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political prisoners
'I Am a Political Prisoner': Mahmoud Khalil Shares Letter From ICE Detention
"My arrest was a direct consequence of exercising my right to free speech as I advocated for a free Palestine and an end to the genocide in Gaza, which resumed in full force Monday night."
Mar 18, 2025
"My name is Mahmoud Khalil and I am a political prisoner."
That's the beginning of a letter from a former organizer of pro-Palestine protests at Columbia University who is fighting the Trump administration's effort to deport him. The letter, which he dictated from the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) facility in Louisiana where he is now detained, was posted on social media Tuesday by groups representing him in court.
Khalil finished his graduate studies at Columbia in December. He is an Algerian citizen of Palestinian descent and was living in the United States with a green card when he was arrested by Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officers in New York City earlier this month. His family—including his wife Noor, who is a U.S. citizen and expecting their first child—shared a video of the arrest on Friday.
"DHS would not tell me anything for hours—I did not know the cause of my arrest or if I was facing immediate deportation," Khalil said Tuesday. "At 26 Federal Plaza, I slept on the cold floor. In the early morning hours, agents transported me to another facility in Elizabeth, New Jersey. There, I slept on the ground and was refused a blanket despite my request."
"My arrest was a direct consequence of exercising my right to free speech as I advocated for a free Palestine and an end to the genocide in Gaza, which resumed in full force Monday night," he continued. "With January's cease-fire now broken, parents in Gaza are once again cradling too-small shrouds, and families are forced to weigh starvation and displacement against bombs. It is our moral imperative to persist in the struggle for their complete freedom."
Khalil also called out administrative leaders at Columbia for not only enabling his arrest but also "the expulsion or suspension of at least 22 Columbia students—some stripped of their B.A. degrees just weeks before graduation—and the expulsion" of Grant Miner, president of United Auto Workers Local 2710, which represents thousands of student workers, on the eve of contract negotiations.
"If anything, my detention is a testament to the strength of the student movement in shifting public opinion toward Palestinian liberation," Khalil said. "Students have long been at the forefront of change—leading the charge against the Vietnam War, standing on the frontlines of the Civil Rights Movement, and driving the struggle against apartheid in South Africa. Today, too, even if the public has yet to fully grasp it, it is students who steer us toward truth and justice."
The letter came a day after Khalil's attorneys filed a motion asking the federal court in the Southern District of New York to immediately release the "recent Columbia graduate student, activist, soon-to-be father, and legal permanent resident."
Samah Sisay, staff attorney at the Center for Constitutional Rights, said Monday that "as a result of the federal government's unlawful decision to detain and transfer Mahmoud Khalil to Louisiana in retaliation for his support for Palestinian rights, he faces the loss of his freedom, a profound silencing of his speech, lack of meaningful access to legal counsel, separation from his pregnant U.S. citizen wife, and the prospect of missing the birth of his first child. We filed an emergency bail motion because these extraordinary circumstances require Mr. Khalil's release—and the court has inherent authority to release him and send him home."
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Tlaib Slams Colleagues for Not Demanding Release of Jailed Palestinians
Rep. Rashida Tlaib condemned the refusal of many U.S. lawmakers to "view Palestinians as equal human beings who deserve the same rights, freedom, and human dignity."
Nov 29, 2023
Democratic Rep. Rashida Tlaib on Tuesday called for the release of all hostages and political prisoners currently being held in Israel and Gaza after the U.S. House passed a resolution demanding that Hamas immediately free hostages taken during last month's deadly attack.
Tlaib, who voted for the resolution, said the failure of many of her colleagues to urge Israel to release Palestinians who have been jailed without charge or trial "demonstrates their refusal to view Palestinians as equal human beings who deserve the same rights, freedom, and human dignity."
"Every innocent civilian should be released and reunited with their family, no matter their faith or ethnicity," said Tlaib, the first Palestinian-American woman ever elected to the U.S. Congress. "I will continue to call for the release of all hostages, as well as the innocent Palestinians who were arbitrarily detained and being held by the Israeli government indefinitely without charge or trial."
Prior to the Hamas-led October 7 attack, Israel was holding more than 1,300 Palestinians in administrative detention, the Israeli human rights group B'Tselem has estimated. In the wake of the attack, Israeli authorities arrested thousands of additional Palestinians.
Under a deal that Israel and Hamas reached last week, dozens of Palestinians and Israelis have been freed from captivity during a fragile humanitarian pause. But as Al Jazeera reported, Israel arrested nearly as many Palestinians as it released during the first four days of the pause.
The Israeli military has described all of the Palestinians it has freed under the deal with Hamas—many of them children—as "terrorists." The Intercept's Jeremy Scahill observed that "of the 300 names Israel proposed for potential release, 233 of them have not been convicted of any crimes; they are categorized simply as 'under arrest.'"
"The Netanyahu government and its supporters have promoted a narrative that these prisoners are all hardened terrorists who committed violent crimes," Scahill wrote Sunday. "This assertion relies on a farcical 'Alice in Wonderland'-inspired logic of convicting them by fiat in public before any trial, even the sham trials to which Palestinians are routinely subjected. Israel released a list of the names with alleged crimes they committed. And who is making these allegations? A military that acts as a brutal occupation force against Palestinians in the West Bank."
"Israel is asking the world to believe that these 300 people are all dangerous terrorists, yet it has built a kangaroo military court system for Palestinians that magically churns out a nearly 100% conviction rate," Scahill added. "All of this from a country that constantly promotes itself as the only democracy in the Middle East."
More than 100 Palestinians and more than 60 Israelis have been freed during the pause, which is set to end Wednesday. While talks to further extend the pause are underway, the Financial Times reported that "far-right ministers in Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's coalition have rejected the possibility of a broader hostage-for-prisoner release deal with Hamas."
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200+ Groups Implore COP28 Nations to Address UAE's Human Rights and Climate Abuses
"Allowing COP28 to be held by the rulers of a repressive petrostate, and overseen by an oil executive, is reckless, represents a blatant conflict of interest, and threatens the legitimacy of the whole process."
Sep 13, 2023
More than 200 civil society organizations from around the world on Wednesday urged leaders of countries participating in this autumn's United Nations Climate Change Conference—popularly known as COP28—to address host nation United Arab Emirates' "human rights record and destructive policies on climate change."
"We support the concerns expressed by climate justice movements that allowing COP28 to be held by the rulers of a repressive petrostate, and overseen by an oil executive, is reckless, represents a blatant conflict of interest, and threatens the legitimacy of the whole process," the groups wrote in a letter, referring to Sultan Ahmed al-Jaber, the CEO of the United Arab Emirates' state-owned Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC)—one of the world's largest fossil fuel firms.
Earlier this year, one European Union lawmaker likened al-Jaber's COP28 presidency to "having a tobacco multinational overseeing the internal work of the World Health Organization."
The groups' letter continues:
Climate justice and human rights are deeply interconnected—there cannot be one without the other. As COP28 delegates prepare to attend the talks in Dubai, it is crucial for the international community to use the opportunity to shine a spotlight on the UAE's human rights record, and to stand in solidarity with communities on the frontlines working to stop climate change impacts and human rights violations in the UAE and across the world.
The signatories called on the world leaders to:
- Demand that the UAE not spy on COP28 attendees and end unlawful surveillance that violates international human rights law;
- Call on the UAE to release all prisoners of conscience;
- Demand action on violations of women's rights;
- Condemn violations of LGBTQ+ rights;
- Call for workers' rights reforms and reparation for forced labor;
- Urge the UAE to stop supporting human rights violators in Yemen and across the Middle East and North Africa; and
- Publicly repudiate UAE greenwashing and fossil fuel hypocrisy.
"In addition, we urge all nations to make meaningful and ambitious commitments at COP28, with rich countries taking responsibility for their historical emissions and leading the way with commitments in line with their common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities and principles of equity," the letter asserts.
"COP28 must produce a global commitment to phase out all fossil fuels and fossil fuel subsidies at the speed needed to keep global average temperature increases below 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels," the signers added.
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