Monroe Man Compares Mild Inconvenience to Living in Auschwitz

When it comes to politics and our Satmar brothers and sisters, it's Heads You Lose, Tails I Win. Just ask Woodbury's MAGA Mayoral Candidate, Brandon Calore, and Monroe's Yossi Dresner.

Pictured Above: All the people you shouldn’t vote for this Fall (Calore, Luciani, Cardone, Houle) are hanging out.

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Ok. So, there is A LOT to talk about. If you don’t mind, today we’re going to briefly touch on two stories, both dealing with claims of antisemitism in Monroe and Woodbury.

Let’s start in Monroe with a man identifying himself as Yossi Dresner.

Apparently They Gave Out Parking Tickets In Concentration Camps

When covering South Blooming Grove, and the un-elected de-facto co-mayors — Isaac Ekstein and Joel Stern — we’ve previously discussed the concept of “a shande far di goyim.”

But since there are new people joining us every day, here’s a quick refresher: This is a Yiddish phrase thrown around by many Jewish families of a certain generation, my grandparents included. That’s where I first heard it.

In the most basic sense, the phrase refers to embarrassing behavior committed by one of our fellow Tribesman that makes us all look bad. Particularly in front of non-Jews.

Mr. Yossi Dresner is guilty of committing a shande far di goyim.

I’m still gathering documents via FOIL on this one. But the long story short is that Mr. Dresner lives on Sutherland Drive in the Village of Monroe — allegedly. He does not appear anywhere in Orange County’s Real Property Database, which is why I said a man identifying himself as “Yossi Dresner” at the start of this story.

Sutherland Drive is where a lot of children often play unsupervised. Photos provided to The Monroe Gazette by concerned neighbors of Mr. Dresner verifies that children routinely play in the street without supervision.

Mr. Dresner, and his associate who joined him in the above video, drive commercial vehicles. (Buses, to be more specific.) The operation of these buses on Village Streets pose a danger to these children, as both the Town of Monroe and Village of Monroe residents have a well documented problem with the behavior of private school bus drivers. (Just ask the people on Hawxhurst Road.)

Mr. Dresner claims he’s being targeted by the Village of Monroe for being “a Jew” and likened receiving parking tickets and other notices of violation by the Village of Monroe Police Department to “living in Auschwitz.”

Yes. You read that right. A man parking a large bus, and operating it, on a street where children play unsupervised, potentially putting them in danger, is comparing receiving notices from the Village Police to living in a concentration camp.

Also if you stick around to the end of the meeting, you can hear Mr. Dresner’s associate try to find a way out of paying for these tickets and other notices of violation they’ve received for parking their buses on the street. So much for “Dina d'malkhuta dina” or “The Law of the Land is the Law” which is a core tenet of the Halakha.

Actually, I’d like to take a moment to thank Village Trustee Andrew Ferraro, because he has the best response to this request from Dresner and his associate, which is essentially what I just said: The law of the land is the law.

And while I recognize that some of our Haredi brothers and sisters believe they live in exile, and therefore no laws apply to them because they don’t recognize living in the United States or the State of New York, that’s not something anyone should put up with. It’s been an excuse for lawlessness for far too long — often excused and enabled by New York State’s Democratic party — and we can’t have a functional society when ANY group of people decides that the rules and laws don’t apply to them.

Either everyone counts, or nobody counts.

Either the laws apply to everyone equally, or they don’t apply at all.

It can’t be both.

Speaking of which, how’s life under the fascist Trump regime treating you?

It’s Been Fifty Years Of This Bullshit

You can see Mr. Dresner approach the podium at 41:38. At 47:00 he claims he feels to be targeted as “a Jew” and then a few seconds later you can hear Mr. Dresner say he feels like he’s living in Auschwitz.

Now, if you don’t live in Southern Orange County, or Rockland, or Sullivan, you may not be familiar with this tactic.

You may not even be familiar with the Satmar, who are one of over thirty different kinds of Haredi Jewish communities. But if you do live in our area, you know very well that there is a factual, and well documented pattern over the last fifty years that goes like this: “I didn’t get what I want, therefore, you’re antisemitic.” or “You did something I don’t like, therefore, you are antisemitic.”

Constantly.

For fifty years.

If you read any book about the Satmar or the creation of the Village of Kiryas Joel, you will hear stories from the 1970s in Monroe that go exactly like that. “I didn’t get what I wanted with this building permit. It’s antisemitism.” “This annexation request didn’t go my way, it’s antisemitism.” “I’m running an illegal boarding house, or day care center, and the Town shut me down. That’s antisemitism.”

And I’m honestly tired of it. I do not doubt that antisemitism exists. I do not doubt that there have been instances of antisemitism in any of these communities. Of course it does! Of course there are! I’ve experienced it myself here as a resident of Southern Orange County. But. I also feel, as Jews, we have a moral and ethical obligation to call this nonsense out. Because there’s a difference between actual discrimination, and claiming discrimination because you didn’t get what you wanted.

Case in point: Getting a parking ticket is not akin to living in a Concentration Camp.

If you want to see what a concentration camp looks like, you’re welcome to visit the new one they just opened in Florida. Or the CECOT in El Salvador. Or any of the new ones that open up in “Red” States in the not too distant future because of the funding provided for it within the MAGA Murder Bill. (Remember Kids, there’s no such thing as a Red State. There are occupied states, and states where people can mostly vote without any hassle. But don’t worry, because we have an upcoming story about how the Trump DOJ is already looking to fuck around with the 2026 elections here in New York.)

Depending on your interpretation of the Talmud and the Torah, you may also have a religious obligation to call out bad behavior by your fellow Jews, especially when it’s done to, or in front of, non-Jews.

But despite this obligation, you get organizations like the Jewish Federation of Greater Orange County who don’t want to comment on things like Mr. Dresner’s comments (I asked.)

You also get the local synagogues who don’t want to comment on Mr. Dresner’s comments (I also asked.)

And so, usually, what happens is, Mr. Dresner’s reprehensible comments go unaddressed. So, he gets away with it.

Thankfully, the Monroe Village Board was not having any of Mr. Dresner’s bullshit.

And this time, there was a Monroe resident there to call him out too.

This time, Carol Sotiropoulos, was in attendance. And Carol, as a member of Indivisible Monroe, did not let that shit slide either. Providing an example all of my fellow Jews in the region should follow.

She told The Monroe Gazette that she was attending the meeting, and that she was “infuriated by the comparison of Monroe to Auschwitz.” In the video, you can hear Mrs. Sotiropoulos confront Mr. Dresner at the end, saying his remarks were insulting to members of her own family who perished in Auschwitz, as well as insulting to Monroe.

Mr. Dresner can be seen dismissing Mrs. Sotiropoulos, who audibly responded to Mr. Dresner’s initial comparison of the Village of Monroe to Auschwitz, in the above video. In fact, Mrs. Sotiropoulos was at the meeting to talk about ICE and the legitimate concentration camps — as defined by the US Holocaust Museum — and Mr. Dresner said, in so many words, that there was little difference between what Mrs. Sotiropoulos was saying about actual concentration camps to what he was describing in the Village of Monroe.

So, I want to take a moment to publicly thank Carol Sotiropoulos for doing what the Jewish Federation of Orange County refused to do, and what other synagoges have refused to do, and what many of my fellow Jews have refused to do over the last fifty years in Southern Orange County: Call this bullshit out.

If there’s actual anti-semitism to call out, it will be called out. But just as vociferously, when there are claims of anti-semitism that are being made for no other reason than self-interest and, as the story below goes, for personal gain, that needs to be called out too.

When everything is anti-semitism, according to the man who coined the modern definition of the term, nothing is.

My grandmother’s family was wiped out by the Nazis. So I have no problem telling Mr. Dresner to go fuck himself.

And if you’re a fellow Jew, you have a moral obligation to tell him to do the same.

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It’s Not Anti-Semitic To Talk About Facts, It Is Anti-Semitic to Post Shit Like This

Pictured above is a member of the Town of Woodbury Democratic Committee, Amidee Haviland, using a decades old anti-Semitic dog whistle. You see, with the exception of MAGA Mayoral Candidate, Brandon Calore, nobody runs around saying “THE JEWS" in our area. Nobody with a brain anyway, which is something that remains questionable where Mr. Calore is concerned. Instead they say “Special Interest Group.”

I can factually say this, because if you look at the propaganda being put out by Brandon Calore’s (allegedly) unpaid campaign manager — and child labor — Elias Cunningham, Mr. Calore is always wearing glasses. Because Calore’s trying to convince you he can read. The jury is still out on that one.

(I don’t know if Mr. Cunningham can read either. He has all the looks of a one of those weird home schooled kids because Mommy and Daddy saw “Sovereign” and decided Nick Offerman’s character had a lot of great ideas. I didn’t say that was true. I am only saying that, based on the constant online trolling done by Mr. Cunningham, you wouldn’t be wrong to have that impression. Actually, any time you see Cunningham show up to troll people, just call him Junior Mitts. Since everything he says reads like a Tim Mitts Facebook post with the spellcheck turned on.)

Anyway …

Last Fall, Mr. Calore — who is currently still a Woodbury Town Board member despite being investigated for corruption as it relates to his business relationship with parties in South Blooming Grove by the Orange County Board of Ethics — loudly told anyone he could that THE JEWS were the reason Calore Campaign Donor, Tyler Etzel Jr., and Calore Campaign Donor John Keleman, lost to current Woodbury Village Trustees Susan Fries-Ciriello and Vic Ferrarelli.

If one was to look at the district by district breakdown of the Fall 2024 election in Woodbury; however, they would see that the majority Satmar neighborhoods (Woodbury Junction, Highland Lake Estates, Country Crossing) came out for Mr. Etzel Jr. and Mr. Keleman. Not Fries-Ciriello and Ferrarelli.

But wouldn’t you know it, our Satmar brothers and sisters in Woodbury Junction, according to records obtained from the Orange County Board of Elections, factually came out for Mr. Calore in the June 2025 Woodbury Mayoral Primary.

Given that Calore won by about 70 votes, we can also factually say that our Satmar brothers and sisters made up the difference in Mr. Calore winning the primary.

Math doesn’t lie. But Brandon Calore does.

Except, Mr. Calore doesn’t want to talk about that.

And Mr. Calore’s friends in the Woodbury Town Democratic Committee (otherwise known more formally as the Committee to Elect Woodbury Democrats), are telling people the opposite. This is called gaslighting.

Which is what you can see Mrs. Haviland doing in the above screenshot. So, as always, don’t take my word for it. Use the eyes and brain Hashem gave you.

In our area, the local (MAGA) Republicans are just fucking stupid. They are. They’re running around tripping over their own dicks. Constantly. I don’t think much about them, because they’re about to experience a tidal wave of outrage and anger at the ballot box this November. And as always, I am NOT talking about Republicans. I am talking SPECIFICALLY about MAGA REPUBLICANS. How do you know if someone is still MAGA? Ask them if they believe Trump’s claims that the Jeffrey Epstein files don’t exist.

Actually, the test to see if someone is MAGA or not is this: Ask them if it’s possible Fox News and Donald Trump is lying to them. About anything. If the answer is no, you got yourself a Far Right Nut Bag MAGA Weirdo.

If the answer is yes, you still got someone with a functional brain that just so happens to be a Republican, and that’s totally fine. I’m not here to fight you. I am here to fight the 20% or so of you that are actively pushing for a fascist takeover of the United States of America. I want my flag back. I want my country back. And fuck you if you’re going to stand in the way and promote the creation of concentration camps where over 65% of the people imprisoned haven’t committed any sort of crime at all.

I do worry about the local Democrats.

Because a lot of them aren’t stupid. They’re just shitty people. The Monroe Town Democratic Committee is run by shitty people who spent months gaslighting residents about who their endorsed candidates were. One of which I’m about to go to a judge and ask to file charges against for second degree harassment. (Don’t think for a second that I forgot about Mrs. Kiesel.)

The Woodbury Democratic Committee is the same. It’s just shitty people who figure you don’t know any better, and as long as you don’t know they’re shitty, you’re going to vote for them no matter what because the MAGA Republicans are a bunch of stupid fascists who are incapable of governing.

That’s a big concern this Fall. That people are going to come out and vote all Democratic all the way, without realizing that some of those Democrats (Freiband and Fabbro in particular) are actually not what you think they are. Proof? Ask Mr. Fabbro and Freiband if they attended the Hands Off Protest. Or the No Kings Rally. Or the Good Trouble Lives On Event happening today as I write this. An actual Democrat would be at those events. As someone who helps organize the Monroe Indivisible Protests, I haven’t seen either of those dumb shits at any protest.

So this here is the other side of the coin in Southern Orange County, and Rockland, and Sullivan.

On one side, you have our Satmar brothers and sisters who will claim antisemitism over anything and everything, and go so far as to compare parking tickets and moving violations to living in a concentration camp.

And on the other side, you have opportunistic, pro-real estate developer candidates like State Senator James G. Skoufis, and his pal Brandon Calore, claim antisemitism whenever questions are asked about why our Satmar brothers and sisters voted the way that they did.

If this sounds familiar to our national readers, it should. Because this is what you get with Israel all the time. You can’t question Israel’s continued genocide in Gaza, because “that’s antisemitism.” Or more often than not, you get the response, “But October 7th!” Yes. I know there was a terrorist attack. It was terrible. Everyone responsible for it should be brought to justice. But that’s not what happened. We got vengeance instead. And you don’t need to look too far here in the United States to see what vengeance gets you, because 9/11 is how we got ICE and Homeland Security.

See how that shit works?

And if you don’t, ask any Iraq or Afghanistan vet what they were over there fighting for. Because Bin Laden skipped town after Tora Bora in 2001, after we wiped out most of Al-Qaeda.

That’s what vengeance does. Justice would have been wiping out Al-Qaeda and going home. Vengeance was hanging out in Afghanistan for twenty years, and invading Iraq for zero reason. Not to mention terrorizing and discriminating against people at home because everyone thought anyone with a funny sounding name was a terrorist.

So that’s the situation here politically.

Heads: You can claim antisemitism, regardless of whether or not it’s true.

Tails: You can claim antisemitism in order to further your own political agenda.

Any criticism is silenced. You can’t ask questions. You can’t fact check. That’s the only coin you got.

It’s the exact pretense the Trump regime is using to bully and harass colleges and universities nationwide, and to silence any dissent concerning the continued funding and arming of Netanyahu’s war crimes.

Heads you lose, Tails I win. And Don’t Ask About Those Epstein Files …

And again, a lot of this happens because my fellow Jews allow it to happen. We don’t speak up. Instead, Mrs. Amidee Haviland’s comments go unchecked the same way Mr. Dresner’s comments go unchecked. (Mrs. Haviland did not respond to a request for comment about her Facebook post.)

The same way Israel’s actions go unchecked. Because we’ve allowed claims of antisemitism to be weaponized as a way to silence any sort of dissent or criticism.

Now, if you’re wondering what Mr. Calore offered our Satmar friends in Woodbury Junction, I’m still gathering information on it. But if the first thought you had concerned the buffer space that was meant to keep the neighborhood from being annexed into the neighboring City of Kiryas Joel, you’re on the right path.

Mr. Calore should be asked repeatedly at Woodbury Town Board meetings about what promises he made to local real estate developers concerning further annexation of Town and Village land into the City of Kiryas Joel. Not for the benefit of all people in our community, but for the specific benefit of wealthy real estate developers.

Unfortunately for Southern Orange County residents, you don’t have Democrats and Republicans representing you. You have people working for the real estate developers, and people working against the real estate developers. Just take a close look at Nininger Road, and remember that’s all courtesy of Tony Cardone, Dorey Houle, and their running mate, Steve Thau.

(Actually, Mr. Thau lost the last time he ran for the Monroe Town Board, and because the local Republican party is fresh out of ideas, they’re just running the same loser again.

God save us from Dorey Houle vs. James Skoufis Round 3. Actually, I keep joking I’m going to run against Skoufis, but let me tell you something: If it’s legit Houle vs. Skoufis Part 3, I will 100% run against both those corrupt freaks on a third party ballot line. I promise you that. I don’t want to run. I have zero interest in it, but I can’t sit here and do nothing either. I just got done telling you about moral and ethical obligations. It would be a sin to sit here and let those freaks battle it out again during a time when over a million New Yorkers are about to lose their health insurance, and tens of thousands more are going to lose access to food. Something neither Houle or Skoufis want to fix. Fuck that.)

If you have any doubt about where Mr. Calore’s allegiances are, I can prove it. On May 17th, in the only email Mr. Calore ever responded to from The Monroe Gazette, he said the following:

My campaign is one for Woodbury Mayor. It's flattering that you believe I have done such a good job that I must have some sort of massive network. The reality is, Brandon, my campaign is self-funded by myself, small local donations, and family.

First of all, it’s BJ. Not Brandon. Only my ex-wife can call me Brandon.

Second, I’ll point out here real quick that, in an upcoming story, we’re going to talk about how Mr. Calore — and Woodbury Town Supervisor, Kathryn Luciani, and Woodbury Town Councilwoman Kelly Rinaldi — held a fundraiser at Annie McGuinness’s A Better Place Bar and Grill.

A place on Route 32 that’s been accused by both former employees and Woodbury residents of routinely hosting meetings of a violent gang of white supremacists. Miss Mcguinness declined to answer our questions. One of those questions concerned whether or not she saw Brandon Calore at any of the Proud Boys meetings she is alleged by former employees and Woodbury residents to have hosted at her establishment. For a long time, I couldn’t talk to you about A Better Place Bar & Grill, but now that the Town Supervisor, a Town Councilperson, and a fellow Town Councilperson running for Woodbury Mayor held a fundraiser at the establishment, I can talk about it all I want.

It’s news now, baby!

So, just so we’re all on the same page here: Mr. Brandon Calore didn’t respond to questions about whether or not he was a member of a violent gang of white supremacists, and whether or not he condemns the presence of such a group in our community.

But he DID respond to a questions asking about who’s funding his campaign. A day after receiving a few thousand dollars from Woodbury Town Supervisor Kathyrn Luciani. And the response was a lie.

Me Thinks Doth Protest too Much, and all that jazz.

So, this is a long way of saying I can factually call Brandon Calore a liar. He claimed his campaign is mostly self-funded, but it’s not. He lied to all of you, because he thinks you’re stupid. Because his campaign manager thinks you’re stupid. That’s how little Brandon Calore & Elias Cunningham think of you. To them, you’re what Trump called our troops: Suckers and Losers.

Here’s where it currently stands in terms of donations to the Brandon Calore Campaign:

-Tyler Etzel Jr., for example, donated $300 to Mr. Calore. Mr. Keleman donated $50. I guess Mr. Keleman has buyers remorse from switching from the Republicans to the Democrats to run with Mr. Etzel, but again, you don’t have Democrats and Republicans in Southern Orange County.

You have people working for the real estate developers like Wayne Corts, and those who don’t. Much like you do nationally. Kelemen just helped to highlight that fact.

You have MAGA Republicans who do whatever Trump says, and you have Corporate Democrats who do whatever The Money says. There’s no in between. Nobody’s representing you.

And if you doubt that last point about the Democrats, you should know I’ve called Congressman Pat Ryan’s office twice, over the span of a month, asking for his position on HJR54 (The “We The People Amendment.”)

The first time I called, I wanted to know the Congressman’s position on supporting an amendment to the constitution overturning Citizen’s United, which would get rid of most, but not all, of the corporate money in our elections. His office said they didn’t know his position.

So I called again just prior to writing this article, over a month later. His office said they STILL didn’t know his position, which means he doesn’t support the amendment.

So Congressman Pat Ryan, much like House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, are all on the side of “We don’t like Trump, but we’re not going to solve the problems that created Trump in the first place.” Because then they’d lose out on all that sweet, sweet AIPAC money. From 2023-2024, Congressman Pat Ryan’s top campaign contributor was AIPAC — The American Israel Public Affairs Committee — at a grand total of $220,662. He also took in $54,513 from Peter Thiel’s Palantir Technologies.

Once again, you can’t trust the Democrats.

Republicans will lie right to your face.

Democrats will wait until your back is turned, and the second it is, they’ll go do some shady shit. Just ask Senator Kirsten Gillibrand about her support for the crypto industry’s GENIUS Act.

Brandon Calore’s “Self-Funded” Campaign

Fellow MAGA candidate — and a man also using unpaid child labor for his Town Supervisor Campaign — Tony Cardone donated $99. Dorey Houle, who spent nearly a half-million dollars on racist dog whistle TV ads for her failed state senate campaign, gave $51.

Dorey, you have money for racist TV ads, but not the guy who loves watching racist TV ads? Really?

Orange County Sheriff Paul Arteta donated $200

Goshen Town Supervisor Joseph Betro donated $100

Monroe Town Councilman — and man who’s son was accused of threatening to murder Satmar men at the Monroe Target in order to gain views on TikTok — Sal Scancerello, donated $95 (I also understand Sal may be in some financial trouble, which is also the subject of an upcoming story as it relates to his business dealings in the Village of Monroe.)

South Blooming Grove’s Scott Ugell donated $100, and that alone should be disqualifying for Calore among Woodbury residents. Because seriously. Some of you have been running around saying, “Woodbury is the next South Blooming Grove!” And some of you who said that are the SAME PEOPLE SUPPORTING BRANDON CALORE. And here is direct evidence of a connection between SBG and Woodbury. (Remember how I told you the trick to identifying MAGA? Well it works locally too. If you don’t think there’s a connection between Calore and South Blooming Grove, you don’t have a functioning brain, and you might just be MAGA. Congratulations, I guess.)

Woodbury Deputy Town Supervisor, Councilwoman Gretchen Weiners, donated $125

MAGA Woodbury Planning Board member, Tom DeLuca — whom I all warned you about months ago — gave Calore $300. So, maybe next time believe me when I tell you about someone.

MAGA State Senator, Bill Weber, also donated $100. (Bill is constantly licking Trump’s boots in the comments section of Congressman Mike Lawler’s Facebook Page.)

And, yes, Mr. Calore did receive a number of donations from our Satmar brothers and sisters, including Mr. Pinchas Glauber. Mr. Glauber is Mr. Calore’s largest single, individual donor (although Tom DeLuca and Tyler Etzel JR. aren’t far behind him.)

So, while I don’t want to spend too much time on this point, it’s factually correct to say there were some Satmar donors to the Calore campaign. That’s ok. You can do whatever you want with your money. But what you can’t do is run around and tell people “THE JEWS” are supporting your opponents when they’re not factually doing so, and claim antisemitism when someone raises this point about your own campaign.

Of the nearly $12,000 Mr. Calore has raised thus far, only $2,257 came from either Mr. Calore himself or his family.

Mr. Calore received more money from Woodbury Town Supervisor Katrhyn Luciani, $3,316.1 then he received from anyone in his family or that he himself put into his campaign.

This campaign transfer from Friends of Luciani is the single largest campaign contribution received by Calore, and came a DAY BEFORE he wrote and said nobody was funding his campaign except himself, his family, and small donors.

Womp Womp.

From Satmar donors, Mr. Calore received $2,594.55, which is also more than what either he or his family put into his campaign, despite Mr. Calore’s statements to the contrary.

Hence, “Anti-Semite Endorsed By United Jewish Community of Woodbury” which Mr. Calore also lied and told people wasn’t real when asked about those flyers.

There’s always more to say, but The Math Doesn’t Lie. But Brandon Calore does.

I’ll be back real soon. Pardon any typos if you’re reading the email version of this post. I always go back and correct them, but it’s hard to catch the first time through, and I’m writing this in a hurry.

I have a 17 page podcast transcript to edit, and a new lawsuit to file against the Village of South Blooming Grove.

-BJ