A New Jersey Democrat running in the race for a seat in the state’s 12th Congressional District volunteered with a Chicago-based nonprofit with alleged ties to Al-Qaeda, according to multiple reports.
Adam Hamawy, who is running to replace Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-NJ), volunteered in 1994 with a nonprofit called the Benevolence International Foundation, which was reported to have had offices in Bosnia, which were “raided in 2002,” according to Jewish Insider.
One of the offices — which was located in Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia, was described as being “part of the ‘impressive array of offices [that] covertly provided financial and other support for terrorist activities” for Osama bin Laden, in the 9/11 Commission Report, according to the outlet.
Per the outlet, “evidence federal prosecutors proffered in court, and the affidavits of federal agents” revealed that the raids in 2002 on the foundation’s offices “recovered weapons” and “correspondence between the group’s chief executive, Enaam Arnaout” and bin Laden:
According to evidence federal prosecutors proffered in court, and the affidavits of federal agents, the 2002 raids on the Bosnian offices recovered weapons; correspondence between the group’s chief executive, Enaam Arnaout, and bin Laden from the 1980s and 1990s; letters from other Al-Qaida leaders on battles and financial transactions; a photo of Arnaout and bin Laden together; an organizational chart of Al-Qaida; a handwritten list of top donors to the terror organization; copies of never-before-seen documents concerning Al-Qaida’s 1988 founding and its admission policies; and details regarding training camps and Al-Qaida operations in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Sudan.
In an interview with the Newark Star-Ledger in 1996, Hamawy explained that during his time in Bosnia, he had “worked in Sarajevo for 10 days and then the rest in Zenica,” according to the outlet.
“We went out to hospitals around the area and in the mountains to check what supplies they needed and we tried to deliver them,” Hamawy explained.
Hamawy has also previously faced criticism over his “past relationship” with Omar Abdel-Rahman, who is also referred to as the “Blind Sheikh,” according to the outlet.
Hamawy’s relationship with the “Blind Sheikh” is reported to have “spanned a 1991 road trip the two took together to Detroit,” and “Hamawy’s service as the sheikh’s translator for a press conference in which Abdel-Rahman denied any role in the 1993 World Trade Center bombing,” among other things.
In a statement to the New York Post, a spokesperson for Hamawy noted that the Democrat candidate was a “veteran who served” the United States “for twenty years.”
“It must be the final days of the election, because the attacks are getting more desperate than ever,” the spokesperson told the outlet.
The spokesperson added: “The idea that this absurd claim could be seriously entertained about the work of a veteran who served out country for twenty years, was awarded the Global War on Terrorism medal for his service in Iraq, and climbed the rubble at Ground Zero searching for survivors on 9/11 would be laughable if it weren’t so gross and bigoted.”
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