BOULDER, Colorado: A man with a makeshift flamethrower yelled \u201cFree Palestine\u201d and threw an incendiary device into a group that had assembled to raise attention for Israeli hostages in Gaza, law enforcement officials said Sunday. Six people were injured, some with burns.
\nThe suspect, Mohamed Sabry Soliman, 45, was expected to face charges in connection with the attack the FBI was investigating as a terrorist act.
\nThe burst of violence at the popular Pearl Street pedestrian mall, a four-block area in downtown Boulder, unfolded against the backdrop of a war between Israel and Hamas that continues to inflame global tensions and has contributed to a spike<\/p>\n
in antisemitic violence in the United States. It occurred barely a week after a man who also yelled \u201cFree Palestine\u201d was charged with fatally shooting two Israeli embassy staffers outside of a Jewish museum in Washington.<\/p>\n
\u201cSadly, attacks like this are becoming too common across the country,\u201d said Mark Michalek, the special agent in charge of the FBI\u2019s Denver field office, which encompasses Boulder. \u201cThis is an example of how perpetrators of violence continue to threaten communities across the nation.\u201d
\nThe six victims who were wounded range in age from 67 to 88 and the injuries spanned from serious to minor, officials said.
\nThe attack occurred as people with a volunteer group called Run For Their Lives was concluding their weekly demonstration to raise visibility for the hostages who remain in Gaza. Video from the scene shows a witness shouting, \u201cHe\u2019s right there. He\u2019s throwing Molotov cocktails,\u201d as a police officer with his gun drawn advances on a bare-chested suspect who is holding containers in each hand.
\nLynn Segal, 72, was among about 20 people who gathered Sunday. They had finished their march in front of the courthouse when a \u201crope of fire\u201d shot in front of her and then \u201ctwo big flares.\u201d
\nShe said the scene quickly turned chaotic as people worked to find water to put out flames and find help.
\nSegal, who said she is Jewish on her father\u2019s side and has supported Palestine for more than 40 years, was concerned that she might be accused of helping the suspect because she was wearing a pro-Palestine shirt.
\n\u201cThere were people who were burning, I wanted to help,\u201d she said. \u201cBut I didn\u2019t want to be associated with the perpetrator.\u201d
\nAuthorities did not disclose details about Soliman but said they believe that he acted alone and that no other suspect was being sought. No criminal charges were immediately announced but officials said they would move to hold Soliman accountable. He was also injured and was taken to the hospital to be treated, but authorities didn\u2019t elaborate on the nature of his injuries.
\nFBI leaders immediately declared the attack an act of terrorism and the Justice Department denounced it as a \u201cneedless act of violence, which follows recent attacks against Jewish Americans.\u201d
\n\u201cThis act of terror is being investigated as an act of ideologically motivated violence based on the early information, the evidence, and witness accounts. We will speak clearly on these incidents when the facts warrant it,\u201d FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino said in a post on X.
\nIsrael\u2019s war in Gaza began when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and abducting about 250 others. They are still holding 58 hostages, around a third believed to be alive, after most of the rest were released in ceasefire agreements or other deals.
\nIsrael\u2019s military campaign has killed over 54,000 people in Hamas-run Gaza, mostly women and children, according to Gaza\u2019s Health Ministry, which does not say how many of the dead were civilians or combatants. The offensive has destroyed vast areas, displaced around 90 percent of the population and left people almost completely reliant on international aid.
\nThe violence comes four years after a shooting rampage at a grocery store in Boulder, about 25 miles (40 kilometers) northwest of Denver, that killed four people. The gunman was sentenced to life in prison for murder after a jury rejected his attempt to avoid prison time by pleading not guilty by reason of insanity.
\nMultiple blocks of the pedestrian mall area were evacuated by police. The scene shortly after the attack was tense, as law enforcement agents with a police dog walked through the streets looking for threats and instructed the public to stay clear of the mall.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
BOULDER, Colorado: A man with a makeshift flamethrower yelled \u201cFree Palestine\u201d and threw an incendiary device into a group that had assembled to raise attention for Israeli hostages in Gaza, law enforcement officials said Sunday. Six people were injured, some with burns. The suspect, Mohamed Sabry Soliman, 45, was expected to face charges in connection …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":81913,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-81903","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81903","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=81903"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81903\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":81916,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/81903\/revisions\/81916"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/81913"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=81903"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=81903"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=81903"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}