Three Palestinian College Students Shot in Burlington, Vermont

CNN
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Three college students from the Palestinian territories were victims of a shooting incident in Burlington, Vermont, on Saturday evening, as reported by their former school in the occupied West Bank.

According to a news release by Burlington Police Chief Jon Murad, officers responded to a call and discovered two shooting victims near the University of Vermont campus, while the third victim was found a short distance away.

The injured students were immediately transported to the University of Vermont Medical Center for treatment, stated the news release.

As of now, the shooter or shooters remain unidentified and at large. Chief Murad mentioned that the police department is in the early stages of investigating this crime.

The three students, identified as Hisham Awartani, Kinnan Abdelhamid, and Tahseen Ahmed, had recently graduated from Ramallah Friends School, a Quaker-run private nonprofit school in Ramallah.

Ramallah Friends School confirmed the students’ identities in a Facebook post and revealed that all three were enrolled in American colleges. Haverford College in Pennsylvania released a statement confirming that Kinnan Abdelhamid, a junior at the college, is currently recovering from gunshot wounds at a hospital.

Husam Zomlot, the Palestinian ambassador to the United Kingdom, expressed his concern about the incident on social media platform X, identifying the victims as “three young Palestinian men” and calling for the protection of Palestinians everywhere.

The Burlington police have not provided information regarding the ethnicity of the victims or whether they were targeted for that reason.

The American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee issued a news release stating that they have reason to believe the shooting occurred due to the victims’ Arab background. The civil rights organization added that two of the students are still in intensive care, and one is in a critical condition.

In response to the incident, the Council on American-Islamic Relations announced a $10,000 reward for any information leading to the arrest and conviction of the perpetrator(s) responsible for the shooting.

This shooting takes place against the backdrop of heightened tensions and hate crimes in the United States since October 7, when Hamas launched a deadly attack in Israel, resulting in devastating airstrikes across Gaza. In October, a 6-year-old Palestinian American boy was tragically stabbed to death by his family’s landlord, a case authorities are treating as a hate crime.

CNN has reached out to the University of Vermont, the University of Vermont Medical Center, the students’ universities, Burlington Mayor Miro Weinberger, and Governor Phil Scott for their comments on the incident.