After attack, Boulder pro-hostage march set to resume ‘undeterred’ next week
Organizers say local Jewish community is filled with pain, anger and fear after 12 wounded in flamethrower and firebomb attack, but will not be stopped
Zev Stub is the Times of Israel's Diaspora Affairs correspondent.
Following Sunday’s attack on a group of pro-hostage demonstrators in Boulder, Colorado, the group’s weekly demonstrations will continue next Sunday with greater strength, organizers told The Times of Israel on Tuesday.
“We will not be deterred or stopped by this kind of action,” said Bruce Shaffer, co-lead for the Boulder chapter of Run For Their Lives, a global initiative with 230 groups around the world promoting awareness of the plight of Israeli hostages held by Hamas. “Canceling the march is exactly what these people want us to do.”
Shortly after the attack Sunday, in which the suspect wounded 12 people with a homemade flamethrower and Molotov cocktails, the global Run For Their Lives organization canceled all upcoming events for fear of copycat attacks, said Rachel Amaru, head of the Boulder chapter. However, the group updated its guidance Monday, saying it will allow each chapter to make its own decisions in cooperation with local authorities.
The upcoming march along Boulder’s central Pearl Street pedestrian mall will have a heavy police presence, and a large crowd is expected to attend, Amaru said. Israel’s Hostages and Missing Families Forum is expected to send representatives to speak and show solidarity at the event, she said.
The Boulder community is experiencing tremendous pain, anger and fear following the attack, said Shaffer, who had two family members set on fire during the attack. “There is a lot of pain and trauma, and the victims need their privacy right now,” he said.
Three of the victims, including an 88-year-old, were still hospitalized with severe burns as of Monday night, Amaru said. She declined to share the victims’ names due to privacy concerns.
On Sunday, Acting US Attorney J. Bishop Grewell said the 45-year-old suspect, Mohammed Sabry Soliman, will be charged with state and federal charges, facing life in prison if convicted. The Egyptian national, in the US illegally, shot a makeshift flamethrower at the crowd and threw lit Molotov cocktails while shouting “Free Palestine,” according to reports.
The attack on the eve of the Jewish Shavuot holiday was the latest in a relentless trend of growing antisemitic incidents around the US since Hamas launched its war against Israel with its assault on October 7, 2023. A record 9,354 antisemitic cases of harassment, vandalism, and assault were recorded in the US in 2024, translating to more than one every hour on average, according to the Anti-Defamation League.
The Boulder attack followed the murder of two Israeli Embassy staff members shot outside a Jewish museum in Washington, DC, two weeks ago. Some are concerned that such attacks are signs that “global intifada” calls may be gaining steam on US soil.
Every Sunday afternoon since November 2023, participants in the Boulder march have gathered at the corner of Pearl & 8th and walked the seven blocks to the courthouse at the end of the Pearl Street Mall and back, Shaffer said. At the courthouse, the group sings Israel’s national anthem, watches a brief video, and reads the names of hostages still held in Gaza by Hamas.
“We walk quietly, single file, and after each name is read, the crowd chants, ‘Let them go,'” Shaffer described. “It’s quite a powerful experience.”
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.
Nonetheless, Amaru said, the trauma of the attack has left deep scars and shattered her sense of safety.
“We are deeply hurting,” she said. “I have never wanted to move to Israel and make aliyah as much as I want to now.”
The Times of Israel Community.