Obama policies criticized– not always politely

By Sergey Kadinsky

“You’re very hardy souls for coming out today,” said Rabbi Aryeh Spero of the conservative group Caucus for America. “No president, prime minister, not even the United Nations, can tear asunder what G-d has decreed.”

The reason for the rally varied: demonstrators cited the president’s snubbing of a photo opportunity with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during his recent visit; Obama’s public condemnation of Jewish construction in East Jerusalem; and the president’s inability to stop Iranian nuclear ambitions.

The message on Glen Oaks-resident Bonnie Bockman’s shirt was of a turban-clad Barack Obama alongside  Osama bin Laden. “The only difference between Obama and Osama: Just a little B.S.,” read the t-shirt. “I searched for this shirt on an AOL message board, and I had to have it,” said Bockman. “I proudly wore this shirt when I voted for president.”

Needless to say, the vote she cast was not for Mr. Obama.

Across the street, a dozen Neturei Karta members staged a quiet counter-protest. Trading brief insults with their opponents, they were in no mood for dialogue.

“I was speaking to the young man with the reddish beard,” said Astoria resident Zelig Krymko. “But the other Neturei Karta were telling him not to speak to the apikorus,” using the Hebrew term for heretic. The anti-Obama mood at the rally was unforgiving as author Joan Peters came to the stage.

“I was a civil rights worker, and I voted for Obama,” said Peters, as booing erupted from the crowd. “I believed him when he said he loved Israel.”

Peters, author of the history book “From Time Immemorial,” had flown from Chicago to attend the rally. She said that her impression of Obama changed after his speech in Cairo. “The Holocaust is not the reason that Jews went to Israel,” said Peters. “There was already a Zionist movement before the war.”

The rally was spearheaded by Beth Gilinsky, who founded the Jewish Action Alliance to Combat Islamic Extremism.

“We are here to show the Holocaust survivors that we have learned,” said Gilinsky. “We are shedding the victim status and putting on the mantle of victory.”

“You are standing in the rain,” said Rabbi David Algaze of Forest Hills. “you are not fair-weather friends. If ‘Never Again’ means anything, it means we are vigilant.”

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