Protesters rally in San Francisco over detention of British journalist Sami Hamdi

Dozens of demonstrators gathered Friday afternoon in downtown San Francisco to protest the continued detention of British Muslim journalist Sami Hamdi.

Hamdi, a reporter and political commentator, was detained on Sunday at San Francisco International Airport (SFO) as he was preparing to fly to Florida for a speaking engagement.

He had been on a US speaking tour when authorities transferred him to a detention facility in southern California.

His detention is one of several recent cases in which critics of the United States or Israel have reportedly faced detention or deportation under the expanded powers of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) since President Donald Trump began his second term in January.

On social media, far-right influencer Lara Loomer claimed credit for Hamdi's detention, referring to him as a "jihadist".

Hamdi had been a vocal voice against Israel's genocide in Gaza, making comments that were interpreted as supportive of Hamas - though he later clarified that his comments were meant to express solidarity with Palestinian civilians.

Protesters gathered on Montgomery Street in front of a federal immigration court building in the city’s financial district, which has become a focal point for anti-ICE demonstrations.

Wearing keffiyehs and holding signs in English, Spanish, and Arabic, they drew attention from passing drivers with a large banner that read "Honk if you hate ICE".

Community leaders and activists took turns speaking in support of Hamdi, highlighting his right to free expression and his history of international speaking tours, including in the United States.

"They came for his words, for expressing what any normal human being with a pulse should - sympathy with a population of refugees that have undergone a brutal military occupation for over 75 years now," said Sarah El-Sharif, an independent scholar.

"He spoke up against a foreign government's genocide, to remind Americans that food was being taken from the mouths of their children to fund bullets and guns that maim and kill children in Palestine," she said.

"The truth is the erosion of rights to privacy, free speech, and due process domestically has always been intimately tied to devastating foreign policy," El-Sharif continued, noting that surveillance of Muslims in the United States "goes back decades".

"They want to scare us all by making an example out of Sami, but what tyrants and oppressors will never understand is - the more you try to suffocate a message, the louder it gets," she said.

Similarly, Hibah Hammoudeh, a civil rights coordinator with the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), linked Hamdi's case to a broader pattern of suppressing dissent.

"This is about more than just one person," she said. "It is sadly only one example of several cases where the revocation and denial of visas has been weaponised to silence those criticising the Israeli government. We are witnessing the ongoing criminalisation of dissent, which people who do not have US citizenship are the most vulnerable to."

CAIR is among several organisations providing legal representation to Hamdi. His attorneys are currently seeking to prevent his transfer to another state, such as Louisiana, which rights groups say lacks adequate human rights protections for detainees.

This marks at least the second high-profile detention of a foreign speaker at SFO in recent months.

In June, Palestinian peace activist Awdah Hattaleen was detained and deported from the airport after being invited on an interfaith speaking tour by a local synagogue. A month later, he was killed in the West Bank.