In the United States, a man charged after attempted murder of three young Palestinians
A forty-year-old was charged Monday in Vermont, a state in the northeast of the United States, with attempted murder after shooting three students, possibly because of their Palestinian origin, in a context of an increase in racist acts in the United States. United since the start of the war in Gaza.
This attack sparked outrage, with US President Joe Biden saying “horrified” in a White House press release. Justice Minister Merrick Garland announced that a “investigation was underway, in particular to determine whether this was a criminal act motivated by hate”.
The suspect, identified as Jason Eaton, 48, was arrested late Sunday after a search of his home, near where the incident took place the previous evening, Burlington police said. He is suspected of having, in this town in Vermont, fired four times with a 380 caliber handgun at the three students, aged 20, hitting all three.
“One of them suffered injuries whose after-effects could follow him for the rest of his life”, said police chief Jon Murad during a press conference. The other two were described on Sunday as being in a ” stable state “.
The three students, who were spending the Thanksgiving holidays in Burlington, near the Canadian border, were walking down the street talking in English and Arabic when the suspect appeared in front of them, without speaking, and opened fire before to flee, explained Mr. Murad. Two victims wore a keffiyeh, the traditional Palestinian headscarf. Two of them have American nationality and the third resides legally in the United States, according to authorities.
The suspect was kept in detention without the possibility of release on bail, according to the American press. “While we do not yet have evidence to say that this was a hate crime, it is very clear that we are dealing with a hateful act.”underlined the local prosecutor, Sarah George.
In the United States, a hate crime is an act against a person targeted because of certain characteristics of their identity such as ethnicity, religion, nationality, sexual orientation or disability.
In a joint statement, the victims’ families said Monday that the investigation “will likely show that [leurs] sons were targeted and attacked just because they are Palestinian”. According to them, a “hateful rhetoric” conveyed “in the American media and even by some of the most important elected officials in the country” helped create a “environment of increased racism and violence towards Palestinians and Arabs”.