A TV screengrab of US airman Aaron Bushnell walking towards the Israeli Embassy in Washington, DC., where he set himself ablaze while shouting ‘free Palestine’ on Sunday.
A US Air Force staffer who set himself ablaze while shouting “free Palestine” outside the Israeli embassy in Washington on Sunday afternoon, died early Monday morning.
US Secret Service officers doused the flames before the man, identified as Aaron Bushnell, 25, was rushed to hospital on Sunday afternoon, where he succumbed to his injuries.
In a video aired live on Twitch, a streaming site, Bushnell, from San Antonio, Texas, after identifying himself as a serving member of the USAF, declared that he would no “longer be complicit in genocide,” and that he was planning “to engage in an extreme act of protest.” He is also said to have alerted a local media outlet about his plans. The video –which has since been pulled down—apparently shows him walking towards the Israeli embassy, wearing military fatigues around 1 pm, and repeating that “I will no longer be complicit in genocide. I’m about to engage in an extreme act of protest…But compared to what people have been experiencing in Palestine at the hands of their colonizers, it’s not extreme at all. This is what our ruling class has decided will be normal.”
He can then be seen dousing himself with a liquid and reaching for a lighter, and an unidentified law enforcement official can be heard asking “can I help you?” seconds before he set himself ablaze, shouting “Free Palestine” several times.
While the DC Police Department said it was “not confirming the authenticity of the video,” Bushnell’s profile on social media indicates he was a IT engineer with the USAF since 2020.
DC police said it was working with the Secret Service and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to investigate the incident.
The Israeli embassy in DC has been the target of several protests ever since Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered a massive offensive in the Gaza Strip after the October 7 cross border attack by the Hamas, in which 1200 Israelis were killed and 253 taken hostage.
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In a career spanning three decades and counting, Ramananda (Ram to his friends) has been the foreign editor of The Telegraph, Outlook Magazine and the New Indian Express. He helped set up rediff.com’s editorial operations in San Jose and New York, helmed sify.com, and was the founder editor of India.com.
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