Quite a lot of pro-Palestinian teams slammed Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani for his choice to retain Jessica Tisch as NYPD commissioner in an open letter, accusing Mamdani of abandoning a trigger central to his political id.
Dozens of teams signed onto the Tuesday night letter, together with College students for Justice in Palestine’s nationwide and a number of other native chapters, Inside Our Lifetime and far-left Marxist and communist Democratic Socialists of America caucuses.
“We strongly oppose this decision,” the teams stated in an open letter directed at Mamdani. “Retaining Tisch represents a political alignment with the NYPD’s legacy of racialized policing, surveillance, and repression, and a retreat from the values of justice and liberation that Mamdani’s campaign claimed to champion.”
Tuesday’s letter hinted at a few of the challenges Mamdani is more likely to face as he seeks to take care of his left-wing allies whereas additionally successful the help of extra average New Yorkers. After saying that Tisch would keep in her submit, for instance, Mamdani raised eyebrows when he softened his stance on how a lot energy the town’s Civilian Grievance Assessment Board ought to have.
The professional-Palestinian teams knocked Tisch’s background rising up the NYPD ranks within the Counterterrorism Bureau, together with her lead function in administering a build-out of the NYPD’s Area Consciousness System, a community NYPD makes use of to trace targets although CCTV cameras and license plate monitoring.
She and Mamdani stand opposed on many public questions of safety — for instance, she has been vocal towards bail and discovery reform and elevating the age of prison duty.
NYPD Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch is pictured throughout a press convention on the Middle for Jewish Historical past denouncing the Antisemitic murders of two Israeli Embassy employees in Washington, D.C. Thursday, Could 22, 2025 in Manhattan, New York. (Barry Williams/ New York Every day Information)
Mamdani’s choice to maintain her on has appeased a lot of these involved about his acknowledged positions on public security, together with previous statements calling to “defund the police” and to prioritize non-police responses to sure emergency conditions with a brand new Division of Group Security.
Past public questions of safety, the teams cited Tisch’s help of Israel as an element of their criticism. “Tisch’s record is inseparable from the NYPD’s direct collaboration with the Israeli occupation,” the letter reads, referencing examples of Tisch’s public help of Israel, together with internet hosting members of Israel’s Nationwide Police.
Spokesmen for the NYPD and Mamdani didn’t instantly reply to requests for remark.
Of their letter, the pro-Palestinian teams accuse Mamdani of forsaking “the communities and movements that propelled him into office.”
Mamdani has lengthy advocated for Palestinians, with the problem shaping his political id. The mayor-elect based an SJP chapter at Bowdoin School when he was a scholar there, supported the BDS motion and opposed U.S. army support to Israel and has stated he rejects Israel’s id as a Jewish state. He’s additionally pledged to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ought to he land in New York.
These positions have led to criticism he boosts not simply important positions on the Netanyahu authorities or the warfare in Gaza, however these with a deeper antipathy for Jewish individuals.
However the mayor-elect has additionally confronted flack from a few of the teams that signed onto the letter after his efficiency at a June major debate the place he stated he believed Israel has the best to exist as a state with “equal rights” for all.
With Chris Sommerfeldt
