The US Air Force officer who set himself on fire outside the Israeli embassy in DC has been identified as 25-year-old Aaron Bushnell. He passed away on Sunday after being rushed to a hospital due to his "life-threatening injuries". According to his now memorialised LinkedIn profile, Bushnell was an "aspiring software engineer" who had a "talent and passion for solving complex problems with code."
He was "pursuing a Bachelor's degree in Software Engineering from Western Governor's University, and have taken several supplementary classes in software development outside of college." He went on to share the he was passionate about writing software and couldn't wait to "help drive innovation in the civilian world."
Bushnell was in the US Air Force for three years, graduating from the top of his class in 2020 from Basic and Technical Training. He then went on to work with IT Infrastructure Monitoring and Oversight, before eventually landing his current position as a DevOps Engineer in San Antonio, Texas.
Raised in a seemingly devout Christian family, Bushnell even worked for Paraclete Press (a Christian publisher in Massachusetts) in IT and web development - a company that his mom, Danielle, currently works at as a Purchaser and Contracts Administrator. Looking at his Facebook account, it was found that Bushnell followed Kent State University Students for Justice in Palestine group - it was not mentioned on his LinkedIn that he attended said school.
On the day of the incident, Bushnell had posted a final message on Facebook, writing: "Many of us like to ask ourselves, 'What would I do if I was alive during slavery? Or the Jim Crow South? Or apartheid? What would I do if my country was committing genocide?' The answer is, you're doing it. Right now."
A video was later posted showing Bushnell's protest which IBT has deemed too graphic to show. In said video, Bushnell introduces himself and said that he would no longer be "complicit in genocide" - citing U.S. support for Israel's actions in Gaza as the reason for his "extreme act of protest". He goes on to say that his act was not "extreme at all" in comparison to what people have been experiencing in Palestine at the hands of their colonisers..."
