Mamdani tapped Kassem, who teaches at CUNY’s law school, to serve as his chief counsel in January.

By Collin Anderson, The Washington Free Beacon

Presumptive Democratic congresswoman and Zohran Mamdani-backed socialist Darializa Avila Chevalier, 32, is dating Mamdani’s chief legal counsel, 48-year-old Ramzi Kassem, who is best known for defending al Qaeda terrorists, including a “close associate” of Osama bin Laden.

Chevalier confirmed the relationship in a statement shared with City & State.

“Ramzi Kassem and I met outside an ICE detention facility, both working to free someone unjustly held,” she said.

“Over the years, as we collaborated on different projects, our professional acquaintance became a friendship, which grew into a romantic relationship. I’m deeply grateful for such a loving, supportive partner – he’s been a refuge these past few years.”

City & State reported that the couple became official in 2023, when Kassem helped Chevalier, a City University of New York graduate student, with her research paper “analyzing the racism and Islamophobia of a Customs & Border Protection anti-terror unit.”

Mamdani tapped Kassem, who teaches at CUNY’s law school, to serve as his chief counsel in January.

Before that, Kassem represented a slew of al Qaeda terrorists, including Ahmed al-Darbi, who was convicted in 2017 for the bombing of a French oil tanker, and several other Guantanamo Bay detainees, most notably Shaker Aamer, a “close associate of Osama bin Laden” who fought in the 2001 Battle of Tora Bora, where U.S. forces stormed an al Qaeda complex in Afghanistan where bin Laden was hiding.

Both Kassem and Chevalier were deeply involved in anti-Israel campus activism while students at Columbia University.

Kassem, who attended Columbia College before moving on to Columbia Law School on a fellowship funded by Paul Soros, lobbied to rename a sandwich called the “Israeli wrap” in the student dining hall, claiming the terminology was offensive to Muslims.

Chevalier cofounded Columbia University Apartheid Divest (CUAD), the notoriously militant campus group that openly supports “armed resistance” by Hamas and posted a statement declaring “Death to America” after the United States launched the war against Iran.

Kassem defended the Syrian-born Columbia graduate student and CUAD organizer Mahmoud Khalil after the Trump administration revoked his green card.

The relationship is an indicator that the insurgent Democratic Socialists of America are embracing the tactics of establishment figures in the Democratic Party, using romantic relationships to climb the political ladder.

Chevalier started dating Kassem well before launching her congressional campaign, placing her closer to Mamdani and better positioning her to receive his endorsement.

Indeed, a Mamdani spokeswoman told City & State that the New York City mayor “has been aware of their relationship for some time” and discussed Chevalier’s campaign with Kassem before endorsing her.

It’s aligned with the political moves of Kamala Harris, who dated California Democratic kingmaker Willie Brown before launching her first political campaign for San Francisco district attorney.

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Kassem has faced longstanding criticism from Jewish and pro-Israel organizations over his legal advocacy and activism.

By World Israel News Staff

Zohran Mamdani is set to be sworn in as mayor of New York City just after the ball drops in Times Square on January 1, ushering in an administration already facing sharp scrutiny over a series of controversial personnel decisions.

Hours before his inauguration, Mamdani confirmed the appointment of Ramzi Kassem as chief counsel to the mayor, placing him in the administration’s top legal advisory position at the outset of his term.

Kassem, a law professor at the City University of New York and a member of Mamdani’s transition team for legal affairs, has faced longstanding criticism from Jewish and pro-Israel organizations over his legal advocacy and activism.

He gained national prominence for representing detainees held at the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, including Ahmed al-Darbi, an al Qaeda terrorist convicted in 2017 for involvement in the bombing of a French oil tanker.

U.S. authorities have identified other former clients as senior or close associates of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden.

More recently, Kassem has defended radical anti-Israel activists on U.S. campuses, including Mahmoud Khalil, a leader of Columbia University Apartheid Divest, a group that publicly backed Hamas’s “armed resistance” and helped organize illegal encampments calling for boycotts of Israel—protests that sparked widespread concern over antisemitism on campus.

While supporters describe his work as civil-rights lawyering, critics point to his past representation of al Qaeda terrorists and pro-Hamas activists as deeply troubling for a senior municipal post.

BREAKING: Zohran Mamdani named Ramzi Kassem as NYC Chief Counsel.

Kassem says he returned after 9/11 to defend Al Qaeda detainees. He recently defended Mahmoud Khalil, a Syrian terrorist sympathizer flagged for deportation on national security grounds.

pic.twitter.com/aVrPNwEELx

— Eyal Yakoby (@EYakoby) December 31, 2025

The appointment has added to broader concerns surrounding Mamdani’s transition team, which has already come under fire following a report by the Anti-Defamation League finding that a significant share of appointees have histories of antisemitic rhetoric, anti-Israel extremism, or ties to groups hostile to the Jewish community.

Controversy has also surrounded Mamdani’s inaugural committee. According to a New York Post report, committee appointee Alvaro Lopez, a senior Democratic Socialists of America organizer, praised the public tearing down of Israeli hostage posters in Manhattan in November 2023, writing, “All I see are heroes.”

Lopez has also accused pro-Israel Democratic Congressman Ritchie Torres of having “Palestinian children’s blood on your hands.”

Additional criticism followed Mamdani’s inclusion of Rachel Griffin Accurso, the children’s video educator known as Ms. Rachel, whom watchdog group StopAntisemitism says repeatedly amplified unverified or debunked claims sourced from Hamas or UN-linked organizations.

Actress Cynthia Nixon, a public supporter of the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement who has signed petitions calling for boycotts of Israeli cultural institutions, has also been added to Mamdani’s inaugural circle.

Taken together, the appointment of Kassem and the composition of both the transition and inaugural teams have raised growing alarm among New York’s Jewish community, with leaders warning that the incoming administration is signaling a pattern of tolerance for figures and rhetoric widely viewed as hostile to Jewish concerns and Israel.

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Kassem has a lengthy history of anti-Israel activism dating back to his student days at Columbia University.

By World Israel News Staff

New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani is considering a controversial civil rights lawyer with a long record of defending terrorists and attacking Israel for one of the most powerful legal positions in New York City government, according to a source familiar with the transition process.

Ramzi Kassem, a law professor at the City University of New York and a member of Mamdani’s transition team for legal affairs, has emerged as the leading candidate for chief counsel to the mayor, the top legal advisory role in the administration.

The potential appointment was first reported by the New York Post, citing a source close to the transition team.

Kassem has built a national profile representing Guantanamo Bay detainees, including Ahmed al-Darbi, an al Qaeda terrorist convicted in 2017 for involvement in the bombing of a French oil tanker.

He has also represented other detainees described by U.S. authorities as senior or close associates of Osama bin Laden. His legal career has been championed by progressive activist circles, while drawing sharp criticism from Jewish and pro-Israel groups.

Beyond his legal work, Kassem has a lengthy history of anti-Israel activism dating back to his student days at Columbia University.

According to reporting by the Washington Free Beacon, Kassem wrote multiple opinion pieces accusing Israel of “genocide,” “ethnic cleansing,” and illegitimacy, and argued that Zionism itself obstructs peace.

In a 1998 article in the Columbia Spectator, he claimed there was “sufficient evidence” of a “systematic genocide” against Palestinians, and in later writings rejected the viability of a two-state solution while endorsing a so-called Palestinian “right of return” that would effectively erase Israel as a Jewish state.

Kassem has also defended radical anti-Israel activists on U.S. campuses.

Most recently, he represented Mahmoud Khalil, a leader of Columbia University Apartheid Divest, a group that publicly backed Hamas’s “armed resistance” against Israel and led illegal encampments demanding academic and economic boycotts of the Jewish state.

Khalil served as a lead negotiator during last year’s encampment protests, which sparked widespread concern over antisemitism on campus.

In 2022, Kassem was appointed as a senior immigration policy adviser to the Biden administration’s Domestic Policy Council, a move that drew scrutiny amid concerns about rising antisemitism and the administration’s posture toward Israel.

The Free Beacon noted at the time that Kassem’s academic home, CUNY School of Law, had repeatedly faced allegations of fostering a hostile environment for Jewish students and promoting anti-Israel boycotts.

Mamdani’s own record on Israel has intensified concern over Kassem’s potential elevation.

The mayor-elect has repeatedly accused Israel of apartheid and genocide, endorsed the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement, and participated in rallies targeting Israeli policy.

At a July 2023 protest in Manhattan, Mamdani urged supporters to oppose what he called “state subsidy of settler crimes,” while following the October 7 Hamas massacre he criticized Israel’s response and called for “ending the occupation and dismantling apartheid.”

Mamdani is scheduled to be sworn in as New York City’s 111th mayor on January 1, 2026. If confirmed as Chief Counsel, Kassem would play a central role in shaping the city’s legal strategy, advising the mayor on litigation, legislation, and policy priorities.

The prospect of placing a lawyer with a record of defending al Qaeda terrorists and advancing extreme anti-Israel positions in such a senior role has already sparked alarm among Jewish leaders, who warn it would further legitimize hostility toward Israel and deepen concerns about antisemitism within New York City government.

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Like his new client, Kassem was also involved in anti-Israel activism as a student at Columbia, where he lobbied to rename a sandwich called the ‘Israeli wrap’ in the student dining hall, claiming the terminology was offensive to Muslims.

By Alana Goodman, The Washington Free Beacon

When Hamas-supporting Columbia graduate student Mahmoud Khalil appeared in court on Wednesday, he was represented by, among others, Ramzi Kassem, a lawyer perhaps best known for defending al Qaeda terrorists.

The Syrian-born Khalil had his green card revoked by Immigration and Customs Enforcement over the weekend as part of the Trump administration’s crackdown on foreign nationals involved in pro-terrorist demonstrations at universities.

Kassem has represented terrorists including Ahmed al-Darbi, an al Qaeda member convicted in 2017 for the bombing of a French oil tanker, as well as several other Guantanamo Bay detainees, including a “close associate” of Osama bin Laden.

He went on to serve as an immigration policy adviser to former president Joe Biden as a member of the White House’s Domestic Policy Council.

Like his new client, Kassem was also involved in anti-Israel activism as a student at Columbia, where he lobbied to rename a sandwich called the “Israeli wrap” in the student dining hall, claiming the terminology was offensive to Muslims.

He attended Columbia Law School on a fellowship funded by Paul Soros, the elder brother of Democratic megadonor George Soros.

His client, Khalil, who graduated from a Columbia graduate program in December, was a leader of Columbia University Apartheid Divest, which backed Hamas’s “armed resistance” against Israel.

He served as a lead negotiator for student activists’ illegal anti-Israel encampment last spring and vowed that the group would “remain in this encampment until we achieve all of our demands,” which included a boycott of Israel.

Columbia briefly suspended Khalil for his role in the encampment, but he continued to back the demonstrations on campus, which turned violent in the spring, when students stormed and occupied campus building.

“What we will see [is] the students will continue their activism, will continue doing what they’ve done in conventional and unconventional ways,” Khalil told The Hill in August. “So not only protests, not only encampments, kind of any—any available means necessary to push Columbia to divest from Israel.”

“And we’ve been working all this summer on our plans, on what’s next to pressure Columbia to listen to the students and to decide to be on the right side of history,” Khalil went on.

Since then, pro-Hamas activists at Columbia have disrupted classes to distribute anti-Semitic flyers, violently seized campus buildings, and physically assaulted university employees.

The chaos led the Trump administration last week to cut off $400 million in federal grants to the university, citing the school’s “continued inaction in the face of persistent harassment of Jewish students.”

President Donald Trump said Khalil’s green card revocation was the first “of many to come.”

Khalil is expected to remain in the country after a federal judge, Jesse Furman, intervened on Wednesday to block his immediate deportation.

Furman, of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, is a prolific Democratic donor who once threw out a terrorism lawsuit against the Palestine Liberation Organization.

Furman, who has served as a judge for the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York since he was nominated in 2011 by President Barack Obama, has a long history of involvement with liberal political causes.

The brother of Obama’s former economic advisor Jason Furman, Jesse Furman has donated over $20,000 to Democrats, including Obama, Hillary Clinton, and the Democratic National Committee.

Furman also served as the treasurer of his family’s charity, the Furman Foundation, which has donated to Media Matters, the Alliance for Justice, and People for the American Way, according to his Senate confirmation questionnaire.

The Khalil ruling isn’t the first time Furman has staked out a controversial position on a case involving Israel. In 2018, Furman dismissed a terrorism lawsuit against the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and Palestinian leadership in Judea and Samaria, citing a lack of jurisdiction.

The lawsuit was filed by the family of Ari Fuld, an American-Israeli citizen who was stabbed to death by a Palestinian terrorist outside an Israeli shopping center in 2018.

The plaintiffs argued that the PLO and Palestinian Authority were liable in Fuld’s murder under the Anti-Terrorism Act, because the Palestinian government paid the terrorist’s family following the attack. Critics say this payment system, known as the “pay-to-slay” program, incentivizes terrorism.

Furman tossed the suit, arguing that the court didn’t have jurisdiction over the PLO and the Palestinian Authority. But Fuld’s family and other victims of Palestinian terrorism have appealed the issue, and the Supreme Court agreed to take up the question of jurisdiction in December.

In Khalil’s case, the government is challenging the Southern District’s jurisdiction over the case, arguing that Khalil’s lawyers should have filed it in either New Jersey or Louisiana, where Khalil was detained at the time.

Ted Frank, the director of the Hamilton Lincoln Law Institute, told the Washington Free Beacon that there is a strong argument for challenging the jurisdiction and that he would be “surprised if the motion isn’t granted.”

Khalil’s lawyers countered that there is legal standing to file his case in the place where he was arrested, if there is evidence that the government transferred him to prevent him from speaking with legal counsel.

“There is a two-track process here: habeas corpus (in federal court) and deportation (before an immigration judge),” Andrew McCarthy, a former prosecutor in the Southern District and columnist for National Review, told the Free Beacon. “The issue in the habeas case is whether Khalil’s arrest and detention violate the Constitution.”

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