A sample of initial reactions the morning after, including some revealing tidbits from the Arab media

Israelis are continually fascinated by American politics. New York City’s mayoral race was no exception. While the results were never truly in doubt, the Israeli media reacted with nearly universal shock to Zohran Mamdani’s sizable victory. Here is a sample of initial reactions the morning after, including some revealing tidbits from the Arab media.

WHAT ISRAEL STANDS TO LOSE

Why do I care, sitting in Zion, about what happens in New York?

That’s the question Daniel Edelson, YNET’s correspondent who covered the New York City mayoral race, asked. He gave two answers, one focusing on style and one on substance.

“What happens in New York never stays in New York. Although the mayor doesn’t determine foreign policy, his power in shaping the public mood is enormous. A hostile or defiant mayor can affect investments, educational campaigns, and the image of Israel in the American public arena.”

Mamdani’s slogans pose a risk to Jewish security, but he could also drive a financial stake into the heart of Israel’s investment community financially.

“New York is home to the largest Jewish community in the world – about 1.6 million Jewish residents – and the largest Israeli community outside of Israel. For many, it serves as the ‘second home’ of Israeli high-tech, culture, and entrepreneurship. Companies established by Israelis in the city generated some $19.5 billion in economic output in 2024,” Edelson wrote.

He also connected to Mamdani’s campaign promise to divest from Israeli assets. “In a city where pension funds invest some $291 million in Israeli companies, these are statements of real economic significance.”

A SELF-INFLICTED WOUND

A CNN exit poll showed Mamdani received about 33 percent of the Jewish vote. Yuval Malka, a commentator for Channel 14, a right-wing media outlet that ranks second in Israel’s media ratings, asked, “How did we manage to forget who we are again?” Malka described Mamdani as a candidate who sells dreams wrapped in glittery social slogans like “equality,” “justice,” and “opportunity.”

“Everything the American ear loves to hear. I can understand why Muslims voted for him. I can understand why Christians voted for him. But I have a hard time understanding, how Jews voted for him? Jews who were enthusiastic about a clause in the platform that promises a few more dollars in their wallets, lower taxes, and don’t see the big picture, the long-term consequences? What will happen when the city is filled with anti-values policies that will harm, first and foremost, the Jews themselves?”

EXPLOITING DISUNITY HAS EXPORT VALUE

“The Mamdani model operates on a venomous and straightforward principle: It identifies, amplifies, and legitimizes the most radical and anti-Zionist Jewish voices, and uses them as a human shield against any charge of anti-Semitism.”

That’s the strongly worded opinion of Dr. Nissim Katz, a media lecturer at Kinneret Academic College, who wrote a harsh op-ed on Mamdani’s modus operandi for Israel Hayom, which has Israel’s largest daily circulation. Dr. Katz points out that Mamdani systematically surrounds himself with support from groups such as Jewish Voice for Peace, providing them a platform and making them the legitimate face of his campaign. “Mamdani understands the conflict many young Jews feel, torn between progressive values and traditional support for Israel,” Katz wrote. “He offers them an easy, attractive solution: a reformed Judaism that disavows Israel and treats it as a colonial project to be ashamed of. The implied and brutally effective argument is: How can you call me anti-Semitic if there are Jews who agree with me word for word? This tactic paralyzes the mainstream, fractures communal consensus, and ultimately paves the way for extreme anti-Israel agendas to reach the core of power.”
Dr. Katz says Jews need new strategies to counteract this new form of political warfare. “Mamdani’s success in New York would turn his model into an operating manual for radical politicians in London, Paris, or Toronto. They will learn that the most effective way to neutralize the Jewish lobby is not a frontal confrontation but internal division.”

ARAB VOTERS FIND VINDICATION

The Anadolu Agency (AA) was founded in Turkey in 1920 as a symbol of liberation for the Muslim world after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. AA is now considered a mouthpiece of the Turkey’s ruling party, the AKP, whose leader President Recep Tayyip Erdogan strives to resurrect the Ottoman Empire at Israel’s expense. AA’s reporter in New York, Rabia Iclal Turan, interviewed New York Muslims celebrating Mamdani’s victory at various New York hangouts.  Zamzam Ali, a Broooklyn resident having a late-night snack at a popular Yemeni cafe in Astoria, Queens, told the reporter that Mamdani’s victory resonates personally.

“Muslims have really struggled and been victims of discrimination in America since 9/11,” Ali said. “So, to see a Muslim become the mayor of the very city in which Muslims were blamed for all kinds of crimes and accused of terrorism – it’s phenomenal.”

Israel’s Minister of Diaspora Affairs, Amichai Chikli, took to X with a different take on that sentiment, while urging New York Jews to make aliyah. “The city that was once a symbol of global freedom has handed over its keys to a Hamas supporter — to someone whose positions are not far from those of the jihadist fanatics who, 25 years ago, murdered 3,000 of its own people.”

MAMDANI RIDES THE TRUMP TIDE

President Trump bears no physical resemblance to Mayor-elect Mamdani, but some analysts in the Arab media contend they have consulted the same political playbook.

Tarek Rashed, an Egyptian-American, and former senior editor at Reuters, compared Trump and Mamdani in an article he wrote for Al Majalla, a London-based affiliate of the Saudi Research & Media Group with a global audience of 165 million people.

“Some analysts have pointed out that Mamdani’s meteoric rise bears an uncanny resemblance to that of Donald Trump,” Rashed wrote. “His [Trump’s] populism initially repelled the Republican Party establishment, but his growing popularity with voters ultimately compelled them to acquiesce. Likewise, for Democrats, it is no longer a question of whether to accommodate Mamdani, but how to embrace the generational tide he embodies.”