(JTA) Ilhan Omar, who once called Israel an “apartheid regime,” but who more recently came out against the boycott Israel movement, handily won the Democratic nomination in a Minneapolis-area congressional district.
Omar, a Somalia-born community activist and representative in the State House, is favored to win in November in the 5th District now held by Keith Ellison, who won the DFL primary for state attorney general. DFL is the state’s Democratic Party.
Minnesota was one of four states to hold primaries on Tuesday along with Wisconsin, Connecticut and Vermont.
Omar’s tweets about Israel have earned her notoriety in the pro-Israel community. In 2012, she said that Israel had “hypnotized the world” to ignore its “evil doings.” Defending that tweet earlier this year, she said on the same platform that calling attention to the “Israeli apartheid regime” was not anti-Semitic.
