Detained: The Last Columbia Protester

In April 2024, over 100 protesters were arrested outside Columbia University, calling for a ceasefire in Gaza. Leqaa Kordia, a young Palestinian woman living in Paterson NJ,, was one of them. She’d lost over 175 family members since the conflict began.

Kordia was released afterwards, but the arrest put her on the government’s radar. This past March, ICE agents took Kordia into custody and sent her to a detention facility in Texas. Kordia has been detained for more than seven months. 

Kordia’s cousin, Hamzah Abushaban, talks to Kordia almost every day. On the podcast, we’ll hear one of those calls.