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Angela Buchdahl, prominent NYC rabbi, ratchets up criticism of Zohran Mamdani — and cautions against Jewish infighting
(JTA) — Rabbi Angela Buchdahl, one of New York City’s most prominent rabbis, addressed the growing turmoil within New York’s Jewish community over the upcoming mayoral election — delivering a sermon at Manhattan’s Central Synagogue Friday night that included her most pointed comments yet about frontrunner Zohran Mamdani, while reaffirming her refusal to endorse or oppose any political candidate.
“I fear living in a city, and a nation, where anti-Zionist rhetoric is normalized and contagious,” Buchdahl said during services at her synagogue, one of the country’s largest Reform congregations. “Mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani has contributed to a mainstreaming of some of the most abhorrent antisemitism.”
She cited Mamdani’s 2023 remark, surfaced this week, saying the New York Police Department had learned aggressive policing tactics from the Israeli army and his past reluctance to label Hamas a terrorist group.
Yet even as she condemned the rhetoric, Buchdahl rejected calls from some in the Jewish community to endorse in the mayoral race — a demand that has placed her, and other prominent New York rabbis, under intense pressure in recent weeks.
The city’s Jewish institutions, already reeling from a war in Gaza that led to intense anti-Israel protests, have been alarmed by the rise of Mamdani, a progressive state assemblyman from Queens and anti-Zionist critic of Israel. Jewish leaders across the denominational spectrum have debated whether rabbis should publicly oppose his candidacy, citing fears about normalization of anti-Zionism in politics and worries that if elected Mamdani will not protect Jewish interests.
Last month, over 1,100 Jewish clergy signed a letter denouncing Mamdani and the “normalization of anti-Zionism,” quoting another prominent Manhattan rabbi, Elliot Cosgrove of Park Avenue Synagogue, who in a recent sermon endorsed Mamdani’s independent opponent, former N.Y. Gov. Andrew Cuomo. In a sign that Jews are not of one mind on Mamdani’s candidacy, more that 200 rabbis, at least 40 located in or near New York City, signed a second letter charging the first letter was divisive.
Buchdahl, who has a national profile as the country’s first Asian-American woman rabbi and as a sought-out spokesperson on Jewish affairs, had previously written to her members to explain why she would not endorse any candidate or sign public political letters, despite her “steadfast support of Israel and Zionism.”
After Buchdahl declined to sign the rabbinic letter, she drew withering attacks on social media from those who said she was failing to advance Jewish interests — some from her own congregants.
In her latest remarks, Buchdahl said she felt so compelled to address the tension directly that she returned during a sabbatical taken to promote her new book.
“I knew I needed to be here with my Jewish family,” she said. “Some of you agreed with my position. Some of you, very emphatically, did not.”
She continued, “I was flooded with emails of support, and I want to thank all of you who shared those words with me. But I want to offer even more thanks to those of you who privately and respectfully shared your disagreement with me. I have been listening, and I want to respond in person tonight because that is what you do when you care about your family.”
Buchdahl framed her sermon around Lech Lecha, the Torah portion in which Abraham and Sarah leave the familiarity of home for “a place they do not know.” The story, she suggested, mirrors the community’s uncertainty about its place in a shifting political and moral landscape.
She spoke both to those who see the election as “an existential moment for our Jewish community” and to younger Jews who fear that “our community has become too focused on fear and what can be done to us.”
She acknowledged that Mamdani has met recently with Jewish civic and business leaders and softened some of his language. “I would not quickly trust a campaigning politician changing his lifelong positions,” she said. “But I hear those who believe we must engage even with those we deeply disagree with, or risk isolating ourselves from the broader good of this city.”
Drawing on an idea from Israeli writer Yossi Klein Halevi, Buchdahl described the community’s divide as one between “Purim Jews” — who prioritize vigilance and self-protection — and “Passover Jews,” who emphasize empathy and justice for the vulnerable. “Both memories are sacred, and both are necessary,” she said. “Compassion without caution is reckless naïveté; vigilance without empathy is paranoia or despair.”
While acknowledging that she is “terrified by how anti-Zionist rhetoric and antisemitic tropes have led to some deadly violence against Jews,” Buchdahl also turned her concern inward to talk about the internal Jewish tensions. “It endangers all of us: the way we are trying to impose a litmus test on other Jews, essentially saying you’re either with us or you’re against us,” she said. “Pitting Jew against Jew. Rabbi against rabbi.”
She warned that such divisions could do more damage than any outside threat. “Both Temples were destroyed because of sinat chinam — senseless hate,” she said. “We can argue robustly and should. But disputation does not require defamation.”
Buchdahl also defended her decision not to make political endorsements, invoking both the federal Johnson Amendment — the decades-old ban on political campaigning by religious institutions that the IRS recently announced it would stop enforcing — and Central Synagogue’s own policy of non-endorsement. “Once a rabbi can tell you how to vote, imagine donations being given, or withheld, in exchange for a rabbi’s thumb on the scale,” she said.
Instead, she pledged to continue speaking on “moral issues that unfold in the political realm,” regardless of partisanship. “I thanked President Biden for standing with Israel after Oct. 7, and I thanked President Trump for helping bring home the hostages after others failed,” she said.
Buchdahl concluded with a message of hope, describing meetings with Jewish students at Yale, Brandeis and Harvard who, she said, “don’t want to be defined by fear.”
“They want a Jewish community where disagreement doesn’t mean disconnection,” she said. “We will find our way forward if we walk it together.”
Buchdahl’s sermon was applauded and received a standing ovation from the congregation.
The post Angela Buchdahl, prominent NYC rabbi, ratchets up criticism of Zohran Mamdani — and cautions against Jewish infighting appeared first on The Forward.
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Man Charged With Hate Crime for Car Ramming at Chabad Headquarters in Brooklyn
Police control the scene after a car repeatedly slammed into Chabad World Headquarters in Crown Heights section of Brooklyn. The driver was taken into custody. Photo: ZUMA Press Wire via Reuters Connect
Police in New York City charged a man on Thursday with a hate crime and other charges after he allegedly rammed his car repeatedly into Chabad Lubavitch World Headquarters in Brooklyn.
The suspect, 36-year-old Dan Sohail, has been charged with attempted assault as a hate crime, reckless endangerment as a hate crime, criminal mischief as a hate crime, and aggravated harassment as a hate crime, New York City Police Department (NYPD) Chief of Detectives Joseph Kenny announced at a press conference on Thursday.
“The hate crime right now is that he basically attacked a Jewish institution,” Kenny explained. “This is a synagogue, it was clearly marked as a synagogue, he knew it was a synagogue because he had attended there previously.”
The Chabad-Lubavitch movement is an influential force in Orthodox Judaism that operates around the world. The iconic 770 Eastern Parkway building in the Crown Heights neighborhood of Brooklyn became the world headquarters of the Hassidic movement in 1940.
The NYPD’s Hate Crimes Task Force is leading the investigation into the car ramming.
Sohail is a resident of New Jersey and has no criminal history in New York City, Kenny said. The vehicle he allegedly used on Wednesday night was registered under his name and, earlier this month, Sohail attended an event at the Chabad Lubavitch World Headquarters.
“We believe that he was in Brooklyn last night to continue this attempt to connect with the Lubavitch Jewish community,” Kenny said. Sohail was due in court on Friday.
Footage from the incident showed Sohail drive his vehicle multiple times into the rear door of the 770 Eastern Parkway building in Crown Heights, according to Kenny, who added that the suspect stepped out of his vehicle, removed several blockades from his path, and cleared snow away from a sidewalk before ramming into the building.
Later, when talking to police, Sohail claimed his foot slipped and that he lost control of the car because he was wearing “clunky boots,” Kenny said. No injuries were reported and the damaged synagogue door is currently being repaired, according to Yaacov Behrman, head of public relations at the Chabad Lubavitch World Headquarters.
“It is clear the incident was intentional,” Behrman added. “The attacker removed the metal bollards that typically block the ramp and protect the entrance shortly before driving into the building. The bollards have since been restored.”
The car ramming took place the same day as the 75th anniversary of Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson being chosen as the leader of the Chabad-Lubavitch movement.
Rabbi Yehuda Krinsky, chairman of the Chabad Lubavitch World Headquarters, said in a statement on Thursday night that the incident “underscores a painful and undeniable reality: acts of hate, intimidation, violence, and antisemitic aggression are no longer isolated incidents or abstract threats.”
“Condemnation alone is insufficient. Real deterrence requires prompt, decisive action by the justice system — through swift prosecution and meaningful consequences — to discourage further incidents and ensure public safety,” he said. “As this incident occurred while the anniversary of the beginning of the Rebbe’s leadership was being observed worldwide, we reaffirm our faith that the world is meant to be refined — not ruled by fear or force, but cultivated as a place of moral clarity, responsibility, and goodness. We remain committed to that vision, even in the face of events such as this.”
The ramming incident occurred amid an alarming surge in antisemitic hate crimes across New York City.
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Left-Wing Conspiracists Attempt to Connect Israel With Minneapolis ICE Shootings
People tend to a candlelight vigil assembled for Alex Pretti at the Veterans Affairs New York Harbor Healthcare System on Jan. 29, 2026, in New York, New York, USA. Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old ICU nurse at the Minneapolis VA hospital, died Jan. 24 after being shot multiple times during a brief altercation with border patrol agents. Photo: Derek French / SOPA Images via Reuters Connect
Political progressives are attempting to draw a direct link between the ongoing unrest in Minneapolis over US Customs and Immigration Enforcement (ICE) and Israel, suggesting that the Jewish state has trained or infiltrated critical American governmental agencies.
A sprawling constellation of left-wing social media accounts and news outlets have argued that Israeli agencies have trained or assisted ICE, a federal agency responsible for conducting criminal investigations and enforcing immigration laws. They claim that Israel has collaborated with ICE in surveillance and detainment strategies. On social media platforms such as TikTok, baseless claims that ICE agents are from Israel have gone viral.
“From Palestine to Minneapolis, ICE and Israel use the same playbook,” wrote popular, far-left social media pundit Sulaiman Ahmed on X/Twitter.
Protests in Minneapolis have intensified following a surge in federal immigration enforcement operations and two controversial fatal shootings involving federal agents this month. Demonstrations grew after large numbers of ICE and partner agents were deployed to the area under an expanded enforcement initiative, drawing criticism from local activists and officials. A statewide strike and mass rallies followed, then expanded nationally after the shooting of a Minneapolis hospital worker during an ICE operation, prompting a US Justice Department civil rights investigation.
Controversial leftist social media personality Hasan Piker was suspended from the Twitch streaming platform for spreading anti-Israel conspiracy theories and making antisemitic comments in attempt to connect ICE to the Jewish state.
“This is another big suck my d**k to all the f**king Israel d**k riders out there. You f**king rabid ultra-Zionist pigs,” Piker wrote.
“You run around going ‘Why are you tying this back to Palestine?’ Because this is precisely the same s**t. You Israel-first monsters,” he added.
Piker also posted that Israel had helped the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) implement a “censorship regime” to label Americans “domestic terrorists” and carry out surveillance “on the basis of their anti-Israel & anti-ICE activism.”
“Two senior national security officials tell me there are more than a dozen secret watch lists that homeland security is using to track protestors (both anti-ICE and pro-Palestinians),” he wrote.
Other progressive commentators pointed out that ICE maintains offices in Tel Aviv, suggesting that the agency is controlled by Israel
“ICE isn’t just trained by the IDF [Israel Defense Forces], they have a whole office on Israeli-occupied land,” wrote another left-wing account on X/Twitter.
However, ICE maintains a broad international presence through its Homeland Security Investigations division, operating dozens of offices at US embassies and consulates in more than 50 countries worldwide. While ICE is best known domestically for immigration enforcement, its overseas units primarily serve as investigative and liaison posts focused on transnational crime, including human trafficking, smuggling networks, financial crimes, and sanctions violations.
Josh Paul, a self-described “human rights activist” and a former director of congressional and public affairs for the Bureau of Political-Military Affairs, attempted to draw parallels between ICE and Israeli policy in the West Bank
“You have units of a security force that are imposed on the local authorities, imposed on the local police, that engage in checkpoints, detentions, including of children […] And it seems to operate broadly with impunity,” Paul told Responsible Statecraft, a publication of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, a think tank critical of US support for Israel.
“It’s kind of every man for himself. They are obviously not operating under any standard operating procedures,” Anthony Aguilar, a US Army veteran and former contractor for the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) who has made discredited claims against Israel, told the publication. “This is exactly how the Israel Defense Forces operate in Gaza.”
Aguilar claimed he witnessed the IDF shoot a child — Abdul Rahim Muhammad Hamdene, known as Abboud — as the GHF was distributing humanitarian aid on May 28. The GHF was an Israeli and US-backed program that delivered aid directly to Palestinians, blocking Hamas from diverting supplies for terrorist activities and selling them at inflated prices. An independent investigation later revealed that Abdul had not been killed and was alive with his mother, exposing that Aguilar’s story was fabricated.
There is no evidence to suggest that ICE, which is part of the US government and charged with enforcing American immigration laws, has taken any direction from Israel in Minneapolis.
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Israeli NGO Uncovers Online Terror Plot Targeting Jews in US on Passover, Shares Data With FBI
Rabbi to the UAE Rabbi Levi Duchman helping to prepare matzah. Photo: Jewish UAE/Shneor Shif.
The Israeli nongovernmental organization Fighting Online Antisemitism (FOA) announced this week that it uncovered a terrorist plot by white nationalists to target Jewish communities in the United States on the eve of Passover and that the intelligence was handed over to the FBI.
The NGO said the planned terrorist attack was orchestrated by a “white nationalist accelerationist cell” and was scheduled for April 1, the first night of the Jewish holiday. FOA discovered messages by the terrorist cell on X in which the white nationalists discussed their goal to “bring the Nova massacre home,” which is a reference to the deadly Hamas-led terrorist attack at the Nova music festival in Re’im, Israel, of Oct. 7, 2023. Members of the cell talked about their intent to repeat the Nova attack in the US by using weapons and targeting Jewish families that would be gathering to celebrate Passover.
“We have been following this X account for a few months and recently we have noticed a shift from general slurs to operational specifics,” said Tomer Aldubi, FOA’s founder and executive director. “The group began discussing the acquisition of knives and celebrating the Oct. 7 atrocities as a blueprint. They explicitly stated it was ‘time for violence’ because ‘Jews don’t learn.’ We realized they were counting down to April 1.”
FOA shared several of the messages it found on X that were related to the terrorist plot. One post read: “Honestly we don’t have to go anywhere. Everyone just wake up on April t, choose violence, clean up our communities and cities.” Another message said: “April 1. Delete the Invaders. Pass It On!
FOA, which was founded in 2020, said it shared its intelligence with X so that the platform could remove the accounts owned by members of the terrorist cell. FOA has worked with X for many years, according to the Israeli organization. The data has also been shared with the FBI.
“The team secured a comprehensive evidentiary file, including digital fingerprints of the ringleaders, operating under specific handles, and transmitted the intelligence directly to the FBI Detroit Field Office’s hate crimes division via a confidential channel,” FOA stated.
“The distance between an online post and a terror attack is shrinking,” said Aldubi. “This success was made possible by our trained volunteers, proving that individuals have the power to protect their communities and fight antisemitism. Join us and get training on how you too can stop the next attack.”