Progressive Ecosystem Is Breeding Killers

Wednesday night’s barbarous murder of two Israeli Embassy employees — gunned down, shot in the back by a pro-Palestinian activist while leaving a peace event at the Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C. — is more than a mere workaday atrocity. I have had difficulty writing about it, at least to contribute anything more than a semi-articulate howl of rage. (He was about to ask her to marry him, for God’s sake.) It has gotten underneath my skin in a uniquely uncomfortable way. For it feels unmistakably like an escalation.

The alleged killer is from Chicago — in fact, he went to college at the University of Illinois Chicago, mere blocks from where I live. He is not Palestinian or even Muslim at all; he is instead an unremarkable young left-wing activist named Elias Rodriguez. His social media activities indicate he became obsessed with the Gaza war after October 7 out of vicarious sympathy for the cause of the “oppressed,” but he otherwise expresses an almost frighteningly generic range of “young progressive activist” views, the kinds that one might associate with the average Bluesky account, not with a cold-blooded killer. (I had to at least bitterly chuckle when one media outlet stipulated that the alleged killer’s purported manifesto was “written in the clear language of an English major” — whether it is authentic or not, that is a devastatingly accurate description.)

About the Author

Jeffrey Blehar

Jeffrey Blehar is a National Review staff writer living in Chicago. He is also the co-host of National Review’s Political Beats podcast, which explores the great music of the modern era with guests from the political world happy to find something non-political to talk about.

Featured Tags

Wednesday night’s barbarous murder of two Israeli Embassy employees — gunned down, shot in the back by a pro-Palestinian activist while leaving a peace event at the Jewish Museum in Washington, D.C. — is more than a mere workaday atrocity. I have had difficulty writing about it, at least to contribute anything more than a semi-articulate howl of rage. (He was about to ask her to marry him, for God’s sake.) It has gotten underneath my skin in a uniquely uncomfortable way. For it feels unmistakably like an escalation.

The alleged killer is from Chicago — in fact, he went to college at the University of Illinois Chicago, mere blocks from where I live. He is not Palestinian or even Muslim at all; he is instead an unremarkable young left-wing activist named Elias Rodriguez. His social media activities indicate he became obsessed with the Gaza war after October 7 out of vicarious sympathy for the cause of the “oppressed,” but he otherwise expresses an almost frighteningly generic range of “young progressive activist” views, the kinds that one might associate with the average Bluesky account, not with a cold-blooded killer. (I had to at least bitterly chuckle when one media outlet stipulated that the alleged killer’s purported manifesto was “written in the clear language of an English major” — whether it is authentic or not, that is a devastatingly accurate description.)

About the Author

Jeffrey Blehar

Jeffrey Blehar is a National Review staff writer living in Chicago. He is also the co-host of National Review’s Political Beats podcast, which explores the great music of the modern era with guests from the political world happy to find something non-political to talk about.