Can you imagine Rashida Tlaib or Ilhan Omar representing Midwood? What would your reaction be hearing your Congresswoman say she gets a “calming feeling” when pondering the Holocaust? How would we protest if our own lawmaker would reduce all support for Israel down to a few “Benjamins”?
We, the Orthodox community of Flatbush have worked too hard and come too far to allow this to happen. But the very real possibility exists that within 36 hours of reading this, a person who likely shares similar opinions of Omar and Tlaib could be representing thousands of frum families in the New York City Council.
Monique Chandler-Waterman is currently ahead in the contest to be the district’s next councilwoman. She reached this by campaigning on a platform of anti-Semitic codewords, and by holding rallies in which she and her surrogates use dog whistles to dismiss our community without ever saying “Jew.”
First, the backstory.
Jumaane Williams represented the 45th Council district for about ten years when he won the race earlier this year to be the city’s public advocate. Mayor Bill de Blasio then called a special election to replace him, and the community entered in an historic partnership with the district’s Haitian and Caribbean communities to back Farah Louis in last month’s election.
Jumaane originally told friends and associates that he would stay out of the race. At the last minute, he reneged and backed Monique while the district’s Haitian, Caribbean and Orthodox communities united in support of Farah Louis. A large reason Orthodox Jews backed Louis was because many felt poorly served and ignored by Jumaane for years. Community members were looking for the candidate who offered to represent all parts of the district and not just some of it. Farah Louis was ultimately successful and won the special election.
But a fluke in the city’s campaign schedule means that the victory is only for a few months. Now a little over a month after that election, another contest is taking place tomorrow to hold the seat for the full four years.
Monique Watterman announced immediately that she would run again. She then embarked on an ugly, divisive campaign, painting Orthodox Jews in dark and menacing colors, describing them as interlopers from the “outside” who “bought” Farah.
WATCH THIS SHOCKING VIDEO BELOW:
“In the special election last month,” one ad says, “Trump-voting Republicans (the word is ominously italicized) got to decide who represents us (also italicized) in the City Council.”
Other ads and videos describe our community as “slumlords” and “real estate developers.” In the African-American district, these terms are common anti-Semitic slurs. There is no debating this – Monique is using gutter language to get elected, and Jumaane is going on his worst instincts to preserve his political legacy. And we, the Jews, are the victims of this. We say STOP. Stop the divisiveness. Stop making Jews the cause of all your troubles. We have seen too much of this in recent history to allow this to go without a response. We reject such divisive language and will never vote for anyone who uses it.
Vote for Farah Louis tomorrow. Our future depends on it.
Charley Briedel – A resident of the 45 council district.
NOTE: The views expressed here are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent or reflect the views of YWN.
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13 Responses
I do think “greedy landlords” might be anti-Semitic. I’m not sure what else she said that would be interpreted that way. Many frum Jews support Trump.left-wing Democrats don’t like trump. That is seemingly a political issue . Am I missing something
What you’re missing is that she’s saying because we support Trump we should not be entitled to a say, our votes are illegitimate and ought not to count. That because we voted for this person her election was illegitimate and should now be corrected.
Sounds like a Democrat. They talk like that. That’s the new “normal”.
Is there anything inacurate in the title regarding what the candidate said?
“What you’re missing is that she’s saying because we support Trump we should not be entitled to a say, our votes are illegitimate and ought not to count. That because we voted for this person her election was illegitimate and should now be corrected.”
Perhaps she does say that but I don’t say where in the videos and pictures mentioned in this article. I think we should make every effort to vote against her because of her left-wing ideology. But other than the potentialy “greedy landlords I don’t see evidence of anti-semitism
> chareidi amiti
The headline may as well read “Jews exhaling carbon-dioxide while breathing contributes to the carbon dioxide of global warming”. Anything NOT true about that? And the self-evident inference of that (especially when espoused as a political platform), just like the self-evident inference from the current headline, is to STOP the Jews. In my case it is to stop the Jews from contributing to this global warming by stopping them from breathing. What is so anti-Semitic about saving the planet! It is just as anti-Semitic in the current headline that clearly means “stop the Jews” from doing and having the rights of anyone else. And you don’t find that anti-Semitic?
There are 2 communities in this district who have different views. The Monique supporters appear to be liberal Democrats. The Jewish community is overwhelmingly politically conservative. This is typical campaigning. Although they did refer to our community with oblique terms, & they may or may not be anti semites, these campaign speeches didn’t appear to be blatantly anti semitic, (aside from the “real estate developers” term, which another comment pointed out). We are, for the most part, Trump supporters. That’s a fact. It’s not an anti semitic term. There are 2 sides condemning each other, as they hold very different views. That’s campaigning, not anti semitism.
Chareidi Shekari; So you think all Jews in Midwood are Slumlords?!
You are an Anti-Semitic Jew hater!
Typical classical hate, feeding the old Anti Semitic provocation to the ignorant masses: “that its those mean bankers, Landlords that are the cause of your problems”!
p.s. chareidi amiti – please read a book or two… before commenting…
FLATBUSH shluft ” veain ish som al lev the voting polls are empty
Nothing antisemtic here…in fact i dont see where she ssys anything of thr sort…it might be implied but it bothers me more when jews cry it out and put words in their mouth thats not actually there….not saying anyone should vote for her cuz shes a democrat but that can be said without the lies
stop commenting. go out and vote
“FLATBUSH shluft ” I voted at 7:45 last night, my ballot was the 39th scanned by the machine all day (there was a 2nd machine next to it). hopefully people came after me and voted…