New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani condemned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's speech at the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on Thursday, saying he used the platform to "repeat baseless lies meant to sanitize his genocide of Palestinians."
"No lie can change the fact that he remains the subject of an International Criminal Court (ICC) arrest warrant," Mamdani said.
This comes days after Mamdani called for the ICC to honor Netanyahu's arrest warrant in an interview with CNN.
In July, Mamdani said he was investigating the possibility of arresting Netanyahu based on the ICC’s warrant, concluding after a few days that he could not legally do so but still warning that Netanyahu was “not welcome” in New York City.
Netanyahu criticizes Mamdani, says he cannot silence the truth
During his address to the UNGA, Netanyahu addressed Mamdani directly, calling him antisemitic and saying that many Jews no longer feel safe in New York.
"Shame on you for spitting in the face of the truth, Mr. Mamdani," Netanyahu said.
"It's no wonder if we consider that you [Mamdani] praised criminals convicted of supporting Hamas; you count as friends people like Hassan Piker, who said America deserved 9/11. Some friends you have. You invite into your home a Palestinian journalist who filmed Hamas terrorists beating and torturing Israeli hostages and later admitted that he refused to publish the videos in order to protect the terrorists. Your wife likes a post praising the Oct. 7 massacre, and another saying Tel Aviv shouldn't exist," Netanyahu added.
"Mr. Mamdani, you tried to stop me from coming here; you tried to silence me. You can’t silence me. You can’t silence the truth. And here's the simple truth. Israel didn't commit genocide. Israel prevented genocide. And that's exactly what Mr. Mamdani's Hamas buddies would have done to us had we not stopped them," he said.
Miriam Sela-Eitam contributed to this report.