One of the three Palestinian students injured in a shooting in Vermont may never walk again after taking a bullet to the spine.
Hisham Awartani and his friends Kinnan Abdalhamid and Tahseen Ali Ahmed, all 20 years old, were shot while walking to Thanksgiving dinner in Burlington on 25 November. The attack is being probed as a hate crime following the arrest of suspect Jason Eaton.
Mr Awartani’s mother Elizabeth Price gave a heartbreaking interview to ABC News on Monday, recounting the moment she learned about the shooting and how her son is coping as he remains in the intensive care unit at the University of Vermont Medical Center.
“My brother called me in the middle of the night,” Ms Price recalled. “He told me [Mr Awartani] was in the hospital and that he had been shot. I was stunned.”
Ms Price then told her husband and the parents of the two other men, Mr Abdalhamid and Mr Ahmed, about the incident. All three had been staying with her brother, Rich Price, over Thanksgiving weekend to celebrate the holiday.
“To think these two boys, the children of my two friends, had been hurt while with my family, it was terrible,” she said.
Mr Awartani, a 20-year-old mathematics and archaeology student at Brown University, has a long road to recovery. Doctors believe it’s unlikely that he’ll be able to use his legs again, his mother told NPR. The student has a bullet embedded in his spine.
He’s expected to remain in the ICU for another week and will then be moved to a spinal injury ward for a month, before starting several months of physical therapy.
“He’s confronting a life of disability, a potentially irreversible change to his life and what it means for his future,” she said.
The mother told NPR that both she and her husband decided to keep their son in the US instead of bringing him home over Christmas break, considering the safety concerns regarding the ongoing war between Israel and Hamas.
“My husband is so bitter,” the woman told the outlet. “He thought my son would be safe in Burlington.”
Her son suffered the most severe injuries, she said. One of the students who had a superficial wound has been released from the hospital. Another one will be in the ICU for the time being, she said, without distinguishing the injuries of each of the men.
Ms Price plans to arrive in the US on Wednesday afternoon. She and her husband will be leaving their home in the West Bank, crossing into Jordan and boarding a flight. The couple also has a daughter, who will remain in the West Bank, the outlet reported.
The students have received an outpouring of support and well wishes since officials released information about the Saturday night shooting.
Staff members at Brown University went to visit Mr Awartani in Burlington to offer their condolences following the incident.
During a campus vigil on Monday evening, Beshara Douman, a history professor at the school, read aloud a statement Mr Awartani provided for the event.
“It’s important to recognize that this is part of the larger story,” Mr Awartani wrote, according to The Brown Daily Herald.
“This hideous crime did not happen in a vacuum. As much as I appreciate and love every single one of you here today, I am but one casualty in this much wider conflict.
“Had I been shot in the West Bank, where I grew up, the medical services that saved my life here would likely have been withheld by the Israeli army.
“The soldier who shot me would go home and never be convicted,” he said.
“I understand that the pain is so much more real and immediate because many of you know me, but any attack like this is horrific, be it here or in Palestine.
“This is why when you say your wishes and light your candles today, your mind should not just be focused on me as an individual, but rather as a proud member of a people being oppressed.”
At least 14,800 Palestinians have been killed in the war which began on 7 October, after Hamas launched a series of attacks in Israel, killing roughly 1,200 individuals, mostly civilians.
The suspect in the shooting, Jason J Eaton, 48, has been charged with three counts of second-degree attempted murder, a felony in Vermont. He’s currently being held in jail without bond. If convicted, he faces a maximum of life imprisonment.
