Badar Khan Suri is one of the many pro-Palestine scholars being targeted by the Donald Trump administration.
Suri, originally from India, is a Georgetown University professor and postdoctoral scholar on religion and peace processes in the Middle East and South Asia.
On the evening of 17 March, Suri was ambushed by masked federal agents with the Homeland Security Department as he and his family returned to their home in Rosslyn, Virginia, after attending an iftar gathering for Ramadan. Suri was taken into custody without being charged with or accused of any crime. He was told the federal government had revoked his visa.
Over the next 72 hours, Suri was transferred to multiple immigration detention centres, and he is currently jailed at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility in Louisiana, separated from his wife, a US citizen of Palestinian descent, and his three children.
Unlike Mahmoud Khalil, the Columbia University graduate facing deportation, Suri “is not a political activist”, says Nader Hashemi, a professor of Middle East and Islamic politics at Georgetown University. “He was just a very serious young academic focusing on his teaching and his research.”
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Produced by: Democracy Now!
AGENDA RAKYAT - Lima perkara utama
- Tegakkan maruah serta kualiti kehidupan rakyat
- Galakkan pembangunan saksama, lestari serta tangani krisis alam sekitar
- Raikan kerencaman dan keterangkuman
- Selamatkan demokrasi dan angkatkan keluhuran undang-undang
- Lawan rasuah dan kronisme
