Latest news with #JewishCommunityCenter
CTV News
a day ago
- General
- CTV News
Vigil held for victims of Boulder firebombing attack as suspect's family fights deportation
A visitor offers a tribute after leaving a bouquet of flowers at a makeshift memorial for victims of an attack outside of the Boulder County, Colo., courthouse as a light rain falls Tuesday, June 3, 2025, in Boulder, Colo. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski) BOULDER, Colo. — Hundreds of people squeezed into the Jewish Community Center in Boulder, Colorado, for a vigil that featured prayer, singing and emotional testimony from a victim and witnesses of the firebombing attack in the city's downtown, while a federal judge has blocked the deportation of the suspect's family. Mohamed Sabry Soliman, 45, has been charged with a federal hate crime and state counts of attempted murder in Sunday's attack on a group demonstrating for the release of Israeli hostages in Gaza. He is being held in a county jail on a $10 million cash bond and is scheduled to make an appearance in state court on Thursday. Witnesses say Soliman threw two Molotov cocktails at the group and authorities say he confessed to the attack that injured 15 people. Rachelle Halpern, who has been walking with the group since 2023, said during Wednesday evening's vigil that she remembers thinking it was strange to see a man with a canister looking like he was going to spray pesticide on the grass. Then she heard a crash and screams and saw flames around her feet. 'A woman stood one foot behind me, engulfed in flames from head to toe, lying on the ground with her husband,' she said. 'People immediately, three or four men immediately rushed to her to smother the flames.' Her description prompted murmurs from the audience members. One woman's head dropped into her hands. 'I heard a loud noise, and the back of my legs burning, and don't remember those next few moments,' said a victim, who didn't want to be identified and spoke off camera, over the event's speakers. 'Even as I was watching it unfold before my eyes, even then, it didn't seem real.' Defendant's family investigated U.S. District Judge Gordon P. Gallagher on Wednesday granted a request from his wife and five children, who like Soliman are Egyptian, to block their deportation after U.S. immigration officials took them into custody. They have not been charged. Federal authorities have said Soliman has been living in the U.S. illegally, and U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem said Wednesday that the family was being processed for removal. It's rare that a criminal suspect's family members are detained and threatened with deportation. 'It is patently unlawful to punish individuals for the crimes of their relatives,' attorneys for the family wrote in the lawsuit. Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin described the plaintiff's claims as 'absurd' and 'an attempt to delay justice.' She said the entire family was in the country illegally. Soliman's wife, Hayam El Gamal, a 17-year-old daughter, two minor sons and two minor daughters were being held at an immigration detention center in Texas, said Eric Lee, one of the attorney's representing the family. Soliman told authorities that no one, including his family, knew about his planned attack, according to court documents. El Gamal said she was 'shocked' to learn her husband had been arrested in the attack, according to her lawsuit. Victims increase to 15 people and a dog On Wednesday, authorities raised the number of people injured in the attack to 15 from 12, plus a dog. Boulder County officials said in a news release that the victims include eight women and seven men ranging in age from 25 to 88. Details about how the victims were impacted would be explained in criminal charges set to be filed Thursday, according to Boulder County District Attorney's office spokesperson Shannon Carbone. Soliman had planned to kill all of the roughly 20 participants in Sunday's demonstration at the popular Pearl Street pedestrian mall, but he threw just two of his 18 Molotov cocktails while yelling 'Free Palestine,' police said. According to an FBI affidavit, Soliman told police he was driven by a desire 'to kill all Zionist people' — a reference to the movement to establish and protect a Jewish state in Israel. Authorities said he expressed no remorse about the attack. The family's immigration status Before moving to Colorado Springs three years ago, Soliman spent 17 years in Kuwait, according to court documents. Soliman arrived in the U.S. in August 2022 on a tourist visa that expired in February 2023, McLaughlin said in a post on X. She said Soliman filed for asylum in September 2022 and was granted a work authorization in March 2023, but that has also expired. Hundreds of thousands of people overstay their visas each year in the United States, according to Department of Homeland Security reports. Soliman's wife is an Egyptian national, according to her lawsuit. She is a network engineer and has a pending EB-2 visa, which is available to professionals with advanced degrees, the suit said. She and her children all are listed as dependents on Soliman's asylum application. The case against Soliman Soliman told authorities that he had been planning the attack for a year, the affidavit said. Soliman's attorney, Kathryn Herold, declined to comment after a state court hearing Monday. Public defenders' policy prohibits speaking to the media. The attack unfolded against the backdrop of the Israel-Hamas war, which has contributed to a spike in antisemitic violence in the United States. It happened at the beginning of the Jewish holiday of Shavuot and barely a week after a man who also yelled 'Free Palestine' was charged with fatally shooting two Israeli Embassy staffers outside a Jewish museum in Washington. ___ Colleen Slevin, Jesse Bedayn, Rebecca Santana and Hallie Golden, The Associated Press Golden reported from Seattle. Associated Press reporters Eric Tucker in Washington, Heather Hollingsworth in Kansas City, Missouri, Samy Magdy in Cairo, Hannah Schoenbaum in Salt Lake City, Sean Murphy in Oklahoma City contributed to this report.
Washington Post
a day ago
- Washington Post
Vigil held for victims of Boulder firebombing attack as suspect's family fights deportation
BOULDER, Colo. — Hundreds of people squeezed into the Jewish Community Center in Boulder, Colorado, for a vigil that featured prayer, singing and emotional testimony from a victim and witnesses of the firebombing attack in the city's downtown , while a federal judge has blocked the deportation of the suspect's family.
Associated Press
a day ago
- Politics
- Associated Press
Vigil held for victims of Boulder firebombing attack as suspect's family fights deportation
BOULDER, Colo. (AP) — Hundreds of people squeezed into the Jewish Community Center in Boulder, Colorado, for a vigil that featured prayer, singing and emotional testimony from a victim and witnesses of the firebombing attack in the city's downtown, while a federal judge has blocked the deportation of the suspect's family. Mohamed Sabry Soliman, 45, has been charged with a federal hate crime and state counts of attempted murder in Sunday's attack on a group demonstrating for the release of Israeli hostages in Gaza. He is being held in a county jail on a $10 million cash bond and is scheduled to make an appearance in state court on Thursday. Witnesses say Soliman threw two Molotov cocktails at the group and authorities say he confessed to the attack that injured 15 people. Rachelle Halpern, who has been walking with the group since 2023, said during Wednesday evening's vigil that she remembers thinking it was strange to see a man with a canister looking like he was going to spray pesticide on the grass. Then she heard a crash and screams and saw flames around her feet. 'A woman stood one foot behind me, engulfed in flames from head to toe, lying on the ground with her husband,' she said. 'People immediately, three or four men immediately rushed to her to smother the flames.' Her description prompted murmurs from the audience members. One woman's head dropped into her hands. 'I heard a loud noise, and the back of my legs burning, and don't remember those next few moments,' said a victim, who didn't want to be identified and spoke off camera, over the event's speakers. 'Even as I was watching it unfold before my eyes, even then, it didn't seem real.' Defendant's family investigated U.S. District Judge Gordon P. Gallagher on Wednesday granted a request from his wife and five children, who like Soliman are Egyptian, to block their deportation after U.S. immigration officials took them into custody. They have not been charged. Federal authorities have said Soliman has been living in the U.S. illegally, and U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem said Wednesday that the family was being processed for removal. It's rare that a criminal suspect's family members are detained and threatened with deportation. 'It is patently unlawful to punish individuals for the crimes of their relatives,' attorneys for the family wrote in the lawsuit. Department of Homeland Security Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin described the plaintiff's claims as 'absurd' and 'an attempt to delay justice.' She said the entire family was in the country illegally. Soliman's wife, Hayam El Gamal, a 17-year-old daughter, two minor sons and two minor daughters were being held at an immigration detention center in Texas, said Eric Lee, one of the attorney's representing the family. Soliman told authorities that no one, including his family, knew about his planned attack, according to court documents. El Gamal said she was 'shocked' to learn her husband had been arrested in the attack, according to her lawsuit. Victims increase to 15 people and a dog On Wednesday, authorities raised the number of people injured in the attack to 15 from 12, plus a dog. Boulder County officials said in a news release that the victims include eight women and seven men ranging in age from 25 to 88. Details about how the victims were impacted would be explained in criminal charges set to be filed Thursday, according to Boulder County District Attorney's office spokesperson Shannon Carbone. Soliman had planned to kill all of the roughly 20 participants in Sunday's demonstration at the popular Pearl Street pedestrian mall, but he threw just two of his 18 Molotov cocktails while yelling 'Free Palestine,' police said. According to an FBI affidavit, Soliman told police he was driven by a desire 'to kill all Zionist people' — a reference to the movement to establish and protect a Jewish state in Israel. Authorities said he expressed no remorse about the attack. The family's immigration status Before moving to Colorado Springs three years ago, Soliman spent 17 years in Kuwait, according to court documents. Soliman arrived in the U.S. in August 2022 on a tourist visa that expired in February 2023, McLaughlin said in a post on X. She said Soliman filed for asylum in September 2022 and was granted a work authorization in March 2023, but that has also expired. Hundreds of thousands of people overstay their visas each year in the United States, according to Department of Homeland Security reports. Soliman's wife is an Egyptian national, according to her lawsuit. She is a network engineer and has a pending EB-2 visa, which is available to professionals with advanced degrees, the suit said. She and her children all are listed as dependents on Soliman's asylum application. The case against Soliman Soliman told authorities that he had been planning the attack for a year, the affidavit said. Soliman's attorney, Kathryn Herold, declined to comment after a state court hearing Monday. Public defenders' policy prohibits speaking to the media. The attack unfolded against the backdrop of the Israel-Hamas war, which has contributed to a spike in antisemitic violence in the United States. It happened at the beginning of the Jewish holiday of Shavuot and barely a week after a man who also yelled 'Free Palestine' was charged with fatally shooting two Israeli Embassy staffers outside a Jewish museum in Washington. ___ Golden reported from Seattle. Associated Press reporters Eric Tucker in Washington, Heather Hollingsworth in Kansas City, Missouri, Samy Magdy in Cairo, Hannah Schoenbaum in Salt Lake City, Sean Murphy in Oklahoma City contributed to this report.
Nahar Net
23-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Nahar Net
Johansson debuts as a director in Cannes with a comic tale of grief and empathy
by Naharnet Newsdesk 23 May 2025, 16:46 Scarlett Johansson's directorial debut, "Eleanor the Great," stars June Squibb as a 94-year-old woman who, out of grief and loneliness, does a terrible thing. After her best friend (Rita Zohar) dies, Eleanor (Squibb) moves to New York and, after accidentally joining the wrong meeting at the Jewish Community Center, adopts her friend's story of Holocaust survival. The film builds toward a moment where Eleanor could be harshly condemned in a public forum, or not. For Johansson, her movie speaks to the moment. "There's a lack of empathy in the zeitgeist. It's obviously a reaction to a lot of things," says Johansson. "It feels to me like forgiveness feels less possible in the environment we're in." Johansson brought "Eleanor the Great" to the Un Certain Regard sidebar of the Cannes Film Festival this week, unveiling a funny and tender, character-driven, New York-set indie that launches her as a filmmaker. For the 40-year-old star, it's the humble culmination of a dream that's always bounced around in her mind. "It has been for most of my career," Johansson says, meeting at a hotel on the Croisette after a day of junket interviews. "Whether it was reading something and thinking, 'I can envision this in my mind,' or even being on a production and thinking, 'I am directing some elements of this out of necessity.'" Johansson came to Cannes just days after hosting the season finale of "Saturday Night Live," making for a fairly head-spinning week. "It's adding to the surrealistic element of the experience," Johansson says with a smile. In just over a month's time, she'll be back in a big summer movie, "Jurassic World Rebirth." But even that gig is a product of her own interests. Johansson had been a fan of the "Jurassic Park" movies for years, and simply wanted to be a part of it. Following her own instincts, and her willingness to fight for them, has been a regular feature of her career recently. She confronted The Walt Disney Co. over pay during the pandemic release of "Black Widow," and won a settlement. When OpenAI launched a voice system called "Sky" for ChatGPT 4.0 that sounded eerily similar to her own, she got the company to take it down. She's increasingly produced films, including "Eleanor the Great," "Black Widow" and "Fly Me to the Moon." After working with an enviable string of directors such as Jonathan Glazer ("Under the Skin"), Spike Jonze ("Her"), the Coen brothers ("Hail, Caesar!") and Noah Baumbach ("Marriage Story"), she's become a part of Wes Anderson's troupe. After a standout performance in "Asteroid City," she appears in "The Phoenician Scheme," which premiered shortly before "Eleanor the Great" in Cannes. "At some point, I worked enough that I stopped worrying about not working, or not being relevant — which is very liberating," Johansson says. "I think it's something all actors feel for a long time until they don't. I would not have had the confidence to direct this film 10 years ago." "Which isn't to say that I don't often think many times: What the hell am I doing?" she adds. "I have that feeling, still. Certainly doing 'Jurassic,' I had many moments where I was like: Am I the right person for this? Is this working? But I just recently saw it and the movie works." So does "Eleanor the Great," which Sony Pictures Classics will release at some future date. That's owed significantly to the performance of Squibb, who, at 95, experienced a Cannes standing ovation alongside Johansson. "Something I'll never forget is holding June in that moment," says Johansson. "The pureness of her joy and her presence in that moment was very touching, I think for everyone in theater. Maybe my way of processing it, too, is through June. It makes it less personal because it's hard for me to absorb it all." Some parts of "Eleanor the Great" have personal touches, though. After one character says he lives in Staten Island, Squibb's character retorts, "My condolences." "Yeah, I had to apologize to my in-laws for that," Johansson, who is married to Staten Island native Colin Jost, said laughing. "I was like: Believe it not, I didn't write that line." A poster for the 1999 documentary about underground cartoonist R. Crumb, "Crumb," also hangs on the wall in one scene, a vague reference, Johansson acknowledges, to her loosely connected 2001 breakthrough film "Ghost World." "I was very young when I made that movie. I think I was 15, and the character is supposed to be 18 or 19. When I was a teenager, I often played characters who were a bit older than myself," Johansson says. "Even doing 'Lost in Translation,' I think I was 17 when I made it. I think I was playing someone in their mid-20s." "It's a funny thing," she says. "I wonder sometimes if it then feels like I've been around so long, that people expect me to be in my 70s now."
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First Post
23-05-2025
- Entertainment
- First Post
Scarlett Johansson debuts as a director in Cannes with a comic tale of grief and empathy
Johansson brought 'Eleanor the Great' to the Un Certain Regard sidebar of the Cannes Film Festival this week, unveiling a funny and tender, character-driven, New York-set indie that launches her as a filmmaker read more Scarlett Johansson's directorial debut, 'Eleanor the Great,' stars June Squibb as a 94-year-old woman who, out of grief and loneliness, does a terrible thing. After her best friend (Rita Zohar) dies, Eleanor (Squibb) moves to New York and, after accidentally joining the wrong meeting at the Jewish Community Center, adopts her friend's story of Holocaust survival. The film builds toward a moment where Eleanor could be harshly condemned in a public forum, or not. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD For Johansson, her movie speaks to the moment. 'There's a lack of empathy in the zeitgeist. It's obviously a reaction to a lot of things,' says Johansson. 'It feels to me like forgiveness feels less possible in the environment we're in.' Johansson brought 'Eleanor the Great' to the Un Certain Regard sidebar of the Cannes Film Festival this week, unveiling a funny and tender, character-driven, New York-set indie that launches her as a filmmaker. For the 40-year-old star, it's the humble culmination of a dream that's always bounced around in her mind. 'It has been for most of my career,' Johansson says, meeting at a hotel on the Croisette after a day of junket interviews. 'Whether it was reading something and thinking, 'I can envision this in my mind,' or even being on a production and thinking, 'I am directing some elements of this out of necessity.'' Johansson came to Cannes just days after hosting the season finale of 'Saturday Night Live,' making for a fairly head-spinning week. 'It's adding to the surrealistic element of the experience,' Johansson says with a smile. In just over a month's time, she'll be back in a big summer movie, 'Jurassic World Rebirth.' But even that gig is a product of her own interests. Johansson had been a fan of the 'Jurassic Park' movies for years, and simply wanted to be a part of it. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD Following her own instincts, and her willingness to fight for them, has been a regular feature of her career recently. She confronted The Walt Disney Co. over pay during the pandemic release of 'Black Widow,' and won a settlement. When OpenAI launched a voice system called 'Sky' for ChatGPT 4.0 that sounded eerily similar to her own, she got the company to take it down. She's increasingly produced films, including 'Eleanor the Great,' 'Black Widow' and 'Fly Me to the Moon.' After working with an enviable string of directors such as Jonathan Glazer ('Under the Skin'), Spike Jonze ('Her'), the Coen brothers ('Hail, Caesar!') and Noah Baumbach ('Marriage Story'), she's become a part of Wes Anderson's troupe. After a standout performance in 'Asteroid City,' she appears in 'The Phoenician Scheme,' which premiered shortly before 'Eleanor the Great' in Cannes. 'At some point, I worked enough that I stopped worrying about not working, or not being relevant — which is very liberating,' Johansson says. 'I think it's something all actors feel for a long time until they don't. I would not have had the confidence to direct this film 10 years ago.' STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD 'Which isn't to say that I don't often think many times: What the hell am I doing?' she adds. 'I have that feeling, still. Certainly doing 'Jurassic,' I had many moments where I was like: Am I the right person for this? Is this working? But I just recently saw it and the movie works.' So does 'Eleanor the Great,' which Sony Pictures Classics will release at some future date. That's owed significantly to the performance of Squibb, who, at 95, experienced a Cannes standing ovation alongside Johansson. 'Something I'll never forget is holding June in that moment,' says Johansson. 'The pureness of her joy and her presence in that moment was very touching, I think for everyone in theater. Maybe my way of processing it, too, is through June. It makes it less personal because it's hard for me to absorb it all.' Some parts of 'Eleanor the Great' have personal touches, though. After one character says he lives in Staten Island, Squibb's character retorts, 'My condolences.' STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD 'Yeah, I had to apologize to my in-laws for that,' Johansson, who is married to Staten Island native Colin Jost, said laughing. 'I was like: Believe it not, I didn't write that line.' A poster for the 1999 documentary about underground cartoonist R. Crumb, 'Crumb,' also hangs on the wall in one scene, a vague reference, Johansson acknowledges, to her loosely connected 2001 breakthrough film 'Ghost World.' 'I was very young when I made that movie. I think I was 15, and the character is supposed to be 18 or 19. When I was a teenager, I often played characters who were a bit older than myself,' Johansson says. 'Even doing 'Lost in Translation,' I think I was 17 when I made it. I think I was playing someone in their mid-20s.' 'It's a funny thing,' she says. 'I wonder sometimes if it then feels like I've been around so long, that people expect me to be in my 70s now.' STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD
