New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio said Thursday at his daily COVID-19 city briefing that he is determined to make sure his city remains as healthy as possible, regardless of how much effort that might take.
One of the mayor’s efforts — implementing a lockdown in nine zip codes across the city, most of which are home to a majority of Orthodox Jews — caused a great deal of friction. On Wednesday night, hundreds of Jews gathered on one of the main streets of Brooklyn’s Borough Park neighborhood to make their anger known, setting a fire to cardboard boxes at an intersection, and chanting slogans in the street.
Some of the men in the crowd spotted Jewish journalist Jacob Kornbluh covering the events, and attacked him — an unheard-of situation that was later raised at the mayor’s briefing in a question from a NY1 journalist, who asked de Blasio what he intends to do about it.
“It’s just unacceptable,” de Blasio said. “There need to be consequences for that.
“The situation here overall is a very difficult one because we’re having to tell many communities of people that after the success we’ve had as a city in some communities we’re gonna have to turn back to where we were in the spring.
“No one wants to hear it, I understand. But we have to do it. The city and state are united on this.
“I do expect a clearer response going forward,” he added, referring to the response of the police at the scene of the “protest” in Borough Park.
“I think there were some issues yesterday honestly in terms of both the NYPD’s approach and the approach of the city’s legal team understanding the state guidance and getting it right, once and for all.
“That has to be corrected; we need a much clearer approach. And I expect that to be corrected today before anything that happens this evening.”