Mandy Patinkin’s Chanukah Cameo: A Cover for Mamdani’s Record?

New York’s mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani released a Chanukah video so awkward and contrived that it would’ve been funny if the politics weren’t so serious. It wasn’t just the botched menorah lighting – eight candles on day six – or the half-said blessings, or latkes frying in barely a spoonful of oil.

No, the most jarring part was who was standing next to him: actor and singer Mandy Patinkin.

Patinkin isn’t merely a celebrity who wandered onto a set. He is a passionate, outspoken critic of Israel whose comments go far beyond policy disagreement. In July, he accused Israel of “endangering the Jewish population all over the world” and likened Israeli actions against Hamas to historic persecutions of Jews. In 1998, he declined to participate in Israel’s 50th anniversary celebrations.

So why would he willingly appear in a feel-good holiday video with a mayor-elect who supports BDS, pushes for the arrest of Israeli leaders, and has built a political identity around delegitimizing the only Jewish state in the world?

That’s the question too many are ignoring.

For Mamdani, the motive is obvious. He wants images of himself with Chanukah candles, latkes, and famous Jews circulating online, not images of him chanting at BDS rallies or calling Israel a criminal nation. He knows that Jewish New Yorkers – the largest Jewish population outside Israel – are uneasy, if not alarmed, by his record.

So, the video sends a message: Relax. See? I’m lighting candles with Mandy Patinkin.

It’s political deodorant.

But what does Patinkin get out of it? That’s harder to explain.

This wasn’t just a holiday greeting. It was a calculated photo-op designed to soften Mamdani’s public image in the very community he has alienated most. And Patinkin, intentionally or not, helped deliver that.

That should trouble every Jew in this city.

Let’s not pretend the timing was accidental. The video dropped Saturday morning, on Shabbat when observant Jews wouldn’t see it. It wasn’t made for them. It was made for everyone else, particularly non-Jews who don’t know the ritual details and wouldn’t catch the inconsistencies.

And there was plenty: the wrong number of candles, incomplete blessings, no kippot, and a pounding lack of reverence that left the whole scene feeling less like Chanukah and more like improv theater.

But Mamdani isn’t being judged on ritual accuracy. He’s being judged on whether New York Jews can trust him.

Patinkin just helped him check that box.

This is not a small moment. Jewish New Yorkers are living through the worst wave of antisemitism many have ever seen: attacks on the street, harassment on campus, synagogues hiring private security, people afraid to wear a kippah or a Magen David necklace on the subway.

Mamdani will soon be the public face of City Hall, and there are real questions looming:

Will he protect Jewish institutions?

Will he address hate crime spikes?

Will he confront antisemitism on the left, not just the right?

Or will he dismiss Jewish concerns as “political noise”?

These are life-and-death issues for families in the five boroughs.

And now Mandy Patinkin – a man who proudly expresses his Jewish identity – has helped the mayor-elect send the message: There’s nothing to worry about.

That alone raises the stakes.

In a recent op-ed I wrote about the celebrity campaign to “Free Marwan Barghouti.” Actors from Hollywood to Broadway lined up behind a convicted terrorist and murderer. What stood out was the eagerness of celebrities to pronounce moral judgment on Israel while sidestepping the brutal realities of terrorism.

Patinkin’s participation in Mamdani’s Chanukah video fits that pattern.

Not because he is malicious.

Not because he hates Jews.

But because he has convinced himself that signaling empathy is more important than confronting the facts – whether about Hamas atrocities in Israel or spiraling antisemitism on the streets of New York.

It is the triumph of symbolism over substance – and Mamdani knows it.

Chanukah is the story of Jews fighting to preserve their faith and sovereignty against those who would erase both. It is not a backdrop for politicians who cheer on campaigns to isolate the Jewish state, nor is it a branding tool for celebrities eager to display their conscience while ignoring the facts on the ground.

Mandy Patinkin may genuinely believe he is standing on the side of compassion. But compassion without judgment becomes a prop in someone else’s script. In this case, it’s the script of a mayor-elect whose record on Israel and the Jewish people should trouble every Jewish family in this city.

Jewish New Yorkers deserve a mayor who doesn’t need props to prove he isn’t hostile to them – and a community strong enough to say so when he tries.