I remember the day like it was yesterday. I had landed in New York City’s JFK just a few months before, after being forced to leave Lebanon after four illegal detentions, multiple assaults in the streets of Beirut and two outstanding military court summons. Israeli settlers were stealing Palestinian homes, and a bunch of people in Brooklyn decided to meet up near Grand Army Plaza to show solidarity with Palestinians and voice their disapproval at the state’s senators shamelessly funding and supporting ethnic cleansing.

Back then, wasn’t like now. Being at those protests was risky. The Israeli chokehold on free speech in the US was still ironclad. You could be punished for being against indigenous people being kicked out of their grandparents’ home so a “Jacob” from Williamsburg could move in, and instead of paying taxes here, have our taxes bankroll his life built on the ruins of Palestinians. After two years of genocide still being committed by Israel in Gaza, most Americans now see the Israeli occupation for what it is. And that brings me to the reason of this post: Zohran Mamdani’s victory despite zionist billionaires throwing tens of millions of dollars to try to smear him as an antisemite for being for equal human rights for all.

That day, Zohran spoke at that protest. I took a video that day of part of his address, as he had particularly captivated me. He had just been elected as a NY State Assemblyman for Queens and parts of Brooklyn. He left an impression. This is the video I took:

Even back then, Zohran Mamdani always reminded people that antisemitism was a scourge that had no place in the movement for Palestinian liberation. If anything, Zohran is consistent, and it’s one of the many things I respect and admire about him.

Since that day, we would stay in touch and Instagram via DMs, and I constantly told him he should run for mayor. In October, he replied “loading” and I flipped. It was his time. It was our time. Now, a year later, I woke up in Sunnyside in Queens, and ran to get the NY Post with its hilariously offensive cover announcing his win.

In today’s podcast, I speak with my friend Russ Finkelstein, who was the person I went to that protest to with in 2021. After all, I’ve spent countless hours talking politics with him, arguing even, but after we spent weeks huffing and puffing up flights of stairs to knock on doors for Zohran, along with 999,998 other New Yorkers, there’s no one I’d rather unpack what this means, what we can learn and where we’re headed with a New York City with a leftist mayor, a progressive that refuses to throw immigrants, trans people, queer folks and women under the bus while trying to become Diet Republicans like so many racist, octogenarian Democratic leaders who not only refused to support their party’s nominee, but conspired against him in things that were reminiscent of the dark times before the US invaded Iraq, the mass hysteria and hatred towards Muslim and brown people that caused so many deaths in so many places around the world.

Zohran, make us proud! And we are all supporting your administration.

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What We Can Learn From Zohran Mamdani's Historic Victory With Russ Finkelstein