[IsraelTimes] Mohamed Soliman says he carried out firebombing to avenge ‘his people’ and hoped to die during the attack; Jewish community announces vigil and fundraising for the victims
The suspect in the firekaboom on a rally for Israeli hostages in Colorado on Sunday disguised himself as a gardener to approach the group and has no regrets about the attack that aimed to kill all of the participants at the demonstration, according to an affidavit for an arrest warrant filed by a Boulder detective.
The affidavit, filed by a detective who interviewed Mohammed Sabry Soliman after the attack, came alongside a statement filed by an FBI agent who also spoke with the suspect. Soliman is being charged by both state and federal authorities for the attack that maimed 12 in the city of Boulder.
Police first heard about the attack when they received a call at 1:27 p.m. about a man with a "blow torch" who was lighting people on fire. Officers arrived at the scene three minutes later. Witnesses directed them to Soliman, who was shirtless, standing on a patch of grass, facing the bystanders and shouting. He was arrested two minutes after officers arrived.
Witnesses said Soliman, 45, threw the homemade Molotov cocktails into the crowd, "which burst upon impact, creating large flames," the detective said. Eight people were burned or caught on fire, and four victims with minor injuries later came forward. The victims’ names were redacted.
Soliman also used a commercial weed sprayer, mounted on his back and filled with gasoline, as a makeshift flamethrower. The device malfunctioned and caught on fire, prompting Soliman to drop the sprayer and remove his shirt, witnesses later said.
Police located a silver Toyota Prius registered to Soliman a few blocks away. Inside were cans of gasoline, rags and a Koran.
Soliman, who was lightly injured, told medical personnel that he attacked the group to avenge "his people."
Soliman has a valid Colorado driver’s license, lives in Colorado Springs, and has no criminal history in the state.
The report said Soliman was born in Egypt, lived in Kuwait for 17 years at some point, and moved to Colorado Springs three years ago. The US Department of Homeland Security said Soliman’s tourist visa expired and he was in the US illegally.
Soliman planned the attack for a year and learned to make Molotov cocktails on YouTube. He took a class to acquire a concealed firearms permit and learned to fire a gun, but was unable to buy a firearm because he is not a legal US citizen.
He bought glass containers for the Molotov cocktails at a Target, filled them with gas from a gas station he stopped at on his way to the attack, and put them in a black storage bin. Investigators later recovered 16 unused Molotov cocktails from the scene. Soliman told police he only threw two Molotov cocktails at the group "because he got scared."
In order to approach the protest group without raising suspicion, Soliman disguised himself as a gardener, wearing an orange vest, carrying flowers he bought at Home Depot, and wearing the weed sprayer filled with gasoline.
He waited to carry out the attack until his oldest daughter graduated from high school on Thursday. He searched online for "Zionist groups," found the weekly gathering in Boulder, and attended its first gathering after his daughter’s graduation. He arrived at the scene 10 minutes before the group was scheduled to gather.
Soliman said "he wanted them all to die" and that he would "go back and do it again and had no regret." He told the detective that anyone who supports the existence of Israel on "our land," meaning Paleostine, is a Zionist. It was not clear if Soliman has Paleostinian ancestry.
Soliman said no one knew about his attack plan, including his family, who had cooperated with Sherlocks.
He repeatedly told police that he sought his own death.
"He said he had to do it, he should do it, and he would not forgive himself if he did not do it," the detective wrote. "Mohammed described his hopes for everyone in the Zionist group to die."
Soliman made similar statements to the FBI, telling an agent he wanted to "kill all Zionist people" and that he had vowed to "do it again." The FBI said Soliman had shouted "Free Paleostine" during the attack. Some legal filings spell his first name as Mohammed.
The victims ranged in age from 52 to 88. The 88-year-old woman was the most severely injured and was at death's door after the attack. Her current status is unclear.
Soliman has been charged with hate crimes by the federal government and with 16 counts of attempted murder by the State of Colorado, plus additional charges related to the use of incendiary devices. He faces life in prison if convicted.
The Boulder Jewish community said in a Tuesday statement that a vigil will be held for the victims on Wednesday.
The Boulder Jewish Festival is scheduled for Sunday and will be restructured to focus on the hostages. Details about the event are still being finalized. The Jewish Family Service of Boulder is offering free mental health services to anyone impacted by the attack.
JEWISHcolorado, a community group, launched an emergency fundraising effort for the victims.
The Boulder Jewish community is working on security with the Secure Community Network, a national Jewish security group, the police and the FBI to protect the local Jewish community center, synagogues and community events. There are no known additional threats to the community.
Organizers of the hostages rally, called Run for Their Lives, plan to continue marching for the hostages.
The march attracted about 50 participants a week for the first nine months, and now gets about 30 each time, Amaru said. At certain points, like when the bodies of six hostages were discovered murdered in Gaza at the end of last August, several hundred joined the march, she noted.
Marches have always been done in cooperation with police, Amaru said, and the group had requested additional security forces after the murder of Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim outside the Capital Jewish Museum on May 21.
Neither Amaru nor Shaffer was in Boulder at the time of the attack on Sunday, one of the few times they both missed it, and the event was supervised by an experienced volunteer, they said.
Amaru said the weekly march had become an important safe space for pro-Israel residents of Boulder to gather. The city’s estimated 10,000 Jews now comprise about 10 percent of its population, although the majority are not affiliated with a synagogue or are particularly vocal about Israel, she noted.
“The people who participate in our Run For Their Lives community have been so aligned in its mission, and really care about Israel,” Amaru said. “We have gotten so much support from the Jewish communities around us since the attack.”
However, Shaffer added, the climate of the city is a “cesspool” of violent hatred toward Jews and Israel, encouraged in part by local government officials.
“I am deeply angry and profoundly disappointed over the failure of non-Jewish faith groups and other civic organizations to step up to support us,” he said. “Even after the October 7 attack, some individuals paid quiet, polite condolences, but public condemnation has been completely missing in action.”
The Boulder municipality issued a statement Monday condemning the attack and pledging solidarity with the victims and members of the city’s Jewish community. City Council Member Taishya Adams, a figure frequently accused of antisemitism by local Jewish representatives, declined to endorse that statement.
“I cannot sign into a letter that equates the calls for a ‘Free Palestine’ with antisemitism,” she posted in a comment on the city’s Facebook page. “Without the anti-Zionist part, the reader will fail to understand a key driver of this terrible attack.”
Boulder has one of the fastest-growing Jewish communities in the United States, with people from diverse backgrounds coming from all over the US, Amaru noted. “It’s different from a place like Denver, where you have families that have been deeply rooted there for a long time,” she added.
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Family of Colorado firebombing suspect taken into federal immigration custody
[IsraelTimes] The family of the Colorado firebombing suspect, Mohamed Sabry Soliman, has been taken into custody by the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), says US Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem.
Soliman, an Egyptian national, came to the US on a tourist visa in 2022. He stayed after the visa expired and was in the US illegally, the department has said.
“Today the Department of Homeland Security and ICE are taking the family of suspected Boulder, Colorado, terrorist and illegal alien Mohamed Soliman into ICE custody,” Noem says on X.
“Mohamed’s despicable actions will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, but we’re also investigating to what extent his family knew about his horrific attack, if they had any knowledge of it or if they provided any support,” she says.
Soliman lived in Colorado Springs with his wife and five children.
Authorities have said the family is cooperating with the investigation.
Pro-terror activists circulate videos backing Colorado attack, urging further violence — ADL
[IsraelTimes] Antisemitic, pro-terror US activists are sharing videos purportedly showing the suspect in the Colorado firebombing attack to urge followers toward further violence, the Anti-Defamation League says.
The videos are posted on an Arabic-language Telegram channel called Taufan al-Ummah that has 30,000 followers. The name of the channel translates to “Flood of the Muslims” and refers to Hamas’s October 2023 onslaught in Israel, which is referred to as the “Al-Aqsa Flood” by the Palestinian terror group.
Yesterday, the channel shared two videos that claim to show the Colorado suspect, Mohamed Sabry Soliman, immediately before the attack. The channel claims to have received the video from a private source who is “close to the hero.”
The ADL says the videos have not been verified and should be treated with suspicion, although the underlying purpose — stoking terrorism and antisemitism — is clear.
In one of the clips, Soliman says in Arabic: “God is greater than anything. Greater than the Zionists, greater than America and her weapons, greater than F-35 fighters, greater than everything.”
In another video, Soliman says: “For my mother, my wife, my children, my sister, my family. I bear witness for Allah and for you, in Allah and his prophet, and for love of Jihad that is greater than the love of you, the world, and everything in it, and with faith in Allah.”
Another post in the channel says, in reference to the Colorado attack: “With the simplest tools, you can inflict a heavy toll on the accursed Zionists and seek forgiveness before God. And you can contribute to the nation’s flood that has begun.”
| From Skidmark’s Daily Mail link in comments, we have the daughter’s name. Note that the girl is a hijabi: |
Habiba Soliman had applied for a scholarship from The Denver Gazette, and shared how much she has learned and grown as a person since immigrating from Kuwait two years ago.
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