On his first day in office on Thursday, 1 January 2026, New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani revoked several executive orders issued by his predecessor, Eric Adams, including the adoption of the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) definition of antisemitism, and the city’s opposition to the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement, a Palestinian-led, nonviolent campaign to pressure Israel to comply with international law. Born to an Indian mother and an Indian-Ugandan father, Mamdani, who was sworn in with his hand on a Quran held by his wife, described the move as “a new era” for his administration. He vowed to include Palestinian New Yorkers in his inaugural address on Thursday. Mamdani specifically addressed Palestinian New Yorkers in his speech, stating, “There will be Palestinian New Yorkers in Bay Ridge who will no longer have to contend with a politics that speaks of universalism but makes them the exception.” The revocation of the IHRA definition and the city’s stance on the BDS movement situates Madmani’s decision within a wider and deeply contested debate over how antisemitism is defined, interpreted, and applied in public discourse. The IHRA working definition of…
