Uncategorized
Trump on Mamdani: ‘He hates Jewish people and yet he’s got Jewish people supporting him’
This piece first ran as part of The Countdown, our daily newsletter rounding up all the developments in the New York City mayor’s race. Sign up here to get it in your inbox. There are 20 days to the election.
Trump turns up the heat on Mamdani and NYC
- President Donald Trump renewed his attacks on Mamdani on Tuesday, calling him “down and dirty,” a “communist” and anti-Jewish.
-
“He hates Jewish people and yet he’s got Jewish people supporting him,” Trump said during a press conference with Argentinian President Javier Milei. A recent Marist poll showed Jewish voters evenly divided between Mamdani and Cuomo.
- Trump has regularly expressed disbelief that Jews would vote for Democrats or against him, given what he has argued is a clear track record of antisemitism on the left and his own support for Israel.
-
Trump didn’t have kind words for Mamdani’s opponents, either. He said the frontrunner’s victory would be “a fluke” because he was running against “failed people.”
-
Trump also reiterated his threats to cut New York’s federal funding and deploy federal troops to the city, as he did in Chicago and Washington, D.C., if Mamdani is elected.
-
Mamdani responded to the comments at an event in Brooklyn where he was endorsed by Black clergy leaders. “We will continue to receive funding from the federal government, and it’s not because of President Trump’s generosity. It’s because it is the law,” he said. Congress has the role of appropriating federal money that is distributed to states and cities.
Hochul teams up with Mamdani
- Gov. Kathy Hochul also snapped back at Trump’s threat to withhold funding. “I’ll fight like hell to make sure that doesn’t happen,” she said in her first appearance with Mamdani since she endorsed him last month.
N.Y. Gov. Kathy Hochul announces $5 million in state funding to build a new Queens Boys & Girls Club Clubhouse in Astoria, Queens. (Susan Watts/Office of Governor Kathy Hochul)
-
Hochul and Mamdani weren’t together for a campaign event. They linked up at a Boys and Girls Club in Queens, where they announced funding for youth programs and affordable housing, and Mamdani appeared in his role as an Assembly member.
-
Hochul praised Mamdani’s focus on affordability and highlighted one area where she planned to cooperate with him. “I’ve had conversations with Assemblymember Mamdani about how we can get to universal child care. I believe we can,” she said.
Sarah Sherman spoofs Mamdani critics on ‘SNL’
- Actress Sarah Sherman, who once called herself a “f—ing freaky Jewish woman,” spoofed Mamdani critics in an appearance as the Long Island character Rhonda LaCenzo on “Saturday Night Live.”
-
Sherman parodied Islamophobic rhetoric surrounding the race, with her character calling Mamdani a “hipster jihadist.”
-
“Mamdani is an ISIS-trained millennial nepo baby from Uganda,” the character said, warning that he would “enact Sharia law in the city.”
Debate prep
- Thursday night’s debate is one of Cuomo’s last chances to make up his distance behind Mamdani. Despite a boost after incumbent Mayor Eric Adams quit the race, Cuomo still trails Mamdani by double digits in recent polling.
-
Cuomo has to rally moderate and conservative New Yorkers who would otherwise vote for Sliwa or stay home on Election Day.
-
Mamdani has to make sure he doesn’t mess up his lead. It’s rare for a debate to significantly change a race at this late stage — but it’s certainly possible.
—
The post Trump on Mamdani: ‘He hates Jewish people and yet he’s got Jewish people supporting him’ appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
Uncategorized
Israel’s Netanyahu Hopes to ‘Taper’ Israel Off US Military Aid in Next Decade
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks to the press on Capitol Hill, Washington, DC, July 8, 2025. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in an interview published on Friday that he hopes to “taper off” Israeli dependence on US military aid in the next decade.
Netanyahu has said Israel should not be reliant on foreign military aid but has stopped short of declaring a firm timeline for when Israel would be fully independent from Washington.
“I want to taper off the military within the next 10 years,” Netanyahu told The Economist. Asked if that meant a tapering “down to zero,” he said: “Yes.”
Netanyahu said he told President Donald Trump during a recent visit that Israel “very deeply” appreciates “the military aid that America has given us over the years, but here too we’ve come of age and we’ve developed incredible capacities.”
In December, Netanyahu said Israel would spend 350 billion shekels ($110 billion) on developing an independent arms industry to reduce dependency on other countries.
In 2016, the US and Israeli governments signed a memorandum of understanding for the 10 years through September 2028 that provides $38 billion in military aid, $33 billion in grants to buy military equipment and $5 billion for missile defense systems.
Israeli defense exports rose 13 percent last year, with major contracts signed for Israeli defense technology including its advanced multi-layered aerial defense systems.
US Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, a staunch Israel supporter and close ally of Trump, said on X that “we need not wait ten years” to begin scaling back military aid to Israel.
“The billions in taxpayer dollars that would be saved by expediting the termination of military aid to Israel will and should be plowed back into the US military,” Graham said. “I will be presenting a proposal to Israel and the Trump administration to dramatically expedite the timetable.”
Uncategorized
In Rare Messages from Iran, Protesters ask West for Help, Speak of ‘Very High’ Death Toll
Protests in Tehran. Photo: Iran Photo from social media used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law, via i24 News
i24 News – Speaking to Western media from beyond the nationwide internet blackout imposed by the Islamic regime, Iranian protesters said they needed support amid a brutal crackdown.
“We’re standing up for a revolution, but we need help. Snipers have been stationed behind the Tajrish Arg area [a neighborhood in Tehran],” said a protester in Tehran speaking to the Guardian on the condition of anonymity. He added that “We saw hundreds of bodies.”
Another activist in Tehran spoke of witnessing security forces firing live ammunition at protesters resulting in a “very high” number killed.
On Friday, TIME magazine cited a Tehran doctor speaking on condition of anonymity that just six hospitals in the capital recorded at least 217 killed protesters, “most by live ammunition.”
Speaking to Reuters on Saturday, Setare Ghorbani, a French-Iranian national living in the suburbs of Paris, said that she became ill from worry for her friends inside Iran. She read out one of her friends’ last messages before losing contact: “I saw two government agents and they grabbed people, they fought so much, and I don’t know if they died or not.”
Uncategorized
Report: US Increasingly Regards Iran Protests as Having Potential to Overthrow Regime
United States President Donald J Trump in White House in Washington, DC, USA, on Thursday, December 18, 2025. Photo: Aaron Schwartz via Reuters Connect.
i24 News – The assessment in Washington of the strength and scope of the Iran protests has shifted after Thursday’s turnout, with US officials now inclined to grant the possibility that this could be a game changer, Axios reported on Friday.
“The protests are serious, and we will continue to monitor them,” an unnamed senior US official was quoted as saying in the report.
Iran was largely cut off from the outside world on Friday after the Islamic regime blacked out the internet to curb growing unrest, as videos circulating on social media showed buildings ablaze in anti-government protests raging across the country.
US President Donald Trump warned the Ayatollahs of a strong response if security forces escalate violence against protesters.
“We’re watching it very closely. If they start killing people like they have in the past, I think they’re going to get hit very hard by the United States,” Trump told reporters when asked about the unrest in Iran.
The latest reported death toll is at 51 protesters, including nine children.