Israel warns Syria against attacks on Golan

Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, center, attends the weekly cabinet meeting in Jerusalem, Israel, on Sunday, May 19, 2013. Netanyahu, whose air force struck suspected weapons shipments to Hezbollah from Damascus twice this month, warned at a weekly Cabinet meeting Sunday that Israel is prepared for any eventuality in Syria. (AP Photo/Ronen Zvulun, Pool)

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli and Syrian troops exchanged fire across their tense cease-fire line in the Golan Heights on Tuesday, prompting an Israeli threat that Syria's leader will "bear the consequences" of further escalation and raising new concerns that the civil war there could explode into a region-wide conflict.

The incident marked the first time the Syrian army has acknowledged firing intentionally at Israeli troops since the civil war erupted more than two years ago. President Bashar Assad's regime appears to be trying to project toughness in response to three Israeli airstrikes near Damascus in recent months.

In the exchange, an Israeli jeep came under fire during an overnight patrol in the Golan Heights, a strategic plateau which Israelcaptured from Syria in 1967 and later annexed. Syria claimed it destroyed the vehicle after it crossed the cease-fire line.

Israel said the jeep was on the Israeli side of the line and suffered minor damage, and no one was hurt. It said it returned fire at the source and scored a "direct hit." It gave no further details. Syria did not comment on the Israeli fire.

It was the latest in a string of incidents in which gunfire and mortar shells have struck the Israeli side of the Golan in recent months. Israel believes that most of the fire has been incidental spillover from the Syrian civil war, but that several cases, including Tuesday's, were intentional.

Israel's military chief, Lt. Gen. Benny Gantz, accused the Syrian leader of encouraging and directing operations against Israel. He said the Israeli patrol was targeted several times Tuesday by a "clearly marked Syrian position."

In his speech, he clearly alluded to the possibility that hostilities could erupt between Israel and Syria, which have fought several full-scale wars over the years and are bitter enemies.

"We will not allow the Golan Heights to become a comfortable space for Assad to operate from," Gantz told a conference at the University of Haifa. "If he escalates (the situation on) the Golan Heights, he will have to bear the consequences."

Gantz said the situation is extremely combustible, and "a day doesn't go by" where there could be a "sudden uncontrollable deterioration." He warned, "Instability will be the only stable thing that will happen here."

Israel has been warily watching the Syrian civil war since it broke out in March 2011, fearing the conflict could spill across its borders at any time.

Israel is concerned that Assad, if he is facing defeat, might try to draw Israel into the fighting to divert attention away from his internal struggles. More than 70,000 people have been killed in the civil war, and rebels now control large swaths of Syrian territory.

Israel is also concerned that Assad's arsenal of advanced arms, including chemical weapons, anti-aircraft systems and sophisticated missiles, could be transferred to Iranian-backed Hezbollah militants in Lebanon or fall into the hands of radical rebel groups.

Islamic extremists linked to al-Qaida are among the groups trying to oust Assad, and Israel is concerned they could turn their attention toward the Jewish state if they overthrow Assad. Although Assad is a sworn enemy of Israel, he is also a known quantity, and his family has been careful to keep the border with Israel quiet for most of the past 40 years.

But tensions have been rising between Israel and Syria in recent weeks, particularly following the airstrikes, which targeted alleged Syrian arms shipments bound for Hezbollah. Israel has not confirmed carrying out the attacks.

The airstrikes marked a sharp escalation of Israel's involvement on the periphery of the Syrian civil war.

Syria vowed to retaliate, and Assad said Syria is "capable of facing Israel" and would not accept violations of its sovereignty. Firing at an Israeli target, like the incident Tuesday, appears to be in line with the tougher rhetoric that followed the airstrikes.

Gantz visited the area after the exchange and told soldiers stationed there to "stay alert during these challenging times."

Downplaying the immediate dangers, Moshe Maoz, a Hebrew University expert on Syria, described Tuesday's events as "mostly rhetoric," saying neither Syria nor Israel has an interest in sparking a region-wide war.

Israel's powerful military is capable of toppling Assad, he said, while an outbreak of hostilities could potentially drag in Syria's key allies, Iran and Iranian proxy Hezbollah in Lebanon. Hezbollah is already active in Syria, sending hundreds of fighters to back Assad's troops.

"At this stage, neither side wants it, not Israel and not Syria," Maoz said. "It's rhetorical escalation, not strategic escalation. It's more talk. Each side is flexing its muscles."

Suicide at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris

By ANGELA CHARLTON and GREG KELLER Associated Press

PARIS May 21, 2013 (AP)

Some 1,500 visitors were cleared out of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris after a man put a letter on the altar of the 850-year-old monument Tuesday, pulled out a gun and shot himself in the head.

It's the first suicide in decades at the landmark site, Monsignor Patrick Jacquin, the cathedral's rector, told The Associated Press.

"It's unfortunate, it's dramatic, it's shocking," Jacquin said. The motives for the suicide, and the contents of the man's letter, were unclear.

In a message on her Twitter account, French far-right politician Marine Le Pen named the victim as a far-right author and historian. Police officials could not be reached to confirm the identification.

Police ushered people out of the cathedral after the shooting, Interior Minister Manuel Valls told reporters from the grand stone plaza in front of Notre Dame. "We call for compassion," he said.

It's highly unusual for the cathedral, visited by some 13 million people from around the world every year, to be evacuated.

Police, the Paris prosecutor and church employees gathered inside the cathedral, while puzzled tourists crowded outside on the island in the Seine River that has been home to the cathedral since the 12th century.

School groups lined up in hopes of entering the cathedral Tuesday evening, when it was expected to reopen for an evening service that church officials said would include a prayer for the man who committed suicide and other struggling souls.

Tuesday's death comes less than a week after another unusual suicide in central Paris, when a man shot himself in front of a dozen schoolchildren at a private Catholic school in the French capital.

AP photographer describes destroyed Okla. school

A child calls to his father after being pulled from the rubble of the Tower Plaza Elementary School following a tornado in Moore, Okla., Monday, May 20, 2013. A tornado as much as half a mile (.8 kilometers) wide with winds up to 200 mph (320 kph) roared through the Oklahoma City suburbs Monday, flattening entire neighborhoods, setting buildings on fire and landing a direct blow on an elementary school. (AP Photo Sue Ogrocki)

MOORE, Okla. (AP) — I left the office in Oklahoma City as soon as I saw the tornado warnings on TV. I had photographed about a dozen twisters before in the past decade, and knew that if I didn't get in my car before the funnel cloud hit, it would be too late.

By the time I got to Moore, all I could see was destruction. I walked toward a group of people standing by a heaping mound of rubble too big to be a home. A woman told me it was a school.

I expected chaos as I approached the heaping mounds of bricks and twisted metal where Plaza Towers Elementary once stood. Instead, it was calm and orderly as police and firefighters pulled children out one-by-one from underneath a large chunk of a collapsed wall.

Parents and neighborhood volunteers stood in a line and helped pass the rescued children from one set of arms to another to get them out of harm's way. Adults carried the children through a field littered with shredded pieces of wood, cinder block and insulation to a triage center in a parking lot.

They worked quickly and quietly so rescuers could try to hear voices of children trapped beneath the rubble.

Crews lifted one boy from under the wall and were about to pass him along the human chain, but his dad was there. As the boy called out for him, they were reunited.

In the 30 minutes I was outside the destroyed school, I photographed about a dozen children pulled from under the rubble.

I focused my lens each one of them. Some looked dazed. Some cried. Others seemed terrified.

But they were alive.

I know students are among those who died in the tornado, but for a moment, there was hope in the devastation.

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AP Photographer Sue Ogrocki has worked in Oklahoma for more than 10 years where she has covered about a dozen tornadoes.

Oklahoma City-based AP photographer Sue Ogrocki was at the elementary school destroyed by a tornado and saw rescuers pulling children out of the rubble. This is her account of what she witnessed.

2nd day of riots in Stockholm suburb shakes Sweden

Police officers stand guard in a street during a riot in Stockholm, Sweden, Monday, May 20, 2013. Gangs of youth apparently angered by the police shooting death of an elderly man hurled rocks at police and set cars and buildings on fire in a Stockholm suburb, forcing the evacuation of an apartment block. (AP Photo Johan Nilsson) SWEDEN OUT

HUSBY, Sweden (AP) — Some 200 youths hurled rocks at police and set cars ablaze in a largely immigrant suburb of Stockholm on Tuesday, the second day of rioting triggered by the fatal police shooting of a man wielding a knife.

Dozens of windows were smashed, 10 cars and several containers were set on fire, and seven police officers were injured. Cars and containers were also set ablaze in another of the Swedish capital's suburbs, Fittja, although police said it was not clear whether the two events were linked.

The unrest began Sunday night in response to the May 13 shooting, in which police killed a 69-year-old man who had locked himself in an apartment in Husby, west of Stockholm. Police refused to give the nationality of the victim.

Six youths were arrested early Tuesday, but two were released after questioning, police spokesmanJorgen Karlsson said.

Many local residents see the shooting as an example of police brutality, and the violence has stirred debate in Sweden.

Known for its strong welfare state and egalitarian society, the country has nonetheless had the biggest surge in inequality of any OECD country over the past 25 years, according to a recent publication by the global economic watchdog.

"This is not OK. We will not give in to violence," Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt said. "We must all help out to regain calm. The residents of Husby need to get their neighborhood back."

Reinfeldt added that Husby — where around 80 percent of the roughly 11,000 residents are first- or second-generation immigrants — has been going in the right direction during his seven-year tenure, with employment increasing and crime falling.

The atmosphere was tense on Tuesday, with residents expressing both anger at police and sadness about the destruction. City workers were seen clearing the debris of a burnt-out container and documenting fire damage.

"It's frustrating and difficult to see how those of us who live here get affected by something that has nothing to do with us," said university student Muhamad Abukar, 24. "And then outsiders get the idea that we are animals, uncivilized."

Abukar said he had seen the riots from his balcony and that those involved were mainly teenagers aged 13 to 16.

Reza Al Bazi, 14, and his friend Sebastian Horniak, 15, said they witnessed the violence throughout the night.

"The people of Husby have become tired of police brutality, so they react like this," said Al Bazi.

Horniak claimed he witnessed police firing warning shots in the air and calling a woman a "monkey." ''I got upset yesterday because I saw police attack innocent people, they beat a woman with a baton," he said.

Horniak's claims of racist remarks were backed up by the organization Megafonen, which represents citizens in Stockholm's suburbs. One of its representatives, Quena Soruco, said she heard police use abusive words such as "rats, hobos, negroes."

Sweden's Justice Minister Beatrice Ask told the TT news agency that anyone who feels mistreated by police should file a report.

Prosecutors have launched an internal probe into the shooting. Police say they shot the man in self-defense because he attacked them with a knife when they broke down the door to an apartment where he had locked himself up with a woman.

Crews race to find survivors of Oklahoma twister

An aerial view shows Tower Plazas Elementary school in Moore, Okla., Tuesday, May 21, 2013 as rescue workers make their way through the structure. At least 24 people, including nine children, were killed in the massive tornado that flattened homes and a school in Moore, on Monday afternoon. (AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez) Dalton Sprading, right, hands a gun to his uncle Roger Craft as he salvages items from his tornado-ravaged home Tuesday, May 21, 2013, in Moore, Okla. A huge tornado roared through the Oklahoma City suburb Monday, flattening an entire neighborhoods and destroying an elementary school with a direct blow as children and teachers huddled against winds. (AP Photo/Charlie Riedel)

MOORE, Okla. (AP) — Emergency crews searched the broken remnants of anOklahoma City suburb Tuesday for survivors of a massive tornado that flattened homes and demolished an elementary school. At least 24 people were killed, including at least nine children, and those numbers were expected to climb.

The state medical examiner's office cut the estimated death toll by more than half but warned that the number was likely to climb again. Gov. Mary Fallin said authorities did not know how many people were still missing, but vowed to account for every resident.

"We will rebuild, and we will regain our strength," said Fallin, who went on a flyover of the area and described it as "hard to look at."

Amy Elliott, a spokeswoman for the medical examiner, said she believes some victims were counted twice in the early chaos of the storm that struck Monday afternoon. Downed communication lines and problems sharing information with officers exacerbated the problem, she said.

"It was a very eventful night," Elliott said. "I truly expect that they'll find more today."

Authorities initially said as many as 51 people were dead, including 20 children.

New search-and-rescue teams moved at dawn Tuesday, taking over from the 200 or so emergency responders who had worked all night. A helicopter shined a spotlight from above to aid in the search.

Many houses have "just been taken away. They're just sticks and bricks," the governor said, describing the 17-mile path of destruction.

The National Weather Service said the twister was on the ground for 40 minutes, with winds estimated at 190 mph. The agency issued an initial finding that the tornado was EF-4 on the enhanced Fujita scale — the second strongest type of tornado — and that it was at least half a mile wide.

Emergency crews were having trouble navigating neighborhoods because the devastation is so complete, and there are no street signs left standing, Fallin added.

Fire Chief Gary Bird said fresh teams would search the whole community at least two more times to ensure that no survivors — or any of the dead — were overlooked. Crews painted an 'X' on each structure to note it had been checked.

"That is to confirm we have done our due diligence for this city, for our citizens," Bird said.

The community of 56,000 people, 10 miles south of Oklahoma City, braced for another long, harrowing day.

"As long as we are here ... we are going to hold out hope that we will find survivors," said Trooper Betsy Randolph, a spokeswoman for the Oklahoma Highway Patrol.

More than 200 people had been treated at area hospitals.

Other search-and-rescue teams focused their efforts at Plaza Towers Elementary, where the storm ripped off the roof, knocked down walls and turned the playground into a mass of twisted plastic and metal as students and teachers huddled in hallways and bathrooms.

Fallin said she arrived in Moore late Monday and observed the search and rescue operation at the school.

"It was very surreal coming upon the school because there was no school," she said at the Tuesday news conference.

Earlier, she described her astonishment at the destruction, saying: "It would be remarkable for anyone to survive."

Seven of the nine dead children were killed at the school, but several students were pulled alive from under a collapsed wall and other heaps of mangled debris. Rescue workers passed the survivors down a human chain of parents and neighborhood volunteers. Parents carried children in their arms to a triage center in the parking lot. Some students looked dazed, others terrified.

Officials were still trying to account for a handful of children not found at the school who may have gone home early with their parents, Bird said Tuesday.

Many parents of missing schoolchildren initially came to St. Andrews United Methodist Church, which had been set up as a meeting site. But only high school students were brought to the church, causing confusion and frustration among parents of students enrolled at Plaza Towers. They were redirected to a Baptist church several miles away.

"It was very emotional — some people just holding on to each other, crying because they couldn't find a child; some people being angry and expressing it verbally" by shouting at one another, said D.A. Bennett, senior pastor at St. Andrews.

After hearing that the tornado was headed toward another school called Briarwood Elementary,David Wheeler left work and drove 100 mph through blinding rain and gusting wind to find his 8-year-old son, Gabriel. When he got to the school site, "it was like the earth was wiped clean, like the grass was just sheared off," Wheeler said.

Eventually, he found Gabriel, sitting with the teacher who had protected him. His back was cut and bruised and gravel was embedded in his head — but he was alive. As the tornado approached, students at Briarwood were initially sent to the halls, but a third-grade teacher — whom Wheeler identified as Julie Simon — thought it didn't look safe and so ushered the children into a closet, he said.

The teacher shielded Gabriel with her arms and held him down as the tornado collapsed the roof and starting lifting students upward with a pull so strong that it sucked the glasses off their faces, Wheeler said.

"She saved their lives by putting them in a closet and holding their heads down," Wheeler said.

The tornado also grazed a theater, and leveled countless homes. Authorities were still trying to determine the full scope of the damage.

Roofs were torn off houses, exposing metal rods left twisted like pretzels. Cars sat in heaps, crumpled and sprayed with caked-on mud. Insulation and siding was smashed up against the sides of any walls that remained standing. Yards were littered with pieces of wood, nails and pieces of electric poles.

President Barack Obama declared a major disaster and ordered federal aid to supplement state and local recovery efforts.

"Among the victims were young children trying to take shelter in the safest place they knew — their school," he said Tuesday.

The town of Moore "needs to get everything it needs right away," he added.

Obama spoke following a meeting with his disaster-response team, including Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and top White House officials.

The Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Okla., forecast more stormy weather Tuesday in parts of Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana and Oklahoma, including the Moore area.

In video of the storm, the dark funnel cloud can be seen marching slowly across the green landscape. As it churns through the community, the twister scatters shards of wood, awnings and glass all over the streets.

Monday's tornado loosely followed the path of a killer twister that slammed the region with 300 mph winds in May 1999. It was the fourth tornado to hit Moore since 1998.

The 1999 storm damaged 600 homes and about 100 businesses. Two or three schools were also hit, but "the kids were out of school, so there were no concerns," recalled City Manager Steve Eddy.

At the time of Monday's storm, the City Council was meeting. Local leaders watched the twister approaching on television before taking shelter in the bathroom.

"We blew our sirens probably five or six times," Eddy said. "We knew it was going to be significant, and there were a lot of curse words flying."

Betty Snider, 81, scrambled inside with her son and husband. She put her husband, who recently had a stroke, in a bathroom, but there wasn't room for both of them. So she and her son huddled in a hallway.

"That is the loudest roar I've ever heard in my life," she said.

She said she didn't have time to do anything. She couldn't duck, couldn't cover her ears, couldn't find another place to hide.

She said this was the closest a twister had ever come to her house, which remained standing.

Monday's twister also came almost exactly two years after an enormous tornado ripped through the city of Joplin, Mo., killing 158 people and injuring hundreds more.

That May 22, 2011, tornado was the deadliest in the United States since modern tornado record keeping began in 1950, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Before Joplin, the deadliest modern tornado was June 1953 in Flint, Mich., when 116 people died.

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Associated Press writers Tim Talley and Ramit Plushnik Masti; and Associated Press photographer Sue Ogrocki contributed to this report.