A Jewish man in Miami Beach allegedly tried to kill two men he believed were Palestinians, but turned out to be from Israel. Surveillance video allegedly shows driver Mordechai Brafman, 27, doing a U-turn and exiting his truck before using a semiautomatic handgun to fire 17 times on a passing car around 9:30pm Saturday, per the Miami Herald. Upon his arrest, Brafman boasted that "he saw two Palestinians and shot and killed both," according to arrest documents. However, neither of the Israeli victims died. One man was struck on the left shoulder, the other on the left forearm, police say.
Police didn't comment on the victims' nationalities, though the Herald identified them as a father and son from Israel who were vacationing in the US. Social media posts show the son, Ari Rabey, at a Miami hospital and his vehicle riddled with bullets, per the Guardian. The son allegedly wrote "death to the Arabs" on social media while suggesting the shooting was an "antisemitic" attack. "It is deeply ironic and telling that both the alleged pro-Israel perpetrator and the pro-Israel victim ... reportedly hold racist anti-Palestinian views," said Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR).
"Policymakers in our nation should stop fomenting the anti-Palestinian hate that led to the genocide in Gaza and to hate crimes in America," added Awad, who's calling for hate crime and domestic terrorism charges in the shooting. City of Miami Beach Commissioner Alex Fernandez said he's also "urging the Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office to pursue hate crime charges in this case," per the Herald. Brafman is currently held on two counts of attempted second-degree murder. His lawyer claims he was "experiencing a severe mental health emergency" on Saturday. (More attempted murder stories.)
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