While Tal Fortgang acknowledges that there are reasonable questions about whether authorities observed due process in ordering the deportation of Mahmoud Khalil—one of the leaders of the anti-Israel movement at Columbia University—he argues that freedom of speech is not at issue in this case. Khalil, a foreign national holding a green card, is not about to lose his rights because of his ideas or words, but because of his activities:

No one disputes that Khalil was the face of Columbia University Apartheid Divest (CUAD), an umbrella group for pro-Palestinian campus organizations opposed to “the Zionist project” during CUAD’s “Gaza Solidarity Encampment” at Columbia in April last year. . . . CUAD does not just have an implied affinity for terrorists, it celebrates them: when Hamas’s leader, Yahya Sinwar, was killed by Israeli troops last year, CUAD published a “tribute” to this “hero of the revolution,” extolling him for organizing Hamas’s October 7, 2023, terrorist attack on Israel—one of “the greatest moments of Palestinian resistance.”

CUAD’s “resistance” isn’t just rhetorical. The organization and its affiliate groups organize the mass commission of minor crimes, such as trespassing, vandalism, and disorderly conduct, with a clear aim of trying to intimidate others into capitulating to their policy demands. . . . The Columbia Spectator, a student newspaper, reported in January that “a video posted jointly on Instagram by New York City Resists with Gaza and Columbia University Apartheid Divest” showed protesters vandalizing toilets in a campus building and spray-painting walls.

Now, consider the law. The Immigration and Nationality Act authorizes the deportation of noncitizens for various reasons; . . . at least three could apply to Khalil’s case. The government may deport a noncitizen who serves as “a representative, . . . an officer, official, or spokesman” of “a political, social, or other group that endorses or espouses terrorist activity.” Khalil has in the past unequivocally held himself out as a representative of CUAD, which explicitly endorses terrorism.

Addressing a recent meeting of the Palestine Liberation Organization’s Central Committee, Mahmoud Abbas criticized Hamas more sharply than he has previously (at least in public), calling them “sons of dogs.” The eighty-nine-year-old Palestinian Authority president urged the terrorist group to “stop the war of extermination in Gaza” and “hand over the American hostages.” The editors of the New York Sun comment:

Mr. Abbas has long been at odds with Hamas, which violently ousted his Fatah party from Gaza in 2007. The tone of today’s outburst, though, is new. Comparing rivals to canines, which Arabs consider dirty, is startling. Its motivation, though, was unrelated to the plight of the 59 remaining hostages, including 23 living ones. Instead, it was an attempt to use an opportune moment for reviving Abbas’s receding clout.

[W]hile Hamas’s popularity among Palestinians soared after its orgy of killing on October 7, 2023, it is now sinking. The terrorists are hoarding Gaza aid caches that Israel declines to replenish. As the war drags on, anti-Hamas protests rage across the Strip. Polls show that Hamas’s previously elevated support among West Bank Arabs is also down. Striking the iron while it’s hot, Abbas apparently longs to retake center stage. Can he?

Diminishing support for Hamas is yet to match the contempt Arabs feel toward Abbas himself. Hamas considers him irrelevant for what it calls “the resistance.”

[Meanwhile], Abbas is yet to condemn Hamas’s October 7 massacre. His recent announcement of ending alms for terror is a ruse.

Abbas, it’s worth noting, hasn’t saved all his epithets for Hamas. He also twice said of the Americans, “may their fathers be cursed.” Of course, after a long career of anti-Semitic incitement, Abbas can’t be expected to have a moral awakening. Nor is there much incentive for him to fake one. But, like the protests in Gaza, Abbas’s recent diatribe is a sign that Hamas is perceived as weak and that its stock is sinking.