ICE Detains Another Columbia University Anti-Israel Rabble-Rouser

Federal Immigration authorities have detained a Columbia University anti-Israel protest leader in Vermont.

The detention of Mohsen Mahdawi, a student originally from the West Bank, was part of the Trump administration’s broader crackdown on non-citizen activists that started with the detention of Columbia protest leader Mahmoud Khalil last month.

Mahdawi was arrested when he went to an immigration office for an appointment related to his citizenship process, according to a statement from several Vermont legislators led by Senator Bernie Sanders. The statement said Mahdawi lived in Vermont and was a legal permanent US resident.

According to an ICE database, Mahdawi was in the agency’s custody, but it did not specify a location. As of the publication of this piece, ICE has not responded to a request from the press for more information.

Several attorneys are representing Mahdawi in a federal court in Vermont. The judge in the case, William K. Sessions III, ordered that Mahdawi not be removed from the US or Vermont “pending further order” from the court.

“Mahdawi, through his leadership and involvement in disruptive protests at Columbia University, has engaged in antisemitic conduct through leading pro-Palestinian protests and calling for Israel’s destruction,” a senior State Department source said.

Most of his social media accounts have been deleted, but a few videos scattered around the internet show him using antisemitic rhetoric and espousing anti-Israel propaganda. In two separate videos filmed at the Columbia campus, Mahdawi can be heard leading a crowd in a chant of “from the river to the sea, Palestine will be free” — which the Anti-Defamation League says is a rallying cry used by organizations like Hamas “calling for the destruction of Israel through violent means.”

He also attempted to portray the Israeli soldiers as engaging in brutality against pregnant women and even babies.

“We see images of premature babies who were pulled out of their mothers’ wombs after explosions, leaving the babies and their mothers killed. We see the babies in the blood connected still to their mothers’ wombs. That is a shocking image that no human being can see and stay silent. Shame on you, Columbia.”

An anonymous State Department source speaking to the NY Post said screenshots of Mahdawi’s social media activity that show his virulent anti-Israel views only tell part of the story.

“Mahdawi played an active role in fall 2024 student protests at Columbia University, instructing protesters to physically push a small group of pro-Israel students, events that university officials later acknowledged as threatening rhetoric and intimidation,” the source said.

The source also said Mahdawi was behind “antisemitic rhetoric” during the protests, including referring to Israel Defense Forces soldiers as terrorists and “shouting through a megaphone” at Jewish bystanders and supporters of Israel.

A legal filing in the case said he had co-founded Columbia’s Palestinian Student Union, and the campus newspaper, The Columbia Spectator, said in November 2023 that he was a member of the campus chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP).

The university later suspended the group in November 2023 for repeated violations of campus policy around protests.

Families of hostages still held by Hamas after the terror attack filed a lawsuit last month that alleged SJP had advance knowledge of Hamas’ bloody plans, accusing it of being “Hamas’ American propaganda arm” and pointing to an Instagram post by the group proclaiming “we are back!!” that it said was published minutes before the attack.