The Trump administration deported a Brown University professor after discovering “sympathetic photos and videos” of Hezbollah leaders on her phone that had been deleted.
Rasha Alawieh visited Beirut last month to attend the funeral of deceased Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah and followed his teachings from a religious vantage point, she told U.S. Customs and Border Patrol.
“Last month, Rasha Alawieh traveled to Beirut, Lebanon, to attend the funeral of Hassan Nasrallah— a brutal terrorist who led Hezbollah, responsible for killing hundreds of Americans over a four-decade terror spree. Alawieh openly admitted to this to CBP officers, as well as her support of Nasrallah,” the Department of Homeland Security said in a statement Monday.
“A visa is a privilege not a right—glorifying and supporting terrorists who kill Americans is grounds for visa issuance to be denied. This is commonsense security.”
A Lebanese kidney doctor and professor, the U.S. deported Alawieh on Friday after she arrived at Boston’s Logan Airport from Lebanon one day earlier, a move that her family claimed violated her right to work in the U.S. under an H-1B visa.
“CBP questioned Dr. Alawieh and determined that her true intentions in the United States could not be determined,” assistant U.S. Attorney Michael Sady said in the Justice Department’s court papers filed Monday, Politico reported.
The Justice Department submitted the filings to explain Alawieh’s deportation before a hearing scheduled by Massachusetts federal judge Leo Sorokin. CBP officers interrogated Alawieh Thursday about her views and possible ties to Hezbollah, a U.S. designated foreign terrorist organization backed by the Iranian regime.
Alawieh told federal agents the photos of Nasrallah and other Hezbollah leaders on her phone were from a Whatsapp group chat with Shia Muslim family members. The Ivy League physician claimed she is apolitical and that Hezbollah leaders are highly thought of in the Shia Muslim community.
Pressed on whether she supported Nasrallah, Alawieh acknowledged that she did so “from a religious perspective” but not necessarily a political one. The Israeli military killed Nasrallah and other senior Hezbollah commanders in September with a targeted airstrike on the terror group’s underground headquarters in Beirut. Around that time, Israeli forces eliminated most of Hezbollah’s leadership, decimating the group’s capabilities amid its multi-front regional war against Iranian-backed terror proxies.
Alawieh also had photos on her phone of Iranian supreme leader Ali Khamenei, something she attributed to his stature in the Shia Muslim community. She deleted the photos before coming back to the U.S. because she did not want there to be a perception that she was involved in political or military activities.
“Because I don’t want the perception. But I can’t delete everything. But I know I’m not doing anything wrong. I’m not related to anything politically or militarily,” she said.
Sorokin canceled a hearing Monday on Customs and Border Security’s decision to deport Alawieh despite his order to keep her in the country after Alawieh’s family filed a legal challenge to her deportation. Sorokin, an Obama appointee, said Alawieh already left the U.S. for Lebanon by the time CBP officers received notice of his order, according to CBS News.
The government made a filing under seal Monday and Sorokin said it included an affidavit from a CBP watch commander. Government attorneys insisted that CBP would not willingly defy a court order as Alawieh’s family argued the federal agents did when they deported the Lebanese doctor.
Alawieh came into the U.S. in 2018 for a nephrology fellowship at Ohio State and stayed in the country for similar programs at the University of Washington and Yale. Ahead of the hearing, John Freedman, an attorney from law firm Arnold & Porter, and several of his colleagues moved to withdraw from her case after conducting “further diligence.”
Alawieh’s immigration attorney Stephanie Marzouk requested Sunday for the hearing to be delayed to ensure her new legal team can adequately prepare.