The executive director of the anti-Israel Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) pushed the baseless claim that the Jewish state is behind a suspected Iranian plot to assassinate former president Donald Trump.
Nihad Awad asserted that reports of Iran’s plans to kill Trump could instead be an "Israeli plot to ignite another war" in the Middle East. Awad was responding to a report that intelligence officials beefed up Trump’s Secret Service security after learning of Iran’s plans to murder the former president. There’s no indication that the suspected Iranian plot is related to Saturday’s assassination attempt, in which the former president was shot in the ear.
It’s the latest inflammatory anti-Israel statement from Awad, who has contributed to the campaigns of several "Squad" members. He has given $3,000 to Rep. Summer Lee (Pa.), $1,000 to Rep. Ilhan Omar (Minn.), and $1,500 to Jamaal Bowman (N.Y.) since December, according to campaign finance records.
Awad, who also goes by the name Nehad Hammad, made all of those donations after drawing widespread condemnation for praising Hamas’s terrorist attack on Israel. Awad said in November he was "happy to see" the attack, and asserted Israel "does not have [the] right to self-defense."
Those jarring comments stoked blowback from the White House, which partnered with CAIR earlier last year on its "National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism." The White House condemned Awad’s "shocking, antisemitic statements in the strongest terms," and removed references to CAIR from the White House’s website.
His latest conspiracy theory raises questions for the trio of "Squad" members, all of whom have faced political blowback over their anti-Israel views and sympathy for Tehran.
Omar, who will face Republican Dalia al-Aqidi in November, said she was "outraged" over the Trump administration’s assassination of Iranian general Qassem Soleimani, who was responsible for hundreds of Western casualties as head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps. Omar was kicked off the House Foreign Affairs Committee last year for pushing anti-Semitic tropes, such as that the U.S. government’s alliance with Israel was "all about the Benjamins."
Bowman, who voted against a resolution in April to condemn Iran’s drone missile attack on Israel, lost a bitter primary against George Latimer last month. Lee, who touts an endorsement from Sen. Bob Casey (D., Pa.), was criticized earlier this year by dozens of rabbis and Jewish leaders over her anti-Israel remarks and her cozy relationship with CAIR. The Washington Free Beacon reported Lee was slated to speak at the annual fundraising banquet for CAIR’s Philadelphia chapter, but she pulled out at the last minute amid scrutiny from her Democratic primary opponent and Jewish leaders.