Harris’s Director of Arab-American Outreach Once Said ‘Zionists’ Control Politics, But ‘No Longer Thinks That Way’

On August 28, the Harris campaign announced that it had hired Brenda Abdelall to be the head of its outreach to Arab-American voters. Then there came to light comments Abdelall had made in the past about how “Zionists are controlling” a lot of American politics. This is the kind of remark that skirts close to Protocols-of-the-Elders-of-Zion territory. You know the kind: the Jews control the banks, the Jews control the media, the Jews control the government. Robert Spencer wrote about this briefly here, and more on Ms. Abdelall can be found here: “Harris’s director of Arab-American outreach once said ‘Zionists’ control politics,” Times of Israel, September 1, 2024:

An Egyptian-American lawyer tapped by US Vice President Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign came under scrutiny over the weekend for comments she made in 2002 that “Zionists are controlling a lot” of American politics.

The comments by Brenda Abdelall, whom the campaign announced it had hired on Wednesday to lead its Arab-American outreach effort, resurfaced Friday in an article by the Washington Free Beacon, which connected the remarks to the age-old antisemitic trope of Jews controlling politics behind the scenes.

The Harris campaign defended Abdellel on Friday, telling The New York Post, “Those 2002 comments do not reflect Brenda’s views or the views of the campaign.”

Where have we heard this excuse before — that his/her/their “views do not reflect their current thinking”? It comes up whenever some Muslim is discovered to have said at a conference, or in an interview, or posted on social media, something most unpleasant about either Jews or Israel or Palestinian terror groups, that cannot be denied, but instead, we are expected to believe that in every case that person, caught out, “no longer thinks that way.” And so it is with Brenda Abdelall, who presumably no longer believes that “the Jews” control American politics.

Abdelall, then a college student, made the remarks to The New York Sun while attending a convention for the American Muslim Council at which one speaker had proclaimed, “Zionists are destroying America.” The Council itself also has a history of antisemitic statements.

“Destroying is a harsh word,” Abdelall said at the time, when asked about Fayez’s remarks. But, she continued, “The Zionists have a strong voice in American politics. I would say they’re controlling a lot of it.”

Abdelall cited the then-recent loss of US Rep. Earl Hilliard, a five-term Democratic congressman from Alabama who lost his reelection bid after voting against a resolution that pledged support for Israel and condemned Palestinian suicide bombings.

Following that vote, Hilliard’s opponent received significant support from pro-Israel groups, drawing donations from American Jews and others across the country who took issue with the incumbent’s views about the Middle East. Other congresspeople who voted against the resolution did not suffer electoral consequences, The Wall Street Journal reported at the time.

Since those congresspeople who voted against Israel — save for Earl Hilliard — were reelected, this suggests that “the Jews” are not, pace Brenda Abdelall, “controlling a lot” of American politics.

In the years since her 2002 remarks, Abdellal [sic] became a lawyer and went on to work for the Department of Homeland Security, becoming chief of staff of the department’s civil rights office shortly after the Biden administration took office.

A campaign spokesperson noted Friday, “In her role at DHS, Brenda worked closely on the implementation of the country’s first National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism” and helped stage a White House summit against hate-fueled violence.

There was no immediate comment from Abdelall herself….

Why wouldn’t Abdelall herself describe her change of heart? Wouldn’t that be more believable than having the Harris campaign speak for her, denying her agency, or perhaps it was worried that on her own she wouldn’t be credible?

All this media insistence on the presumed key role to be played by Arab-American voters in deciding the 2024 election, because it is said to be the “main factor” in the “key battleground state of Michigan” is absurd. Arab-Americans make up only 2% of the voters in Michigan. They are “key” voters only in the 18th Congressional district of heavily Arab Dearborn — the district represented by Rashida Tlaib. Nationwide, Arab-Americans are only 1% of the population. Jews are 2.4% of the population. And Arab-Americans really have no place else to go: they know that a President Trump, who moved the American Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, recognized Israel’s annexation of the Golan Heights, and instituted a ban on immigration from countries that would not or could not provide adequate data regarding people who were trying to enter the U.S., which was widely mischaracterized as a “Muslim Ban,” is not their friend. They have to vote for Kamala Harris who, after all, has said that “too many people are dying in Gaza” and “this has to stop.”

Meanwhile, who’s next in the Arab and Muslim-American political lineup who, we will be solemnly told after certain embarrassing remarks and social media posts are discovered, “no longer thinks that way”?