The head of an antisemitism watchdog has come out against the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) and other groups for their “divisive, hyperbolic and aggressive response” to Zohran Mamdani’s election, warning that a combative stance towards the New York City mayor-elect is a gift to the far right.
“The instrumentalizers of antisemitism are cheering on the divisions being created in New York City, because that’s their goal: divide people, divide Jews from each other,” said Jonathan Jacoby, the director of the Nexus Project, which works to combat antisemitism and its political abuse.
Nexus criticized the ADL in an open letter earlier this week after the ADL announced an initiative to “monitor” the incoming Mamdani administration for antisemitic bias.
In an interview with the Guardian, Jacoby warned that the initiative risks further dividing American Jews at a time of profound rifts exacerbated by the New York City mayoral election.
Nexus also called out the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations and Stop Antisemitism’s responses to Mamdani’s win as “dangerous and counterproductive” – the first accused Mamdani of “an ideology that demonizes or ostracizes Jews and Israelis” and the second called him “antisemitic”. The Conference of Presidents did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Stop Antisemitism said “anyone who believes you can interact with [Mamdani] in good faith is foolish”.
A spokesperson for the ADL did not directly address Jacoby’s letter but said in a statement to the Guardian that the group was launching its tracker now “not only because of the climate in New York, but also because of the Mayor-Elect’s history from associating with individuals who have a history of engaging antisemitic rhetoric to his own animosity to the Jewish state.”
The ADL unveiled its monitoring project hours after Mamdani scored a historic victory, becoming New York City’s first Muslim and openly pro-Palestinian mayor. ADL’s director, Jonathan Greenblatt, said in a statement that Mamdani “promoted antisemitic narratives, associated with individuals who have a history of antisemitism, and demonstrated intense animosity toward the Jewish state that is counter to the views of the overwhelming majority of Jewish New Yorkers.” According to the group, the project would include a “dedicated New York City citywide antisemitism tipline” and a public-facing “Mamdani Monitor” monitoring the incoming administration’s policies and appointments.
Earlier this week, more than a dozen Jewish organizations signed a statement accusing the ADL of “racist and Islamophobic attacks on our mayor-elect [that] undermine our shared commitment to confronting both antisemitism and Islamophobia in New York City”. Mamdani told reporters that “anyone is free to catalog the actions of our administration.” He added, in reference to a false statement made by Greenblatt in a CNBC interview: “I have some doubts about Jonathan [Greenblatt]’s ability to do so honestly, given that he previously said I had not visited any synagogues, only to have to correct himself.”
The Nexus Project was established in 2019 as an effort to foster education about antisemitism, particularly as it intersects with issues relating to Israel. It is behind a definition of antisemitism that is often presented as an alternative to the controversial International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) one, which has been increasingly adopted by US universities and policymakers despite its conflation of some criticism of Israel with antisemitism.
But increasingly, the Nexus Project is also dealing with questions of authoritarianism in the US, Jacoby noted. It recently published a blueprint that challenges the rightwing approach to combating antisemitism embraced by the administration, which largely mirrors the Heritage Foundation’s Project Esther plan to dismantle the Palestine solidarity movement in the US.
Jacoby wishes more Jewish leaders working on antisemitism issues would focus on the Trump administration, rather than the incoming Mamdani one.
“Some organizations have been inconsistent in their criticism and the alarm that they ought to be expressing about white nationalism,” he said. “They have tried to find a balance between that criticism and their desire to not alienate the [Trump] administration and its supporters, which relies on the support of white nationalism.”
He did not name the ADL, but the group has been widely criticized for narrowing its anti-extremism and civil rights mission to focus on pro-Israel activism, and recently took down its online “glossary of extremism”, which included information on the far right, after it came under fire from Elon Musk and rightwing influencers. The ADL was once considered an authority on tracking antisemitic incidents, but the credibility of its data has increasingly been challenged for framing peaceful pro-Palestinian actions, including by Jews themselves, as antisemitic.
Mamdani’s public criticism of Israel has played an outsized role in the mayoral election. His adversaries frequently focused on his support for BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions), his refusal to condemn the protest slogan “globalize the intifada” – the use of which he says he discourages – and his refusal to support Israel’s existence as an explicitly Jewish state. (He says he believes it should be a state that respects equal rights without religious hierarchy.)
Despite the organized opposition to his campaign, he was supported by a number of Jewish groups, and ultimately earned about one-third of the Jewish vote, according to exit polls. He has also repeatedly reached out to Jews concerned about his mayoralty. “We will build a City Hall that stands steadfast alongside Jewish New Yorkers and does not waver in the fight against the scourge of antisemitism,” he said in his election night speech.
Jacoby said that “legitimate concerns” about Mamdani’s positions on Israel were widely debated during the campaign, in both private and public forums.
“It’s perfectly fine that there be a discussion about those positions and the implications of the mayor-elect’s own positions on American Jews, on New York Jews. What isn’t fine is when those concerns degenerate into attacks,” he said, a reference to the aggressive and often Islamophobic tone of some of Mamdani’s critics.
Jacoby pointed to an op-ed published this week by a Manhattan rabbi who, before the election, had called Mamdani “a danger to the New York Jewish community” in a sermon. After the election, he struck a different tone, calling on his community to “work with” the incoming administration.
“It would seem that what was self-evident to me was not so self-evident to a sizeable percentage of my kinfolk,” the rabbi, Elliot Cosgrove, wrote.
Jacoby, who had been critical of the rabbi’s earlier comments on Mamdani, pointed to the op-ed as a “model” for Jewish leaders who had opposed his election, “to be reflective about what happened and how we should move forward,” he said.
Groups whose mission it is to fight antisemitism, he added, should recognize the “clear and present danger” where it really is – including “young, angry, white men”.
“The habits of the past that used to guide us – and that included an intolerance towards prejudice, including antisemitism but all forms of prejudice – are disappearing,” said Jacoby, citing the far-right antisemite Nick Fuentes and his supporters as an example.
Jacoby would not say whether he directly discussed Mamdani with the ADL’s director, but said: “I think he appreciates knowing our position.”
He called on the group to repair the relationships frayed by its recent trajectory – “in order to be part of a coalition to protect American democracy, protect Jews, and protect all Americans”.
