As a Political Prisoner, I Won’t Back Down on Supporting Palestine
Part of the Series
Struggle and Solidarity: Writing Toward Palestinian Liberation
On December 10, 2022, I arrived in the United States to start a post-doc fellowship at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. I was excited to begin a new phase of my academic career.
Three years later, I am a political prisoner, held unlawfully at a detention center in Texas, more than a thousand miles away from my wife and children. Theoretically I am “detained,” but in practice I am incarcerated, classified as high-risk with extreme restrictions.
On March 17, as I was returning home from Iftar [the sunset fast-breaking meal during Ramadan], a convoy of black unmarked cars blocked my path, and masked agents abducted me, without giving me any explanation. Later, after putting me in a car, they told me my visa was revoked by someone high up at the Secretary of State’s office for my social media posts. I would be deported to my home country of India that day, they told me.
The first night was like a walk with death. I feared they were disappearing me. On my flight to Louisiana, I was put in chains with hundreds of other chained people. We experienced such extreme turbulence that I was afraid the plane would be crashed deliberately. Between that night and the next evening, I was moved four times to different locations. I was never informed where I was going and not allowed to call my wife (aside from the first night) or attorneys until March 21, when I was transported to my present location in Alvarado, Texas.
The whole process was started by dangerous pro-Israeli groups that are infamous for witch-hunting. Rather than protect me from this vicious campaign, the Trump administration came after me under the pretense of protecting national security and foreign policy. My only “crimes” making me a “national security threat” are my marriage to a United States citizen of Palestinian origin and my support for the Palestinian cause.
As a student of peace and conflict studies, I was introduced to many conflicts, and the Palestinian cause in particular stuck with me. I unapologetically support Palestinians, and their inalienable rights guaranteed by international law. Where are the Geneva Conventions? Or is it true that elites are protected by laws, but not bound by them, while the unprivileged are bound, but never protected?
To say it all started on October 7, 2023, is a cynical lie. Palestinians have suffered ethnic cleansing for more than a century. The international community has abdicated its responsibility to fellow humans in the Holy Land. The ongoing genocide of Palestinians would not have been possible without billions of dollars of funding, particularly from the U.S., but also from many European and other prominent states. The United Nations is made dysfunctional through vetoes; even when the Security Council or General Assembly passes resolutions sanctioning Israel, they are ignored. This dysfunction has allowed Israel to commit crimes against humanity with impunity as it destroys hospitals, schools, universities and all life-supporting infrastructures. The impunity has also led to unspeakable sadism. Those of us who have cared to look have seen videos of Israeli soldiers destroying kids’ toys, raping Palestinian detainees in notorious prisons and killing medical staff.
Nonetheless, the attack of October 7 was a crime against humanity, as many innocent Israelis lost their lives. It was inhumane and against Islamic principles: if you kill an innocent human, it is as if you have killed the entirety of humanity. It also defies Mahatma Gandhi’s principle that means should justify the ends, and not vice versa. Gandhi’s principle of nonviolent resistance to misery or tyranny is what I believe and practice.
We can neither forget the Holocaust of Jews in Europe nor that Palestinians were not responsible for it.
We must remember that Palestinian resistance has often taken nonviolent forms, such as the Great March of Return in 2018 and 2019. Unfortunately, their demands for justice were ignored by the world, and Israeli snipers killed more than 200 Palestinian nonviolent protesters, medics, and journalists, including forty-six children. As a matter of fact, Marwan Barghouti – the Palestinian Gandhi — has been in jail for more than two decades.
Still, Gandhian nonviolent resistance is the best means to an inalienable free Palestine: a single state with unshakable guarantees of rights to Jews, Muslims, Christians, and others, which any factor — including a majoritarian electoral democracy — can never disturb.
We can neither forget the Holocaust of Jews in Europe nor that Palestinians were not responsible for it. Let us fulfill Pope Francis’s last wish to end bloodshed in the Middle East and end wars of retribution.
My Indian upbringing and education have shaped my stance on Palestine, as it comes from the great teachers, not only Gandhi but also Ashoka and Siddhartha (Gautama Buddha). Siddhartha was a royal prince, but he was not indifferent to the suffering that he encountered as he came out of his palace. My beliefs do not allow me to ignore the pain of Palestinians. As a political prisoner, I face deprivation — of sleep, food, hygiene, and, worst of all, contact with my loved ones — but I take solace in knowing that I endure this ordeal for the children of Palestine, and I see my suffering as nothing compared to theirs.
The time-honored principles I have adopted as my own also empower me to leave no avenue unexplored in defying the witch hunt unleashed upon me and others who believe in freedom for Palestinians. We will reject authoritarianism and oppose this travesty of justice. Be courageous, because courage is contagious. Together, we can stand against the tide of totalitarianism, because, as the Mundaka Upanishad states, “satyameva jayate” — ultimately truth triumphs over falsehood.