Deportations from USA

Express Tribune

16-04-2025

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President Trump is back to the Oval Office and so are the day-to-day dramas. Whatever chaos and troubles might lie ahead of us, one thing is for certain: the next 4 years will be non-stop entertainment. The last time around, Trump had imposed what was wrongly titled as Muslim ban. It did not really ban Muslims, but it made many anti-immigrant and Islamophobic imbeciles happy.
This time around, the Trump administration is deporting the pro-Palestinian activists. Student visas are being revoked for many international students, including many Indians.
The interesting part is the rationale that the Trump administration provides in deporting some of these leading activists, including Mohsen Mahdawi, who is actually a legal permanent resident, which is more commonly called a green card holder. The rationale goes that the activism that these people indulge in is actually harmful for the Middle East peace process.
That is wrong on so many levels that the hardest part is to decide where to start from while dissecting it. Firstly, the phrase 'peace process' is a code word for the Palestinian slaughter and the Arab world's silence and capitulation to it while the Israelis continue to annex more Palestinian land. Israeli aggression and the American blind support for it while whining about anti-seminitism are some of the code phrases for what the 'peace process' means.
Secondly, Washington has always argued that the decisions and laws of the international bodies such as the UN, the ICC, etc are not welcomed inside America because allowing those foreign bodies to influence American politics is a violation of US sovereignty.
However, I am shocked to read the rationale provided for deporting legitimate students from America, that peace process in the Middle East, a goal in the foreign world should decide how America is going to treat its own legal residents and legitimate students. Is it not a violation of American sovereignty, the US constitution, and American civil liberties?
Thirdly, if Marco Rubio, the US Secretary of State, is so concerned about anti-seminitism in America, then all he needs to look at is the actions of the Israeli lobbies, who earn hatred for Jews. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee, whose very presence at the crossroads of American political power, campaign donations and media control are throwing American democracy out the window.
Fourthly, if the Trump administration is really concerned about any entity disrupting the peace in the Middle East, then they should be bold to say that it is Israel only that kills any chances of peace on purpose.
I guess the deportations speak a disturbing reality, less about the fate of the students and about the constitutional crisis this can lead to, and more about the weakness of the American power system and their media goons. The days of manufacturing consent are gone. People have access to social media and so, not too many of them can be fooled using a sophisticated propaganda campaign.
Since minds cannot be controlled and noise makers cannot be blunted, they are deported from the country. The game shifted from Chomsky's manufacturing consent to ejecting dissent.
Finally, and this is one essential to understand. The arrangement between the US and Israel is quite interesting. Israel was enlisted by the US after the 1967 war to become the local cop on the beat for America doing its dirty work. In return, of course, Israel wanted the American borrowed power. Gradually, that relationship morphed into America doing the dirty work for Israel.
It is no stretch of imagination that it was Israel that played a key role in convincing the Bush administration to attack Iraq in 2003. Israel had a history of attacking Iraq. It had executed the 1981 attack on an unfinished Iraqi nuclear reactor in a secret operation called Operation Babylon.
America has expanded on its job description for Israel where it now gleefully violates its constitution, curtails its civil liberties, punishes its own residents and Congresswomen. And it pays for it all too.