Per Mayor Zohran Mamdani, New York\u2019s problem with Israel goes way beyond the \u201cgenocide\u201d in Gaza.<\/p>\n
The Jewish state, he explains, is also why things are so tough here at home, right down to the poor conditions in New York City Housing Authority buildings \u2014 and even the fact that babies need diapers.<\/p>\n
No joke: In a recent sit-down with The New York Times<\/a>, Hizzoner described an experience he had walking around Washington Heights with Democratic congressional nominee Darializa Avila Chevalier.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were discussing the amount of money that our federal government sends, billions of dollars, to the Israeli military,\u201d the mayor related, and \u201ca man came out of a bodega with his hands full with two packages of Huggies. And you see what the priorities are of people living in the district.\u201d<\/p>\n It\u2019s hard to know which part of that anecdote makes the least sense.<\/p>\n The two socialists were talking about the \u201cbillions of dollars\u201d the US gives the Israeli military<\/a> (of course they were), and then \u2014 wait for it! \u2014 they saw a man buying diapers.<\/p>\n Huh? What does a random diaper purchase prove?<\/p>\n Does the mayor think only poor people buy diapers, and\/or that Israel makes babies soil themselves?<\/p>\n Is he implying that, if only we didn\u2019t give Israel so much money, diapers would be free, and parents wouldn\u2019t have to buy them?<\/p>\n He makes similar points frequently.<\/p>\n Last April, Mamdani told Politico \u201cit is hard\u201d to explain to his constituents in NYCHA\u2019s Queensbridge Houses \u201cwhy they have to live in substandard conditions . . . \u00a0while we continue to find billions of dollars to drop bombs that kill tens of thousands of Palestinians<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n To be clear, the United States gives Israel about $3.3 billion in arms credits every year (the cash stays in America). By contrast, NYCHA has a capital repair backlog of $80 billion.<\/p>\n So even if the US cut Israel off completely and Congress dedicated all that funding to NYCHA, it\u2019s unlikely residents at the Queensbridge Houses would notice much difference.<\/p>\n Yet Mamdani\u2019s point is a common theme on the anti-Zionist left.<\/p>\n The US Campaign for Palestinian Rights<\/a> (the US umbrella group for the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement that, per Tablet, also indirectly facilitates tax-exempt donations to Palestinian terror groups) claims New York\u2019s share of military aid to Israel \u201ccould instead fund\u201d 929,393 households with one month\u2019s free rent; 3,119,164 families with one month\u2019s free groceries; 515,790 children with free healthcare; and so on.<\/p>\n The USCPR provides similar breakouts for every state.<\/p>\n Wow, you might think: Israel really is the cause of all human misery and need in America today.<\/p>\n Look at everything we could have . . . if it wasn\u2019t for greedy Israel.<\/p>\n Yet creating long lists of everything that $3.3 billion could buy is deceptive.<\/p>\n Behavioral economists call this the \u201cmultiple-use fallacy,\u201d which is when a resource is promised simultaneously to satisfy more needs than remotely possible.<\/p>\n Think of a child imagining how he will spend his pocket money: \u201cI can go to the movies, get a new video game, a skateboard, a catcher\u2019s mitt . . . and put the rest in my college fund!\u201d<\/p>\n