Attacker who firebombed a Jewish gathering in Colorado pleads guilty to murder and gets life in prison

A Colorado man pleaded guilty on Thursday to murder and other state charges and was sentenced to life in prison for a fatal 2025 firebombing on a group of Jewish marchers.

Mohamed Soliman’s June attack in Boulder targeted a group of elderly activists advocating on behalf of Israeli hostages in Gaza, ultimately leaving one woman dead and a dozen people injured.

About a month after the attack, Karen Diamond, 82, died of injuries she sustained in the firebombing.

“In those weeks, we learned the full meaning of the expressions ‘living hell’ and ‘fate worse than death,’” Diamond’s sons said in a statement read in court by a prosecutor earlier Thursday.

“There are no words that can express my sadness for her passing,” Soliman, 46, said through an Arabic interpreter in court, the Associated Press reports.

“If I went back, I would not have done this as this is not according to the teaching of Islam,” he added. “What I did came out of myself and only myself.”

Soliman still faces federal hate crime charges related to the attack, in which he used a makeshift flamethrower and Molotov cocktails to ambush the marchers. Originally from Egypt, Soliman disguised himself as a gardener and shouted “Free Palestine!” during the incident.

Federal prosecutors are reportedly weighing whether to bring the death penalty against Soliman. The Egyptian has pleaded not guilty to the federal charges.

The 46-year-old came to the U.S. with his family from Kuwait in 2022 on a short-term visa and applied for asylum. Federal officials say he was living in the U.S. illegally at the time of the attack.

After his arrest, Soliman told police he had planned the attack for a year and would do it again if he could, according to federal officials. He also allegedly told police he wanted to “kill all Zionist people.”

In parallel to the cases against Soliman, the federal government has been moving to deport his family, including his now ex-wife Hayam El Gamal and their five children, who have disavowed Soliman and have not been accused of any wrongdoing related to the attack.

Soliman allegedly told police he planned the attack for a year and was not remorseful, though he later apologized in court (Lisa Turnquist)

Last June, immigration officials detained the family, holding them for nearly a year in a notorious Texas detention facility accused of poor conditions, the longest of any family held in the center since it reopened last year under President Trump.

“It is farcical that the United States calls itself a democracy when the federal government deliberately ruins childhoods and strips young people of their innocence,” attorney Eric Lee, who represents the family, told The Independent in a statement at the time.

The family was released on bond last month.

Federal agents rearrested them two days later at an immigration check-in and attempted to rapidly deport them. The family’s attorneys filed emergency appeals, and the deportation flight was forced to turn around mid-air after leaving the country, according to Lee. The family has been returned to Colorado.

The federal government has been trying for months to deport Soliman’s family, who have disavowed the man and are not accused of participating in the attack. The family was held for nearly a year in a notorious Texas detention facility, where they say they suffered neglect. Immigration officials attempted unsuccessfully to rapidly arrest and deport the family after they were released last month. (Courtesy of Eric Lee)

On Monday, the family filed another emergency appeal.

Soliman’s lawyers, meanwhile, have also sought to block the deportation, too, arguing the family’s testimony could be needed in future court proceedings.