Jewish pride’s Israel parade: Mamdani isn’t wanted and should stay away

Next Sunday, May 31, more than 50,000 people will march up Fifth Ave. in the Celebrate Israel Parade, as tens of thousands will line the route, reveling in the fact that Israel in its 78th year is a proud Jewish democracy in our indigenous homeland.

The Knesset, Israel’s parliament, is sending its largest delegation in the parade’s history. Mayor Mamdani — unsurprisingly — confirmed he will not be among us. In doing so, he will be the first mayor of New York to make that choice in the parade’s six-decade history.

Mr. Mayor, do us a favor. Stay home in Gracie Mansion. We don’t want you, your rhetoric, and your diatribe to ruin our proud day.

Last weekend, just before the Jewish Sabbath began, Mamdani posted a four-minute propaganda video marking the “Nakba.” The “Nakba” translates to a “great catastrophe.” The “Nakba” was declared by the Palestinians on the day Israel became an independent state.

Not once does he acknowledge that the “Nakba” was the result of Israel’s neighbors declaring war on the Jewish state the moment it was born. Not once does he mention the 850,000 Jews who were expelled from their homes in Arab lands after Israel’s 1948 independence.

For the mayor of New York to invoke the “Nakba” during American Jewish Heritage Month shows a complete disregard and insensitivity for what his Jewish constituents are living through right now. Can you be more tone deaf, Mr. Mayor?

Meanwhile, while Mamdani remained silent about thousands of New Yorkers running to bomb shelters in Israel during Iran’s indiscriminate bombing, he had no issue lamenting when a few New Yorkers were arrested by Israel preventing a Gaza-bound flotilla. Why would he care about New Yorkers possibly dying versus a PR-stunt-filled boat?

Mamdani supports the controversial Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign against Israel and accused the Jewish state of committing genocide in the war against Hamas in Gaza after Oct. 7. He continues to bifurcate anti-Zionism from antisemitism. As a member of the Muslim faith, he is out of touch with the leadership of the greater Muslim world who support a two-state solution and recognize the Jewish identity of the state of Israel.

Why would we want him to attend the parade? His wife Rama Duwaji was greeted in a Brooklyn coffee shop by Miss Israel, Melanie Shiraz. She asked Duwaji for a selfie. Duwaji refused once Shiraz revealed she was Israeli. Is the Jewish community so desperate that we need a dark cloud hovering over sunny Fifth Ave.?

David Dinkins attended. Rudy Giuliani attended. Mike Bloomberg attended. Bill de Blasio attended. Eric Adams attended. Since 1964, every mayor of New York, Democrat, Republican and independent, has stood on Fifth Ave. together with the largest Jewish community outside of Israel demonstrating that the Big Apple honors its partnership with Israel.

I write this as someone who chaired this parade in the 1990s. I have walked its length more times than I can count. I know what the parade means to the families who march, to the Holocaust survivors who watch from the streets, to the children striding up the avenue, proudly waving their Israeli and American flags.

Remember how he is a “mayor for all New Yorkers.” Well, except anyone who believes Jews have an indigenous right to our homeland.

The mayor has time for the gala of the Institute for Middle East Understanding, an anti-Israel advocacy group. He has time for causes that suit his limited agenda. He may not have time for us, and that’s OK. We do not want him on Fifth Ave. next Sunday.

The Jewish people are at the top of their game, at this moment, in this city, in this country, despite an unprecedented surge of antisemitism. There is a post-Oct. 7 surge of pride and deeper engagement in Jewish life, characterized by increased enrollment in schools, camps, and synagogues.

We have rallied in numbers this country has not seen in generations. We have raised our children to be unafraid of wearing their kippot and Stars of David in the public arena. We stand proudly in the face of unjustified, senseless hate, and Mr. Mayor, we do not require any endorsement from you and City Hall to do so.

That is what will make the mayor’s absence so revealing. It is not that we need him. It is that he is signaling, in the loudest possible way for a sitting mayor, that the Jewish community of New York is not a constituency he is willing to stand beside. Every other mayor in modern history found a way, regardless of what they thought about Israeli policy. He will not, and that is fine. Message delivered. We don’t want you anyway.

Gov. Hochul, when I asked her last year in a dialogue at my synagogue whether anything would happen to the parade under a Mamdani administration, looked me in the eye and said, “Rabbi, that will never happen. Never, never, never happen. That parade will always continue.” She was right. The parade continues. The mayor’s absence only confirms what we know about him.

So, Mr. Mayor, stay in Gracie Mansion. We will march without you. The Knesset delegation will march without you. The hostage families and Holocaust survivors will march without you. The thousands of children with Israeli and American flags painted on their cheeks will march without you. New York will be the New York that has welcomed Jews for nearly four centuries. We aren’t going anywhere.

The mayor was elected to lead all of us. He has decided that some of us are not worth his time. That is his right. It is also our right to remember it.

We are doing just fine without Mamdani. We always have. We always will.

• Schneier is the president of the Foundation for Ethnic Understanding and the founding senior rabbi of The Hampton Synagogue.

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