A woman shared her disturbing encounter with the suspected gunman who killed two Israeli diplomats Wednesday night at the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C. during an appearance on “Fox & Friends” the following morning.
Katie Kalisher told the news show Thursday how she bumped into the suspect, 31-year-old Elias Rodriguez, moments after hearing about 10 to 15 gunshots. At first, the suspect was “playing dumb,” Kalisher said, wondering what type of museum it was and asking “do you think that’s why they did it?” after being told it was a Jewish museum.
The suspect was “covered in rain” and appeared “very distressed,” Kalisher added, while also telling bystanders to call the police.
Soon after, Kalisher said the man reached into his bag, pulled out a keffiyeh, and admitted to murdering the two victims, Yaron Lischinsky and Sarah Milgrim.
“I did it. I did this for Gaza,” Rodriguez told her.
He then shouted “free Palestine” as he was being arrested.
You can hear her recounting of the chilling meeting below, via Fox News’ X account:
Several details on the suspect have emerged since the shooting, including that he showed an affinity for a socialism and far-left politics; more recently, he has been interested in the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.
He has also ripped Amazon in the past, saying the company’s “whitening of Seattle is structurally racist and a direct danger to all workers who live in that city.”
The suspect added: “So do we in Chicago and all across the country want a nation of cities dominated and occupied by massive corporations where only the rich and white can live and the vast majority of us must live on the edges of the city and society living in deeper and deeper poverty?”
In an X post from earlier on Wednesday that appears to belong to the suspect, he shared a lengthy diatribe on his hatred of Israel, which he called a “genocidal apartheid state.”
“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,” the screed concluded.
The two victims were Israeli embassy staff members. Lischinsky, who was 30-years-old, was set to propose to 26-year-old Milgrim in the near future; he had just purchased an engagement ring, days before the couple were murdered.
