“They came for her and destroyed my family,” he said.

Then in 2006, Turfe’s two grandmothers were killed in Lebanon while Israel fought Hezbollah in a war backed by President George W. Bush.

Turfe said his community was primarily Republican until those years. But members warmed to Democrats during Barack Obama’s presidency and later helped Biden defeat Trump in 2020.

Those political ties are now broken.

Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, 2023, killing 1,200 Israelis and kidnapping more than 200 hostages. Israel launched its offensive soon after with military and diplomatic support from the Biden administration.

As civilian casualties in Gaza mounted, anti-war Democrats in Michigan and elsewhere launched a protest voting movement in the Democratic primaries. They gathered more than 100,000 “uncommitted” votesand most come from the state’s Muslim-majority cities like Dearborn.

Turfe was part of the “uncommitted” movement as Biden ran for re-election, but said he changed his mind when Harris became the nominee. He endorsed her in August and met her before a rally near Detroit in October.

She said she told Harris about her grandmothers’ deaths nearly two decades ago and “I felt her empathy.”

“She felt my pain,” Turfe said.

Turfe’s endorsement has sparked a backlash. On social media, photoshopped images accuse him of supporting atrocities in Gaza. He also received text messages calling him a traitor. Longstanding relationships in his hometown of Dearborn have become strained.

Dearborn resident Suehaila Amen is used to her community being in the national spotlight, having starred in the 2012 TLC reality series “All-American Muslim.” Amen, a lifelong Democrat, said he will not vote for Harris.

“They want to send their people to come and see how we feel because now they are afraid of losing a swing state,” said Amen, who lived in Lebanon from 2017 to 2021. “But, you know, if you lose, it’s because of his own, by his own hand, and he deserves it.”

Amen said he doesn’t want Trump to win, but “I have to, at the end of the day, sleep at night.”

Harris made a rare reference to Israel’s fight against Hamas and Hezbollah during a recent speech in Oakland County, outside Detroit.

“This year has been very difficult, given the scale of death and destruction in Gaza and given the civilian casualties and displacement in Lebanon,” he said. the death of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar.He stated, “it can and should be a turning point.”

Harris also said she is “very proud to have the support” of Turfe and other Muslim leaders.

But Harris has not called for any reduction in the flow of American weapons to Israel, and her campaign did not allow a pro-Palestinian speaker to take the stage at the Democratic National Convention in August, a key demand of the “uncommitted” movement.

Khanna, a progressive Democrat from California, has been in close contact with Arab-American leaders in metro Detroit for months and received the Arab-American Civil Rights League’s “Profile in Courage” award this summer. Khanna is Hindu, but said his family background has allowed him to share experiences with Arab Americans.

During the Oct. 26 meeting with Arab American leaders, Khanna sat alongside Harris’s Arab and Muslim relations directors and acknowledged that Harris “has not done enough” to help end the war between Israel and Hamas.

“If Trump is elected, people like me won’t be in any of the rooms,” Khanna said. “Harris gives people like us a seat at the table to defend him.”

It’s the kind of message that resonates with Mike Musheinesh, a Palestinian-American who runs his own auto parts store and attended the meeting. He said the community should vote for Harris “even if we have to hold our nose.”

“If we want a seat at the table, we have to help her get to the finish line,” he said.

___ Associated Press writer Chris Megerian in Washington contributed to this report.

___

This story has been updated to correct Assad Turfe’s position to remove the reference to being elected. He was appointed, not elected.