Wadea Al-Fayoume, 6, a Muslim boy who was stabbed to death in an attack that targeted him and his mother for their religion and as a response to the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, poses in an undated family photograph — Reuters
Americans Urged to Speak against Hate after Young Boy’s Murder
By Anwar Iqbal
Washington: The need for healing was felt across America, as the media reported details of the murder of six-year-old Palestinian boy Wadea Al-Fayoume, whose murderer had his first day in a Plainfield, Illinois, court on Monday.
“All must speak out against hate,” wrote The Baltimore Sun, referring to a speech former President George W. Bush made at the Islamic Center of Washington days after the Sept 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, where he urged Americans not to blame an entire religion and its followers for an act committed by a handful of militants.
Emphasizing this point, The Baltimore Sun suggested that the campaign against hate “can start by mourning 6-year-old Wadea Al-Fayoume,” who loved to play ball, loved to color, loved to swing, loved his family, and who, we surely can all agree, did not deserve to have his life ripped from him, stabbed 26 times“.
The court ordered that 71-year-old Joseph Czuba, who is charged with murder and hate-crime, must be kept behind bars without bail.
Czuba also stabbed Fayoume’s mother, Hanaan Shahin, dozens of times, but she survived the attack and is now in a hospital near Chicago.
“You Muslims have to die,” screamed Czuba, when he barged into the ground-floor apartment that he owned and where his tenants, Fayoume and his parents lived.
“You are killing our kids in Israel. You Palestinians don’t deserve to live,” he shouted as he attacked his victims.
The county’s attorney Michael Fitzgerald said the boy’s mother told investigators that when first confronted by Czuba over the violence in Israel, she told him, “Let’s pray for peace”.
That’s when Shahin said he attacked her with a knife. “He didn’t give her time. He then attacked her with a knife,” Fitzgerald told the court.
On Monday night, people gathered outside Shahin’s hospital, while her son was laid to rest in a Chicago suburb of Bridgeview, where hundreds attended his funeral.
According to court documents, Shahin told police she rents two rooms in Czuba’s house where she lived with her son on the first floor, and Czuba lived on the second floor, according to the documents.
The family “had no reason to suspect what was to occur”, said Ahmed Rehab, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, Chicago, as Czuba was friendly to the family until the bombing of Gaza began.
“It wasn’t until Czuba started watching the news and hearing the statements that something changed,” he added.
Czuba’s wife, Mary, told police he “listens to conservative talk radio on a regular basis”, and was heavily interested in the recent events happening in Israel.
Czuba told his wife on Wednesday that he wanted Shahin and her family to move out of the home. - Dawn
According to an earlier AFP story, US President Joe Biden said the boy’s family were Palestinian Muslims who “came to America seeking what we all seek — a refuge to live, learn, and pray in peace.”
“This horrific act of hate has no place in America,” Biden said in a statement.
The suspect, Joseph Czuba, 71, was charged with first-degree murder, attempted first-degree murder, two counts of hate crime and aggravated battery with a deadly weapon, the sheriff’s office said.
“Detectives were able to determine that both victims in this brutal attack were targeted by the suspect due to them being Muslim and the ongoing Middle Eastern conflict involving Hamas and the Israelis,” the Will County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement.
Reuters could not identify an attorney for Czuba. He was in jail awaiting his initial court appearance, the office said.
Although Czuba did not make any statements to detectives, as is his constitutional right, police said they determined the charges through interviews and evidence.
When police arrived at the scene, they said they found Czuba sitting on the ground outside the home with a cut to his forehead. The victims were in a bedroom.
Authorities said the woman managed to call 911 as she fought off the landlord, named by the sheriff’s office as Czuba.
“Deputies located two victims inside the residence in a bedroom. Both victims had multiple stab wounds to their chest, torso, and upper extremities,” the sheriff’s statement said.
A serrated military-style knife with a seven-inch blade was pulled from the boy’s abdomen during the autopsy, the statement said.
When police arrived they found Czuba sitting on the ground near the driveway of the residence with a laceration on his forehead. He was taken to hospital for treatment before being charged with murder, attempted murder, and two counts of hate crimes.
“He knocked on the door and attempted to choke her, and said ‘you Muslims’ must die,’ ” Ahmed Rehab, head of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) Chicago office, told reporters, citing text messages sent by the woman to the murdered boy’s father from her hospital bed.
The CAIR identified the boy as Wadea Al-Fayoume and said the woman, Hanaan Shahin, was his mother.
“The Islamophobic rhetoric and anti-Palestinian racism being spread by politicians, media outlets, and social media platforms must stop,” CAIR said on the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter.
FBI Director Christopher Wray warned the International Association of Chiefs of Police conference to stay vigilant “in this heightened environment.”
“There’s no question we’re seeing an increase in reported threats, and we’ve got to be on the lookout, especially for lone actors who may take inspiration from recent events to commit violence of their own,” Wray told the conference in San Diego on Saturday, according to the FBI website . – AFP/Reuters
