Boulder (United States) (AFP) – A man yelling “Free Palestine” used a makeshift flamethrower to torch protesters rallying in support of Israeli hostages, injuring at least eight people in the US state of Colorado on Sunday. The FBI said it was investigating the incident as a “targeted terror attack” and identified the suspect as 45-year-old Mohamed Sabry Soliman. Investigators said the man had been taken into custody, but provided no further details about him.
Police in the city of Boulder were cautious in presuming a motive. The Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish activist group, said the “violent antisemitic attack” occurred at Sunday’s “Run for Their Lives” event, a weekly gathering of the Jewish community in solidarity with hostages seized during Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, sparking the war in Gaza. “This attack happened at a regularly scheduled weekly peaceful event,” FBI agent Mark Michalek told reporters. “Witnesses are reporting that the subject used a makeshift flamethrower and threw an incendiary into the crowd,” he said, adding that “the suspect was heard to yell: ‘Free Palestine!'”
Boulder Police said eight victims, four men and four women aged between 52 and 88, were transported to hospitals. Boulder Police Chief Steve Redfearn told reporters that “at least one victim was very seriously injured, probably safe to say critical condition.” The suspect was also injured before being taken into custody, Redfearn said.
In one video apparently of the attack, a shirtless man holding clear bottles in his hands is seen pacing as the grass in front of him burns. He can be heard screaming “End Zionists!” and “They are killers!” towards several people in red T-shirts as they tend to a person lying on the ground. Other images showed billowing black smoke. Boulder resident Alexis Cendon said he felt “very, very scared” after hearing about the attack near his workplace. “We are in a country in the first world, so these things are not supposed to happen,” he told AFP.
Sunday’s attack occurred during the Jewish holiday of Shavuot. It comes almost two weeks after the fatal shooting of two Israeli embassy staffers outside a Jewish museum in Washington, where a 31-year-old suspect who shouted “Free Palestine” was arrested. Asked if it was a terror attack against the protesters, Boulder Police Chief Redfearn insisted it was “way too early to speculate motive” behind the violence, which took place shortly before 1:30 pm (1930 GMT). There had initially been reports of a possible second perpetrator, but Redfearn stressed that “at this point, we do not believe that there is an additional suspect at large.”
FBI chief Kash Patel described Sunday’s incident as “a targeted terror attack,” while Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser labeled it “a hate crime.” “People may have differing views about world events and the Israeli-Hamas conflict, but violence is never the answer to settling differences. Hate has no place in Colorado,” Weiser said. White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller posted on X that the suspect was a foreign national who “illegally overstayed (his) visa.” The White House said President Donald Trump had been briefed on the incident.
Israel’s top diplomat Gideon Saar condemned Sunday’s “terrible antisemitic terror attack targeting Jews in Boulder.” Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Danny Danon also voiced outrage, stating, “Terrorism against Jews does not stop at the Gaza border — it is already burning the streets of America.” US Secretary of State Marco Rubio described the Boulder incident as a “targeted terror attack,” while Attorney General Pam Bondi said “FBI agents are on the ground in Colorado following what appears to be a horrific anti-Semitic attack.” Lawmakers on both sides of the political aisle expressed revulsion.
“Tonight, a peaceful demonstration was targeted in a vile, antisemitic act of terror,” top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer said in a statement. “Once again, Jews are left reeling from repeated acts of violence and terror.” Several organizations also decried the violence. “Our community was targeted in a violent, antisemitic attack,” the Israeli-American Council said in a statement. “This is an attack on all of us — and we will not stay silent.”
© 2024 AFP
