A man of “Middle Eastern descent” has been charged with the cold-blooded shooting death of a young Jewish dentist in California. But police warned that the shooting was likely not “racially or politically motivated.”
Shortly after 4 p.m. last Thursday, police received a report of a shooting inside the offices of Smile Plus Dentistry and Orthodontics in El Cajon, Calif., about 24 miles northeast of San Diego. When they arrived, they found three gunshot victims, two adult males and one adult female.
Two of the victims were– A man in his 40s and a woman in her 20s – He was taken to a local hospital in “serious but stable condition.” police report Said. Both are expected to survive.
Unfortunately, the third victim, 29-year-old dentist Benjamin Haruni, succumbed to his injuries at the scene.
Witnesses claimed the suspect quickly left in a white U-Haul pickup truck. Several hours later, police located the vehicle and arrested the suspect, Mohamed Abdulkareem, 29, of El Cajon. He was a former patient of the dental clinic.
When police found Abdulkareem, he was in possession of “a loaded handgun and several loaded handgun magazines,” a police statement said. He reportedly bought a handgun just two weeks ago and rented a U-Haul truck an hour before the shooting.
Abdulkareem was booked into San Diego County Central Jail on one count of murder and two counts of attempted murder. prison records His ethnicity is listed as “Middle Eastern.”
The identities of the suspect and victim led some to immediately suspect that anti-Semitic zeal was a motive for the shooting. “The media has dismissed the shooting as the result of mental instability, as is often the case when Jews are the victims of murderous hatred,” the pro-Israel group Stand With Us posted. Facebook The day after the shooting. “We call on law enforcement to investigate this as a hate crime.”
Organizers of Sunday night’s vigil in Harouni’s memory also said that while the “role of anti-Semitism” in the shooting “remains unknown,” they still wanted to “raise public awareness of the senseless loss of life.” We want to reveal the identity of the victim.” The culprit was a Jewish man who was killed by a Muslim man. ”
Rabbi Zalman Carlebach, a friend of the Haruni family and resident of Chabad in downtown San Diego, does believe that anti-Semitic hatred was involved. “It’s hard to say it wasn’t,” he said. He added that Abdul Kareem’s “name is very suggestive of Arab influence and the doctor is a Jewish doctor.” “That’s all we know.”
Since then, El Cajon police have addressed these charges head-on, expressing doubts in two public statements that anti-Semitism was involved. “While we are still in the early stages of the investigation, we want to be clear that the attack was not racially or politically motivated,” the agency tweeted to the California Anti-Defamation League.
The police report similarly claims that “Although the exact motive for the shooting remains under investigation, Abdulkareem is believed to have been a disgruntled former customer.”
The San Diego ADL office has since softened its wording on the incident. ”[T]There is no indication that the murder was motivated by anti-Semitism,” it said in a statement.[I]It is important to investigate all possible motives that led to the tragic murder of Benjamin Haruni, including anti-Semitism,” he added in another article.
El Cajon Mayor Bill Wells said at the vigil that whatever the motive for the shooting, investigators will get to the bottom of it. “People have told me they’re concerned that the city or the FBI or whoever is in charge will try to cover this up and treat it as if it were a simple crime,” he told attendees. ” he said. “We will get to the truth about what happened.”
At the time of his death, Haruni had just graduated from dental school and joined the dental practice run by his parents, Jack and Hilda Haruni. Rabbi Carlebach called him a “beautiful soul” with “a whole life ahead of him.”
“In memory of Benjamin, please perform positive acts of kindness, spread peace, and fill the world with much-needed light,” he added. “May G-d comfort his parents, siblings, extended family, and the entire Jewish community.”
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