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2025-03-15 Fifth Column
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Mahmoud Khalil roundup: Khalil worked at UNRWA, got ‘rigorous security clearance’ as British gov staffer years before protests
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[NYPost] Detained anti-Israel protester Mahmoud Khalil worked for the controversial United Nations
...an organization which on balance has done more bad than good, with the good not done well and the bad done thoroughly...
agency for Paleostinian refugees while pursuing his graduate degree at Columbia University.
The campus rabble-rouser’s stint at the UN Relief and Works Agency for Paleostine Refugees came after he held a senior position at the UK office for Syria in Leb
...The Leb civil war, between 1975 and 1990, lasted a little over 145 years and produced 120,000 fatalities. The average length of a ceasefire was measured in seconds. Only one of those statements is an exaggeration....
for four years, according to multiple reports.
The role would have required a thorough background check and "rigorous security clearance," Andrew Waller, one of Khalil’s former co-workers there, told The Guardian.
He was involved, too, with a British government program, known as the Syria Chevening Program, which dishes out fully funded scholarships to foreign students who "show potential to inspire" so they can study in the UK.
Khalil — a Syrian-born Paleostinian who is also a citizen of Algeria
Oh? How did that happen? — stopped working there roughly two years ago — right before he relocated to the US in 2022 to enroll at Columbia.
Khalil, 30, was grabbed by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents Saturday at his Columbia-owned apartment building and later transferred to a detention facility in Louisiana, where he faces deportation.
The new details about his trajectory before he became a student leader of last spring’s riotous campus protests emerged as Khalil, now a permanent legal resident, continues to fight the Trump administration’s push to revoke his green card and boot him from the US.
Born in 1995, Khalil was raised in a Paleostinian refugee camp in Syria after his grandparents were displaced from Tiberias, his lawyer has said in court papers.
| More fully, they fled ahead of the invading five Arab armies, looking forward to returning afterward to get their share in the resulting loot. Only the untrained, self-organized Jews with their small arms beat back the armies, so there was neither returning nor loot, only half a million Arabs trapped by their hosts in “refugee camps”, living off the world’s largess and watching the unconquered Jews turning swamp and desert into a land of milk and honey. Bummer. |
After civil war broke out in Syria, he fled for Lebanon at 18,
| …just him? Where was his family? |
the Guardian reported, pursuing an undergraduate degree in computer science at the Lebanese American University in Beirut.
He then got the gig at the UK office for Syria, a diplomatic mission within the UK embassy in Beirut.
There, he worked in a support role that helped inform British foreign policy on Syria given his knowledge of the region, as well as his Arabic skills, the newspaper reported.
After rising up the ranks, he decided to pursue a master’s degree in public administration from Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs and moved to the US on a student visa in December 2022.
From June through November 2023, he was a political affairs officer with the UNRWA.
The infamous relief agency was stripped of tens of millions in federal funding after an explosive report that some of its members took part in Hamas
 ..a contraction of the Arabic words for "frothing at the mouth",...
’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel.
| Not so much some as lots. But do go on. |
Following the bloodshed and the start of the Israel-Hamas war, Khalil became a driving force behind many of the anti-Israel protests, building takeovers and encampments that plagued Columbia for more than a year.
He had a leading role in Columbia United Apartheid Divest (CUAD) — an umbrella of radical student organizations that sympathizes with terror groups like Hamas and Hezbollah and has previously called for the "end of Western civilization."
Khalil acted as the main negotiator between CUAD and Columbia administrators during the encampment protests that saw scores of tents set up for weeks on the Morningside Heights campus.
The group also spearheaded the violent mostly peaceful takeover of Columbia’s Hamilton Hall last April.
He has been pictured at various campus protests over the past year — speaking into bullhorns, taking part in dance circles and marching draped in a keffiyeh head scarf.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, while defending the Trump administration’s move to deport Khalil this week, said "pro-Hamas propaganda fliers with the logo of Hamas" were handed out at some of the protests.
Khalil has also been a regular fixture on news programs discussing the group’s disruptive efforts — including an interview on Quds News Network where he spoke in Arabic.
At one point, Khalil was filmed telling CUAD members during a forum that "we’ve tried armed resistance, which is legitimate under international law, but Israel calls it terrorism."
He became a permanent US resident after marrying his wife, Noor Abdalla, in the Big Apple in 2023.
| She’s been a dentist for a few years. Has he been letting her support him, or is someone paying him for all that protesting and organizing he’s been doing? |
The pair had originally met in Lebanon in 2016 when Abdalla, a US citizen, was part of the scholarship program Khalil was overseeing at the time.
They had a seven-year long-distance relationship before tying the knot, she revealed in a Rooters interview this week.
The couple, who are expecting their first child in late April, live in an off-campus apartment owned by Columbia, where ICE agents detained him last week.
The Trump administration has argued it can legally boot Khalil given his role in the anti-Israel campus protests.
Officials have said that while Khalil isn’t accused of or charged with a crime, his actions are "contrary to national and foreign policy interests."
Khalil’s wife is a 28-year-old dentist in New York.
Protesters at UMass Amherst, Harvard, rally over detention of Columbia University graduate Mahmoud Khalil
[BostonGlobe] Protesters at Harvard University and University of Massachusetts Amherst campuses stood in solidarity Thursday with Mahmoud Khalil, a graduate student and outspoken figure during the Gaza war protests last spring at Columbia University, who was arrested last weekend at the behest of the Trump administration.
About 100 demonstrators, including students, gathered on each campus, waving Palestinian flags, handing out flyers, chanting down the Trump administration, and calling for their universities to divest from companies tied to Israel. The administration is seeking to deport Khalil, who was born in Syria to Palestinian parents and has a green card to stay in the United States. He is married to a US citizen. He has not been charged with any crimes.
At UMass Amherst, the protest took place outside the Whitmore Administration Building, where many were draped in black and white keffiyehs while others wore medical masks and sunglasses to conceal their faces.
One student hunched over a stack of cardboard posters, scrawling “sanctuary over suppression” across them with thick markers. Another stood with a megaphone by her side, greeting students as they arrived.
Just before 4 p.m., one student stepped forward with the stack of cardboard in hand. She placed the stack on the pavement and encouraged attendees to take a sign.
The protests are the latest iterations of the pro-Palestinian encampments built on campuses across the nation last spring, including one at UMass Amherst, which resulted in over 130 arrests.
On Thursday, students passed out small sheets of paper that outlined their demands. A “Free Palestine” chant filled the air.
“Don’t engage with Zionists, don’t engage with cops,” a student yelled to the crowd. “Who’s ready?”
Students at UMass Amherst said the police presence has increased on campus since Saturday’s arrest of Khalil.
Khalil’s detention has set off widespread uproar and daily protests in New York, including on Friday, when several hundred protesters gathered outside Columbia in support of Khalil.
The protest took place off campus on Broadway Ave., outside Columbia’s main gate. The campus is only accessible to those with a Columbia ID.
It was not clear how many of the protesters were students. Many had their faces covered with masks or keffiyehs. They held signs that said “Free Mahmoud” and “The people want the fall of the regime.”
Police set up metal barricades all around the protest area. Two helicopters hovered overhead, and onlookers watched from balconies and windows on campus.
The demonstration was backed by an array of Muslim and anti-Israel activist groups.
The coalition of Columbia protest groups, Columbia University Apartheid Divest, on Friday posted photos of an “anonymous submission” showing red paint splattered on the Columbia president’s mansion alongside graffiti that said “Free them all” and an inverted triangle, a Hamas symbol.
On Thursday, federal officials sent a letter to university leaders outlining steps Columbia must take to secure its federal funding. The Trump administration cut $400 million in funding for Columbia last week over campus antisemitism and threatened billions more.
The letter said the university must enact discipline against student protesters, institute a mask ban, adopt the IHRA definition of antisemitism, create a plan for admissions reform, and put the academic department covering the Middle East under academic receivership, meaning an outside figure, not from the department’s faculty, would take the helm of the department.
Amid the pressure from the administration, Columbia on Thursday said it had expelled, suspended and revoked the degrees of students who forcibly took over the campus building last year. There were no details about the number of students punished. Columbia University Apartheid Divest claimed that 22 students had been sanctioned.
The White House has said Khalil is being deported for distributing pro-Hamas propaganda. Days before his detention, he attended a protest at Barnard where activists distributed Hamas material. Federal immigration laws prohibit non-citizens from espousing support for terror groups. Columbia University Apartheid Divest, for which he served as an organizer and spokesperson, in the past also voiced support for terror groups and violence.
In a Thursday court filing, Khalil’s lawyers said he was a Palestinian who grew up in Syria. When the war broke out in Syria, his family was displaced and is now dispersed in Europe and West Asia.
| Answering the question asked above. Are they now going back to Syria, or choosing to remain scattered abroad? |
The Thursday court filing was an amended complaint that came after a judge ordered Khalil to be allowed phone calls with his lawyers.
The Student Workers of Columbia held a rally in support of Khalil and Grant Miner, President of UAW Local 2710 - Student Workers of Columbia, whom the union said Columbia expelled for his involvement in pro-Palestinian campus protests.
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Posted by trailing wife 2025-03-15 00:00||
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Posted by Grom the Affective 2025-03-15 04:32||
2025-03-15 04:32||
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Posted by ed in texas 2025-03-15 06:48||
2025-03-15 06:48||
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