Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand quietly sat in a hijab beside a Bronx cleric who has praised Hamas and mourned Osama bin Laden’s spiritual adviser, a stop she left off her public feeds.
Photos from the Sept. 21 visit show the New York Democrat in a pink headscarf at the Bronx Muslim Center in the city’s Little Yemen section, seated next to longtime cleric Hamud Alsilwi. The center’s outreach director posted the images. Gillibrand did not promote the stop on her social media or Senate website, even as she shared footage the same day from other events in East Harlem and the Bronx wearing the same suit without a head covering.
The Washington Free Beacon reported the appearance and the cleric’s record. Gillibrand chairs the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. Her office did not respond to requests for comment. Neither did the Bronx Muslim Center.
Yahay Obeid, the mosque’s director of outreach, framed the visit as community outreach.
"It was an honor to welcome U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand to Little Yemen today and have her spend time directly with members of our community."
The photos also showed a banner seeking donations for a new 32,000-square-foot mosque. The stop itself drew little public notice from the senator who made it.
Alsilwi, a Yemeni cleric, has led the Bronx Muslim Center since 1998. His social media history is harder to ignore than the quiet photo-op.
In an October 2016 post, he wrote, in an English translation carried by the Free Beacon: “The Muslim Brotherhood came to power in Palestine, and they harmed no one except the Jews and Israel.”
In January 2016 posts, he praised Hamas founder Ahmed Yassin for “causing so much trouble for the Jews in Palestine.” Yassin was later killed in an Israeli airstrike after being linked to multiple murders.
Those are not vague theological notes. They are public cheers for a U.S.-designated terrorist group’s founder and for the Brotherhood’s rise, framed as harm directed at Jews and Israel alone.
After Sheikh Abdul Majeed al-Zindani died in April 2024, Alsilwi mourned him with posts, photos, and videos. He called al-Zindani an “eminent scholar” and prayed, “O God, grant him spacious gardens in Paradise.”
The U.S. government designated al-Zindani a terrorist in 2004. Officials cited his role as spiritual adviser to Osama bin Laden and alleged work recruiting for al Qaeda and helping purchase weapons for al Qaeda and other terrorists.
A Bronx cleric who leads a mosque visited by a sitting U.S. senator chose to honor that record in plain view.
The Bronx Muslim Center is described as a branch of the Muslim American Society. Federal prosecutors have called the society an “overt arm” of the Muslim Brotherhood in the United States.
Rep. Ritchie Torres, a New York Democrat, secured $1 million in earmarks for the Bronx Muslim Center, according to a 2024 Middle East Forum report referenced in the Free Beacon coverage. That money flowed to an institution whose longtime leader has a documented trail of praise for Hamas’s founder and for a man the Treasury Department tied to bin Laden.
Taxpayers underwrite the building. Elected Democrats pose for the photos. The cleric’s old posts stay online.
Gillibrand is not the first New York Democrat to reach for a hijab in front of the right audience. Gov. Kathy Hochul donned one at an event for the Islamic Cultural Center on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. President Donald Trump called her the “Worst Governor in the Country” and said she “wears the hijab” to “get the Arab Vote.” Gubernatorial candidate Bruce Blakeman labeled it “Hijab Hochul. Kathy’s Latest Costume: Whatever the Audience Wants.”
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wore a hijab at an outdoor Eid event earlier this year. Iranian dissident Masih Alinejad accused her of hypocrisy for putting on the garment while claiming to fight for women’s self-determination.
Gillibrand’s version stands out for the company in the frame. She sat beside the man whose posts celebrate Hamas’s founder and exalt bin Laden’s designated mentor. Then she kept the visit off her own channels while posting the rest of her day in the same suit, uncovered.
The Free Beacon asked Gillibrand’s office and the Bronx Muslim Center for comment. Both stayed silent. There is no public explanation from the senator of why she chose that mosque, what she discussed, or whether she knew Alsilwi’s record on Hamas, the Brotherhood, and al-Zindani.
Voters are left with the pictures, the cleric’s words, the federal designation from 2004, the prosecutors’ description of the Muslim American Society, and a $1 million earmark trail. A senior Democrat who helps run her party’s Senate campaigns treated the stop as something to attend, not something to advertise.
Accountability starts with who gets the photo and who gets the silence. New York’s senior senator gave both to a cleric who made his preferences clear.
