June 23, 2026 10:46 AM UTC

Melat Kiros Proved Us Right And Then Some

• 0 Comments
• by: Colorado Pols

In recent weeks, this blog has taken some criticism for our reaction to the immoderate views of a Democratic congressional primary candidate in Colorado’s First Congressional District, Democratic Socialists of America (DSA)-supported challenger Melat Kiros, running against longtime progressive incumbent Rep. Diana DeGette of Denver. Kiros, who is running for office for the first time after losing her job at a New York law firm over her views on the Israeli/Gaza conflict following the October 7, 2023 Hamas terror attacks on Israeli civilians, has run a basically single-issue campaign focusing on the conflict–the product of her own background, but also as a means of differentiating herself from the progressive incumbent who agrees with her on a multitude of issues from universal health care to immigration reform and voting rights.

Kiros’ focus on the Gaza conflict as a defining issue of her campaign has brought her into the orbit of a popular but deeply controversial podcast host with millions of followers named Hasan Piker, whose rally with Kiros a week ago was cancelled after multiple venues refused to host an event starring a man who says “America deserved 9/11” among a long list of other deliberately provocative statements that recently got Piker barred from entering the United Kingdom. Appearing on Piker’s show last month, Kiros stated that the Hamas terrorist attack on October 7, 2023 that killed over 1,000 Israeli civilians was the “inevitable consequence” of Israel’s own actions. As readers know, we had an editorial reaction to these comments, since it’s our view that the only responsible position is to condemn the killing of all civilians. To suggest that the Israeli civilians who died or were taken hostage on October 7th had it coming, which Kiros did, is an extreme and in our opinion disqualifying position for an aspiring member of Congress. Kiros’ response was that our criticism was “incredibly racist and dangerous,” and we’ve received some other clap-backs of a similar nature.

Last night, 9NEWS Kyle Clark posted his in-depth interview with Kiros, in which he followed up on Kiros’ views on Israel, the 9/11 terror attacks, Hasan Piker’s praise for Hamas, and perhaps most tellingly, the antisemitic terror attack one year ago in Boulder that killed one elderly Jewish woman and injured several others.

To say our concerns with Melat Kiros have been validated is a considerable understatement:

CLARK: Is it a suggestion that Israel had it coming?

KIROS: No, not at all. It’s about understanding the conditions in which violence and war happens, right? Israel is a country that has been accused of apartheid and occupation for decades now, and has been able to resist any kind of change despite all of the, you know, frustration on the world stage that people have had for the conditions that Palestinians have been living in. And I hope that as an ally that Israel claims to be, that they would be responsive to our demands to make sure that they change those conditions so that we can actually finally start to the work of peace building and delivering aid to the people in need…

Kiros responds “no, not at all” to the question of whether Israel had the October 7th attacks coming…and then she explains how Israel had the October 7th attacks coming. Kiros is not trying to “understand the conditions” that led to the October 7th terror attacks, she is justifying them. With these very comments.

And Kiros was just getting warmed up:

CLARK: Do you believe that the 9-11 terrorist attacks on America were the inevitable consequence of American foreign policy?

KIROS: Inevitable in the sense that we destabilized a lot of the Middle East that forced people to believe that another act of violence was the only response. And again, just like I said before, our responsibility is to getting rid of those conditions that lead to violence in the first place.

This is another stunning oversimplification of history that ends up at the same place: Kiros also believes America had the 9/11 terror attacks coming. That is of course not a novel viewpoint, having been articulated by everyone from Osama bin Laden to CU’s Ward Churchill. But it’s not a responsible viewpoint for a member of Congress to hold, and we don’t think it’s the view of a plurality of Democratic primary voters in CO-01. Just like October 7th, you can criticize policy decisions without taking the additional step of rationalizing the killing of innocent people on either side.

From here, Kiros was asked about the opinions of her supporter Hasan Piker, specifically regarding the terror group Hamas responsible for the October 7th attacks, who Piker has repeatedly said is morally superior to the Israeli government. Apparently, Kiros won’t back Piker up on that one:

CLARK: You recently campaigned with Hasan Piker. He’s got a huge streaming audience. Do you agree with his statement that Hamas is a lesser evil than Israel?

KIROS: No, I don’t. [Pols emphasis]

Then why is she campaigning with him? We know the answer to that, it’s all about Piker’s three million angry young male followers. But running away from the things Hasan Piker actually says when questioned is information that Kiros’ supporters, who are convinced that the cancellation of her Piker rally was a giant conspiracy, need to be aware of.

Clark’s next question to Kiros was about her proposed arms embargo against Israel, which Kiros says should include defensive weapons as well as offensive weapons:

CLARK: You’ve called Israel’s actions in Gaza genocide. You’ve called for an arms embargo against Israel. Would that include the U.S. selling or financing defensive weapons that Israel uses to protect itself against rocket attacks from Hezbollah or Iran?

KIROS: Yes. It would. It would.

CLARK: Why not differentiate between offensive weapons used to wage war against another population and then defensive weapons that are used to protect civilians from outside attack?

KIROS: I believe that our selling of arms to Israel, defensive or offensive, [Pols emphasis] gives them the cover to continue the genocide that’s taking place in Palestine and now the ethnic cleansing that’s taking place in Lebanon.

Basically, what Kiros is saying is that Israel should be defenseless against attacks by neighbors who have been trying to destroy the country since its founding in 1948. From that, you might reasonably infer some things about Kiros’ opinion on Israel’s right to exist at all, which is a debate Kiros tried to normalize in the letter she wrote in November of 2023 that got her fired from Sidley Austin. It’s safe to say that if Kiros got her way as a member of Congress, more Israeli civilians would die.

From there, Clark turned to the motives of the Egyptian national who firebombed a “Run For Their Lives” event supporting Hamas’ hostages in Gaza in Boulder one year ago, killing one Jewish person and injuring a dozen more. And although Kiros is quick to pass judgment on the “genocidal” motives of Israel against the Palestinian people, the motives of accused firebomber Mohamed Sabry Soliman are apparently much less discernible:

CLARK: There’s a debate within the Democratic Party and elsewhere about what is anti-Semitism and what is anti-Zionism. That firebombing attack in Boulder on the group of peaceful protesters there that were protesting in support of the Jewish hostages being held by Hamas, was that firebombing attack on them an act of anti-Semitism?

KIROS: I don’t know what was in the heart of the perpetrator. All I know is that he went and attacked innocent people because of what they might have believed. And I don’t even know what the people that were at that protest believed, too. In fact, most of them were probably just there to ask that the people who were kidnapped during October 7th be returned home to their families. That’s not a political statement in and of itself.

CLARK: But you would not describe it as anti-Semitism?

KIROS: I don’t know. I don’t know what his intentions were. [Pols emphasis]

Soliman threw Molotov cocktails at the Jewish marchers in Boulder while literally shouting the words “Free Palestine.” After his arrest, Soliman declared to police that “anyone supporting the existence of Israel on our land” is a “Zionist,” and called the state of Israel a “cancer entity.” Kiros’ refusal to identify Soliman’s fatal attack on Jewish people in Boulder as anti-Semitic is consistent with her objective to carve out an acceptable space for debate over whether Israel should have the right to exist. But it stands out in sharper relief after an 80-year-old Jewish grandmother gets burned to death and Kiros can’t state the obvious reason why.

We’ve read comments that suggest we have inappropriately fixated on Kiros’ views about Israel and those of her supporters like Hasan Piker. All we can say is that in our over two decades covering Colorado politics, we don’t know when these kinds of extreme viewpoints, making excuses for the killing of defenseless civilians, have ever been so prominently featured in a Democratic primary. We’ll readily confess to not having much experience with Democratic candidates making excuses for killing innocent people, either in Gaza or in New York City on September 11, 2001. But these, as one look at the headlines makes obvious, are not normal times.

In short, we don’t believe that Kiros’ extreme views are representative of a majority of Denver Democrats, and this election will test whether we’re right. Kiros is a symptom of a bigger problem that we believe Democrats everywhere must confront in order to claim the political mainstream. In that way, Kiros is once again making Colorado a political harbinger…of something.

We’ll find out what exactly next Tuesday.