A Jew-hater killed my friend now Zohran Mamdani owes us answers

In May, I lost my friend of more than 40 years — not to illness, as might be expected at age 71, but to violence.Someone killed Cara Trager.And her family and her many friends think it may have been because she was Jewish.Cara practiced as a Conservative Jew and championed the state of Israel, which she visited 11 times.In 2024 she went there with her husband Mike to meet families of Israelis still held hostage.“Sadly, antisemitism has reared its ugly head again,” Cara, a freelance journalist, wrote last year.“It makes no pretenses about hating us and our ancestral homeland.And it scares me about the future for our children and grandchildren.”On Memorial Day, Cara and Mike were taking a stroll on Union Turnpike after dinner at a kosher Israeli restaurant in Queens.At the same time a driver on nearby Francis Lewis Boulevard ran a red light and collided with a car.Dawood Faisal, 22, didn’t stop: He kept going, allegedly racing along at 75 miles per hour — more than twice the limit.As Cara and Mike stepped into a crosswalk, Faisal plowed into two vehicles, propelling one toward the Tragers.Faisal abandoned his car and would have escaped if some good Samaritan witnesses hadn’t managed to tackle him.But the damage was done: The car Faisal recklessly hit had run over my friends.Mike came away with minor injuries, but Cara suffered severe head trauma.She clung to life for four days before finally passing away.Police arrested Faisal at the scene.

He’s been charged with manslaughter in the second degree, among other crimes, and is now in custody on Rikers Island, with a bail hearing scheduled for October.But the Trager family believes antisemitism might have motivated Faisal’s lethal hit-and-run — because of a troubling incident that came to light after his arrest.In the weeks before the accident, Faisal allegedly targeted a kosher bagel shop in Fresh Meadows that displayed Israeli flags and banners.He was twice captured on video upending outdoor plan...