How politically detached does someone have to be to accuse New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani of being genocidal? Mamdani is a Muslim Democratic socialist who built his political career around advocacy for Palestinian rights and won the mayoralty of the country’s largest city while openly embracing Democratic socialism.

That achievement should make Mamdani one of the greatest political success stories the American socialist left has produced. Instead, its most extreme faction has responded by branding him both genocidal and Zionist, turning a breakthrough victory into yet another excuse for ideological combat.

The spectacle resembles the treatment of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York by the national Democratic Socialists of America. The national organization effectively excommunicated Ocasio-Cortez even as its New York City chapter continued supporting her.

DSA factions participated in protests against Mamdani, but the attack was not confined to that organization. It reflected a broader assault from a self defeating fringe that appears more interested in policing allies than expanding political power or delivering results.

The backlash has become so absurd that prominent supporters of Palestinian rights are publicly recoiling from it. Activist Ihab Hassan has been particularly fierce in criticizing the voices claiming to represent the movement while pursuing this destructive strategy.

Hassan wrote on X, “The Palestinian cause was hijacked by these idiots long ago, and most people in the pro-Palestine movement who disagree with them are too cowardly to call them out or challenge their disgusting narrative.” He has also noted that much of this far left constituency is very white.

The obvious question is what these activists believe they are accomplishing. Their attacks are not helping Palestinians, and their decision to focus anger on a Democratic socialist mayor does nothing to build the political strength needed to change policy.

Politics requires winning power and then using it. That means constructing coalitions, prevailing in elections, enacting policies, and improving people’s lives rather than endlessly proving personal righteousness to a shrinking circle of ideological companions.

Mamdani did exactly what successful political movements ask candidates to do. He assembled a coalition broad enough to win America’s largest city without abandoning his progressive principles, giving Democratic socialism an opportunity to demonstrate that it can produce tangible improvements.

That should be an extraordinary opening for the movement that helped elect him. Yet instead of celebrating the victory and supporting the difficult work ahead, extremists are trying to undermine one of the most successful politicians their movement has produced.

Governing requires compromise, engagement with opponents, and recognition that Mamdani represents 8.5 million people. He is the mayor of an enormous and diverse city, not the president of a collegiate activist club where every disagreement can be treated as disqualifying betrayal.

For zealots invested in absolute purity, compromise is not a necessary feature of democratic government. It is treason, which means they do not merely attack their own allies but reserve some of their fiercest contempt for the allies who actually succeed.

Republicans have allowed far right white nationalists to fester and damage their broader movement, a problem conservative radio personality Erick Erickson has recently confronted. Progressives should likewise reject anyone who treats Mamdani and Ocasio-Cortez as genocidal Zionists merely for engaging in practical politics.

That rejection is not exclusion for its own sake. These activists exclude themselves by viciously attacking former allies, concentrating their fire on Democrats, and even agitating against the Democratic ticket in 2024 while accepting that Donald Trump could return to the White House.

During that election, Vice President Kamala Harris was treated as though she were the most powerful figure controlling the war involving Israel and Hamas. Defeating the candidate they called “Killer Kamala” became so important that Trump’s victory was deemed an acceptable outcome.

Trump and Vice President JD Vance are now turning the Middle East upside down, while Palestinians are hardly better off with Trump in the White House. Yet the anger remains fixed on Mamdani, who attended a vigil mourning both Israeli and Palestinian victims.

This is self sabotage on a Trumpian scale, without Trump’s inexplicable ability to rally supporters around himself. Ocasio-Cortez has done well distancing herself from these extremists, and Mamdani now has every reason to understand that ideological zealots will never allow him to satisfy them.