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School is sending ‘deliberate message’ by trying to platform Mahdawi, Catholic leader says
Columbia University student Mohsen Mahdawi, who has been under fire for allegedly supporting terrorist organizations, dropped out of an event marking the anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on campus this week.
Mahdawi was slated to be interviewed at the event titled “The Forever War’s Long Shadow.” It is hosted by the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia, which aims to expand discourse on free expression and press rights.
The symposium, scheduled for Sept. 9 and 10, will examine how the post-9/11 “War on Terror” continues to affect democratic rights, specifically freedom of speech and the press, according to the event description.
“First Amendment freedoms came under stress from the moment President George W. Bush declared a ‘War on Terror’ and his press secretary warned Americans to ‘watch what they say,’” the description reads.
“Surveillance programs proliferated, from the NYPD’s targeting of New York Muslim communities to digital surveillance operations of unprecedented scope and reach. Anti-terrorism legislation criminalized forms of peaceful speech and association,” it reads.
The event schedule was updated this week to inform attendees that Mahdawi told organizers he “will not be able to participate.” It did not provide a reason for his decision to drop out.
Mahdawi has garnered attention for leading violent pro-Palestinian protests on Columbia’s campus. He was detained by the Trump administration in 2025.
According to a news release by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Mahdawi is a “terrorist sympathizer and national security threat who does not belong in this country.”
“Mahdawi supposedly told a gun shop owner ‘that he had considerable firearm experience’ and used guns to ‘kill Jews while he was in Palestine,’” the release states.
Further, a recent investigative report reveals Mahdawi’s history of praising Hamas and honoring terrorists. For example, in July 2014, Mahdawi expressed support for Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad on Facebook.
He is now fighting a legal battle over his deportation order after spending 17 years and counting in college. In July, an appeals court panel overruled a previous decision that had released Mahdawi from custody while removal proceedings continue, The College Fix previously reported.
The Knight Institute, however, simply called Mahdawi “a Palestinian human rights advocate and Columbia University graduate student.”
This has sparked intense outrage, particularly given the timing of the event.
“I might have been born at night, but it was not last night,” Catholic League spokesperson Michael McDonald told The College Fix via email. Catholic League is a religious and civil rights organization.
“You do not accidentally invite someone who made common cause with radical Islamist terrorists on the same week as the 25th anniversary of the deadliest terrorist attack in American history – one in which nearly 3,000 innocent Americans were killed by radical Islamist terrorists. That is not an oversight. That is a deliberate message,” he said.
He added that Mahdawi is being falsely presented as a hero. In reality, he “led a protest that harassed, abused, and, in some instance, physically hurt Americans. He has expressed a desire to kill people to advance his so called political aims,” McDonald said.
“Clearly, Columbia is doing this now because they think they can get away with it. They are getting air cover from Mayor Mamdani, the DSA, and all the other radicals in this country who fail to unequivocally call out the threat of Islamist terrorism,” he said.
He added that the Knight Institute should have invited “the son or daughter of a first responder who lost his life that day and had to grow up without their dad because some radical Islamists decided to kill Americans.”
The list of speakers for the 9/11 symposium “brims with anti-Israel sentiment,” according to the Washington Free Beacon.
“In addition to Mahdawi, it includes several other journalists and activists who’ve accused Israel of genocide or, more specifically, in the case of the nonbinary New York Times writer M. Gessen, compared Gaza to a Nazi-era Jewish ghetto,” the outlet reports.
The College Fix reached out to Columbia University and the Knight First Amendment Institute to learn more about the motivation behind inviting Mahdawi to speak. Neither responded.
The Knight Institute is led by Jameel Jaffer, an anti-Israel attorney, who “was a strong supporter of the pro-Hamas protests at Columbia and condemned Columbia administrators and the NYPD for taking steps to restore order,” the Free Beacon reported.
