Nicole Malliotakis, career Albany politician and Washington’s handpicked candidate, owes the Jewish community an apology after her offensive comments last week.
On a Zoom call hosted by the Staten Island Jewish Community Center last week, Malliotakis compared her career as a “Republican in New York City” to fighting in Israel’s Six-Day War. The offensive comments came during a celebration of Jerusalem Day.
Stunningly tone-deaf.
At least one attendee said: “We had soldiers on those front-lines who risked their lives, some who were even Holocaust survivors,” said the person, who described himself as a political “conservative” and didn’t want his identity known out of fear of retribution. “It was stupid more than anything else. How do you compare being a politician in New York to being a soldier in Israel?”
What’s worse, instead of apologizing to the Jewish community for her troubling words, her campaign doubled down and attacked Congressman Max Rose, a Jewish veteran and Purple Heart recipient.
As election forecasters recently noted, Republicans have not been promoting Malliotakis as a star recruit, and given her pattern of refusing to acknowledge or take responsibility for her campaign missteps, we see why.
“Nicole Malliotakis should apologize to the Jewish community for her offensive comments,” said DCCC Spokesperson Christine Bennett.
Staten Island pol tells NYC Jews being ‘a Republican in New York City’ is like fighting in Israel’s Six-Day War
By CHRIS SOMMERFELDT | NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
MAY 22, 2020
Staten Island Assemblywoman Nicole Malliotakis raised some eyebrows when she told a Jewish congregation this week that she knows what it was like for Israeli soldiers to fight in the Six-Day War because she’s “a Republican in New York City,” the Daily News has learned.
Malliotakis, who’s mounting a Republican challenge against Rep. Max Rose (D-N.Y.) in November’s congressional election, drew the curious comparison while on a Thursday night Zoom call hosted by the Staten Island Jewish Community Center in celebration of Jerusalem Day.
“When you think about the small army at the time that Israel had and that they were confronted with five armies — I mean, I’m a Republican in New York City so I can kind of understand what they may have been going through or thinking,” Malliotakis said on the call.
The Six-Day War was an armed conflict in 1967 between Israel and a coalition of Arab states comprising Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Iraq and Lebanon. Upward of 16,000 people died in the bloody battle, including some 1,000 Israelis.
A participant on the Jerusalem Day Zoom call told The News that Malliotakis’ comparison was offensive.
“We had soldiers on those front-lines who risked their lives, some who were even Holocaust survivors,” said the person, who described himself as a political “conservative” and didn’t want his identity known out of fear of retribution. “It was stupid more than anything else. How do you compare being a politician in New York to being a soldier in Israel?”
Malliotakis, who’s not Jewish, had a spokesman for her campaign push back against the criticism by noting that three participants on the Zoom event, including Israeli U.S. consul general Dani Dayan, reached out afterward to compliment her.
[…]
But Dayan contacted The News late Friday to note that his post-event compliment to Malliotakis referred to her “words about Israel and Jerusalem.”
“Not to any partisan statement about which I would never opine,” Dayan said.
Bonnie Sussman, one of the organizers of the Zoom event and wife to Staten Island Rabbi Gerald Sussman, said she could “understand why people might get upset” by Malliotakis’ remarks.
“But sometimes politics gets very rugged. People get death threats, especially Republicans in New York City,” Sussman said. “It was a meant as a joke … You can’t have humor today. You make any kind of wrong comment and you get attacked.”
Rose, who’s Jewish and spoke before Malliotakis on the Zoom call, blasted his Republican challenger’s Six-Day War comments as “tone-deaf” and noted that, contrary to him, she has never once stepped foot on a battlefield.
“So to hear her compare her political career to the Six-Day War in some bizarre metaphor is offensive, tone-deaf, and arrogant all at once,” said Rose, who’s a U.S. Army combat veteran of the war in Afghanistan. “She owes the Jewish community an apology.”
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