Good Riddance, Mahmoud Khalil

On the same day that Islamic State terrorist Shamsud-Din Jabbar murdered 15 Americans by plowing a car into a crowd in New Orleans, thousands of Hamas and Hezbollah supporters, many decked out in Islamist garb, descended onto Times Square chanting, “Globalize the intifada.”

One of the organizers of the protest was Columbia University Apartheid Divest, a group often led by Syrian national Mahmoud Khalil.

Khalil, a former graduate student, is now detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement and now faces deportation, an enforcement of President Donald Trump’s executive orders “prohibiting anti-Semitism.” I am assured by Democrats that his deportation is a ghastly assault on free speech.

Now, like anyone in the United States, Khalil enjoys the First Amendment right to spread his message. Being a bigot and warmonger isn’t a crime. Free expression is a fundamental and universal right. And one hopes Khalil will be free to express his opinions unfettered in his homeland of Syria or Algeria, where he is a citizen. Because he has no constitutional right to be in the U.S.

You don’t need to be convicted of a crime to lose your immigration status. The immigration card system exists so that newcomers can be properly vetted. To become a citizen, you must exhibit “good moral character,” a criterion that Khalil doesn’t come close to meeting by any objective standard. Just obey the law, pay taxes, and stay out of trouble. Orchestrating and participating in harassment, vandalism, bigotry and civil unrest at a once-esteemed Ivy League university falls under the label of “trouble.”

Then again, according to 8 U.S.C. Section 1227(a)(4)(B), Khalil’s permanent residency can also be denied or revoked if he “endorses or espouses terrorist activity or persuades others to endorse or espouse terrorist activity or support a terrorist organization.” (My italics.)

Khalil, who came here initially on a student visa, does little else. The CUAD brags about fighting for the “total eradication of Western civilization” and explicitly advocates “global intifada” and “armed resistance” by Hamas, an organization designated a terrorist group by the U.S. Justice Department. As The New York Times reported last year, the group was “openly supporting militant groups fighting Israel and rescinding an apology it made after one of its members said the school was lucky he wasn’t out killing Zionists.” (Me again.)

One of the accusations against Khalil, leveled by Columbia’s new Office of Institutional Equity, is that he organized an event glorifying Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack. Hamas, of course, not only murdered 35 Americans on Oct. 7, but numerous citizens before that day. The first and second “intifadas” were responsible for the deaths of more American citizens, including children and diplomatic personnel. Since Khalil is so fond of the intifada, maybe he can now join his friends on the front lines.

Khalil’s defenders contend that his only crime was being “critical of Israel” – a popular euphemism for advocating the destruction of the Jewish state. No one has ever stopped anyone from being critical of Israel. If Khalil were merely writing or giving speeches offering the customary fantasies about “genocide” and “occupation” instead of organizing illegal “protests” on Columbia University grounds, no one would have noticed he existed. Blocking access to buildings and classes and intimidating Jewish students, tactics adopted by Khalil’s group, do not constitute “free expression.”

Khalil, it should be remembered, promised that protests and encampments were just the beginning — “the limit is the sky,” he said. The sky apparently means having masked nutjobs barging into classes while passing out flyers that illustrated a boot stamping on a Star of David. Khalil and his minions, much like Klansmen, use keffiyehs instead of white sheets to hide their faces so they can get away with crime and intimidate people.

And eventually, these “protests” turned violent. When 200 rioters swarmed the Barnard College library recently, vandalizing the place and barricading themselves in the building, draping a giant flag calling for “intifada,” the CUAD took credit. When rioters trashed and took over Hamilton Hall in 2024, Khalil represented them as a “negotiator.”

Let’s also remember that simply because these rioters and their leaders, who rarely do the dirty work themselves, are offered immunity by leftist district attorneys like Alvin Bragg doesn’t mean they aren’t engaged in criminality. Everyone in the mob who wrecked Hamilton Hall and attacked a Columbia custodian was let off the hook by NYC’s radical DA.

Will Khalil be deported? Who knows. Due process can take a long time. In the end, though, if we’re a nation that’s compelled to hand citizenship to foreigners who lead groups that hang “Death to America” banners at their protests, we are on a suicide mission.

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