Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani is planning to elevate a deeply controversial attorney to one of the most powerful legal posts in New York City government, drawing alarm from critics who warn the move could further inflame tensions with Jews and reshape City Hall’s legal agenda.

Ramzi Kassem, a CUNY law professor and member of Mamdani’s legal transition team, is the leading candidate to become Chief Counsel—the mayor’s most senior legal adviser and a gatekeeper for policy, litigation, and ethics decisions across city government—according to a report from the NY Post.

Kassem, 47, has built a career defending high-profile and polarizing clients, including a convicted al Qaeda terrorist and a radical pro-Palestinian activist detained by federal immigration authorities.

Among Kassem’s past cases was his defense of Ahmed al-Darbi, an al Qaeda operative convicted in 2017 of masterminding the 2002 bombing of the French oil tanker Limburg off the coast of Yemen, an attack that killed a crew member and sent shockwaves through global energy markets. Al-Darbi was later transferred from Guantanamo Bay to Saudi Arabia to serve the remainder of his sentence.

More recently, Kassem served as an attorney for Mahmoud Khalil, a Syrian-born leader of Columbia University’s pro-Palestinian encampment, who was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and targeted for deportation. After 104 days in detention, federal judges ordered Khalil’s release. He is now free and living in New York City.

Kassem’s legal work is compounded by a paper trail of anti-Israel rhetoric dating back to his time as a student at Columbia University, where he attended law school on a fellowship funded by members of the Soros family.

In columns and letters published in the Columbia Spectator in the late 1990s, Kassem accused Israel of “ethnic cleansing,” wrote that Jews came to the Middle East “with the intention of conquering the land,” and rejected a two-state solution as neither “viable” nor “desirable.” In a 1999 letter, he criticized the naming of a sandwich as an “Israeli wrap,” arguing it was offensive to Muslims and Arabs.

Kassem later participated in anti-Israel protests on campus and has remained closely associated with progressive and pro-Palestinian advocacy circles.

He also leads CLEAR—Creating Law Enforcement Accountability and Responsibility—a legal clinic he founded in 2009 at CUNY that provides free representation to Muslims and other communities. CLEAR has received more than $3 million from George Soros’ Open Society Foundations and at least $1 million from MacKenzie Scott, public records show.

In 2022, the Biden administration named Kassem a senior policy adviser on immigration issues, further raising his national profile.

Further fueling controversy, the Council on American-Islamic Relations honored Kassem last year for his work defending Khalil. CAIR has been designated a foreign terrorist organization by both Texas and Florida.

(YWN World Headquarters – NYC)