‘Height of chutzpah’: House hopeful Niou hit for ‘challah’ pic after anti-Israel posting
Baruch atah a … just don’t!
Jewish leaders are trashing congressional candidate and Assemblywoman Yuh-Line Niou for reposting a photo of herself Thursday night posing as if to take a big chomp out of a loaf of challah bread just days after coming out in support of the anti-Israel boycott, divestment and sanctions movement.
“It’s the height of chutzpah. It’s really insulting,” said former Brooklyn Councilman David Greenfield in what pro-Israel Jewish activists are calling “Challah Gate.”
Niou, a state assemblywoman who represents Chinatown and the Lower East Side, is running in the 10th Congressional District that runs from Lower Manhattan through brownstone Brooklyn and into heavily Orthodox Jewish Borough Park.
She’s been endorsed by the left-wing Working Families Party and is considered a leading candidate in a race that includes more than a dozen Democrats running in the Aug. 23 primary, including former Mayor Bill de Blasio, Manhattan Councilwoman Carlina Rivera, Westchester Rep. Mondaire Jones and House impeachment lawyer and Levi Strauss heir Dan Goldman.
Niou visited the home of a couple in Borough Park when the photo was taken Thursday and posted shortly after.
“Heated in the oven just a bit to make it fresh. Double butter is right!!!,” the tweet says.
“Best challah I’ve had in a long time. I could even put into words how perfect the inside was. Perfect crust. Soft with just a little density…Dreams,” the tweet said.
Adding insult to injury, Jewish activists said, is that SodaStream bottles are on the dinner table while Niou poses with the Challah bread.
The Israel-headquartered sparkling water machine business, whose promoters have included actress Scarlett Johansson, has been subject of Palestinian boycotts.
The photo was taken down after Jewish leaders mocked and slammed Niou for exploiting the community just days after telling the Jewish Insider she backed the BDS movement against Israel. But not before viewers took snaps of it.
“I believe in the right to protest as a fundamental tenet of western democracy, so I do support BDS,” Niou said in an email to the publication.
Niou declined requests for comment Friday and referred questions to a campaign spokesperson, who also declined comment, about her positions on BDS and the challah bread munching.
“The Jewish community wants to know, are you with us or against us,” Greenfield said.
Assemblyman Simcha Eichenstein, who represents Borough Park, said, “Is eating challah the new whitewashing for supporting the anti-Semitic BDS movement?”
“This pander is offensive. It’s a photo-op. Photo-ops don’t whitewash extreme positions.”
Niou’s current Assembly district includes a considerably Orthodox Jewish population on the Lower East Side.
“As a colleague I’m surprised she took that position after five years,” Eichenstein said.
Yeruchim Silber, director of government relations at Agudath Israel, posted the Niou challah bread photo and took it down after Jewish activists expressed outrage that he enabled a proponent of BDS.
“I’ve worked with @yuhline in Albany for years. Her quote on BDS left many including myself deeply concerned. My effort here was to dialogue. It is being misconstrued as giving her a pass,” Silber tweeted.
“So let me be clear, her expressed position on BDS is unacceptable. I urged her to reconsider.”