Genuinely not as disappointed in Mamdani as I am at all those who refuse to hold elected officials feet to the fire. He has absolutely no incentive to deliver on the demands of the Palestine movement if we don’t relentlessly make those demands. Meanwhile, Zionist organizations are doing exactly that, applying pressure and getting more and more of what they want, while people who claim to be on the left or support Palestine tell us our strategy should be to shut up. It’s absurd. You see that political pressure works. You see Zionist organizations using it to advance their interests. Yet somehow when Palestinians do that, in the context of a genocide no less, we’re accused of doing AIPAC’s job for them. There is nothing Zionist organizations would like more than for the Palestine liberation movement to silence ourselves while politicians endlessly cater to their demands. But what infuriates me even more is being lectured by Americans whose tax dollars are funding the weapons slaughtering my people. People who not only refuse to hold their own politicians accountable or do more to stop the genocide, but have the audacity to tell Palestinians to shut up about it. You don’t get to sit comfortably in the country financing the slaughter of our people, refuse to hold your own politicians accountable, and then lecture us about how we’re allowed to resist it.