New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani posted a video statement to X on Tuesday night under the caption “Benjamin Netanyahu is a war criminal,” in which he accused the Israeli prime minister of a litany of atrocities in Gaza, but ultimately admitted he would not be able to fulfill a campaign promise of arresting him under a warrant from the International Criminal Court. 

The democratic socialist pledged to arrest Netanyahu from the earliest days of his candidacy for the job in 2024, and reiterated the promise in the final weeks of the race last year. But days after attesting to The New York Times that he was still consulting city attorneys about his ability to actually enforce the ICC warrant against the leader of the Jewish state, Mamdani finally acknowledged that his office had no power to do so.

“It is clear that we do not have the independent legal authority to enforce this warrant,” Mamdani said, after an extended attack on Israeli military policy in Gaza — one that made no mention of Hamas or of the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks that prompted the latest round of the conflict.

Mamdani called Netanyahu the “architect of a horrific genocide,” naming him individually responsible for the “maiming of tens of thousands of children as those who survive undergo amputation without anesthesia” and for the “targeting of neonatal hospitals and maternity care centers,” among other charged accusations. 

The mayor further called on federal authorities to act on the ICC warrant, despite the country not being a party to the court — and despite President Donald Trump’s recent pledge on Truth Social that Netanyahu would not be arrested anywhere in the United States. 

“Benjamin Netanyahu is not welcome in New York City,” the mayor concluded. “We can examine every tool we have to defend the humanity and dignity of all people. That is my commitment to you.”

The video ends without Mamdani explaining what that commitment would mean in practice.