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The advocacy group Jewish Voice for Peace announced Friday that 50 people, including elected officials, were arrested at the Manhattan offices of U.S. Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer while protesting the New York Democrats' continued support for Israel as it annihilates the Gaza Strip.
"The deliberate and shameless killing of Palestinians in Gaza is enraging the world," said scholar Judith Butler, a member of the Jewish Voice for Peace (JVP) Academic Advisory Council, in a statement. "If it is not bombing or shooting, it is a strategic plan of starvation, all of which are crimes against humanity. It is time, past time, to cease looking away. Actions such as ours are a message to all those who look away: Wake up, take a stand, and demand the end to this genocide."
Although a majority of U.S. Senate Democrats this week supported Sen. Bernie Sanders' (I-Vt.) latest effort to block additional arms sales to Israel, Gillibrand and Schumer, the chamber's minority leader, opposed the resolutions.
"It is absolutely unconscionable that Sens. Schumer and Gillibrand continue to arm the Israeli military while it carries out genocide against Palestinians and uses starvation as a weapon of war in Gaza," JVP's Jay Saper, who had family members killed in the Holocaust, said Friday. "The echoes of the past are not lost on us. We refuse to be silent—because never again is now."
Around 200 protesters gathered at the Manhattan offices of U.S. Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer, both New York Democrats, on August 1, 2025. (Photo: Ken Schles/Jewish Voice for Peace)
Protesters wore shirts with the message "Let Gaza Live," banged on pots and pans, and chanted "stop starving Gaza" in the lobby of the Third Avenue building. They held banners with messages including: "Jews for Palestinian Freedom," "Stop Arming Israel," and "End the Blockade."
Since the Hamas-led October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, the Israeli government has not only directed its forces to decimate Gaza but also severely restricted the flow of humanitarian aid into the coastal enclave. More than 150 people have died from starvation, according to local officials. Experts believe the official death toll of at least 60,332 is likely an undercount.
Outraged by the conditions in Gaza—enabled by the U.S. Congress and both the Biden and Trump administrations—200 people demonstrated at the Senate offices, JVP said. Protesters included New York City Councilwomen Alexa Avilés (D-38) and Tiffany Cabán (D-22), state Assemblywoman Claire Valdez (D-37), and actor Sara Ramirez.
The New York Daily News reported that Cabán and Valdez were among the protesters arrested, zip-tied, and put on decommissioned Metropolitan Transportation Authority buses. Cabán's spokesperson, Arden Dressner Levy, said she was taken into police custody for "participating in civil disobedience" to demand that "Israel stop starving Gaza."
"Israeli attacks in Gaza have created the highest rate of child amputees in the world. Israel is blocking food, medicine, and baby formula from entering Gaza. Israel is systematically destroying Palestinian life and society, and Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand are writing the checks," Levy told the outlet. "Never again is now."
Religious leaders also joined the protest. Rabbi Abby Stein of the JVP Rabbinic Council said that "Jewish teachings compel us to take action to save lives. That is why we support blocking the sales of deadly U.S. weapons to the Israeli military, which is one of the few tools available to members of Congress that could actually, and immediately, save lives."
The protest came as U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee and President Donald Trump's special envoy to the Middle East, Steve Witkoff, visited one of the controversial Gaza Humanitarian Foundation aid distribution sites.
In response to their trip to Gaza, Oxfam America director of peace and security Scott Paul said that "we do not have time for symbolic measures—a few more trucks, airdrops, and humanitarian pauses may be better than nothing—but in reality, they are far more effective in grabbing headlines than they are at saving lives."
Independent U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders on Thursday reaffirmed his support for Democratic New York City mayoral nominee Zohran Mamdani, a fellow democratic socialist facing fierce opposition from deep-pocketed establishment figures who fear the broad nationwide appeal of his people-over-profit agenda.
Faced with the growing possibility that Mamdani would win the June 24 primary, Wall Street bankers, corporate executives, real estate developers, mega-landlords, and others rushed to dump money into disgraced former Gov. Andrew Cuomo's campaign coffers. Now that Mamdani is the Democratic nominee, they're pouring tens of millions of dollars into an anti-Mamdani war chest, despite not even agreeing on which candidate to back in November's mayoral election.
In a Thursday interview with CNN's Christiane Amanpour—who noted that Sanders' Fighting Oligarchy tour "has been drawing record crowds"—the Vermont senator said that policies like "giving massive tax breaks to billionaires and cutting healthcare and education and nutrition from working-class families [are] not popular."
While acknowledging that "mainstream Democrats" have been unable to galvanize opposition to Republicans' pro-billionaire, anti-working class agenda, Amanpour pressed Sanders about what he would tell New Yorkers who say that Mamdani "has never run anything, and he says, free buses, and... is he antisemitic or not?'"
Watch Sanders' response:
"First of all, understand, he's going to have the entire establishment, the oligarchy, the billionaires coming down on his head, not only because he's demanding that the wealthy and large corporations in New York City start paying their fair share of taxes, they are worried that his campaign is an example of what can happen all over the country when you bring people together to demand the government that works for all of us and not just a few," the senator said. "So, they really want to crush this guy."
"You have billionaires saying quite openly, 'We are going to spend as much as it takes to defeat this guy.' You have Democratic leadership not refusing to jump on board a campaign where this guy is the Democratic nominee," Sanders added. "So, most importantly, I'm going to do everything I can to see that Zohran becomes the next mayor of New York."
Some Democrats have done more than refuse to support their own party's nominee. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) falsely claimed last month that Mamdani had made references to "global jihad" and speciously argued that "globalize the intifada"—a call for Palestinian liberation and battling injustice—is a call to "kill all the Jews."
Freshman Congresswoman Laura Gillen (D-N.Y.) also falsely accused Mamdani of "a deeply disturbing pattern of unacceptable antisemitic comments."
Congressional progressives including Reps. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), André Carson (D-Ind.), and Lateefah Simon (D-Calif.)—the four practicing Muslims in the House of Representatives—last month condemned what they called the "vile, anti-Muslim, and racist smears from our colleagues on both sides of the aisle."
Despite the attacks against him, Mamdani is leading Cuomo—who is now running as an Independent—by 10 points in a Slingshot Strategies poll of more than 1,000 registered voters published earlier this week. Mamdani also leads Republican nominee Curtis Sliwa by 21 points and scandal-ridden incumbent Mayor Eric Adams by 24 points.
Observers note that establishment Democrats' reservations about backing Mamdani seem to be fading amid the strength of his campaign. As Democrats including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) hold out on endorsing their own party's nominee, critics argue it's time to follow other lawmakers like Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Jerrold Nadler, Adriano Espaillat, and Nydia Velázquez—all New York Democrats—and endorse Mamdani.
"Mamdani won a record-setting primary victory, and unions, grassroots Democratic groups, and savvy elected officials are rushing to back him," The Nation's national affairs correspondent, John Nichols, wrote Friday. "Now it's the establishment's turn."
Supporters of progressive New York mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani are putting pressure on reluctant centrist Democrats to fall in line and back his candidacy after he scored an upset win in last month's Democratic primary.
Progressive advocacy organization Our Revolution has gathered more than 30,000 signatures in a petition urging the Democratic political establishment to not sabotage Mamdani's candidacy by backing independent candidates such as incumbent Mayor Eric Adams or former New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo.
The organization said Wednesday that it attempted to deliver the petition to the Manhattan offices of Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), who is one of many big-name Democrats in the state who have yet to back Mamdani's general election candidacy, but was denied access to the building by security.
"After multiple calls to both the NYC and D.C. offices, staff refused to accept the petition in person and directed organizers to submit it online—despite the urgent, NYC-specific nature of the issue," Our Revolution claimed.
The event was organized to draw attention to the double standard and disconnect between party leadership and grassroots voters, especially in races where big money interests—some with ties to the Democratic Party machinery and others without—work behind the scenes to push out progressives.
"Democratic leaders love to talk about unity—until a progressive wins," said Joseph Geevarghese, executive director of Our Revolution. "Every cycle, we're told to fall in line for the good of the party. Well, Zohran Mamdani is the nominee—and yet the establishment's silence is deafening. It's time for party leaders to live up to their own standards and stand with Zohran against these billionaire-funded attempts to undo the will of the voters."
The action was first reported by Politico, which also reports that a dozen chapters of progressive organizing group Indivisible are writing letters to Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) and Democratic New York Gov. Kathy Hochul to urge them to get behind Mamdani.
"The party should be celebrating and analyzing this win as we prepare for the fight of our political lives in 2026," wrote Indivisible signatories. "At a time when Democrats have struggled to connect with voters and build credibility, supporting and learning from Mr. Mamdani's playbook is paramount."
Additionally, Politico reports that Jasmine Gripper, the co-director of the New York Working Families Party, is also urging the state's Democratic leadership to put aside their reservations and back the party's nominee. Gripper noted that Mamdani has won the endorsements of his fellow New York state assemblymembers from across the political spectrum, which should ease their concerns that his candidacy is out of the mainstream.
"The Mamdani tent is big enough for everyone," Gripper said. "Any leader who is serious about building a base of energized voters and wins would be smart to join us."
A poll released by political consulting firm Slingshot Strategies on Wednesday shows that Mamdani currently leads among voters, although that advantage could shrink should either Adams or Cuomo drop out of the race to endorse the other's candidacy.
Overall, the poll showed Mamdani scoring 35% of the vote, compared to 25% for Cuomo, 14% for Republican Curtis Sliwa, and just 11% for Adams. Mamdani also held the highest net favorability of the major candidates at +4 percentage points, whereas Cuomo was underwater by 2 percentage points and Adams had a net favorability of -34 percentage points.