NYC Mayor's First-Day Israel Policy Sparks Fury from Jerusalem

Israel's government has accused New York City's new mayor of antisemitism. The accusation came on Mayor Zohran Mamdani's first day in office. Mamdani reversed a policy set by the previous mayor, Eric Adams. He canceled the use of a specific definition of antisemitism created by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA). He also removed restrictions on city groups that boycott Israel. In a social media post, Israel's foreign ministry strongly criticized the mayor. It said Mamdani had poured "antisemitic gasoline on an open fire." The ministry stated that scrapping the IHRA definition and allowing boycotts of Israel was not leadership. The IHRA definition is used by many governments and institutions to identify antisemitic speech and actions. Critics of the definition argue it can be used to wrongly label criticism of Israel as antisemitism. Mayor Mamdani has not yet publicly responded to Israel's statement.