Detained Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil has been permitted to hold his one-month-old son for the first time after a federal judge overruled the Trump administration’s efforts to keep father and child separated by a plexiglass barrier.
The visit came just before a scheduled immigration hearing for Khalil, a legal permanent resident and Columbia University graduate who has been held in a Louisiana jail since March 8.
Khalil was the first person arrested under President Donald Trump's promised crackdown on pro-Palestine protesters and remains one of the few still in custody, as his case continues through both immigration and federal courts.
Federal authorities have not charged Khalil with a crime but are seeking his deportation on grounds that his prominent role in protests against Israel's genocide in Gaza could be seen as undermining US foreign policy interests.
His request to attend his son's April 21 birth was denied last month by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement [ICE].
The question of whether Khalil would be allowed physical contact with his newborn or be forced to meet him through a barrier sparked days of legal battles, with his lawyers alleging political retaliation by the government.
Palestinian activist Mahmoud Khalil remains in ICE custody in Louisiana after being denied a contact visit with his wife and newborn son.
'Deliberate Violence'
On Wednesday night, federal judge Michael Farbiarz in New Jersey intervened, authorising a "contact visit" for Thursday morning, according to Khalil's legal team.
Prior to the ruling, federal officials opposed the request, insisting that Khalil could only be granted a "non-contact" visit, meaning he would be separated from his wife Noor Abdalla and son Deen by a plastic divider.
Brian Acuna, acting director of ICE’s New Orleans field office, stated in an affidavit that allowing Khalil's wife and baby into the secure area would be "unsafe".
In response, Khalil’s attorneys called the refusal "further evidence of the retaliatory motive behind Mr Khalil's arrest and faraway detention." insisting that his wife and infant son posed "the farthest thing from a security risk."
They also noted that Abdalla had travelled nearly 1,500 miles to the remote detention centre to introduce their son to his father.
"This is not just heartless," said Abdalla.
"It is deliberate violence – the calculated cruelty of a government that tears families apart without remorse. And I cannot ignore the echoes of this pain in the stories of Palestinian families, torn apart by Israeli military prisons and bombs, denied dignity, denied life."
Faculty and students testify
On Thursday, Khalil appeared before Louisiana immigration judge Jamee Comans as his attorneys submitted evidence regarding the dangers he would face if deported to Syria – where he grew up in a refugee camp – or Algeria, where he holds citizenship through a distant relative.
Statements from Columbia University faculty and students were presented in court as testimony to Khalil's character.
In one declaration, Joseph Howley, a classics professor at Columbia, said he had first introduced Khalil to a university administrator to serve as a spokesperson on behalf of campus protesters, describing him as a "upstanding, principled, and well-respected member of our community."
"I have never known Mahmoud to espouse any anti-Jewish sentiments or prejudices, and have heard him forcefully reject antisemitism on multiple occasions," Howley wrote.
