NY Lawmaker Draws Fire For Anti Israel Tweet

By COLlive staff

Claiming that she was misunderstood, a New York state assemblywoman deleted a controversial tweet that replaced a map of Israel with Palestine and adorned with flowers, JNS reported.

Phara Souffrant Forrest, serving her first term in office as Assemblymember for New York’s 57th Assembly District, is a “lifelong resident of Crown Heights,” according to her website. The 57th district includes Prospect Heights, Fort Greene, Clinton Hill, and parts of Crown Heights and Bedford-Stuyvesant.

“I deleted a previous tweet that led to misunderstandings about my position,” said Souffrant Forrest, 32, who’s also a nurse. “My position has always been about peace and justice. I stand against apartheid because I believe that all people deserve to live under equal rights, regardless of ethnicity or religion.”

The map, however, was just one of several anti-Israel tweets by Souffrant Forrest, who touts support from Rep. Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) on her website.

Among other tweets supporting the BDS movement against Israel, Souffrant Forrest also posted: “It is a moral stain on our country and all who live here to have our government and elected officials continue to prop up an Israeli state dedicated to apartheid. We must change that. #BDS #FreePalestine.”

Local Jewish community member Avi Lesches told JNS, “In short, it is extremely disturbing and upsetting, to say the least, especially when this is coming from an elected official who represents a portion of Crown Heights,” the Brooklyn neighborhood that is home to the Chabad-Lubavitch movement and one of the largest Jewish areas of New York City. “An elected person is supposed to represent all the people of their district, not just those they agree with. … I welcome Assemblywoman Forrest to meet with members of the Crown Heights Jewish community … to learn who we are and what we stand for before making blanket statements that are not only hurtful but shameful.”

Scott Richman, regional director of the Anti-Defamation League New York/New Jersey, said “it is incendiary and outrageous, especially at such a sensitive time, for any public official to make references to erasing Israel’s existence from the map or denying its Jewish history as well as leveling claims of apartheid.”

Before deleting the tweet, Forrest had doubled down and retweeted the map on Thursday morning, writing: “This is a map of historic Palestine. This land has a history of peaceful coexistence. Today, as an @hrw [Human Rights Watch] report states, the reality on the ground is apartheid. We need to make sure our tax dollar don’t support the oppression of any peoples.”

It is incendiary and outrageous, especially at such a sensitive time, for any public official to make references to erasing Israel’s existence from the map or denying its Jewish history as well as leveling claims of apartheid. pic.twitter.com/TYGTw01x4j

— ADL New York / New Jersey (@ADL_NYNJ) May 13, 2021