Mohsen Mahdawi, a 34-year-old Palestinian and US permanent resident, has returned to Columbia University to begin a master's at SIPA and vowed to continue speaking out for peace and justice. He was a prominent organizer of campus protests over Israel's war in Gaza. He was detained at a naturalization interview in Vermont and ordered to be deported under an obscure immigration provision that allows revocation of legal status for alleged threats to US foreign policy. He was never charged with a crime, and his lawyers described the arrest as retaliatory. Born in a West Bank refugee camp, he immigrated to the US over a decade ago and enrolled at Columbia in 2021. He intends to study diplomacy, security, peacemaking, conflict resolution, and negotiation and says he will remain on campus to pursue solutions rather than leave.
They have failed to silence me, and in fact, now I am more outspoken than before, and I will continue to work for peace and justice. I do this work not for myself alone I do this for the future of children, whether they are Palestinians or Israelis, he told the Guardian on Tuesday in his first interview since stepping back on to campus to begin his graduate studies.
Born and raised in a refugee camp in the occupied West Bank, Mahdawi immigrated to the US over a decade ago and enrolled at Columbia in 2021. His return to the school comes nearly five months after he was detained by federal immigration authorities while attending a naturalization interview in Vermont and ordered to be deported.
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