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He loves a parade, but the feeling isn’t entirely mutual.
Mayoral hopeful Anthony Weiner received a mixed reception as he marched in the Israel Day Parade yesterday (pictured), lustily booed at stops along Fifth Avenue — all while maintaining a manic grin wider than the Gulf of Suez.
“He abused the rights of women!” jeered Staten Islander Paul Lebowitz, referring to sexually explicit pictures Weiner tweeted of himself, forcing his resignation from Congress in 2011.
“He abused women all over New York City and all over the world by doing what he did. He has no right to be here. He doesn’t represent New York,” Lebowitz added.
“We elect people for their morals. When you’re immoral, you don’t belong in a position of power or to be elected by the people,” added Phil Rosenblatt. “Do I send naked pictures of myself to other people? I don’t think so.”
Not everyone rained on Weiner’s parade.
“What he does in his private life and whatever else he’s done in the past, I’m willing to overlook for the sake of New York City,” said supporter Jack Gindi of Brooklyn.
But the string-bean-thin pol — who clutched a megaphone in one hand and an Israeli flag in the other — appeared immune to any jeers, hot-dogging it for the 30,000 strong who lined the avenue from 57th to 74th streets.
“I’m kind of like a thoroughbred in a stable ready to hit the starting line. The support has been remarkable,” he crowed. Weiner also touted his credentials as an unapologetic supporter of Israel.
“When people describe me as being hawkish on Israel, I don’t disagree,” he said. “I mean, I think there should be zero space between the Israeli imperatives in that part of the world and what US policy should be. Frankly, they are an island of democracy in a sea of tyrannical regimes.”
Weiner, the lone Jewish candidate in a tightening race, said that he answers to a higher authority — voters.
“I’ve represented a district that had a heavy Jewish population for my entire career,” he said. “The things I’m talking about in this campaign are unifying themes. I think that it doesn’t matter where you live, it doesn’t matter what your faith is — you probably believe that this city has become harder for the middle class to live in.”
Weiner was among many pols, including chief rival Christine Quinn, at the parade.
Later, he held a rally at a Flatiron eatery owned by his brother, Jason, telling about 100 volunteers who will collect the 3,750 signatures needed to get him on the ballot that this is the “beginning of the race.”
“This is where individual citizens go out and visit other citizens and explain to them why they think their candidate, Anthony Weiner, is the one for them,” he said.
Meanwhile, Weiner was grilled yesterday by his successor, former GOP Rep. Bob Turner.
Turner — who is trying to woo Police Commissioner Ray Kelly to enter the mayoral race — said Weiner should be nowhere near the keys to City Hall.
Additional reporting by Kenneth Garger and Carl Campanile