A man who allegedly injured 12 pro-Israel marchers said he tried to purchase firearms but was blocked and resorted to using Molotov cocktails instead.
The suspect, identified as 45-year-old Mohamed Sabry Soliman, yelled ‘Free Palestine’ on Sunday at an outdoor mall in Boulder, Colorado, where the group had gathered to raise attention to hostages held by Hamas in Gaza. Soliman is accused of using a makeshift flamethrower to set fire to attendees at the event calling for the release of Israeli hostages.
Soliman said he ‘hated what he called a Zionist group’, said Acting US Attorney J Bishop Grewell for the District of Colorado during a press conference on Monday afternoon.
‘When he was interviewed about the attack, he said he wanted them all to die, he had no regrets, and he would go back and do it again,’ said Grewell.
‘He said that he had previously tried to purchase firearms but resorted to Molotov cocktails when he could not purchase them because he was not a legal citizen.’
Soliman could not purchase a weapon because his US visa expired, and he had taken a concealed-carry class to learn how to fire guns, said Boulder Judicial District Attorney Michael Doherty.
Law enforcement officials found 16 unused Molotov cocktails at the scene, said Doherty.
‘Sixteen, so I really want to thank law enforcement,’ he said of the rapid response.
Soliman had been planning the attack for a year, according to a federal criminal complaint.
Authorities said that four more victims were found, bringing the injured count to 12. The four newly identified victims suffered minor injuries, and two of the injured are still hospitalized, said Boulder police Chief Stephen Redfearn.
‘He was not on our radar in Boulder. We had no prior contacts with him,’ said Redfearn.
Federal officials on Monday said they have charged Soliman with hate crimes. He has also been charged with 16 counts of attempted murder, among other charged, with possible sentences of up to life behind bars.
Other charges against Solimon include first-degree murder although no one died, a count of first-degree assault and a count of using explosives or incendiary devices.
He faces up to 624 years in prison if convicted.
Soliman appeared in court in Boulder briefly on Monday afternoon. Prosecutors said they would bring formal charges against him at a hearing on Thursday afternoon.
He is being held on a $10million bond.
Confirmed injuries ranged from serious to minor, while the ages of the victims ranged from 52 to 88.
Boulder Rabbi Israel Wilhelm told a local news station the 88-year-old is a Holocaust refugee who fled Europe.
The suspect, who has been described as an ‘illegal alien’ by a White House official, was also injured and was taken to the hospital to be treated.
Video from the scene showed a witness shouting, ‘He’s right there. He’s throwing Molotov cocktails,’ as a police officer with his gun drawn advanced on a bare-chested suspect with containers in each hand.
Alex Osante, from San Diego, told AP News he heard a bottle break before a massive ‘boom’ erupted and people yelling and screaming.
An Israeli visitor who had joined the gathering ran up to Osante, who was in a nearby restaurant, asking for some water to help.
Osante then said the suspect threw a Molotov cocktail from behind some bushes but unintentionally set himself on fire before being arrested.
FBI leaders in Washington said they were treating the Boulder attack as an act of terrorism, and the Justice Department, which leads investigations into acts of violence driven by religious, racial or ethnic motivations, decried the attack as a ‘needless act of violence, which follows recent attacks against Jewish Americans’.
FBI deputy director Dan Bongino said in a post on X: ‘This 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.’
Soliman, who lives in El Paso County, Texas, was called an ‘illegal alien’ by White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller.
Soliman, from Egypt, first arrived in the US on a non-immigrant visa in August 2022, a border official told Fox News.
He was authorised to stay until February 2, 2023, but was then granted a work permit to stay in the country until March 2025.
The attack occurred more than a week after the fatal shooting of two Israeli embassy staffers in Washington by a Chicago man who yelled: ‘I did it for Palestine, I did it for Gaza’ as he was being led away by police.
Israel’s war in Gaza began when Hamas-led militants stormed into southern Israel on October 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.
Israel’s military campaign has killed over 54,000 people in Gaza, mostly women and children, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry.
The offensive has destroyed vast areas, displaced around 90% of the population and left people almost completely reliant on international aid.
Police in Boulder were more circumspect about a motive for the fire attack.
Police Chief Steve Redfearn said it ‘would be irresponsible for me to speculate’ while witnesses were still being interviewed.
However, he noted that the group that had gathered in support of the hostages had assembled peacefully and that injuries of the victims were consistent with them having been set on fire.
Multiple 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 pedestrian mall.
Colorado Governor Jared Polis said in a statement that he was ‘closely monitoring’ the situation, adding that ‘hate-filled acts of any kind are unacceptable’.
