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She eventually reunited with her mother in 2016, when she entered the U.S. on a visitor visa. In Ramallah, she had studied fashion design; in the U.S, she enrolled in English-language programs on an F-1 student visa. Her mother, who is a U.S. citizen, filed a family-based petition for her to start the process of obtaining permanent residency, which was approved in 2021. While waiting for a green card, Kordia withdrew from school, voluntarily giving up her student status. According to court documents, a teacher had led her to believe—falsely, it turned out—that she was already a lawful permanent resident. In the years that followed, she cared for her mother, worked as a waitress, and helped look after her half brother, who is autistic. Paterson, which has a large Palestinian and Arab community, began to feel like home.
Since Israel launched its war on Gaza, following Hamas’s attacks on October 7, 2023, Kordia has lost more than a hundred and seventy-five relatives in the Strip. “My mind was all about Gaza, nothing else,” she said. The stories she heard from family members were horrifying. They were continuously displaced from one city to the next, fleeing for safety, only to confront more immediate dangers. Kordia, feeling “heartbroken,” didn’t know what to do. “To feel helpless—this is one of the most awful feelings in the world,” she said, adding that one of her aunts had already lost her home during Israeli bombardments in 2021. “There is no safe place in Gaza.”
As Kordia watched loved ones going hungry or being indiscriminately killed, protest became her only lifeline. She was accustomed to going to New York, a forty-five-minute train ride from Paterson, to visit museums and stroll the city’s streets. On April 30, 2024, as Columbia students erected encampments in solidarity with Palestinians, attracting international attention, she joined a demonstration outside the university’s gates, calling for an end to the violence. Police ordered the crowd to disperse. “Something you only see in movies,” she said of the display of force. Kordia, who felt lightheaded, sat on a sidewalk and was swept up in the arrests; she was handcuffed and shuttled by bus to police headquarters, where she was forced to remove her hijab for a search. The next morning, she was released with a notice to appear in court. The charges were later dismissed. She assumed that was the end of it.
When Kordia was arrested in March, the government accused her of terrorism. In a public statement issued shortly after her arrest, the Department of Homeland Security mistakenly identified her as a Columbia student. “It is a privilege to be granted a visa to live and study in the United States of America,” Kristi Noem, the Homeland Security Secretary, said. “When you advocate for violence and terrorism that privilege should be revoked, and you should not be in this country.” According to a report by the Associated Press, the N.Y.P.D. had turned over evidence of her arrest at the student demonstrations to ICE.
The government claims that money that Kordia sent to her family in Gaza—a few thousand U.S. dollars in total—is evidence of material support for Hamas. According to court documents, the money came from her waitressing job and from contributions from her neighbors. In late June, a federal judge concluded that Kordia’s detention likely violated her constitutional right to due process and recommended her release. No convincing evidence linking her to terrorist activity had been brought up. In response, the government contended that she posed a flight risk. Her petition is now pending in federal court alongside a separate asylum proceeding. “It breaks my heart to be labelled as something that I have nothing to do with,” she said.
In early October, the Trump Administration helped broker a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, which included an exchange of hostages and prisoners. “Together we’ve achieved what everybody said was impossible,” President Trump said. “At long last we have peace in the Middle East.” Kordia, meanwhile, is the last remaining campus protester still in detention from the Trump Administration’s crackdown on pro-Palestinian demonstrators in the U.S. At Prairieland Detention Facility, in Texas, she is fighting for her release while living in constant fear of deportation. She holds a passport from the Palestinian Authority, a travel document that offers no protection if she is deported to Israel. Such deportation, her legal team contends, would send her into the custody of the same Army that has killed dozens of her family members. Both the Israeli government and the Palestinian Authority have targeted those accused of being affiliated with Hamas. Photos of Kordia have circulated widely online. Her lawyers say that the gravity of the allegations against her have compelled her to seek asylum. “I’m not just scared—I’m terrified,” Kordia said. “I’m terrified of being subjected to jail, torture even. It could get to the point of getting killed.”
In the facility, Kordia spends her days reading, praying, writing in her journal, and answering letters of support. She also finds solace and strength in the friendships she’s developed with the other detainees. “They’re beautiful women with dreams. They’re educated. They’re smart. They’re funny,” she said. “These beautiful women made it bearable.” She formed a particularly strong bond with Ward Sakeik, a Palestinian woman whose family is from Gaza. Sakeik was arrested by ICE in February while returning from her honeymoon in St. Thomas. In July, she was released.
According to court documents filed in August, Kordia has lost a significant amount of weight in detention. The filing noted that Kordia, a practicing Muslim, “has only had a single halal meal on a religious holiday, even though the detention center accommodates the religious dietary needs of other people in custody.” Kordia said the Quran helps her stay strong, especially the verses that remind her that hardships can be a divine test. One reads, “God does not burden a soul beyond that it can bear.” Kordia added, “Allah has chosen me for this, and I should be honored and proud.” ♦
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Aida Alami
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