El-Sayed Has ‘Struggles’ With the Question of Whether Israel Should Be a Jewish State
Abdul El‑Sayed, a Democrat candidate for the U.S. Senate in Michigan, says he has a tough time deciding whether Israel should be a Jewish state.
The candidate’s remarks come as anti‑Israel activists and state sponsors of terrorism, such as Hamas and Iran, have repeatedly waged violence against the state of Israel for being a Jewish state.
“I often struggle with the question that people ask in this particular scenario, because what they now ask is, ‘Do you believe in the right of Israel to exist as a Jewish state,’ which, to me, forces the question of a definition of what a Jewish state means,” he said at a campaign event, according to a recording obtained by Jewish Insider.
He then added that Israel’s right to exist overlooks “the rights of people who’ve been displaced by Israeli action” dating back to 1948.
“[Israel] exists as it stands, but nobody ever asked me about the right of Palestine to exist, because it doesn’t exist,” he continued. “And so I just push back on the characterization here.”
During his remarks, El‑Sayed redirected the question, saying that if the person asking it cannot be specific, he is not inclined to answer.
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“I need folks who want to ask me that question [to explain] what it is that they mean by that, and how that is consistent with any form of liberal values that we say we believe in here in the United States.”
El‑Sayed has pulled similar dodges in the past.
Earlier this year, a staff writer for The Free Press, Olivia Reingold, asked the Democrat candidate whether Israel has a right to exist as a Jewish state.
El‑Sayed replied by asking Reingold, “What do you mean by a ‘Jewish state’?”
Before she could answer, he cut her off and said, “If you can’t define the question, I’m not going to answer your question.”
El‑Sayed’s seemingly anti‑Israel rhetoric came months after the candidate campaigned at Michigan State University with left‑wing streamer Hasan Piker, who previously said, “America deserved 9/11.”
After the killing of Iran’s supreme leader, a leaked recording also showed El‑Sayed telling his campaign staffers that he did not want to condemn the deceased leader because “a lot of people in Dearborn are sad.”
In that same leaked recording, El-Sayed downplayed the attempted terrorist attack of Jewish synagogue in Michigan, justifying it by saying that the attacker was filled with rightful rage.
“A week earlier, an airstrike killed his niece and nephew. Imagine if that had never happened. Imagine there was no war in Iran. Imagine if there were no airstrikes in Lebanon. Imagine if his family had never died,” El-Sayed said after Lebanese-born Ayman Mohamad Ghazali, who became a naturalized U.S. citizen in 2016, drove his car into Temple Israel synagogue on March 12. “We can and must condemn the attack on Temple Israel, and we can and must condemn the violence 6,000 miles away.”
Polls show El-Sayed currently leads his Democrat rivals for the Senate nomination, with his support growing. Michigan holds its primary Aug. 4, with the winner likely facing Republican Mike Rogers.
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