New York City Mayor Zahran Mamdani came under fire for having breakfast at Gracie Mansion with Mahmoud Khalil and his family on a day that also marked the one-year anniversary of Khalil’s arrest. Mamdani said that he and his wife, Rama Dawaji, were honored to receive Mahmoud Khalil, his wife Nour, and their son Dean at the mayor’s house to have breakfast together.
“Mahmoud is a New Yorker, and he belongs to New York City,” Mamdani wrote, posting a photo showing Mahmoud Khalil at the breakfast table, smiling.“A year ago, Mahmoud was walking home through our city after having breakfast with his wife, Nour, when he was arrested by federal agents, flown to Louisiana, and then detained in an ICE facility for several months. At that time, he was forced to miss the birth of his first child. All because he exercised his First Amendment rights to protest the ongoing genocide in Palestine,” the New York City mayor posted.
An explosive device was found outside Zahran Mamdani’s home in New York City; The FBI is investigating terrorism charges
“And yet, even in the face of that cruelty, there was also beauty. New Yorkers raise their voices in solidarity. A city refuses to look away. Mahmoud gained his freedom, and a father and his baby girl are finally reunited,” the post read.
MAGA activist Laura Loomer called this “outrageous” and called the New York City mayor a national security threat. “Are you going to invite Prince Balat to your house as well?” One of them wrote that two ISIS supporters were arrested while trying to detonate explosive devices in front of Mamdani’s house during a protest.
“I am deeply offended by this photo as a Jewish New Yorker. This man is harassing Jewish students and is anti-Semitic! How do you think it would be appropriate to post this photo on government social media?? As an advocate for the Jewish community, I want an apology immediately!!!” another wrote. “This is extremely offensive to the Jewish community as Mahmoud Khalil has spent almost the last three years aggressively harassing Jewish students on campus.
Whether you agree with his deportation or not, his behavior was abhorrent and should not be celebrated by the mayor,” the CEO of the Jewish organization Aish wrote.
One year since the arrest of Mahmoud Khalil
Immigration and Customs Enforcement arrested Mahmoud Khalil on March 8 of last year from the Columbia University campus. He was a leader and negotiator of the pro-Palestinian protests at Columbia University. While the federal administration attempted to deport him, he was released from detention by court order. “It has now been a full year,” Khalil wrote to The Guardian. “A year since that horrific night that marked the beginning of a brutal wave of arrests targeting protesters for simply telling the truth. Although we have never met in person, I have carried you with me every day since Nour called me while I was detained in Jena, Louisiana, to tell me that you had been kidnapped. I remember thinking: Not again, and neither will any of us. From that moment on, a piece of my heart has been linked to your struggle.” On the first anniversary of his arrest.“I am free, but not free. I carry with me the detention center in Jena. I carry with me my fellow detainees – Alex, Ziad, Marcel, Juan and Mamoki. I carry the cold and the fluorescent light. I carry the night they came for me, the night I got out, and every night in between. And I carry the knowledge that while I am here, there are still others out there. And that my freedom is partial as long as no one remains in the cage for the same reasons I was locked in.” books.