Assemblyman Ari Brown Pens Letter Following Offensive NYC Health Billboard

UPDATE: Assemblywoman Stacey Pheffer Amato has confirmed that the truck has been removed:

(2/2) While I appreciate the swift action, I will never tolerate an attack on the Jewish community, even if it was “unintentional.” I hope they can do better in promoting health concerns.

— Stacey Pheffer Amato (@Stacey23AD) March 28, 2023

Jewish leaders: NYS polio truck is anti-Semitic. There is no end to the barrage of anti semitic tropes we must face each day. A polio truck at the Gourmet Glatt parking lot in Cedarhurst??? How offensive can you get! https://t.co/K5X3TfRzwa

— @Richard Altabe (@Raltabe) March 29, 2023

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In response to an offensive and anti-Semitic billboard that was displayed in the Jewish Orthodox Five Towns Community with the subtle message that “Jews Spread Disease,” Assemblyman Ari Brown (R-Cedarhurst) wrote a letter to New York State Department of Health Associate Commissioner Sam Miller admonishing the department and bringing to light the department’s subtle bigotry.

Commissioner Sam Miller
NY State Department of Health External Affairs

“Dear Commissioner Miller,

I wear several hats, one being a NYS Assemblyman, another, being the Deputy Mayor of the Village of Cedarhurst. I was appalled but not surprised to learn that the NYS Department of Health sent a truck to our Orthodox Jewish community of the Five Towns on Long Island, displaying the subtle antisemitic trope of “the Jew spreading disease”.

Antisemitism should not be a fact of Jewish life, something that we or anyone should simply accept as a way of life. We Jews, like any other group, want to live unencumbered to practice our religion, to wear our yarmulkes, to attend synagogue and attend Jewish events, without fear of harassment or violence.

Antisemitism is a hatred that can be manifested in conspiracy theories, often portraying Jews as pulling the strings of the world, controlling banking and the media are often repeated epitaphs. One of the worst and historically generated tropes is that, “Jews spread disease”. Over the course of history, Jews have had many encounters with contagious diseases; often blamed for them. The Nazis, justified the walling off of the ghettos as a preventive measure against the spread of typhus, while some 300 Jewish communities were destroyed in the mass hysteria associated with the plague.

Fast forward to the 21″ century. Antisemitism is sometimes expressed by people in power, in the soft and subtle bias of their words, much of which goes unchallenged. We have seen this disguised bigotry with the targeting of Orthodox Jewish communities by city and state

leaders during COVID-19 lockdowns in New York and now with a New York State Department of Health truck riding around Jewish neighborhoods with the rhetoric of, “Polio is spreading in Israel, Get immunized now”. They literally parked this truck today, March 27, 2023, in Parking Field One, in front of the Gourmet Glatt supermarket, Cedarhurst. It’s the same “Jews spread disease libel”. I will fight antisemitism and will not be silent whether it’s from a government official, media, academic institution, or whomever”. I would appreciate an expeditious response.”

Sincerely,

Assemblyman Ari Brown