New Jersey governor touts ‘the five pillars of Islam’ in visit to Islamic Center of Passaic County
New Jersey governor Mikie Sherrill, who ran for election in November as a “moderate” Democrat, visited a New Jersey mosque on Friday that has been linked to terrorist activity since its founding in 1989 and whose cofounder was convicted of funneling money to Hamas. During that visit, Sherrill met with a cleric who has faced deportation proceedings over his own alleged ties to the terror group and for calling for a “new intifada.”
At the Islamic Center of Passaic County, which Sherrill visited for Ramadan services, according to photos posted on social media, she met with Imam Mohammad Qatanani. “This is a community with the five pillars of Islam that is constantly looking to do good works,” Sherrill, sporting a head covering, said in remarks in the mosque after meeting with Qatanani. “And that is something I think is lacking now in this country.”
While Qatanani has denied having ties to Hamas, he has espoused extremist anti-Israel views. The cleric called for a “new intifada” against Israel during a rally in Times Square in 2017 against the Trump administration’s plans to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital, according to court documents. “No peace process and negotiation without liberation in Palestine,” said Qatanani. “We have to start a new intifada. Intifada, intifada!”
Mohammad El-Mezain, a cofounder of the Islamic Center, was convicted in 2009 of funneling money to Hamas through the Holy Land Foundation. Mohammed Al-Hanooti, who allegedly raised more than $6 million for Hamas, served as an imam at the Islamic Center in the 1990s, according to the magazine Islamic Horizons. And Qatanani, whom Sherrill met with, has been accused of having ties to Hamas. According to Department of Homeland Security court filings, an Israeli jury convicted Qatanani in 1993 of being a member of the terrorist group. Federal officials have filed several deportation cases against Qatanani, alleging he failed to disclose his Hamas conviction in a visa application in 1999.
The visit undercuts Democrats’ portrayal of Sherrill, who won election in November, as a moderate voice in the party. A former assistant U.S. attorney for New Jersey, Sherrill campaigned as a centrist Democrat in 2018 alongside other female national security and military veterans. She joined the moderate Blue Dog Coalition and New Democrat Coalition, a group of “pragmatic” House Democrats that support “strong national security and defense.” News outlets like PBS touted Sherrill’s 14-point victory in the gubernatorial race as “reassurance for moderates within the Democratic Party as they navigate the path forward for next year’s midterms.”
Qatanani has won several appeals to stave off deportation, most recently in a July 2025 ruling from the U.S. Third Circuit Court of Appeals, which said in a two-to-one decision that the Department of Homeland Security did not have authority to revoke Qatanani’s green card. The appellate court did not weigh in on allegations about Qatanani’s ties to Hamas.
Qatanani has also praised prominent terrorists. He posted a tribute to Yusuf al-Qaradawi, an influential Muslim Brotherhood leader who died in 2022. In 2013, al-Qaradawi met with Hamas leaders in Gaza and asserted that “our wish should be that we carry out Jihad to death,” according to Reuters.
“May God have mercy on you, our sheikh and teacher,” Qatanani wrote of al-Qaradawi in a 2022 obituary. “Someone who combined heritage and contemporary, stability, flexibility, discipline in fatwa and daring died.”
Sherrill’s office and the Islamic Center of Passaic County did not respond to requests for comment.
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