The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) called for the release of a British journalist and analyst who the organization said was detained at San Francisco International Airport on Sunday morning.
Officials said Sami Hamdi, the managing director of The International Interest, a geopolitical consulting and advisory publication, was detained on his way to attend a CAIR gala in Florida. He was in the United States on a valid visa and had just spoken at a similar CAIR event in Sacramento on Saturday, according to CAIR.
“Abducting a prominent British Muslim journalist and political commentator on a speaking tour in the United States because he dared to criticize the Israeli government’s genocide is a blatant affront to free speech,” CAIR said in a statement.
The organization blamed the social media personality Laura Loomer for Hamdi’s detention, pointing to an online screed Loomer posted on X on Sunday and her previous demand that U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio block the arrival of flights of Palestinian children that needed urgent medical care in the U.S. in August.
Loomer’s post took credit for, and celebrated, Hamdi’s detention and said she looked forward to an announcement by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement that he would be deported.
A spokesperson for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the reason for Hamdi’s detention and whether he would be allowed to resume his journey to Florida or be deported.
CAIR said its attorneys were working to get Hamdi released and said his detention was only because his views about Israel’s conduct in Gaza, which has been declared a genocide by the United Nations, some Israeli scholars and international human rights organizations.
“Our nation must stop abducting critics of the Israeli government at the behest of unhinged Israel First bigots,” CAIR said in a statement. “This is an Israel First policy, not an America First policy, and it must end.”
Loomer’s post also included a video of a podcast in which Hamdi pointed out that U.S. Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and social media personalities Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens, all vocal supporters of President Donald Trump, had taken the view that Israel’s conduct was unacceptable.
Loomer also falsely accused Hamdi of supporting terrorism and made several Islamophobic remarks. In the same post, she accused the government of Qatar of funding terrorism.
Trump has accepted a Qatari jumbo jet as a gift and has agreed to let the Qatari government to build an air force base in Colorado.