{"id":82314,"date":"2025-12-28T04:13:10","date_gmt":"2025-12-28T04:13:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/82314\/"},"modified":"2025-12-28T04:13:10","modified_gmt":"2025-12-28T04:13:10","slug":"exclusive-mamdani-backed-queens-assembly-candidate-hates-american-holidays-like-veterans-day-july-4th","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/82314\/","title":{"rendered":"Exclusive | Mamdani-backed Queens Assembly candidate hates American holidays like Veterans Day, July 4th"},"content":{"rendered":"

Federal holidays are no cause for celebration, according to a far-left Queens Assembly candidate backed by NYC Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhether it is July 4th, Thanksgiving, Veterans, Columbus or now Labor Day, we enjoy days off that are supposed to be victories for people, when they truly represent the silencing & destruction of our movements,\u201d Aber Kawas, a longtime Palestinian-American activist, wrote in an online journal posted<\/a> on Sept. 7, 2015 \u2014 Labor Day.<\/p>\n

\u201cToday I do not celebrate a day off, I only recommit myself to a global movement that fights against the death, displacement, and exploitation of people for capital.<\/p>\n

\"AberAber Kawas, a far-left Queens Assembly candidate backed by NYC Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani despises federal holidays because they reject socialism and are all part of the American Dream. Instagram\/Aber Kawas<\/p>\n

\u201cFor this movement, a day off is not a victory. A day off means nothing, because liberation means everything,\u201d added Kawas, who like Mamdani, is a card-carrying member of the Democratic Socialists of America.<\/p>\n

\u201cDignity, justice & equality is the true victory. Don\u2019t get it twisted.\u201d<\/p>\n

The resurfaced remarks by the 33-year-old, Brooklyn-born Kawas \u2014 who moved to Queens last year \u2014 are a slap in the face to American principles such as equality and liberty established in the Declaration of Independence and U.S. Constitution, critics said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen Zohran Mamdani backs candidates like Aber Kawas who openly hate Labor Day, Veterans Day, and the American Dream, it\u2019s a warning sign that we need to stop electing people who despise this country and everything it stands for,\u201d said Councilman Robert Holden, a conservative Queens Democrat.<\/p>\n

\"AberAber Kawas (far right) in a group photo with Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani (center) posted on Instagram last month. Instagram\/Aber Kawas<\/p>\n

\u201cSocialism has failed everywhere, and it\u2019s flat-out un-American.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kawas is seeking the 34th District Assembly seat representing Corona and other parts of Queens.<\/p>\n

Assemblywoman Jessica Gonzalez-Rojas is vacating the seat to challenge state Sen. Jessica Ramos (D-Queens).<\/p>\n

Despite Mamdani\u2019s endorsement, Kawas is no lock to win in the predominantly far-left district and will likely have to duke it out against a fellow DSA comrade in the next year\u2019s Democratic primary.<\/p>\n

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Gonzalez-Rojas endorsed her chief of staff Brian Romero, while the DSA\u2019s Electoral Working Group has recommended endorsing Kawas, according to City & State.<\/a><\/p>\n

Kawas is a former intern for the Council on American-Islamic Relations\u00a0<\/a>who has remained affiliated <\/a>with the controversial Muslim charity through her activism for more than a decade.<\/p>\n

She recently came under fire for incendiary comments about 9\/11, which resurfaced on X last month after news of Mamdani\u2019s reported support <\/a>for her campaign came to light.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe system of capitalism and racism and white supremacy et cetera \u2014 and Islamophobia \u2014 have all been used, you know, to colonize lands, to take resources from other people, and so this is a long trajectory and we are just seeing the manifestations of that continuation \u2026 with 9\/11,\u201d she said in an unearthed video segment posted by Australian political activist Drew Pavlou.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThe idea we have to apologize for like a terror attack that like a couple of people did and then there is no apology or reparations for genocides and for slavery, et cetera \u2014 is something I find reprehensible,\u201d she added.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Mandani\u2019s reps and Kawas did not return messages. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Federal holidays are no cause for celebration, according to a far-left Queens Assembly candidate backed by NYC Mayor-elect…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":82315,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[1091,40550,969,40551,57,9,24,17566,63,122,124,123,6967,58,19546,82],"class_list":["post-82314","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-democratic-socialists-of-america","tag-fourth-of-july","tag-holidays","tag-labor-day","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-state-assembly","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news","tag-thanksgiving","tag-us-news","tag-veterans-day","tag-zohran-mamdani"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82314","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=82314"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/82314\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/82315"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=82314"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=82314"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=82314"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}