Vandals target Seattle synagogue

Vandals target Seattle synagogue

SEATTLE

Police say a Seattle synagogue in the Capitol Hill neighborhood was vandalized with anti-Semitic Holocaust-denying graffiti.

The Seattle Times reported that a police officer discovered the spray-painted message Friday morning on an exterior wall of Temple De Hirsch Sinai.

Rabbi Daniel Weiner said the message reads “The Holocaust is fake history.” The “s” characters in the graffiti are dollar signs.

Weiner said it “really is a toxic mix of Holocaust denial, the stereotypical charge that Jews are obsessed with money, and the notion coming from the [President Donald Trump] administration that all facts are fungible, fake facts, fake history.”

Police search for motorcyclists who beat Uber driver

SAN FRANCISCO

Police are searching for as many as 15 men on motorcycles and all-terrain vehicles who pummeled an Uber driver after surrounding his vehicle on a San Francisco freeway this week.

The San Francisco Chronicle reported Thursday that police want help from the public to identify suspects.

The attack occurred just after 6 p.m. Wednesday on Highway 101 when the Uber driver’s white Toyota stopped on the highway for unknown reasons and the group of men surrounded it.

Official: Russian ambassador died from heart attack

NEW YORK

Russia’s ambassador to the United Nations, who collapsed in his office last month, died from a heart attack, and no foul play is suspected, according to a senior city official briefed by the medical examiner’s office.

The official was not authorized to reveal the cause of death for Ambassador Vitaly Churkin and spoke to The Associated Press on the condition of anonymity Friday after the medical examiner’s office, citing diplomatic protocol, said it was instructed not to publicly release the cause of death.

Orlando judge revokes bond for wife of shooter

ORLANDO, Fla.

A federal judge in Orlando on Friday revoked bond for the wife of the gunman responsible for the Pulse nightclub massacre, the worst mass shooting in modern U.S. history.

U.S. District Judge Paul Byron reversed the decision of a magistrate judge in Oakland, Calif., last week to release Noor Salman on $500,000 bond and ordered her jailed pending trial on charges of aiding and abetting and obstruction. Acting upon a request from prosecutors, Byron said Salman hadn’t overcome a legal presumption that she was a flight risk or a danger to the community.

Archaeologists discover massive statue in Cairo slum

CAIRO

Archaeologists in Egypt discovered a massive statue in a Cairo slum that may be of Ramses II, one of the country’s most famous and longest-ruling ancient pharaohs.

The colossus, a large portion of whose head was pulled from mud and groundwater by a bulldozer and seen by The Associated Press on Friday, is about 26 feet high and was discovered by a German-Egyptian archaeological team.

“We used the bulldozer to lift it out. We took some precautions, although somewhat primitive, but the part that we retrieved was not harmed,” said Khaled Mohamed Abuelela, manager of antiquities at Ain Shams University.

Associated Press