Agents from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) arrested a foreign exchange student studying at Georgetown University in Washington, DC, who was reportedly “actively spreading Hamas propaganda.”
Badar Khan Suri, who was “studying and teaching on a student visa,” was reportedly arrested by DHS agents outside of his home in Virginia on Monday evening, according to a lawsuit filed by Khan’s lawyer, Hassan Ahmad, Politico reported.
While Ahmad argues in the filing that “Suri is being punished because of the Palestinian heritage of his wife,” who is an American citizen, Tricia McLaughlin, a spokeswoman for DHS claimed that Suri “has close connections to a known or suspected terrorist, who is a senior advisor to Hamas.”
“Suri was a foreign exchange student at Georgetown University actively spreading Hamas propaganda and promoting antisemitism on social media,” McLaughlin wrote in a post on X. “Suri has close connections to a known or suspect terrorist, who is a senior advisor to Hamas. The Secretary of State issued a determination on March 15, 2025 that Suri’s activities and presence in the United States rendered him deportable under INA section 237(a)(4)(C)(i).”
Suri’s faculty page for Georgetown University lists him as being a “Postdoctoral Associate.”
“Dr. Badar Khan Suri is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding at the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University, Washington, D.C.,” his faculty page says.
Politico reported that the petition states Suri “has no criminal record and has not been charged with a crime.” However, the article also notes that the “petition also says that Suri’s wife, Mapheze Saleh, has been alleged to have ‘ties with Hamas’ and once worked for Al Jazeera”:
The petition says the couple has “long been doxxed and smeared” on anonymously run, far-right websites due to their support for Palestinian rights. The petition also says that Suri’s wife, Mapheze Saleh, has been alleged to have “ties with Hamas” and once worked for Al Jazeera.
A 2018 article about the couple published in the Hindustan Times, an Indian newspaper, said Saleh’s father, Ahmed Yousef, served as a “senior political adviser to the Hamas leadership.”
In a post on X, conservative commentator Marina Medvin shared screenshots from a Jewish News Syndicate (JNC) article which explained that Suri’s father-in-law, Ahmed Yousef, had been “a senior Hamas figure in Gaza and an adviser to Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh.” The article also explained that Yousef “founded the United Association for Studies and Research, which had ties to officials at Georgetown.” The center was reportedly “a Hamas-affiliated think tank”:
Ahmed Yousef was a senior Hamas figure in Gaza and an adviser to Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh. He also founded the United Association for Studies and Research, which had ties to officials at Georgetown and its Alwaleed Center where his son-in-law, Suri, now works. The United Association for Studies and Research was a Hamas-affiliated think tank that operated in the United States from 1989 t0 2004. According to the Investigative Project on Terrorism, it was established by Hamas leader Mousa Abu Marzook and served as a front for Hamas activities in the United States, including propaganda and fundraising.
“Hold on. Why is @Georgetown affiliated with a think tank that was founded by Hamas and serves Hamas propaganda interests in the US?” Medvin wrote in her post. “Georgetown’s Hamas connections run deeper and scarier than any of us have ever realized. Look at who they employ at the ‘Alwaleed Center.'”
While “no judge” has reportedly been assigned to the case so far, the petition said Suri was “taken to a facility in Virginia” and is “expected to be transferred” another detention center in Texas, according to the outlet:
Suri’s petition said he was taken to a facility in Virginia and expected to be transferred soon to a detention center in Texas. On Wednesday evening, an online locator for immigration detainees showed him at an Immigration and Customs Enforcement “stage” center at the Alexandria, Louisiana, airport.
Fox News national correspondent Bill Melugin shared a statement from Georgetown University in a post on X. The university stated that it was “not aware” of Suri “engaging in any illegal activity,” and added that it expects “the legal system to adjudicate this case fairly.”
“Dr. Khan Suri is an Indian national who was duly granted a visa to enter the United States to continue his doctoral research on peacebuilding in Iraq and Afghanistan,” the statement shared by Melugin said. “We are not aware of him engaging in any illegal activity, and we have not received a reason for his detention. We support our community members’ rights to free and open inquiry, deliberation and debate, even if the underlying ideas may be difficult, controversial or objectionable. We expect the legal system to adjudicate this case fairly.”
In an executive order from January, President Donald Trump stated that it was the policy of the United States “to protect its citizens from aliens who intend to commit terrorist attacks, threaten our national security, espouse hateful ideology, or otherwise exploit the immigration laws for malevolent purposes.”
The executive order also stated that in order to protect U.S. citizens, the U.S. government “must be vigilant during the visa-issuance process to ensure that those aliens approved for admission into” the country “do not intend” to do harm.
“More importantly, the United States must identify them before their admission or entry into the United States,” the executive order adds. “And the United States must ensure that admitted aliens and aliens otherwise already present in the United States do not bear hostile attitudes toward its citizens, culture, government, institutions, or founding principles, and do not advocate for, aid, or support designated foreign terrorists and other threats to our national security.”
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.