May 22, 2025 — Louisiana : Mahmoud Khalil, a Columbia University graduate and Palestinian activist currently detained by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), was denied physical contact with his newborn son during a recent visit, according to his legal team.
Khalil, a U.S. green card holder arrested in New York on March 8, has been held at a detention center in Louisiana operated by a private contractor. His wife, Noor Abdalla, a U.S. citizen, traveled over 1,000 miles from New York with their one-month-old infant in hopes of a contact visit. Instead, the meeting took place through a glass partition.
Despite requests from Khalil’s lawyers, ICE and the facility’s operators refused to allow a physical meeting, citing a general no-contact policy and vague “security concerns.”
“After flying over a thousand miles to Louisiana with our newborn son, his very first flight, all so his father could finally hold him in his arms, ICE has denied us even this most basic human right,” Abdalla said in a statement. “This is not just heartless. It is deliberate violence — the calculated cruelty of a government that tears families apart without remorse.”
Khalil had previously petitioned to attend the birth of his son in New York but was denied. Abdalla called the decision “a purposeful act by ICE to make me, Mahmoud, and our son suffer.” Khalil experienced the birth by phone.
His arrest is among the first in a reported wave of ICE detentions targeting students and academics involved in pro-Palestinian demonstrations.
In a letter to his son, published by The Guardian, Khalil expressed his anguish: “My heart aches that I could not hold you in my arms and hear your first cry, that I could not unfurl your clenched fists or change your first diaper.”
He continued: “My absence is not unique. Like other Palestinian fathers, I was separated from you by racist regimes and distant prisons. The grief your mother and I feel is but one drop in a sea of sorrow that Palestinian families have drowned in for generations.”
Khalil’s legal team continues to advocate for his release, citing humanitarian grounds and due process concerns. ICE has not commented publicly on the specifics of his detention.
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