Israeli envoy: ‘Pro-terror’ protests should worry all New Yorkers

As he settled into his office at the Israeli consulate in Midtown East three months ago, Ofir Akunis had his staff mount a large photo of the 9/11 attack and place it alongside a framed Israeli flag that was found in the ruins of the World Trade Center.

Both the flag and the photo of the Twin Towers being destroyed are meant as a reminder, he said, that the same forces that invaded Israel on Oct. 7 have attacked New York City before — and could strike again. 

“They don’t understand. It’s a short memory,” Akunis said of New Yorkers during an interview earlier this month at his office. “It’s very natural, but you can’t forget the history.”

He added, “I’m worried for America. I’m asking my American friends, ‘Wake up.’ Say to these people, ‘Enough.’”

Akunis, 51, a veteran lawmaker and former minister in Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud Party, became Israel’s consul general in New York in May — one of the most influential Israeli diplomatic posts worldwide. He landed in a city convulsed by disruptive street protests against Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, punctuated with acts of vandalism, a rise in antisemitic incidents since Oct. 7 and a fraught climate on the city’s campuses. 

Since arriving, Akunis has advocated against the protesters — a movement he calls “pro-terror” and sees as a danger to Americans. He believes some of the protesters are part of a radical Islamist movement and called for the city city to crack down on the demonstrations. 

“They don’t want to live in peace with us — they want to live instead of us,” he said of radical Islamists. “They are saying it to people in London, in Manchester. They’re saying it to the Belgians in Brussels. They’re saying it here, to you. They’re saying, ‘Death to America.’”

The Israeli consul in New York represents Israel in New York state, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Delaware. Akunis’ predecessor, Asaf Zamir, was appointed by the previous Israeli government and resigned last year to protest the Netanyahu coalition’s effort to overhaul the judiciary.

Akunis, as a Likud lawmaker, faced protests over the judicial overhaul when he visited the United States last year, when he was a minister in Netanyahu’s government. Protesters followed him on the street, and he canceled a speech in Los Angeles, anticipating interruptions.

Now, by contrast, he has been squarely focused on the local fallout from Hamas’ Oct. 7 attack and the ensuing war in Gaza. His first meeting after becoming consul general was with students from Columbia and New York Universities to tell them that “we are here for them, anything that they need,” he said. In a public statement earlier this month, he attacked Columbia anti-Israel protesters for saying they sought the “eradication of Western civilization.”

Referring to that statement, he tweeted in English and Hebrew, “My American friends: The truth always comes out. The boycott movement at Columbia University finally revealed what they really want.”

He highlighted a protest that took place at the New York Public Library in November 2023, and compared a photo of the rally to an image of Nazis blocking the entrance to a library in Germany in 1933. “It is unacceptable that Jewish students and Israeli students will actually be afraid to walk nearby and actually to live under threat,” he said.

In recent months, anti-Israel protesters in the city have regularly embraced the symbols of Hamas and Hezbollah, both U.S.-designated terror groups, including by wearing clothing associated with the groups and waving their flags.  “They are not pro-Palestinians. They are pro-terror organizations because they are waving the flags of Hezbollah, Hamas,” he said.

In particular, Akunis is calling for local officials to more stringently enforce laws barring disruptive protests and to pass anti-masking legislation that would allow law enforcement to better identify protesters, whom he accused of exploiting democratic freedoms to undermine democracy. He praised an anti-masking bill introduced by Israeli-American legislator Mazi Pilip in Long Island’s Nassau County that passed earlier this month.

His previous warnings that New York faced a “radical Muslim occupation,” made earlier this summer, drew condemnation from the local branch of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, known as CAIR.

“This false ‘wake up’ call is in reality a call to hatred and violence targeting New York Muslims and Arabs, and those perceived to be Muslim and Arab-American,” the group’s executive director, Afaf Nasher, said in a statement. “These false and hate-filled remarks should be repudiated by all political and religious leaders.”

Akunis drew a distinction between radical Islamists and moderate Muslims, praising Israel’s longtime peace agreements with Egypt and Jordan. Akunis served as the Israeli government’s regional cooperation minister at a time when Israel signed normalization agreements with Muslim states including the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco. 

He keeps a framed photo of former Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin, the Likud founder who signed the deal with Egypt, on a shelf in his office.

“They’re all Muslims,” he said of the countries with which Israel has signed agreements. “We don’t have any problems. I want to live in peace with them, with all of them.”

Akunis has also reached out to victims of antisemitism in the city, speaking with an Israeli man who was stabbed in Brooklyn earlier this month. He has also fulfilled the job’s traditional roles: speaking with local media, communicating through social media, and advocating for Israel in meetings with members of Congress, Jewish communities, and other groups, such as evangelical Christians. In one message to New Yorkers, the consulate this month rented a billboard in Times Square calling Iran and Hezbollah “partners in terror.”

He has met with an array of Jewish and political leaders, including New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy, and New York Reps. Ritchie Torres and Grace Meng. He offered special praise to New York Mayor Eric Adams, who he called “a brave leader” who is “standing for Israel.”

His office has faced protests from local Israeli critics of Netanyahu’s government, who charge that it is not working hard enough to secure the release of hostages held by Hamas. Many of them were also active in the groups that protested Akunis and other Israeli officials over the judicial overhaul when they visited New York last year. 

He defended the overhaul as the policy of a democratically elected government, and spoke out against foreign criticism of the government’s decisions.

“Every Israeli government reflects the will of the people. I served in the opposition. Nothing happened to me. I never said that Israel is in danger, I never said that democracy is in danger,” he said. “Israeli democracy, like American democracy, reflects the will of the people.”

But overall, since arriving in New York, Akunis, a Tel Aviv native, said he has felt “very much” welcomed by the city’s Jewish community. 

He visits local synagogues most Saturdays, including two visits to Temple Emanu-El, the Reform congregation on the Upper East Side, and he has an affinity for the Greek Jewish community due to his familial roots in Greece, attending the Greek Jewish festival in May in Manhattan. 

He declined to name his favorite Israeli restaurant in New York “to not insult the others” but said he visited many kosher restaurants in the city and expressed his love for American diners.

“I prefer the original American diners, the small ones and the old ones,” he said. “You can feel like [you’re] in a time tunnel, like in real America.”

Behind his desk are U.S. and American flags, next to a framed photo of Israeli hostage Ariel Bibas, a copy of the Torah and a miniature model of Beresheet, the Israeli spacecraft that crashed into the moon in 2019 while Akunis served as Israeli minister of science, innovation and technology.

He added that he feels New York’s Jewish diverse communities have come together since Oct. 7, creating a point of “light in all these truly dark days.” He also says gaps between American Jews and Israelis in the city have dissipated due to the war and antisemitism in the United States.

Protests on the city’s college campuses, which many Jewish students said created a hostile atmosphere, were a catalyst for bringing New York’s Jews together, he said. Earlier this month, Akunis met with Jewish campus groups to prepare for the upcoming school year, telling them the consulate was available to them at any time to protect their right to study safely. 

Akunis expressed appreciation and affection for New York and the United States, calling the establishment of America and Israel “two miracles.” His appreciation for the United States motivated his concern over the threat of radical Islam, he said. He called the situation an “emergency.”

“I’m warning you, from the bottom of my heart, as a big admirer of the United States, you must stop it as a society, not only the Jewish communities,” he said.