Mahmoud KhalilA recent Colombia University graduate and a supportive activist It was reserved by the American immigration authorities 11 days ago, he talks from a detention center in Gina, Louisiana for the first time since his arrest.
in Statement to the guardianKhalil said that he was “a political prisoner … attest to the calm injustice against a large number of people who are tired of protecting the law.”
In his notes that you can Read completelyKhalil accused the Trump administration of targeting him “as part of a broader strategy to suppress the opposition,” adding that “the owners of visas, green cards and citizens alike, will all be targeted because of their political beliefs.”
Khalil, a permanent resident in the United States and married to Nour Abdel -Ala, an American citizen, was detained in New York on March 8 by the enforcement of American migration and customs (ICE) over the role he played in the protests supporting the Palestinians at the University of Colombia.
Khalil says that the agents who arrested him “refused to make a judicial order” before the deportation threatened and canceled his green card.
“At that moment, my only occupy was the safety of Nour,” he said. “I had no idea if it was also taken, because the agents threatened to arrest her for not leaving my side.”
After his arrest, Khalil was transferred to a contract facility in New Jersey before being transferred to Louisiana, where he remains.
On Tuesday, from his cell, Khalil detailed his experiences in detention and inquired about the basics of American law.
“Who has the right to have rights?” He asked. “Certainly, humans are not in cells here.
“The justice escaped the features of immigration facilities in this nation,” Khalil added.
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He continued to condemn US foreign policy, and the University of Colombia wandered at federal pressure to reprimand student demonstrators and break the last Israel for a fragile ceasefire.
He said: “The arrest was a direct result of the practice of my rights in freedom of expression, as it called for free Palestine and the end of the genocide in Gaza, which was fully resumed on Monday night,” adding that “our moral necessity to continue the conflict for their full freedom.”
On the days of Khalil’s detention, calls were grown for his release. Hundreds of demonstrators gathered in New York City, demanding his freedom.
People gather outside the New York City Court to protest the arrest and detention of Mahmoud Khalil on March 12, 2025.
Michael M. Santiago/Getty Emp
On March 10, the efforts made to deport Khalil by Federal Jesse Jesse Foreman, who asked the lawyers for both parties to provide more arguments.
On Friday, legal representatives of the government requested that the Khalil case be rejected or transferred to Louisiana.
On Wednesday, Foreman rejected the requests of government lawyers to transfer his case to Louisiana and order Khalil To stay in the United States now.
Foreman transferred the Khalil case from New York to New Jersey, on the pretext that he had no specialty to supervise it because Khalil was held in New Jersey when his lawyers opposed for the first time to arrest him because of his participation in the demonstrations last year.
Khalil did not participate in the camp at the university due to fears of the loss of his student’s visa, but he spoke frequently to the press and was charged with adhering to the interests of the activists during the discussions with the university regarding the conditions of ending the protests.
Columbia University student Mahmoud Khalil (the center) is speaking to the press during a press conference organized by the demonstrators supporting the Palestinians who set up a new camp on the campus campus at the University of Morningside at Columbia University in New York City on June 1, 2024.
Selcuk Acar/Anadolu via Getty Images)
During this time, he maintained a commitment to preserve the interests of the Jewish people and the Palestinians.
After an increase in anti -Semitism on the campus, Khalil told CNN last spring, “I think the liberation of the Palestinian people and the Jewish people are intertwined and they go manually and you cannot achieve it without the other.”
A year later, Khalil I detention coincides with the national research of university students who participate in the demonstrations against the Israel-Hama conflict, which is more than government pressure on educational institutions to strangle students’ activity.
As a recent social position, US President Donald Trump referred to those who are in line with the Palestinian issue as “terrorist sympathizers”, declaring that they no longer have the right to stay in the United States, adding that his administration “will find, arrest, and deport these terrorist sympathizers from our country – they do not return again.”
Meanwhile, the government is cutting funding for American universities that do not strip their diversity and programmer and inclusiveness.
On Friday, the US Department of Education issued a list of 45 universities Under the investigation to “use racist preferences and stereotypes in education programs and activities.”
On Wednesday, the Trump administration stopped to 175 million dollars in government grants to the University of Pennsylvania because of its policy regarding the participation of sexually transformed athletes.
Likewise, Johns Hopkins University announced on Friday Thousands of workers’ demobilization in 44 countries And ending its activities related to the CAER in Baltimore and internationally, after it lost $ 800 million in financing public health from the United States Agency for International Development.
– With files from Reuters
& Copy 2025 Global News, a Division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
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