Police are investigating whether the suspected terrorist who killed two Israeli Embassy staffers in Washington, D.C., had posted an anti-Israel manifesto online prior to the attack, according to reports. Elias Rodriguez, 31, allegedly shouted “Free, free Palestine” shortly before admitting to shooting the couple outside the Capital Jewish Museum on Wednesday.
As authorities continued to investigate the motive behind the brutal antisemitic attack, they began focusing on a 900-word manifesto bearing Rodriguez’s name that began circulating online shortly after his arrest, according to sources who spoke to the New York Post. It also emerged that Rodriguez has ties to a radical left-wing group known for leading Black Lives Matter protests.
Inside the Killer’s Manifesto
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Police were also probing Rodriguez’s electronic devices alongside efforts to verify the authenticity of the document and exploring the possibility that he may have become radicalized on his own, sources told the outlet.
The document, reportedly dated May 20 — just one day before the killings — appeared to imply that the attack was intended as a political statement driven by the ongoing conflict in Gaza.
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“An armed action is not necessarily a military action. It usually is not. Usually it is theater and spectacle, a quality it shares with many unarmed actions,” the document reads, according to the outlet.
The supposed manifesto further claimed that those “of us against the genocide” have “forfeited their humanity.”
“But inhumanity has long since shown itself to be shockingly common, mundane, prosaically human. A perpetrator may then be a loving parent, a filial child, a generous and charitable friend, an amiable stranger, capable of moral strength at times when it suits him and sometimes even when it does not, and yet be a monster all the same,” the writings state.
“Humanity doesn’t exempt one from accountability. The action would have been morally justified taken 11 years ago during Protective Edge, around the time I personally became acutely aware of our brutal conduct in Palestine.
“But I think to most Americans such an action would have been illegible, would seem insane. I am glad that today at least there are many Americans for which the action will be highly legible and, in some funny way, the only sane thing to do,” it added.
Investigators Trying to Determine Motive
The author ended the document by expressing love for his parents, sister, and family, and then ended with the declaration, “Free Palestine.” The document surfaced as Rodriguez was being questioned by the FBI and D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department early Thursday.
Originally from Chicago, Rodriguez is accused of fatally shooting Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Lynn Milgrim as they were leaving an event at the Capital Jewish Museum.
Washington Metropolitan Police Chief Pamela Smith noted that Rodriguez had been observed pacing near the museum shortly before the attack.
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“Once in handcuffs, the suspect identified where he discarded the weapon, and that weapon has been recovered, and he implied that he committed the offense,” she said.
Witness Katie Kalisher recalled being inside the museum when Rodriguez walked in, appearing frightened just after the gunfire.
Believing he might have been a victim, some attendees tried to help him, until he unexpectedly took out a keffiyeh scarf.
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“He says, ‘I did it. I did it for Gaza, free, free Palestine‘. And he’s chanting this. And then suddenly the police come in and they arrest him,” Kalisher said of the caught–on-camera arrest.
