The New York City Council passed two measures designed to protect worshippers and students from protests that impede them from gathering or studying.

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We reported on protesters chanting outside a Jewish school and synagogue in Queens, NYC: “Say it loud, say it clear: We support Hamas here.” The synagogue, a day care, and two elementary schools closed early because the mob of about 200 was celebrating terrorists so close to their Jewish students. On October 7, 2023, Hamas slaughtered more than 1,200 innocent men, women, children, and babies, and took 251 Jewish people hostage, including children, women, and elderly people.

In response to a 182% increase in antisemitism in the city in January — the month NYC’s first Muslim mayor, Zohran Mamdani, took office — the NYC Council passed two measures to protect worshipers (Measure 1-B) and students (Measure 175-B).

NYC Council Speaker Julie Menin sponsored the bill protecting worshipers. The daughter of Holocaust survivors, she is the first Jewish speaker of the NYC Council. Through her X account, she also wished NYC a “Happy Easter,” saying, “Today we celebrate the miracle of Christ’s resurrection.”

Israel Leung, a leader at Messiah’s Lighthouse, a Messianic Jewish congregation in Manhattan, told IFA, “I do like the measure, and I’m happy these measures are being worked on. They could provide a safer place for all.” I asked Mr. Leung his position at the synagogue, and he wrote, “Servant of our Lord Jesus Christ.”

Speaker Menin’s measure was passed 44 to 7, a super majority that cannot be vetoed by Mayor Mamdani.

Cristina Fontanelli, who is running for New York State Assembly in the 75th District (Manhattan), wrote to IFA: “I am appalled that this very important legislation even needs to be passed and very relieved and grateful that our City Council has passed it by a veto-proof majority.”

Will Mayor Mamdani protect students?

The measure protecting students also passed, but by a vote of 30 to 19, meaning that Mayor Mamdani could veto it.

We’ve reached out to Mayor Mamdani’s press office to ask when he plans to sign the measures or if he plans to veto. At the time of publication, his office had not replied.

Mayor Mamdani has publicly advocated for the city to divest from Israel Bonds, and one of his campaign promises was that he would arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he attended meetings at the United Nations. His wife, Rama Duwaji, liked posts on social media celebrating the October 7 rampage.

Ms. Fontanneli wrote:

I was horrified by the paid protests that began at our universities that opened a Pandora’s Box of hatred that we have never seen in our once great NYC. I am deeply saddened for the Jewish people that are not feeling safe, not only to worship in their synagogues, but to even walk on the street. As far as protecting our children and youth in schools – why would there even be a question in anyone’s mind that this is necessary? How sad that we are waiting and wondering if our Mayor will sign this. What can be more important than protecting our citizens right here at home, right here in our beloved New York City. Our elected officials should focus on keeping our citizens safe here at home. That’s what they were hired for.

Pray Mayor Mamdani does the right thing.

What is the right thing?

The way the measures are designed to protect worshipers and students is to enforce an area free of protestors. It is akin to the federal Freedom to Access Clinic Entrances or FACE Act, which prevents pro-life advocates from getting too close to abortion clinics.

Opponents of the NYC measures point out that freedom of religion cannot cancel out freedom of speech.

I mentioned to our neighbor, Michael V. Austin, that I was working on this article, and he told me a story he wrote up for IFA: He wanted to protest President Bill Clinton’s “unconscionable renting out of The Lincoln Bedroom in exchange for political contributions.” On March 1, 1997, he heard on the radio that the Clintons would be attending the Broadway production of RENT, but a protest zone was set up several blocks away from the Nederlander Theatre, where they’d be. Mr. Austin wrote, “The problem was that the cordon was so far that the President would never be able to even tell that citizens were peaceably gathered to protest.” Instead, Mr. Austin got as close to the theatre as he was allowed:

I stood up as tall as I could and raised my placard high in the sky and there my liberty rang out uninhibited. Media started filming and snapping up my one-man protest seeing my hand-scrawled message which I wrote with the jagged letters of the RENT Playbill, “LINCOLN BEDROOM FOR RENT.” It created a stir, smiles, buzz of the crowd, and the clamoring of the media hounds. Just then a large, well dressed Secret Service agent rapidly approached me wearing his best intimidating look, not knowing that you cannot intimidate a free patriot on a mission. He barked, “What are you doing?” My response had to be directly from God as I had never met aggression with such utter calm and control. I mildly replied, “I am John Q Public, and I am exercising my sacrosanct First Amendment Rights.”  He smugly replied like an automaton, “This is a ‘no protest zone.’ There is a place for you back at Port Authority.” I calmly and assuredly asked, “On whose authority are you claiming to be able to deny my right to peaceable protest?” Just then, very well prepared for the moment, I pulled my pocket-sized U.S. Constitution out and firmly stated, “This is The Constitution of The United States, and it guarantees my right to peaceably redress my government for grievances.” That was the abrupt end of the conversation.

Pray for balance

Jewish News Syndicate quoted Stu Smith, an investigative analyst at the Manhattan Institute, calling the passage of the measures…

…a massive win on so many levels for religious Americans, for constitutional order, and for simple human decency. George Washington said the American government should give “to bigotry no sanction, to persecution no assistance.” Thomas Jefferson wrote that no one should be “restrained, molested or burthened” on account of religion. Protecting people from harassment as they worship is squarely in that American tradition.

After writing a draft of this article, I went to bed and woke in the night to this verse: Then the woman took the two men and hid them. So she said, “Yes, the men came to me, but I did not know where they were from” (Joshua 2:4).

This passage was also in the Pray for America One Year Bible the day before. We know from that chapter that Rahab broke two of the Ten Commandments: As a prostitute, she most likely committed adultery, and she bore false witness. A figurative definition of זָנָה, translated “prostitute,” is “unfaithful to God.” Yet King David and the Messiah are both birthed through her lineage, and the writer of Hebrews and James both commend her for hiding the spies, who helped usher God’s Chosen People into their Promised Land.

Lord, where freedoms collide, may we side with Your People, and may Your vision for the balance between freedom and protection come to pass.

Here’s a prayer from Ms. Fontanelli:

Dear Jesus, please place love of neighbor in the hearts of all New Yorkers. Let us live up to the beautiful ideals of “E pluribus unum” on which our divinely-inspired country was based. We love You, Lord, and pray that all of our elected leaders will walk in Your Truth, govern with Your wisdom and choose to protect all of Your beloved children that have been placed in their care. Thank You for helping us to continue this beautiful American experiment providentially-designed and perfected by Your Almighty Hand. We are grateful to enjoy the Freedom this Land provides. May all of its people, at all times, feel safe. Amen.

Add your prayers in the comments below.

Rich Swingle has presented in 42 nations on six continents, mostly with his own one-man plays. The first video he created for IFA was outside the Nederlander Theatre. Rich and his bride Joyce Swingle have 41 screen children. The Swingles live in New York City. www.RichDrama.com. Photo Credit: Metropolitan Transportation Authority – https://www.flickr.com/photos/mtaphotos/55025927311, CC BY 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=186868118.