Zohran Mamdani joined Democratic Socialists to fight for Gaza

Socialist candidate for New York City mayor Zohran Mamdani joined the Democratic Socialist movement in politics because of the Palestinian cause against Israel. He made the comments during video call with the Young Democratic Socialists of America organization.

"The reason why I joined DSA (Democratic Socialists in America) in the first place is because, as someone who came up through the Palestinian solidarity movement, I knew of a term, and many of us do, called PEP: progressive, except Palestine. And I would see time and time again, different organizations that would have a belief in so many of the values that I held, but then would draw a line on Palestine," Mamdani saind in 2021.

"And the reason that I joined DSA, if I had to pick one, was because there was no exception for Palestine, it was because the same fight, the same struggle, was understood to be a universal one. And this was an organization that not only understood that, but sought to lift up what was going on in Palestine."

Mamdani, who won the Democratic primary for mayor in New York City earlier this month against Andrew Cuomo, has recently been slammed for not condemning, "globalize the intifanda," a phrase that many interpret to being a call for violence against Jews.

He has expressed similar beliefs throughout his politiical career. He told the left-wing outlet Jacobin in 2020 that he started his "political organizing life around Palestinian solidarity" by cofounding his "school’s Students for Justice in Palestine."

In 2021, Mamdani led a group of anti-Israel protesters in a "BDS" (Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement) chant in New York across from the Israeli Consulate, per the New York Post. 

In college, Mamdani wrote for the university's newspaper, The Bowdoin Orient, where, among other topics, he railed against "white privilege" and called on the newspaper to "follow through in its efforts at recruiting writers of a more diverse background, whether in regards to race or gender," and called the lack of diverse writers in the opinion section the "pervasive male whiteness of the Opinion pages" which "builds on the sadly still-present white male monopolization of both discourse and understanding."

Mamdani's policy proposals for New York City include raising the minimum wage to $30 an hour by 2025, increasing taxes on "whiter neighborhoods," freezing rent, having government-run grocery stores, free child-care for every child up until the age of 5, and many more "free" programs. Some have compared the policy proposals to when he ran for stuent office in high school on the platform of having free juice. As mayor, he has also said that if Israli Prime Minister Netanyahu came to the city, he would have the foreign leader arrested. His plan to pay for it all is to tax the wealthy.