Trump v. Öztürk: So this is America now

Rümeysa’s case is symbolic because it chillingly reveals three entangled stories: Trump’s America, Netanyahu’s Israel, and Erdoğan’s selective outrage.

“Everyone should read the op-ed she co-authored and then watch the footage of her abduction. The contrast is shocking. That single op-ed is the sole basis for her continued detention. She has now been imprisoned for over two weeks without any reasonable justification,” said one lawyer¹.

Another added², “The government has confirmed that the sole basis for any of its actions against her is her co-authorship of an op-ed. A single minute in detention on this basis is an affront to us all, let alone the near three weeks she has spent in a facility far from any of her community.”

A third³ put it bluntly: “To be clear, the government is trying to punish and deport Rümeysa for co-authoring an op-ed espousing a view the administration doesn’t like, and she’s now been locked in a detention center for over two weeks for saying what she thinks.”

These lawyers do not practice in Turkey, Russia, or Belarus. They are not part of the bar in Venezuela, Egypt, or Hungary. They live and work in the United States—defending a Turkish student with a valid visa, abducted in broad daylight by six plainclothes men who, we later learned, belonged to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

Her name is Rümeysa Öztürk. A child development researcher. A Fulbright scholar with a master’s from Columbia. A PhD student at Tufts, just a few months from graduation.

She had seen it coming.

After co-authoring an op-ed condemning Tufts University's silence on Gaza, Öztürk’s name appeared on Canary Mission—a blacklist run by anonymous pro-Israel operatives. She feared not just reputational damage, but state retaliation. The fear deepened when news spread of Mahmoud Khalil, a Palestinian student at Columbia, being targeted for deportation over campus activism.

By late March, Öztürk had started skipping Ramadan dinners. On the night of March 25, while walking to meet friends in Somerville and still on the phone with her mother, six masked men surrounded her. She screamed. Within minutes, she was shoved into an unmarked vehicle and disappeared.

The video—captured and released by local activists—shows what many called a “rendition,” evoking the post-9/11 era when Muslim suspects were snatched off the streets and funneled into legal black holes. The scene was shocking. For my part, I genuinely believed she had been kidnapped. I couldn’t have imagined that six men, without visible badges, could seize her so brazenly—frightening her so much that she screamed. My bad, my naiveté. Because according to immigration attorneys, the most chilling part isn’t what was captured on camera but it’s how often these seizures happen and happen invisibly.

Held incommunicado for nearly 24 hours, Öztürk suffered the first of four asthma attacks while in ICE custody. Her legal team later pieced together the night: transferred from Massachusetts to New Hampshire to Vermont, then flown to Alexandria, Louisiana. Her final stop: a detention center in rural Basile, a facility known for overcrowding, mold, and mice. ICE would later claim they couldn’t find her a bed in New England. Her lawyers say the transfer was strategic—to isolate her from legal counsel and place her in a jurisdiction aligned with the administration’s deportation agenda.

Rümeysa, described by her close friend as a bookish cat lover, has never been charged with a crime. The basis for her detention, confirmed by the government itself, is that op-ed—written with three other named students and signed by dozens more. It is a modest and measured piece which cites UN officials and human rights investigators in describing Gaza’s devastation. Öztürk, who works with children affected by violence, was shaken by the images of burned Palestinian bodies. But she wasn’t a regular campus activist let alone organising rallies or leading chants.

Then Canary Mission listed her anyway. Based on that one op-ed. And Marco Rubio—Secretary of State—revoked her visa, citing a clause that permits removal of individuals deemed “adverse to U.S. foreign policy.” He later defended the move: “We gave you a visa to come and study, not to become a social activist who tears up our campuses.”

One lawyer describes a familiar pattern: publish something critical of Israel, get doxxed, wait. Deportation may follow. Canary Mission boasts of feeding names to the administration, which denies coordination. But on April 14, The Washington Post obtained a leaked State Department memo prepared days before her detention. The memo found no evidence linking her to antisemitism or terrorism. But the detention went ahead anyway.

Tufts University issued a statement calling Öztürk a valued member of the community and affirming that the op-ed violated no university policies. Twenty-seven Jewish-American organizations have condemned her detention and submitted an amicus brief in her defense.

Öztürk’s case is no anomaly—it is a test balloon. The expansion of surveillance, the use of anonymous blacklists and the weaponization of visa status mark a new chapter in America’s approach to dissent. The message is clear: if you challenge the official narrative on Palestine, have the temerity to critique Israel, you may disappear only to find yourself on a plane to nowhere.

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Who is behind this blacklist machine?

But what is Canary Mission, really? Who runs it? A few fringe Israeli nationalists with too much time and money?

Not quite.

According to an in-depth investigation by James Bamford published in The Nation (December 2023), Canary Mission is not some rogue digital outpost. It is the visible node of a well-organized, transnational operation conceived in Israel, executed in the United States, and bankrolled by a closed circle of ultra-wealthy donors and ideological foundations.

The site masquerades as a watchdog. In practice, it operates like an intelligence outfit. It surveils students and academics critical of Israeli policy, uploads their names and photos, cherry-picks quotes, and brands them as threats. The goal is not dialogue. It’s not even deterrence. It’s neutralization: reputational damage, career derailment, long-term intimidation. Once listed, individuals find it nearly impossible to be removed. The site is designed to haunt them on every future background check.

Behind the curtain is a kind of laundering system that uses American philanthropic infrastructure to fund political operations abroad. One example: a prominent West Coast family foundation, known for backing far-right candidates, quietly donated six figures to Canary Mission through a chain of intermediaries. Because direct support to foreign political actors would compromise their tax-exempt status, the money was routed first through a major Jewish community federation in a large U.S. city. From there, it flowed to a near-defunct Israeli nonprofit set up as a front.

This wasn’t an isolated maneuver. Several donors used the same playbook. Major charitable foundations in cities like Los Angeles and New York—entities managing billions—channeled funds into this pipeline. These same institutions, notably, have refused to support progressive Jewish human rights groups critical of the occupation. Yet they had no problem financing blacklists and violent settler organizations.

To preserve tax deductibility, a second legal scheme was introduced: a settler family based in Israel registered a U.S. nonprofit in New York. On paper, it looked like a charity. In reality, it was a mailbox. Donations went in, and within days were re-routed to groups operating thousands of miles away with no oversight or public record of purpose. The physical address of the nonprofit that received much of this money in Israel? An abandoned building with a rusted padlock and bird droppings on the floor.

But the real architecture isn’t made of bricks or offices. As you can see, it’s built on financial loopholes, untraceable transactions and a political climate that allows philanthropy to be weaponised and operate unchecked.

This is where Rümeysa Öztürk’s name ended up and she is paying for it dearly.

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This is not lobbying

For years, the world has been told to fear Russian interference in American democracy—troll farms, fake accounts, psychological operations designed to inflame division and pit citizens against each other. Rightly so. These campaigns have inspired films, docuseries, stage plays, even crime novels, all centred on the idea of a foreign power using digital tools to destabilize a democratic society from within.

I have no interest in minimizing the sophistication or severity of Russian intelligence operations. They are real, and they are dangerous.

But I would suggest widening our lens and acknowledging ‘other’ dangers.

What Canary Mission represents is not merely a blacklist. It is the operational arm of a foreign campaign—conceived in Israel, financed through U.S. tax shelters, and deployed against students, researchers, and activists on American soil. It functions as a system of surveillance and punishment, not debate. It influences public discourse, immigration enforcement, and professional futures, all while cloaked in the language of “community protection” and “pro-Israel advocacy.”

And it is not operating alone.

A constellation of similarly opaque organizations—anonymous, donor-shielded, tax-deductible—now work in parallel, targeting dissent through dossiers, smear campaigns, HR pressure, and selective intelligence handed off to federal agencies. These groups masquerade as civil society actors. In truth, they are tools of information warfare, designed not to engage but to eliminate.

This is not lobbying. It is foreign political interference—only, unlike others, it is rarely acknowledged as such.

Russian influence campaigns are rightly treated as threats to democracy. But when Israel employs similar tactics—silencing voices, manipulating institutions, punishing thought—the operation is rebranded as advocacy.

I beg to differ.

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Selective outrage

The Turkish Foreign Ministry’s timid response to Rümeysa Öztürk’s unlawful detention has not gone unnoticed. After days of silence, and mounting criticism from the main opposition, the Ministry finally issued a statement:

“Developments regarding our citizen Rümeysa Öztürk have been closely monitored since day one. She has become a symbolic figure in a legal process affecting thousands of international students, which arose as a result of domestic political developments in the United States. The process concerning her case is being conducted with respect for personal rights and in line with the preferences of our citizen and her family. On the other hand, the consular support provided to all of our citizens in difficult situations abroad has also been extended to Ms. Öztürk from the very beginning. Our Consul General in Houston has visited her multiple times in the state of Louisiana, and our Consul General in Boston has held an online meeting with her. Both legal processes will continue to be closely followed using all resources available to our Ministry, and the necessary support will be provided.”

Yes, they followed the case, spoke to her, and even provided a new headscarf. But where is the Erdoğan who once thundered “one minute” at Shimon Peres in Davos? The one who turned Khashoggi’s murder into an international media spectacle, leveraging it to pressure MBS—until it no longer served his interests.

Wouldn’t a similar stance be fitting here? For a student who merely expressed cautious support for her university senate’s criticism of Israel. But Erdoğan remained silent until now. This too is a case in point. His actions are never guided by principle or ideology—but by convenience and opportunity. Pragmatism, always. Conjuncture, always.

1. Jessie Rossman, Legal Director, ACLU of Massachusetts.

2. Naz Ahmad, Co-director, CLEAR, CUNY School of Law.

3. Sonya Levitova, Associate, Emery Celli Brinckerhoff Abady Ward & Maazel LLP.