‘Healthcare not bombs’: How Gaza shaped Adam Hamawy’s path to US Congress

A former army surgeon and Gaza volunteer, Hamawy is the first Muslim American to be elected to the US Congress from New Jersey. On Tuesday, he stood in front of supporters in Plainsboro, New Jersey, celebrating “hope” that he said he had gleaned from some of those victims of violence.

“To the men, women and children of Gaza and Palestine: Your smiles give me the hope and the courage to fight for a better world,” said the Egyptian-American surgeon, set to become New Jersey’s first Muslim US congressman. Hamawy entered politics after participating in medical missions to Gaza in 2024 and 2025, experiences he said made it impossible for him to return to normal life.

He campaigned for New Jersey’s 12th Congressional District on a platform of “healthcare not bombs”, pledging to challenge a system that “funds genocide [in Gaza] while trapping us all here in medical debt”. But Hamawy’s bid for the House of Representatives was met with a wave of attacks that he described as “anti-Muslim”, as well as scrutiny over his past association with a sheikh later convicted of seditious conspiracy.