Authorities arrested and charged a Jordanian citizen in connection with an attack on a solar energy facility in Florida. The crime, which reportedly took hours to commit, resulted in over $700,000 in damages. Some solar panels were so severely damaged that they will need to be permanently decommissioned.
Law enforcement officials stated that this attack is part of a broader pattern of violence allegedly carried out by the suspect, 43-year-old Hashem Younis Hashem Hnaihen. In addition to the solar facility attack, Hnaihen is accused of smashing doors and windows at other businesses.
At several of these crime scenes, he reportedly left behind notes expressing anti-Israeli sentiments as his motivation for the crimes, according to officials.
“We allege that the defendant threatened to carry out hate-fueled mass violence in our country, motivated in part by a desire to target businesses for their perceived support of Israel,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement. “Such acts and threats of violence, whether they are targeting the places that Americans frequent every day or our country’s critical infrastructure, are extremely dangerous and will not be tolerated by the Justice Department.”
One of the letters, addressed to the U.S. government, threatened to blow up “everything” in America, with a specific focus on “companies and factories” that support the state of Israel. The suspect now faces multiple charges, including four counts of threats to use explosives and one count of destruction of an energy facility.