Columbia University student Mohsen Mahdawi was released from US immigration custody on Wednesday, after a judge ruled he should be free on bail to challenge the Trump administration’s efforts to deport him over his participation in pro-Palestinian protests. Mahdawi, born and raised in a refugee camp in the West Bank, was arrested earlier this month upon arriving for an interview for his US citizenship petition. A judge swiftly ordered President Donald Trump’s administration not to deport him from the United States or take him out of the state of Vermont.
After two weeks in detention, Mahdawi walked out of the federal courthouse in Burlington, Vermont, following US District Judge Geoffrey Crawford order that he be released at a court hearing on Wednesday.
In his ruling, Crawford said Mahdawi did not pose a danger to the public and was not a flight risk. The judge drew parallels between the current political climate and the Red Scare and McCarthyism eras of the last century when thousands of people were targeted for deportation due to their political views.
Mahdawi’s release marked a setback for the Trump administration’s efforts to deport pro-Palestinian foreign university students, though other students remain in jail.
“I am saying it clear and loud to President Trump and his cabinet, I am not afraid of you,” Mahdawi said after he emerged from the courthouse, dozens of protesters waving Palestinian flags chanting “no fear” and “yes love.”
“This is a light of hope, hope and faith in the justice system in America,” Mahdawi said of Crawford’s decision to release him.
Trump administration officials have said student visa and green card holders are subject to deportation over their support for Palestinians and criticism of Israel’s conduct in the war in Gaza, calling their actions a threat to US foreign policy.
Department of Homeland Security spokeswoman Tricia McLaughlin said Mahdawi’s privilege of studying in the United States on a green card should be taken away.
“When you advocate for violence, glorify and support terrorists that relish the killing of Americans, and harass Jews, that privilege should be revoked, and you should not be in this country,” McLaughlin said in a statement. “No judge, not this one or any other, is going to stop us from doing that.”
Trump’s critics have called the effort an attack on free speech rights under the First Amendment of the US Constitution.
“Mahdawi is here in the United States legally and acted legally,” Vermont’s US Congressional delegation of Senator Bernie Sanders, Senator Peter Welch and Representative Becca Balint said in a statement. “The Trump Administration’s actions in this case — and in so many other cases of wrongfully detained, deported, and disappeared people — are shameful and immoral.” Other protesters in similar circumstances include Columbia University student Mahmoud Khalil and Tufts University student Rumeysa Ozturk. Both Khalil and Ozturk remain in custody and have not been charged with any crimes.
Mahdawi, a green card holder, has lived in Vermont for 10 years and is set to graduate from Columbia in May, according to his lawyers.
He has not been accused of any crime. Rather, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said his pro-Palestinian activism could potentially undermine the Middle East peace process.
“They arrested me. What’s the reason? Because I raised my voice, and I said no to war, yes to peace,” Mahdawi said outside the courthouse. “Because I said, ‘Enough is enough. Killing more than 50,000 Palestinians is more than enough.’” In his ruling, Crawford said Mahdawi had exercised his right to advocate for a peaceful resolution to the conflict in Gaza. As a noncitizen resident, he enjoyed the same First Amendment free speech rights as US citizens, Crawford said.
People who knew Mahdawi described him as a peaceful figure who sought consensus in a highly-charged political environment, the judge added.
“Even if he were a firebrand, his conduct is protected by the First Amendment,” Crawford wrote.
Palestinian student released on bail as he challenges deportation from US
https://arab.news/jq59b
Palestinian student released on bail as he challenges deportation from US
- People who knew Mahdawi described him as a peaceful figure who sought consensus in a highly-charged political environment, the judge says
Trump urges Iranian Kurds to attack Iran as war widens
- Azerbaijan preparing unspecified retaliatory measures on Thursday
- The seven-day war has now seen Iran target Israel, the Gulf states, Cyprus, Turkiye and Azerbaijan, and spread to the Indian Ocean off Sri Lanka
DUBAI/WASHINGTON: US President Donald Trump encouraged Iranian Kurdish forces in Iraq to launch attacks against Iran as the Middle East conflict widened, with Azerbaijan warning it would retaliate for being targeted by Iranian missiles.
Israel on Friday said it had started a “broad-scale” wave of attacks against infrastructure targets in Tehran, as Gulf cities came under renewed bombardment by Iran.
The seven-day war has now seen Iran target Israel, the Gulf states, Cyprus, Turkiye and Azerbaijan, and spread to the Indian Ocean off Sri Lanka where a US submarine sank an Iranian naval ship.
On the possibility of the Iranian Kurdish forces entering Iran, Trump told Reuters on Thursday: “I think it’s wonderful that they want to do that, I’d be all for it.”
Two Iranian drone attacks targeted an Iranian opposition camp in Iraqi Kurdistan on Thursday, security sources said.
Iranian Kurdish militias have consulted with the United States in recent days about whether, and how, to attack Iran’s security forces in the western part of the country, according to three sources with knowledge of the matter.
The Iranian Kurdish coalition of groups based on the Iran-Iraq border in the semi-autonomous region of Iraqi Kurdistan has been training to mount such an attack in hopes of weakening the country’s military, as the United States and Israel pound Iranian targets with bombs and missiles. Trump, speaking with Reuters in a telephone interview, also said the United States must have a role in deciding who will be the next leader of Iran after airstrikes killed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei last week.
“We’re going to have to choose that person along with Iran. We’re going to have to choose that person,” he said.
US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Thursday that the US was not expanding its military objectives in Iran, despite what Trump said about choosing the country’s next leader.
“There’s no expansion in our objectives. We know exactly what we’re trying to achieve,” he said. The attack on Iran is a major political gamble for the Republican president, with opinion polls showing little support and Americans concerned about the rise in gasoline prices caused by disruption to energy supplies. Trump dismissed that concern. Shares on Wall Street fell on Thursday, weighed by surging oil prices, as the economic impact of the campaign intensified, with countries around the world cut off from a fifth of global supplies of oil and liquefied natural gas and air transport still facing chaos and global logistics increasingly snarled.
Azerbaijan prepares to retaliate
Azerbaijan was preparing unspecified retaliatory measures on Thursday after it said four Iranian drones crossed its border and injured four people in the Nakhchivan exclave.
“We will not tolerate this unprovoked act of terror and aggression against Azerbaijan,” President Ilham Aliyev told a meeting of his Security Council.
Iran, which has a significant Azeri minority, denied it targeted its neighbor.
Lebanon’s Iran-backed Hezbollah militia warned Israeli residents to evacuate towns within 5 km (3 miles) of the border between the countries in a message posted on its Telegram channel in Hebrew early on Friday.
“Your military’s aggression against Lebanese sovereignty and safe citizens, the destruction of civilian infrastructure and the expulsion campaign it is carrying out will not go unchallenged,” Hezbollah said.
Us munitions full
Hegseth and Admiral Brad Cooper, who leads US forces in the Middle East, said during a briefing about operations that the US has enough munitions to continue its bombardment indefinitely.
“Iran is hoping that we cannot sustain this, which is a really bad miscalculation,” Hegseth told reporters at Central Command headquarters in Florida. “Our munitions are full up and our will is ironclad.”
The Pentagon earlier this week said the military campaign, known as Operation Epic Fury, is focused on destroying Iran’s offensive missiles, missile production and navy, while not allowing Tehran to have a nuclear weapon.
Cooper said the US had now hit at least 30 Iranian ships, including a large drone carrier that he said was the size of a World War Two aircraft carrier.
He added that B-2 bombers had in the past few hours dropped dozens of 2,000 penetrator bombs targeting deeply buried ballistic missile launchers, and that bombings were also targeting Iran’s missile production facilities.
Iran’s ballistic missile attacks had decreased by 90 percent since the first day of the war, while drone attacks had decreased by 83 percent in that time frame, he said. In Iran, at least 1,230 people have been killed, according to the Iranian Red Crescent Society, including 175 schoolgirls and staff killed at a primary school in Minab in the country’s south on the first day of the war. Another 77 have been killed in Lebanon, its Health Ministry says. Thousands fled southern Beirut on Thursday after Israel warned residents to leave.
