News & Politics
Mamdani: ‘Shared notion of humanity’ applies to both Charlie Kirk and killing of Palestinians
Speaking at a progressive Jewish awards benefit, the mayoral candidate said his commitment to Palestinian rights was validated by the June Democratic primary results.

Democratic mayor nominee Zohran Mamdani speaks at the 2025 Mazals Awards as New York City Comptroller Brad Lander looks on. Peter Sterne
Speaking at Jews for Racial and Economic Justice’s 2025 Mazal Awards on Wednesday night, Democratic mayoral nominee Zohran Mamdani condemned both the recent killing of right-wing activist Charlie Kirk and the Israeli government’s continued killing of Palestinians in Gaza.
Mamdani was honored at the event alongside New York City Comptroller Brad Lander, the erstwhile mayoral candidate who cross-endorsed Mamdani shortly before the Democratic mayoral primary in June. Comedian Ilana Glazer presented the award to both Lander, who has been a member of JFREJ since the 1990s, and Mamdani.
At the start of his speech accepting the award, Mamdani insisted on condemning the fatal shooting of Kirk, who had made Islamophobic comments about Mamdani just months earlier.
“Before I begin, I do want to take a moment to address the horrific political assassination that just occurred today in Utah. Charlie Kirk is dead, yet another victim of gun violence in a nation where what should be a rarity has turned into a plague,” he said. “It cannot be a question of political agreement or alignment that allows us to mourn. It must be the shared notion of humanity that binds us all.”
Mamdani emphasized the human impact of Kirk’s killing at the University of Utah as well as that of other killings, including a mass shooting that took place in Colorado later on Wednesday.
“That humanity, it reminds us that this news is not just that of the murder of a prominent political figure, but also the news of a wife who grieves her husband, of a 1-year-old and a 3-year-old who will grow up without a father, and the fact that there are families feeling that same anguish right now in Colorado, as they wait for their children, also shot at a school,” he said.
Later in his speech, Mamdani made a point of extending that shared notion of humanity to Palestinians in Gaza.
“We hold a common belief in the shared dignity of every person on this planet, and the refusal to draw a line in the sand, as it so often is done, when it comes to Palestinian lives.”
Mamdani suggested that his outspoken support for Palestine had been a key factor in his 13-point victory over former Gov. Andrew Cuomo in the June Democratic mayoral primary.
“Our emphatic June victory over Andrew Cuomo – a man who we will have to and will defeat again – that victory was evidence of many things, chief among them that you should say my last name correctly,” Mamdani said, in a reference to Cuomo’s repeated mispronunciation of his last name as “Mandami.”
“But truly, among them, it was a lesson that so many in this city are horrified by the genocide being perpetrated by the Israeli military in Gaza, by the violence being inflicted using weapons paid for by our tax dollars as Americans, and the suffering we see on a daily basis,” he said.
Mamdani went on to accuse the Israeli and American governments of deliberately starving Palestinians in Gaza.
“We know, because the United Nations tells us, that by the end of the month, millions will be facing starvation, if they are not starving already. This is not accidental. This is not due to a freak blight. This is not because the world now lacks the means to feed the hungry,” he said. “It is because those decisions made by the Israeli government and by our government here continue to ensure that that is a reality. And if that does not stagger the conscience, what will?”
Until recently, this kind of explicit anti-Israel rhetoric would have been unthinkable in New York City politics, but recent polling supports the idea that New Yorkers are horrified by Israel’s actions in Gaza.
A Siena/New York Times poll conducted last week found that 44% of likely voters in New York City sympathized more with Palestinians than Israel, while just 26% sympathized more with Israel than Palestinians. Among likely Democratic voters in the city, those numbers were even more stark: 57% sympathized more with Palestinians and 18% sympathized more with Israel.
In his own speech accepting the award, Lander joined Mamdani in strongly condemning Israel’s war in Gaza. “I want to be clear: I know I have not done enough to speak out against Israel’s war crimes, against ethnic cleansing, against forced starvation of Palestinians,” he said.
Lander, who identifies as a liberal Zionist, called for anti-Zionists and liberal Zionists to come together to oppose Israel’s continued attacks on Palestinians.
“I believe we must build a coalition of anti-Zionists and liberal Zionists committed to ending the horrors in Gaza, letting Israeli hostages and the millions of displaced Palestinians go home, ending the occupation, achieving mutual recognition and safety and dignity for Israelis and Palestinians and fighting against antisemitism and Islamophobia and all forms of hate right here,” he said.
JFREJ is one of the groups attempting to build that coalition. The left-wing Jewish group called for a ceasefire in October 2023, soon after Israel began bombing the Palestinian enclave in retaliation for Hamas’ October 7 attacks. It later endorsed both Mamdani and Lander in the Democratic mayoral primary.
The group counts a growing number of progressive elected officials among its supporters. In addition to Mamdani and Lander, state Sens. Julia Salazar (herself a former JFREJ organizer), Jabari Brisport and Kristen Gonzalez, Assembly Members Emily Gallagher, Jessica González-Rojas, Phara Souffrant Forrest and Claire Valdez and Council Members Alexa Avilés, Tiffany Cabán, Sandy Nurse and Shahana Hanif all attended the Mazals gala on Wednesday.