June 3, 2023

A protester holds up a sign against Rep.-elect George Santos on Dec. 29, 2022. Photo...

The post Long Island Jews protest Santos, condemn his exploitation of the Holocaust for political gain appeared first on Political Protests.

After admitting he fabricated key main points of his resume, George Santos, the newly elected Republican congressman from New York, got here below recent scrutiny for mendacity about his ancestry and his Jewish heritage in newly surfaced paperwork and movies. A couple of hundred other people rallied in his district Thursday out of doors the Nassau County courthouse to name for responsibility and Santos’ resignation.

“This second isn’t about Democratic or Republican politics,” stated Rob Zimmerman, the Jewish Democrat who ran towards Santos and misplaced. “This second is set protective our democracy, status up for justice and status in combination in cohesion to revive our self assurance within the integrity of our public officers.”

A overview of previous interviews posted on-line presentations that Santos used to be now not honest to citizens ever since he entered politics in 2020. In a radio interview throughout his first run for Congress, difficult the district incumbent, Rep. Tom Suozzi, Santos deceptively boasted concerning the backing of a distinguished Jewish Democrat to advertise his wide attraction.

Showing at the Bernie and Sid radio display on WABC77 in October 2020, Santos stated that former Congressman Steve Israel, who represented the district that comes with a part of the North Shore of Lengthy Island and northeastern Queens from 2001 to 2016, presented him his strengthen in public remarks. Santos referred to a Tremendous Tuesday watch birthday celebration in New York that used to be hosted by means of the Council for a Safe The usa, a bipartisan crew co-chaired by means of Israel and Fred Zeidman, a Houston-based Republican donor and a member of the Republican Jewish Coalition’s board of administrators. “He stated it in a big room for everyone to listen to, ‘You’re going to be the primary Republican I’m vote casting for in my existence,’” Santos claimed Israel instructed the group on the tournament.

In an e mail alternate on Wednesday, Israel stated he doesn’t recall assembly Santos, and the organizers of that tournament showed on Thursday that Santos used to be now not an invited visitor. This reporter, who lined the development for a special Jewish media outlet on the time, couldn’t to find any point out of Santos in written notes.

Israel, who in the past served as chair of the Democratic Congressional Marketing campaign Committee, whose undertaking is to strengthen Democratic Space applicants, known as the tale “preposterous.” Santos used to be a first-time Republican candidate working towards a two-term Democratic incumbent who out-fundraised him 3-1, in line with FEC filings.

Santos has admitted he cast his skilled biography and lied about his schooling and paintings enjoy and is now below federal investigation over his monetary claims. He additionally falsely claimed to have Jewish grandparents who fled anti-Jewish persecution in Ukraine after which Belgium throughout International Conflict II.

 

Suozzi instructed the Ahead he couldn’t recall whether or not Santos claimed he used to be Jewish throughout the 2020 marketing campaign since he didn’t take note of his opponent and didn’t stumble upon him at the path because the coronavirus pandemic used to be raging. Suozzi beat Santos by means of 12 issues.

It seems that that the primary time Santos publicly raised his Jewish ancestry used to be in his marketing campaign release video in June 2021. In the three-minute clip, Santos used pictures of the Nazi dying camps and stated he “despised” socialism as a result of “my grandparents survived the Holocaust.” In a separate look on Fox Information that month, Santos stated, “My grandparents escaped socialism, they’ve escaped communism and the Holocaust.”

Santos additionally advised his mom’s circle of relatives’s historic Jewish identify used to be “Zabrovsky” and perceived to perform a GoFundMe marketing campaign for a puppy rescue charity the use of that alias. “My grandfather used to be born in Kyiv,” Santos claimed in an interview with Fox Information in February 2022. “For numerous people who find themselves descendants of International Conflict II refugees, or survivors of the Holocaust, numerous names and forms have been modified within the identify of survival. So I don’t lift the circle of relatives ultimate identify — that might’ve been Zabrovsky.”

The Ahead first reported ultimate week that Santos’ maternal grandparents have been each born in Brazil prior to the Nazis got here to energy. Social media posts reviewed by means of the Ahead indicated that his mom, the now deceased Fatima Alzira Caruso Horta Devolder, often shared Catholic imagery and adopted a number of accounts about Catholicism.

Santos, who stated in contemporary interviews that he had joked about being “Jew-ish,” known as himself a “proud American Jew” and stated he traveled to Israel “a large number of instances” ready paper his marketing campaign submitted to more than one Jewish and pro-Israel organizations, together with the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC).

Suozzi known as the episode “a shanda.” The Santos marketing campaign didn’t reply to a request for a remark.

‘Pretend Jew, actual gonif

On the Thursday rally, State Sen. Anna Kaplan, a Jewish Democrat, stated that Jews “are owed an apology for his reprehensible lies about his nonexistent Jewish religion and his entire false connection to the Holocaust.”

A number of other people on the courthouse held up posters that learn, “Pretend Jew, actual gonif” (the Yiddish time period for thief),  “You must repent, now not constitute us,” and “Santos sucks.”

Protestors against Congressman-elect George Santos gathered at a rally in Nassau County.
Protestors towards Congressman-elect George Santos accrued at a rally in Nassau County. Picture by means of Jacob Kornbluh

“You don’t simply get to be Jewish and there’s no such factor as being ‘Jew-ish,’” stated Rabbi Deborah Bravo from a Reform synagogue in Bethpage, Lengthy Island, known as MakomNY. Jews make up 11% of the inhabitants in Santos’ third Congressional District in line with David Pollock, affiliate government director of the Jewish Group Members of the family Council of New York.

Janet Jeddah, who’s Jewish and a 43-year resident of the district, stated Thursday’s collecting on the courthouse used to be her first protest for the reason that Vietnam Conflict within the Seventies. “It’s essentially the most despicable act,” she stated. “He lacks ethical persona.”

David Frank, a textile artist of Ukrainian Jewish descent, stated he’s “outraged” that Santos appropriated the Holocaust for political achieve. “It’s unacceptable,” he stated, “and unforgivable.”

Zimmerman, who misplaced the election to Santos by means of 9 issues, stated he used to be “impressed” by means of the massive turnout. “We’re combating again,” he stated, including that he didn’t be expecting a “pathological liar” like Santos to ask for forgiveness for his Jewish claims.

Cross to Supply
Creator:

The put up Lengthy Island Jews protest Santos, condemn his exploitation of the Holocaust for political achieve seemed first on Political Protests.

Cross to Supply
Creator: Russell Morris