A man accused of launching a Molotov cocktail attack on a pro-Israel rally in Boulder, Colorado, has been charged with a federal hate crime, US officials confirmed on Monday.

According to an affidavit issued by the Department of Justice, Mohamed Sabry Soliman, 45, was arrested after allegedly injuring at least 12 individuals during an attack on an event organised by the group Run for Their Lives, which aimed to draw attention to hostages taken during Hamas’s 2023 assault on Israel.

US Attorney General Pam Bondi said the suspect would be prosecuted “to the fullest extent of the law” and termed the incident an “antisemitic terror attack”. Authorities revealed that Soliman had been planning the attack for over a year.

The incident unfolded on Sunday at the Pearl Street pedestrian mall, a popular shopping district near the University of Colorado in Boulder. Law enforcement officials discovered 14 petrol-filled Molotov cocktails near the suspect’s location, alongside a weed sprayer and a petrol canister found in his vehicle. Soliman reportedly told police he had learned to make the firebombs through YouTube tutorials.

The affidavit also included social media footage showing a shirtless Soliman pacing while holding what appeared to be Molotov cocktails. Upon arrest, the suspect allegedly declared he “wanted to kill all Zionist people and wished they were all dead”.

Local authorities said the attack occurred at the onset of Shavuot, a Jewish religious holiday. Eight people — four men and four women between the ages of 52 and 88 — were hospitalised. The oldest victim, identified as a Holocaust survivor, had fled Europe during World War II, according to Rabbi Yisroel Wilhelm, director of the Chabad centre at the University of Colorado.

Soliman, who resided in Colorado Springs with his wife and five children, reportedly waited until after his daughter’s graduation to carry out the assault. He is currently being held on $10 million bail.

Todd Lyons, acting director of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), disclosed during a press briefing in Boston that Soliman had overstayed a tourist visa and possessed an expired work permit. While federal records did not specify his nationality, the New York Times quoted Department of Homeland Security (DHS) sources identifying him as Egyptian.

A DHS spokesperson said Soliman entered the United States in August 2022 and filed an asylum application the following month. Lyons alleged that the case reflects broader immigration oversight failures: “There are millions of individuals like this that we are attempting to locate from the past administration that weren’t properly screened.”

Former US President Donald Trump was quick to politicise the incident, blaming what he termed President Joe Biden’s “Open Border Policy” for allowing Soliman into the country. “This is yet another example of why we must keep our Borders SECURE, and deport Illegal, Anti-American Radicals from our Homeland,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.

The attack is the latest in a series of violent incidents in the United States amid growing tensions linked to Israel’s ongoing war in Gaza. The Boulder assault came less than a week after a separate incident in Washington, D.C., where a man shouting “Free Palestine” was charged with killing two Israeli embassy staff outside a Jewish museum.

In a statement, federal prosecutors reiterated their commitment to investigating hate crimes and domestic terrorism, saying that “acts of violence motivated by antisemitism and political extremism have no place in a civilised society.”

This is not the first time the city of Boulder has witnessed mass violence. In 2021, ten people, including a police officer, were killed in a mass shooting at a local grocery store.

The FBI’s Denver field office is leading the ongoing investigation, while DHS and Justice Department officials have yet to release further details.