President Trump said Monday that Benjamin Netanyahu wouldn’t be arrested “in any way, shape or form” in the U.S., after New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani said he would explore whether the Israeli prime minister could be taken into custody by local authorities.
Netanyahu “is fighting against the Islamic Republic of Iran, which recently killed 52,000 innocent protestors, and has spent the last 47 years killing American Soldiers, and others,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
Mamdani said that he was having conversations with the city’s legal department about its authority to arrest Netanyahu, but he suggested he wouldn’t rewrite any laws. In an interview with the New York Times, Mamdani called Netanyahu a “war criminal” and said that the prime minister “belongs in The Hague.” The International Criminal Court, which is in The Hague, previously issued an arrest warrant for Netanyahu over alleged war crimes in Gaza.
Netanyahu is expected to come to New York in September for the United Nations General Assembly.
Mamdani, a sharp critic of the Israeli government, vowed during his mayoral campaign that if he were elected, he would arrest Netanyahu should the prime minister come to New York. Mamdani, a Democratic socialist, has accused the Israeli government of committing genocide in Gaza.
His statements have been polarizing for moderate Democrats and some members of the city’s Jewish community. “The idea that an executive would try to direct a police agency under their jurisdiction to arrest their political opponents is very much third-world behavior,” said David Greenfield, a former Democratic city councilman and chief executive of Met Council, an influential Jewish nonprofit. “It’s not what we do in a democracy.”
During an unrelated press conference Monday, the mayor said that his administration would follow local laws in making any determination about the legal authority to arrest Netanyahu. He added that he would seek the arrest of other international leaders who had arrest warrants, including Russian President Vladimir Putin .
“My point is that if someone is charged with a warrant by the International Criminal Court for these kinds of crimes, that’s something I believe that should be honored,” he said.
The office of the Israeli prime minister said on social media Sunday that the ICC was a kangaroo court and the mayor’s comments were an attempt to distract from his administration’s shortcomings. “Mr. Mamdani should focus on fixing the damage his policies have caused New York,” the office said.
Lawyers and legal scholars said Mamdani’s authority to order Netanyahu’s arrest on an ICC warrant is tenuous at best. The U.S. doesn’t recognize the court. Additionally, the 2002 federal American Servicemembers’ Protection Act prohibits local law-enforcement agencies such as the New York Police Department from cooperating with the ICC process, said Brian Ginsberg, a partner at law firm Harris Beach Murtha.
“The arrest contemplated by Mayor Mamdani would face significant legal challenges,” said Ginsberg, who previously worked in the New York state attorney general’s office. “It may well set up a three-way clash among local power, federal law, and international law.”
Trump and Netanyahu have had a sometimes complicated relationship amid the war with Iran. The Wall Street Journal previously reported that the Republican president had grown tired of Netanyahu arguing for more military action.
Write to Marianne LeVine at marianne.levine@wsj.com and James Fanelli at james.fanelli@wsj.com
