Reiterating his views, Mamdani says ‘I can’t tell you I support’ Israel as a Jewish state

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani again said he could not endorse states that privilege one religion over another, including Israel and Saudi Arabia, during a one-on-one interview with ABC’s Jonathan Karl on Sunday.

“Democratic Socialists of America now says they no longer favor a two-state solution. Is that the way you see it as well?” Karl asked in the interview, which came days after Mamdani’s endorsed Democratic socialist candidates for Congress swept their New York Democratic primaries.

Among them, Claire Valdez and Darializa Avila Chevalier campaigned on platforms that included opposition to all US military aid to Israel, which they accuse of committing genocide in Gaza.

Mamdani replied to Karl: “The way I see it is equal rights for all people. And I think that that’s the truth for Israel. It’s the truth for any country in the world.”

When pressed by Karl that Israel is in fact a Jewish state and “that’s in the charter, that’s the way it is now,” Mamdani said he has consistently stated he supports “the state of Israel as a state with equal rights,” a formulation he has used several times previously.

He added, “I think any state that privileges one religion over the other is one that I can’t tell you I support, whether it be Israel or Saudi Arabia or anywhere else.”

Karl: Israel is a Jewish state. That’s in the charter. Do you support that?

Mamdani: I’ve said time and again that I support the state of Israel as a state with equal rights.

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Karl: As jewish state?

Mamdani: I believe that any state that privileges one religion over another is… pic.twitter.com/WFIqM9PAib

— Acyn (@Acyn) June 28, 2026

The backlash to Mamdani’s comments from Israeli officials and pro-Israel voices was quick. In a statement Sunday, Ofir Akunis, Israel’s consul general in New York, said, “Mamdani, we do not need your recognition of the Jewish state. If you knew a little history, instead of spending all day inciting and spreading hatred, you would know that Israel’s Declaration of Independence guaranteed full equality for all its citizens. That has been the reality since the day our state was established.”

Danny Danon, Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, responded on X, saying, “Recently, Mamdani used blatant antisemitic language against AIPAC,” referring to a speech in which Mamdani condemned the pro-Israel lobby as “monsters” and said it moves “millions in dark money to accomplish a single goal, to preserve their power so that they can turn us against one another instead of our leaders turning towards the moral change we all know to be necessary.”

“When you connect all the dots, it becomes very easy to understand who @NYCMayor does support,” Danon added.

Mark Dubowitz, CEO of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies think tank, posted on X, “Mamdani is either willfully ignorant or maliciously mendacious.”

He also stated that there are multiple countries for which Islam is the state religion, including Muslim-majority countries that declare Islam as the state religion in their constitutions.

Karl also asked Mamdani about his views on military aid to Israel, which became a prominent issue during the New York Democratic primaries.

Mamdani said voters made it clear that “they were tired of tens of billions of dollars being spent in our taxpayer dollars to violate international law to kill thousands of civilians.”

He added, “Right now, the way that Palestine is described is as if there is a ceasefire,” referring to the October ceasefire in the Gaza war between Hamas and Israel, which now split control of the enclave.

Mamdani continued, “More than 1,000 Palestinians have been killed in that ceasefire… To follow international law, to believe in the humanity of all people, it shouldn’t be a journey too far.”

Karl also pressed the mayor on the Poetica coffee shop incident in Brooklyn last week, in which the shop refunded New York Democratic Rep. Dan Goldman’s money for a purchase and told him not to return, calling him a “genocide enabler” because he supports Israel.

Mamdani said while he has “political disagreements” with Goldman (who lost his seat to Mamdani-backed Brad Lander), “I do believe that that’s a response that goes beyond that.”

And when asked about rising antisemitism in New York City, the mayor said that while Jews are a minority of the city’s population, they constitute a majority of victims of the hate crimes committed in the city. ”That’s something that’s unacceptable,” he said.

Akunis predicted that Mamdani’s language would fuel antisemitism in the city.

“The surge in antisemitism across the United States, and particularly in New York, is the result of ignorance and a lack of knowledge, combined with a fundamental hatred of the Jewish people,” he said. “I once again warn that Mamdani’s inflammatory rhetoric will end in very serious and violent acts against Jewish and Israeli communities throughout the city.”