The Iran War, Gaza and US military aid to Israel have brought foreign policy and Mid-East unrest to the midterms, particularly in the tight race between Republican US Senate candidate Mike Rogers and Democrat Abdul El-Sayed.
Troy Zukowski-Serlin is a clinical social worker.
“For me, in the Senate race, it's a personal issue and a tribal issue," he said.
“I'm Jewish, and I have some major concerns about Abdul El-Sayed's anti-Zionist rhetoric, blaming Israel, and saying that Israel is committing a genocide or is an apartheid state, which are blatantly false. But he continues to push these narratives. And frankly, that's putting Jews like myself at risk.”
Zukowski-Serlin said he’s a life-long Democrat, but he’ll vote for Rogers, who he called a "lackluster candidate," in the Senate race.
Western Michigan University chemical and paper engineering professor Said Abubakr, could not see things more differently.
“Well, the facts are there are mass killing or genocide in Gaza. And that's affected me on three areas: morally, economically and politically.”
Abubakr is a Palestinian-American who grew up in Jordan.
“I voted all Democrat because I feel they are much closer to my moral, economic, and political values.”
He added that he made that decision because "there are candidates like Abdul El-Sayed and others who really listen to the base" even if, in his view, the Democratic establishment seems out-of-touch.
Nearby, at Kalamazoo College, history and religion professor Jeffrey Haus is also the college's director of Jewish Studies.
“I'm going to vote for El-Sayed, but I'm not happy about voting for him.”
Haus said that he wished El-Sayed "did not run the primary campaign that he had" and had "not embraced certain antisemitic tropes in the way that he had."
Despite that, he said he considers Mike Rogers a bigger threat and said his campaign is "whipping up fear of El-Sayed."
"To me the greatest enemy that I'm facing right now in the immediate sense is the continued destruction of American democratic institutions by the Trump administration," something Haus said Rogers would continue.
“As uncomfortable as the candidate's stance on Israel and anti-Semitism makes me, my greatest concern in this election is the future of American democracy, which I think is at an existential point.”
The election is Nov. 3.
