White House rips American Islamic leader’s remarks on Oct. 7’s attack

The White House blasted remarks by the director of an American-Muslim advocacy group that seemed to approve of Hamas’ decision to “break the siege, the walls of the concentration camp, on October 7.”

A spokesman for President Biden denounced the comments by Nihad Awad, national executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, delivered weeks ago at a gathering of the American Muslims for Palestine.

“We condemn these shocking, antisemitic statements in the strongest terms,” said Mr. Biden’s spokesman, Andrew Bates.

Mr. Awad’s remarks were circulated by the Middle East Media Research Institute, or Memri, which tracks Middle East news in Arabic and from other sources. It posted a clip of the remarks to the pro-Palestinian convention in Chicago on Nov. 24.

“The people of Gaza only decided to break the siege, the walls of the concentration camp, on October 7. And yes, I was happy to see people breaking the siege and throwing down the shackles of their own land and walk free into their land, which they were not allowed to walk in,” Mr. Award says in the clip. “And yes, the people of Gaza have the right to self-defense, have the right to defend themselves, and yes, Israel, as an occupying power, does not have that right to self-defense.”

Mr. Awad released a statement saying his remarks were taken out of context and pointed to parts of his speech in which he condemned antisemitism as a “real evil” that must be rejected.

“Despite my clear remarks, an anti-Muslim, anti-Palestinian hate website selected remarks from my speech out of context and spliced them together to create a completely false meaning,” he said. “What I actually said while discussing international law: Ukrainians, Palestinians and other occupied people have the right to defend themselves and escape occupation by just and legal means, but targeting civilians is never an acceptable means of doing so, which is why I have again and again condemned the violence against Israeli civilians on Oct. 7th and past Hamas attacks on Israeli civilians, including suicide bombings, all the way back to the 1990s — just as I have condemned the decades of violence against Palestinian civilians.”

Mr. Biden has been vocal in backing Israel after the Oct. 7 attack that killed over 1,000 people in southern Israeli towns, with scores of hostages taken by Hamas, a Palestinian terrorist group.

At the same time, he’s acknowledged the rising civilian death toll in Gaza by calling on Israel to conduct its military response under international law. The White House has also said that both antisemitism and Islamophobia must be rejected.

Mr. Bates, in his statement, noted that Oct. 7 was the deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust.

“The horrific, brutal terrorist attacks committed by Hamas on Oct. 7 were, as President Biden said, ‘abhorrent’ and represent ‘unadulterated evil,’” he said. “The atrocities of that day shock the conscience, which is why we can never forget the pain Hamas has caused for so many innocent people.”