However, most of the video footage from passengers had been confiscated by the IDF. Footage that was smuggled out later clearly showed the commandos attacking the passengers. Abunimah accused Abraham Foxman of the Anti-Defamation League in August 2011 of having influenced the Norwegian mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik: "After Norway, Foxman may fear that the Islamophobic genie he helped unleash is out of control, and is a dangerous liability for him and for Israel." In March 2012, Abunimah was among those Palestinian activists who signed a statement criticizing the views of Gilad Atzmon as racist and antisemitic. The signatories to the statement called for "the disavowal of Atzmon by fellow Palestinian organizers, as well as Palestine solidarity activists, and allies of the Palestinian people". Abunimah visited the headquarters of the Popular Committee for Refugees in the Maghazi camp in the Gaza Strip in May 2013. He "expressed his overwhelming joy at being in the camp," saying that the experience "reinforced his spirit of resistance." Abunimah met Barack Obama personally in 2004 when the latter was a member of the Illinois State Senate. Abunimah wrote in 2007 that he had met Obama around half a dozen times before Obama held elective office. The events were often at Chicago-based Arab-American and Palestinian events, including a 1998 fundraiser at which Edward Saïd was the keynote speaker. Abunimah has since accused Obama of having cut off his relationships with American Arabs after his election to the U.S. Senate. "Obama said that he is sympathetic to the Palestinians," Abunimah has declared, "but I do not believe that. ... I believe that he is political and he does not sympathize with the Palestinians in light of his recent positions and actions. He said he was sympathetic to the Palestinians because he needed their votes in order to be elected." Abunimah has strongly criticized Obama's approach to Mid-East affairs, writing that the president has "entrenched" the policies of his predecessor, George W. Bush, and has not contributed to "even the pretense of a serious peace effort." A 2007 article in New York's "Jewish Week" reported that Palestinian activist and Israel critic Rashid Khalidi had held an Obama fundraiser in his home when Obama was running for the House of Representatives, and quoted Abunimah as saying that Obama “convinced me he was very aware of the issues [and] critical of U.S. bias toward Israel and lack of sensitivity to Arabs...He was very supportive of U.S. pressure on Israel.'"