Sen. Chuck Schumer
Sen. Chuck SchumerReuters

Veteran New York State assemblyman Dov Hikind (D-Brooklyn), an Orthodox Jew, is outraged after New York Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer criticized Orthodox Jews for failing to call out what he said was President Trump's inability to confront hate groups in the United States.

Last week, JTA reported that Schumer chastised the Orthodox Jewish community in the US for failing to condemn President Trump's statement blaming "both sides" for a violent riot between neo-Nazis and counter-demonstrators in Charlottesville, Virginia this past summer. The comments were made at a meeting with the heads of major US Jewish organizations, including AIPAC and the Orthodox Union. Schumer apparently left the meeting without giving the OU, the only Orthodox organization present, a chance to respond.

The accusation infuriated New York Assemblyman Dov Hikind, who said that the allegations were "the height of political hypocrisy. Singling out Orthodox Jews was distasteful, shameful and arrogant," wrote Hikind on Facebook. "This statement of Senator Schumer’s was nothing less than his playing to his progressive liberal base."

"If the Senator was genuinely concerned about confronting hate and anti-Semitism, he wouldn’t have given President Obama a pass when the Obama administration did everything possible to marginalize Israel," continued Hikind. "Where was Schumer when Linda Sarsour showed support for terrorists and undermined the existence of Israel? Or when Black Lives Matter adopted anti-Israel platforms? Has the Senator held press conferences confronting the racist BDS movement, which seeks to isolate and starve innocent Israelis?" asked Hikind.

"The best candidate who Senator Schumer saw fit to lead the DNC was Keith Ellison, a friend of Louis Farrakhan who called Hitler ‘a great man'," continued the assemblyman.

“The Orthodox community does not need to be lectured by Senator Schumer. Let the good Senator work on alleviating anti-Israel animus within segments of the Democratic party. Because, as we all know, anti-Israel rhetoric and ‘anti-Zionism’ is simply the 21st-century version of anti-Semitism."

The Coalition for Jewish Values (CJV) also expressed pain and offense at the comments by Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-NY) which targeted the Orthodox Jewish community, calling his remarks "a nasty swipe against other Jews, bordering on bigotry."

"It is ironic that Mr Schumer singles out an entire community as he calls on them to combat racism elsewhere," commented Rabbi Yoel Schonfeld, Vice President of the CJV and Queens resident. "It looks like he has his own scale to determine what is acceptable discrimination. This was a nasty swipe against other Jews, bordering on bigotry."

The CJV welcomed the comments of NYS Assemblyman Dov Hikind, who called Schumer's comments "the height of political hypocrisy" and "distasteful, shameful and arrogant." .’"

"That took courage, to confront New York's senior Senator, a fellow Democrat, so vocally," said Rabbi Avrohom Gordimer, Chairman of the CJV Rabbinic Circle and a resident of Upper Manhattan. "And Assemblyman Hikind is right across the board. Sen. Schumer was silent when President Obama nastily snubbed Israeli PM Netanyahu, called the latter a 'liar,' and orchestrated the UN condemnation of the State of Israel. Instead of hypocritically attacking a different Jewish community, perhaps it is time he put his own house in order."

The Coalition for Jewish Values (CJV), the largest rabbinic public policy organization in America, articulates and advocates for public policy positions based upon traditional Jewish thought.