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A 61-year-old Palestinian woman who escaped Israel’s war on Gaza earlier this year was detained in Sydney after Australian authorities cancelled her visa on national security grounds, sparking protests and condemnation from her family.
Maha Almassri was taken into custody in the early hours of Thursday following a pre-dawn raid by a contingent of nearly 15 Border Force officers at her son’s home in Punchbowl in the southwest of the city.
She was held at the Bankstown police station and then transferred to the Villawood Immigration Detention Centre.
According to documents seen by The Guardian and SBS News, Ms Almassri’s visa was “personally” cancelled by the assistant minister for citizenship and multicultural affairs Julian Hill following an assessment by the Security Intelligence Organisation that deemed her to be “directly or indirectly a risk to security”.
The decision stated the elderly woman failed Australia’s “character test” and her removal was “in the national interest” under the Migration Act.
Ms Almassri arrived in Australia on a tourist visa in February 2024, having escaped the Israeli assault on Gaza through the Rafah border crossing.
She was living with her son in Sydney and had applied for a protection visa. While her application was being processed, she had reportedly been granted a bridging visa.
Her relatives insisted Ms Almassri posed no threat, citing her poor health, trauma, and the fact she had undergone security checks by both Israeli and Australian authorities before being granted a visa.
“She’s an old lady, what can she do?” her cousin Mohammed Almassri told The Guardian, adding that there was “no country, no house, nothing” for her to go back to in Gaza.
She was left terrified during the raid and was unable to speak through tears when he contacted her at Villawood later in the day, Mr Almassri said.
“She was sleeping when the raid happened. She couldn’t walk, she was so scared.”
Mr Almassri’s brother told SBS News the family initially feared that Israeli soldiers had landed at their door. “They just came like a bunch of police officers and some federal police, and they terrorised everyone inside the house,” Soliman Almassri said in a video message.
He described the experience as “traumatic” and claimed that they had been provided no clear explanation for her detention.
The Department of Home Affairs declined to comment on individual cases, citing privacy. However, a spokesperson told The Guardian it would “continue to act decisively to protect the community from the risk of harm posed by individuals”, including “visa cancellation or refusal where appropriate”.
The minister for home affairs also declined to comment directly. “Any information in the public domain is being supplied by the individual and isn’t necessarily consistent with the information supplied by our intelligence and security agencies,” Tony Burke was quoted as saying by SBS News.
“Our security checks never stop and this cancellation is proof the system is working.”
The Refugee Advice and Casework Service, representing Ms Almassri, said that it had “nothing to comment on at this time”.
Human rights lawyer Alison Battisson criticised the Australian government’s handling of the situation, pointing to a lack of transparency and the practice of early-morning raids.
“It’s a Palestinian grandma. I would be very interested to understand the decisionmaking process behind it,” she told The Guardian.
She also questioned how authorities expected to remove someone to Gaza, given the ongoing humanitarian catastrophe. “Individuals can only be detained if there are reasonable prospects of their removal in the foreseeable future,” she said.
Ms Almassri’s isn’t an isolated case. In November 2024, Australian officials confirmed that a Palestinian person’s visa had been cancelled onshore on character grounds.
Amnesty International previously accused Australia of rejecting over 7,000 Palestinian visa applications since Israel started bombarding Gaza in October 2023.
A protest led by Ms Almassri’s family was held outside Mr Burke’s office on Thursday, with signs reading “Bloody Burke” and calls for her immediate release.
“She’s traumatised, she’s sick and this is the treatment she gets from the Australian government,” said Soliman Almassri. “We demand that she be released tonight.”
Ms Almassri’s family said she had more than 100 relatives living across Australia. They traced their origin to a town near present-day Tel Aviv, from which they were displaced during the 1948 Nakba, the mass expulsion of more than 750,000 Palestinians following the establishment of the state of Israel.
Her family also reported another relative’s visa had been cancelled last week, although this could not be independently verified.
The timing of Ms Almassri’s detention coincides with the Australian government’s release of a new report on combating antisemitism, which includes stricter screening of visa applicants for antisemitic views.
While there is no suggestion Ms Almassri holds such views, her supporters fear the increasingly hostile climate towards Palestinians may be influencing immigration decisions.
