Mamdani’s wife backed Palestinian terrorism in old social media posts, report says

Rama Duwaji said to have shared content about plane hijacker Leila Khaled, the PLO in the First Intifada and ‘valiant freedom fighters,’ in the latest in a series of controversies

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s wife, Rama Duwaji, celebrated Palestinian terrorists in old social media posts, according to a Wednesday report.

The posts, on the X and Tumblr social media platforms, dated to when Duwaji, now 28, was a teenager and in her early 20s, The Washington Free Beacon said.

The Times of Israel could not independently confirm the claims.

In 2017, Duwaji posted a photo to Tumblr that showed the Palestinian terrorist Leila Khaled, with the caption, “If it does good for my cause, I’ll be happy to accept death.”

Khaled was a member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a US-designated terrorist group, who participated in two plane hijackings in 1969 and 1970.

In another post from 2017, Duwaji shared a photo of an individual in a keffiyeh sewing a Palestinian flag with the caption, “A Palestinian demonstrator sews a Palestinian Liberation Organization flag before a protest during the First Intifada.”

The PLO was involved in violence against Israelis around the time of the First Intifada in the late 1980s.

Another post Duwaji shared in 2017 showed a postage stamp with a keffiyeh-clad man holding an assault rifle and the text, “We salute the valiant freedom fighters of Palestine.”

Other posts she shared as a teenager denigrated American soldiers, claimed that white people created Al Qaeda, and said that Tel Aviv “shouldn’t exist.”

The Washington Free Beacon linked the accounts, now inactive, to Duwaji through facial recognition technology and other corroborative data points, such as her birthday and the name of a pet cat.

The report comes after several other Israel-related controversies surrounding Duwaji.

Earlier this month, reports indicated Duwaji “liked” social media posts celebrating the October 7, 2023, Hamas invasion of Israel, supporting protests against Israel the day after the attack, and calling reports of Hamas rapes during the attack a hoax.

“My wife is the love of my life,” Mamdani said at a press conference when asked about the social media activity, “and she’s also a private person who has held no formal position on my campaign or in my City Hall.”

Last week, another report found that Duwaji illustrated a book for a prominent anti-Zionist writer, Susan Abulhawa, who has called Jews “supremacist vampires,” supported terrorism against Israelis and made other antisemitic statements.

Inflammatory social media activity by members of Mamdani’s staff and inner circle, much of it directed at Israel, has caused repeated controversy since he launched his run for mayor last year.