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How Zohran Mamdani’s Ambiguous Words Echo in the Digital Sphere
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
When politicians speak out about Israel, antisemitism, or the Holocaust, what they omit can matter as much as what they say. In the digital arena, where nuance collapses within seconds, ambiguity often becomes ammunition.
The case of New York politician Zohran Mamdani, a progressive rising star who will likely become the mayor of New York City, illustrates this dynamic vividly. His statements about Israel, antisemitism, and the war in Gaza have sparked heated debate — not only for their content, but for the way strategic ambiguity allows them to be interpreted in starkly different ways.
Our research analyzed Mamdani’s rhetoric across multiple platforms — from television interviews to TikTok and YouTube — and traced how his words were reframed by influencers and audiences online.
The findings reveal how ambiguous political language can fuel polarization, distort Holocaust memory, and invite antisemitic readings that the speaker may never have intended.
The Power — and Peril — of Ambiguity
Ambiguity functions as a rhetorical strategy: it allows politicians to gesture in several directions at once, offering different audiences the interpretations they prefer. This flexibility provides plausible deniability, yet also creates an opening for distortion and hate.
Mamdani’s communication style is a textbook case. His remarks on Israel and antisemitism frequently hover between empathy and insinuation, critique and deflection — giving the impression of moral seriousness while avoiding clear commitments.
The effect is twofold: admirers see courage and compassion; critics see evasion and coded hostility. But the real consequences emerge online, where ambiguous statements are picked up by content creators, reframed through ideological lenses, and amplified to millions — often in ways that intensify division and resentment.
Omissions That Speak Volumes
Following Hamas’ October 7, 2023 massacre, in which terrorists murdered 1,200 Israelis and abducted more than 250, Mamdani issued a statement that conspicuously omitted any mention of Hamas or its victims.
Instead, he accused the Israeli government of preparing a “second Nakba.”
Such omissions are not neutral. In political communication, what is left unsaid shapes interpretation just as powerfully as explicit statements. By focusing solely on Israel’s alleged actions, Mamdani’s message erased the context of terrorism and Jewish suffering — effectively reframing a massacre as an act of “resistance.”
This pattern continued in later comments. Mamdani publicly repeated claims — later shown by independent investigations to be caused by a misfired Palestinian rocket — that Israel had bombed the Al-Ahli hospital in Gaza and that pro-Israel students at New York protests had used “chemical weapons.” Both claims spread rapidly online before being debunked. Yet even after corrections, the emotional narrative — Israel as aggressor, Jews as oppressors — remained intact.
When asked about these inaccuracies, Mamdani rarely corrected himself. Instead, he shifted attention to alleged efforts to silence him. In one speech, he attacked the lobbying group AIPAC as “undermining American democracy.” In the version later posted to his social media, that line was quietly edited out — an omission that further invited speculation and conspiratorial readings.
The pattern is consistent: statements are made, outrage follows, then a revised version appears — leaving both supporters and detractors to project their own meanings onto the ambiguity.
Reframing and Decontextualization
Much of Mamdani’s rhetorical power lies in reframing contentious slogans. During debates and interviews, he defended the chant “From the River to the Sea” as an expression of “universal human emancipation,” detaching it from its historic associations with the destruction of Israel. Likewise, when confronted about the slogan “Globalize the Intifada,” he called it “a call for justice,” likening it to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.
In the Bulwark podcast, he cited the US Holocaust Memorial Museum’s translation of “intifada” as “uprising” — implying moral equivalence between Jewish resistance during the Holocaust and Palestinian militancy today. Such analogies, presented as scholarly nuance, flatten historical distinctions and convert Holocaust memory into a tool of political comparison.
This decontextualization serves two purposes: it universalizes Jewish suffering (suggesting it belongs equally to all oppressed peoples) and downplays antisemitic violence within the Palestinian movement.
The result is a moral narrative where Jewish trauma becomes a universal metaphor, detached from Jewish history — a rhetorical move with deep emotional resonance and troubling implications.
“Right to Exist” — With Conditions
Mamdani’s statements about Israel’s right to exist are similarly ambivalent. On The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, he affirmed support for Israel “as long as it abides by international law” — a condition that effectively renders recognition provisional. In a later debate, he reiterated that Israel has “a right to exist” but declined to say “as a Jewish state,” instead describing a hypothetical state “with equal rights.”
These formulations sound reasonable, but they subtly shift the premise: from defending Israel’s right to exist as the world’s only Jewish homeland — a right enshrined after the Holocaust — to questioning the legitimacy of Jewish self-determination altogether.
Such framing enables both deniability (“I said they have a right to exist”) and accusation (“but they are violating it”).
How Digital Amplification Works
Our team analyzed hundreds of YouTube and TikTok videos discussing Mamdani’s remarks, focusing on content creators with large followings such as Hasan Piker, Kyle Kulinski, Sam Seder, Guy Christensen, and Vaush.
Across these channels, we coded the creators’ framing of Mamdani’s rhetoric and examined the first 200 comments per video.
The pattern was unmistakable: ambiguity in Mamdani’s statements invited radical amplification online. Influencers portrayed him as a victim of “smears,” “Islamophobia,” and “AIPAC propaganda.”
In turn, comment sections erupted into open antisemitic conspiracy theories.
- Denial and Inversion
Creators like Piker dismissed accusations of antisemitism as “fake nonsense,” claiming they were “weapons” to silence pro-Palestinian voices. Commenters echoed this denial, insisting that “antisemitism is a made-up shield” and calling the Anti-Defamation League the “Apartheid Defense League.”
This rhetorical inversion — portraying those who identify antisemitism as aggressors — transforms legitimate concern into alleged oppression. It blurs the line between defending free speech and trivializing hate.
- Competing Victimhood
Another recurring pattern was reversal of victimhood. Influencers framed criticism of Mamdani as evidence of Islamophobia, arguing that “Muslim politicians are automatically branded antisemitic.” In comment sections, this morphed into claims that Jewish concerns about antisemitism are “privileged” over Muslim experiences of discrimination.
This competitive framing pits minority groups against one another, eroding solidarity and obscuring the specific nature of antisemitism as a distinct, historically rooted form of hate.
- Conspiracy and Servility Tropes
When Democratic leaders criticized Mamdani, content creators claimed they were “doing AIPAC’s bidding.” Commenters took this further: “The Zionists control every dimension of life,” one wrote. Others invoked classic antisemitic imagery — “Follow the $$$ … puppets of Israel” — or even violent fantasies, predicting Mamdani would be “JFK’d” if he continued defying “the lobby.”
These narratives recycle centuries-old myths of Jewish financial and political control, now reframed in the language of internet populism.
- Normalizing Anti-Israel Rhetoric
Creators like Kulinski claimed Mamdani’s stance represented “mainstream Democratic opinion,” suggesting most Americans — even Jewish ones — share his criticisms of Israel. Commenters adopted this as fact, declaring that “the only thing Zionists fear is losing power.”
This normalization transforms hostility toward Israel into a marker of political authenticity. Within this logic, accusing someone of antisemitism becomes proof of their moral courage — a dynamic increasingly visible across progressive movements.
- Holocaust Inversion and Dehumanization
The most alarming finding was the reversal of Holocaust imagery. Influencers compared Israel to Nazi Germany; commenters fused the terms into slurs like “Zionazi” or “Isra-heil.” Some even glorified violence, cloaking assassination fantasies in gaming metaphors: “Trump and Netanyahu in NY? Perfect 2-for-1 moment for the Mario Brothers.”
While such remarks may seem fringe, they accumulate into a broader culture of digital derision — a climate where violent and dehumanizing speech becomes normalized through humor, irony, or moral outrage.
From Ambiguity to Escalation
The progression across these layers — Mamdani’s original statements, influencers’ reinterpretations, and audience reactions — shows how strategic ambiguity can spiral into participatory hate.
- Primary discourse: Mamdani’s words, open-ended and self-protective, avoid explicit antisemitism while enabling multiple readings.
- Secondary discourse: Influencers reframe his critics as tools of oppression, inverting accusations and legitimizing resentment.
- Tertiary discourse: Audiences collapse nuance entirely, producing overt antisemitic language and violent fantasies.
As meaning travels outward from the politician’s mouth to millions of screens, moral ambiguity collapses into moral abdication. This discursive spiral is not unique to Mamdani. It reflects a broader trend in digital politics, where rhetorical vagueness is weaponized by audiences seeking validation rather than understanding.
The Broader Challenge
Mamdani’s case highlights a growing dilemma for democracies: how to handle rhetoric that inflames division without crossing into illegal hate speech. Platforms and policymakers still struggle to address this “gray zone,” where statements remain technically permissible yet have corrosive downstream effects.
Democracy depends not only on freedom of speech but also on responsibility in speech. Politicians who wish to champion justice cannot outsource the meaning of their words to online mobs. Clarity is not censorship; it is accountability.
As the digital public sphere amplifies every utterance, the boundary between rhetoric and radicalization narrows. Mamdani’s example should serve as a warning: when ambiguity becomes a political habit, amplification becomes inevitable — and the cost is borne by those targeted in its echoes.
Dr. Matthias J. Becker is a Researcher in discourse studies at the University of Cambridge and New York University, and Research Lead at AddressHate. He directs the “Decoding Antisemitism” research project, which analyzes how antisemitic ideas spread in digital communication.
Gabrielle Beacken is a PhD student in Journalism and Media at the University of Texas at Austin. Her research focuses on propaganda, disinformation, and online antisemitism across social media and emerging technologies. She is a Research Assistant at the Center for Media Engagement’s Propaganda Research Lab.
Liora Sabra is a PhD student in Hebrew and Judaic Studies at New York University. Her research explores antisemitism, Holocaust memory, and propaganda, focusing on definitional debates and their reflection in public discourse. She works at NYU’s Center for the Study of Antisemitism, contributing to research on prejudice and political communication.
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A course on the Yiddish proverbs collected through the An-Ski expeditions
אינעם קומעדיקן ווינטער־זמן פֿון די ייִדיש־קלאַסן בײַם „אַרבעטער רינג“ וועט מען הײַיאָר פֿירן דורך „זום“ אַן אייגנאַרטיקן מיני־קורס אויף ייִדיש: וועגן די אידיאָמען און שפּריכווערטער, וואָס דער סאָוועטישער פֿאָלקלאָריסט אַבא לעוו האָט געזאַמלט בעת זײַנע עקספּעדיציעס מיט ש. אַנ־סקין איבער מערבֿ־אוקראַיִנע פֿון 1912 ביז 1914.
דעם קורס וועט לערנען דער ייִדישער שרײַבער און רעדאַקטאָר פֿונעם אָנלײַן־זשורנאַל „ייִדיש בראַנזשע“ — באָריס סאַנדלער, און וועט זײַן געבויט אויפֿן יסוד פֿון יענע וועלטסווערטלעך און סאַנדלערס קאָמענטאַרן וועגן זיי.
דער קלאַס וועט זיך טרעפֿן יעדן דינסטיק פֿון 2:30 ביז 4:00, ניו־יאָרקער צײַט, אָנהייבנדיק פֿונעם 24סטן פֿעברואַר.
דאָס וועט זײַן צום ערשטן מאָל וואָס דער ברייטער עולם וועט האָבן צוטריט צו אַבא לעווס מאַטעריאַלן. דורך בליצפּאָסט האָט סאַנדלער דערציילט ווי אַזוי ער האָט באַקומען די זאַמלונג: נאָך דעם ווי אבא לעוו איז געשטאָרבן אין 1959 האָבן די העפֿטן מיט די ייִדישע אידיאָמען און ווערטלעך זיך געפֿונען אין דער רעדאַקציע פֿון „סאָוועטיש היימלאַנד“, און שפּעטער — אינעם אַרכיוו פֿונעם ייִדישן פּאָעט און פֿאָרשער חיים ביידער. נאָך ביידערס טויט אין 2003 האָט זײַן אַלמנה, יעווע ביידער, איבערגעגעבן די העפֿטן סאַנדלערן אין אַ קאָנווערט, וווּ ס׳איז מיט ביידערס האַנט געווען אָנגעשריבן „פֿאַר באָריס סאַנדלערן“.
ווי אַ צאָל אַנדערע זאַמלער אין אייראָפּע און אַמעריקע, איז אַנ־סקיס און אַבא לעווס אינטערעס צום ייִדישן פֿאָלקלאָר געווען פֿאַרבונדן מיט זייער איבערגעגעבנקייט צום „פֿאָלקיזם‟: זיי האָבן באַטראַכט די ייִדיש־רעדנדיקע פֿאָלקסמענטשן אין די שטעטלעך און דערפֿער ווי אַ שליסל צו שאַפֿן אַ נײַע וועלטלעכע אידענטיטעט, צוגעמאָסטן צו די שטאָטישע רוסישע ייִדן, אַזוי ווי זיי זענען אַליין געווען.
כּדי זיך צו פֿאַרשרײַבן אויפֿן קורס גיט אַ קוועטש דאָ.
דער אַרבעטער רינג וועט אויך פֿירן לענגערע קורסן אויף ייִדיש אינעם ווינטער־זמן. אָט איז דער אויסקלײַב:
• די ייִדישע קולטור־אינפֿראַסטרוקטור פֿונעם אַמעריקאַנער קאָמוניזם
• אונגעריש־ייִדיש צווישן די וועלט־מלחמות
• דער לשון־קודש־קאָמפּאָנענט אין מרדכי שעכטערס לערנבוך „ייִדיש צוויי“
• די דערציילונגען פֿון יצחק באַשעוויס
• דער אָנהייב פֿון מאָדערנעם ייִדישן טעאַטער: אַבֿרהם גאָלדפֿאַדען און די ערשטע אַקטריסעס אויף דער בינע
• שלום אַשעס ראָמאַן „אויף קידוש השם“
• מאַני לייבס סאָנעטן
• ש. אַנ־סקי, דער „בעל־תּשובֿה“ וואָס האָט פּראָוואָצירט אַ רעוואָלוציע אין פֿאָלקלאָר
• דאָס קול פֿונעם ייִדישן שרײַבער — רעקאָרדירונגען פֿון דערציילונגען און לידער פֿאָרגעלייענט פֿון די שרײַבער אַליין
• די קולטור־ירושה פֿון די ייִדישע שרײַבער אין אוקראַיִנע (1950ער ביז די 1980ער)
נאָך מער פּרטים אָדער זיך צו פֿאַרשרײַבן אויף איינעם אָדער מער פֿון די קורסן, גיט אַ קוועטש דאָ.
The post A course on the Yiddish proverbs collected through the An-Ski expeditions appeared first on The Forward.
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White House Religious Liberty Panel Member Decries ‘Zionist Supremacy,’ Vows Not to Resign Despite Backlash
Carrie Prejean Boller speaks during a White House Religious Liberty Commission hearing on Feb. 9, 2026. Photo: Screenshot
Carrie Prejean Boller, a member of the White House Religious Liberty Commission, has vowed to combat so-called “Zionist supremacy” in the United States, sparking fresh outrage amid ongoing furor over her recent comments condemning the Jewish state and defending antisemitic podcaster Candace Owens.
“I will continue to stand against Zionist supremacy in America. I’m a proud Catholic. I, in no way will be forced to embrace Zionism as a fulfillment of biblical prophesy [sic]. I am a free American. Not a slave to a foreign nation,” Prejean Boller posted on the social media platform X on Tuesday.
Thank you all for the love and support I’ve received. I will continue to stand against Zionist supremacy in America. I’m a proud Catholic. I, in no way will be forced to embrace Zionism as a fulfillment of biblical prophesy. I am a free American. Not a slave to a foreign nation.
— Carrie Prejean Boller (@CarriePrejean1) February 10, 2026
The comments came on the heels of furor over Prejean Boller’s conduct during Monday’s hearing of the 13-member White House Religious Liberty Commission, which descended into a tense back-and-forth after she asked pointed questions about Israel’s policies and whether rejection of the Jewish state’s legitimacy should itself be labeled antisemitic.
The council was established by US President Donald Trump to examine religious freedom issues and was intended to focus on concrete challenges facing Jewish communities, including bias and harassment. Prejean Boller’s conduct, which included an impassioned defense of antisemitic personalities Candace Owens and Tucker Carlson, and her peddling of unsubstantiated claims that Israel has intentionally starved and murdered Palestinian civilians, raised alarm bells among pro-Israel advocates.
“I would really appreciate it if you would stop calling Candace Owens an antisemite,” Prejean Boller said to Seth Dillon, CEO of the political satire site Babylon Bee, during the hearing. “She’s not an antisemite. She just doesn’t support Zionism, and that really has to stop. I don’t know why you keep bringing her up, and Tucker.”
Owens, one of the country’s most popular podcasters, has spent the past two years spreading antisemitic conspiracy theories on her platform. She has called Jews “pedophilic,” argued that they oppress and murder Christians, and asserted that they are responsible for the trans-Atlantic slave trade.
Prejean Boller, a conservative activist and former Miss California, repeatedly pressed witnesses about Israel’s actions in Gaza and religious leaders on their views of Zionism, drawing audible boos from the audience and confusion from her colleagues. At one point she asked a Jewish activist if he would condemn Israel’s military response to Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, massacre across southern Israel, despite the hearing’s official focus on domestic antisemitism. Prejean Boller also donned a Palestinian flag pin on the lapel of her suit, telegraphing her support for the anti-Israel ideological cause.
“Since we’ve mentioned Israel a total of 17 times, are you willing to condemn what Israel has done in Gaza?” Boller asked Jewish activist Shabbos Kestenbaum.
During the hearing, she also accused Rabbi Ari Berman, president of Yeshiva University, of Islamophobia after he declared that anti-Zionism — the belief that Israel does not have a right to exist —is an antisemitic ideology. Berman argued that attempts to delegitimize the existence of the world’s sole Jewish state, while showing ambivalence toward the existence of dozens of Muslim states, indicates anti-Jewish sentiment.
Panel members repeatedly stressed that American universities and communities must do more to confront bias and ensure Jewish students can live without fear of harassment.
Members of the commission expressed visible surprise at Prejean Boller’s line of questioning and repeated downplaying of antisemitism. Kestenbaum took aim at Prejean Boller after she asserted that the young activist had conflated antisemitism with harboring anti-Israel sentiment.
“She decided that this should be a debate on Israel’s conduct in Gaza, which I’m not entirely sure how that affects American students being discriminated against,” Kestenbaum said, “given that there are hundreds of millions of Catholics, including some who are on this commission, speaking at this commission today, who would vehemently disagree with such a grandiose assertion.”
Spectators suggested that the hearing also spotlighted deeper fissures within the conservative movement. Prejean Boller’s impassioned defense of Owens and Carlson, who have spent the past few years peddling anti-Israel conspiracies, suggest that their narratives may be penetrating deeper into the Republican base. The hearing also raised questions about the White House’s vetting process for the commission.
A recent analysis by the Jewish People Policy Institute found that both Carlson and Owens dramatically increased the volume and intensity of negative content about Israel in 2025, with Owens also incorporating explicit antisemitic language and conspiracy narratives, including accusations of disproportionate violence and undue influence over US policy into her commentary.
Carlson, the former Fox News host whose podcast remains influential among conservative audiences, has in recent years amplified fringe voices, including figures such as white nationalist streamer Nick Fuentes. Carlson’s interviews have featured conspiratorial depictions of “Christian Zionists” as afflicted by a “brain virus,” and his platforming of extremists and Holocaust minimizers has drawn widespread condemnation from lawmakers and civil rights advocates across the ideological spectrum.
Some prominent conservative voices have demanded for Prejean Boller to resign or be removed from the commission, arguing that her views are counter to the mission of the initiative. Prejean Boller has repeatedly refused to relinquish her position, arguing that her Catholic faith does not allow for support of Israel and doing so would signal a surrender to “Zionist supremacy.”
However, conservative reporter and podcaster Laura Loomer stated that sources at the US State Department are pressing for the Trump administration to remove Prejean Boller from the panel.
“Carrie’s behavior is unacceptable and is not representative of the Trump administration’s values. We have asked the White House to take action,” Loomer posted on social media, attributing the quote to an unnamed State Department official.
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13-Year-Old Boy Brutally Assaulted in Paris in Second Antisemitic Attack in Less Than a Week
Tens of thousands of French people march in Paris to protest against antisemitism. Photo: Screenshot
In a shocking second antisemitic attack in less than a week, a 13-year-old boy in Paris was brutally beaten Monday by a knife-wielding assailant, prompting authorities to open a criminal investigation and step up security amid a rising tide of antisemitism.
On his way to a synagogue in Paris’s 18th arrondissement, the schoolboy was physically attacked by a group of five assailants who beat him, pressed a knife to his throat, called him a “dirty Jew,” and stole his belongings, the French news outlet Le Parisien reported.
According to the Paris prosecutor’s office, the victim was walking to a synagogue, clutching his kippah in his hand rather than wearing it for fear of being recognized, when five attackers confronted him; stole his AirPods, sneakers, and coat; and forced him to empty his pockets.
The boy also told authorities that he was shoved, punched in the face, and threatened with a knife to his throat before his attackers stole his belongings, shouting antisemitic remarks throughout the assault.
Local police have arrested and taken an 18-year-old suspect into custody after he was recognized during the assault by someone on a video call with the victim. The four other attackers remain at large as of this writing.
The prosecutor’s office has opened an investigation into armed robbery and armed violence, committed as a group and aggravated by discrimination, as authorities continue to work to identify and apprehend the remaining suspects.
This latest antisemitic attack marks the second such incident in less than a week, underscoring a growing climate of hostility as Jews and Israelis face a surge of targeted assaults.
Over the weekend, three Jewish men wearing kippahs were physically threatened with a knife and forced to flee after leaving their Shabbat services near the Trocadéro in southwest Paris’s 16th arrondissement, European Jewish Press reported.
As the victims were leaving a nearby synagogue and walking through the neighborhood, they noticed a man staring at them. The assailant then approached the group and repeatedly asked, “Are you Jews? Are you Israelis?”
When one of them replied “yes,” the man pulled a knife from his pocket and began threatening the group. The victims immediately ran and found police officers nearby. None of the victims were injured.
Like most countries across Europe and the broader Western world, France has seen a rise in antisemitic incidents over the last two years, in the wake of the Hamas-led invasion of and massacre across southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023.
According to the French Interior Ministry, the first six months of 2025 saw more than 640 antisemitic incidents, a 27.5 percent decline from the same period in 2024, but a 112.5 percent increase compared to the first half of 2023, before the Oct. 7 atrocities.
Last week, a Jewish primary school in eastern Paris was vandalized, with windows smashed and security equipment damaged, prompting a criminal investigation and renewed outrage among local Jewish leaders as targeted antisemitic attacks continued to escalate.