An Illinois man was sentenced to 53 years in prison on Friday for the murder of a six-year-old Palestinian-American boy in an attack deemed an anti-Muslim hate crime linked to the Israel-Hamas war.
Joseph Czuba, 73, was convicted in February of fatally stabbing WadeaAl-Fayoumi and attacking the boy’s mother, Hanan Shaheen.
Joseph Czuba, 73, was convicted in February of fatally stabbing WadeaAl-Fayoumi and attacking the boy’s mother, Hanan Shaheen.
Czuba was the family’s landlord and the attack took place a week after the start of the Israel-Hamas war in October 2023.
Wadea was stabbed 26 times and a serrated military knife with a 15-cm (six-inch) blade was removed from the child’s abdomen during the autopsy.
Shaheen and Czuba’s now ex-wife, Mary, testified that he targeted the Muslim family after becoming agitated about the conflict in Gaza, media reported.
A jury deliberated for just over an hour before finding Czuba guilty of first-degree murder, attempted murder and two counts of a hate crime.
Judge Amy Bertani-Tomczak sentenced Czuba to 30 years in prison for Wadea’s murder, 20 years for the attack on his mother and three years for the hate crimes, to be served consecutively, the Chicago Sun Times reported.
During sentencing, the boy’s great-uncle Mahmoud Yousef asked Czuba why he did it but received no response, the newspaper said.
“We want to know what made him do this,” Yousef told the judge.
According to the Will County Sheriff’s Office, the victims were targeted “due to them being Muslim and the ongoing Middle Eastern conflict involving Hamas and the Israelis.”
Joe Biden, then the US president, condemned the attack as a “horrific act of hate” that “has no place in America.”
