Just hours after Fernando Ferrer won the Democratic primary for mayor, beating back a late surge by Rep. Anthony Weiner, his possible strategy to pick up Jewish votes in an uphill battle to unseat Mayor Michael Bloomberg was coming into sharper relief.

Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, who endorsed Ferrer in the primary and campaigned with him on the Lower East Side on election day, said he would urge Ferrer to talk to Jewish audiences about education and reassure the public that although he would be the city’s first Hispanic mayor, he would be a leader for the entire city.

“He has to make people comfortable that in a Ferrer administration, everybody will be part of it,” said Silver. “His track record in the Bronx was that he was very evenhanded and reached out to the Jewish community on many issues. He will have to show how he will keep a safe city, improve the education system, keep the economy viable. Education resonates in the Jewish community.”

Political consultant Hank Sheinkopf, who worked for Ferrer in 1997, offered that Ferrer must work to “get some Orthodox people around him and prove to people in the outer boroughs that they can trust him. Orthodox outnumbers non-Orthodox in the city.”

But it remained to be seen whether the considerable Jewish support Weiner commanded – as high as two-thirds of Tuesday’s vote by some estimates – can be transferred to Ferrer.

“I’m going to do all I can to help Freddy,” Weiner said at a noon press conference Wednesday hours after he promised a spirited runoff campaign if the counting of paper ballots kept the former Bronx borough president under the needed 40 percent.

In Ferrer’s Bronx neighborhood of Riverdale, divisions still remain over a fractious 2000 congressional race in which Ferrer was neutral, and on Wednesday the winner of that contest did not rule out he and others supporting Bloomberg.

“I have never in my career supported a Republican,” said Rep. Eliot Engel, who was one of several Riverdale leaders to back Weiner in the primary. “I have to give it a lot of thought. I think a lot is going to depend in the way [Ferrer] conducts himself between now and the election. He talked about two New Yorks. People are going to want to see if they are included in his vision of New York.”

Support for Weiner, who was at 29 percent of the vote Wednesday, had surged in recent weeks as the campaigns of candidates Gifford Miller and C. Virginia Fields foundered. Weiner’s concession suggested the strong desire by his party to avoid a costly and fractious runoff that helped put Bloomberg into office four years ago.

Ferrer now stands to inherit the political operations and resources of all three of his primary rivals, with elected leaders from across ethnic and geographic lines helping him throughout the city.

Although a runoff might have benefited Bloomberg by forcing the candidates to undergo another two weeks of expensive combat, he may also gain because Ferrer does not command the same support as Weiner among non-Hispanic whites, including Jews.

Ferrer does, however, have the overwhelming support of Hispanics, the city’s fastest growing ethnic group and one the mayor has aggressively courted.

In his bid for Jewish votes, Sheinkopf said Ferrer will find an obstacle in the support of the Rev. Al Sharpton, who remains an unfavorable figure among many Jews and other whites because of his past role in race-motivated controversies.

“Sharpton is now the issue,” said Sheinkopf. “He is a problem with Jews that [Ferrer] will have to work to overcome.”

Silver, however, believes Sharpton is a non-issue.

“I think most reasonable people understand that you need everyone’s support when you’re running and you take it wherever you can get it,” Silver said.

Brooklyn Assemblyman Dov Hikind, who is backing Bloomberg, said he was concerned that apathy and a sense of inevitability of the mayor’s re-election could cause low Jewish turnout in his and other Jewish areas.

“The biggest issue for the mayor is people coming out to vote, people being excited about the race,” said Hikind. “A lot has to be done to literally schlep people out of their homes. If the black and Latino communities really come together, this could be a real race.”

Sensing a threat to Ferrer’s winning the primary above 40 percent, a feat with which Sharpton clearly wanted to be associated, Sharpton blasted Weiner last week for supporting the Iraq war, in which a large share of the casualties have been black and Latino, and the Patriot Act, which critics claim promotes discrimination and racial profiling. That raised the prospect of the match-up turning ugly, particularly if Sharpton critics tried to make him a centerpiece of the campaign, as was the case in 2001, with subsequent divisions imploding nominee Mark Green’s candidacy.

By bowing gracefully out of a race he was unlikely to win anyway because of Ferrer’s solid minority backing, Weiner – who was often critical of his own party and what he called its “stale” ideas – can mend fences and score points with party leaders and loyalists.

“It allows the party to move forward,” said Weiner. “Others might not have done that.”

Weiner’s late rally may have had more to do with the campaigns of his opponents, but few would disagree that his campaign was well run and avoided debacles, and that he found ways to separate himself from the pack.

“He’s the uncola,” said Democratic political consultant Norman Adler, referring to the 7-Up slogan that defined the soft drink by what it wasn’t. “He’s not from Manhattan, he’s not a minority. He’s not viewed as a city politician because he’s in Washington, too. He seemed to be a little more innovative in his communication with voters and wasn’t afraid to confront the other Democrats when everyone else was playing nice. Voters appreciated that.”

Campaigning Tuesday on the Lower East Side, Ferrer said he was proud of the overall tone of the primary.

“People wanted a mud-wrestling contest, but I’m glad we disappointed them,” he said.

It remains to be seen if that will last in the general election.