Mamdani says he was ‘proud to attend’ 7 October vigil where protesters called him a ‘traitor’

JTA – New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani said on Thursday he was “proud to attend” the previous night’s 7 October vigil held by Israelis for Peace, where pro-Palestinian protesters swarmed and called him a “traitor” to the movement. 

“I’m the mayor of New York City and this is what I signed up for,” Mamdani said during a press conference. 

Demonstrators mocked and yelled at the people sitting vigil. They also lobbed chants at Mamdani and Democratic congressional nominee Brad Lander, who spoke during the event. Some protesters displayed Hamas symbols. 

Mamdani said he was “proud to attend last night’s vigil, as I did last year, to listen to testimonies from family members of those who were killed on 7 October, and those who’ve been killed in the three years since, and all of whom united in the vision for peace and an end to the genocide in Gaza”. 

Mamdani was also asked during the press conference whether he would have changed anything about his statement on Wednesday morning commemorating the 7 October anniversary. A number of Jewish groups criticised the mayor for focusing the statement more on Israel’s military campaign in Gaza than on Hamas’s 2023 attack. 

Mamdani sidestepped the question, pointing instead to the totality of his statement, his attendance of the Israelis for Peace vigil, and his meeting with Palestinian New Yorkers later that night at Ayat Hinds Hall, a Palestinian restaurant on the Upper West Side. 

“It all speaks to a reckoning with horror,” he said. “And a horror that devastated the lives of New Yorkers three years ago, and also continues to devastate New Yorkers.” 

New York Governor Kathy Hochul condemned the protest on Wednesday night, posting on X that “disrupting a vigil for the victims of October 7 while waving the flags of terrorist organisations is absolutely despicable”. 

“Jewish New Yorkers deserve to mourn in peace, free from hatred and intimidation,” Hochul wrote. “There is no excuse for this. None.”