OPINION:
Voters should have serious concerns about Michigan’s Democratic Senate nominee, Abdul El-Sayed, and his family’s reported views about the Muslim Brotherhood.
Appearing on “Meet the Press” on Oct. 11, Mr. El-Sayed was asked by NBC’s Kristen Welker whether his family had ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. “No,” Mr. El-Sayed replied, adding that his Republican opponent, former Rep. Mike Rogers, was making an Islamophobic attack on him and his family.
If the allegations constitute Islamophobia, that must make Mr. El-Sayed’s half sister, Eman Abdelhadi, an Islamophobe.
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In a 2012 post, Ms. Abdelhadi disclosed, “Had an amazing talk with my mom about her activism in the Muslim Brotherhood while she was in college during the ’70s.” In another 2012 post, Ms. Abdelhadi, a professor at the University of Chicago, revealed, “My family has long been MB” — for Muslim Brotherhood.
Mr. El-Sayed and Ms. Abdelhadi’s mother, Fatten Elkomy, worked for the Islamic American Relief Agency, which was sanctioned for funding al Qaeda. The Treasury Department named the group a specially designated terrorist organization in 2004 for providing financial and logistical support to terrorist groups, including al Qaeda and Hamas. Court documents filed by U.S. officials named Ms. Elkomy more than a dozen times in connection with the cash transfers, according to The Washington Free Beacon.
In a third 2013 post, Mr. El-Sayed’s half sister wrote, “Praying for all my family that supports the MB in Egypt. Lie low. Stay safe.”
Why “lie low”? Because Egypt is one of several Muslim countries — including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain — in which the Muslim Brotherhood is banned as a terrorist organization.
Mr. El-Sayed himself signed a 2012 open letter supporting the short-lived regime of Mohamed Morsi, the Muslim Brotherhood president of Egypt. A year earlier, he penned a column in The Huffington Post urging the Obama administration to support Egypt’s anti-regime protesters and arguing that fears of Egypt falling to the Muslim Brotherhood should not prevent the U.S. from backing democracy.
The Muslim Brotherhood, which was established in Egypt in 1928, views Islam not just as a religion but also as a system of government. It believes Islam should rule the world, and it has fomented terrorism toward that end.
Mr. El-Sayed’s father-in-law, Tayeb Jukaku, is on the board of the Islamic Society of North America, known as the public face of the Muslim Brotherhood in the United States. The group was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the landmark 2007 terrorist financing trial of the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development. Mr. Jukaku has donated at least $300,000 to a pro-El-Sayed super PAC.
Mr. El-Sayed’s political positions align with those of the Brotherhood. He opposes the war with Iran, demands the end of all U.S. aid to Israel and refuses to even say whether he believes Israel has a right to exist.
When he was asked by an interviewer which posed a greater threat to America — Israel or Iran — Mr. El-Sayed again refused to answer.
Israel is our staunchest ally in the Middle East. Iran, on the other hand, has waged nonstop war on the United States since 1979, either alone or via proxies.
Sen. Ted Cruz, Texas Republican, predicted that Mr. El-Sayed’s election would pose an “acute national security risk.” Mr. Cruz said, “I believe if Abdul El-Sayed has access to classified information, that will endanger the lives of servicemen and women.”
This is not about Islamophobia. Are Egypt and the UAE Islamophobic? These kinds of viewpoints pose a clear and present danger to our national security.
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