A far-left New York City councilwoman who has faced backlash over her refusal to publicly condemn Hamas and her handling of antisemitism is now poised to face off against a progressive challenger who is already gearing up for a heated primary in next year’s election.

Shahana Hanif, who represents Park Slope and other neighborhoods in central Brooklyn, is expected to soon draw her first primary rival of the upcoming election cycle, Maya Kornberg, a Jewish Democrat who has filed to run in the deep-blue council district.

Kornberg, who leads research on elections and government at the Brennan Center for Justice, a nonpartisan think tank affiliated with New York University’s School of Law, is actively fundraising for the challenge and plans to launch her campaign next month, according to two people familiar with her preparations.

In an email to Jewish Insider last week, Kornberg said she is “exploring a possible City Council run at this time,” but declined to elaborate on her plans.

The looming matchup portends what would likely be a bitter race in a district home to a sizable and diverse population of Jewish voters, many of whom have increasingly registered dissatisfaction with Hanif’s views on Israel and alleged insensitivity to reports of rising antisemitic activity in the wake of Hamas’ Oct. 7 attacks.

In a statement to JI on Tuesday, Hanif said that she was “not yet familiar with” Kornberg’s “track record in our neighborhoods,” adding that she is “proud of” her “extensive work in delivering for” the district.

“I have helped lead the fight against Eric Adams’ disastrous mayoralty as co-chair of the Progressive Caucus. I have passed transformative legislation that has strengthened abortion rights, environmental justice and the labor movement. I have been a consistent champion for our schools, parks and streets,” Hanif said. “I have my constituents’ backs and look forward to making my case on the campaign trail.”

Hanif, a first-generation Bangladeshi American who in 2021 made history as the first Muslim woman elected to serve in the City Council, ran unopposed in last summer’s primary, but still faced attacks from a well-funded super PAC called SAFE NYC, which launched an ad campaign criticizing, among other things, her vote to oppose a resolution establishing an annual “End Jew Hatred Day” in New York.

A political consultant familiar with the ad campaign confirmed to JI that “groups aligned” with the super PAC will “definitely” engage in Hanif’s primary next year, but clarified that plans are still materializing at this early stage. 

One pro-Israel group that has previously worked with SAFE NYC, the New York Solidarity Network, is currently evaluating local races but has not made any decisions about the upcoming cycle, according to a source familiar with internal discussions. The group, which recently launched a super PAC that made endorsements in several state primaries this summer, prominently features Hanif near the top of a so-called “Wall of Shame” on its website, urging supporters to hold her “accountable” for statements that critics have accused of justifying Hamas’ terror attacks.

While Hanif had drawn scrutiny from her Jewish constituents before the Oct. 7 attacks — including for endorsing a call to “globalize the intifada” on social media — her rhetoric on the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza has faced widespread backlash from Jewish voters in her district, critics say. 

Particularly unnerving to Jewish constituents was Hanif’s refusal to explicitly condemn Hamas in the aftermath of the attacks — when six days after the massacre she issued a statement on social media attributing “the root cause” of the violence to what she called Israel’s “illegal, immoral and unjust occupation of the Palestinian people.” 

Hanif, who has also accused Israel of genocide, was arrested at a Manhattan cease-fire rally last October organized by the Democratic Socialists of America and other groups, where demonstrators were heard chanting “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free.”

Meanwhile, Jewish community members in Hanif’s district have raised concerns that she has neglected to speak out against certain incidents of antisemitic vandalism and graffiti, despite her role as a co-chair of a recently created “Taskforce to Combat Hate” on the City Council.

Those issues were the focus of a tense discussion this past spring, when Hanif met privately with 16 Jewish leaders in the district who voiced concerns with her commentary on Israel and suggested that some of her statements were stoking antisemitism, according to audio of the gathering shared with JI.

Pressed at the meeting to clarify her positions, Hanif confirmed that she does “not support Hamas” and said that she “absolutely” believes that Jews have a right to self-determination. But she refused to commit to requests from participants who asked if she would be willing to publicly condemn Hamas and issue a statement recognizing “Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish and democratic state.”

“I’m not going to discuss geopolitics,” Hanif said in the hour-long meeting, where she grew increasingly defensive. “If we want to talk about the geopolitics, that’s going to have to be another conversation, because then I’m going to have to bring in my allies,” she added. “I’m not going to just have a conversation with me as the only Muslim person in this room full of just only Jewish leaders. That’s not a fair conversation.”

Later in the discussion, Hanif reiterated that she would “prefer not to have to rehash statements from Oct. 7,” shooting down a participant who took issue with her comments in the days after Hamas’ attacks. “I’m just not going to do this,” she said. “We’re at a death toll of nearly 35,000 Palestinians right now. Have you all condemned that?”

Hanif also bristled when a participant said that “it would really mean a lot” if she released a statement calling out antisemitic graffiti within the district.

“I’ve called out the vandalism that flattened Gaza,” Hanif said. “So what’s the vandalism that you’d like me to call out, because if it’s ‘Free Palestine,’ that’s making a statement about a self-determination.”

Still, she encouraged the Jewish leaders to share incidents with her office and vowed that she will “absolutely speak out against any vandalism in a synagogue” or on “a menorah,” among other places.

But Hanif rejected claims from participants who said they interpret a slogan she amplified on social media, “globalize the intifada,” as an antisemitic call to violence against Jews. “I don’t appreciate that, in this one hour, we’re going to define and tease out what is antisemitism to you and what is not to me,” she said.

The private meeting was later the subject of a scathing opinion article in the New York Daily News, in which three Jewish community leaders who had participated in the discussion said their encounter with Hanif left them feeling “abandoned, betrayed and endangered.”

In response to the article, Hanif issued a statement on social media in which she “vehemently” opposed antisemitism and “categorically” denounced “the atrocities committed by Hamas on Oct. 7.”

And on Monday, Hanif condemned the stabbing this weekend of a Jewish man in Crown Heights whose suspected attacker yelled “Free Palestine,” according to police. “This antisemitic violence does not reflect the ‘Free Palestine’ movement,” Hanif wrote in a statement posted to social media. “With hate crimes on the rise, it’s our duty to condemn such acts and ensure the safety of all.”

But such comments have not been sufficient for Jewish activists in the district who no longer see her as an ally and are eager to back a primary challenger in the next election cycle. Andrés Spokoiny, who leads the Jewish Funders Network and attended the meeting, claimed that Hanif has “failed her Jewish constituents.”

“She has ignored our concerns and made us unsafe with her statements and activism,” Spokoiny, who lives in the district, told JI. “In a context of record antisemitic incidents, her calls to ‘globalize the intifada,’ her blaming of the victims for Oct. 7 and her refusal to condemn Hamas unequivocally pose a real and present danger to Jews in the district.”

Joni Kletter, a Jewish community activist who was also present for the meeting and is the founder of Park Slope’s Jewish Affinity Group, launched after the Oct. 7 attacks to counter antisemitism, said that “Brooklyn’s Jewish community has seen antisemitic hate crimes increase dramatically over the last two years.”

“People are legitimately scared and upset,” she told JI this week. “Shahana Hanif’s indifference and lack of engagement with her constituents is a blatant dereliction of duty.”

In her statement to JI on Tuesday, Hanif reiterated her recent condemnation of Hamas and said she continues to “call for a release of all hostages” held in Gaza. “I stand firmly against antisemitism in all its forms and am committed to continuing to collaborate with leaders throughout my district to address and combat antisemitic violence,” she said. “My experience as an interfaith organizer has equipped me with the skills to lead and foster interfaith coalitions.”

“I believe my record demonstrates a genuine commitment to the needs and values of my constituents, and I would be honored to earn the ability to continue serving them,” Hanif added. 

If Kornberg enters the race as expected next month, it remains to be seen if she will raise any criticism of Hanif’s record on Israel and antisemitism. A Jewish activist who met privately with Kornberg to discuss her campaign, which she was weighing before Oct. 7, described her as a “pragmatic progressive” and said she “is not going to shy away from speaking out.”

But Israel in particular is “not going to be a big focus for her,” the Jewish activist told JI, noting that she will instead focus largely on local issues. “She’s going to vote all the right ways that this district is going to want on transportation and housing and public safety.”

Kornberg, the daughter of Nobel laureate Roger Kornberg, studied in Israel while she was in college and has written numerous articles on Middle East issues. In 2015, she argued in a prescient opinion piece in Haaretz that Israel’s political instability posed a major threat to its national security.

Hanif, a close ally of her council predecessor, New York City Comptroller Brad Lander, who is running for mayor, would be difficult to beat considering the left-wing dynamic of the district, observers say — even in a post-Oct. 7 political landscape that has recently seen two Squad members lose their seats, including Rep. Jamaal Bowman (D-NY), who appeared at a fundraiser hosted by the councilwoman during his primary campaign.

Hanif, who currently has just under $18,000 on hand, has previously won endorsements from the Working Families Party and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), among other progressive standard bearers.

But Jewish community activists frustrated with Hanif’s leadership suggest that her antagonistic approach to Israel and other sensitive issues has sown a pervasive sense of discontent across the district. 

“This is a diverse district that always managed to live with tolerance and mutual respect,” Spokoiny told JI. “Hanif put all that at risk by importing the Middle East conflict to Park Slope.”