Michigan leftist U.S. Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed (D), who is a Muslim, apologized Saturday for comments he made after an attack on a Jewish synagogue in West Bloomfield Township.
When previously speaking of the attack, El-Sayed said in part that “hurt people hurt people,” but Saturday claimed “I made a mistake,” the Times of Israel reported Sunday.
The apology came during a gathering for the state Democrat Party’s Jewish caucus at the party convention.
“If my statement caused pain, I’m sorry. It was not what I intended to do. We issued a statement, of course, condemning it, and that just should have been it, full stop,” he said.
When the incident happened in March, the attacker was reported to be a Lebanese national, per Breitbart News. The man was accused of driving into the Temple Israel building before being engaged by security and killed.
Reports said he was Ayman Mohamad Ghazali who entered the United States in 2011 on an IR1 immigrant visa as the husband of an American citizen, and he was naturalized in 2016 during former President Barack Obama’s (D) administration.
“There is a school at Temple Israel and no children or staff were harmed in the attack,” the outlet said.
Per the Times:
El-Sayed’s initial Temple Israel comments, which many Jews interpreted as justifying the attack, have alienated Jewish voters in the state. After an initial statement condemning the attack, El-Sayed then followed up with one referencing Israel’s war against Hezbollah in Lebanon, where the attacker had lost family in an Israeli airstrike.
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In recent days, El-Sayed has also minimized some of his harsh critiques of Israel in his stump speeches and issued a statement distancing himself from onetime campaign ally Hasan Piker, the far-left anti-Israel streamer some have accused of antisemitism.
Some Jewish leaders have been encouraging Jewish Democrats and independents to support former Rep. Mike Rogers (R-MI) who is running against El-Sayed, according to Breitbart News.
During a recent interview, Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) said “I’ll just make it clear, there’s no way I’m ever coming out for El-Sayed right now. And like, until — this is a guy who has made it very clear his views toward — and has refused to back off his views toward Jewish Americans. And I hope he comes out and clarifies where he is.”
He continued, “I also hope that he does the right thing and condemns Hasan Piker clearly and the language very clearly. What I don’t understand is, and I would hope if this were against anybody else or any other group in our country, and someone came out with this kind of hateful rhetoric, that people would stand up and speak out. What confounds me is why are people so silent when it comes to antisemitism, anti-Jewish language?”
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