TEHRAN – Zohran Kwame Mamdani, the Ugandan-Indian son of a postcolonial scholar who was born in Uganda, has done something the pundit class assumed impossible: his campaign dragged the once-distant politics of Gaza into the center of a New York mayoral election and forced voters to decide whether American power remains accountable.

Mamdani’s blunt language — “We are on the brink of a genocide of Palestinians in Gaza” — didn’t occur in ivory-tower debate; it landed in subway stations, viral clips, and the homework of swing voters.

That moral naming is the reason his rise matters and the reason the backlash was immediate.

When he doubled down with lines like “If I’m the Mayor, the NYPD will arrest Netanyahu” and “It is important that NYC is in compliance with international criminal law,” Mamdani signaled that his politics weren’t just rhetorical—they were about wielding power in ways that unsettled the establishment.

What followed reads less like policy disagreement than a coordinated playbook to otherize. AI-generated attack ads, some quickly deleted but widely seen, portrayed Mamdani’s supporters in criminalized, racialized terms; civil-rights groups called it racist and dangerous.

This is old-fashioned Islamophobia in new clothes: codewords, manufactured fear, and now AI to amplify the lie.

At the same time, Trump publicly labeled him a “communist” and threatened to curtail federal support for New York if Mamdani won—a move that turns municipal elections into a constitutional skirmish.

Polls show Mamdani leading into election day, fueled by under-45 turnout and a coalition of Muslims, Arabs, young progressives, and disillusioned working voters who care about rent, transit, and childcare as much as foreign policy.

But popularity is not the same as power. Mayors can use procurement, divestment, and moral pressure — not unilaterally halt arms shipments or rewrite foreign policy — and pretending otherwise shrinks political courage by rewarding tactical retreats.
Mamdani has turned NYC’s mayoral race into a test of moral courage: can the city use municipal power—contracts, divestment, sanctuary—against complicity, or will entrenched political and financial forces bend principle into performance?

A sober left must hold two truths at once. First: Mamdani injected moral clarity when much of the party offered platitudes. If naming genocide shocks a nation into debate, that’s a strategic gain.

Second: the left’s history includes a parade of rhetorically brave figures — Sanders, AOC, and other Squad members — whose supposed courage dissolved when tested, leaving only theatrical posturing and habitual compromise.

Criticism of Israel, conditional aid, and BDS are righteous stances; translating them into lasting policy requires sustained organizing and the willingness to use power, not only language. Words are wind; policy is the millstone that grinds them into change.

There are also tactical errors that opponents seized. Mamdani’s earlier refusal to disown certain provocation-ready slogans gave adversaries a tidy opening: conflate critique of Israel with support for violence.

Later walk-backs — discouraging inflammatory phrasing and promising Jewish New Yorkers protection — may have appeared as politically necessary, but they also revealed how easily moral clarity becomes political liability. The left should neither demand martyrdom nor accept dilution as inevitability. It must sharpen strategy, not surrender principle.

The broader story is structural. Gaza has loosened old partisan loyalties: younger Jews and Jewish progressive organizations canvassed for Mamdani even as institutional bodies tied to the Israel lobby mobilized in opposition.

If the Democratic Party cannot move from rhetoric to real leverage — conditioning aid, building congressional pressure — it risks losing the very base that wants ethical coherence.

This brings us to the crux of the matter. Mamdani is neither saint nor savior: he is a test case. If he wins and governs by principle and practical coalition-building, his administration could model municipal solidarity that constrains complicity.

If he retreats into the comfortable compromises that blunted other progressives, Gaza’s will be another missed turning point for the American left.

Worse, the political and financial establishment may actively try to make a Mamdani-led NYC fail—starving it of resources, weaponizing regulation and markets, or otherwise setting it up as a cautionary tale—just as the U.S. empire has historically undermined left-leaning experiments abroad.

The choice New Yorkers face is larger than one man: will a city known for its immigrant muscle keep its moral nerve, or will fear and money snuff out a rare alignment of conscience and politics? Strike while the iron is hot — and return to the forge when the fire wanes.