Latest / Sid & Friends In The Morning / Abraham Hamra | Attorney & Syrian Jewish Ex-Refugee Makes Return to S&FIM

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Abraham Hamra | Attorney & Syrian Jewish Ex-Refugee Makes Return to S&FIM · Sid & Friends In The Morning

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Abe Homra is a dear, dear, dear, dear, dear, dear,
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: dear family friend, his lovely wife, Rachel, and their kids.
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: But I got to say this. I also like Stephanie Ben-Shemel,
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: and I have history with her. She annoyed the hell
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: out of me. Her loyalty to Curtis Sleva was ridiculous.
• 0:18
  Speaker 2: It was dumb, okay? We actually fought over it.
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: But, but, she does a good job out there. You know,
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: she's out there chasing down the mayor in Borough Park,
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: and she does fight for Jews all over the place.
• 0:29
  Speaker 1: But Hamra is a family friend forever, and I know, A.B.,
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: and I'm hearing things that he's being accused of that
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: I just don't believe, nor have I seen. So with
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: that said, on this huge fight, which all started, I think,
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: over Assemblyman Michael Novikov. I've never even heard of that guy.
• 0:48
  Speaker 3: Sorry.
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: Sorry I talked to B.B. and the President of the
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: United States. Anyway, here he is, Abraham Hamra. A.B., good morning, buddy.
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: How are you?
• 0:56
  Speaker 3: Good morning, Sid. How you doing? So my daughter Jill
• 0:59
  Speaker 3: is listening on the bus. I just want to send
• 1:01
  Speaker 3: her a good morning and.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: Hello, Jill.
• 1:03
  Speaker 2: She's a cutie. Jill's a cutie.
• 1:05
  Speaker 3: Oh, you're cute. Isn't she?
• 1:07
  Speaker 4: Yeah.
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: No, they're all great. And Rachel's great. Your whole family's great.
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: And again, I do like Stephanie, too, but I don't
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: like what I'm hearing. They're accusing yourself. There's no way
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: you would do. So quickly, we've got eight minutes. Give
• 1:16
  Speaker 1: me the genesis of how this whole fight started over
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: this assemblyman.
• 1:22
  Speaker 3: Brother, I'm not even going to attack Stephanie. God bless her.
• 1:25
  Speaker 3: I wish her all the best in the world. I
• 1:28
  Speaker 3: believe she's being used as a distraction for this assemblyman
• 1:32
  Speaker 3: and they're coming after me. So I'm going to focus
• 1:35
  Speaker 3: on the assemblyman and why I even got involved in
• 1:38
  Speaker 3: this completely, to be honest with you, almost irrelevant race.
• 1:42
  Speaker 3: I'm standing trying to get Blakeman appointed, you know, working,
• 1:45
  Speaker 3: trying to campaign for Blakeman on my own. because that's
• 1:49
  Speaker 3: an important race. That's how we fix New York State.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: And by the way, Blakeman likes you. Don't forget, I
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  Speaker 1: went to Blakeman first.
• 1:56
  Speaker 5: I love Blakeman.
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: And I said, get Homer on your team, and he
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: loves what you do for him. He does.
• 2:01
  Speaker 3: All for Team Bruce. And, you know, I've been working
• 2:03
  Speaker 3: with Caroline Schenkel, the grassroots enthusiasm for that candidate. 12th
• 2:08
  Speaker 3: District Congress is through the roof. Her candidate is hiding.
• 2:12
  Speaker 3: He won't debate. And all of a sudden, I found
• 2:15
  Speaker 3: myself getting dragged into this assembly race. Now, you know
• 2:18
  Speaker 3: that I'm a Jewish Syrian. I belong to one of,
• 2:21
  Speaker 3: in my opinion, one of the best communities in the world,
• 2:24
  Speaker 3: the Syrian Jewish community. It's full of traffic. We're tight-knit.
• 2:27
  Speaker 3: We're like family, each of us. We all take care
• 2:30
  Speaker 3: of each other, and we're all good people. My friend
• 2:32
  Speaker 3: Joey Saban, I've known him since I was a child.
• 2:35
  Speaker 3: He's a good, dear friend of mine. And even though
• 2:38
  Speaker 3: he was a friend, I was staying away from this race.
• 2:41
  Speaker 3: I said, you know, it's not really my race until...
• 2:44
  Speaker 3: Michael Novikov decided to recruit, you know, Stephanie and a
• 2:47
  Speaker 3: couple others, and they started pushing lies against my friend
• 2:51
  Speaker 3: that he was DSA aligned and pro-Palestinian.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: By the way, just so you know, not only are
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: they saying lies about Joey, I'm going to take your
• 2:59
  Speaker 1: word for it, but I've even heard some people in
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: the Novikov camp refer to you as anti-ICE because you're
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: an immigration attorney.
• 3:08
  Speaker 3: So that's exactly it. All of a sudden, I came in.
• 3:10
  Speaker 3: I stepped up because Joey's a good friend of mine,
• 3:12
  Speaker 3: and I know him. And just like you said, you
• 3:14
  Speaker 3: know me. I'm a loyal friend. If somebody's attacking my friend,
• 3:17
  Speaker 3: I'm going to speak up. And so I said, hold up, Novakov.
• 3:20
  Speaker 3: You've donated to Bernie Sanders six times. You have voted
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: to give control of our schools to Mamdani, breaking with
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: the minority Republican vote. You have allegedly went on a
• 3:30
  Speaker 3: CCP-sponsored trip to China in 2023. These are all reported
• 3:35
  Speaker 3: by the New York Post, not the Daily News. These
• 3:37
  Speaker 3: are Republican publications. Novikov, before you throw dirt, accept a
• 3:42
  Speaker 3: debate with Joey, my friend, so you can confront him
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: with your allegations. That's what the voters want. This is
• 3:47
  Speaker 3: the electoral system that makes our democracy so great. Instead
• 3:52
  Speaker 3: of responding to the actual candidate, Joey, Novikov and and
• 3:57
  Speaker 3: others with him decided to go after my business. Yeah,
• 4:01
  Speaker 3: I'm an immigration lawyer. So they're basically calling. He made
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  Speaker 3: an entire.
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  Speaker 5: Video, a sitting assemblyman made.
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  Speaker 3: An entire video against me, a person who supports so
• 4:10
  Speaker 3: many Republicans calling me an anti ICE advocate and a
• 4:15
  Speaker 3: bad company to keep around. I was floored. I'm not
• 4:19
  Speaker 3: even in the race. What do you want from me?
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  Speaker 3: And so that's the genesis of the fight. I obviously
• 4:24
  Speaker 3: respond because my business has been boycotted before. I don't
• 4:26
  Speaker 3: want you to bring my business up in the public.
• 4:28
  Speaker 3: Leave me out of this. Go candidate to candidate. And
• 4:31
  Speaker 3: so this seemingly irrelevant assembly race has taken a life
• 4:36
  Speaker 3: on its own. My question still remains. I respect the
• 4:39
  Speaker 3: Republican Party because we are people of morals character. When
• 4:42
  Speaker 3: we stand on an issue, we believe in it and
• 4:44
  Speaker 3: we stand ready to debate. Why is Michael Novikov hiding
• 4:48
  Speaker 3: from real issues, real questions that the people deserve to
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  Speaker 3: hear answers to?
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  Speaker 2: Where is he at? Where is this race? Is it Brooklyn?
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: Where is this?
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  Speaker 3: It's Brooklyn, the 45th District.
• 4:59
  Speaker 5: And my friend Joey Saban, I want to say this
• 5:01
  Speaker 5: real quick, just so everybody here knows. When I started
• 5:05
  Speaker 5: the petition for the buffer zone, Joey was the first
• 5:07
  Speaker 5: person to call me, told me, A.B., I saw your petition.
• 5:10
  Speaker 5: I'm calling Senator Sam Sutton.
• 5:12
  Speaker 3: We're getting this done.
• 5:13
  Speaker 5: Within two days, he called me back.
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  Speaker 3: He said, we're getting the bill through the assembly.
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  Speaker 5: That is the bill that Novikov is saying I signed
• 5:20
  Speaker 5: on to.
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  Speaker 3: This is Joey without being in office. Now, I don't
• 5:25
  Speaker 3: care what party he wants to associate himself with in
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  Speaker 3: a Brooklyn race. I know who this man is, who
• 5:30
  Speaker 3: Joey Saban is. And I know, and people who's listening
• 5:33
  Speaker 3: to this, you can hold me to account. If he
• 5:36
  Speaker 3: does something wrong, call me out on it. Of course.
• 5:38
  Speaker 3: That's how much willing I am to endorse you.
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: No, I believe you.
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: But I did watch the video when you did, I guess,
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: go back at Stephanie Benchimol.
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: Let me say it again. I like her.
• 5:49
  Speaker 1: Again, I had huge disagreements in the past, but I
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: like her. But I'm much closer with you.
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: I'll be honest. Okay, much closer.
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: But she contends that you threatened her children. I've watched
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: that video 10 times.
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: I never heard that.
• 6:03
  Speaker 3: All right. I'll address this because it's really manipulative. So
• 6:06
  Speaker 3: I told her on Friday not to mention my business.
• 6:09
  Speaker 3: On Monday, Michael Novikov turned her comment into a video,
• 6:13
  Speaker 3: which he reposted against my business. So I made a
• 6:16
  Speaker 3: video telling Michael Novikov, dude, I'm an immigration lawyer. There's
• 6:19
  Speaker 3: due process. I'm not anti-ICE. And Stephanie, stop talking Lashon Hada,
• 6:24
  Speaker 3: which is bad speaking about other Jews.
• 6:26
  Speaker 5: I told her to listen to her son.
• 6:28
  Speaker 3: I respect her son. I said, go listen to your
• 6:30
  Speaker 3: son's classes on Lashon Hala. God forbid would I ever
• 6:33
  Speaker 3: attack her son. The problem was the reason you saw
• 6:37
  Speaker 3: that video is she called Linda and said, I'm really
• 6:40
  Speaker 3: hurt by this response. You know me, Sid. I don't
• 6:43
  Speaker 3: want to hurt people. I took down the video myself
• 6:45
  Speaker 3: thinking that we had a truce. Overnight, Stephanie took this
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  Speaker 3: out of context clip of mine, posted it on her page,
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  Speaker 3: and posted a video of herself crying as if I'm
• 6:56
  Speaker 3: this horrible bully against women. I'm like, oh, my God.
• 7:00
  Speaker 3: I don't even hate you. I really don't. I really
• 7:03
  Speaker 3: wish her all the best. I don't want to fight
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  Speaker 3: with her over a candidate. These are two politicians. They
• 7:08
  Speaker 3: should fight each other. I, you know, I, I don't
• 7:11
  Speaker 3: hate her. It's sad that she's, you know, going personal
• 7:15
  Speaker 3: for a political race. I had the.
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: Same thing with her with Curtis Sliwa.
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: She was like really getting, she wouldn't listen to me, belligerent.
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: And I like Stephanie, but she knows everything.
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  Speaker 1: About 1% of what I know about politics.
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: Okay, about 1%.
• 7:29
  Speaker 1: So when I was telling her, stay away from Curtis,
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: she was giving me a hard time. Can we fix this?
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: Because I like both of you guys. Can we fix this?
• 7:36
  Speaker 3: Anytime. I have no objection to making peace and shalom.
• 7:40
  Speaker 3: This is, I hate infighting. I hate drama. This is nonsense.
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  Speaker 3: I have no problem fixing it with her. I have
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  Speaker 3: no problem just existing in two separate spheres of the
• 7:51
  Speaker 3: universe either, right? I don't want to fight. Even if
• 7:54
  Speaker 3: she continues to fight, I'm not responding anymore, Sid, because
• 7:58
  Speaker 3: you don't respond to people screaming on the subway.
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: No, that's crazy.
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: So who is winning that race between Novikov and Sabin?
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  Speaker 3: Joey Saban is going to run away with it. It's
• 8:09
  Speaker 3: not even going to be close.
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: Oh, really?
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  Speaker 3: Especially now that Novikov decided to put me on the
• 8:13
  Speaker 3: ballot like a genius that he was in my Syrian
• 8:16
  Speaker 3: Jewish community.
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it doesn't work. That's pretty stupid, actually. And he
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: lives in Brooklyn, that guy? Novikov?
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  Speaker 3: He's in Brooklyn, the 45th district.
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  Speaker 5: He hasn't passed one bill in four years.
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  Speaker 3: And when he was asked, what could you deliver? I
• 8:28
  Speaker 3: have the video.
• 8:29
  Speaker 5: He said, Hope, what could I do?
• 8:31
  Speaker 3: I'm just a Republican. That's how Republicans act. We change things.
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: Right, right, 100%. All right, well, listen, I believed you
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: from the very beginning because I love you.
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: I know you're a very, very good man. You're a very,
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: very decent person. And again, I like Stephanie Benjamin. I'd
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: like the two of you to fix this. But I
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: don't like it when people say things about my friends
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: that are not true. And I do believe in this
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: case that that happened to you more than once.
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  Speaker 2: So fix it.
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: But stop saying things about Abraham Hammer that are just
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: not true. OK, just stop it.
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: A.B., I love you. Good Shabbos.
• 9:02
  Speaker 3: And let's go get Blakeman into office. Let's fix New
• 9:05
  Speaker 3: York State, people. Let's do this.
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: Let's hope so.
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: Tuesday night should be a very big night at the
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: Lannan in Eisenhower Park. That's where the big party is
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: going to be for Bruce Blakeman.
• 9:15
  Speaker 4: Thanks for listening to Sid and Friends in the Morning.
• 9:18
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• 9:21
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• 9:24
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• 9:29
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• 9:32
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• 9:39
  Speaker 4: and X. See you next time for a new episode
• 9:42
  Speaker 4: so you never have to wonder.
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: What the heck is going on here?