Elias Rodriguez, 30, from Chicago, taken into custody by police for allegedly shooting two Israeli Embassy staffers outside the Capital Jewish Museum in Washington, DC, on May 21, 2025. Photo: Screenshot

The suspect who allegedly murdered two Israeli embassy staffers in Washington, DC, on Wednesday night expressed admiration for a man who set himself on fire outside the embassy last year to protest the war in Gaza, according to newly released court documents.

Elias Rodriguez, a 30-year-old left-wing and anti-Israel activist from Chicago, was charged on Thursday in US federal court with two counts of first-degree murder. He is accused of fatally shooting Yaron Lischinsky, 30, and Sarah Lynn Milgrim, 26, a young couple about to become engaged to be married, as they left an event at the Capital Jewish Museum for young professionals and diplomatic staff hosted by the American Jewish Committee (AJC).

According to a surveillance video, Rodriguez shot both in the back, FBI documents say. After being hit Milgrim tried to sit up and Rodriguez shot her from close range again, court documents said. Rodriguez then fired additional rounds as both Milgrim and Lischinsky tried to crawl away from him. “Once the decedents fell to the ground,” Rodriguez was “captured on the video advancing closer to the decedents, leaning over with them and with his arm extended, and firing several more times,” the FBI affidavit says.

In addition to murder, Rodriguez was charged in a criminal complaint with murder of foreign officials, causing death with a firearm, and discharging a firearm in a crime of violence.

An affidavit filed by US federal authorities in support of the criminal complaint charging Rodriguez revealed that he said at the scene of the shooting, “I did it for Palestine; I did it for Gaza.” He also chanted “Free Palestine, Free Palestine” after being taken into custody, according to video of the incident.

The court document also explained that Rodriguez told law enforcement that he idolized Aaron Bushnell, a 25-year-old serviceman of the US Air Force who died after setting himself on fire outside the front gate of the Israeli embassy in Washington, DC, in February 2024. Bushnell was protesting Israel’s military campaign against the Palestinian terrorist group Hamas in Gaza. He said in a video of the incident that he would “no longer be complicit in genocide” and chanted “Free Palestine” while pouring liquid over himself and igniting it.

“During an interview with MPD [Metropolitan Police Department] detectives, after having been advised of his Miranda rights and after waiving them, Rodriguez expressed admiration for the actions of an individual who self-immolated in front of the Israeli embassy in Washington, DC, on Feb. 25, 2024, as a form of protest intended to draw attention to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict,” the affidavit stated. “Rodriguez described this person’s actions as courageous and labeled him a ‘martyr.'”

As Jewish communities worldwide deal with the shock of Wednesday night’s shooting, details have emerged about Rodriguez showing he has maintained ties to extremist left-wing groups and held virulent anti-Israel views.

Rodriguez was involved with the Party for Socialism and Liberation (PSL), a far-left organization that has previously called for the “extermination” of all Zionists, according to a review of his history and information obtained by The Algemeiner.

The Chicago chapter of PSL has routinely called for violence and “armed resistance” against Israel. The organization declares that Israel is an “apartheid state” and a result of “settler-colonialism,” while venerating Hamas as a legitimate “resistance.” PSL has also expressed open support for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), an internationally designated terrorist group, and has hosted reading sessions of works penned by PFLP founder Ghassan Kanafani.

PSL holds large rallies in which attendees openly endorse terrorism against the Jewish state and call for its elimination. Earlier this month, PSL joined a coalition of other far-left organizations to hold a protest outside of the Israeli consulate in Chicago.

In the immediate aftermath of the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, invasion of and massacre across southern Israel, PSL organized an event titled “Gaza Fights for Freedom.” Additionally, PSL Chicago partnered with several prominent anti-Israel organizations, such as the ANSWER Coalition, CODE PINK, Palestinian Youth Movement (PYM), Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP), the Middle East Children’s Alliance (MECA), and the Palestine Feminist Collective.

In the aftermath of Wednesday night’s shooting, PSL has attempted to distance itself from Rodriguez, claiming that the alleged murderer is only associated with the group in a limited capacity and does not currently hold a membership. However, in an April 2025 picture posted to Facebook, a person resembling Rodriguez participated in a “Socialist Reconstruction Study Group” workshop hosted by PSL.

“Through collective study, we mapped the contradictions of US foreign policy and discussed tactics to organize within the imperial core,” the group said of the gathering. “By understanding imperialism’s motivations, we explored the revolutionary possibilities that emerge in its wake — and how to build that future now, through concrete struggle.”

Rodriguez is also suspected to have maintained an anonymous X/Twitter account, in which he called for violence against Israel. The account, named “kyodo.leather,” was started just two weeks after the Oct. 7 slaughters in Israel. It endorsed a video calling to “bomb Tel Aviv” and praised the conduct of the Hamas terrorist group. The social media account also allegedly shared videos glorifying Hasan Nasrallah, the now-deceased leader of Hezbollah, another Islamist terrorist organization.

Early Thursday, investigative journalist Ken Klippenstein published a manifesto allegedly belonging to Rodriguez. In the 900-word document, Rodriguez seemingly confirms that the ongoing Israel-Hamas war motivated him to act.

“A word about the morality of armed demonstration. Those of us against the genocide take satisfaction in arguing that the perpetrators and abettors have forfeited their humanity,” Rodriguez allegedly wrote. “I sympathize with this viewpoint and understand its value in soothing the psyche which cannot bear to accept the atrocities it witnesses, even mediated through the screen. But inhumanity has long since shown itself to be shockingly common, mundane, prosaically human. A perpetrator may then be a loving parent, a filial child, a generous and charitable friend, an amiable stranger, capable of moral strength at times when it suits him and sometimes even when it does not, and yet be a monster all the same. Humanity doesn’t exempt one from accountability.”