Aber Kawas, a Palestinian American activist endorsed by New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, won the Democratic primary for a Queens state Senate seat after a campaign built around Gaza, and now a resurfaced 2017 podcast is drawing fresh scrutiny of her views on the worst terror attack in American history.
In a recorded episode of the Asian American Writers' Association podcast titled "Islamophobia beyond 9/11 with Aber Kawas," the newly minted Democratic nominee framed the September 11 attacks not as an act of war by jihadist terrorists but as a predictable consequence of American systems. Fox News Digital reported on the resurfaced clip and Kawas's response.
Kawas defeated Democratic Assemblyman Steven Raga handily in the primary for New York State Senate District 12, which covers western Queens, including Astoria. The New York Post reported she captured roughly 60 percent of the vote, positioning her to become the first Palestinian American woman in the state Senate. In a deeply blue district where incumbent State Senator Michael Gianaris is stepping down, Kawas faces no meaningful general-election obstacle. She is expected to take her seat in Albany in January.
The 2017 podcast episode is not ambiguous. Kawas told listeners:
"The system of capitalism and racism and White supremacy... and Islamophobia have all been used to colonize lands, to take resources from other people and so this is a long trajectory, and we're just seeing the manifestations of that continuation with 9/11."
She went further, dismissing the expectation that Muslim Americans should condemn the attacks:
"The idea we have to apologize for a terror attack that a couple of people did and then there is no apology or reparations for genocides and for slavery... is something I find reprehensible."
Nearly 3,000 people died on September 11, 2001. Calling that mass murder something "a couple of people did" is a striking choice of language for anyone seeking public office, let alone in New York, a city that buried firefighters, office workers, and airline passengers under the rubble of the Twin Towers.
When Fox News Digital reached Kawas for comment, she did not retract the remarks. Instead, she reframed them. Kawas told the outlet Thursday morning:
"I've always been outspoken about the wrongful scapegoating of Muslim Americans, both before and after 9/11, and in this interview I was speaking about the harmful notion that Muslims should have to apologize for an act of violence they have nothing to do with."
She then cast the coverage itself as bigotry:
"Our resounding victory this week shows that the people of Queens simply don't buy into this kind of desperate, Islamophobic smear, and want leaders in office who aren't afraid to call out bigotry, racism, and double standards."
The pattern is familiar. When a politician's own recorded words surface, the defense skips past the substance and attacks the questioner. Kawas's 2017 comments were not cherry-picked by a hostile editor. They were her own extended argument, delivered on a podcast, in full context. She described 9/11 as a "manifestation" of American capitalism and white supremacy. Voters can judge for themselves whether that amounts to suggesting the country had it coming.
Kawas had previously faced questions about her past social media posts, and the pattern of deflection has followed her throughout the campaign.
Kawas did not win this primary on her own. She ran with the full backing of Mayor Zohran Mamdani, a self-described socialist who has built a political operation aimed at remaking New York's Democratic Party from the left. Mamdani's endorsement of Kawas was his first political endorsement since winning the mayor's office, the Washington Free Beacon reported, delivered at a Democratic Socialists of America meeting.
The DSA celebrated the result in blunt terms. The New York City chapter declared: "Palestine was on the ballot, and now a Palestinian-American democratic socialist is going to Albany. Socialists get it done."
That declaration tells you everything about the coalition's priorities. This was not a campaign about potholes, transit, or public safety in Queens. It was an ideological project, and Kawas was the vehicle.
The broader socialist primary sweep across New York suggests Kawas's win was not an isolated fluke but part of a coordinated effort by the DSA and Mamdani's political network to install aligned candidates in seats across the state.
The 9/11 comments are not the only item drawing scrutiny. Breitbart reported that images surfaced on social media showing Kawas wearing a headband associated with Hamas. Fox News Digital noted she has reportedly been affiliated with the Council on American-Islamic Relations, which has been designated a terrorist organization in some U.S. states and other countries.
The Washington Free Beacon's earlier reporting added further context: Kawas defended convicted al-Qaeda financier Fahad Hashmi and expressed sympathy for a man sentenced for plotting to blow up a Manhattan synagogue. At a DSA meeting, one of Kawas's advisers, Joe Stanton, stated bluntly: "We have to actually run a Palestinian Arab in this race because we need to draw the fire of the Israeli lobby, and we have to beat them."
These are not the associations of a mainstream candidate running for a state legislature seat. They are the associations of an activist who has spent years in circles that treat convicted terrorists as political prisoners and American foreign policy as the root cause of jihadist violence.
Even some prominent Democrats have balked. Veteran strategist James Carville rejected Kawas's candidacy outright, arguing she has no place in the Democratic Party.
Kawas made her own family story a centerpiece of her run. She described herself as the Muslim daughter of illegal immigrants and portrayed her father's deportation as cruel persecution by immigration authorities. The New York Post reported a different set of facts: Abdelkareem Kawas, a Jordanian national, entered the United States on a tourist visa in 1989 and never left. He was later deported after a conviction for real estate fraud and a prison sentence.
There is a wide gap between "cruel persecution" and deportation following a fraud conviction. Kawas chose to present her father's case as an injustice on the campaign trail. Voters in District 12 apparently accepted that framing. Whether voters statewide, or the broader public, will view a fraud conviction and overstayed visa the same way is another question.
In her victory remarks, Kawas declared that "another world is possible" and envisioned "a world where Gaza is free to live." These are the words of a candidate who ran a single-issue ideological campaign in a low-turnout primary and won because the institutional left, Mamdani, the DSA, Bernie Sanders, poured resources and organizing muscle into a small Queens district.
Mamdani himself appeared at a primary-night watch party in East Williamsburg, Brooklyn, for another DSA-aligned candidate, NYC Congressional hopeful Claire Valdez. The mayor has been rallying openly with a full socialist slate, making clear that Kawas's win is one piece of a larger project to reshape New York politics from the hard left.
Kawas's 2017 remarks were not a slip of the tongue at a private dinner. They were a recorded, public statement on a podcast. She described 9/11 as a "manifestation" of American systems of oppression. She minimized the attack as something "a couple of people did." She called it "reprehensible" that Muslims were expected to condemn it.
When confronted, she did not apologize. She did not walk the comments back. She accused the press of Islamophobia and pointed to her primary margin as proof that voters don't care.
Maybe the voters of District 12 don't. But the rest of New York, a state that lost thousands of its own on that September morning, deserves to know exactly who is headed to Albany in their name.
When a politician tells you who she is on tape, believe her.
