded shouting racist slurs, according to the New York Times.
A video of the protest went viral early Friday and quickly brought condemnation from city elected officials such as Gov. Kathy Hochul.
“Hamas is a terrorist organization that calls for the genocide of Jews,” Hochul wrote on a tweet on X at 9:32 a.m. Friday. “No matter your political beliefs, this type of rhetoric is disgusting, it’s dangerous, and it has no place in New York.”
Critics blasted Mamdani for waiting until around 1 p.m. Friday to comment on the protest — after former Mayor Eric Adams, Mamdani’s predecessor, had rebuked protesters on social media.
“My team is in close touch with the N.Y.P.D. regarding last night’s protest and counterprotest,” he said in the statement. “We will continue to ensure New Yorkers’ safety entering and exiting houses of worship as well as the constitutional right to protest.”
Later in the day, after being criticized from some corners for not denouncing Hamas specifically, Mamdani went further. “Chants in support of a terrorist organization have no place in our city,” he wrote on social media.
“We will continue to ensure New Yorkers’ safety entering and exiting houses of worship as well as the constitutional right to protest,” he wrote on X.
Mamdani has been under close scrutiny from New York’s Jewish community in wake of comments and positions he has taken regarding Israel and the war in Gaza that are seen by some as bolstering hatred of Jews.
When asked about his delay at an unrelated event Saturday, Mamdani said that he commented on the protest “around the same time” Adams did and “made very clear something that is consistent with my own politics and my own policies.”
“Not only was that wrong, but also that it has no place in our city,” he said.
Thursday’s protest was very similar to one outside the Park East Synagogue on Nov. 19, which quickly became a political firestorm after pro-Palestinian protesters were allowed to demonstrate right outside the Upper East Side house of worship’s door.
NYPD Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch attended a service at the synagogue after the protest and apologized that police didn’t set up a frozen zone outside.
The NYPD’s Internal Affairs Bureau also launched an investigation into how the police handled that protest.
