The suspected shooter, who fatally shot two Israeli Embassy staff members, was captured on video being restrained while shouting “Free, free Palestine” shortly after Good Samaritans assisted him, unaware he was the perpetrator.
The suspect, identified as 31-year-old Elias Rodriguez, is accused of opening fire and killing the pair outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C. shortly after 9 p.m. on Wednesday night.
The museum was hosting an event organized by the American Jewish Committee.
Video footage captured by witness Katie Kalisher and shared on Instagram shows Rodriguez being bear-hugged by a security guard sporting a Metropolitan Police tactical vest and pushed towards an exit, as two civilians hurried over to help the officer restrain him.
The guard secured the alleged shooter’s hands behind his back without struggle.
The guard is heard asking someone off-camera if they “have cuffs” after reaching down to his side.
The alleged gunman, with his arms being held behind his back by both the guard and the civilian, then begins shouting “free, free Palestine” at the camera as he’s pulled out the door.
The suspect was seen pacing back and forth outside the museum, leading up to the shooting, and allegedly flashed a handgun in front of a group of four people before opening fire, DC Metro Police Chief Pamela Smith said during a press conference.
Kalisher, who was attending the event for the American Jewish Committee’s Young Diplomats Reception at the museum, was inside when the gunfire rang out and saw Rodriguez come inside looking “distressed.”
“We thought that he just liked, needed help,” Kalisher told the BBC alongside another witness, Yoni Kalin.
Kalin said people inside rushed over to the suspect’s aid, thinking he needed help.
“People were calming him down, bringing him water, taking care of him,” Kalin said. “Little did we know he was somebody that executed people in cold blood.”
It was only when police rushed in and the suspect pulled out a red keffiyeh that they and others realized he was the suspected shooter.
Kalin said the suspect told police he was “unarmed” and committed the shooting “for Gaza.”
‘”I did this for Gaza. Free Palestine. There’s only one solution, intifada revolution,’ and he just kept yelling ‘free Palestine,’” Kalin recalled.
Kalin also told the Associated Press it’s shocking the shooter chose to target their event because it was “about humanitarian aid.”
“How can we actually help both the people in Gaza and the people in Israel? How can we bring together Muslims and Jews and Christians to work together to actually help innocent people? And then here he is just murdering two people in cold blood,” Kalin said.
The Israeli embassy confirmed that the victims were staffers Yaron Lischinsky, 28, and Sarah Milgrim in a post on X on Thursday.
The couple were set to be engaged in Jerusalem next week before they were killed.
Lischinsky served as a research assistant in the embassy’s Political Department since September 2022 after serving three years in the Israel Defense Forces, according to his LinkedIn.
Milgrim, who earned degrees from the University of Kansas and American University, has worked in the embassy’s Department of Public Diplomacy since November 2023, her online profile stated.
President Trump denounced the deadly shooting and said the killings were done out of hate and radicalism.
“These horrible DC killings, based obviously on antisemitism, must end, NOW! Hatred and Radicalism have no place in the USA,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
Attorney General Pam Bondi said she was at the scene with former judge Jeanine Pirro, who serves as the US attorney in Washington and whose office would prosecute the case.
