BOSTON: US immigration authorities have detained and revoked the visa of a Turkish doctoral student at Tufts University near Boston who had voiced support for Palestinians in Israel’s war in Gaza.
A video of the arrest showed masked and plainclothes agents taking the 30-year-old Turkish national into custody near her home in Somerville, Massachusetts, on Tuesday evening, when, according to her lawyer, she was heading to meet with friends to break her Ramazan fast.
US Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said in a post on X that authorities determined Ozturk “engaged in activities in support of Hamas … A visa is a privilege not a right.”
She did not specify what specific activities were engaged in by Ozturk, a Fulbright Scholar and student in Tufts’ doctoral programme for Child Study and Human Development who had been in the country on an F-1 visa to study.
Her arrest came a year after Ozturk co-authored an opinion piece in the school’s student paper, the Tufts Daily, that criticised Medford, Massachusetts-based Tufts’ response to calls by students to divest from companies with ties to Israel and to “acknowledge the Palestinian genocide”.
“Based on patterns we are seeing across the country, her exercising her free speech rights appears to have played a role in her detention,” said Mahsa Khanbabai, Ozturk’s lawyer.
After Ozturk’s arrest, Khanbabai filed a lawsuit late on Tuesday arguing she was unlawfully detained, prompting US District Judge Indira Talwani in Boston to order US Immigration and Customs Enforcement to not move Ozturk out of Massachusetts without at least 48 hours’ notice.
Yet by Wednesday night, Ozturk was in Louisiana, despite the court order, Khanbabai said. Democratic US Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts described her arrest as “the latest in an alarming pattern to stifle civil liberties”.
Her arrest fuelled a large demonstration in Somerville, with protesters holding signs saying “Resist,” “Defend student voices,” and “Release Rumeysa Ozturk now!” Tufts President Sunil Kumar said the school had no advance knowledge of the arrest, which he recognised would be “distressing to some members of our community”.
The Turkish embassy in Washington said in a statement it was in touch with the US State Department, ICE and other authorities about Ozturk’s detention. “Every effort is being made to provide the necessary consular services and legal support to protect the rights of our citizen,” it said.
Published in Dawn, March 28th, 2025
