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NYC Mayoral Candidate Zohran Mamdani Defends BDS Support, Vows to Arrest Netanyahu During Synagogue Event

Candidate Zohran Mamdani speaks during a Democratic New York City mayoral primary debate, June 4, 2025, in New York, US. Photo: Yuki Iwamura/Pool via REUTERS

New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani again defended his support for the boycott, divestment, and sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel and his promise to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during an event at the B’nai Jeshurun synagogue in Manhattan on Sunday.

“I’ve seen the efficacy of non-violent movements in creating compliance in international law, specifically with South Africa. That is what brought me to support BDS, and what I’ve said is that one need not visit Israel to stand up for Jewish New Yorkers,” Mamdani said, referring to the international movement that seeks to isolate Israel from the international community as a step toward its eventual elimination.

Mandani said that he would prefer to combat antisemitism by engaging with New York City Jews on a personal basis and that expressing support for Israel is not necessary to be an ally of the Jewish community. 

“Ultimately, the focus of our mayor should be on the issues of New York City, at hand,” he argued.

Mamdani then defended his vow to arrest Netanyahu if he visits New York, comparing the Israeli premier to Russian President Vladimir Putin. 

“My answer is the same whether we are speaking about Vladimir Putin or Netanyahu. I think that this should be a city that is in compliance with international law,” Mamdani said. “And we have seen, other countries across the world that are signatories of the ICC [International Criminal Court] that they would honor that same request, being Canada or other countries in Europe, and their honoring of it meant that Netanyahu did not travel there.”

Mamdani acknowledged that the United States is not a party to the Rome Statute, which established the ICC, but argued that “there are times where courage is required,” comparing his desire to arrest Netanyahu to California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s decision to defy federal law and issue marriage certificates to same-sex couples as mayor of San Francisco.

“What I am trying to showcase is a belief that international law is something that should be honored, should be respected, and something that we should actually bring our city into compliance with,” Mamdani said. 

US and Israeli leaders have blasted the ICC’s decision to issue an arrest warrant for Netanyahu over alleged war crimes in Gaza, rejecting the allegations as false and decrying the court for drawing a moral equivalence between Israel’s democratically elected leaders and the heads of Hamas, the Palestinian terrorist group that launched the ongoing war in Gaza with its massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2o23.

Although Mamdani, a representative within the New York State Assembly, entered New York City’s mayoral race as a longshot, polls indicate that the progressive firebrand has made significant strides among the electorate in the past month. Mamdani trails former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo by a margin of 51 percent to 49 percent among likely voters, according to a May 23-26 Emerson College poll.

In the closing stretch of the Democratic primary, Mamdani’s views on Israel and antisemitism have been increasingly scrutinized. Mamdani, a member of the far-left Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) organization, has been under pressure by anti-Israel activists to adopt a more adversarial posture against the Jewish state.

Moreover, the progressive official also sparked outrage after engaging in a series of provocative actions, such as appearing on the podcast of anti-Israel, pro-Hamas influencer Hasan Piker and vowing to arrest Netanyahu.

During an event hosted by the UJA-Federation of New York last month, Mamdani also declined to recognize Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state.

“I believe that Israel has a right to exist with equal rights for all,” Mamdani said in a carefully worded response when asked, sidestepping the issue of Israel’s existence specifically as a “Jewish state.”

During last week’s New York City Democratic mayoral debate, he once again refused to acknowledge Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state, sparking immediate backlash among the other candidates.

Mamdani has made anti-Israel activism a cornerstone of his political career.

New York City, which is home to the largest Jewish population outside of Israel, has experienced a major spike in antisemitic incidents since Hamas’s invasion of southern Israel, amid the ensuing war in Gaza.

The post NYC Mayoral Candidate Zohran Mamdani Defends BDS Support, Vows to Arrest Netanyahu During Synagogue Event first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Netanyahu Expects to Meet Trump Next Week in the US

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Tuesday he expects to travel to the United States next week for meetings with President Donald Trump, after a “great victory” in the 12-Day War with Iran last month.

Netanyahu said in a statement ahead of a cabinet meeting that the visit will also include talks with other top US officials, such as Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff, and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick.

“We still have a few things to finalize in order to reach a trade agreement in addition to other matters,” he said, referring to Trump’s tariff plans. “I’ll also have meetings with congressional and Senate leaders and some security meetings.”

Trump last month announced a ceasefire ending the hostilities between Israel and Iran.

The US president said last week that his administration would send letters to a number of countries notifying them of their higher tariff rates before July 9, when the duties are scheduled to revert from a temporary 10% level to a range of between 11% and 50% announced on April 2 and subsequently suspended.

The U.S. initially set a 17% tariff on Israeli goods sold in the United States.

The post Netanyahu Expects to Meet Trump Next Week in the US first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Haaretz Claim That IDF Was Ordered to Fire on Unarmed Gazans Refuted by Translation Discrepancies, Contradictions, and Eyewitness Accounts

Gazans receiving humanitarian aid in the Gaza Strip. Photo: Col. Richard Kemp

A recent Haaretz exposé accusing the Israeli military of ordering troops to fire at unarmed civilians near food aid sites in Gaza relied on mistranslation, selective quotes, factual omissions, and contradictions to construct a narrative of unprovoked Israeli violence, according to independent observers interviewed by The Algemeiner.

Debunking the claim of indiscriminate fire by the IDF, the experts instead described widespread fear of Hamas, not the Israeli military. 

The Haaretz report quickly gained traction in international media. Titled “’It’s a Killing Field’: IDF Soldiers Ordered to Shoot Deliberately at Unarmed Gazans Waiting for Humanitarian Aid,” it was cited by outlets such as NPR, CNN, and Reuters, . 

British military analyst Andrew Fox criticized the article for its framing and language. One of the discrepancies he pointed to was the shift in the English version of the story from soldiers firing “towards” civilians, as stated in the Hebrew original, to “at” them. The original Hebrew subheader also specified that soldiers were told to fire “towards” crowds “to distance them” from the aid sites, suggesting the shooting took place as a means of crowd control. 

“It’s a matter of intent,” Fox told The Algemeiner. The phrase “‘at civilians’ means they are trying to kill them. It’s misleading because they’re firing warnings to avoid harm rather than shooting to cause harm.” 

“Warning shots are something all armies do — we did in Afghanistan — but when you pull the trigger there’s always a risk of harm, and that’s not great,” explained Fox, a think tank researcher and former British Army officer. “Still, there’s a huge difference between that and deliberately targeting civilians.”

Colonel Richard Kemp, a former commander of British forces in Afghanistan, said that “shooting towards,” as in the original Hebrew, was “quite reasonable as a means to exercise crowd control in a war zone.”

“It is highly unlikely the IDF would be ordered to shoot at unarmed civilians unless they directly endangered them,” Kemp told The Algemeiner, citing Israel’s interest in the success of US-backed humanitarian relief efforts in Gaza. “The IDF rigidly follows laws of war. It makes no sense for the IDF to want to damage aid efforts. They cooperate with and facilitate [the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation] and want it to succeed. The ones who want it to fail are Hamas because it deprives them of control and funds. If anyone has been doing this shooting, it would be Hamas. They have the motive the IDF do not.”

There were other discrepancies in the original headline and its translation. Whereas the Hebrew version reads “Soldiers testify: IDF deliberately shoots towards Gazans near aid collection points,” the English version not only omitted any reference to mediating testimony or attribution, but also framed the event as an empirical fact: “IDF soldiers ordered to shoot deliberately at unarmed Gazans waiting for humanitarian aid.” Further, the phrase “waiting for humanitarian aid” may carry specific legal implications under international law, suggesting heightened vulnerability, whereas the Hebrew version referred more vaguely to crowds “near aid collection points.”

The subheader — which claimed soldiers were ordered to fire at unarmed civilians “even when no threat was present” — conflicted with the body of the text, which acknowledged that Israeli soldiers were wounded near the aid distribution zones. One sentence, appearing for the first time in the 21st paragraph, stood out: “There were also fatalities and injuries among IDF soldiers in these incidents.” The piece offered no explanation for how such casualties could occur if, as the article claims, no one else present was armed. 

Elsewhere in the article, a soldier is quoted describing the IDF creating a “killing field,” supposedly involving heavy machine guns, mortars, and grenade launchers. But if such weapons were used with lethal intent, as Fox pointed out in a Substack post, the casualty rate would be far higher than the one to five reported per day. “That’s not a massacre,” he wrote, going on to quip that the only massacre to take place was one of “journalistic standards by Haaretz.”

“Could some soldiers accidentally miss and hit someone?” Fox wrote. “Yes. That is tragic and warrants investigation. However, the article itself acknowledges that the IDF is already examining those incidents. To jump from that to ‘deliberate killing fields’ is not responsible reporting. It is narrative laundering.”

The lack of video footage of the alleged mass shootings near GHF sites raises questions, given the large volume of media typically produced from Gaza, according to Fox, who noted that Hamas has repeatedly circulated images and clips for propaganda purposes. 

“Every Gazan has a mobile phone, and numerous videos of other events have been released,” he wrote. “Why is there a total absence of any credible footage of these supposed IDF combined arms assaults on queuing civilians?”

Kemp, who visited two of the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation’s distribution sites in the days following the report’s publication, described hearing distant gunfire but reported that the aid operation proceeded mostly without disruption. 

Col. Richard Kemp at humanitarian aid site with Gazans. Photo: Provided

“None of the Gazans there showed any concerns [about the IDF] whatsoever,” he said. Many of the civilians identified Hamas, not the IDF, as the main threat to the aid effort — a dynamic not acknowledged in the Haaretz report — telling Kemp they could not return home for fear of being recognized and targeted by Hamas. 

“I must have spoken to at least 50 Gazans at each site,” he said. “Many told me they feared Hamas and Hamas threatened them if they used the sites.” 

Kemp added that the atmosphere was chaotic but manageable, with GHF workers — most of them local Gazans — interfacing directly with the crowds. He described people smiling, holding up food packages, and expressing gratitude for the aid. 

“The overwhelming impression was how grateful they were to be getting free aid for once, as opposed to buying aid looted by Hamas and sold at a premium,” he told The Algemeiner

Many Gazans at the GHF sites who spoke to Kemp voiced hatred for Hamas and praised the US-backed aid effort, with some chanting “kill Hamas” while others said “I love America” or expressed admiration for President Donald Trump. The alignment between Hamas and UN criticism of the food program was “shocking,” Kemp added, particularly given the visible gratitude expressed by many recipients.

“They associate this aid program with the US,” he said. “They seem to like it, whereas Hamas and the UN seem to be its greatest enemies.” 

The post Haaretz Claim That IDF Was Ordered to Fire on Unarmed Gazans Refuted by Translation Discrepancies, Contradictions, and Eyewitness Accounts first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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Former Australian Nurses Charged Over Threatening Viral Video Banned from NDIS

Illustrative: Supporters of Hamas gather for a rally in Melbourne, Australia. Photo: Reuters/Joel Carrett

Two former Australian nurses who were charged over a viral video in which they allegedly threatened to kill Israeli patients have been banned from working under the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS), four months after being suspended from their jobs at Bankstown-Lidcombe Hospital in Sydney.

Earlier this year, Ahmad Rashad Nadir and Sarah Abu Lebdeh, both 27, gained international attention after they were seen in an online video posing as doctors and making inflammatory statements during a night shift conversation with Israeli influencer Max Veifer.

The widely circulated footage, which sparked international outrage and condemnation, showed Abu Lebdeh declaring she would refuse to treat Israeli patients and instead kill them, while Nadir made a throat-slitting gesture and claimed he had already killed many.

Following the incident, New South Wales authorities suspended their nursing registrations and banned them from working as nurses nationwide. They are now also prohibited from working with or providing any services — paid or unpaid — to NDIS participants for two years.

This latest ban, which took effect on May 9, applies nationwide and prohibits Nadir and Abu Lebdeh from working with NDIS participants or performing any role for or on behalf of NDIS providers in any Australian state or territory.

Abu Lebdeh was charged with federal offenses, including threatening violence against a group and using a carriage service to threaten, menace, and harass. If convicted, she faces up to 22 years in prison.

Nadir was charged with federal offenses, including using a carriage service to menace, harass, or cause offense, as well as possession of a prohibited drug.

Currently, both of them remain free on bail and have not yet entered any pleas, with a court appearance scheduled for July 29. They’ve been prohibited from leaving Australia or using social media while their cases proceed.

According to Nadir’s lawyer, the video was captured “without the consent and knowledge” of his client, and he intends to argue for its exclusion from court.

“We will be challenging the admissibility of the video recording because it was a private conversation which was recorded by the person overseas without my client’s consent and without his knowledge,” Nadir’s lawyer said. “That video recording was made secretly overseas and was unlawfully obtained.”

This incident, which drew international attention, occurred amid a surge of antisemitic acts across Australia since the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza began in October 2023, with Jewish institutions targeted in arson attacks and businesses defaced.

Antisemitism spiked to record levels in Australia — especially in Sydney and Melbourne, which are home to some 85 percent of the country’s Jewish population — following Hamas’s Oct. 7 atrocities, with the escalation continuing amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Iran.

According to a report from the Executive Council of Australian Jewry (ECAJ), the country’s Jewish community experienced over 2,000 antisemitic incidents between October 2023 and September 2024, more than quadrupling from 495 in the prior 12 months.

The number of antisemitic physical assaults in Australia rose from 11 in 2023 to 65 in 2024. The level of antisemitism for the past year was six times the average of the preceding 10 years.

The post Former Australian Nurses Charged Over Threatening Viral Video Banned from NDIS first appeared on Algemeiner.com.

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