Two teenagers who pledged allegiance to ISIS tried to detonate bombs outside Gracie Mansion on Saturday, hurling improvised explosive devices into a crowd of protesters. The bombs failed to go off. A five-count federal complaint was unsealed Monday afternoon, charging Emir Balat, 18, and Ibrahim Kayumi, 19, with using a weapon of mass destruction while supporting a foreign terror group, among other charges.
New York City Police Commissioner Jessica Tisch was direct about what happened. She called it "ISIS-inspired terrorism" and made clear these were not toys or props.
"These were not hoax devices, nor smoke devices. It is, in fact, an improvised explosive device that could have caused serious injury or death."
The devices contained triacetone triperoxide, or TATP, an explosive compound known as the "Mother of Satan." Cops initially believed the devices were merely homemade smoke grenades. The FBI took over the investigation on Sunday and searched both suspects' homes in Bucks County, just outside Philadelphia.
According to the complaint, Balat allegedly told detectives he hoped the casualty count would surpass that of the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing. When informed that the attack killed three people, his response was chilling.
"No, even bigger. It was only three deaths."
That is the voice of someone who wanted a body count.
Mayor Zohran Mamdani, the first Muslim mayor of New York City, first addressed the attack on Sunday, the New York Post reported. His statement opened not with the bombing attempt, not with the ISIS allegiance, not with the fact that two individuals tried to murder people outside his own residence. It opened with the protest.
"Yesterday, white supremacist Jake Lang organized a protest outside Gracie Mansion rooted in bigotry and racism. Such hate has no place in New York City. It is an affront to our city's values and the unity that defines who we are."
The protest, organized by far-right agitator Jake Lang and dubbed "Stop the Islamification of NYC," was an anti-Muslim demonstration. Mamdani called it "a vile protest rooted in white supremacy." He said he found it "appalling" but would not waver in defending its right to occur. Fine. That's a reasonable position on free speech.
But notice the structure. The protest received four sentences of specific moral condemnation. The bombing attempt that followed got folded into the passive construction of "what followed was even more disturbing." The two men who allegedly tried to kill New Yorkers in the name of ISIS were described in the language of a parking violation.
"Violence at a protest is never acceptable. The attempt to use an explosive device and hurt others is not only criminal, it is reprehensible and the antithesis of who we are."
No mention of ISIS. No mention of radical Islam. No mention of the ideology that animated the attack. Just "violence at a protest."
By Monday morning, when Mamdani delivered prepared remarks at a press conference, the federal complaint had not yet been unsealed, but the nature of the attack was already well understood. Tisch had already identified it as ISIS-inspired terrorism. Mamdani acknowledged the suspects threw devices at the crowd and that police had determined they were improvised explosive devices "made to injure, maim, or worse." He said the pair were "suspected of coming here to commit an act of terrorism."
"Let me say this plainly: Anyone who comes to New York City to bring violence to our streets will be held accountable in accordance with the law."
After the federal complaint was unsealed Monday afternoon, Mamdani issued another statement.
"Emir Balat and Ibrahim Kayumi have been charged with committing a heinous act of terrorism and proclaiming their allegiance to ISIS. They should be held fully accountable for their actions."
He managed to say ISIS. He managed "heinous." He managed "fully accountable." What he did not manage, across three separate statements over three days, was to name the ideology. Not once did the words "radical Islam" or "Islamic extremism" cross his lips. He dodged questions on Monday. He treated the ideological motivation like furniture in a room he was trying not to bump into.
Consider what Mamdani was willing to name and what he wasn't:
The mayor had no trouble diagnosing the ideology of the protest. He had every word he needed for that. But when two ISIS supporters allegedly tried to blow people up outside his home, ideology suddenly became unspeakable. The specificity vanished. "Terrorism" stood alone, scrubbed of its modifier, as if the attack emerged from nowhere in particular.
This is a familiar pattern in progressive politics. Hate has a name when it comes from the right. When it comes wrapped in a crescent, it becomes "violence" or "extremism," stripped of origin, floating free of any ideology anyone might be expected to confront.
One detail that deserves attention: Mamdani was not home when the bombs were thrown at his residence on Saturday. He and his wife spent the day at the New York City Sign Museum in Brooklyn. There is nothing wrong with a mayor being away from Gracie Mansion. But the fact that ISIS-aligned attackers targeted the home of America's first Muslim mayor, and that mayor then declined to name the ideology behind the attack, tells you something about the distorted incentives of progressive identity politics.
Mamdani acknowledged as much himself, noting that "anti-Muslim bigotry is nothing new to me, nor is it anything new for the 1 million or so Muslim New Yorkers." He's right about that. And one of the most corrosive forms of that bigotry is the assumption that Muslim communities cannot withstand honest conversation about extremism within their own ranks. The refusal to name radical Islam doesn't protect Muslim New Yorkers. It insults them by implying they can't distinguish between their faith and its most violent distortions.
Mamdani said the right things about accountability. He said the suspects should be "held fully accountable." He said New York would "not tolerate terrorism or violence." These are fine sentences. They are also the bare minimum expected of any mayor whose city was just targeted by ISIS supporters carrying bombs nicknamed the Mother of Satan.
The question isn't whether Mamdani condemned the attack. He did. The question is why the condemnation was so carefully hollowed out. You cannot fight what you refuse to name. You cannot lead a city through a threat you will only describe in the vaguest possible terms while reserving your sharpest language for the protest that preceded it.
Two men came to New York City to kill in the name of ISIS. The bombs didn't go off. Next time, they might. New Yorkers deserve a mayor who will say so plainly, all of it, including the part that makes progressive coalition politics uncomfortable.
