Mahmoud Khalil's Wife Says She Naively Dismissed His Concerns About Potential Arrest

"I think it would be very devastating for me and for him to meet his first child behind a glass screen," his wife, who is eight months pregnant, told Reuters.

The wife of Mahmoud Khalil, the Palestinian activist who was detained by ICE agents over his role in student protests at Columbia University’s campus against Israel’s war in Gaza last year, on Wednesday said she was wrong to dismiss his earlier concerns about becoming a target for immigration agents.

Khalil and his wife, who through her attorney said she prefers media outlets not use her name, were returning to their university-owned apartment on Saturday night when Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents detained him without a warrant, threatening to revoke his green card. ICE agents threatened to arrest his wife, a U.S. citizen, if she didn’t cooperate by leaving Khalil behind and heading up to their apartment.

In an interview with Reuters, his wife, who is eight months pregnant, said she had dismissed Khalil’s concerns about ICE agents potentially confronting him two days before they showed up at the couple’s apartment building.

“I didn’t take him seriously,” she told the news agency. “Clearly I was naive.”

His wife, who is due to give birth in late April, said she hopes Khalil will be released ahead of their child’s birth.