Palestinian activist Mohsen Mahdawi, whose arrest by masked and hooded ICE agents when he arrived for his naturalization interview to become a U.S. citizen made national headlines last year, is facing a new deportation threat after a three-judge panel overturned a lower court ruling that had freed him from ICE custody. Mahdawi was involved in pro-Palestine protests at Columbia University, where he was a student, demanding an end to Israel’s genocide in Gaza. He says he is being targeted solely for his advocacy.
“Enough is enough,” Mahdawi says. “Palestinian people deserve to have safety, freedom and equal rights between the river and the sea, and this government is trying to silence me.”
“That is just textbook censorship, and the First Amendment doesn’t allow it,” adds ACLU attorney Nathan Freed Wessler, a member of Mahdawi’s legal team.