Freshman Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) is no stranger to controversy. The House of Representatives passed an anti-bigotry resolution in March indirectly condemning Omar’s repeated use of anti-Semitic slurs, and she attracted hundreds of protesters last month when she spoke at a fundraiser for a terror-tied Islamist group.
Now, Omar’s name is in the headlines once again after she openly and unapologetically called for the release of a senior member of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood (MB), a violent and radical Islamist group known for being the ideological forerunner of terrorist outfits like al-Qaida and Hamas.
Islamist ally
In a Tuesday evening Twitter post, Omar sympathized with imprisoned MB leader Hoda Abdelmonem, calling her a “political prisoner” and asking for President Donald Trump to step in and intervene on her behalf.
I recently met with @jkbadawy and @thefreedomi to talk about Hoda Abdelmonem, a political prisoner in Egypt. I hope that Trump brings up her case in his meeting with the regime that has imprisoned her. We must work to #FreeHoda. pic.twitter.com/3KMPNd4Kfb
— Rep. Ilhan Omar (@Ilhan) April 2, 2019
Conservative Review national security correspondent Jordan Schachtel was the first to confirm Abdelmonem’s Islamist credentials. He posted evidence from Reuters and The Guardian confirming that the Egyptian activist’s untenable past.
Reuters and The Guardian: pic.twitter.com/26q0oUQkAV
— Jordan Schachtel (@JordanSchachtel) April 2, 2019
According to the Middle East Eye, an Islamist publication sympathetic to the Brotherhood, Abdelmonem was arrested in a government roundup of “19 human rights lawyers and activists.” Egyptian authorities raided her Cairo apartment on Nov. 1, hauling the activist off to prison without allowing her to collect any personal belongings or medication.
“They broke down the door, ransacked the flat, and left with suitcases full of books and DVDs,” Abdelmonem’s daughter said.
The Eye called Abdelmonem “a prominent human rights lawyer and activist,” but Schachtel disputes that description. He contends that the human rights groups with which Abdelmonem was affiliated “all remain fiercely opposed to the rule of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, who in 2013 ousted Mohamed Morsi, the Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated former president in Cairo.”
In other words, Abdelmonem’s activism may have been a front for MB activities. Nonetheless, Omar shared an Al Jazeera video whitewashing the Egyptian lawyer’s ties to Islamic fundamentalism.
#freeHodahttps://t.co/MpXVjUzvqu
— Jihad Khaled (@Jkbadawy) April 2, 2019
A return to violence
Many Western apologists have focused on the MB’s nonviolent political activism in recent years, describing the organization as a legitimate social and political movement. However, as Mokhtar Awad explained for The Hudson Institute, the Brotherhood only “abandoned” violence when it became politically expedient to do so.
“The group may have been non-violent since the 1970s, but it was never pacifist, and this proved to be key when the Brotherhood faced its first true adversity since the abrupt end of its decades long détente with the Egyptian state in 2013,” Awad wrote.
After Egypt’s short-lived MB-led government was overthrown, the group returned to its violent past. The current MB hierarchy includes members who have personally engaged in violent jihad and terror activities.
MB operatives have also been implicated in the deaths of counter-protestors, and have been known to use torture, abduction, and murder to realize their political goals. Still, a U.S. congresswoman supports a senior leader of this organization, and is willing to openly call for one of its senior member’s immediate release.
The Brotherhood is considered a terrorist entity by multiple secular and theocratic Middle Eastern nations, and there is a movement without the U.S. that seeks to apply the same label here. Americans are right to question Omar’s loyalties — and she should be removed from the House Foreign Affairs Committee immediately.
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