A Chicago-born man arrested as the lone suspect in the fatal shooting of two Israeli Embassy employees in Washington was charged on Thursday (May 22) in federal court with two counts of first-degree murder in a killing widely condemned as an act of antisemitism.
Elias Rodriguez, 31, is accused of opening fire on a group of people on Wednesday night as they left an event for young professionals and diplomats hosted by the American Jewish Committee, an advocacy group that fights antisemitism and supports Israel.
Rodriguez told police on the scene, “I did it for Palestine, I did it for Gaza”, according to the charging documents. Witnesses recounted hearing him chant, “Free Palestine” after he was taken into custody.
The two victims struck by gunfire and killed were identified as Yaron Lischinsky, 30, and Sarah Lynn Milgrim, 26, a young couple about to become engaged to be married.
Friends and members of advocacy groups they belonged to said the pair were committed to building bridges between Arabs and Jews in hopes of ending bloodshed in the Middle East.
After the shooting, Israeli embassies around the world immediately stepped up security.
In addition to two counts of first-degree murder, Rodriguez was charged in a six-page criminal complaint with murder of foreign officials, causing death with a firearm and discharging a firearm in a crime of violence.
Interim US Attorney Jeanine Pirro, newly appointed by President Donald Trump as the top federal prosecutor in Washington, said at a news briefing that the complaint against Rodriguez constitutes a “death penalty-eligible case”.
“We are going to continue to investigate this as a hate crime and as a crime of terrorism,” Pirro told reporters.
US Attorney General Pam Bondi said earlier that the suspect was believed to have acted alone.
At his first appearance in court on Thursday, the suspect waived his right to a detention hearing, and a preliminary hearing in the case was set for Jun 18.
Rodriguez said little during the proceeding except to answer, “I do” to questions from a federal magistrate judge about whether he understood his rights.
The charges were filed as FBI and police investigators pored over apparent writings and political affiliations of the suspect.
POSSIBLE MANIFESTO?
FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino posted on social media that investigators were “aware of certain writings allegedly authored by the suspect” and hoped to soon have updates regarding their authenticity.
Bongino’s statement appeared to refer to a manifesto signed with Rodriguez’s name that was posted to an anonymous X account on Wednesday night shortly before the shooting.
Posted with the title “Escalate For Gaza, Bring The War Home”, it condemned Israel’s killing of tens of thousands of Palestinians since the October 2023 Hamas attacks, and discussed the morality of “armed” action.
“In the wake of an act people look for a text to fix its meaning so here’s an attempt,” the document read. “The atrocities committed by Israelis against Palestine defy description and defy quantification.”
Israel has faced sustained international condemnation for its escalating Gaza military offensive, while Jewish advocacy groups have warned of a rise in antisemitic incidents globally.Investigators also delved into apparent political affiliations of the suspect.
SUSPECT’S BACKGROUND
Rodriguez was once involved with a far-left group in Chicago, the Party for Socialism and Liberation, according to a post from the group on X. The group said Rodriguez had a brief association with a PSL branch that ended in 2017 and was unaware of any further contact with him in more than seven years.
“We have nothing to do with this shooting and do not support it,” the organisation said.
Rodriguez was also identified in a 2018 local news report as a member of the Chicago branch of a national group called ANSWER, an acronym for Act Now to Stop War and End Racism, which has organised demonstrations in solidarity with Palestinians. ANSWER did not immediately respond to email and phone messages.
At the time of his arrest, Rodriguez worked at the healthcare nonprofit American Osteopathic Information Association, the organisation confirmed in a statement expressing sympathy for the victims.
He had also worked as an oral history researcher at The HistoryMakers, a nonprofit dedicated to preserving African American stories, according to a now-deleted biography on the group’s website, and was a content writer for technology firms.
Rodriguez was born and reared in Chicago and graduated from the University of Illinois Chicago in 2018 with a bachelor’s degree in English.
According to the FBI affidavit, the suspect flew to the Washington area from Chicago on Tuesday. On Wednesday night, he was seen pacing outside the museum, little more than 2km from the White House, shortly before the shooting, police said.
Surveillance video footage showed Rodriguez firing several times at Lischinsky and Milgrim, then leaning over them to fire several more rounds after they fell to the ground and after Milgrim tried to crawl away and sat up, according to an FBI affidavit in the criminal complaint. The gunman paused to reload, then resumed firing, it said.
He then tossed away his gun, retreated into the museum and was arrested there after calling attention to himself as the suspect, pulling out a red Palestinian-style keffiyeh scarf and declaring that he “did it”, the affidavit said.
Investigators recovered a 9mm handgun that he had purchased in Illinois five years ago, 21 spent shell casings and a firearm magazine at the scene, according to the complaint.
Trump condemned the shooting.
“These horrible DC killings, based obviously on antisemitism, must end, NOW!” he said in a message on Truth Social. “Hatred and Radicalism have no place in the USA.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said his heart ached for the families of the victims, “whose lives were cut short in a moment by an abhorrent antisemitic murderer”.