Donald Trump praises 'wonderful statements' of Democratic Jewish leader who accuses AOC, Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib of anti-Semitic hate speech amid growing row with New York Mayor Bill de Blasio over blame for mass stabbing at Hanukkah party
By Katelyn Caralle
Daily Mail
December 30, 2019
Donald Trump praised a Jewish leader Monday for 'wonderful statements about me' after he blamed Democrats for a rise in anti-Semitism and slammed Bill DeBlasio and Andrew Cuomo in the wake of a mass stabbing at a Hanukkah party.
'There is a cause for hate speech. When you have the Farakahns of the world, when you have members of the United States Congress – Tliab, Omar, AOC – when you have them indulging in hate speech themselves – and to get away with it. You know there's a new standard, one is for anti-Semitism and one is for other type of hate,' Dav Hikind said on Fox & Friends Sunday morning.
'Unfortunately, people within my party – I'm a Democrat – within the Democratic Party, there's a double standard,' he said, claiming those on the left disparage any type of hate speech unless it's against Jewish people.
'The hate, the anti-Semitism that emanates from within the left – you don't hear anything, you hear very little,' he continued. 'Anything that comes from the other side, it's all – I mean, even the mayor of the city of New York has continued to call the hate coming from the right. All the hate in New York is coming from the left.'
Trump thanked Hikind, a former Democratic New York state assemblyman.
'Thank you to highly respected Jewish leader Dov Hikind for his wonderful statements about me this morning on @foxandfriends,' Trump tweeted Monday morning, but he was actually referencing Hikind's interview with Pete Hegseth on Sunday.
Hikind reacted to Trump's gratitude on Twitter Monday, and thanked him in return for helping make strides to protect Jewish people.
'Thank you Mr. President for all you've done and continue to do to protect the Jewish people all the while making America stronger and more prosperous!' Hikind said in response to Trump's tweet. 'God should increase your strength to rise above all the obstacles placed before you!'
Hikind, a Democrat, appeared on Fox News Channel the day after a man broke into a rabbi's home during a candle lighting ceremony in upstate New York Saturday night, the seventh night of Hanukkah, and stabbed five people.
The stabbing came after a string of attacks on the Jewish community in the area throughout Hanukkah, and Hikind blamed the rise in anti-Semitism on the left side of the political aisle.
He specifically called out those who have been accused of spouting anti-Semitic tropes, including Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan and progressive freshmen Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib.
Hikind and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio are also at odds over the cause of the stabbing and overall genisis of the spike of anti-Semitic attacks.
'For him to tell me, every time there's an anti-Semitic incident that he condemns it, that he feels the pain, and then he goes home and waits for the next incident and does the same thing, what is going to be done by the mayor, the governor? They are literally taking advantage of us,' Hikind said of de Blasio and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo.
De Blasio disagreed with Hikind in an interview with Fox News Sunday night, claiming that the hate is emanating from Washington D.C. and Trump.
'When I think something is anti-Semitic, I say it and I've said it about fellow Democrats. But I also want us to be clear what's happening here. An atmosphere of hate has been developing in this country over the last few years. A lot of it is emanating from Washington and it's having an effect on all of us,' de Blasio said.
'Wait, so you're saying -- you're blaming the president by saying [unintelligible] from Washington,' Fox News' Ed Henry questioned on America's News HQ Sunday evening.
'Not just the president,' de Blasio asserted. 'I'm saying, but we have to be clear. We need a different tone starting in Washington.'
Stabbing suspect Grafton Thomas, a 37-year-old black man, broke into Rabbi Chaim Leibush Rottenberg's house in a predominantly Jewish neighborhood in Monsey, New York Saturday night. He stabbed five people before he was chased out of the house.
The victims were taken to two nearby hospitals, but their conditions were not released.
De Blasio said in an interview with Fox News over the weekend that authorities in New York are working to find the root cause of the attacks on the Jewish community and other minority groups.
Hikind says de Blasio needs to face the fact that the issue of violence against Jews is mostly coming from young black men.
'I think the mayor is being very dishonest, because the mayor is not dealing with a reality that exists,' Hikind said of de Blasio. 'Most of the attacks in New York that have happened against Jews, happened to come from the African-American community.'
'We're not blaming the African-American community,' he continued, 'but when you look at the video surveillance and you see that almost all these acts are committed by young blacks, you need to raise the question, you need to have the discussion, you need to bring in the clergyman, you need to bring in people and say, 'Why is this going on?'
Hikind also said Jews, in particular Hasidic Jews, are easy targets, especially when they are easy to identify by their appearance and garb.
Trump, on Sunday, called for the country to 'come together to fight anti-Semitism' after a machete-wielding man attacked those gathered for a Hanukkah celebration.
'The anti-Semitic attack in Monsey, New York, on the 7th night of Hanukkah last night is horrific,' Trump tweeted Sunday afternoon is response to the attack. 'We must all come together to fight, confront, and eradicate the evil scourge of anti-Semitism. Melania and I wish the victims a quick and full recovery.'
Witnesses said Thomas had a machete and stabbed five people before one of the attendees chased him out of the home by throwing a coat rack, table and chair. There were about 60 people gathered for the celebration.
Thomas tried to enter the synagogue next door but it was already barricaded by people who had taken shelter inside.
NYPD officers located him covered in blood 30 miles away in Harlem about two hours later and he was taken into custody at the 32nd precinct.
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, while speaking to reporter Sunday morning, called the attack 'an act of domestic terrorism.'
Trump's daughter and Senior Advisor Ivanka converted to Judaism and is married to fellow-Senior Advisor Jared Kushner, who is also Jewish.
Ivanka posted on her Instagram story that the issue of anti-Semitic violence in the New York area isn't receiving enough media attention or action from the government.
'The vicious attack of a rabbi in Monsey, NY last night was an act of pure evil. As we pray for the victims, may the candles of Chanukah burn bright through this darkness,' she posted.
'Attacks on Jewish New Yorkers were reported almost every single day this past week,' she continued in a second story post. 'The increasing frequency of anti-Semitic violence (and around the country) receives far too little local governmental action and national press attention.'
The attack in New York appeared to be the latest in a string targeting Jews in that region.
Earlier this month a massacre occurred at a kosher grocery store in New Jersey and there are at least six other known anti-Semitic incidents over the first seven nights of Hanukkah, which began on December 23.
This time, a witness said the suspect said, 'No one is going anywhere' before he launched the attack.
The five stabbing victims were transported to two hospitals in the area but their conditions are still unknown.
Authorities have also not provided a motive for the attack, including whether it was prompted by religion.
An estimated one-third of the 320,000 residents of Rockland County, where the attack occurred, are Jewish, according to census figures, and it is the county with the highest concentration of Jews in the United States.
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