Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson faced harsh criticism from the city's Jewish community after wearing a keffiyeh to a public event last week commemorating Arab Heritage Month.
"Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson appropriately commemorated Arab Heritage Month this week. Arab Heritage should be honored and celebrated," Rabbi Ari Hart from the local Jewish community wrote, "but would it not be possible to commemorate Arab Heritage without wearing the symbol that millions of Jews around the world saw worn during the murders, rapes, and kidnappings on October 7?"
Hart expressed particular concern about the keffiyeh, which has become one of the most prominent symbols of pro-Palestinian demonstrations in the United States and worldwide over the past year and a half.
Again, Brandon Johnson shows some of the WORST political instincts in the entire country. The worst mayor in America. Period. pic.twitter.com/Hu8HTw815b
— Corey Walker (@CoreyWriting) April 24, 2025
"We understand that Mayor Johnson may not have intended to cause harm, but at a time of historic antisemitic threat levels, including in Chicago, symbols matter. Their public use, especially by elected officials, carries weight and meaning," Lisa Katz, chief government affairs officer of the Combat Antisemitism Movement, a pro-Israel group, said in a statement.
"The Jewish Alliance of Chicago," an organization established in early 2024 after Johnson voted for a city council resolution calling for a ceasefire in the Gaza war, also condemned the action, "for the mayor of Chicago to stand there — cloaked in a symbol now synonymous with Jewish bloodshed, flanked by an organization that justifies it — is more than tone-deaf. It's a betrayal," the group said in a Facebook post. "It tells Jewish Chicagoans: your pain doesn't matter. Your dead don't count. Your safety is negotiable."
