By South China Morning Post | Created at 2025-03-17 19:51:34 | Updated at 2025-03-18 06:07:56
10 hours ago
Homeland Security officials on Monday said a doctor from Lebanon who was deported over the weekend despite having a US visa “openly admitted” to attending the funeral of a Hezbollah leader, as well as supporting him.
The department’s statement, posted on social media, provides a possible explanation for the deportation of the 34-year-old Dr Rasha Alawieh, whose removal from the US has sparked widespread alarm, especially after a federal judge ordered that she not be sent back until there was a hearing. Government lawyers have said customs officials did not get word in time before Alawieh was sent back to Lebanon.
“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 common-sense security,” Homeland Security said in its statement.
The Justice Department has also detailed its reasons for deporting Alawieh in court filings, but those documents have been sealed from the public by a federal judge. News outlets that were able to obtain those records before they were sealed report that Alawieh had photos of Hassan Nasrallah – the leader of the Lebanese militant group for the past three decades – on her phone.
It is the latest deportation of a foreign-born person with a US visa in the past week, after a student at Columbia who led protests of the Gaza war was arrested, and another student’s visa was revoked. The Trump administration also transferred hundreds of immigrants to El Salvador even as a federal judge issued an order temporarily barring the deportations.
Alawieh had been granted the visa on March 11 and arrived at Boston Logan International Airport on Thursday, according to a complaint filed on her behalf by a cousin in federal court.
