Mayor Zohran Mamdani said his administration was still discussing whether to arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he comes to New York as expected for the UN General Assembly in September. “I believe that Prime Minister Netanyahu belongs in The Hague,” Mamdani told Lulu Garcia-Navarro this week on “The Interview,” a New York Times show, referring to the home of the International Court of Justice. “He’s a war criminal who has been charged by the International Criminal Court,” Mamdani added. “And what you will find is that is an opinion that is held by many, purely because of what his actions have wrought over these last many years.” According to NYT, the mayor said it was unclear to him whether he has the legal authority to order the Police Department, which he oversees, to detain a foreign leader like Netanyahu. He said he was in “an active conversation” with the city’s Law Department about the matter. “Whatever the law allows me to do in New York City, that’s what we will do, but we won’t be writing our own laws to that end,” Mamdani added.
