October 26, 2025 · Micah 6:8
A member of the congregation, a retired attorney and longtime advocate for Palestinian rights, tells the stories of three students detained this year over their advocacy, and of the court rulings that released them on First Amendment grounds.
Transcript
I've been an advocate for Palestinian rights for twenty years. So it really got my attention when three foreign student activists, Mahmoud Khalil, Rümeysa Öztürk and Mohsen Mahdawi, were snatched off the streets earlier this year because of their Palestinian rights advocacy. I began reading everything I could about them following their cases seemed to be a way to connect my anguish with what Israel and the United States were doing in Gaza, with my shock over what was happening to our democracy here at home, because they are, of course, interrelated. So today I will be telling you the stories of the three students while Rümeysa Öztürk was not the first to be taken. I'm going to start with her because it happened so close to home right here in Somerville, and because it's the easiest to understand.
Before I begin, I should say that while I am a retired attorney, I'm not an expert and didn't practice in either constitutional or immigration law. So I'm giving you my best take on what happened. But I'm not claiming to be an expert.
So starting with Rümeysa, thirty years old, a Turkish national former Fulbright scholar here legally in the U.S. on a student visa, a doctoral candidate at Tufts University in the field of child study and human development, her dissertation topic was on how positive media use among children can nurture more kindness and compassion in the world. She was abducted by ICE agents Late afternoon March twenty fifth while walking on a street near her residence. On her way to break the Ramadan fast by having a meal at the Tufts Interfaith Center. How many have seen the surveillance camera video of her abduction? Oh, good. All right. Quite a few. So you remember she stopped by a man in a hooded sweatshirt who suddenly grabs her wrists and takes away her cell phone. She's been talking to her mother. She screams. Five other people wearing ordinary clothing surround her, and after putting on masks, put her hands in handcuffs behind her back and one on each arm march her away to an unmarked car.
Once alerted, her attorney leapt into action, and by ten that night had filed a habeas corpus petition in Massachusetts Federal District Court. And within less than an hour, the court had issued an order that she not be taken out of Massachusetts. But by that time ICE agents had already moved her. Taking her first to New Hampshire and then to Vermont, where she was held in custody until the wee hours of the morning, when she was flown off thirteen hundred miles to a detention center in Louisiana. All this was done in total secrecy, during which the government attorneys, well aware that the Massachusetts court had ordered that she not be taken out of Massachusetts, continued to say they didn't know where she was and to prevent her from contacting anyone during transport, she was not only handcuffed, but shackled at her belly and her feet. And for a while she thought she was being kidnapped and would surely be killed.
Why was the government intent on getting her to Louisiana? Because the Court of Appeals, with jurisdiction over Louisiana is the most right wing of the twelve Courts of Appeals in the state. Now, what was the just the government's justification for what it did? Rümeysa was not charged with any crimes. Rather, the government claimed she was involved in associations. That, quote, may undermine U.S. foreign policy by creating a hostile environment for Jewish students and indicating support for a designated terrorist organization. End quote.
What was the government's evidence for that claim? An op ed that she and three other students had published the year before in the Tufts student newspaper. That piece criticized the university's dismissive response to student resolutions criticizing actions of the government of Israel. Now, let this sink in. The only conduct the government produced to support shackling this woman at her hands, feet and belly and dragging her off to a prison in Louisiana was that she had co-wrote co-written an op ed in the student newspaper Critical of Israel, an op ed that the student president, sorry, the university president stated was not in violation of any Tufts policies and was in fact consistent with speech that was approved by the Tufts trustees policy on Freedom of Speech. How many of you have read the op ed? Oh, good. All right. So you have it in your program.
Since the government's entire case for what it did depends upon this op ed. Let's take a look at it together. Paragraphs one and two simply describe the resolutions passed by the student Senate, which include a demand for acknowledgment of the Palestinian genocide and a call for divestment from companies linked to Israel. Paragraph three reminds the University of its commitment to critical thinking, even when this may cause distress or discomfort. Paragraph four refers to a recent ruling by the International Court of Justice that the rights of Palestinians in Gaza to be protected from genocide are at plausible risk of being breached. Paragraph five invokes the president of the university's historic divestment from apartheid South Africa. Paragraph six rejects the administration's characterization of the resolutions as divisive and affirms the equal dignity of all people. Paragraph seven quotes civil rights champion James Baldwin on the paradox that education causes students to examine the society in which they are educated. And paragraph eight is a plea to the president and the administration to engage meaningfully with the student resolutions. Now you have the evidence. You have the evidence in your hands. So correct me if I'm wrong. There is no expression here of hostility towards Jewish students. Indeed, no mention of Jewish students or even Jews. No mention of Hamas, much less support for it, and no incitement to violence. Whatever one's views of the wisdom of the student resolutions, this is an educated and restrained defense of them.
Well what happened? The Massachusetts District Court transferred the case to the Vermont District Court, which issued a seventy four page opinion. The opinion is refreshing because it takes us back to constitutional basics. First amendment protection of free speech is the cornerstone of our vibrant American democracy. End quote. This protection belongs not just to citizens, but also to non-citizens residing in the country. Freedom of speech is both a means and an end. An end. Because the freedom to think and speak is an inalienable human right and a means, because it is indispensable to the discovery and spread of truth. At the core of the cornerstone is political speech. Speech on public issues, quote occupies the highest rung of the hierarchy of First Amendment values as and is entitled to special protection. Was Rümeysa's op ed. An example of speech on public issues entitled to this special protection. The judge said that was self-evident.
Consequently, the judge ruled that Rümeysa had presented, quote, serious and viable First Amendment claims requiring urgent review on the merits, and ordered that she be returned to Vermont for a hearing. The government immediately appealed. In response, a three judge panel of the appeals court quickly issued a unanimous opinion, rejecting the government's appeal and praising the lower court decision as careful and thoughtful. Two days later, the Vermont judge ordered Rümeysa immediately released on bail. Quote, her continued detention potentially chills the speech of the millions and millions of people in this country who are not citizens. There has been no evidence introduced by the government other than the op ed. I mean, that literally is the case. The judge said Rümeysa was released on May nine after more than six weeks in detention.
The second case, Mahmoud Khalil, thirty years old, born in a refugee camp in Syria, the grandson of Palestinians forcibly displaced by Israeli forces during the nineteen forty eight Nakba. A graduate student at Columbia in International and Public Affairs and a lawful permanent resident of the United States, he was abducted by Homeland Security agents in the lobby of his student housing on March eight, just days after Israel had imposed an almost three month total food blockade on Gaza. Like Rümeysa, he was not charged with any crime. Like her, he was handcuffed, taken out of state and secretly flown off to a detention center also in Louisiana. Unlike her, his involvement in Palestinian rights advocacy extends beyond writing a single op ed. as many of you probably know, he was a prominent spokesperson for Columbia student protests against Israel's assault on Gaza, which he referred to as a genocide because he was regarded by fellow protesters as calm, principled, trustworthy and welcoming to everyone, including the many Jewish students involved in the protests. They chose him to represent them in negotiations with the administration. As he stated in a twenty twenty four CNN interview, quote, I believe that the liberation of the Palestinian people and the Jewish people are intertwined and go hand in hand, and you cannot achieve one without the other. Antisemitism in any form of racism has no place on campus and in this movement. While the government described him as a radical foreign pro-hamas student and bragged that his arrest was the first of many to come, No evidence was ever introduced linking him to Hamas.
What was the legal basis that the government had then? The immigration law sets out a number of grounds on which non-citizens can be deported, one of which is the rarely used foreign policy provision. Unlike virtually all other provisions in the immigration law, this one doesn't require any crime, the provision reads. An alien whose presence or activities in the U.S., the Secretary of State has reasonable grounds to believe will have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences is deportable. Let me read that again. An alien whose presence or activities in the United States, the Secretary of State has reasonable grounds to believe would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences is deportable.
Let's pause and think about that provision for a moment. You don't have to be a lawyer to realize there's something seriously amiss here. The provision gives a single individual, the Secretary of State, what is virtually unfettered discretion to decide who and who is not deportable. True, the Secretary must believe there are potentially serious foreign policy consequences. But what does potentially mean more likely than not, or not likely, but merely a possibility? And during what time frame might this potentiality be realized in the imminent future? Or maybe, just possibly, sometime in the many years to come? Note that a person does not have to actually do anything, much less do anything criminal. It's enough if the Secretary believes the person's mere presence in the United States might potentially sometime merely in the near. Who? Who knows? Many years might be dangerous. Well, you might say at least the Secretary's belief has to be reasonable. But who is going to be judging the reasonableness? Since it's the role of the Secretary to oversee foreign policy, the Secretary arguably has the final say about what foreign policy is and what might potentially sometimes someday impact it. And indeed, the government takes the position that the Secretary's determination as to who is deportable under the foreign policy provision is unreviewable. The secretary announces this person's got to go and that's it.
So it should come as no surprise that the sole federal court rule on constitutionality of this provision found it to be unconstitutionally void for vagueness in a nineteen ninety six decision, a new Jersey District Court characterized the provision as, quote, a breathtaking departure from well-established precedent. This provision, the judge said, provides absolutely no notice to aliens as to what is required of them to afford to avoid deportation, and no standards to restrain arbitrary and discriminatory conduct by the secretary. As such, she held it subjects aliens to deprivation of their liberty without due process of law, which is a violation of the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution. The name of the judge who made that decision is Maryanne Trump Barry. Yes, you heard that right. Maryanne Trump Barry, Donald's older sister, now deceased, struck down as patently unconstitutional the provision that he now relies upon to deport immigrants, aliens. For student advocates really for Palestinian rights. Unfortunately, Donald's older sister's decision was subsequently overturned on procedural grounds, not constitutional ones. So the argument had to be made all over again, which it was, within an hour.
Mahmoud's attorneys had filed a habeas corpus petition in a one hundred and six page decision, the judge made a painstaking analysis of the many ways in which the foreign policy provision is unconstitutionally vague. Sorry. Six. Oh. After one hundred days in detention, he was released on one dollar bail. Good resolution of that case.
The third one. And it will be much briefer. Mohsen Mahdawi, thirty four years old, born and raised in a Palestinian refugee camp in the occupied West Bank. At the time of abduction, he was an undergraduate student in philosophy at Columbia, dedicated, in his words, quote, to understanding how to achieve a lasting peace for Palestinians and Israelis, particularly through the study of conflict resolution. Like Mahmoud, he was an activist and organizer and student protest against Israel's military assault on Gaza. Since his story is very similar to the other two, I'm just going to focus on two ways in which his story is different.
First, his abduction can only be described as entrapment. Mohsen was in the. He's been here. He'd been here for ten years, and he's in the process of becoming a U.S. citizen, and he received a summons to appear in Vermont on April fourteenth. For what he believed was to be the final stage in the citizenship process. After he had answered all the interviewer's questions correctly and passed the citizenship test, he was asked to sign a document affirming he was willing to take the oath of allegiance to the United States. Once he signed, the interviewer mysteriously left the room, then, masked and visibly armed Homeland Security agents entered, shackled him, and rushed him away to the Burlington Airport in an unmarked van. The agents had a one way ticket to Louisiana printed up, but they missed the plane by nine minutes. Those critical nine minutes gave his quick acting attorneys, subsequently joined by the ACLU, time to file a habeas corpus petition in Vermont District Court demanding that he not be removed from Vermont, which he wasn't.
The second way in which his case is different is that while all three students were well supported by their communities, Mohsen is extraordinary in that regard. The judge commented on having received over one hundred and twenty five letters of support from from professors, neighbors, fellow students and others who knew him well, attesting to his commitment to nonviolence. A striking number of those letters, the judge noted, came from, quote, Jewish colleagues and professors involved in the study of the history and culture of Israel and Judaism. One such letter was signed by two hundred and six Israeli citizens in the United States, attesting to his dedication to dialogue and cooperation between Israelis and Palestinians. Several commenting that, quote, working with Mohsen has been the most valuable experience in our time at Columbia University. Mohsen, the letter states, is not a threat but a partner for peace. The court also received letters of support signed by members of state and national Buddhist organizations. Mohsen reported experiencing anger and grief growing up under the violence of the Israeli occupation on the West Bank and turning to Buddhism, as well as to a Vermont Unitarian church, which he had joined for help in transmuting these emotions into forgiveness and love and a commitment to nonviolence. The Vermont court ruled Mohsen was likely to succeed on his claim that he was being punished for the exercise of his First Amendment rights, noting that every day he was deprived of free speech constituted irreparable harm. The judge released Mohsen on bail only two weeks after his abduction. In a brief address after his release, he said, quote, for anyone who is doubting justice, this is a light of hope and faith in the justice system in America. We are witnessing the fight for justice in America, which means a true democracy and the fight for justice for Palestinians, which means that both liberations are interconnected because no one of us is free until all of us are.
What can we draw from these three stories? First, that what is alleged to be antisemitism may rather be opposition to war crimes and genocide. And we can draw inspiration, inspiration from the ACLU, which in all three cases quickly activated its habeas strike force. Inspiration from the principal. Principled and well reasoned and careful federal district court decisions, which stood firm on constitutional grounds and from the appeals courts which upheld them. Inspiration from the public. Outpouring of support for all three students.
Perhaps most of all, we can draw inspiration from the courage of the three students themselves. It was March of last year when Rümeysa Öztürk co-wrote the op ed, calling upon the president of Tufts to acknowledge the Israeli genocide of Palestinians in Gaza. Within the last three months, an op ed published in The New York Times by a leading Israeli genocide scholar, two of Israel's own human rights organizations, the head of J Street, a liberal pro-Israel organization in the United States. The International Association of Genocide Scholars, the world's largest organization of genocide scholars. And just last month, the U.N. Independent International Commission of Inquiry in a landmark report have all acknowledged the appropriateness of the term genocide for what is happening and has been happening in Gaza. Would this be happening today without the courage of the three students who refused to look away? I think not.
So let us draw inspiration then, from the courage of these three students. And let us remember, in the words of the Unitarian Universalist Association poster now on Instagram, love is not silent in the face of genocide. Let it be so. Thank you.