Man suffers severe burn injuries after self-immolation protest outside Israeli consulate in Boston
Matt Nelson was rushed to the hospital with severe burn wounds after setting himself on fire outside the Israeli consulate in Boston Wednesday night, in protest of the Israel-Hamas war. (Lokman Vural Elibol/Anadolu via Getty Images)
(JTA) — A man was rushed to the hospital with severe burn wounds after setting himself on fire outside the Israeli consulate in Boston.
Matt Nelson said in a video he uploaded to YouTube before arriving at the location that he was about to engage in an “extreme act of protest” due to “the ongoing genocide in Gaza.”
Nelson’s identity and motive were not immediately apparent following the incident, which took place Wednesday evening. The video surfaced on Friday.
The incident marks at least the third instance of self-immolation in the United States outside of an Israeli consulate or embassy in protest of Israel’s military campaign in Gaza.
In late February, Aaron Bushnell, a U.S. airman wearing his military uniform, died after setting himself on fire outside the Israeli Embassy in Washington, D.C. Bushnell uploaded a since-removed video to the video game streaming platform Twitch declaring his views on the war and saying he “will no longer be complicit in genocide.”
Bushnell’s death came nearly three months after a still-unknown protester engaged in a similar act at the Israeli consulate in Atlanta, where she suffered critical injuries.
Security camera footage from Boston shows Nelson pacing backwards and forwards outside a hotel near the consulate before pouring gasoline on himself and setting himself on fire, local station NBC10 reported. Witnesses then ran over to help put out the fire.
Suffering from severe burn wounds, Nelson was then transported by ambulance to Massachusetts General Hospital, according to a police report. A spokesperson for the Boston Police Department declined to comment further on the case, saying only that it was an “active investigation.”
Neither the Suffolk County District Attorney’s Office in Massachusetts nor the Israeli consulate in Boston immediately responded to a request for comment.
In his video, Nelson said he specifically sought to end U.S. arms sales to Israel and to back a potential International Criminal Court case against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“The protest I’m about to engage in is a call to our government to stop supplying Israel with the money and weapons it uses to imprison and murder innocent Palestinians, to pressure Israel to end the genocide in Gaza and to support the ICC indictment of Benjamin Netanyahu and other members of the Israeli government,” he said.
“I urge any of you who are of the same mind to call your senators and representatives and demand that they introduce and advance legislation to achieve these goals. If sitting lawmakers won’t, vote for those who will,” Nelson added.
He concluded, “A democracy is supposed to serve the will of the people, not the interests of the wealthy. Take the power back. Free Palestine.”
Bushnell has emerged as a folk hero for some pro-Palestinian activists. Nelson, too, was drawing support in some corners after his identification on Friday, with social media posts amplifying his comments and responses praising his actions.
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