An Ohio State University student sent eleven faculty and students to the hospital on Monday after ramming his car into passersby and stabbing nearby pedestrians until a university police shot him.  The student, later identified as Abdul Artan, intentionally crashed his car into a busy sidewalk along the campus, and immediately began stabbing pedestrians with a butcher knife.

  Alan Horujko is the campus police credited with killing the armed assailant after Artan refused to drop his knife.  Though the suspect was shot within a minute of the attack, the Ohio State University campus remained under lockdown for ninety minutes as students anticipated the attacker to have a gun.   Tommy Kwon (9) reflected on the incident and said, “It must have been scary for the students and staff, especially coming right back from Thanksgiving break.”

  The authorities quickly concluded that the attack was deliberate and are now investigating the slain attacker’s motives.  Investigators are looking to see if the incident was an act of terrorism. Though there is no concrete evidence of Artan’s association with the extremist group, the Islamic State posted on social media updates of the attack.  

  According to the New York Times, earlier in the year, the campus newspaper, The Lantern, interviewed Artan, in which he expressed his concerns over the growing Islamophobia in the United States.  He said, “If people look at me, a Muslim praying, I don’t know what they’re going to think”. Emily Matsui (11) believed that “though people are especially scared because of [Artan’s] possible connection to the Islamic State, the panic could also be due to his religion.”                                                  

  Authorities are now waiting on a search warrant to investigate further on whether Artan was connected to a bigger motive for the interests of the Islamic State. The six people hit by the car and the five with stab wounds have been treated at nearby hospitals, and all are expected to survive the attack.

*Update: As of Tuesday, ISIS has claimed responsibility for the attack at Ohio State University.  The terrorist group is called Artan a “soldier” of the Islamic State.