Netanyahu says "shame on you" to Mamdani, claims "Jews no longer feel safe"

A wave of delegates left the United Nations General Assembly hall Thursday just before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rose to deliver blistering remarks targeting New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani. Netanyahu accused Mamdani, a longtime critic of Israel who supports Palestinian statehood, of antisemitism, saying Jews he has spoken with feel unsafe in New York since Mamdani's election and no longer recognize the city they once knew. He told Mamdani "shame on you" several times, faulting him for what he described as distorting facts, reversing victim and aggressor, and disregarding the truth, according to CBS News.

Mamdani, who took office as mayor in January, had vowed during his campaign to enforce an international arrest warrant against Netanyahu on his next visit to the city, calling him a war criminal over Israel's conduct in Gaza, though he acknowledged in July that city officials lacked legal authority to carry out such an arrest. Thursday's speech gave Netanyahu his earliest chance to appear in New York following Mamdani's mayoral win.

Netanyahu, who denies that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza, also responded to Mamdani's criticism of his government, declaring that efforts to silence him would fail and insisting Israel "prevented genocide" rather than committing one. Mamdani answered in a statement accusing Netanyahu of repeating "baseless lies" to sanitize what he called a genocide of Palestinians, noting that an International Criminal Court warrant alleging war crimes and crimes against humanity remains outstanding against the prime minister.

Summarized by PolitiKool from CBS News’s reporting. Read the full story at CBS News →