Senate Judiciary Committee Democrats are demanding the release of Columbia University student and pro-Hamas protester Mahmoud Khalil. While House Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) is accusing the Trump administration of “authoritarianism,” the Democrats are about to be embarrassed.
Khalil is a leader of Columbia University Apartheid Divest, one of more than 150 pro-terrorism groups I identified in my comprehensive study for the Capital Research Center, “Marching Toward Violence: The Domestic Anti-Israeli Protest Movement.”
The real question is whether decision-makers recognize their options and have the resolve to act.
I recently wrote a follow-up series identifying about 250 “pro-Palestinian” groups allied with this group that have expressed genocidal desires to see the U.S. destroyed and replaced by an indigenous Native American “Turtle Island,” just as they desire to see Israel destroyed and replaced by a Palestinian state.
The following smoking guns about the national security risk posed by Khalil and his group should serve as a microcosm of the broader threat — not just as a vindication of a single decision by the Trump administration.
1. Khalil’s group seeks to incite and carry out terrorism on U.S. soil, including copying the October 7 atrocities.
His organization instructed “comrades” to “look to the tactics” of “the Palestinian resistance for inspired action against oppressive institutions” and to “rise” like a “flood.”
The term “flood” — which anyone in the pro-Hamas seditionist ecosystem would recognize — is a reference to the Oct. 7 attacks that Hamas and other terrorist groups refer to as “Operation Al-Aqsa Flood.”
CUAD also declared its intention to “grow” the number of terrorist attacks in the West like Casey Goonan’s multiple acts of arson in California targeting UC Berkeley.
2. Khalil’s CUAD praised the Oct. 7 attacks and Islamist-backed violent uprisings in Bangladesh as parts of the “global intifada” against “American imperialism.”
3. CUAD said “we” must “genuinely threaten the state” so much that “we” are “killed, jailed, tortured, disappeared, and targeted” in America.
The group continued: “If we want to achieve liberation in America, we must be prepared to make these same sacrifices,” as was the case during the overthrow of the Bangladeshi government.
4. Khalil’s group called for attacking the military and police “en masse” and “dismantling state infrastructure.”
CUAD glorified the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorists and Bangladeshi militants for “escalating the global battle for liberation. By directly confronting military and police en masse, by not merely ‘engaging’ but battling fascist agitators, by dismantling state infrastructure, they are moving the global resistance into a new phase of struggle.”
It frighteningly ended the paragraph in bold writing that reads, “Those of us in the Western world have the obligation to meet them there.”
5. Khalil’s group describes itself as part of a violent anti-American “insurgency” that must target the criminal justice system “until the empire crumbles.”
It specifically called on insurgents in the United States to follow the methods of Bangladeshi “actionists” who took over a prison, released the prisoners, and burned the building down.
6. Khalil’s group seeks the “eradication of Western civilization.”
Specifically, CUAD posted: “We are Westerners fighting for the total eradication of Western civilization,” “the imperialist world order,” and “we reject every genocidal, eugenicist regime that seeks to undermine the personhood of the colonized.”
7. Khalil’s group asks violent extremists abroad for help in organizing uprisings.
8. His group asked for help from “militants in the Global South” in achieving its goal of eradicating Western civilization and fighting “the fascism ingrained in the American consciousness.”
A separate statement said, “We send love and wait to learn more from our comrades” who overthrew the Bangladeshi government, ending with “Long live the Global Intifada.”
9. Khalil’s group threatened to “shut down” Columbia University unless it eliminated the police presence on campus and severed all ties to the NYPD.
10. Khalil’s group really likes to see things set on fire.
CUAD said “the only way to respond to state repression” is to “learn from our comrades in Bangladesh” who “set fire to the state broadcasting network’s headquarters” and starting with “setting fire to the prison, government offices, and state vehicles.”
It also repeatedly professed its affection for Casey Goonan’s multiple acts of arson in California. Khalil’s group endorsed an attempted firebombing of a federal building in Oakland, the firebombing of a UC Berkeley cop car, the torching of a campus building, the looting of a campus supply building, and the setting of a fire at a construction site in the middle of the campus.
11. Khalil’s group had terrorists teach Columbia students.
CUAD held a virtual event where actual terrorists propagandized to students in March 2024. Two leaders of Samidoun (Palestinian Prisoner Support Network), an obvious front for the Marxist-Leninist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine terrorist group that participated in the October 7 attacks alongside Hamas, were booked as speakers.
Khaled Barakat, a senior PFLP official, explained to the students that hijackings are “one of the most important tactics that the Palestinian resistance have engaged in.” Of course, the Oct. 7 attacks were depicted as inspiring.
The U.S. and Canadian governments designated Samidoun as a terrorist entity that is a “sham” charity for PFLP. It is a landmark decision that opens the door to possible action against a wide array of pro-terrorism groups linked to Samidoun and PFLP.
12. Columbia protesters were told to riot by a Chinese Communist Party entity, and they complied merely hours later.
In late April 2024, over 100 Columbia University protesters visited the headquarters of the People’s Forum, which is a front for the Chinese Communist Party, where they were told to go riot on campus grounds. The protesters, which would have included CUAD as the umbrella coalition bringing all the allied student groups together, then rioted a few hours later.
13. Khalil’s group’s stated goal is to “topple all institutions that benefit from colonial, racial capitalism” and “dismantle” the state.
14. Khalil’s group boasts about vandalism of campus property.
15. A large part of Khalil’s coalition declared itself a literal part of Hamas.
According to its website, Khalil’s organization is a large coalition of 116 groups. The Columbia University chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine is almost certainly the biggest group in the coalition.
Although SJP’s open celebration of the Oct. 7 attacks did get noticed, almost no one noticed that SJP framed its fight against Israel as part of a broader war against the U.S. to liberate “Turtle Island” and that SJP declared itself to be a literal part of Hamas.
After explaining that it is fully supportive of the “resistance movement” that perpetrated the Oct. 7 massacres, tortures, kidnappings, sexual assaults, and animal abuses in Israel, SJP announced, “We, as Palestinian students in exile, are PART of this movement, not in solidarity with this movement.”
SJP also signed an April 18, 2024, statement by the Committee of Anti-Imperialists in Solidarity with Iran that endorsed Iran’s direct attacks on Israel and expressed wholehearted support for the Iranian government and its “Axis of Resistance” proxies including Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Houthis, cheerfully predicting they would defeat the United States, Israel, and their allies. It also sided with Russia over Ukraine and NATO.
Other groups in CUAD’s coalition that expressed support for the October 7 attacks or other acts of terrorism include chapters of Democratic Socialists of America, Sunrise, National Lawyers Guild, and Jewish Voice for Peace.
What’s next?
Defenders of Khalil deserve some grace because many assume, understandably, that the Trump administration would have presented clear evidence if it existed. However, officials failed to involve researchers who closely track this issue — a surprising oversight. That mistake has turned Khalil into a free-speech icon, at least temporarily, and weakened the administration’s position. It also undermines its ability to carry out future deportations and related actions effectively.
Deporting Khalil is only the first step. The Trump administration has several viable, straightforward, and even cost-free options to dismantle the pro-terrorism, anti-Semitic, and seditious networks tied to Khalil and CUAD. These measures are outlined in “Marching Toward Violence: The Domestic Anti-Israeli Protest Movement.”
Officials possess substantial evidence to justify deportations, revoke tax-exempt statuses, and launch investigations and prosecutions. The real question is whether decision-makers recognize their options and have the resolve to act.
Hamas, October 7, Columbia, Mahmoud khalil, Deportation, Terrorism, Capital research center, Donald trump, Arrests, Anti-semitism, Palestinian, Gaza, Immigration, Green cards, Turtle island, Western civilization, Columbia university, Casey goonan arson, Bangladesh, Chinese communist party, Vandalism, Students for justice in palestine, Opinion & analysis