Rather than being deported, Hamas-supporting Columbia student Mohmoud Khalil is on a publicity tour after being released from DHS detention and returning to New York City. Khalil, who was of course given an op-ed in the Washington Post, has now appeared on the New York Times' podcast, explaining that you're not supposed to like the chants "From the river to the sea" and "Globalize the intifada" — they're meant to make to reflect on your own complicity in oppressing the Palestinian people.
Kahlil also told the New York Times' Ezra Klein Show that "we" couldn't have avoided Hamas' October 7 slaughter of Israeli civilians. "It felt frightening that we had to reach this moment in the Palestinian struggle," he said. "We couldn't avoid such a moment."
Why hasn't this guy been deported yet? The same things that got him detained in the first place have now gained him a platform to spread his support for Hamas in the Post and the Times.
The Times' headline for the Kahlil interview reads, "The Trump Administration Tried to Silence Mahmoud Khalil, So I Asked Him to Talk." Hen Mazzig read Klein's interview with Khalil and listed some of the most outrageous moments.
I read Ezra Klein’s interview with Mahmoud Khalil, so you don’t have to.
— Hen Mazzig (@HenMazzig) August 7, 2025
Here are the most outrageous moments.
Buckle up 🧵 pic.twitter.com/jDL1GSq2eO
Khalil talks about how Palestinians in Syria have no property rights, even after generations. That’s blatant discrimination.
— Hen Mazzig (@HenMazzig) August 7, 2025
But Klein doesn’t pause to reflect on what that means.
No curiosity about how other Arab states treat Palestinians. He just moves along. >> pic.twitter.com/ns5esQjnmV
Khalil, who often describes himself as a Palestinian refugee, mentions one grandparent living in modern day Israel: his grandmother lived in Tiveria for 30 years before 1948.
— Hen Mazzig (@HenMazzig) August 7, 2025
So she must have lived through the Tiveria pogrom, in 1938, when Arab terrorists lit Jewish homes and… pic.twitter.com/KkdDnDqf9I
The post continues:
… synagogues on fire and stabbed the people inside, including a baby, to death.
Somehow, the Arab-initiated violence that preceded his family’s departure from Tiveria was never part of the narrative Khalil was taught. He says he was raised to believe that “Palestine was taken from us, was stolen from us.”
I am not saying Palestinians have no connection to the land; in fact I am a loud advocate for peace and their right to live in this land. But as Jew whose family lived in Iraq and Tunisia for centuries, only to be violently kicked out with all of their property stripped from them, I always find the asymmetry in these conversations jarring.
Palestinian identity is inherently tied to Arab identity, the same Arabs who forced my family out of their land. But this is often forgotten in this narrative. >>
Khalil states that October 7th was inevitable, parroting Hamas’s rationale for the rape and slaughter of Jews as a means to avoid Israel’s normalization with Saudi Arabia.
— Hen Mazzig (@HenMazzig) August 7, 2025
Khalil's statement directly aligns with Yayha Sinwar’s message to top Hamas officials, uncovered in May,… pic.twitter.com/uqkOoIsrft
The post continues:
… that an “extraordinary act” would be necessary to stop normalization. Sinwar conveyed this message mere days before the October 7th massacre, rape, and abduction of innocent Israeli civilians.
Despicable acts of terrorism are being normalized as an appropriate— even inevitable— political tactic in the pages of the New York Times, with no pushback. >>
“Having lived in the Middle East most of my life, unfortunately, the only Jew you hear about is the one who’s trying to kill you.”
— Hen Mazzig (@HenMazzig) August 7, 2025
Here’s my question:
What happened to the 50,000 Jews of Syria and Lebanon, where Khalil grew up? Where are they now? Did they try to kill you? >> pic.twitter.com/CqVmXBhEdr
Klein gently asks about a Columbia protester who said “Zionists don’t deserve to live.” The protest group first apologized, then took the apology back.
— Hen Mazzig (@HenMazzig) August 7, 2025
Khalil doesn’t condemn the statement. He plays the victim, saying his movement is being “demonized.”
Then comes this gem:… pic.twitter.com/9830oDhtDg
The post continues:
… Khalil wants to “liberate my oppressor from their hate and from their fear.”
A good first step would be calling out genocidal calls in your own camp. Literally. >>
Klein tries again: Is there antisemitism at Columbia?
— Hen Mazzig (@HenMazzig) August 7, 2025
Khalil’s answer? “Manufactured hysteria.”
Meanwhile, Jews were beaten, harassed, pushed out of classrooms and clubs. Professors openly discriminated against them.
The idea that Jews fake antisemitism is one of the oldest… pic.twitter.com/XUivmyQw5d
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… tropes there is.
Klein doesn’t challenge it. In fact, he joins in: “Nobody there ended up as unsafe as you did.”
Why is the goalpost for what qualifies as hate against Jews always moving, while other minority groups are encouraged to call out microaggressions of any scale and scope? >>
“It’s actually to make you uncomfortable”
— Hen Mazzig (@HenMazzig) August 7, 2025
Mahmoud Khalil fan and NYC mayoral hopeful Zohran Mamdani said in an interview that he sees the call to “globalize the intifada” at anti-Israel rallies as “a desperate call for equality and equal rights.” Later on he decided to change… pic.twitter.com/RhJN5G8cZM
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… his tone and say he doesn’t like to use this term.
But Khalil confirmed here what Jews have been saying all along: The purpose of the chant is to make people who support Israel's right to exist (i.e.. most Jews) feel uncomfortable.
And if you think Khalil actually has a handle on the difference between discomfort and danger, check out what he says about the intifada >>>
“I don’t want to sanitize history…the second intifada involved violent acts, but overwhelmingly, they were peaceful.”
— Hen Mazzig (@HenMazzig) August 7, 2025
I survived a suicide bombing during the second intifada. The baby and grandmother who were near me didn’t.
Do not ask me to accept Khalil’s definitions of… pic.twitter.com/iXrPdftAF3
The post continues:
… peace, violence, or safety. >>
This wasn’t an interview.
— Hen Mazzig (@HenMazzig) August 7, 2025
It was a whitewash of terror, antisemitism, hate, and historical revisionism. It was published in the New York Times, without journalistic scrutiny or any pushback.
And that should concern everyone.
Of course, there was no pushback. Klein and the Times agree with everything this terrorist sympathizer believes.
At least there was one voice of sanity in the media. CNN's Scott Jennings schooled a panel weeping about Khalil's detention:
Mahmoud Khalil’s group wants to eradicate Western Civilization & foment unrest in the United States. President Trump & @SecRubio are well within their legal rights to deport this radical. We are either going to stand up or become Europe. I’m 100% behind the President. pic.twitter.com/0shUR407pr
— Scott Jennings (@ScottJenningsKY) March 11, 2025
Hamas sympathizers asked if Khalil could be deported for exercising his First Amendment right to free speech, then "what legal guarantee does any citizen have that their free speech rights won't be violated in any circumstance?"
Platforming this guy is despicable. Just having him on legitimizes him and his malign cause and world view. Yeah, he indicted himself as a Hamas supporter, but, for many, supporting Hamas is otherwise normalized. But the viewership was great, right? So never mind.
— Gregg Mashberg (@gregg_mashberg) August 7, 2025
Some voices just don't deserve an audience.
— AMIRAN 🇮🇱 (@Amiran_Zizovi) August 7, 2025
The Left really knows how to pick its heroes.
Deport immediately. He is anti American and is a danger to western civilization. Deport Khalil too while we’re at it.
— Stacy Miller (@StacyMillerrr) August 7, 2025
I was so relieved to learn that "Globalize the Intifada", like good old "Jihad", is merely a call for spiritual awakening, and the intifada itself, yes, resulted in a "few" civilian casualties, possibly unintended. Great relief.
— Judea Pearl (@yudapearl) August 7, 2025
I’ll never understand how someone can openly defend terrorism and still be allowed to stay here.
— Alba (@diurnalreign) August 7, 2025
Yes he's a jihadist - @ezraklein @nytimes are Islamist Pravda at this point
— PixiRebel 🇺🇸 (@PixiRebel) August 7, 2025
Why is this terrorist scum bag still in our country?
— Dr. Henry Rose (@thehankrose) August 7, 2025
We're asking the same thing.
@ezraklein would love to hear your comments. You let him slide with a lot of really awful antisemitic remarks and didn’t check him on anything. Why did you go easy on a man who supports those who’d kill you and your family without a second thought?
— Tome Gross (@Tome_Gross) August 7, 2025
It's sad but Sam Harris proved Ezra Klein has absolutely not credibility, intellectually or morally a good while ago.
— BasilBrush (@sacredcowpats) August 7, 2025
Antisemitism and denial of it is now the default.
It's crazy how much publicity the legacy media is giving this terrorist.
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