Whichever of the 13 candidates wins the free-for-all seeking the Democratic nomination in New Jersey’s 12th Congressional District, following the decision of Rep. Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-N.J.) to retire after 12 years on Capitol Hill, becomes the overwhelming favorite to go to Washington.
That includes Dr. Brad J. Cohen, mayor of East Brunswick and a gynecologist, who is not shy about his support for Israel, as he faces a well-funded Egyptian American doctor, who has accused the Jewish state of genocide.
“I am a proud Jew,” Cohen told JNS. “I believe very much in the state of Israel and its right to exist. It’s critical to me that it remains a Jewish state in the Middle East.”
According to his mayoral biography, Cohen is “an active member of Congregation B’nai Tikvah, North Brunswick and East Brunswick Jewish Center.”
He has raised $424,371 for his campaign through March 31, second highest among the candidates, according to Federal Election Commission filings.
The top fundraiser is another doctor, Adam Hamawy, an Egyptian American, who has brought in $546,965. Hamawy treated injured Gazans in the war against Hamas after Oct. 7 and has accused Israel of “genocide.”
Sue Altman, a former state director for Sen. Andy Kim (D-N.J.), has brought in $406,374. She lost the 2024 congressional election to Rep. Tom Kean Jr. (R-N.J.) in the nearby 7th District.
Hamawy has the endorsements of Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), one of Israel’s sharpest critics on Capitol Hill, and former New York Democratic congressman Jamaal Bowman, who was ousted in 2024 after AIPAC spent $14.6 million to defeat him.
Another anti-Israel politician, Analilia Mejia won the Democratic nomination with only 29% of the vote in New Jersey’s 11th District and went on to win the House seat vacated by New Jersey Gov. Mikie Sherrill. Hamawy might be able to do the same with a small percentage of the vote in the June 2 primary.
“You don’t need to get to 50 plus 1 to win the nomination,” Ben Dworkin. director of Rowan University’s Institute for Public Policy and Citizenship, told JNS. “A well-organized group can emerge victorious in that kind of political situation.”
Cohen doesn’t mention Israel on his campaign website. But Hamawy does.
“In 2024 and 2025, I went on medical missions to Gaza,” Hamawy’s site states. “What I witnessed was a genocide, paid for with American tax dollars and propped up by our foreign policy.”
He told the Washington Post that if candidates want “to get elected or re-elected this coming cycle, you’ll see more and more people being critical of Israel than in the past.”
Hanawy, who was a combat trauma surgeon in Iraq and treated Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), is being supported by a pro-Palestinian super PAC, American Priorities, which has said it would spend $2 million on the race, the New Jersey Globe reported.
“The fact that even a place like New Jersey with a strong, well-organized Jewish community is facing candidates who are openly criticizing mainstream Jewish organizations and Israeli policies in a different way than candidates used to is reflective of how much the ground has shifted,” Dworkin told JNS.
Cohe didn’t list Israel among his top issues in an interview with JNS. What’s most important, he said, was protecting democracy, affordability and affordable health care.
“It doesn’t say, ‘I don’t care about Israel.’ I told you, ‘I absolutely do,’” he told JNS. “But the focus should be on the United States and the issues that face voters in the 12th Congressional District.”
“This is an issue for a good number of people, but I don’t think it’s the central issue,” he said.
His name does not appear on a list of AIPAC-endorsed candidates, even though the pro-Israel group spent $2.3 million against former Democratic congressman Tom Malinowski, whom it previously endorsed, reportedly helping to elect Mejia.
Dworkin said that opposition to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has helped upend the traditional U.S. constituency for Israel.
“It’s a very challenging time for traditional, strong, pro-Israel Democrats right now,” he told JNS. “In the year 2000, it was totally different. And it’s 2026. You can’t can run campaigns from a Jewish community pro-Israel perspective like it was 25 years ago. You just can’t.”
Watson Coleman did not endorse a successor but said it shouldn’t be Cohen.
“I was disappointed when Brad Cohen called me ‘antisemitic,’ because that suggested to me that he had not really gotten to know who I was,” Watson Coleman told JNS.
“I’m very concerned that his feelings about Netanyahu and Israel are not consistent with what the 12th Congressional District believes is a fair attitude, that both Israelis and Palestinians should be able to live in peace and in prosperity and side by side,” she said.
“I don’t want to belabor that point, but that was what I was thinking, and I haven’t changed it,” the congresswoman told JNS.
Cohen told JNS that he never called Watson Coleman “antisemitic.”
“I didn’t say that,” he said. “I would never say that. I knew there have been people who’ve said that about her. But I didn’t call her ‘antisemitic.’”
Nor is he a Netanyahu hardliner, he said. In fact, he said, he supports a two-state solution in the Middle East.
“I’m a supporter of Israel,” he said. “But that doesn’t mean that I always agree with everything that Benjamin Netanyahu does, or any other prime minister.”
On April 13, Cohen posted about Yom Hashoah, Holocaust remembrance day, on social media.
“This day is deeply personal for me and my family,” he wrote. “My father-in-law was a Holocaust survivor. His strength, resilience and courage in the face of unimaginable evil are something I carry with me every day. His story is a reminder not only of the horrors of the past but of the responsibility we all share to stand up against hate in all its forms.”
“Remembering is not enough. We must act,” Cohen added. “That means calling out antisemitism and hate wherever we see it, supporting our communities, educating the next generation and refusing to be silent in the face of extremism.”
