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California Senate candidate Tom Campbell said he regrets not conducting more research nearly a decade ago on two men whom he later learned had ties to terrorist groups, but opponents of the Republican are using those contacts to question his support of the Jewish state.

During his 2000 Senate race, Campbell declined to return a contribution from Abdurahman Alamoudi. Speaking to reporters at the California GOP convention on March 12, he said he should have checked more thoroughly into comments Alamoudi made in support of Hamas and Hezbollah. Those comments prompted Hillary Clinton and George W. Bush to return donations from Alamoudi.

Campbell said it was the weekend before the election and nothing had been proven against Alamoudi. He noted, however, that Clinton did investigate the comments and told reporters he should have done the same. “I was in error and I deeply regret it.”

Campbell also said he made a mistake in January 2002 with a letter of support written on behalf of Sami Al-Arian, at the time a professor at the University of South Florida and a political activist with high-level contacts among American politicians. In 2003, Al-Arian was arrested for supporting Palestinian Islamic Jihad. After a lengthy trial in which the jury either acquitted or deadlocked on each charge, Al-Arian avoided a potential retrial by pleading guilty to one count of conspiracy to support a terrorist organization. Wiretaps made public in the trial revealed Al-Arian discussing suicide bombings and other terrorist activities.

Campbell, a former congressman who represented San Mateo and Santa Clara counties in Congress, said he wrote the letter out of concern for academic freedom and because Al-Arian had helped with his previous political race. He said he would not have written the letter had he known Al-Arian made the statement “death to Israel.” “I did not know, but I could have known. That was my error,” Campbell said.

The resurgence of interest in Campbell’s past, sparked by Conservative bloggers in February, has a sharply political edge. His connection to Al-Arian and his congressional voting record on Israel, including votes cast against some economic aid packages in the 1990s, are not news; both have been known for years.

On aid to Israel, Campbell argued that “a reasonable disagreement can arise over economic aid without implicating America’s commitment to the defense of Israel against an attack” and said he has always supported military assistance to the Jewish state.

Campbell’s Republican opponents in the June primary, Carly Fiorina and Chuck DeVore, both issued statements condemning Campbell as unreliable and potentially dangerous on Israel issues.

Matthew Brooks, executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, says the Al-Arian connection raises a legitimate question. “If he’s offering a mea culpa, then I think that’s a signal to the Jewish community that he maybe would have done things differently,” Brooks said. “It’s up to the voters to decide whether to accept his change of heart or not.”

Idan Ivri of the Jewish Journal of Greater Los Angeles contributed to this report.

 

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