Journalist Levins: DHS Detained and Grilled Me About Social-media Post That Criticized Israeli Minister
An American independent journalist has alleged that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) detained him at an airport on August 20 and interrogated him about a social-media post in which he criticized an Israeli politician.
The journalist is Ethan Levins. The politician is Itamar Ben Gvir, Israeli minister of national security.
Levins criticized Gvir on X in April.
When the illegal interrogation closed, Levins has alleged, DHS ordered him never to post about Gvir again.
Video Allegation
During an interview with Alex Jones at Live.com, Levins explained that DHS detained him on landing at the airport in Atlanta when he returned from Lebanon, where he had visited his girlfriend and family, who, like Levins, are Christians.
He said a federal agent, apparently a Transportation Security Administration employee, scanned his passport and placed it in a red folder, whereupon two DHS agents took him to a room for an interrogation.
The agents asked Levins whether he had ever doxxed anyone or posted anything to X about Gvir. Yes, he replied.
“Did you post Gvir’s Location on Google Maps?” they asked:
I said I screenshotted his office before and then at this point he goes OK and then another officer comes in.… So he looks at me and he goes, “you shouldn’t be posting these things.”
The agents continued pressing Levins, eventually forcing him to say he wouldn’t do so again.
The agents also asked whether he was in contact with Chinese, or Iranians, or Russians, and kept asking him who urged him to post the anti-Gvir post.
In one anti-Gvir post, Levins merely quoted the minister in his own words.
“I was questioned by the Department of Homeland Security yesterday upon returning from Lebanon,” he wrote on X on August 21:
They asked me about 1 thing.
Why I posted negative things about Israeli Minister Ben Gvir.
I am a born American who lives in the United States, and they stopped me at the airport for an Israeli politician.
I’m serious.
Later the same day, Levins wrote that if something happens to him, “let everyone know,” for “if I suddenly stop” posting to social media, “then it means I’ve been forced.”
“I [am an] American Christian,” he wrote, “and Israel is attacking me personally.”
Levins also wrote that he is concerned for his safety.
He also reposted what Gvir said that invited a warning from X.
“For every tear of an Israeli mother, a thousand Lebanese mothers must weep. All of Lebanon must burn!” Gvir wrote on June 19:
With all due respect to the Americans, Israel must make it clear to the entire world that the blood of our sons and the security of our citizens are not forfeit. All of Lebanon must burn. Our supreme duty is to protect the citizens of Israel and the soldiers of the IDF, and this commitment takes precedence over every other consideration.
I told the Prime Minister, even in our private meetings: For every tear of an Israeli mother, a thousand Lebanese mothers must weep.
Levins continued yesterday, noting that DHS harassed him for three hours:
I was told by the DHS to never speak on Ben Gvir again.
They didn’t ask me about a single American politician.
It was ONLY about Ben Gvir, and they TOLD ME to stop.
Why is the DHS protecting him? I’m an American (born and raised!).
Does my free speech stop with Gvir?
“Freedom of Speech is dying in America,” Levins wrote:
I do not feel comfortable criticizing Israel, and millions of Americans feel the same way.
Will I be arrested in the future for criticizing Israel and Ben Gvir? Because it really seems like it.
Reaction
Former GOP Representative Majorie Taylor Greene reminded followers that Israel is not immune from criticism in the United States.
“What is happening?” she asked:
Americans have the first amendment and right to free speech, to be able to criticize any foreign government or leader or our own government and own leaders, that we want to.
No American should be harassed and threatened as they re-enter our country like this.
Criticizing the secular government of Israel and its government leaders is not antisemitism.
It’s free speech.
“This tyrannical event should be a national scandal,” Alex Jones wrote.
Israel First commentator Will Chamberlain, owner of the once-respected Human Events, is upset that DHS didn’t detain Levins longer. “I’m appalled that it was only three hours,” he wrote.
