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Aida Alami

@aidaalami.bsky.social
573 followers 93 following 7 posts

Reporter at large. Mostly migration/human rights. Words in @CJR, @nytimes, @nybooks and other places. @ColumbiaJourn visiting prof/alum. Board member @AMEJA. Contributor @OurWomenOTG. Travel addict.

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Reposted by Aida Alami
Golden Goal @goldengoalmag.bsky.social · 23/06/2026
After a winter of youth protests and a controversial AFCON triumph, @aidaalami.bsky.social reflects on what it means to root for the Atlas Lions today goldengoal.world/2026/06/23/m...
goldengoal.world
Morocco: A Winter of Discontent - Golden Goal
After youth protests and a controversial AFCON triumph what does Morocco represent at the World Cup?
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Reposted by Aida Alami
Columbia Journalism Review @columjournreview.bsky.social · 15/04/2026
Early last month, Shihab-Eldin was arrested in Kuwait on the basis of what CPJ calls “vague and overly broad accusations.” I’ve known him to be a reporter who is quick and elegant and resists euphemism, writes @aidaalami.bsky.social. www.cjr.org/analysis/wai...
cjr.org
Waiting for Shihab-Eldin.
Early last month, the journalist was arrested in Kuwait on the basis of what CPJ calls “vague and overly broad accusations.” I’ve known him to be a reporter who is quick and elegant and resists euphem...
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Reposted by Aida Alami
Anna Oakes @annaoakes.bsky.social · 17/04/2026
In her recent work, Rawya El Chab explores the legacy of the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon, which tore apart the Lebanese Left. With the support of Round Earth Media and the IWMF, and @aidaalami.bsky.social's careful editing, my latest for @hyperallergic.com: hyperallergic.com/rawya-el-cha...
hyperallergic.com
Rawya El Chab Tends to the Wounds of Lebanon's Civil War
The latest segment of her performance series “Crossing the Water” chronicles life under military occupation after the 1982 Israeli invasion of Lebanon.
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Columbia Journalism Review @columjournreview.bsky.social · 09/12/2025
In Netflix’s plan to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery, CNN is left out—to the reported relief of its staffers. Read @aidaalami.bsky.social. www.cjr.org/the_media_to...
cjr.org
A very big deal.
In Netflix’s plan to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery, CNN is left out—to the reported relief of its staffers.
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Reposted by Aida Alami
Columbia Journalism Review @columjournreview.bsky.social · 22/12/2025
In 2025, press freedom came under direct attack. We must not respond to this existential crisis with silence and apathy. Read @aidaalami.bsky.social. www.cjr.org/the_media_to...
cjr.org
In 2025, press freedom came under direct attack.
We must not respond to this existential crisis with silence and apathy.
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Reposted by Aida Alami
Mira Kamdar @mirakamdar.bsky.social · 22/12/2025
www.cjr.org/the_media_to... “I fear that press freedom is slowly and quietly eroding while institutional silence and apathy do nothing to protect it. Freedom is never lost at once.” @aidaalami.bsky.social
cjr.org
In 2025, press freedom came under direct attack.
We must not respond to this existential crisis with silence and apathy.
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Reposted by Aida Alami
Mohamad Bazzi @mbazzi.bsky.social · 22/12/2025
Powerful and poignant piece by @aidaalami.bsky.social in Columbia Journalism Review on how Western legacy media covers Gaza | www.cjr.org/the_media_to...
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Aida Alami @aidaalami.bsky.social · 06/12/2025
www.apmdistribution.org/apm-presents...
apmdistribution.org
APM Presents - News & Talk — APM Distribution
A quarterly collection of news/talk radio broadcast specials.
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Aida Alami @aidaalami.bsky.social · 06/12/2025
Starting January 1 wherever you listen to radio. 🤍 #IWMF
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Reposted by Aida Alami
Columbia Journalism School @columbiajournalism.bsky.social · 25/10/2025
In her latest piece for The @newyorker.com, @aidaalami.bsky.social, James Madison Visiting Professor on First Amendment Issues, tells the story of Leqaa Kordia, who demonstrated outside Columbia’s campus gates and remains the last participant still detained by ICE: www.newyorker.com/news/the-led...
newyorker.com
The Last Columbia Protester in ICE Detention
Leqaa Kordia, a Palestinian woman who has lived in the U.S. since 2016, has been detained in Texas for the past eight months.
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Freedom of the Press Foundation @freedom.press · 03/11/2025
Had Hamdi’s arrest happened anywhere else in the world, it'd "spark a collective outcry," @aidaalami.bsky.social writes in @columjournreview.bsky.social. “But in this case, the person targeted is pro-Palestine. The muted reaction is a troubling public response to a troubling act of state power.”
cjr.org
Twin assaults on press freedom.
The ICE detention of Sami Hamdi closely follows the deportation of Mario Guevara.
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Columbia Journalism Review @columjournreview.bsky.social · 03/11/2025
The ICE detention of Sami Hamdi closely follows the deportation of Mario Guevara. Read @aidaalami.bsky.social. www.cjr.org/the_media_to...
cjr.org
Twin assaults on press freedom.
The ICE detention of Sami Hamdi closely follows the deportation of Mario Guevara.
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Reposted by Aida Alami
Columbia Journalism Review @columjournreview.bsky.social · 20/10/2025
Proximity to power is not the only way—or even the best way—to report on government, by @aidaalami.bsky.social. www.cjr.org/the_media_to...
cjr.org
The press leaves the Pentagon.
Proximity to power is not the only way—or even the best way—to report on government.
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Reposted by Aida Alami
The Washington Post @washingtonpost.com · 19/10/2025
Column: Detainees at ICE facilities may be more vulnerable to extreme heat exposure than people housed in federal, state and county prisons, according to a Washington Post analysis.
wapo.st
Column | ICE detainees face greater risk from extreme heat than most prisoners
A Washington Post analysis found that ICE detention centers experience an average of 29 days of dangerous heat per year.
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Reposted by Aida Alami
Michael Luo @michaelluo.bsky.social · 17/10/2025
Do you know the name, Leqaa Kordia? She’s the last Columbia protester in ICE detention. Read her story. www.newyorker.com/news/the-led...
newyorker.com
The Last Columbia Protester in ICE Detention
Leqaa Kordia, a Palestinian woman who has lived in the U.S. since 2016, has been detained in Texas for the past eight months.
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Reposted by Aida Alami
Rozina Ali @rozinaali.bsky.social · 17/10/2025
Leqaa Kordia faces deportation for protesting the war in Gaza, in which she lost more than 175 of her relatives. She is the last Columbia protestor still in ICE detention. www.newyorker.com/news/the-led...
newyorker.com
The Last Columbia Protester in ICE Detention
Leqaa Kordia, a Palestinian woman who has lived in the U.S. since 2016, has been detained in Texas for the past eight months.
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Reposted by Aida Alami
Rima I Anabtawi @rimaanabtawi.bsky.social · 18/10/2025
Leqaa Kordia, a Palestinian woman who has lived in the U.S. since 2016, has been detained in Texas for the past eight months. www.newyorker.com/news/the-led...
newyorker.com
The Last Columbia Protester in ICE Detention
Leqaa Kordia, a Palestinian woman who has lived in the U.S. since 2016, has been detained in Texas for the past eight months.
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Reposted by Aida Alami
The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 18/10/2025
Leqaa Kordia—not a Columbia student but “a simple Palestinian girl,” as she describes herself—is the last remaining campus protester still in detention from the Trump Administration’s crackdown on pro-Palestinian demonstrators in the U.S. Read her story: newyorkermag.visitlink.me/mGwzBs
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The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 17/10/2025
Leqaa Kordia—not a Columbia student but “a simple Palestinian girl,” as she describes herself—is the last remaining campus protester still in detention from the Trump Administration’s crackdown on pro-Palestinian demonstrators in the U.S.
newyorker.com
The Last Columbia Protester in ICE Detention
Leqaa Kordia, a Palestinian woman who has lived in the U.S. since 2016, has been detained in Texas for the past eight months.
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Reposted by Aida Alami
keefe murren @keefemurren.bsky.social · 09/10/2025
journalist @aidaalami.bsky.social interviewed on the GenZ protests in Morocco and their "very basic and reasonable demands" and regime efforts to "co-opt the movement." www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dx3A...
youtube.com
Morocco public figures urge king to act after youth protests • FRANCE 24 English
YouTube video by FRANCE 24 English
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Mira Kamdar @mirakamdar.bsky.social · 18/08/2025
What Could We Be Doing in Gaza? Urgent ideas to defend press freedom in the world's deadliest place for journalists.! 🦋 www.cjr.org/feature/urge...
cjr.org
Urgent Ideas for Defending Press Freedom in Gaza
Letters, condemnations, and Israeli court cases have failed to change the world’s deadliest place for journalists. We’ve cast out for a new approach.
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Aida Alami @aidaalami.bsky.social · 25/07/2025
🙏🏽🙏🏽
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Abdi Latif Dahir @lattif.bsky.social · 25/07/2025
Fascinating and deeply reported piece from Aida Alami in @nybooks.com on what makes a uniquely Muslim American imam, and how they are helping themselves and their community navigate the demands of a secularizing, pluralistic, and Islamophobic country.
nybooks.com
The New Imams | Aida Alami
For years I have been working on a documentary film about young Muslims in France, centered on the 2017 trial that convicted a police officer of killing a
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Reposted by Aida Alami
The New York Review of Books @nybooks.com · 22/07/2025
“Imams in the US,” writes @aidaalami.bsky.social, “[need] to guide their congregants through civic life in a country whose dominant culture is secularizing, pluralistic, and systematically Islamophobic.”
buff.ly
The New Imams | Aida Alami
For years I have been working on a documentary film about young Muslims in France, centered on the 2017 trial that convicted a police officer of killing a
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Reposted by Aida Alami
Mira Kamdar @mirakamdar.bsky.social · 17/07/2025
"The task of imams in the US is markedly different: to guide their congregants through civic life in a country whose dominant culture is secularizing, pluralistic, and systematically Islamophobic." Excellent piece by @aidaalami.bsky.social @nyrb-imprints.bsky.social www.nybooks.com/online/2025/...
nybooks.com
The New Imams | Aida Alami
For years I have been working on a documentary film about young Muslims in France, centered on the 2017 trial that convicted a police officer of killing a
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Reposted by Aida Alami
jenny hauf @jennyhauf.bsky.social · 31/05/2025
From "The Radical Courage of Noor Abdalla" by @aidaalami.bsky.social for the @newyorker.com. www.newyorker.com/news/the-led...
An excerpt from the linked article. It reads as follows:

As Abdalla readied Deen for the ceremony, cheers could be heard in the main hall. The event’s featured speakers, including the Palestinian writer Mohammed el-Kurd, the Tunisian singer Emel Mathlouthi, and the actor Susan Sarandon, were arriving. A box in the room where Abdalla was getting ready contained dozens of pieces of fabric with the names of Palestinians killed in Gaza written on them in both English and Arabic. Abdalla pinned one on herself: “Azhar Ibrahim Ayesh Shaheen age: 22.” Deen was wearing a miniature cap and gown with text printed on the back that read “They tried to bury us but they did not know we are seeds.”
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Howard French @hofrench.bsky.social · 28/05/2025
An enormous tree has fallen and I'm hoping to see a definitive appreciation. I was privileged to know Ngugi late in his career. He and I did a book discussion together at UC Irvine in 2011, we've shared an agent, and stayed in touch. A big loss. lithub.com/ngugi-wa-thi...
lithub.com
Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Giant of Kenyan Letters
Just thirty kilometres outside of Nairobi, off the Nakuru highway, the land becomes flatter and less populated. An unassuming field beyond Limuru gives way to several isolated buildings behind a ru…
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Aida Alami @aidaalami.bsky.social · 28/05/2025
Where is this ?
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Aida Alami @aidaalami.bsky.social · 28/05/2025
:(
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Mona Molarsky @mmolarsky.bsky.social · 22/05/2025
“To the students here today, you spoke when silence was the easier choice,” Noor Abdalla said. “You stood firmer when these institutions failed you. True justice and education must include the freedom to dissent, the right to speak out for human rights, and the courage ...”
newyorker.com
The Radical Courage of Noor Abdalla
How the wife of Mahmoud Khalil has navigated becoming a new mother while fighting for her husband’s freedom.
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Aida Alami @aidaalami.bsky.social · 22/05/2025
My latest:
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The New Yorker @newyorker.com · 21/05/2025
Noor Abdalla was eight months pregnant when her husband, Mahmoud Khalil, was arrested, in March. She hasn’t seen him since, and now has a one-month-old son. nyer.cm/b7u1tIk
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Aida Alami @aidaalami.bsky.social · 22/05/2025
Thanks so much for reading and sharing !!
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Emily Bell @emilybell.bsky.social · 22/05/2025
Wonderfully written by @aidaalami.bsky.social , an empathetic piece on an enraging situation
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Andrés Bermúdez Liévano @bermudezlievano.bsky.social · 27/03/2025
"In terms of journalism, I am equally as horrified institutionally as I am inspired individually" Very poignant interview by @aidaalami.bsky.social with Omar El Akkad www.cjr.org/the_media_to...
cjr.org
Q&A: Omar El Akkad on the War in Gaza and the Failure of Journalistic Institutions
A conversation with the author of One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This.
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Reposted by Aida Alami
Columbia Journalism School @columbiajournalism.bsky.social · 14/03/2025
📝 The stories are in! M.S. theses are officially submitted today. From idea to investigation, fearless research to final drafts — CJS students have poured everything into their master’s project. Congrats to the 2025 M.S. cohort on this major milestone! #ReportingBeginsHere
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Columbia Journalism School @columbiajournalism.bsky.social · 14/03/2025
A statement from Columbia Journalism School faculty defending press freedom: journalism.columbia.edu/news/cjs-fac...
Pulitzer Hall
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Mira Kamdar @mirakamdar.bsky.social · 15/03/2025
“One does not have to agree with the political opinions of any particular individual to understand that these threats cut to the core of what it means to live in a pluralistic democracy.” Statement by @columbiajournalism.bsky.social journalism.columbia.edu/news/cjs-fac...
journalism.columbia.edu
A Statement from Columbia Journalism School Faculty Defending Press Freedom | Columbia Journalism School
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Mira Kamdar @mirakamdar.bsky.social · 06/03/2025
“This ‘Great Replacement’ theory—the idea that immigrants would take over and ‘invade’ the United States—actually originates from European supremacist intellectual circles,” @rokhayadiallo.bsky.social in @aidaalami.bsky.social www.cjr.org/analysis/con... @columjournreview.bsky.social #islamophobia
cjr.org
Connecting the Dots in Coverage of Trump and Islamophobia
The press has responded to his deluge of anti-immigrant announcements in kind, raising alarm that grants credence to an ahistorical premise.
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Andrés Bermúdez Liévano @bermudezlievano.bsky.social · 20/12/2024
On reporting in Syria and getting it right, this very insightful piece from Moroccan journalist @aidaalami.bsky.social "Foreign reporters would be well served by following the work of Syrian journalists, who know the place best" www.cjr.org/analysis/syr...
cjr.org
What’s Missing from the Syria Coverage
Relief is only one part of the complex reality following the toppling of Bashar al-Assad.
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Mohamad Bazzi @mbazzi.bsky.social · 20/12/2024
“Going forward, foreign reporters would be well served by following the work of Syrian journalists, who know the place best” — excellent analysis by @aidaalami.bsky.social of Syria coverage www.cjr.org/analysis/syr...
cjr.org
What’s Missing from the Syria Coverage
Relief is only one part of the complex reality following the toppling of Bashar al-Assad.
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Okba Mohammad @okbam.bsky.social · 21/12/2024
Lo que falta en la cobertura sobre Siria. La ayuda humanitaria es solo una parte de la compleja realidad tras la caída de Bashar Al Asad. Recomendable de @aidaalami.bsky.social www.cjr.org/analysis/syr...
cjr.org
What’s Missing from the Syria Coverage
Relief is only one part of the complex reality following the toppling of Bashar al-Assad.
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Reposted by Aida Alami
Dru Branch @drubranch.bsky.social · 21/11/2024
Yep! (From the first volume of the student publication, the CJSTribune.) @aidaalami.bsky.social
A full-page vertical editorial on inside of the Volume 1, Fall 2024, of the CJSTribune. The top of the page reads, “According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, 78* journalists and media workers were killed in 2024. We pay tribute to, and remember them here.
*as of the date of publication.” Alongside the names of 54 of the deceased journalists are the words “Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territory,” indicating the “Country/Territory” of their deaths. The locations listed under “City/Town/Village/Area” next to those 54 names, every single one of them is in Palestine.
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Lucia Walinchus @walinchus.bsky.social · 22/11/2024
6. Our Women on the Ground by Zahra Hankir, @christianeamanpour.bsky.social, @aidaalami.bsky.social, and more Is there any journalist braver than the female reporter in an Arab world? Great that it gets so many perspectives too. (This is 19 essays.) www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/575303...
penguinrandomhouse.com
Our Women on the Ground: 9780143133414 | PenguinRandomHouse.com: Books
Nineteen Arab women journalists speak out about what it’s like to report on their changing homelands in this first-of-its-kind essay collection, with a foreword by CNN chief international corresponden...
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Jan Kooy @kooyjan.bsky.social · 14/11/2023
The Rapid Support Forces, an independent military group with a long history of abuse in Sudan, has reached El Fasher, the only major city in the Darfur region still outside its control. Civilians are in grave danger. www.hrw.org/news/2023/11...
A Sudanese woman, who fled the conflict in Murnei in Sudan's Darfur region, walks beside carts carrying her family belongings upon crossing the border between Sudan and Chad in Adre, Chad, August 2, 2023. © 2023 REUTERS/Zohra Bensemra
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Benjamin Dreyer @bcdreyer.social · 13/11/2023
copyediting tip of the day If you use the word "evocative" as a freestanding adjective, at least one person on earth* is going to think and perhaps say aloud "Of what?" *👋🏻
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عمو حسام @barracks.substack.com · 11/11/2023
A child killed on average every 10 minutes in Gaza, says WHO chief
reuters.com
A child killed on average every 10 minutes in Gaza, says WHO chief | Reuters
A child is killed on average every 10 minutes in the Gaza Strip, World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told the United Nations Security Council on Friday, warning: "Now...
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