In an unearthed television appearance from 2013, now Rep. Ihan Omar (D-Minn.) blamed terrorist attacks as a response to “our involvement in other people’s affairs.”
Her statement came days after al-Qaeda affiliate al-Shabab attacked a shopping mall in Kenya, killing 67 civilians.
Fox News reports:
“When are we gonna decide or realize that terrorism is a reaction? It’s an ideology, it’s a means of things, it’s not an entity, it’s not a place, people. It’s a reaction to a situation,” host Ahmed Tharwat asked then-activist Omar, on the show “Belahdan” on Twin Cities PBS during a discussion about the experience of the Somali community in the U.S. following the attack in Kenya.
“Yes,” she agreed. “What you’re insinuating is what nobody wants to face. Nobody wants to face how the actions of the other people that are involved in the world have contributed to the rise of the radicalization and the rise of terrorist acts.”
She continued: “Usually most people want to not look internal and see what their actions that makes another react. For us, it’s always ‘I must have not done anything. Why is it happening to me?’ Nobody wants to take accountability of how these are byproducts of the actions of our involvement in other people’s affairs.”
Tharwat, who has given a platform before to radical activists — including a political cartoonist who won second place in the 2006 Iranian International Holocaust Cartoon Competition, an anti-Semitic contest featuring Holocaust denial — went on to compare the violence perpetrated by terror groups around the world to the actions of western governments.
Later in the interview, Tharwat accurately said Islamic terrorists represented the fringes of society, but alleged the “violence” perpetrated the West is legitimized, prompting Omar to agree.
Omar is a member of the powerful Foreign Affairs Committee, helping to guide legislation and oversight into America’s foreign policy.
AAN Staff
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