The political prosecution of anti-zionist activist, Raunaq Alam.
Raunaq Alam is a 32-year-old community organizer and activist from the Dallas-Fort Worth area. The son of two survivors of the Bangladesh genocide in the early 1970’s, Alam has organized non-stop in his community to protest the zionist settler colony of “israel” and its own ongoing genocide of the Palestinian people.
“There was a time when my dad was traveling between the rivers on a boat to go to his uncle’s house, and he saw, like, a pile of skeletons in the river, just stacked on the bank. Bodies just being thrown in the river…So that’s images that are just burned into my family’s heads that, unfortunately, are having to be resurfaced from all of the imagery that we’re seeing from the very brave journalists in Gaza.”
On March 7, 2024, Raunaq, alongside two of his other co-defendants, plastered pro-Palestine stickers and graffiti reading “fuck israel” beneath the flagpole of a zionist church in Euless, Texas. The church had been open on social media about its explicit support for the zionist settler colony and even provided material support to the israeli occupational forces in 2023, in the midst of their ongoing slaughter and ethnic cleaning of Palestinians in Gaza.
The direct action was caught on the church’s surveillance cameras, and prosecutors obtained a warrant on March 22nd, 2024. Raunaq was arrested by local police and the FBI shortly after they arrived at his job that day. Following his detainment after he refused to speak to law enforcement and asked for his attorney, local police on site began illegally searching his vehicle without a warrant or legal means.
From the start, nothing was typical or usual about Raunaq’s case. To consider his prosecution as anything other than a racist, political sham job would be utterly disingenuous. As of the date of this publication, Raunaq has just been re-arrested for the eighth time in this case. At a court hearing earlier on January 16, 2026, a judge ruled that Raunaq’s initial bail was not high enough due to fact that he has been posting against ice on social media. The state ruled that even if Raunaq is able to make bond (which was raised to $80,000 at the hearing) he is not to possess any social media accounts and must have government installed spyware put onto all of his devices.
This re-arrest and unjust ruling by the court speaks volumes about the racist nature of Raunaq’s case, and it should raise alarm bells that the state has explicitly gone on the record to assert that he does not have any rights to free speech while he continues to be subject to repression and surveillance by the state.
In a filing arguing for a new bond after his initial arrest in 2024, his defense attorney, Adwoa Asante, wrote, “His car was locked and legally parked as an employee of The Sam’s Club parking lot where he worked… Officers took custody of his keys, unlocked his car, and searched his car without a warrant. While Detective Norvell had his body camera activated for Mr. Alam’s arrest a mere 5 minutes before the search, his body-worn camera was deactivated for the search.”
During this illegal search, the police allegedly found less than a gram of psilocybin mushrooms in Raunaq’s car. Police on the other hand claim that there was no illegal search that occurred of the vehicle, and that officers simply discovered the drugs when they “inventoried” his car before having it towed from the parking lot. The DA filed charges for possession of a controlled substance shortly after the search.
A grand jury that was impanelled to indict Raunaq initially found insufficient evidence to formally charge him in the matter. This itself should speak volumes about the nature of the state’s sham case against him, given the incredibly high rate of successful indictments that occur at the hands of grand juries. For reference, in Harris County, a more diverse and progressive part of Texas, grand juries returned indictments in over 97% of all cases presented between 2014-2019. In federal court, grand juries indict in over 99% of all cases they see. Tarrant County impanels grand juries to hear around 19,000 cases each year, and Raunaq’s case was just one of few that did not result in a successful indictment for the state.But this did not stop the state of Texas from continuing to politically target Raunaq.
The fact that Raunaq allegedly had mushrooms in his car is just a convenient excuse and doesn’t actually mean anything. Much like the racist depiction the state created during the political prosecution of Tarek Bazrouk, a young Palestinian man serving a preposterous year long sentence in federal prison for “hate criming” zionists, possession of marijuana that was found during a raid of his home was also included in the large scale character assassination campaign that the state waged against him. But mushrooms, weed, and even many other substances are incredibly common among many of Tarek and Raunaq’s peers. However, people like Tarek and Raunaq aren’t like most people their age. They are political prisoners — brown, muslim men that have been incarcerated due to their steadfast resistance against the zionist settler colony and it’s genocide of the Palestinian people.
While Raunaq was initially offered probation for allegedly tagging the wall underneath the flag pole of the church, this deal was quickly rescinded just less than a week later, after a career death penalty prosecutor, Lloyd Welchel, was assigned to try Raunaq’s case in the courtroom of a misdemeanor judge in the county.
Welchel elevated the misdemeanor graffiti charges to felony criminal mischief and even slapped down a preposterous hate crime enhancement onto the case, arguing that Raunaq’s actions stemmed from a hatred of Jewish people. As a result of this enhancement, Raunaq went from looking at possible probation and restitution like most people who get caught tagging, to the chance of a maximum sentence of 10 years in state prison.
The state wasn’t prosecuting Raunaq for what he did. The state was prosecuting Raunaq for why he did it.
Defense attorney, Adwoa Asante, stated that it is dubious to maintain Raunaq’s action constitutes a hate crime. Raunaq did not target a synagogue, and the message did not single out a group protected under Texas’ hate-crime statute.
“Nowhere in the statute does it cite governmental entities such as states as part of protected persons or groups. If citizens and persons within the United States are allowed to say and express ‘(Expletive) America’, why would the condemnation of a foreign country garner more enhanced prosecution from the state of Texas?”
While one of his co-defendants shamefully took a cooperative plea deal, Raunaq went to trial in early September of 2025, and the racist theatrics that unfolded in the courtroom are hard to stomach.
Raunaq’s defense team initially moved to prevent the jury from seeing a completely unrelated and possibly prejudicial video from one of his previous birthday parties, where he and a group of friends, including both of his codefendants, burned American and Israeli flags in a bonfire. In the background of the video, you can hear someone playing a satirical rendition of the Star Spangled Banner on what happens to sound like a recorder, while the group of people stands around the fire pit with their hands covering their hearts.
Although flag burning has continuously been upheld as protected free speech by the Supreme Court, the prosecution preposterously argued that just because a form of speech was protected by the first amendment, doesn’t mean it didn’t prove motive to later commit a crime. The judge ended up allowing for the video to be played in the courtroom but excluded the audio from being played on the grounds that it could potentially prejudice the jury.
The defense and prosecution then battled out their vastly different definitions of anti-semitism and anti-zionism, placing different experts on the stand to educate the jury on the matter. While the defense witnesses argued that synthesizing criticisms of Israel with criticisms of Jews was a dangerous mistake, the state of Texas attempted to go on the record and create a legal precedent that inherently conflated the two — in order to explicitly criminalize any form of speech that criticizes the zionist settler colony.
But as if this was not enough, in his closing statement to the jury, the prosecutor on the case argued that Raunaq was a “thug” and “terrorist”, before claiming “that’s who he is” and then motioned to a gallery full of Raunaq’s supporters, many being brown and Muslim as well, and stated, “that’s who they are.”
Seeing through all of this immense racial prejudice and Islamophobia, the jury ultimately rejected the exaggerated hate crime enhancement and convicted Raunaq just of the criminal mischief charge instead, sentencing him to community supervision and a preposterous $10,000 fine.
However, the judge on the case decided that this simply was not good enough.
Judge Bolton ordered Raunaq to write a hand written apology letter to the head pastor at the zionist church that explains why he believes what he did was wrong. Then, in a shock even to members of the jury, the judge additionally imposed a 180 day sentence to be served in Tarrant County Jail. While gasps filled the courtroom, the judge also ordered Raunaq to be subject to mandatory random drug testing and imposed a probation period of five years.
One member of the jury was so astonished by the judge’s verdict, that they looked toward another juror in order to confirm that they had not accidentally imposed the 180 day jail sentence on Raunaq themselves.
Although Raunaq should have walked out of the courtroom that day with his friends and family, he was instead promptly taken into custody by sheriffs deputies. Members of the gallery who came to support him at trial all began to shout out their love for Raunaq — he responded by raising his right fist.
Raunaq was immediately placed into maximum security at the county jail.
Shortly after Raunaq was taken into custody, Dr. Barry Trachtenberg, a defense witness and the chair of Jewish History at Wake Forest University, said, “I thought the prosecutor was very afraid of hearing about the genocide that is happening in Gaza and sought to deny the jury the right to hear that information… I’m grateful that the jury has rejected the baseless claim by the prosecution that a state — especially one that is currently committing a brutal genocide against Palestinians — deserves special legal protections to shield it from any and all criticism.”
“By referring to Raunaq Alam as a ‘terrorist’ because of his advocacy for Palestinian lives in its closing remarks, the state made its racist intentions against the defendant clear for all to see — and the jury recognized that,” said Dr. Barry Trachtenberg.
Raunaq’s defense team appealed the unjust 180 day jail sentenced imposed by the judge against the explicit wishes of the jury that was responsible for determining his fate. A little over a week later, Raunaq was released from Tarrant County jail after posting his bond. However, prosecutors later filed a motion to argue that his bond was insufficient, and cited text messaged submitted during trial that included various mentions of controlled substances, alongside arguing that Raunaq had perjured himself by denying on stand that he had used drugs.
Raunaq’s defense attorney stated, “the Tarrant County DA’s office has demonstrated a genuine fear of anti-genocide activists through the criminalization of all of Raunaq’s speech and his confinement in maximum security. They were so desperate to charge him with something that they didn’t take the appropriate steps to even appear neutral in this perjury charge. The same prosecutor that questioned him during the official proceeding alleging the perjury is the same prosecutor that went to the grand jury to procure an indictment. This is an obvious conflict, as he has now become a witness in his own case. Prosecutorial retaliation is an abuse of power, and while history will vindicate Raunaq Alam for his genuine attempts to bring attention to a genocide against Palestinians, history will remember the Tarrant County DA’s office as heavy-handed, careless, and power drunk… They’re trying to revoke his bond on the drug charge, even though he hasn’t had any violations. So they’re essentially trying to revoke his bond for thought crimes…I think it’s very important for people to understand: Fascism is here.”
After his arrest following the filing of aggravated perjury charges against him, Raunaq was released on home confinement from maximum security custody. Tarrant Country Sheriff Bill Waybourn called him a high profile inmate due to the political nature of his case. Raunaq was then forced to dawn an ankle monitor in his family home for weeks on end.
Raunaq has most recently been arrested again following a court hearing on January 16, 2026 — with the judge arguing that this initial bond is insufficient due to him posting against ice and donald trump on his social media accounts. If he is indeed able to post his bond yet again, the judge has ordered Raunaq to not have any access to his social media accounts and has also ordered the government to install spyware and tracking software onto all of his devices.
This is blatant political retaliation against a brown man already facing an unjust political prosecution, and it horrifically mirrors many of the repressive tactics that the state is using against other activists in the area. One such person is Dario Sanchez, one of the defendants in the Prairieland case that has also been forced to have government installed spyware put on all of his devices while he is out on pre-trial release. Dario is similarly a brown man opposed to ice operations and is facing immense state repression over bullshit charges, all because the state has criminalized him removing someone from a signal group chat and claimed that action constitutes participation in a broader criminal conspiracy. Just like Raunaq, Dario is yet another human being facing unjust repression for nothing more than his political beliefs.
Dallas-Fort Worth is home to some incredibly important political prosecutions that we all need to keep our eyes on. These cases provide incredibly important insight into how the state is planning to target anyone who stands in the way of their fascist agenda. From the cases of the Prairieland defendants to the political prosecution of Raunaq Alam, we have much to learn from the state repression being faced by our comrades in Dallas-Fort Worth.
Free the Prairieland Defendants!
Death to “israel”
Abolish ICE
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