(BOULDER, Co) — As law enforcement agents investigate Sunday’s fiery attack on a group of pro-Israel demonstrators in Boulder, Colorado, crime data shows the rampage came amid a dramatic increase in antisemitic and Islamophobic hate crimes across the nation, suggesting further that the war between Israel and Hamas terrorists continues to spill into the U.S.
The suspect in the Boulder attack, 45-year-old Mohamed Soliman, allegedly yelled “Free Palestine” while targeting the pro-Israel demonstrators with a “flamethrower” fashioned from a commercial backpack weed sprayer and Molotov cocktails at a pedestrian mall, authorities said.
Soliman entered the United States in August 2022 on a B2 tourist visa, which expired in February 2023, according to Tricia McLaughlin, the assistant secretary for public affairs at the Department of Homeland Security. He filed for asylum in September 2022, McLaughlin said.
Court documents made public in the case allege Soliman, who was born in Egypt and lived in Kuwait for 17 years before moving to Colorado Springs, Colorado, three years ago, “wanted to kill all Zionist people and wish they were all dead.”
While some politicians and pro-Israel activists have used antisemitism as a catchall word for an alleged motive in the attack, the suspect told investigators, “This had nothing to do with the Jewish community and was specific in the Zionist group supporting the killings of people on his land (Palestine),” according to state court documents.
But Ted Deutch, chief executive officer of the American Jewish Committee, noted that the attack came less than two weeks after a gunman shouting “Free Palestine” killed two Israeli embassy staff members outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C.
“These are not isolated incidents,” Deutch told ABC News. “This is a war against people who support Israel, it’s a war against the Jewish people and nobody should tolerate it.”
Deutch added, “We have to acknowledge that the incitement that we’ve seen from the language that’s being used, the lies about genocide, the calls for globalizing the Intifada, resistance by any means necessary, all of this language contributes to an environment in which violence will, and now twice in two weeks, has taken place.”
Amy Spitalnick, CEO of the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, told ABC News that while there has been a spike in attacks on the American Jewish community since the Oct. 7, 2023, surprise assault on Israel by Hamas terrorists, antisemitic attacks in the United States have been steadily climbing for the last decade.
“The last few months have put a fine point on the fact that there are those who are using the guise of protesting Israel to target and violently attack Jews,” Spitalnick said.
Spitalnick said the term Zionism is “woefully misunderstood” by the general public.
“What Zionism means to me is generally the belief that Jews should have a homeland somewhere in this part of world where we have deep historical connections. And it actually goes hand-in-hand with the belief in Palestinian self-determination and dignity for me and many others,” she said.
“When the term is used in this pejorative as we have seen it particularly over the last few years, but long before that as well, it effectively says that 80% to 90% of Jews should be discriminated against, or cast out of spaces, or in extreme cases violently targeted as we saw this weekend. That is antisemitism when you’re saying the majority of American Jews are fair game,” Spitalnick added.
She said the majority of American Jews have a relationship with Israel.
“That doesn’t mean that we agree with its government,” Spitalnick said. “In fact, many of us, and many Israelis, don’t agree with the government and don’t necessarily support what’s happening in Gaza right now.”
National alarm sounded before attack
According to an audit issued in April by the Anti-Defamation League, antisemitic incidents, including assaults and vandalism, has jumped 344% over the past five years and increased 893% over the past 10 years.
“For the first time in the history of the Audit, a majority (58%) of all incidents contained elements related to Israel or Zionism,” according to the ADL.
Since the Oct. 7, 2023, surprise attack on Israel by Hamas terrorists, more than 10,000 antisemitic incidents have been reported in the United States alone, according to the ADL.
In addition to the Washington, D.C., and Boulder attacks, a 38-year-old man was arrested in April and charged with firebombing the Pennsylvania governor’s residence in Harrisburg, while Gov. Josh Shapiro, who is Jewish, and his family were asleep inside, officials said. According to a search warrant affidavit, the suspect allegedly targeted Shapiro “based upon perceived injustices to the people of Palestine.”
Islamophobic attack have also been on the rise, according to a report issued in March by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the nation’s largest Muslim civil rights and advocacy organization. CAIR reported that it received more than 8,650 complaints in 2024, the highest number the group has ever gotten.
Among the high-profile anti-Muslim incidents reported over the last two years was the fatal Oct. 14, 2023, stabbing of 6-year-old Palestinian American boy, Wadea Al-Fayoume, by his Illinois landlord, 73-year-old Joseph Czuba, who prosecutors said killed the child and attacked his mother in response to the Israel-Hamas war. Czuba was convicted of murder and hate crime charges in February and was sentenced in May to 53 years in prison.
On Nov. 25, 2023, three college students of Palestinian descent were shot, including one who was paralyzed, in Burlington, Vermont, when they were allegedly targeted by 48-year-old Jason J. Eaton, a former Boy Scout leader, as the students, who were visiting the city during the Thanksgiving holiday, were walking in his neighborhood speaking a mix of Arabic and English, authorities said. Two of the students were wearing keffiyehs, traditional Palestinian scarves. Eaton has pleaded not guilty to three counts of attempted murder and is awaiting a trial.
While there were widespread calls for a hate crime charge against Eaton, prosecutors said they did not have enough evidence to support such a charge.
Following the deadly May 21 Washington, D.C., rampage, the Department of Homeland Security issued a bulletin warning law enforcement that “violent extremist messaging continues to highlight major sporting and cultural events and venues as potential targets.”
“The May attack that killed two Israeli Embassy staff members at an event in Washington, D.C., underscores how the Israel-Hamas conflict continue to inspire violence and could spur radicalization or mobilization to violence against targets perceived as supporting Israel,” according to the DHS, adding that some online users were sharing the suspect’s alleged writings and “praising the shooter and generally calling for more violence.”
The increase in antisemitic and Islamophobic attacks have come against the backdrop of the Trump administration’s crackdown on illegal immigration. The administration has also threatened to withhold federal funding to universities, including Harvard and Columbia, for not doing enough to tackle antisemitism on campuses. The administration has attempted to deport or revoke visas of foreign students who have engaged in pro-Palestinian protests and activism on college campuses.
In April, five Democratic Senators, including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, sent a letter to Trump accusing his administration of weaponizing antisemitism.
“We are extremely troubled and disturbed by your broad and extra-legal attacks against universities and higher education institutions as well as members of their communities, which seem to go far beyond combatting antisemitism, using what is a real crisis as a pretext to attack people and institutions who do not agree with you,” the Democratic senators wrote, urging Trump to “reverse course immediately.”
‘An act of terrorism’
Within hours of the Boulder attack on Sunday, FBI Director Kash Patel was quick to say the case is being investigated as “an act of terrorism.”
Twelve people, including members of the group Run for Their Lives, an organization that regularly holds demonstrations in Boulder to bring attention to the Israeli hostages still being held in Gaza, were injured in the attack, which unfolded around 1:26 p.m. local time at Boulder’s outdoor Pearl Street Mall, directly across the street from the Boulder County Courthouse, authorities said.
Video taken of the incident showed a shirtless Soliman allegedly holding his makeshift weapons prior to the attack. Soliman was immediately taken into custody without incident. Soliman, who is being held on $10 million bond, made his first court appearance on Monday afternoon. He did not enter a plea to the charges.
Unlike previous high-profile hate-crime investigations, the Boulder attack was immediately described as an act of terrorism, signaling a change in the approach federal investigators have taken in such incidents under the new Trump administration.
“Back when I was in [the FBI], so before 2016, everything was terrorism until it wasn’t terrorism. We still were working off the 9/11 response,” said retired FBI special agent Rich Frankel, an ABC News contributor. “And after that, it appeared that they started calling it hate crime.”
Frankel said the FBI’s decision to immediately refer to the Boulder incident as an act of terrorism is apparently because it allows investigators to use additional laws and investigative techniques, including the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which establishes the legal framework for the gathering of intelligence, electronic surveillance and physical searches. He said it also enables prosecutors to file additional enhanced charges.
“If you think there might be an international angle naming a group or a country, it is terrorism and that gives you a whole host of different laws that you can use and also investigative techniques because now you’re under the FISA system, you’re under the secret system. Instead of getting search warrants, you can get a FISA,” Frankel said. “The new administration might want that more than a hate crime.”
President Donald Trump has also used the word terrorism to describe the Boulder case, saying in a post Monday on his Truth Social platform that the suspect “came through Biden’s ridiculous Open Border Policy, which has hurt our Country so badly.”
“He must go out under ‘TRUMP’ POLICY,” Trump added. “Acts of Terrorism will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. This is yet another example of why we must keep our Borders SECURE, and deport illegal, Anti-American Radicals from our Homeland.”
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