On Monday morning, Noor Abdalla, the wife of Columbia University graduate and Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil, shared that she had given birth to their first child, and that Khalil’s request to be present for the birth was denied in less than an hour.
Khalil was arrested and detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement in March in front of his wife, who was then eight months pregnant. Since then, Khalil has been detained in a Louisiana facility, over 1,000 miles from Abdalla, due to the Trump administration’s baseless argument that he is a threat to U.S. foreign policy. On April 11, an immigration judge ruled that Khalil is eligible to be deported (despite the fact that he is a green card holder and a legal resident), primarily citing a two-page memo written by Secretary of State Marco Rubio which alleged that his pro-Palestinian activism at Columbia University was antisemitic.
The degradation being perpetrated against Khalil has continued, according to Abdalla’s most recent statement.
“I welcomed our son into the world earlier today without Mahmoud by my side,” she wrote in a statement released on Monday. “Despite our request for ICE to allow Mahmoud to attend the birth, they denied his temporary release to meet our son. This was a purposeful decision by ICE to make me, Mahmoud, and our son suffer.”
According to emails obtained and published by the New York Times and NPR, attorneys for Khalil wrote to the ICE official assigned to his case, relaying the information that his wife had gone into labor on Sunday morning. They proposed multiple ways Khalil could attend the birth, including granting him a two-week furlough in which he’d submit to monitoring.
“A two-week furlough in this civil detention matter would be both reasonable and humane so that both parents can be present for the birth of their first child,” the lawyers wrote. “Mr. Khalil would be open to any combination of conditions that would allow furlough from ICE’s perspective, including a GPS ankle monitor and/or scheduled check-ins.”
Within a half hour, the request was denied by ICE’s New Orleans field office. Its director, Mellissa Harper, replied: “Thank you for your email. After consideration of the submitted information and a review of your client’s case, your request for furlough is denied.” Instead, Khalil dialed in via phone call to be present (as much as he was allowed) for part of the birth.
“My son and I should not be navigating his first days on earth without Mahmoud,” Abdalla’s statement continued. “ICE and the Trump administration have stolen these precious moments from our family in an attempt to silence Mahmoud’s support for Palestinian freedom.”
In a statement to NPR, one of Khalil’s attorneys, Marc Van Der Hout, said that though Khalil is thrilled to become a father, being kept from his son’s birth was inhumane.
“He is happy to be a father, but he’s extremely disappointed that he couldn’t be there to support his wife, be there to hold his first child,” Van Der Hout said. “And he had certainly hoped and expected that the government would show some humanity. But they did not.”
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