ISTANBUL

New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani called Tuesday for the release of a Palestinian activist detained by US immigration authorities, saying her continued custody is “cruel and unnecessary.”

“Leqaa Kordia has spent nearly a year in an ICE prison for exercising her First Amendment rights in NYC & speaking out against the ongoing genocide in Palestine,” Mamdani wrote on the US social media company X’s platform.

“She was hospitalized after suffering a seizure. Now she's back in detention. This is cruel & unnecessary. Release Leqaa now,” he added.

Family members and legal representatives are demanding answers after US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) returned Kordia, a 33-year-old Palestinian Muslim woman, to detention following a medical emergency that left her hospitalized for more than 72 hours without contact with relatives or attorneys.

"While we are relieved Leqaa is out of the hospital, we still have no idea what her medical condition is and what happened to her the past 3 days,” Hamzah Abushaban, Kordia's cousin and designated spokesperson, said in a statement Monday by Kordia’s legal representatives. “It has never been more urgent to call for her release.”

Kordia was discharged and returned to ICE detention after being hospitalized following a seizure, according to her legal representatives. Neither her family nor counsel saw her, heard her voice, or received information about her health status during the three days she remained hospitalized, according to the statement.

"Not knowing what hospital she was in or what condition she was in has been agonizing. Like any other family, we were worried sick," said Kordia's mother.

When one of her habeas counsel rushed to the hospital after her legal team learned Kordia's location from a journalist, authorities denied access to Kordia even by phone. Her immigration attorney was also refused contact despite repeated written requests and a looming deadline in her case, said the statement.

ICE has been confining Kordia at the Prairieland Detention Facility in Texas for nearly a year, according to her representatives. While in custody, she has experienced dizziness, fainting episodes and other signs of poor nutrition, according to her attorneys.

Travis Fife, staff attorney with the Texas Civil Rights Project, said ICE demonstrated "inhumane cruelty" by disconnecting Kordia from loved ones and legal representatives during an "extremely critical time, all while risking her health and safety."

Kordia is the last Columbia University protester still in immigration confinement. Though not a student, she participated in protests after Israel killed more than 100 of her family members in the Gaza Strip.