In an interview with 9News last summer ahead of the June 30 primary election, Democratic candidate for Colorado’s Congressional District 1 Melat Kiros told Kyle Clark would not describe the June 1, 2025 firebombing in Boulder as anti-Semitic.
The firebombing, which targeted Boulder Run For Their Lives, which raised awareness of the hostages still being held in Gaza at the time, took the life of Karen Diamond, 82, and seriously injured others.
In subsequent interviews, such as recently with Politico and Denver7, Kiros describes the attack as political and perpetrated on and impacting Jewish people, but will not call it anti-Semitic.
Kiros has not responded to the IJN’s requests for interview or comment or participated in a Jewish public forum. She says that she has spoken privately with Jewish community leaders.
One of those leaders is Brandon Rattiner, senior director of the JCRC. This week the IJN asked Rattiner about his conversations with Kiros, and whether Kiros is open to why a lot of what she says is very troubling to Jewish people.
Rattiner replied:
“The conversations that we’ve had have been honest and difficult.
“I don’t think anybody is hiding their thoughts.
“The core challenge is there’s just a huge disagreement at the center of all of these conversations about a lot of different things — about Israel’s behavior, about the root causes of anti-Semitism, about the way in which her rhetoric lands and where her responsibilities lie. So it’s hard.
“I’m grateful that we want to stay in conversation, but I’d be lying if I said I saw the conversations producing much better results.
“Melat seems interested in learning and hearing why her comments and her rhetoric are harmful [and] are being heard by so many in the Jewish community as harmful. But at the end of the day, I don’t know if that kind of personal testimony is enough to really change her behavior given all of the other people in her ear.
“She is surrounded by anti-Zionist Jews. And I have told her consistently that she has a responsibility to hear from more mainstream voices.
“Not to say that these aren’t Jewish people, and they’re her constituents, but she has a fundamental responsibility to understand our community beyond just those fringe members whose opinions are closer to hers.
“She’s certainly surrounded herself with an unrepresentative slice of Jews that tell her unrepresentative thoughts about the Jewish community.
“She has a responsibility to do better and to hear from more representative voices in order to make sure that she’s fulfilling her responsibility of keeping Jews safe.”
The IJN reached out to survivors of the June 1, 2025 attack to gain their perspective on Kiros’ comments.
Michelle Goldman wrote to the IJN from Israel, where she travelled to vote in the Oct. 27 elections.
She is the daughter of the late Jack Goldman, a photographer and artist who survived the Holocaust and was liberated from Dachau by Coloradan Gen. Felix Sparks:
Unlike my previous visits here after Oct. 7, 2023, I have been able to “play tourist” this time. I’ve spent more time in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv than during those trips, which were first impacted by the war, then by Gaza and southern Lebanon. Then because of Iran.
Jerusalem as we know is synonymous with Zion. When my sister and I went to the Kotel (Western Wall) and read the passages in our liturgy, especially during the Amidah (Silent Prayer), we both felt the intensity of the words connecting us to Zion.
There is no Jew without Zion and Zion exists for the Jews.
To claim that the attacker attacked Zionists but was not anti-Semitic is impossible since the two are virtually the same.
One of my father’s sculptures about the Shoah included the words in Hebrew, “If I forget Jerusalem, may my right hand forget how to function.”
We are who we are. Others cannot define us.
I grew up in Colorado’s First Congressional District and would not support Melat today if she cannot admit the Boulder attacker’s actions were anti-Semitic.
Jean Unger:
I cannot presume to understand why Kiros is insisting that the June 1 attack was politically motivated rather than what it so clearly was: an act of violent, hateful anti-Semitism.
For someone running for office in Colorado — the very state where this horrific attack took place — to characterize the attack on a predominantly Jewish group peacefully walking to raise awareness for the hostages in Gaza in this way is deeply hurtful and dismissive of the victims and everyone affected.
At best, this reflects a troubling misinterpretation of what happened. At worst, it risks excusing or minimizing an act of anti-Semitic violence.
Perhaps Kiros should have taken the time to speak directly with those of us affected, to listen to our experiences and to express genuine concern before offering a public narrative about the attack.
Instead, her characterization raises serious questions about whether the truth and the pain of the victims are being subordinated to political interests.
Anti-Semitism should be named for what it is, not reframed for political convenience.
The victims and those affected deserve compassion, honesty and accountability — not a narrative that diminishes the nature of the violence they endured.
Natalya Reznik:
Calling the attack political means spreading and propagating the rhetoric of the terrorist, which in turn means siding with the murderer as opposed to siding with the victims.
Blaming Israel for the attack is a manifest of classic anti-Semitism, since it assumes some collective Jewish guilt and responsibility.
There’s a glaring contradiction in the refusal to call the attack anti-Semitic and blaming Israel for it.
A group of mostly Jews was attacked because it mostly consisted of Jews, so it was anti-Semitic.
You can only blame some other Jews for it if you are an anti-Semite yourself.
Ed Victor:
IJN: What is your response to Kiros not calling the June 1, 2025 firebombing anti-Semitic?
Ed Victor: Kiros is trying to parse that the act on the Pearl Street Mall was not anti-Semitic. That’s her opinion, as opposed to the people who were there.
I think it’s better that when people try to parse anti-Zionism, anti-Semitism, they should ask the people who are involved and not try to make those decisions themselves.
Has there been any outreach from Kiros to you to engage on this?
Certainly not to me.
When someone says “Free Palestine,” what I hear is, “kill the Jews.”
Somebody else might hear it differently or think differently, but if you’re Jewish, how do you hear it? What does it mean to you?
Ask us. We’ll tell you.
Why, when you hear that phrase, do you hear, “kill the Jews?”
I’ll say it specifically and generally. Specifically, it was [the June 1, 2025] perpetrator’s intent.
He was there to kill the Jews. He had 16 firebombs. One person died.
He meant to kill us all. That was the intent. When people [say] “Free Palestine” or “From the River to the Sea,” the State of Israel is there.
Almost half the world’s population of Jews is there. I hear: Remove the Jews from that area by any means possible.
When I think about Iran and burning American and Israeli flags, it’s not a peace-loving community. Their goal is to destroy Israel and kill the Jews.
I don’t see why we’re trying to parse it when we see what the intent is.
© IJN 2026
