Latest news with #Zeidan
The Herald Scotland
3 days ago
- Politics
- The Herald Scotland
This rural airport has become Trump's top deportation hub
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement deportation flights climbed to a five-year high in June, and Alexandria ranked first among the nation's five busiest deportation hubs, according analyst Tom Cartwright, who tracks ICE flights for the nonprofit Witness at the Border. The record pace has continued in July, with the Trump administration leaning heavily on the Louisiana ICE detention centers that feed Alexandria. The Alexandria Staging Facility sits on the tarmac of a small regional airport between a golf course and gated neighborhood. Zeidan squinted through the chain-link fence. A Palestinian immigrant with U.S. citizenship, Zeidan told USA TODAY he believed his older brother was going to be deported that day from Alexandria. "He's been making a lot of trouble here," Zeidan said on a Wednesday in mid-June, lacing his fingers through the fence. "Yesterday, they sent him over here but the flight was canceled." More: Trump approval rating drops in new poll; more Americans oppose immigration policies 'Cornerstone of ICE deportation flights' Louisiana's nine dedicated ICE facilities have been holding more than 7,000 detainees each day, on average, in recent months. The state dramatically expanded ICE detention during the first Trump administration, growing its network from four detention centers and about 2,000 detainees. Alexandria's holding facility is one of the oldest, dating to 2014. It has 400 detention beds, receives buses from the ICE jails in rural communities around the state and is run by one of the nation's largest private prison contractors, GEO Group Inc. "Historically, it's a facility that people will go to in the couple of days before their removal flight, because it's attached to the airport and ICE Air," said Deb Fleischaker, a former ICE official who served under the Biden and first Trump administrations. "It's designed as a short-term detention facility." On that mid-June morning, guards could be seen moving men and women off a white prison bus into the humid air, already nearing 90 degrees. Chained at the wrists, waist and ankles in five-point restraints, they climbed a stairway into a plane with "Eastern" painted on the body, blue on white. "If you had to pick one ICE facility that is the cornerstone of the ICE deportation flights, Alexandria is it," Cartwright said. "There are a lot of detention centers that feed into it." Deportation flights on the rise Nationwide, the number of deportation flights rose to 209 in June, according to Cartwright - the highest level since the Biden administration conducted more than 193 flights during a mass deportation of Haitian asylum-seekers in September 2021. That's up 46% from 143 deportation flights in June 2024, he said. The number of deportation flights has increased 12% since President Donald Trump's inauguration, according to Cartwright's analysis. But because the administration doesn't release details of who is on the planes, it's unclear whether the total number of people deported has risen at the same pace. Some deportation flights depart with seats full, 80 to 120 people, to Mexico or Central America, Cartwright said. Others - like the charter carrying eight criminal deportees to South Sudan - leave to faraway destinations with fewer passengers on board. ICE reported removing 271,48 immigrants in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2024. ICE removed 228,282 people from Oct. 1 through mid-July, according to ICE data. The agency didn't respond to USA TODAY's request for information on the number of deportations during the Trump administration so far. Congress recently approved a cash infusion to boost ICE's Enforcement and Removal Operations division: $29.9 billion. The lump sum can be used, among other things, for "for fleet modernization" to support deportations. Alexandria may not hold the top spot for long: The U.S. Army plans to host a 5,000-bed temporary detention center on Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas, with access to the airport on base. More: White House touts nearly 140,000 deportations, but data says roughly half actually deported 'It's Trump season' Zeidan and his family run a grocery store in Alexandria, and he drives Uber on the side, he said. But his brother got into trouble over drugs and was picked up by ICE after being released from a six-year state prison sentence. "He's been in Jena nine months," Zeidan said, referring to the ICE Central Louisiana Processing Center in Jena, Louisiana. His brother's wife is a citizen, Zeidan said, and the couple have five children. He wasn't sure why ICE held his brother for nine months. Or why, his family would later learn, he was held on the tarmac that day for more than four hours before being bused to Texas, then back to a detention center in Louisiana, where he is still being held. He shrugged: "It's Trump season, you know." Lauren Villagran can be reached at lvillagran@
USA Today
4 days ago
- Politics
- USA Today
This rural airport (with a jail on the tarmac) is Trump's deportation hub
The Alexandria Staging Facility features a detention center on the tarmac and has become President Donald Trump's main hub for deportation flights. ALEXANDRIA, LA – Sam Zeidan pulled onto the grassy shoulder at the airport, hoping to see his brother among the shackled men boarding a deportation flight. A jet roared on the sweaty tarmac. The site, known as the Alexandria Staging Facility in rural Louisiana, is the nation's only ICE jail-combo-airport and is the top hub for the Trump administration's mass deportation campaign. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement deportation flights climbed to a five-year high in June, and Alexandria ranked first among the nation's five busiest deportation hubs, according analyst Tom Cartwright, who tracks ICE flights for the nonprofit Witness at the Border. The record pace has continued in July, with the Trump administration leaning heavily on the Louisiana ICE detention centers that feed Alexandria. The Alexandria Staging Facility sits on the tarmac of a small regional airport between a golf course and gated neighborhood. Zeidan squinted through the chain-link fence. A Palestinian immigrant with U.S. citizenship, Zeidan told USA TODAY he believed his older brother was going to be deported that day from Alexandria. "He's been making a lot of trouble here," Zeidan said on a Wednesday in mid-June, lacing his fingers through the fence. "Yesterday, they sent him over here but the flight was canceled." More: Trump approval rating drops in new poll; more Americans oppose immigration policies 'Cornerstone of ICE deportation flights' Louisiana's nine dedicated ICE facilities have been holding more than 7,000 detainees each day, on average, in recent months. The state dramatically expanded ICE detention during the first Trump administration, growing its network from four detention centers and about 2,000 detainees. Alexandria's holding facility is one of the oldest, dating to 2014. It has 400 detention beds, receives buses from the ICE jails in rural communities around the state and is run by one of the nation's largest private prison contractors, GEO Group Inc. "Historically, it's a facility that people will go to in the couple of days before their removal flight, because it's attached to the airport and ICE Air," said Deb Fleischaker, a former ICE official who served under the Biden and first Trump administrations. "It's designed as a short-term detention facility." On that mid-June morning, guards could be seen moving men and women off a white prison bus into the humid air, already nearing 90 degrees. Chained at the wrists, waist and ankles in five-point restraints, they climbed a stairway into a plane with "Eastern" painted on the body, blue on white. "If you had to pick one ICE facility that is the cornerstone of the ICE deportation flights, Alexandria is it," Cartwright said. "There are a lot of detention centers that feed into it." Deportation flights on the rise Nationwide, the number of deportation flights rose to 209 in June, according to Cartwright – the highest level since the Biden administration conducted more than 193 flights during a mass deportation of Haitian asylum-seekers in September 2021. That's up 46% from 143 deportation flights in June 2024, he said. The number of deportation flights has increased 12% since President Donald Trump's inauguration, according to Cartwright's analysis. But because the administration doesn't release details of who is on the planes, it's unclear whether the total number of people deported has risen at the same pace. Some deportation flights depart with seats full, 80 to 120 people, to Mexico or Central America, Cartwright said. Others – like the charter carrying eight criminal deportees to South Sudan – leave to faraway destinations with fewer passengers on board. ICE reported removing 271,48 immigrants in the fiscal year ending Sept. 30, 2024. ICE removed 228,282 people from Oct. 1 through mid-July, according to ICE data. The agency didn't respond to USA TODAY's request for information on the number of deportations during the Trump administration so far. Congress recently approved a cash infusion to boost ICE's Enforcement and Removal Operations division: $29.9 billion. The lump sum can be used, among other things, for "for fleet modernization" to support deportations. Alexandria may not hold the top spot for long: The U.S. Army plans to host a 5,000-bed temporary detention center on Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas, with access to the airport on base. More: White House touts nearly 140,000 deportations, but data says roughly half actually deported 'It's Trump season' Zeidan and his family run a grocery store in Alexandria, and he drives Uber on the side, he said. But his brother got into trouble over drugs and was picked up by ICE after being released from a six-year state prison sentence. "He's been in Jena nine months," Zeidan said, referring to the ICE Central Louisiana Processing Center in Jena, Louisiana. His brother's wife is a citizen, Zeidan said, and the couple have five children. He wasn't sure why ICE held his brother for nine months. Or why, his family would later learn, he was held on the tarmac that day for more than four hours before being bused to Texas, then back to a detention center in Louisiana, where he is still being held. He shrugged: "It's Trump season, you know."
7NEWS
27-06-2025
- 7NEWS
Reem walked for hours to get food for her children. She died trying to reach an aid site
It was 8 pm, just after sunset, when Reem Zeidan, 42, set off for an aid distribution site with two of her eight children, Mervat, 20, and Ahmad, 12. Zeidan wanted to get a bag of flour to make bread. Her 5-year-old daughter, Razan, was hoping for biscuits. Zeidan brought a blue backpack to carry whatever she might be able to bring home. Distribution wouldn't open until the next morning, June 3, but the walk along a sea route, from Khan Younis, where they were sheltering in a tent, to Rafah, where the aid site was, would take hours. On the first day the distribution site opened, Zeidan had arrived at 9am, too late to collect any food. Another day, she turned back when she heard there was gunfire near the site. By then, there had already been multiple incidents in which Palestinians were reported to have been killed while seeking aid in Gaza after a new distribution program was launched just over a week before, led by a recently founded U.S.- and Israel -backed group called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. The United Nations, which had previously run a network of hundreds of aid distribution points across Gaza but has since been sidelined by Israel, warned that reducing aid distribution to GHF's four sites would be chaotic, insufficient and dangerous. Since GHF began operations on May 26, scores of Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces while trying to reach its aid distribution sites, according to the local health ministry and witnesses. The United Nations human rights office said earlier this month that more than 400 Palestinians are believed to have been killed while trying to collect humanitarian aid in just under a month. The Israeli military acknowledges involvement in many of these incidents, often saying that soldiers fire warning shots or at individuals who appear to pose a threat or are in unauthorised areas. GHF says the attacks happen outside their distribution sites. Most of the deadly incidents unfolded as Palestinians travelled to the GHF distribution sites, according to Palestinian health authorities and witnesses. At least one incident unfolded as Palestinians waited to collect food from United Nations convoys, the organisation has said. Zeidan would soon join the dozens killed as they struggled to secure food, underscoring the pitfalls of a new aid system in which tens of thousands of Palestinians must walk long distances — often through areas controlled by the Israeli military — to have a chance of getting a fraction of the limited aid being handed out. After walking for about five hours, Zeidan, Mervat and Ahmad had reached a seaside area north of Rafah known as 'Fish Fresh'. A thriving fish farm before the war, Fish Fresh had become an informal gathering place for thousands waiting to be allowed to enter the aid distribution site during tightly controlled opening hours. Outside of those hours, much of the areas surrounding GHF's aid sites are considered combat zones, according to the Israel Defence Forces. GHF has repeatedly warned Palestinians to stay away from the sites before food distribution starts, a near-impossible directive for many traveling long distances to reach the areas before food runs out. They were resting at Fish Fresh, Ahmad and Mervat later told NBC News, when they came under fire. 'Suddenly, the snipers started shooting,' Ahmad said. 'The artillery began shelling. The tanks were firing too.' He heard drones and quadcopters hovering overhead. 'There was nothing left untouched, not even the sea,' he said. 'They were bombing there too.' NBC News was not able to independently verify his account, though the IDF acknowledged that an incident had occurred that day in which forces fired shots 'near' suspects they said were moving toward them and deviating from 'designated access routes' to aid sites. The three took cover. When the shooting subsided, they began walking. Mervat grasped Ahmad's hand, and Ahmad held Zeidan's. At around 4am, they were about half a mile from the aid site, walking among a crowd in the darkness, wary of more gunfire. They were crouched low and turning a street corner, when Mervat said she heard a girl scream behind her. She turned around and saw her mother falling to the ground. Mervat thought she had fainted, but when she turned her over, Zeidan's face was covered in blood. 'I was in shock, unable to say or do anything, just watching my mother lying in a pool of blood,' she said. Still in shock and struggling to absorb what was happening, Mervat kept trying to wake her mother. 'Mom, get up, the tanks are coming. I'll help you. Mom, Mom...' Mervat pressed herself against her mother's chest, to see if her heart was still beating, and asked her to say the shahada prayer, but Zeidan didn't respond. Gunfire started to break out wildly, Mervat said, and the crowd became more frantic. Mervat and Ahmad ran for safety. Zeidan was one of the nearly 30 people the Palestinian health ministry in Gaza alleged were killed on June 3 after Israeli forces opened fire on a crowd of people trying to reach the GHF distribution site. In a statement shared on Telegram that same day, the IDF said troops had identified 'several suspects' moving toward them and deviating from 'designated access routes' to the aid distribution site in Rafah. They began to shoot 'warning fire', the IDF said, but after the people 'failed to retreat', additional shots were fired 'near a few individual suspects'. The IDF said it was looking into details of the incident and reports of casualties. Asked for an update on that probe, the IDF said it had no further comment. In a separate statement the day of the incident, GHF said that while aid distribution had been 'conducted safely and without incident' at the site in Rafah, it was aware that the IDF was investigating 'whether a number of civilians were injured after moving beyond the designated safe corridor and into a closed military zone', adding: 'This was an area well beyond our secure distribution site and operations area.' Zeidan's children did not see her again until hours later, when her body was brought to Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis to be counted among the dead. Humanitarian groups have railed against the new aid system in Gaza, saying it has put civilian lives at risk. 'The Israeli military must stop shooting at people trying to get food,' the United Nations human rights office, or OHCHR, said in a statement earlier this week as it called on Israel to allow more aid into Gaza. Humanitarian groups have noted that only a limited amount of aid is actually reaching Palestinians under the new system, which was implemented to bring some aid back into the enclave after Israel imposed a total blockade on the entry of food, medicine and other vital supplies into Gaza for nearly three months. In an update on Wednesday, GHF said that in the three and a half weeks since it launched in Gaza, more than 30 million meals had been distributed. Aid groups have noted that among a population of 2.1 million, that number is far from sufficient, with the World Food Programme on Wednesday calling it a 'tiny fraction' of what's needed. Israeli authorities have also begun to allow some U.N. agencies and other organizations to bring in limited quantities of aid. In video captured by NBC News' crew on June 3, Ahmad could be seen wailing over his mother's body, crying out, 'Talk to me, Mother, talk to me — talk.' 'We went, we trusted them,' he said, adding, 'Our bread is soaked in blood.' Her husband, Mohammed Zeidan, 46, remembered his wife of more than 20 years. 'She was from God's paradise. She was my soul,' he said, adding that he felt certain now that the new humanitarian system in Gaza was 'a trap, not aid'. Standing in the family's makeshift tent, Ahmad delicately unpacked a headscarf and a single shoe from a blue backpack. This was all they had left of her, he said. 'This blood is hers,' he said, pointing to a stain on the backpack. 'We were going to collect the aid with this bag. But my mother was returned to us covered in her own blood.'
NBC News
24-06-2025
- NBC News
She walked for hours in hope of getting food. But Israeli forces killed her, family says
It was 8 p.m., just after sunset, when Reem Zeidan, 42, set off for an aid distribution site with two of her eight children, Mervat, 20, and Ahmad, 12. Zeidan wanted to get a bag of flour to make bread. Her 5-year-old daughter, Razan, was hoping for biscuits. Zeidan brought a blue backpack to carry whatever she might be able to bring home. Distribution wouldn't open until the next morning, June 3, but the walk along a sea route, from Khan Younis, where they were sheltering in a tent, to Rafah, where the aid site was, would take hours. On the first day the distribution site opened, Zeidan had arrived at 9 a.m., too late to collect any food. Another day, she turned back when she heard there was gunfire near the site. By then, there had already been multiple incidents in which Palestinians were reported to have been killed while seeking aid in Gaza after a new distribution program was launched just over a week before, led by a recently founded U.S.- and Israel-backed groupcalled the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation. The United Nations, which had previously run a network of hundreds of aid distribution points across Gaza but has since been sidelined by Israel, warned that reducing aid distribution to GHF's four sites would be chaotic, insufficient and dangerous. Since GHF began operations on May 26, more than 100 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces while trying to reach its aid distribution sites, according to the local health ministry and witnesses. The Israeli military acknowledges involvement in many of these incidents, often saying that soldiers fire warning shots or at individuals who appear to pose a threat or are in unauthorized areas. GHF says the attacks happen outside their distribution sites. Most of the deadly incidents unfolded as Palestinians traveled to the GHF distribution sites, according to Palestinian health authorities and witnesses. At least one incident unfolded as Palestinians waited to collect food from a United Nations site, the organization has said. Zeidan would soon join the dozens killed as they struggled to secure food, underscoring the pitfalls of a new aid system in which tens of thousands of Palestinians must walk long distances — often through areas controlled by the Israeli military — to have a chance of getting a fraction of the limited aid being handed out. After walking for about five hours, Zeidan, Mervat and Ahmad had reached a seaside area north of Rafah known as 'Fish Fresh.'
San Francisco Chronicle
10-06-2025
- Business
- San Francisco Chronicle
San Francisco man wins $2 million on Lottery Scratchers ticket
A San Francisco man won $2 million on a California Lottery Scratchers ticket purchased at a downtown convenience store, lottery officials announced Tuesday. Rwhi Zeidan bought the Instant Prize Crossword ticket from Discount Cigarettes and Cigars, located at the corner of Kearny and Commercial streets. He said he was scratching the ticket to pass the time on March 5 when he realized he had won the top prize. 'I didn't read the number correctly. Twice, I read it was $2,000. Maybe the third time I read it, I found too many zeros, so I counted them one by one,' Zeidan said in a statement. 'That's when I got really shocked.' The ticket revealed a $2 million prize. Zeidan said he texted his children to share the news. 'They said, 'Who was that, you?' and I said yes,' he said. 'Until that moment, it was hard to believe.' Zeidan said he plans to use the winnings to pay off his home. The California Lottery announced several recent winners this week, including a $1 million Scratchers winner in the city of Winters. McKinley Nelson claimed the prize after purchasing a Loteria Grande ticket while picking up pizza with his wife. Nelson, a 72-year-old retired veteran, also plans to pay off his home and buy a camper van. He said he had been playing since the California Lottery started 40 years ago this year. 'It took a long time to win,' Nelson said.
