White House oversaw arrest of Mahmoud Khalil. Now another Palestinian has been arrested

White House oversaw arrest of Mahmoud Khalil. Now another Palestinian has been arrested

The Associated Press reports:

On Thursday, Khalil’s lawyers filed new court documents describing how he was rushed from New York to Louisiana last weekend in a manner that left the outspoken Columbia University graduate student feeling like he was being kidnapped.

The experience reminded Khalil of when he left Syria shortly after the forced disappearance of his friends there during a period of arbitrary detention in 2013, the lawyers wrote.

According to the lawsuit, Khalil repeatedly asked to speak to a lawyer after he was snatched by federal agents as he and his wife were returning to Columbia’s residential housing, where they lived, after dinner at a friend’s home.

Confronted by agents for the DHS, Khalil briefly telephoned his lawyer before he was taken to FBI headquarters in lower Manhattan, the lawsuit said.

It was there that Khalil saw an agent approach another agent and say, “the White House is requesting an update,” the lawyers wrote.

At some point early Sunday, Khalil was taken, handcuffed and shackled, to the Elizabeth Detention Center in Elizabeth, New Jersey, a privately run facility where he spent the night in a cold waiting room for processing, his request for a blanket denied, the lawsuit said. [Continue reading…]

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