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OVER 1,000 JEWISH CLERGY CAN’T BE WRONG ON MAMDANI AND ANTI-ZIONISM
– OR CAN THEY?
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Rabbi Brant Rosen
October 27, 2025
Shalom Rav
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_ “The Jewish Majority” statement is an effort to stem
Mamdani’s surging lead – and his popularity with young leftist
Jews. The fundamental goal of the letter is all-too plain: it seeks to
combat the growing “political normalization of anti-Zionism.” _
photo: Jewish Voice for Peace,
As if there wasn’t enough drama
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over the candidacy of Zohran Mamdani in New York City’s mayoral
race, last week saw the release of “A Rabbinic Call to Action:
Defending the Jewish Future,” a statement
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group calling itself “The Jewish Majority,” condemning Mamdani for
voicing political convictions that “delegitimize the Jewish
community and encourage and exacerbate hostility toward Judaism and
Jews.” By the end of the week, the call had garnered over 1,000
signatures from rabbis, cantors and rabbinical students from NYC and
around the US.
Notably, the statement only mentions Mamdani once. The rest of the
six-paragraph letter is devoted to defending the state of
“Israel’s right to exist in peace and security” and promoting
Zionism as central to Judaism and Jewish identity. It’s centerpiece
is a long and pointed quote from a recent sermon
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Cosgrove of Park Avenue Synagogue, in which he warned that Mamdani
“poses a danger to the New York Jewish community”:
_Zionism, Israel, Jewish self-determination—these are not political
preferences or partisan talking points. They are constituent building
blocks and inseparable strands of my Jewish identity. To accept me as
a Jew but to ask me to check my concern for the people and state of
Israel at the door is a nonsensical proposition and an offensive one,
no different than asking me to reject God, Torah, mitzvot, or any
other pillar of my faith._
Given the timing of the letter, “The Jewish Majority” statement is
clearly an effort to stem Mamdani’s surging lead – and his
popularity
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with young leftist Jews in NYC. But on a deeper level, the fundamental
goal of the letter is made all-too plain: it seeks to combat the
growing “political normalization of anti-Zionism.”
From what I can tell, Mamdani has never explicitly referred to himself
as an “anti-Zionist.” What he has said, over
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incessant gotcha question “does Israel have the right to exist as a
Jewish state?” is that he “believes Israel has the right to exist
as a state with equal rights.” Of course, the words “a state with
equal rights” is enough to make him an anti-Zionist – because the
only way Israel can exist as a Jewish state is by denying equal rights
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to Palestinians.
For me, this is the real significance of this statement – it shines
a hard light on the deep moral hypocrisy of a Jewish communal
establishment that is threatened by anti-Zionism: a political position
that is rooted in human rights and equal rights for all. Indeed, if
you listen to Mamdani’s words carefully, he takes pains to point
this out: he refers to Israel’s actions in Gaza as a genocide
because he agrees with the opinions of international bodies such as
ICJ [[link removed]] as well as scores
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of other [[link removed]]
human rights
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observers [[link removed]]. He
openly says
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he would not welcome Netanyahu in NYC because the ICC has put a
warrant [[link removed]] out for his
arrest as a war criminal.
These are not hateful or inciteful positions. What is remarkable –
and galling to the Jewish communal establishment – is that Mamdani
is not paying a political price for expressing them. Quite the
contrary: he is the one who comes off as eminently principled and
reasonable, while apoplectic Jewish leaders are having an increasingly
difficult time explaining why a genocidal, apartheid nation-state is a
“building block” of their Jewish identity. True to form, this
clergy group is simply trotting out familiar talking points, fully
expecting their morality and veracity to be self-evident.
Contrary to the claims of the statement’s signers, the increasing
normalization of anti-Zionism does not “delegitimize Jewish identity
and community.” As the rabbi of an openly anti-Zionist Jewish
congregation [[link removed]], I can attest that
increasing numbers of Jews are identifying as such out of genuine
Jewish conscience: from a deep attachment to Jewish ethical values
that mandate the pursuit of justice and hold that all human beings are
equally created in the divine image.
Recent surveys certainly bear this out: according to an October 2025
Washington Post poll
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of American Jews, 61% believe Israel has committed war crimes and 4
out of 10 say the country is guilty of genocide against the
Palestinians, views that would certainly track with an anti-Zionist
identity. As Jewish Currents editor-in-chief Arielle Angel has
observed [[link removed]],
“the catastrophic failure of Zionist Judaism” has marked “an
opening for anti-Zionist Jews to step into greater influence, (to)
make our case for something new.” By all accounts, the time has come
for a Judaism that rejects the fusion of toxic ethno-nationalism with
Judaism.
I’m also struck by another note of desperation from this ad-hoc
group of Jewish clergy: they purport to speak for the Jewish majority
as if that alone confers legitimacy. They of all people should know
dissent is a sacred, cherished aspect of Jewish tradition. They of all
people should know that in Talmudic debate, both majority and minority
views are given equal weight and consideration. They of all people
should know of the Torah’s sacred injunction “Do not go after the
majority to do evil” (Exodus 23:2). And any student of history,
Jewish or not, should know that the majority is not always right,
whether it be the majority of Southern Whites who supported slavery
and Jim Crow in the US, apartheid in South Africa or the injustices of
Zionism today.
The real moral question here, it seems to me, is not “who is in the
majority?” but rather “who is on the right side of history?”
_[RABBI BRANT ROSEN is the rabbi of Tzedek Chicago._
_"I began this blog in 2006 largely as a way to keep in touch with my
congregation and to post, Torah teachings, poetry. political
commentary, or whimsical observations of whatever caught my fancy._
_"Over the years, I increasingly used Shalom Rav to chart the changes
of my own personal relationship to Israel. Eventually the subject of
Israel/Palestine became a primary focus of the blog. From 2008 to 2014
I carried on something of a conversation with my readers on this
issue; many of those posts and comments were later published in a
book, “__Wrestling in the Daylight: A Rabbi’s Path to Palestinian
Solidarity_ [[link removed]]_._
_"I post my poetic/liturgical work on my other blog, Yedid Nefesh._
_"The opinions I share on my blogs are mine alone."]_
* Zohran Mamdani
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* New York City mayoral election
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* Jewish community
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* American Jewish community
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* zionism
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* Anti-Zionism
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* Israel
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* Palestine
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* Gaza
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* Gaza ceasefire
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* Israel-Gaza War
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* Oct. 7
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* Jewish Voice for Peace
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* JVP
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* Jews for Racial and Economic Justice
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* JFREJ
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* #IfNotNow
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* Jewish Currents
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* Brad Lander
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*
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