‘Palestinian displacement continues even today’, Jewish community enraged by Mamdani’s post on ‘Nakba Day’

New York. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani is embroiled in controversy regarding one of his posts. Actually, using his official platform, he posted a controversial video in memory of ‘Nakba’. After this post of the mayor, he was strongly criticized by Jewish organizations and local leaders. ‘Nakba’ is an Arabic word, which means ‘catastrophe’. It is used to refer to the establishment of Israel in 1948 and the associated displacement of Palestinians.

The video shared by New York Mayor Mamdani on his official social media channels includes an interview with New York resident Inia Bushnak, whom Mamdani described as a Nakba survivor. In the video, Bushnak talks about her family leaving Jerusalem during the 1948 war. He claims that his family was forced to flee Jerusalem due to the arrival of Jews.

Mamdani’s post accompanying the video read, ‘Today is Nakba Day, an annual day observed to commemorate the creation of Israel and the subsequent displacement of more than 7 lakh Palestinians between 1947 and 1949.’ At the same time, in the video shared by Mamdani, it was claimed that the Jewish militia destroyed more than 400 villages and committed mass murders. At the end of the video it was written, ‘For Palestinians, their displacement and Nakba continues even today.’

The video made no mention of the Arab countries’ rejection of the UN Partition Plan or the war launched by neighboring Arab countries against the newly formed Jewish state. There was immediate reaction to this post of Mayor Mamdani from the Jewish community of New York. People not only alleged distortion of historical facts in the video, but also questioned the timing of its posting. The mayor’s office posted this video at 5:40 pm on Friday. The video was uploaded just before the Jewish community celebrated Shabbat.

New York’s UJA-Federation responded, saying, ‘You chose the time of Friday to post this at 5:40 pm, when New York Jews were preparing to light Shabbat candles. We saw it.’ However, this is not the first time such a reaction has come from Mamdani’s side. Even before this he had given statements against Israel and in support of Palestine.