Mahmoud Khalil Tells His Story

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Ezra Klein Show – "Mahmoud Khalil Tells His Story"

Introduction

In the August 5, 2025 episode of The Ezra Klein Show, host Ezra Klein engages in a profound and personal conversation with Mahmoud Khalil, a Palestinian-American activist and advocate for Palestinian rights. Khalil shares his harrowing experiences of political activism, detention by U.S. authorities, and his unwavering commitment to justice and freedom for Palestinians. This summary delves into the key discussions, insights, and conclusions from their in-depth dialogue.

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Early Life and Background

[03:30] Mahmoud Khalil begins by recounting his origins, stating, "I was born in a very small Palestinian refugee camp in southern Damascus called Khanjih camp." He describes his upbringing in a middle-class environment within the refugee camp, emphasizing the importance his parents placed on education despite limited resources.

[04:24] Reflecting on his family's history, Khalil shares, "We had that sense of that there was coexistence," referring to his grandmother's experiences in Palestine and the enduring impact of the Nakba on his identity. This foundational narrative underscores his deep-rooted connection to Palestinian heritage and the ongoing struggle for homeland and recognition.

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Involvement in Syrian Protests and Emigration to Lebanon

[06:50] Khalil narrates his involvement in the Syrian uprising against the Assad regime, highlighting his role in organizing protests and providing relief to displaced persons. At just 16, he faced escalating dangers when two of his friends were disappeared by authorities, leading him to flee Syria.

[09:00] Describing his escape to Lebanon, Khalil explains the urgency of his departure: "I had to make it as soon as possible to the border so that my name is not on the list." Settling in the Shatila refugee camp, he worked in construction before joining the Syrian American organization, Jasour, which provided him with employment and eventually a scholarship to study computer science.

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Education and Career Path to Columbia University

[12:01] Mahmoud Khalil discusses his aspiration to study international affairs, leading him to Columbia University in New York. "I wanted to have this opportunity to actually study international affairs academically," he states, aiming to blend his practical experience with academic knowledge.

[13:19] Khalil reflects on his impressions of America, acknowledging both its opportunities and the negative impacts of U.S. policies in the Middle East: "America being a country of opportunity, a country at least of democracy, of rule of law. However, I had my own reservation about the impact of America on me."

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Experiences at Columbia: Anti-Palestinian Sentiment and Protests

[15:34] Upon joining Columbia, Khalil quickly becomes involved in student activism. He spearheads the creation of the Palestinian Student Society (DAR) and co-leads the Palestine Working Group, striving to build a supportive community amidst a large and sometimes hostile environment.

[16:00] Khalil recounts his shock at witnessing anti-Palestinian sentiment on campus: "our event was flagged as a special event... clearly there was this anti Palestinian sentiment." These early challenges set the stage for escalating tensions, especially following the October 7th attacks.

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Increasing Tensions Under the Trump Administration

[43:27] The conversation shifts to the broader political climate, with Khalil critiquing both Trump and Biden administrations for their handling of Palestinian issues. He asserts, "Biden laid the groundwork for Trump to do what he's doing right now," indicating a continuity of policies detrimental to Palestinian rights.

[44:44] Khalil elaborates on the increasing harassment and targeting of Palestinian activists: "Canary Mission and Bitar became more emboldened. They were more vicious in their attacks online." This environment of fear and suppression directly impacts his personal safety and activism.

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Arrest and Detention by ICE: Personal Experiences

[45:45] Khalil details the harrowing experience of his arrest on March 8th: "they asked me, are you Mahmoud Khalil? I was like, yeah, who are you?" Initially confused by officers claiming to be from Homeland Security, he was forcefully detained without proper documentation or the opportunity to contact a lawyer.

[48:03] He explains the legal justifications used for his detention, citing the Trump-era provision that allows for the deportation of noncitizens deemed threats to U.S. foreign policy: "The provision here that they're working off of the Trump administration is an alien whose presence or activities in the United States, the Secretary of State has reasonable ground to believe would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States is deportable."

[51:00] Khalil describes his time in the detention center in Louisiana, sharing poignant stories of fellow detainees facing immense personal hardships, such as family separations and the fear of arbitrary deportations.

[66:23] He recounts the emotional toll of witnessing his wife, who was eight months pregnant, give birth while he was detained: "I was on the phone listening to my wife... I couldn't hold her hands or give her any supporting words."

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Reflections on U.S. Policy and Dual Standards

[56:36] Addressing the Trump administration's claims that Khalil's activities are anti-Semitic, he counters, "It's absurd. What's a threat to combating antisemitism... is the administration's unconditional support to a country that's committing a genocide in the name of the Jewish people."

[59:57] Khalil critiques the notion that immigrant critiques of U.S. foreign policy weaken the country, arguing instead that such suppression undermines democratic principles: "This administration is trying to target anyone who doesn't fit the very narrow definition of an American should be... It's the privilege of the law, not the privilege of the administration to be in this country."

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The Fight Continues: Advocacy and Legal Battle

[78:37] Following his release on bail, Khalil remains steadfast in his advocacy: "I'm demanding accountability for the overreach, for the illegality of my detention. And I want to bring it to what really matters, which is ending the genocide in Gaza."

[79:44] He highlights the ongoing legal struggles, noting that the administration continues to mount retaliatory charges against him. Despite pressures to "shut up and leave the country," Khalil emphasizes his moral responsibility to continue his fight for Palestinian rights.

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Book Recommendations

In the concluding segment, Khalil recommends three insightful books for listeners seeking a deeper understanding of the Palestinian experience and the geopolitical complexities surrounding it:

1. Umar Al-Aad's "Everyone Will Always Oppose This" – Explores the hypocrisy between Western ideals and actions.
2. Edward Said's "The Question of Palestine" – Provides an essential perspective on Palestinian thought and Zionism.
3. Ari Shavit's "My Promised Land" – Confirms the historical narrative of the Zionist colonial project as discussed by scholars like Rashid Khalidi.

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Conclusion

Mahmoud Khalil's narrative is a powerful testament to the resilience and struggle of Palestinians seeking justice and recognition. Through his personal experiences of activism, persecution, and unwavering commitment, Khalil sheds light on the systemic injustices faced by Palestinians both within the United States and globally. His story calls for greater empathy, understanding, and action to address the ongoing plight of his people.

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Notable Quotes:

• Khalil on Education and Survival: "Education is our main investment. So we really, like my parents, would rather us getting educated than actually getting food at a lot of points." [04:24]

• On His Detention Experience: "I never imagined that there is such injustices happening on US soil." [62:08]

• Regarding U.S. Policy: "Palestinians don't have to be perfect victims... nothing can justify that." [23:38]

• On Advocacy: "There is like a moral imperative to me to speak up, especially now that I have this platform that I should continue to use." [79:44]

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This episode offers a compelling and enlightening perspective on Palestinian activism, U.S. immigration policies, and the personal toll of political persecution. Mahmoud Khalil's story is not just a recount of personal hardship but a broader commentary on the struggle for human rights and dignity.

Transcript

[Ezra Klein]

Your new beginning starts now. Dr. Horton has new construction homes available in Ellensburg and throughout the greater Seattle area. With spacious floor plans, flexible living spaces and home technology packages, you can enjoy more cozy moments and sweet memories in your beautiful new home. With new home communities opening in Ellensburg and throughout the Seattle area, Dr. Horton has the ideal home for you. Learn [e-mail] Dr. Horton, America's builder and Equal Housing Opportunity builder Across the 2024 election, Donald Trump and the people behind him said again and again that they were here to restore free speech to this country. Then they got power and this administration came after speech in a way the left never dared to do, never wanted to do. You saw it with the hunt to cancel any grant that had the word diversity anywhere near it. You saw it as countless organizations that depended on the government or that feared the government began reworking their mission statements or censoring their websites to avoid any words that might offend anyone in this administration. You saw it as border agents looked through travelers phones to see if they had said anything that the administration wouldn't like. And he saw it as immigration agents began yanking people off the streets for the crime of nothing more than speech. Among the first of these was Mahmoud Khalil, who'd been a Palestinian graduate student at Columbia, a leader in the school's anti Israel protests. Khalil's a green card holder. He's married to a US Citizen. His sole offense had been to speak out against Israel in a way this administration did not like. He was detained under authority. The US Secretary of State has to cancel the residency of noncitizens who threaten U.S. foreign policy. Did this grad student at Columbia actually threaten US Foreign policy? Is that how fragile our foreign policy is? No one really believed that Khalil was not followed into his building by plainclothes officers and taken to an ICE detention center in Louisiana for more than 100 days, imprisoned there while his wife gave birth because the US Government feared him. He was imprisoned there because the US Government wanted others like him to fear them. It wanted non citizens and immigrants to stop speaking out. It wanted everyone to ask if they could do this to Kahlil, could they do it to me? If they could detain him on such flimsy grounds, could they not come up with a reason to detain me? Cleo is out now on bail. He's still speaking and so I wanted to hear what he had to say. As always, My email is reclineshowytimes.com Mahmoud Khalil welcome to The show.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Thank you for having me, Israel.

[Ezra Klein]

So let's start at the beginning. Just tell me a bit about yourself. Where were you born?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

I was born in a very small Palestinian refugee camp in southern Damascus called Khanjih camp. It's really like, I wouldn't say like a poor neighborhood, but, you know, middle class, lower middle class.

[Ezra Klein]

What did your parents do?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

So my parents, now they are in Europe, in Syria. Both they were civil servants. My mom, like, just working in a civilian office, issuing passports, IDs to people. My dad was a wielder working in a state company doing, like, metal work. Yeah.

[Ezra Klein]

And what did they want for you, like, when you were growing up? What did they hope your adulthood would look like?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

So both my parents really wanted us to be educated and invested a lot in our education. Especially that, you know, my dad barely made it to middle school. My mom had only like, high school. And when you're Palestinian in Syria, when you don't have any property, there's nothing like, you know, in terms of, like, family wealth. So education is our main investment. So we really, like my parents, would rather us getting educated than actually getting food at a lot of points.

[Ezra Klein]

What were you told about your family's history in Palestine growing up? How has that identity formed for you?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

You know what I know about Palestine, I heard from my grandmother who spent 30 years in Palestine, in Tiberias. And actually my grandmother always would always tell me that they had Jewish neighbors. She would work in their farm. So we had that sense of that there was coexistence. And my grandparents were exiled from Palestine in 1948. And my grandmother, when she left Palestine, she was pregnant with my uncle and she had to give birth en route to southern Damascus. So we had that sense of injustice that since Palestine was taken from us, was stolen from us. The camp is just like about 30, 40 miles away from the borders. You can see the impact of Nakba, the Palestinian exile from Palestine, around you because everyone is talking about it. And we grew up in that environment that we long to go back. That's why they lived in literally just a normal tent for a number of years before upgrading it to Ahmad house. And then they decided to build sort of a concrete house because it was always living in the camps to Palestinians is always temporary. It's a station until we go back to Palestine.

[Ezra Klein]

You said you grew up in Syria and you had to flee during the uprising. Tell me about that moment. What leads to you deciding you have to leave?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

The Syrian people erupted against the autocracy in Syria. The Syrian regime And I was part of that. Palestinians also were oppressed by the Syrian regime. And as a result of that, I was part of organizing protests, relief to displaced persons. But on January 11, 2013, two of my friends were disappeared, arbitrarily detained, and they had to flee the next day. And these two friends died under.

[Ezra Klein]

How do you become involved in organizing in the Syrian protests? I mean, that's a dangerous thing to do. You're how old?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

I was 16 at that point. Palestinian refugees were sort of, at the very beginning, isolated from the big protests. So a lot of displaced persons, Syrians would come to the camp, would come to our schools. So we opened our schools and we started a whole relief operation for them. So we felt that we need to speak up, we need to protect those who are fleeing from the areas that the regime is targeting. And with a very small group of friends, we started to organize small protest. And by a protest, I mean, it would last for 5, 10 minutes, because you fear that the muhabarat or the military would come after you. And the risk of protesting in Syria was your life. It was not like an arrest. It was not a revocation of your degree. It was literally death. And it was a week after my 18th birthday that I left to Lebanon.

[Ezra Klein]

So when you realize you're in danger when two of your friends have been disappeared and within a day you're in Lebanon, did you already have an exit plan? Did you just get in a car and drive? How does that happen for you?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

I learned about the disappearance of my friends. And at that point I feared that they would, under torture, they would confess my name or if they had on their computer anything about me. I feared that I would be next, but also I feared that my name is already with the regime. So I literally, like, same day plan. I went to Lebanon. In a car? Yeah, in a car. In Syria, the security branches are very decent, centralized. So I wanted to make it as soon as possible to the border so that my name is not on the list, that I cannot leave Syria. I had some relatives in Lebanon, so I spent a couple of weeks there, but eventually ended in Shatila refugee camp, which is one of the biggest Palestinian refugee camps in Lebanon. I wanted to continue my education, but I did not speak any English. Most of the universities in Lebanon are either in English or French, and they're very expensive, and they had no money whatsoever. So I started working in construction just to make living. And then I saw the opportunity to volunteer in this organization. It's a Syrian American organization called Jasour, providing opportunities, education, Opportunities for Syrians around the world. And they volunteered there. And then two weeks after, they offered me a job, that was my first job, $600 a month. And a few months after they offered me a scholarship to go to university in Lebanon to study computer science. I worked with them five years. I was doing my undergraduate part time, working full time. And then I joined the British Embassy, also as a program manager and political officer in their Syria office.

[Ezra Klein]

And so you taught yourself English during this period?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah. So because Jassor is a Syrian American organization, we had a lot of American volunteers. So I would just talk with them, I would communicate with them. Not with words. It's just like here they're like, you know, very broke in English. It took me, I would say, until 2017, that I felt, like, confident in my English. So it wasn't like, an easy process.

[Ezra Klein]

What made you want to work with.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

The British government supporting Syrians? I worked in the Syria office. Their policy regarding Syria aligns with my values, aligns with how I see the political solution in Syria. I wanted to have that insight and that contribution in that process. And it also aligns with my career aspirations in terms of working in diplomacy and international affairs as a whole.

[Ezra Klein]

What made you want to come study in the United States?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

In Lebanon, I studied computer science. However, my career took a different path. It's international affairs and development. So I wanted to have this opportunity to actually study international affairs academically rather than just learning that by doing because to learn to actually spend some time looking into theories, looking into the academic part of the work that I've been doing for the past 10 years at that point, Columbia in specific. In 2018, I got a scholarship to study an executive course at Columbia in nonprofit management and leadership. So at the business school. So I came here just for a couple of weeks. I liked Colombia, and Colombia in the Palestinian circles, it's known because of Edward Said, the Palestinian American academic and writer. So I heard also a lot about Colombia. So I was like, yes, Colombia in New York, right next to the un, where I eventually want to work. So why not?

[Ezra Klein]

What's your general impression of America? How do you think about America as an entity, as a country, as a.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah, I mean, the fact that I worked for this Syrian American organization gave me a lot of insight of America being a country of opportunity, a country at least of democracy, of rule of law. However, I had my own reservation about the impact of America on me, because as a Palestinian or as a Syrian refugee in Lebanon, America's influence in the Middle east was very Negative. I felt that impact on me as a Palestinian. However, working for the British Embassy, I would always meet American diplomats because the British and the US policy goals regarding Syria are quite similar. So I would spend a lot of time with American diplomats just discussing Syria and all of that. And the most important thing I I liked about the US is the quality of education.

[Ezra Klein]

What year is this? We're talking?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

So the first time I applied to Columbia was in 2020. I got accepted, but I couldn't come because of COVID So I came in 2022 to the United States before October 7th.

[Ezra Klein]

How was that first year for you? What is Columbia like for you?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

I was very much looking forward to starting my degree at Columbia University. I wanted to take full load of courses. I wanted to have that two years as whether, like, do I want to continue working in diplomacy or should I shift to the private sector? However, that was disturbed by the earthquake in Turkey and Syria when over 50,000 people died because of the earthquake. So. But I continued like, you know, I wanted also to be involved in as many communities as possible. Being the first time living in the country, I wanted to have friends. So I joined the MENA group. I joined the Palestine Working Group.

[Ezra Klein]

Mina is the Middle East, Middle east.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

And North Africa Club. I would say just to build community, because in a city as big as New York, you need a community.

[Ezra Klein]

It's a hard place to get a foothold.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Exactly. However, it was very obvious the anti Palestinian sentiment at Colombia. One of the first event we organized as part of the Palestine Club or Palestine Working Group at Columbia was inviting the Middle east director at Human Rights Watch to talk about Israel practices in the occupied Palestinian territories. And I was surprised that our event was flagged as a special event. And I was like, why is that? We're inviting someone from Human Rights Watch. So I was very surprised that this event was flagged as special event. That's even before October 7th, I think was April or March 2023. Another event inviting the BDS coordinator, Boycott Divestment Sanctions Movement to come and talk virtually. Also, it was flagged as a special event and we had to fight with the administration to make it happen. So clearly there was this anti Palestinian sentiment. And that was my first shock. Colombia, it just to me felt like, okay, it's maybe bureaucratic, it's not a big deal. But that was more obvious after October 7th. The fact that Colombia is the anti Palestinian prejudice within the Columbia administration, I'm saying is very flagrant.

[Ezra Klein]

Tell me about that for a minute before we get to October 7th itself. Because Columbia now has these dual reputations as sort of what you're describing, that it had a board of trustees that was, I think it's fair to say, very concerned about things like the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement. It's also a home of a lot of very important Palestinian scholarship. Rashid Khalidi is there at this time. There's this question of is it an anti Semitic place? There's some kind of tension here that is specific about Colombia.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Colombia is a for profit place. Colombia doesn't care about Jewish students, doesn't care about Palestinian students. They don't. They only care about their brand and money.

[Ezra Klein]

So it's a corporation function.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Absolutely.

[Ezra Klein]

October 7th happens. What do you think that day?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

That day I was at the cinema with my wife Noor here, like in Lincoln Center. And when I left the Cinema around like 12, 12:30am I started to receive all these notifications. And to me it felt frightening that we had to reach this moment in the Palestinian struggle. And I remember I didn't sleep for a number of days and Noor was very worried about just my health and it was heavy. I still remember I was like, this couldn't happen.

[Ezra Klein]

What do you mean? We had to reach this moment. What moment is this?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

I was interning at UNRWA at that point, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency at the UN at their New York office. And as part of my internship, my research and work was focused on Palestine, on the situation in the west bank and Gaza. And you can see that the situation is not sustainable. You have an Israeli government that's absolutely ignoring Palestinians. They are trying to make that deal with Saudi and just happy about their Abraham Accord without looking at Palestinians, as if Palestinians are not part of the equation. And they circumvented the Palestinian question. And it's clear it's becoming more and more violent. Like, by October 6th, over 200 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces and settlers. Over 40 of them were children. So that's what I mean by unfortunately, we couldn't avoid such a moment. And yeah, it was absolutely difficult to see not only the horrific images, but also the response of Israel, because I knew that's what Netanyahu wants, because Netanyahu thrives on the killing of Palestinians. At that point, there were already big demonstrations in Israel regarding the judicial reforms. But I knew that that's something that Netanyahu would use to ethnically cleanse Palestinians.

[Ezra Klein]

When you say you have these days where you're not sleeping, are you just following the news and the social media kind of relentlessly. Are you trying to think about what will happen next? Are you trying to think about how this will play out? What is the nature of your just.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Thinking about the future, to be honest, worried about the future. And I remember one of the things I said, this is gonna be even worse than the Nakba, like the aftermath. And I had to think like, how can you stop this? What can we do? Also just following, is it really a day or two days after when the Israeli or the former Israeli defense minister said we're gonna cut everything from us human animals, all of that. So the intent was clear, that they want to obliterate Gaza.

[Ezra Klein]

I remember I did a piece right after October 7th, and one of the things that seemed clear to me very, very quickly on that day, as you're watching the images, as you're hearing the screams, you're seeing the videos of people of Jewish Israelis being paraded around, of corpses, is both that this attack is horrific and that the counterattack is going to be overwhelming. And that on some level I understood that as something Hamas must have wanted. Pull Israel into this attack, pull it into some kind of war. Maybe you involve other players in the Middle east, but a lot of lives were being used there as kind of chips on the table. Was that your perception or did you see this as something that needed to happen to break the equilibrium?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah, it's more the latter just to break the cycle, to break that Palestinians are not being heard. And to me it's a desperate attempt to the word that Palestinians are here, that Palestinians are part of the equation. That was my interpretation of why hamas did the October 7th attacks on Israel. Because at that point there was no political process. It was clear that the Saudi Israel deal is very imminent and Palestinians wouldn't have any path to statehood and self determination. So they had to do that according to their calculations, which, I mean, it's obvious is not right.

[Ezra Klein]

I've heard you in other news be very clear in condemning killing of civilians. October 7th was obviously an operation that, that did target a lot of civilians, that did kill a lot of civilians. Do you see that as unavoidable, that Hamas had no other choice? Do you see it as a mistake?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

What I know is targeting civilians is wrong. That's why we've been calling for an international independent investigation to hold perpetrators into accountability. And it's very important for us who believe in international law that this should happen. And it's very important to underscore as well that Palestinians have tried all forms of resistance, including nonviolent resistance. However, this was always targeted by Israel. Palestinians who participated in the Great March of Return were killed or maimed because of that. And there's nothing can justify the killing of civilians. And the international law is very clear about that. And we cannot pick and choose when international law applies to us or it applies to others. But also, there's another point to this, Ezra. Palestinians don't have to be perfect victims. And that's what the ward is asking of Palestinians amid the dispossession, the occupation, the killing, all of that, and horrible things happen. Nothing can justify that. And I would do everything in my power to stop that from happening. But we cannot go and ask Palestinians to be perfect victims. After 75 years of dispossession, of killing people in Gaza, being under siege for over at that point, 17 years, Palestinians in the west bank being stopped at checkpoints, settlers, they attacked them at every opportunity. The human dignity of Palestinians was absent and still unfortunately. So that's why when discussing that, unfortunately, these horrible things are happening or happen. But we cannot ask Palestinians to be perfect victims. Hey, I'm Robert Vinlowen. I'm from New York Times Games and I'm here talking to people about wordle and the wordle Archive. Do you all play wordle? I play it every day. All right. I have something exciting to show you. It's the wordle Archive. Why? Oh, okay. That's awesome. So now you can play every wordle that has ever existed. There's like a thousand puzzles. What? Wordle Archive. Oh, cool. Now you can do yesterday's wordle if you missed it. Yeah. New York Times Game subscribers can now access the entire Wordle archive. Find out more at nytimes.com games.

[Ezra Klein]

So tell me about from there to the organizing for you. When do the protests and the encampments begin? What is your initial involvement in them?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

It goes back before October 7th. My involvement in Palestine organizing on campus. And I started the process with the Columbia administration creating dar, which is home in Arabic. It's the Palestinian Student Society to bring Palestinians from different schools together. That was the goal of it. So I worked with the administration over the summer to build that society. And that positioned me by October 7th to be, you know, I was the co president of this in youth society, but I was also a co president of the Palestine Working Group at sipa. So I had this relationship with the Columbia administration. You know, most of them like junior officers.

[Ezra Klein]

I've heard you describe yourself previously to this. You're a bureaucrat and it sounds like you maintain some of that identity at At Columbia, a sort of person working within systems.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah, I mean, you know, most of the students are young, they don't have this like experience through these bureaucratic systems. So I found myself in that position where I would be the one communicating to the administration the concerns of the Palestinian community. So I. On October, October, I think nine or ten, I sent Colombia, you know, an appeal from the Palestinian students regarding the one sided narrative that Colombia is trying to push regarding academic accommodations for Palestinian students like myself who had been awake for days just watching the Herrs and Gaza.

[Ezra Klein]

When you say one sided narrative Colombia was pushing, what narrative in what form? What is the.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

So the narrative that Colombia pushed from the very beginning was a very pro Israel narrative. By October 8, there was hundreds of Palestinians killed by Israel. Yet Colombia erased that from their communication. And our ask was very simple, treat us equally, see us as humans. Yet that was met with opposition of RAM or just no answers whatsoever.

[Ezra Klein]

And the ask here would have meant in these communications being more.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah, being more balanced in terms of acknowledging the Palestinian death, acknowledging the humanitarian crisis, acknowledging that Palestinians are occupied. You either should be consistent with these matters or just don't say anything.

[Ezra Klein]

I guess the perspective of Jewish or Israeli students, or Israeli Jewish students, I should say at Columbia would be that there was a huge attack that killed 1200 some people, murdered 1,200 some people. That they were afraid of anti Semitic violence ripping around the world and they needed to hear something about that.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Again, what we asked is not to omit their suffering or their perspective. We wanted to have equality as we want, like in the whole movement. This movement is about equality and justice and Colombia did that without even the students asking for it. The first statement coming from Columbia was on the evening of October 7th.

[Ezra Klein]

And so the whole set of communications felt like an erasure of Palestinian experience.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah, absolutely. The whole Colombia communication with the student body was designed to erase the Palestinian experience.

[Ezra Klein]

And so at this point you're sending emails, at what point does this become the protests that later become very well known?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah, I must mention that the first protest that happened at Colombia was on October 12, 5, 6 days after October 7. For these five days, every single night, there would be a vigil organized by Israeli and Jewish students. At Columbia, the Palestinians took a decision to not hold any vigils during these days. Give them the space to mourn their death and. Yeah, give them the space to mourn. And when we wanted to have our protest on October 12, we had a counter protest. And Colombia made the mistake of putting these protests in front of each other.

[Ezra Klein]

So the university decides where you can be.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Exactly. So they gave the students supporting Palestine the East Lawn and students supporting Israel the West Lawn.

[Ezra Klein]

It's like a metaphor.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Exactly. And that was one of the biggest first mistakes that Colombia made. Made. The protesters literally took a lawn. They wanted to call for their university to do three things. The first one, to divest its investment from companies complicit in human rights violations, to disclose the investments where Colombia money goes, and the third one, to end ties with Israeli academic institutions. The student movement at Columbia, it's not just after October 7th, and this is something I really want to Highlight, that in 2002, Columbia students voted to ask Columbia or to demand Colombia to divest its investments from companies associated with or complicit in human rights violations in Israel. And every other year after that, the students would do the same quad. The Columbia University apartheid divest was not created after October 7th. It was created in 2016, actually, as a partnership between Students for Justice in Palestine and Jewish Voices for Peace. So this is all not a new thing. And the student movement is not only about protests, encampments, and civil disobedience. There's a lot of work that have been done in terms of political education, referendums, submitting proposals to Colombia to divest on why they should divest, research, mutual aid. So it feels very, very hard when you hear that. It's only about the protest, and it's only about the encampment. However, the students wanted to continue protesting because Colombia was not listening to them whatsoever.

[Ezra Klein]

You sort of described the groups you were in here as sort of Palestinian groups. But as you mentioned a minute ago, Jewish Voices for Peace, which is also a student group, is involved in, I believe, the beginning in these protests, too, and in the divestment movement. Tell me about them, about your relationship with the Jewish students who are part of these protests. What is that set of relationships and dynamics?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Like, you know, having lived in the Middle east most of my life, unfortunately, the only Jew you hear about is the one who's trying to kill you. And that's true for those in Gaza and in the West Bank. That's the only Jewish person they encounter, the one at the checkpoints, the one raiding their homes. And for me, because I was involved in this international work, I met a lot of Jews through my work. And coming in the United States, it was an opportunity for me to expand on that, to really understand what Israel means to the Jewish population around the world and the Jewish perspective about Israel and Jewish Voices for Peace. And not only Them because there's a lot of Jewish students who are not associated with Jewish Voices for Peace, who were part of the movement, who felt that they can't remain silent while a country is committing crimes in their names, who wanted to fight antisemitism by showing what real Judaism is, that their Judaism requires them to speak out. So they were absolutely an integral part of the movement.

[Ezra Klein]

And so you mentioned that the protests have these three goals or these three demands, I should say, which are divestment from countries that have human rights abuses or international law abuses, the cutting of ties to Israeli universities and knowledge of where Colombia's money is going, the sort of more macro demand. The thing you hear in chants, the thing that I think is behind more of that is the idea of Palestinian liberation of freedom.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Absolutely.

[Ezra Klein]

What does that mean to you?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Palestinian liberation means that Palestinians should live in dignity, freedom and justice, as simple as that. They did not have political goals in terms of like one state or two state. What's the form of governance would be for a liberated Palestine? I mean, I have views on that, like, as a Palestinian, but that was what the movement was about. Just to end this occupation, to end the apartheid, to end the genocide now, and to have justice, freedom and dignity for everyone.

[Ezra Klein]

I remember the Columbia protest right before I knew who you were. Becoming a national story and hearing about them constantly. And at every dinner I seemed to go to and them being defined by positions that feel more extreme than that. Famously, a student saying this got attributed to you, but it wasn't you. That Zionists don't deserve to live. Some people hear Palestinian liberation and hear Jewish eradication or expulsion. Is that what you mean when you say it? Is that what you hear in the movement when you say it?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

No, absolutely not. And there is deliberate attempts to demonize the movement. And again, the movement as a whole is not homogeneous. But also there are some ignorance in the movement in terms of what Palestinian liberation could mean, but in no way it means that it is the eradication of the Jewish people. And this is part of the demonization of the movement that, like, if you get Palestinian rights, then you wouldn't get Jewish rights. And to me, as a Palestinian, as an oppressed, I always felt my duty to also liberate my oppressor from their hate and from their fear. But these were all always like just a distraction, such sentiment about the movement, that it's violent, that it wants to eradicate Israel or the Jewish people, because it's not. We are at a time where Palestinians are getting killed every minute. That's what the focus was and still.

[Ezra Klein]

Is, you end up as a negotiator on behalf of the coalition of groups that are protesting. What is that role? Who are you negotiating with? What are you negotiating for?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

So given my relationship with the Columbia administration and given my experience in diplomacy, the students and faculty approach me to negotiate on their behalf. And also as a Palestinian, like, I can't relate more to the demands. So I was negotiating with two top administrators. Colombia, however, Colombia did not want to negotiate. They just wanted to buy time. And it was, you know, disheartening because these students were protesting. Since October, every single week you have a protest. The students submitted proposals to Colombia's Committee on Divestment and the proposals were rejected. When you have Colombia suspending SJP and JVP in November for the protests and then disciplining students for protests, then the students had to step up their game because clearly the university wouldn't listen to them unless they escalate. And that's how the encampment happened. They did not take us seriously at the beginning, but then they took us more seriously. But it was clear that they did not want in any way criticize Israel. They did not in any way appear to be capitulating to the students. And it was very intense. Like I was threatened by the National Guard on the negotiation table. They told me, this is our offer. If you don't sign, the police or National Guard will come today at 12am so that was the to uproot the encampments. Yeah, exactly.

[Ezra Klein]

Many of the people protesting, many of the leaders of the protest would do so with their faces covered. You didn't. Why?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

I wasn't doing anything wrong to cover my face. That doesn't mean that others were doing something wrong. It means that my calculation is different of what risk is because the risk is real. So right after October 7th, there were doxxing or trucks displaying the faces of students.

[Ezra Klein]

These were trucks going around around Columbia.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

University calling students Jewish hating group or Jewish hating students, something like that. So students feared about their identity. Also, there were groups like Canary Mission Bitar harassing these students and posting their information online, calling their parents, calling their employers. So there was this fear.

[Ezra Klein]

And you're a target of these groups?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

I was a target. I'm still a target of these groups. But to me, my risk appetite was higher than others. Like, why would I hide my face for protesting a genocide? If an employer doesn't want to employ me for my views on Palestine, then I don't want to work there.

[Ezra Klein]

Was it your risk Appetite, or was it also a different risk assessment, which is to say that, I mean, we're going to talk about your arrest and detention in a second, but did that not seem to you like a thing that happens in America?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah, I mean, I was ultimately wrong with that assessment because, once again, I wasn't doing anything wrong to hide my face. And these groups, you know, their focus was mainly, like, employers opportunities and just like to smear you online. At no moment. I felt that there actually would be government collaboration with these groups. None of my statements were problematic, not to mention, even if they were problematic, they would be covered by First Amendment. But I did not feel that the government would actually act on such claims, baseless claims against me. And I mean, I was wrong eventually, that the US Government eventually depended on these profiles to target students.

[Ezra Klein]

So Donald Trump is inaugurated for a second term In January of 2025, when he won the election, and then when he was inaugurated, what did you think that meant? For one, the set of issues that you care about, the conflict in American policy. But also, did you think it meant anything for you and other students in your movement personally, did that seem like a likely outcome?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah. The elections of Trump, when it comes to Palestine, unfortunately, it's the same as Biden. Biden was equally bad. It's just Biden was gaslighting us that they care about Palestinians. But in fact, Biden laid the groundwork for Trump to do what he's doing right now. It's just to us, it's, you know, Trump would expose this hypocrisy. And so your view is that their.

[Ezra Klein]

Policies were not that different. Just Trump was honest about it.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Exactly. But when it comes to actually using government resources to come after students, to set the movement back, because that's one of Trump's campaign pledges, is to set the Palestine movement in this country 20 years back. I think that's why he said in the summer of 2024. But my view is that this only exposed that there is a Palestine exception in this country, whether when it comes to First Amendment, whether when it comes to just the US Government institutions.

[Ezra Klein]

So in the early days of March, you reach out to Columbia University, you say that something's changing, that you're feeling unsafe. What were you seeing?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

So, you know, after the executive order in January, targeting basically, like, student activists by the Trump administration, these shady groups like Canary Mission and Bitar became more emboldened. They were more vicious in their attacks online. And the week leading to my arrest, I noticed, like, all my friends would text me all These tweets from Canary Mission, from all these groups like tagging Rubio, tagging dhs, ice, all of that. So I sent the Columbia administration a couple of emails, like, asking for. Mainly I was thinking about, like, I just want a lawyer to send this organization a cease and desist letter.

[Ezra Klein]

And so walk me through what happens on March 8th.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

On March 8th, I was coming back from an Iftar dinner with my wife, and I entered the lobby of my building, and then I noticed that someone is following us. And then they asked me, are you Mahmoud Khalil? I was like, yeah, who are you? Then they said, we are the police. I was like, what police? Because they were in plain clothes. There were two at that point. Then they said, we are Departments of Homeland Security and your visa has been revoked. And I was like, I don't have a visa. I'm not here on a visa. I'm a green card holder. So he looked very confused at that point, and he called onto, like, someone to come. So at some point, there were four people I asked for, do you have any arrest warrant or anything to show me? And they refused to do that. They threatened Noor, my wife, of arrest if she doesn't leave. So Noor went to bring my green card because it wasn't on me at that point. And they were just, like, confused about the green card part of this. And when Noor brought it and they saw it, he looked even more confused. So he had to call someone and someone told him, bring him. Anyway, during all that period, I was chill. I was very calm again. I've dealt with power all my life, so I knew I didn't do anything wrong. I thought, given their first comment about the visa, maybe this is just a misunderstanding. I would go to the office and then it would be solved. But I was very scared because they wear plain clothes. The cars were like unmarked cars. And they was taken to their office in New York. And five hours after they showed me the Ruby Determination that my presence in the United States presents, I think at first, so I can't remember that, but, like, it's foreign policy threat.

[Ezra Klein]

Yeah, Here, I'll read it. The provision here that they're working off of the Trump administration is an alien whose presence or activities in the United States, the Secretary of State has reasonable ground to believe would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States is deportable.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Exactly.

[Ezra Klein]

Did they show you that?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah, they gave it to me five hours after. And they laughed when they saw it. I was like, what? What did I do? Even the Officer shrugged, giving me the nta, the notice to appear. But at the same time, I heard someone approaching the officer. The White House is requesting an update. And I requested endless times to call my lawyer. I told him, I want to talk to my lawyer before signing or just to know what's happening. And they refused. And then they moved me, like, to New Jersey, then back to New York, to JFK, to Texas, to Louisiana in a matter of 30 hours.

[Ezra Klein]

Wait, say that again. They moved you from JFK to Texas.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

To Texas, back to Louisiana.

[Ezra Klein]

Okay, in 30 hours.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

In 30 hours. So everything was, like, very quick without me knowing where I'm going. Like, I was shackled, and you're expected to follow orders.

[Ezra Klein]

And had you been given a lawyer, an opportunity to call someone?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Nothing at all. And, you know, these practices were kind of present in Syria, where you have a security branch, like kidnapping you from the street or disappearing you arbitrarily, detaining you. So I never felt that this would happen to me in the United States, where they would show up without any arrest warrant, without anything, and just take me. And that's why I keep saying it felt like kidnapping. Because from Saturday evening until Monday morning, I had no contact with anyone. No lawyers, no family, nothing. And the last thing I heard from them, when they were taking me to the car, they were threatening Noor with arrest. And she was eight months pregnant at that time. And that was the only thing I was thinking about during these 30 hours. Did they arrest Noor? Is the baby okay? Is she okay? And I wanted answers, but they refused to give any answers. And I was again, just shackled and expected to just follow orders. And I only knew that I was going to Louisiana when we were boarding the plane.

[Ezra Klein]

Tell me about what happens in Louisiana.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

So I didn't know where I was going. Like, is it a jail? Is it an office? Is it detention center for immigrants? I didn't know any of that. So when we arrived there, we arrived at like, 1 in the morning, like 1am and we get to the detention center. They put me in this. In this Dorm with over 70 men. Then in the morning, I learned that this is a nice detention facility, that everyone here are undocumented, or they are here because of their documents. You know, I felt better because now, like, oh, I can't talk to people. Like, what's happening? I can't see. There's a phone. So the first thing when we woke up, I went to ask someone, how can I operate the phone? And I called Noor. And I just wanted, like, I called Noor just wanted, like, you know, like, is she going to pick up? Not, like, what's happening on the outside world? And Noor. Yeah, picked up and we talked, and the first thing he told me, like, the White House has tweeted about you.

[Ezra Klein]

What did Trump say about you that day?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Shalom, Mahmoud. Right.

[Ezra Klein]

I remember that tweet.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah. So, I mean, he said later a lot of things about, like, Hamas sympathizer Rubio, said De Jong, aspiring terrorist, something like that. And. Yeah. And it felt like in a couple of days, the media is painting a totally different image of who Mahmoud Khadil is. The dehumanization of such tweets and of such portrayal in the media was so difficult to me on a personal level. And. Yeah, but I kept asking is what's happening is legal? I fled Syria fearing political prosecution, to come to the United States to face the same fate of political prosecution.

[Ezra Klein]

Do you have a view on why it was you? I will say because I prepared for this show and I went looking for, okay, I need to make sure I know the really inflammatory things you've said. And I found inflammatory things said by people nearby you at different times or by an Instagram account that's part of a group you're a part of that kind of thing. I couldn't find that much from you.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah, I mean, I joked with a couple of friends before my detention that I would be, like, Trump's perfect target if he want to do anything regarding that. But still, it was a joke.

[Ezra Klein]

I didn't think, why would you be his perfect target?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

A Palestinian. My name is Mahmoud, and I was vocal in the media, so that's the perfect target to make an example out of. Because it's not about me. It's not about, like, because he hates me or, like, because I, you know, but it was just the perfect recipe to make an example out of. Because the main goal of targeting me is to chill speech in this country and to make an example out of me that even if you are a permanent resident, you're not safe, that we have ways to come after you. And that's the main message that they wanted to deliver by targeting me. And the other thing is because I present a different narrative than what the Israel lobby and this administration wants to show that Palestinians are violent Palestinians. They just want to bomb things. But I presented a different reality to that. That, no, we know what we're doing. We want justice and freedom and dignity for everyone, that we are educated, that we are doing this, like, from the strong belief in human rights and the dignity of all people.

[Ezra Klein]

I want to go back to the Rubio termination notice. So the legal grounds here are someone, an alien, in the language of the law here, who the Secretary of State has reasonable ground to believe would have potentially serious adverse foreign policy consequences for the United States. So I've tried to look at what the Trump administration has said about the justification of this, and they've offered a few. One is a view that fighting anti Semitism is a foreign policy priority of the United States, that you are anti Semitic and that your presence here is then in conflict with that priority. How do you respond to that?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

I mean, it's just baseless. There isn't any truth to that, and it's absurd. And in fact, what's a threat to combating antisemitism in this country is this administration unconditional support to a country that's committing a genocide in the name of the Jewish people. And they're trying to conflate antisemitism with anti Zionism, with anti Israel policies or sentiment. The same way they're also trying to now couple or conflate between pro Palestine activism and pro Hamas speech. And that's their main goal. But a federal court judge said that it's likely unconstitutional that the administration targeted me. And I'm not sure how much, you know, but like, this provision was used in the 50s to go after Jewish immigrants in this country.

[Ezra Klein]

That's a very proud lineage. You sort of touch this glancingly, but one of the arguments they've made about you is, I think the word they used was aligned, that your communities are aligned with Hamas, and Hamas is a designated terrorist organization under US Law. And so, again, that would make you potentially in conflict with American foreign policy.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

This goes again into the attempt by whether this administration, or just like Israel in general, to group the pro Palestine activism with supporting Hamas, which is not true. What I stand for, what I'm advocating for, is the end of the genocide, the end of the occupation, the end of the apartheid regime, and the end of complicity of Columbia University in this regime. As simple as that. I don't know how that make me aligned with Hamas or with anyone, but that's what I stand for.

[Ezra Klein]

The other thing, and this has become, I think, more present in the administration's rhetoric, not just about you. J.D. vance just gave a speech about citizenship where he makes this point about Zoran Mamdani. It's kind of become a more, I would say, significant part of the rationale for a lot of what they're doing, which is that being in America's privilege, it's not a right. And that the right response to that privilege, that gift. You came here fearing persecution in other places is gratitude, not protest. They believe it weakens America to allow the presence of immigrants who are critiquing what America is, what America's foreign policy is. Maybe, I think only maybe, but maybe citizens are allowed to do that, maybe native born Americans are allowed to do that. But you here on the largesse of the American government, you should be quiet and grateful and treat your presence here as a privilege. And they have decided to start deporting people who don't. How do you think about that argument?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

This is a very dangerous argument. You know, this is about selective then democracy, selective rights to people. And this administration is trying to target anyone who doesn't fit the very narrow definition of an American should be or who is the real American in this country. If you don't look like Stephen Miller, then you're not an American. That's eventually what they want us to do. And the same with the privilege part of it. It's the privilege of the law, not the privilege of the administration to be in this country. I'm married to an American citizen who was born in this country. My son is American. So I get that privilege from the law. This is how this administration is trying to portray everything right now, that anything is a privilege. Federal funding is a privilege. Medicare is a privilege. Birthright, citizenship is a privilege. Freedom of speech, due process is a privilege. And this is very dangerous because you can't have a democracy. For some it's not a democracy then. It's just, you know, like I'm not sure what a word to describe that, but it's absolutely not a democracy. It would be just an autocracy.

[Ezra Klein]

When you were in the ICE detention facility, you had become by this point a national cause with the right calling you all kinds of names, but many people also rallying around you attention to your case. Shalom Mahmoud made sure a lot of people knew who you were. You were there with a lot of people whose names are not known. Tell me a bit about your fellow inmates. Tell me what you learned and saw about what's happening in the immigration system in the ICE detention centers during those 104 days.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Coming to America to study and to live to build a life here. I never imagined that there is such injustices happening on US soil. I mean one example is a 45 year old man who has been in this country since 2021 and he was picked up from his Court hearing, leaving behind his wife, who's battling cancer and four children under the age of 11. This man was literally at his court hearing, going through the process of getting documentation, but now his wife had a chemotherapy appointment upcoming. And he was just, like, literally crying every day. And it was so normal seeing people crying in the detention center. Another story is a person coming to me, showing me, like, a piece of paper. He's like, what. What this paper is about? Since I was, you know, I had a master's degree and I know how bureaucracy works, a lot of people would come to me with questions. And I was like, you don't know what this is? He was like, no, they gave it to me. They made me sign it. And it's his deportation order. And next day, he was deported. And a 19 years old came to ask me, can my mom continue visit me? His mom would drive every week for four hours from New Orleans to see him, but she's also undocumented. So he came to ask me, like, is it safe for her to come and visit me? And I had to tell him, like, no, it's not safe, because they may arrest her. And then you wouldn't have anyone to support you on the outside. So just like so many stories like left and right, you see the injustice happening there. The dehumanization around being named criminals on the news, while the vast majority of them were either picked up from court, hearing from ICE check ins, or from their work. Maybe it's because of my ignorance, but I never thought that this is actually happening where the immigration system is very corrupt. It is, in fact, kangaroo court. It is fully controlled by the executive branch, fully controlled by the attorney general.

[Ezra Klein]

You, in a letter you wrote or that you dictated there, you referenced this line from Hannah Rent, who has a right to have rights?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah, that was, to me, the most difficult part of the whole experience. The moment you enter that facility, you don't have any rights. All your rights are just taken away from you. And to me, having this support from lawyers who would tell me what my rights are. So that's why I felt like in that specific moment, when writing about who has rights to have right, if. If me being, you know, a legal permanent resident in this country, an educated person, in a matter of, like, moments, I was stripped of all these rights.

[Ezra Klein]

While you're in there, your wife, who is eight months pregnant when you were picked up, gives birth. What was that experience like for you?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

I was always hoping that I would be out before the birth of my son, Noor. And I have always Dreamt about this moment. I mean, every parent have done the same. And to me, to lose that moment because a person decided so felt difficult. The dehumanization of that moment that I had to be on the phone listening to my wife at 2:30 in the morning, like listening just to hear screams. And I can't, you know, I can't hold her hands or give her any supporting, like words in a place where, you know, I can't even raise my voice at that time.

[Ezra Klein]

You're listening in this room with.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah, I was on the phone. Yeah. Like there was like 70 people. They were asleep, like the majority of them. I was also like trying to resist crying at that moment. Like, I don't want them to see me crying. And this is one of the moments that I would never forgive them for taking it from me. But this is part of the cruelty that was imposed on me that we went to ice, to DHS to request like temporary or for law, temporary release, but was refused immediately. And we gave them. You can't put all the conditions like you want just like for two hours just for me to be in that room. I have no criminal history, no risks whatsoever. Yet they refuse because their main goal out of this, out of this is to punish me, to make an example out of me, to be as cruel as possible. So, yeah, so I always struggle to answer this question about that feeling because I tried to prepare for that moment. Yeah, I collapsed like when I was on the phone. And I had to wait a number of hours until I could receive a picture of Dean of the newborn. But then the detainees actually made me a cake the night of. Like, I did not tell anyone. But then someone approached me. He's like, you're not okay. Because I stayed on my bunk like the whole day. And he told me, like, you're not okay. I told him, like, yeah, my wife gave birth today. And then an hour after, like, you know, it's a detention made like cake. It's not like a real cake, but like it's. Yeah, but that felt, you know, like to have them. And usually people save these things, you know. But they brought it to like, to me and we celebrated that together.

[Ezra Klein]

Yeah, that's not a moment you can prepare for.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah, but it's unfortunately, this is just like, literally. I always say it's a drop in the sea of sorrow that Palestinians go through every day. It's just a microscope of what a Palestinian story is, why Palestinians are so dehumanized in this country, in the west, that just all this administration had to say that is that I'm Palestinian and this is what we are fighting against now. It's just the dehumanization of Palestinians.

[Ezra Klein]

There's a way in which your experience inverts the narrative that has taken hold. Look, I'm Jewish. I don't take antisemitism lightly. You should see my inbox. And it can be true that Jews can be unsafe, but the idea, and it is real, that there was anti Semitism at Colombia, but nobody there ended up as unsafe as you did.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah, I mean, I would push back regarding antisemitism at Colombia. I would really push back on that.

[Ezra Klein]

That there was none.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

I wouldn't say there was none. I would say there isn't this manufactured history about antisemitism at Colombia because of the protests, because proud boys were at the doors of Colombia, the very right wing. And there are incidents here and there. But it's not that antisemitism is happening at Colombia because of the Palestine movement. This is what I would always push back. And I have that strong belief that antisemitism and anti Palestinian racism, they rise together. The incidents rise together because the same groups are perpetrating that in different ways. And I'm not trying to sanitize history or sanitize the present when it comes to that. But going back to what you said, I paid so much because of that rhetoric, because of Colombia's complicity and because of a lot of the students who targeted me are pro Israel students. The same four or five students would tweet about me every day just to silence me, because it was easier for them to silence me, to throw me in prison, than actually reflect on what I'm saying, than actually listening to this, even if it's uncomfortable. And I know it's uncomfortable because supporting a genocide should be uncomfortable. Like, being uncomfortable is very different from being unsafe. And I want to get into the chants from the river to the sea from Globalize the intifada about all of that. I heard someone on your podcast saying, oh, I don't like the chant. Globalized Intifada. Yeah, don't like it. It's not being chanted for you to like it. It's actually to make you uncomfortable. So you have to think about your complicity and what's happening. And words matter. And the fact that Palestinians are being attacked for whatever chants, symbols, anything they do should be addressed like Palestinians. You have the bds, the Boyka Divestment and Sanctions movement. It's a very peaceful movement. And yet it was labeled as an antisemitism like anti Semitic and criminalized. And criminalized in the United States. So you have people dictating on you what your chant should be. And with the globalized antifa. It's not about, like, violence and, you know, like, globalized. The killing and all of it's not. And it was overwhelmingly civil disobedience against the Israeli occupation. The second Intifada included some instances of.

[Ezra Klein]

Violence, including many suicide bombings.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah, 100 and something. But it also included the killing of 3,000 Palestinians.

[Ezra Klein]

I'm just saying that. But the fact that many Jewish people here. Globalizing Defada as globalize the violent struggle is not based on nothing.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

No, I think it's based on policing Palestinian thought and speech. That's what it's based on. Because from the river to the sea, no one ever said that's a violent. From the Palestinian perspective, no one ever said that's a violent call. Yet you see this narrative that, oh, it's a call to erase Israelis from Palestine, which no one said that. It's actually the Likud Party that says that. That's from the river to the sea. It all should be, like Jewish sovereignty there. It's not Palestinians who said that.

[Ezra Klein]

But there have always been different factions of Palestinians. Right. In the same way that you're saying it's not fair to ask Palestinians to be perfect victims. It's also, I think, not reasonable to collapse. There have been much more violent factions of the Palestinian struggle. There have been plenty of periods when what Hamas meant from things like that was much more annihilatory.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

But the intifada was not started by Hamas.

[Ezra Klein]

No, I agree, but it has. But the second intifada very much involved them.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

But that doesn't mean it started. It started because of.

[Ezra Klein]

I'm just saying when you say that. Nobody ever said it this way.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

No, no, I'm saying, like the way that the students are saying that. And even the students.

[Ezra Klein]

That's fair, I think.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah, the students never said that because to us, it means, let's globalize the struggle to liberate Palestine, that it shouldn't feel convenient where Palestinians are being killed every day and the world is silent. That's what the uprising is about. And again, I don't want to sanitize history. And I told you the second intifada involved violent acts. But overwhelmingly, they were peaceful. And in the second intifada, over 3,000 Palestinians were killed by Israel. The first intifada, 1,000 Palestinians were killed by Israel, too.

[Ezra Klein]

The place where I overwhelmingly agree with you is that there is one abroad effort to demand the Palestinians speak perfectly. That is not demanded of Jewish people. There are no end of chants that happen on Jerusalem day in Israel and no end of rhetoric. I went to a synagogue when I was young that I ended up stalking out of when my rabbi told my confirmation class that Israel would be within its race to displace all Palestinian people. And that was normal. And that was a Reform synagogue. I watched on an interview you were giving the sort of repeated demands that you denounce Hamas. Not just killings of civilians, but Hamas itself. There is an insistence that Palestinians, in my experience, sort of denounce struggle almost entirely that don't understand it as their own struggle, and it's not applied equally. The demand that you would denounce every part of Israeli government or life, including the ruling government right now that is creating a mass starvation, is not demanded of Jewish people. And so there is. There's a huge double standard here.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Yeah, absolutely. And that's why you wouldn't find many Palestinians answer that question. It's not about Hamas. It's about just the perspective of asking this question, the dehumanization of asking this question when. Because it's not about my political view about Hamas. Like, they only want to say. Like want to hear yes or no. That's it. It's not about what I think about it. And this is being used to credit or discredit Palestinian. If I condemn Hamas, then I am a Palestinian worth of listening to. If I don't, then I'm not. And this is what gets Palestinians angry with this line of questioning. Because as I said, Palestinians are the one now being starved and genocided. Because even if Hamas does not exist tomorrow, the Israeli occupation and supremacy would continue against the Palestinians. So it's not about Hamas.

[Ezra Klein]

I want to pick your story back up here. What leads to your release?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

You know, I'm out on bail with very restrictive conditions that I have. Like to reside in New York, very few places to go to. But a federal court ordered that my detention was likely unconstitutional, that I was targeted for my freedom of speech, that there is no evidence of what the administration has said about me. But the legal fight is long. The administration is waging a lawfare against me. They are basically appealing every decision, trying to bring retaliatory charges against me. So I, you know, I just like, shut up and leave the country. But we'll continue the fight because unfortunately, there's no other option right now.

[Ezra Klein]

You're giving interviews like this one. You were on Capitol Hill recently. Tell me about that. Decision.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

I'm demanding accountability for the overreach, for the illegality of my detention. And I want to bring it to what really matters, which is ending the genocide in Gaza. That's why that was centered to my conversation, whether with the media or with Congress members. Because what's happening to me and to others is just a distraction from the real issue, which is the US complicity in the genocide in Gaza. That's why I, you know, like a lot of people tell me, like, oh, take a break or why you're taking all these risks. But I really can't take a break where the genocide is not taking a break, where as of Today there's over 100 people. We're starved to death. There is like moral imperative to me to speak up, especially now that I have this platform that I should continue to use. Unfortunately, I did not choose this place, you know, ICE did. However, I want to take that responsibility with pride and continue advocating for the rights of my people, as always.

[Ezra Klein]

Then our final question. What are three books you recommend to the audience?

[Mahmoud Khalil]

The first book I would recommend is a newly published book, Umar Ala Ad's book, which is one day everyone will have always opposed this. It's sort of like exposing the hypocrisy between the west ideals and actions. The second book is Edward Said the Question of Palestine. That was actually published like in I think late 70s, before Hamas was founded. And it's a good glimpse into the Palestinian thought when it comes to Palestine and Zionism. And Zionism from the perspective of Palestinians. The third book is My Promised Land by Ari Shavet, which matters Rashid Khalidi's hundreds horse on Palestine. And to me that was helpful because it shows that the Zionist colonial project started like in the 80s and sort of confirm what Rashid Khalidi say in a lot of places, the 1880s. The 1880s, yeah. Those are the three books that I would recommend.

[Ezra Klein]

Mahmoud Khalil, thank you very much.

[Mahmoud Khalil]

Thank you, Ezra.

[Ezra Klein]

This episode of the Israel Clancho is Produced by Jack McCordick and Roland who Factory by Michelle Harris. Our senior audio engineer is Jeff Geld, with additional mixing by Amin Sahota. Our executive producer is Claire Gordon. The show's production team also includes Annie Galvin, Marie Cassion, Elias Isquith, Marina King, Kristin Lin and Jan Kobel. Original music by Carol Sabaro, Aman Sahota and Pat McCusker. Audience strategy by Christina Semiluski and Shannon Busta. The director of New York Times Penny and audio is Annie Rose Strasser.