Israeli Ambassador to the United Nations Danny Danon responded to reports of an attack at Park Street Mall in Boulder, Colorado, which left several pro-Israel people injured, and he noted that the attack is “terrorism.”
“Terrorism against Jews does not stop at the Gaza border — it is already burning the streets of America,” Danon said in a post on X. “Today, in Boulder, Colorado, Jewish people marched with a moral and humane demand: to return the hostages. In response, the Jewish protesters were brutally attacked, with an attacker throwing a Molotov cocktails at them.”
Danon continued: “Make no mistake — this is not a political protest, this is terrorism. The time for statements is over. It is time for concrete action to be taken against the instigators wherever they may be.”
Danon’s post came after several reports that multiple people had been injured and burned after a suspect reportedly used Molotov cocktails to attack people taking part in a pro-Israel walk to support hostages held by Hamas.
Witnesses at the scene told CBS Colorado that the suspect attacked people with Molotov cocktails who were participating in a walk to remember the Israeli hostages who remain in Gaza.
One witness stated that he “saw a fire and then saw a cloud of smoke” and added that there had been a woman “burning on the ground” along with two other people who had been “impacted by burns on their legs,” KDVR reported:
A man who was on Pearl Street at the time of the attack said he saw a fire and then saw a cloud of smoke. He said that when they got to the scene, there was a woman “burning on the ground” and two other people impacted by burns on their legs.
He said the incident occurred during “some kind of religious protest.”
One witness of the attack gave an “account” of what had happened at the Pearl Street Mall in a thread on X.
“My account of what happened at Pearl Street today,” the person wrote. “Self proclaimed Palestinian man (in his 50s best guess) lighting people on fire with gasoline (from gardening tool) and throwing Molotov cocktails. Burned about 6 people aged mostly over 70.”
The person continued to claim that the attack was “definitely premeditated.”
“Definitely premeditated as it happened during the typical Sunday scheduled peaceful/silent walk holding Jewish hostage signs and Israeli flags,” the person continued. “Walk has been happening every Sunday sine 10/7/23.”
“Man shouted ‘You f*cking Zionists kill my people so I kill you!’” the person added.
FBI Director Kash Patel responded to the news of the attack and stated that the agency is “aware of and fully investigating a targeted terror attack in Boulder, Colorado.”
“We are aware of and fully investigating a targeted terror attack in Boulder, Colorado,” Patel wrote in a post on X. “Our agents and local law enforcement are on the scene already, and we will share updates as more information becomes available.”
Colorado Gov. Jared Polis (D) also responded to the news of the attack, stating that he is “monitoring the situation.” Polis noted that “hate-filled acts of any kind” are unacceptable.
“I am closely monitoring the situation in Boulder, and my thoughts go out to the people who have been injured and impacted by this heinous act of terror,” Polis wrote in a post on X. “Hate-filled acts of any kind are unacceptable. While details emerge, the state works with local and federal law enforcement to support this investigation. More information will be provided as it becomes available.”
Videos on social media show the alleged suspect shouting “end Zionists” and “Palestine is Free.”
During an appearance on FNC’s “Sunday Morning Futures,” FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy Director Dan Bongino discussed the details surrounding Jeffrey Epstein’s death.
According to Bongino, Epstein committed suicide.
“You said Jeffrey Epstein committed suicide,” host Maria Bartiromo said. “People don’t believe it.”
“Well, I mean, listen, they have a right to their opinion, but, as someone who has worked as a public defender, as a prosecutor, who’s been in that prison system, who’s been in the Metropolitan Detention Center, who’s been in segregated housing, you know a suicide when you see one, and that’s what that was,” FBI Director Kash Patel said.
Bongino added, “He killed himself. Again, you want me to — I have seen the whole file. He killed himself.”
Three years after her son’s suicide, Pauline Stuart said she now has a better perspective on who her real friends are.
Stuart’s son, Ryan Last, was 17 and a high-achieving high school student in a close-knit family when he took his own life in 2022. He did so shortly after becoming the victim of a criminal “sextortion” plot.
Undated photo of Ryan Last, who was 17 and a high-achieving high school student in a close-knit family when he took his own life in 2022 soon after he became the victim of a “sextortion” plot.
Photo provided by Ryan Last’s family
Four men were charged last week in connection with a scheme to target and extort Stuart’s son. But there is another pernicious problem Stuart is trying to combat: a public aversion to acknowledging and talking about America’s crisis of child sex exploitation.
“It’s almost like people feel like they’ll get ‘cooties’ if they simply talk about it,” Stuart told CBS News in an interview from her Oregon home. “People I thought were my friends now seem uncomfortable when I walk in. It seems they feel talking about this tragedy is ‘contagious’ and can’t seem to handle talking to me.”
Ryan Last’s suicide is just one in a flood of child sex exploitation cases since 2022, including a distinctive and alarming surge in cases of what’s now called sextortion, in which children are lured into sharing illicit images and later blackmailed by the recipients.
A CBS News review of FBI data and reports from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children shows more than 20 million tips regarding potential child sex exploitation have been reported to safety officials in each of the past two years. FBI data showed the number of sextortion cases has quintupled since 2019.
The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children also told CBS News, “We’ve seen an alarming rise in the most urgent and dangerous threats: a 192% increase in online enticement, a 1,325% spike in AI-generated abuse material and a growing number of reports linked to violent online groups targeting children.”
But Stuart, child safety experts and federal investigators who spoke with CBS News said the silence and a dearth of news coverage of the crisis of child sex abuse may hamper their efforts to warn families, combat the problem and catch the criminals.
“Parents just don’t think it can happen to their children, so they just shut down conversations about it,” Stuart said.
“This is a topic that does make people squeamish, but we have to be direct and lean into the discomfort,” said Adam Rosenberg, the executive director of the Baltimore-based Center for Hope, which helps prevent child abuse and assist victims.
“If we adults can’t talk about it, how do we expect our children to do so,” Rosenberg said.
The Justice Department, including Attorney General Pam Bondi, FBI Director Kash Patel and Deputy FBI Director Dan Bongino have launched efforts to raise the profile of the crisis.
In a public campaign branded “Operation Restore Justice”, the Justice Department executed a nationwide public campaign by federal agents and local law enforcement to track down offenders, execute arrests and file criminal charges.
At least 200 arrests have been announced, including an Illinois man accused of producing illicit images of an 8-year-old, a West Michigan teacher alleged to have unlawful photos of a student and a Florida prison inmate accused of having child sex abuse images on a contraband phone.
The Justice Department sought to publicize the campaign and its impact through targeted local news releases from FBI field offices and public remarks earlier this month from its headquarters in Washington, D.C., by Bondi and Patel.
With network TV cameras focused on her speech, Bondi said, “Parents, you have to know: Your child has no right to privacy on the internet,” Bondi said in her speech. “You have to monitor what they are doing.”
“These depraved human beings, if convicted, will face the maximum penalty in prison, some for life,” Bondi said. “If you are online targeting a child, you will not escape us.”
FBI field offices and the 93 U.S. attorney offices, which have reach into local community media, spotlighted local arrests from “Operation Restore Justice,” including an announcement from the U.S. attorney in New Jersey who publicized the arrests of four New Jersey men and one New Jersey woman on child pornography charges between April 28 and May 2. The initiative, which yielded hundreds of arrests, was covered in hundreds of media outlet reports that amplified the issue.
Bongino, who was a talk-radio star and social media giant with an audience of millions when he took his post at the FBI, has used his digital platforms to press the issue. In a May 7 social media post, he wrote, “Operation Restore Justice is a powerful message: If you harm children in America, you will be given no sanctuary. There is nowhere you can hide. You will be hunted down, and you will be prosecuted.”
In a slickly-produced FBI video about the initiative, the agency shows agents working in the field in New York, Baltimore, Cleveland, Atlanta and Chicago, as part of the operation.
“Crimes against children, particularly the crimes targeted in Operation Restore Justice, are some of the most heartbreaking and difficult cases we encounter.”
Justice Department spokesperson Kristina Mastropasqua told CBS News., “Parents, caregivers, and communities often do not realize the nature of the threat, how they can help in combatting it, or that they ought to be demanding safer online environments for their children.”
Rosenberg, whose Maryland-based organization has also helped advocate for tougher laws to combat child abuse, said it is critically important to remove the stigma around conversations about child sex exploitation.
“We need to talk directly. We can’t tip-toe around it,” Rosenberg said. “We need to reduce the stigma in the discussion, as we did in the past with the topic of AIDS and cancer.”
Rosenberg said government agencies are wise to use their platforms and communication tools to raise the issue and encourage conversations about child sex abuse.
An FBI official told CBS News the agency is seeing an upward trend in risks to children, in part because of advances in artificial intelligence technology, the pervasiveness of certain phone apps and criminal organizations that target children for extortion money.
Stuart, who last week was notified of a series of arrests in connection with the extortion of her son, said parents need to be more assertive and resourceful in discussing the risks with each other and with children.
“Parents think it absolutely can’t happen to their kids,” Stuart said. “And they’re wrong. We had parental controls on Ryan’s phone. We had limits on what sites he could go on. He couldn’t download apps without our approval. It’s such a hard subject to cover, but there have been so many boys who’ve lost their lives to this.”
Undated photo of Ryan Last, who was 17 and a high-achieving high school student in a close-knit family when he took his own life in 2022 soon after he became the victim of a “sextortion” plot.
Photo provided by Ryan Last’s family
Mastropasqua said the Justice Department works closely with other law enforcement agencies and experts to share prevention tools. She said, “The Department’s primary responsibility is always to the victims.”
Last week, the Justice Department announced arrests in connection with the extortion of Stuart’s son. Among them was a citizen of Côte d’Ivoire, Alfred Kassi, who was accused of sextortion against Ryan Stuart and arrested by Ivorian authorities on April 29.
“At the time of his arrest,” investigators said, “Kassi allegedly still had the sextortion messages he sent to the 17-year-old victim in February 2022 on his phone.”
If you or someone you know might be at risk of suicide, there is help. In the U.S., call or text the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 or visit 988lifeline.org. In the U.K., call Samaritans at 116123.
Scott MacFarlane is CBS News’ Justice correspondent. He has covered Washington for two decades, earning 20 Emmy and Edward R. Murrow awards. His reporting has resulted directly in the passage of five new laws.
Former FBI Director James Comey has provoked an outcry from the Trump administration after he briefly posted a photo to Instagram that federal officials alleged was a call for violence against President Trump — a claim Comey pushed back on.
The image shared by Comey — a longtime Trump foe — showed seashells in sand arranged to form the numbers “86 47,” according to screenshots shared by Trump administration officials.
He did not make his meaning clear, but administration officials and some of his supporters interpreted the numbers as referring to Mr. Trump’s status as the 47th president and the slang term “eighty-six,” which has often been used to mean “eject” or “remove.”
Comey later deleted the image. In a follow-up Instagram post Thursday night, Comey wrote that he “posted earlier a picture of some shells I saw today on a beach walk, which I assumed were a political message. I didn’t realize some folks associate those numbers with violence. It never occurred to me but I oppose violence of any kind so I took the post down.”
CBS News has reached out to Comey’s attorneys for comment.
Noem says post is under investigation
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem wrote on X that the issue is under investigation. She said Comey “just called for the assassination” of Mr. Trump, and added her agency and the Secret Service are “investigating this threat and will respond appropriately.”
Current FBI Director Kash Patel said in a separate statement that, “We are aware of the recent tweet by former FBI Director James Comey, directed at President Trump. We are in communication with the Secret Service and Director (Sean) Curran. Primary jurisdiction is with SS on these matters and we, the FBI, will provide all necessary support.”
A Secret Service spokesperson told CBS News in a statement it “vigorously investigates anything that can be taken as a potential threat against our protectees. We are aware of the social media posts by the former FBI Director and we take rhetoric like this very seriously. Beyond that, we do not comment on protective intelligence matters.”
White House Deputy Chief of Staff Taylor Budowich wrote in his own social media post Comey’s message “can clearly be interpreted as ‘a hit’ on the sitting President of the United States,” and said it is “being taken seriously.”
Comey and Trump have sparred for years. Comey served as FBI director from 2013 until he was fired by Mr. Trump in 2017, during the president’s first White House term.
That firing ultimately set into motion Robert Mueller’s special counsel investigation into allegations that Russia interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election and that the Trump campaign coordinated with the Kremlin. Mr. Trump has repeatedly denounced those allegations as a “hoax.”
For his part, Comey has been a vocal critic of Mr. Trump since his firing, calling him “morally unfit” to be president in a 2018 interview.
Mr. Trump was the target of two assassination attempts during his presidential campaign last year. During a July 13 rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, a 20-year-old gunman opened fire on Mr. Trump, grazing his ear with a bullet. One rally attendee was killed and two more were wounded.
On Sept. 14, a man was arrested on allegations he attempted to assassinate Mr. Trump at his golf course in West Palm Beach by aiming a rifle through shrubbery.
What does “86 47” mean?
It’s unclear what Comey meant with his Instagram post, but according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, to “eighty-six” means to “throw out” or “get rid of” something.
It originates from 1930s soda counter slang, which meant that an item was sold out, Merriam-Webster says. The term can also refer to people: To “Eighty-six” an inebriated bar patron is to kick them out or refuse service to them, the dictionary said.
Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Kash Patel testifies before the Senate Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies on Thursday, May 8.
Patel will answer questions from members of Congress about the FBI’s proposed budget for the year.
Trump’s FBI director answered questions from member of the House in a sometimes contentious hearing on Wednesday.
