Horror and hypocrisy in the USA

The reaction - or lack thereof - to the murder of three young Muslims in the town of Chapel Hill in North Carolina has caused outrage on social media.

The three, all Palestinian-Americans, were identified as Deah Shaddy Barakat, 23, his wife Yusor Mohammad, 21, and her sister, Razan Mohammad Abu-Salha, 19.

Police were called to a bloc of flats east of the University of North Carolina campus at around 5pm, Tuesday, when they found three people dead at the scene.

The shooter, identified as Craig Stephen Hicks, 46, describes himself as an atheist and regularly condemned all religions on his Facebook. He is being held in Durham County Jail on three counts of first degree murder.

Barakat, an American basketball and football fan, was a dental student. He regularly volunteered for charities working with Syrian and Palestinian refugees as well as homeless people in his area.

Here he is featured in a video for the Refugee Smiles Project where he calls on people to donate money for his trip, along with ten other dentists, to treat Syrian refugees in Turkey.

Barakat and Yusor were reportedly married only six weeks prior to their murder.

Razan had recently started an Architecture and Enviromental Design degree at North Carolina State University. She also ran a blog focused on art and photography.

The shooting was met with an outpouring of anger on social media, where people posted pictures of the victims playing basketball, studying and doing charitable work. Many claimed the victems were targetted because of their religion.