On New Year’s Day, a truck rammed into a crowd in New Orleans, killing at least 14 people and injuring dozens more. The suspect, identified as 42-year-old Shamsud Din Jabbar, a United States citizen and Army veteran, was apprehended and killed on the scene of the attack, after firing on law enforcement. The night before, he recorded a video message for his family informing them he had joined ISIS – whose flag he carried in the truck.
The same day, Matthew Livelsberger, an active-duty US Army Green Beret soldier, blew up a Tesla Cybertruck outside the Trump International Las Vegas hotel, injuring seven people. He was found dead inside the vehicle, a gun at his feet, having died by suicide shortly before the blast.
Though both men had served in the military and deployed to Afghanistan, the Pentagon press secretary said there was no evidence of overlap between the two incidents, which are both still under investigation by the FBI. Yet both cases indicate common problems facing the US military today.
