At first, Hakeim Abu Khdeir was furious.

On Oct. 1, 2024, Abu Khdeir recalled, he received a package at his corner store in Baltimore that he did not order. It was a green T-shirt for the Israeli Defense Forces. He thought someone was playing a joke on him.

As a Palestinian American, he said, the T-shirt felt like a personal attack on his identity, as war raged in the Middle East.

The next day, Abu Khdeir received another package. It contained two toy pagers — one green, and one pink — a reference to a strike that Israeli forces carried out through pagers in Syria and Lebanon against members of the Hezbollah militant group.

“These items just weren’t random objects,” Abu Khdeir said. “They were meant to cause harm and fear.”

The FBI and Baltimore Police investigated the packages, and law enforcement later arrested a man: Jeffrey Kopszywa, a customer and U.S. Marine Corps veteran who served from 2000 to 2004. He recently pleaded guilty in the case, marking the first time prosecutors in Baltimore secured a conviction for a relatively new hate crime.

Abu Khdeir, 35, of Baltimore, said he’s moving forward. But what happened, he said, is larger than just him.

“I think there’s a lot of Palestinian hate going on right now,” he said. “I’m not even the only one.”

Tensions over conflict felt in Baltimore area

The conflict in Gaza was sparked on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas militants crossed into southern Israel, killed more than 1,000 Israelis and took another 250 hostage. Israel responded with retaliatory air strikes and an offensive in Gaza, a 25-mile stretch of coastal land that borders Israel and Egypt.

Since the war started, the Gaza Health Ministry reports, at least 48,981 Palestinian civilians and combatants have been killed.

A two-month ceasefire was shattered this week when Israel restarted air strikes and launched what it called a “limited ground operation” in northern Gaza. Israel said would intensify attacks until roughly two dozen remaining hostages were freed. Health authorities in Gaza reported that at least 436 people, mostly women and children, have been killed since the air strikes resumed.

Tensions over the conflict in Gaza have reverberated in the Baltimore area since the war began.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR, documented 413 cases of anti-Muslim and anti-Palestinian complaints, incidents and requests for assistance in Maryland in the first six months of 2024.

“This particular incident is reflective of a much broader trend of hatred, bias, intolerance, targeting Muslims, Arabs and those advocating for Palestinian human rights, within our state,” said Zainab Chaudry, CAIR’s Maryland director.

CAIR called for an investigation into the T-shirt and toy pagers and welcomed the arrest.

At the same time, Chaudry said, the group is struggling with what it believes is drastic underreporting of these incidents.

The council, she said, has anecdotally found community members believe if they come forward nothing will happen. They lack trust in the investigatory process, she said, and fear retaliation.

“It’s challenging,” Chaudry said. “But we’re just going to keep on trying to get that message out there.”

“Our communities deserve the right to justice just as much as every community,” she added.

Meanwhile, the Anti-Defamation League reported that the number of antisemitic incidents in Maryland climbed from 109 in 2022 to 339 in 2023 — an increase of more than 221%.

The group previously cited a surge in organized white supremacist propaganda along with an increase in incidents at public schools and on college campuses.

Before he received the T-shirt and toy pagers, Abu Khdeir said his business had been targeted in the past with constant prank phone calls from an untraceable number.

Sometimes, Abu Khdeir said, he’d receive up to 100 of those calls per day.

Abu Khdeir learned another business owner, who is Jewish, was receiving similar calls at his store. People had been throwing food containers at that shop with racist and incoherent messages written on them including, “The Clowns =) are coming!!”

Police reported that a yellow toy pager was attached to the mailbox of that business, too.

‘What transpired was very hurtful and scary’

On Feb. 11, Kopszywa, 42, of Baltimore, pleaded guilty in Baltimore Circuit Court to the use of an item or a symbol to threaten or intimidate and was sentenced to three years in prison, suspending all but time served, plus five years’ supervised probation.

He spent three months and 17 days in jail.

As part of the plea agreement, Kopszywa is required to undergo alcohol and mental health screening and treatment. He’s neither allowed within 100 feet of the store nor permitted to have contact with the owner.

Del. Mark Chang and then-state Sen. Sarah Elfreth, both Democrats from Anne Arundel County, sponsored legislation in 2020 that created the crime of use of an item or a symbol to threaten or intimidate. It’s a misdemeanor that carries a maximum sentence of three years in prison.

Chang testified before the House Judiciary Committee about how his family in the 1980s was targeted with a cat hanging from a noose.

“If injustice happens to me, it’s happening to other people out there,” Chang testified. “And that’s our job, is to fight for people who can’t fight for themselves.”

Elfreth has since been elected to represent Maryland’s 3rd Congressional District.

The law was enacted without the signature of Gov. Larry Hogan, a Republican. The measure took effect on Oct. 1, 2020.

The case against Kopszywa marked only the second time the crime had been charged in Baltimore.

“This is obviously a different kind of case than we normally have in this courthouse,” Assistant State’s Attorney Justin Dickman said in court.

“The state’s very concerned with the events that occurred,” he added. “What transpired was very hurtful and scary.”

Kopszywa did not have a prior criminal record, Dickman said. He stated that heavily factored into the plea agreement.

Abu Khdeir delivered a victim impact statement in which he spoke about how the T-shirt and toy pagers were “deliberate, premeditated threats meant to make me feel unsafe in my own business and home.”

“The calculated nature of these actions show the clear intent to harass, intimidate and terrorize me,” Abu Khdeir said.

He called for accountability. But Abu Khdeir said he held no ill-will toward Kopszywa and wished him the best.

At one point, Kopszywa interrupted him and stated, “Objection. That’s a lie.” During the hearing, Kopszywa also laughed.

Later, Kopszywa called the prosecution a travesty and stated he did not have a motive to commit the crime.

“I don’t care if it came from my Amazon account, or if my account was charged, at all,” Kopszywa said. “You cannot prove that my account was not hacked or somebody else used my funds.”

Kopszywa said he’s unemployed and suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder. He deployed in 2001 to Afghanistan, and in 2003 to Iraq. The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, he said, assigned him a 100% disability rating.

“There is not an ounce of hate in my body,” Kopszywa said.

Circuit Judge Martin H. Schreiber II remarked that he was faced with a “very strange situation.”

“On the one hand, we’ve got a crime with an actual flesh-and-blood victim whose testimony is moving,” Schreiber said. “Anybody who heard it, their heart would go out to him and his family.”

A lot of crimes, he said, do not have an “identifiable victim.”

“On the other side, we’ve got the defendant, who but for this incident, seems to have had a lot of good characteristics and things that should be considered,” Schreiber said. “Not least of all is having been a combat veteran in the Middle East.”

Schreiber told Abu Khdeir that “it’s a shame you were subjected to mistreatment.”

“I’m just sorry that this happened,” Schreiber said. “It’s sad to see.”

‘I’m already moving forward’

Reflecting on the case, Abu Khdeir said he feels Kopszywa should have received the maximum sentence.

In a statement, Baltimore State’s Attorney Ivan Bates said, “Justice demands that every act of hate be met with accountability.”

Prosecutors, he said, “must evaluate and pursue charges based on specific elements that must be supported by evidence and proven beyond a reasonable doubt.”

Though Bates said the plea agreement did not call for any additional incarceration, he noted Kopszywa is required to undergo a mental health evaluation.

“Baltimore is a diverse and vibrant city, and hate has no place here,” Bates said. “Moving forward, we will continue pursuing justice while balancing accountability and fairness.”

At the time, Abu Khdeir did not object to the plea agreement, Bates said.

Abu Khdeir said is not what’s important. Instead, he said, it’s crucial to raise awareness about the injustices happening in Gaza and the West Bank.

Since the war began in Gaza, at least 48,981 Palestinian civilians and combatants have been killed. Meanwhile, about 1,200 people were killed in Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, after Hamas launched a terrorist attack. Another 407 soldiers have since died in the conflict.

“I hope he can move forward,” Abu Khdeir said of Kopszywa, “because I’m already moving forward from it.”

Abu Khdeir reiterated that he wishes Kopszywa the best.