Far-left New York City mayoral frontrunner Zohran Mamdani said his view on the phrase \u201cglobalize the intifada\u201d has changed as he appears to be changing his position to help him electorally.<\/p>\n
Mamdani told MSNBC host Al Sharpton on \u201cPoliticsNation\u201d that he would now \u201cdiscourage\u201d others from using it. The 33-year-old Democratic Socialist said the shift came after a rabbi told him the phrase reminded her of bus bombings and restaurant attacks targeting Jews in Israel.<\/p>\n
He said there was a \u201cgap in intent\u201d between those who use the phrase to protest Israel\u2019s occupation of Palestinian land and the way many Jews and pro-Israel New Yorkers hear it as a threat.<\/p>\n
The American Jewish Committee defines the phrase as a rallying cry for \u201caggressive resistance against Israel.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sharpton noted some of his own past comments had been \u201cmisunderstood,\u201d without giving examples.<\/p>\n
He pressed Mamdani on whether his \u201cpersonal views\u201d on intifada \u2014 mispronounced as \u201cthe intifitada\u201d \u2014 have shifted.<\/p>\n
Here is Mamdani\u2019s full response:<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we won the primary election, I said on that stage that I know that millions of New Yorkers care deeply about what happens in Israel and Palestine \u2014 and I\u2019m one of those New Yorkers. And I commit to reaching even further, to understand disagreement, to wrestle with the complexities of those differing viewpoints, because what this city deserves is a mayor that looks not only to represent the close to 600,000 New Yorkers that voted for me, but rather the 8.5 million people that call this city home,\u201d the candidate said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd in the meetings that I have had since that moment, I\u2019ve met with Jewish elected officials, with rabbis, with community leaders. And there was one rabbi that spoke to me about how that phrase, for her, brought back memories of bus bombings in Haifa, of restaurant attacks in Jerusalem. And I knew that from what she was sharing with me that she had a fear, as she said, that that could come home to New York City,\u201d Mamdani said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd so in having that conversation with her, I knew that the gap between the intent that I have heard some New Yorkers share with the use of that language, of calling for the end of the Israeli occupation of Palestinian land, was disconnected from the impact it was having in that same conversation I was having with that rabbi. So I have said, after having that conversation, that this is language I would discourage,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
The comments marked a departure from just weeks ago, when Mamdani told NBC\u2019s Kristen Welker on \u201cMeet the Press\u201d that the phrase was \u201cnot language that I use.\u201d<\/p>\n
At the time, he also stated that he did not view it as the role of a mayor to \u201cpolice\u201d speech.<\/p>\n
In July, the New York Times reported that Mamdani had told a closed-door gathering he would \u201cdiscourage\u201d the use of the phrase.<\/p>\n
Mamdani is the leading contender to replace Mayor Eric Adams (D).<\/p>\n
He has faced a busy stretch, appearing Friday on CNN with Abby Phillip, who questioned his proposal to open five government-run grocery stores.<\/p>\n
Mamdani recently hosted a Brooklyn town hall with Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).<\/p>\n
Sanders said he and Mamdani would \u201cnot allow\u201d Elon Musk to become the world\u2019s first trillionaire \u201cif they have anything to do with it.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s important that we feel the outrage of children going hungry, people being homeless, 85 million without healthcare, [and] you got one guy \u2014 one guy \u2014 Mr. Musk, whose own wealth is more than the bottom 52% of American households,\u201d the senator said.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou may have seen in the papers, they want to give him a little bonus \u2014another $800 billion-$900 billion! We are living in crazy world! Millions of people struggling to put food on the table, and making one guy a trillionaire is insane, not about what this country is supposed to be about, and we are not going to allow that to happen,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Far-left New York City mayoral frontrunner Zohran Mamdani said his view on the phrase \u201cglobalize the intifada\u201d has changed as he appears to be changing his position to help him … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14765,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14764","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cndailynews.store\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14764","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cndailynews.store\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cndailynews.store\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cndailynews.store\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cndailynews.store\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14764"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cndailynews.store\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14764\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":14766,"href":"https:\/\/cndailynews.store\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14764\/revisions\/14766"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cndailynews.store\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/14765"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cndailynews.store\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14764"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cndailynews.store\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14764"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cndailynews.store\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14764"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}