A woman whose 6-year-old son was fatally stabbed in an attack that prosecutors say was motivated by hate said her son watched in fear as she was stabbed.

The mother of a 6-year-old Palestinian American boy killed in October 2023 in Illinois in a stabbing that authorities called a hate crime testified on Tuesday that her son's alleged attacker said they must die because they were Muslims.

Hanan Shaheen was the first witness called to testify in the trial of Joseph Czuba, the Plainfield landlord charged with attacking her and killing her 6-year-old son, Wadee Al Fayoumi.