Oscar-nominated actress Debra Winger sounded off about having a “debt to pay” for her Jewish upbringing as she joined last week’s Trump Tower protest over the arrest of anti-Israel activist Mahmoud Khalil.
“I was brought up Jewish, I was brought up with a lot of things that were untrue,” said Winger, 69, to Al Jazeera outside President Trump’s Midtown East tower Thursday, when nearly 100 demonstrators were arrested in the protest in defense of the Columbia University activist.
“I was brought up with a lot of things that weren’t true, I had to unlearn them, and it’s taken me a lot of years,” said Winger — whose performances in the flicks “Terms of Endearment” and “Shadowlands” earned her best-actress nominations in the 1980s and ’90s.
She explained for example that she didn’t agree with an idea she was raised on — that Israel is the Jewish homeland.
“I have a debt to pay. I have a debt for what I grew up with and believed on what the state of Israel has done and what they haven’t done and how they’re conflating Judaism with Zionism,” she said of some pro-Israel advocates.
Winger called Khalil — who was arrested by US immigration officials and faces deportation for his role in anti-Israel protests that rocked Columbia last year — a “political prisoner” and accused Trump of running a fascist regime.
“[Khalil] was abducted from his home with his eight-months pregnant wife illegally and taken to an undisclosed location. Does that sound like America?” she said.
“They come for students first. They come to universities, they try to take over universities. Just read some history, every single fascist regime has done this,” Winger said. “They start with the educators and the students because that’s where the movement is strong.”
Khalil, a 30-year-old Columbia University graduate and green-card holder born in Syria, was arrested March 8 at his city apartment and carted off to an immigration detention center in Louisiana.
He has not yet been charged with any crime, but his arrest is what Trump called the first “of many to come” for students who engage in “pro-terrorist, anti-Semitic, anti-American activity.”
Khalil is said to be the leader the group Columbia United Apartheid Divest, which has been accused of supporting terror groups Hamas and Hezbollah and distributing their propaganda.
The legality of his deportation is currently being battled in the courts, while his arrest has sparked protests across the country.
At Trump Tower last week, about 150 protesters from the group Jewish Voice for Peace stormed the building’s atrium wearing red t-shirts emblazoned with “Stop arming Israel” and other slogans.
NYPD officers eventually descended on the crowd and arrested 98 people.
With Post wires
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