Dem newcomer heads to Washington despite past ties to al Qaeda-linked group

Democratic congressman-elect Adam Hamawy is headed to Capitol Hill after cruising through the New Jersey election amid renewed scrutiny of his past ties to a charity later designated by the U.S. as a terrorist financier.

Hamawy, a plastic surgeon and former U.S. Army medical officer, secured approximately 70% of the vote in New Jersey's 12th Congressional District, despite facing questions on the campaign trail about his reported previous volunteer work with the Benevolence International Foundation (BIF), a Chicago-based charity that federal authorities later identified as providing financial and logistical support to al Qaeda.

According to a 1996 interview with the Newark Star-Ledger uncovered by Jewish Insider, Hamawy spent five weeks in Bosnia in 1994 volunteering with the organization, delivering medical supplies to hospitals in Sarajevo and Zenica.

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"I worked in Sarajevo for 10 days and then the rest in Zenica, a large regional center in central Bosnia," Hamawy told the newspaper at the time. "We went out to hospitals around the area and in the mountains to check what supplies they needed, and we tried to deliver them."

In 2002, Bosnian authorities raided the charity's offices in those cities, recovering documents that federal investigators linked to Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda, including correspondence, financial records and information about terrorist training camps.

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The 9/11 Commission later identified the charity's Sarajevo office as part of a network that covertly provided financial and logistical support for terrorist activities.

The organization's chief executive, Enaam Arnaout, pleaded guilty in 2003 to a racketeering charge involving funds raised for purported humanitarian purposes and diverted to the Bosnian military. Federal prosecutors ultimately dropped terrorism charges against him.

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The BIF remains on the U.S. Treasury Department's terrorism-related sanctions list.

Hamawy's past relationship with Sheikh Omar Abdel-Rahman, commonly known as the "Blind Sheikh," also drew scrutiny during his congressional campaign.

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Abdel-Rahman was convicted in 1995 of conspiring to carry out terrorist attacks in New York City. Court records show that Hama