Foreign anti-Israel activist arrested at Columbia University

Donald Trump's government has followed through on taking action against anti-Israeli inciters at universities, and one such example was at Columbia in NYC, already a hotbed of anti-Israeli activity:

Following through on President Donald Trump’s recent promise to detain foreign “agitators” who participate in illegal forms of protest, Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents on Saturday arrested a Palestinian activist who helped lead Columbia University’s anti-Israel encampment last year, his lawyer said.

Mahmoud Khalil is a member of Columbia’s anti-Israel coalition, the Columbia University Apartheid Divest (CUAD), and was one of the lead negotiators for the school’s infamous encampment. A graduate student at the Columbia School of International and Public Affairs who completed his undergraduate degree in Beirut, Khalil told the Columbia Daily Spectator that he was afraid of losing his student visa if he participated in the protests.

Federal immigration authorities arrested Khalil at his university-owned apartment over the weekend, his lawyer Amy Greer told the Associated Press. One agent told Greer that ICE was executing a Department of State order to revoke Khalil’s visa and green card, the AP reported. He is allegedly being held at Elizabeth Contract Detention Facility in New Jersey. [...]

Khalil was reportedly a political affairs officer with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA) for a number of months in 2023. President Donald Trump ended U.S. participation in UNRWA in February, citing the humanitarian organization’s extensive ties to Hamas.

Trump suspended $400 million in federal grants to Columbia last week over concerns about the campus’s inability to address campus anti-semitism. The president has also said that he will arrest and deport foreign student “agitators” who participate in pro-Hamas protests, and that his administration will investigate a host of other universities in relation to reports of rampant anti-semitism on campuses.

Whereever he comes from, this Khalil should be deported instantly. And Trump did the right thing to stop funding to Columbia. Taxpayer money should not go to such hostile establishments.