By Iqbal Jassat

The danger facing civil liberties, especially for the vast number of Americans opposed to the genocidal apartheid regime of Israel, is real.

America’s discredited, illegal and immoral “War On Terror” (WOT), has left a terrible legacy of arbitrary detention without recourse to due process, among a range of attacks on civil liberties.

Mahmoud Khalil is the latest casualty of a pervasive WOT pursued by a corrupt rightwing administration under the leadership of US president Donald Trump.

The language and approach by Trump and his lieutenants is no different to that of George W. Bush, who within a few days following the events of September 11, 2001, addressed the country by promising that the WOT will not be limited to “one battle”.

His decision was shocking. The WOT will be a lengthy campaign, “unlike any other we have ever seen”. It will include dramatic strikes, visible on TV, and covert operations, secret even in success, Bush declared.

“We will starve terrorists of funding, turn them one against another, drive them from place to place, until there is no refuge or no rest. And we will pursue nations that provide aid or safe haven to terrorism. Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make. Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists.”

His description of “terrorists” and their “goals” is straight out of Israel’s playbook for not only does it reveal Bush’s vengeful Islamophobia, but also gives insight to the current state of affairs within Trump’s White House.

In answering his own rhetorical question about why do they (“terrorists”) hate America, Bush declared “they hate what we see right here in this chamber – a democratically elected government. Their leaders are self-appointed. They hate our freedoms – our freedom of religion, our freedom of speech, our freedom to vote and assemble and disagree with each other”.

Bizarrely without blinking an eye, Bush went on to contradict his “freedom to vote…” by saying “They want to overthrow existing governments in many Muslim countries, such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan”.

Surely the irony would not have been lost by the millions in these pro-US countries who are denied voting rights as well as other fundamental freedoms, including freedom of speech. US-backed client-regimes have dungeons overflowing with tortured victims who have no recourse to due process.

It is precisely what we are confronted with in today’s unjust American politics with the detention of Mahmoud Khalil.

The danger facing civil liberties, especially for the vast number of Americans opposed to the genocidal apartheid regime of Israel, is real.

An investigative journalist Joshua Frank, spelled it out on his social media platform:

@joshua.frank – “There is no doubt that the illegal detention of Mahmoud Khalil is a test run for Trump’s expanding, pervasive police state. If this corrupt administration can get away with deporting a permanent resident who hasn’t been accused of a single crime, they’ll move on to target anyone they deem a threat – which means any of us who stand up for Palestinian’s right to exist. So don’t take this blatant attack on free speech lightly. It’s a shot across the bow. Khalil is a political prisoner. Make your voices heard, or we’ll all be next. Free Khalil! Free Palestine!”

As in South Africa, where we have pro-Israel lobbies hell-bent on defending the settler colonial regime’s notorious racist policies, the US has many more powerful pressure groups.

One such group that has been cited taking credit for the arrest of Mahmoud Khalil, is New York-based Zionist outfit Betar USA.

It has been described as “notorious for spreading hatred against Palestinians and has explicitly and directly incited the mass murder of Palestinian babies”, in reports by Electronic Intifada editor Ali Abunimah.

Not surprising at all for Betar USA describes itself as “the North American arm of the international movement of Ze’ev Jabotinsky,” the Russian settler who inspired the violent anti-Palestinian ideology of Israeli war criminal Netanyahu’s Likud Party.

To gain further insight into the vile racist ideology of this outfit, we learn that in response to a tweet by Palestinian journalist Laila al-Arian in which she posted names of hundreds of Palestinian babies killed in the Israeli genocide in Gaza before reaching their first birthday, Betar USA gave this horrific response: “Not enough. We demand blood in Gaza.”

And to confirm that the detention of Mahmoud Khalil is linked to demands by the Zionist lobby to stifle, silence and snuff out voices critical of the apartheid regime, the Trump administration did not hesitate to do so.

The list of demands on Columbia University – as much as it smacks of a deviant police state – is by all accounts Israeli inspired:

“Disciplining students involved in last year’s protest at Hamilton Hall, when students occupied the building and renamed it Hind’s Hall.

“Meaningful discipline means expulsion or multi-year suspension.

“Formalizing a definition of antisemitism in accordance with the IHRA definition.”

Given the extent of Zionist meddling in and manipulation of US affairs, and echoes of Bush’s WOT, it is thus no surprise to learn that a White House official is reported to have distinguished Khalil as a “threat to the foreign policy and national security interests of the United States.”

However, the most important voice to articulate Khalil’s predicament, is that of his wife Noor Abdalla.

In an interview with Reuters, Abdalla, a US citizen who is eight months pregnant, said she hoped Khalil will be free before their first child is born.

Will he?

The world awaits.

The views expressed in the article do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of The Palestine Chronicle.