A federal court sentenced a pro-Hamas 35-year-old man to more than 19 years in prison for committing a series of arson and fire bombings at the University of California, Berkeley, and the Oakland federal building last year.

Casey Robert Goonan of Oakland and Pleasant Hill, California, had pleaded guilty to one count of maliciously damaging or destroying property used in or affecting interstate commerce by means of fire or an explosive, a Justice Department statement said.

“At sentencing, the court referred to Goonan as a ’domestic terrorist’ and found that he had committed a felony offense that involved or was intended to promote a federal crime of terrorism,” the U.S. Attorney’s Office of the Northern District of California said.

In addition to those two attacks, the Justice Department said, Goonan set three other fires on the UC Berkeley campus in June 2024.

Goonan said that the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attack against Israel was the inspiration for his behavior.

“Goonan acknowledged that these attacks were inspired by Hamas’s Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, and that he called on others to attack property on Bay Area college campuses in support of Palestine,” the Justice Department said in a statement. “Goonan admitted that his conduct was designed to influence and affect the conduct of governments by intimidation and coercion and to retaliate against the governments of the United States and the State of California for their conduct.”

According to a plea agreement, in the early morning hours of June 1, 2024, Goonan placed a bag with six explosive devices colloquially known as “Molotov cocktails” beneath the fuel tank of a marked University of California Police Department patrol car parked near the UC-Berkeley campus.

He then lit the bag on fire and ran off while the patrol car caught on fire.

Additionally, Goonan attempted to firebomb the Ronald V. Dellums Federal Building and U.S. Courthouse in Oakland on June 11, 2024, the Justice Department said.

Upon his arrival at the federal building, he was carrying a bag with three Molotov cocktails. He threw rocks at a window to smash it so he could throw lit Molotov cocktails inside the facility, but his plan was foiled when protective services officers spotted him and he fled.

Goonan placed the Molotov cocktails in a planter on the side of the building and then ignited them.

In addition to the prison term, the court also ordered Goonan to serve 15 years of supervised release after he is released from custody, and ordered restitution of $94,267 and a $100 special assessment.

President Trump has ordered his Justice Department to crack down on certain violent left-wing individuals and groups as “domestic terrorists.”

He signed an executive order on Monday designating Antifa, the left-wing black-clad protest group that takes its name from “anti-fascist,” as a “terrorist threat.”

• Kerry Picket can be reached at kpicket@washingtontimes.com.