New Jersey Democratic congressional hopeful Adam Hamawy is facing outrage over his past work tied to the terror group Al-Qaeda. Hamawy's past relationship with Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman, a late mastermind of the 1993 World Trade Center bombing known as the 'blind sheikh,' has been thrust into the limelight after a recent report from Jewish Insider.
Hamawy served as the sheikh's translator during a press conference in which the terrorist mastermind denied involvement with the 1993 World Trade Center attack. He also translated for the sheikh during his 1995 trial, and even served as a defense witness during proceedings. Abdel-Rahman was ultimately convicted of seditious conspiracy for plotting the attacks and died in federal prison in 2017.
Hamawy's connection to the World Trade Center bombing mastermind has incensed Republicans. 'Democrats are now running actual terrorists for Congress. Surprising? No. Disappointing? Yes,' said Montana Republican Senator Tim Sheehy.
But it's not scaring away his top Democratic backers, including Congresswomen Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar - and Independent Senator Bernie Sanders. The Daily Mail reached out to their offices for comment.
Hamawy's volunteer work in the early 1990s for the Benevolence International Foundation, a group later shuttered for providing 'logistical support' to Al-Qaeda, is also exposed in the Jewish Insider report. He admitted in a past interview that he went to Bosnia to help the foundation's relief efforts, spending time in Sarajevo and Zenica while on a trip. Years later in 2002, Bosnian authorities raided the Sarajevo and Zenica offices of the Benevolence International Foundation, where they discovered the office was connected to Al-Qaeda's global network.
The 9/11 Commission Report later said the Bosnian Al-Qaeda base was a part of an 'impressive array of offices [that] covertly provided financial and other support for terrorist activities.' Weapons and correspondence between the benevolent group's former top executive, Enaam Arnaout, and Osama bin Laden were discovered at the office. US federal prosecutors alleged in a case against Benevolence International that Al-Qaeda deployed representatives to the Balkans in the early 1990s 'to establish a base for operations in Europe.'
A 1996 interview with Hamawy in the Newark Star-Ledger sheds light on the future candidate's time in Bosnia. 'I worked in Sarajevo for 10 days and then the rest in Zenica, a large regional center in central Bosnia,' Hamawy, fresh out of medical school, told the paper at the time. 'We went out to hospitals around the area and in the mountains to check what supplies they needed and we tried to deliver them.' The trip lasted about five weeks total.
The Democratic hopeful has run on a pro-Palestinian platform while condemning Israeli interest group AIPAC. Hamawy is the heavy favorite to win the June 2 primary for New Jersey's 12th congressional district. According to prediction site Kalshi, Hamawy had a 90 percent chance of winning the primary as of 3:00 pm ET on Wednesday. Hamawy and a crowded field of Democratic candidates are running to succeed retiring Congresswoman Bonnie Watson Coleman, who has held the seat since 2015.
