Mamdani’s Oct. 7 statement assailing ‘genocide in Gaza’ provokes outrage from Jewish groups

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani observed the third anniversary of the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel with a statement that opened with a denunciation of Hamas and the “horrific war crimes” it committed that day, but spent most of its length excoriating the Israeli response — drawing fierce criticism from mainstream Jewish organizations.

“We grieve alongside our many friends and neighbors who still carry that unthinkable loss,” the top of the statement concludes — before launching into the main body of his remarks attacking Israel. “The suffering did not begin nor end that day. It instead continued through the Israeli government’s devastating, ongoing genocide in Gaza,” it continues.

The mayor then laid out a litany of familiar criticisms of the Israeli military campaign in Gaza and of U.S. support for the Jewish state in a passage more than twice as long as his comments on Hamas and its victims.