By COLLEEN SLEVIN and OLGA R. RODRIGUEZ, Associated Press

BOULDER, Colo. (AP) — Eight people calling for the release of Israeli hostages in Gaza were injured at an outdoor mall in Boulder, Colorado, by a man who police say used a makeshift flamethrower and hurled an incendiary device into a crowd. The FBI immediately described the violence as a “targeted terror attack.”

The suspect, identified by the FBI as 45-year-old Mohamed Sabry Soliman, yelled “Free Palestine” during the Sunday attack on the group of demonstrators, said Mark Michalek, the special agent in charge of the FBI’s Denver field office.

Law enforcement officials dress to investigate after an attack on the Peark Street Mall Sunday, June 1, 2025, in Boulder, Colo. (AP Photo/David Zalubowski)

Soliman was arrested and taken to the hospital for treatment, but authorities didn’t elaborate on his injuries.

Here is what we know about the attack:

How the attack unfolded

Authorities said the attacker targeted demonstrators with a volunteer group called Run for Their Lives, which organizes run and walk events to call for the immediate release of the Israeli hostages who remain in Gaza since they were captured by militants during the incursion into southern Israel that started the Israel-Hamas war in 2023.

The group had gathered at the Pearl Street pedestrian mall, a four-block area in downtown Boulder frequented by tourists and students.

The map above highlights Pearl Street Mall in Boulder, Colorado, where a man with a makeshift flamethrower yelled “Free Palestine” and hurled an incendiary device into a crowd. (AP Digital Embed)

The Israel-Hamas war has inflamed global tensions and contributed to a spike in antisemitic violence in the United States. A week earlier, two Israeli Embassy staffers were shot to death in Washington by a man who yelled “I did it for Palestine, I did it for Gaza” as he was being led away by police.

Hamas has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States, Canada and the European Union.

Police in Boulder evacuated multiple blocks of the pedestrian mall. The scene shortly after the attack was tense, as law enforcement agents with a police dog walked through the streets looking for threats and instructed the public to stay clear.

The violence occurred four years after 10 people were killed a shooting rampage at a grocery store in Boulder, about 25 miles northwest of Denver. The gunman was sentenced to life in prison for murder after a jury rejected his attempt to avoid prison time by pleading not guilty by reason of insanity.

Several people hospitalized

The people injured in the Pearl Street attack range in age from 52 to 88.

Photos from the scene showed a woman lying on the ground in the fetal position with her hair soaked, and a man helping her and getting water from someone with a water jug.

The injuries authorities found were consistent with reports of people being set on fire, Boulder Police Chief Steve Redfearn said, adding that injuries ranged from serious to minor.

Redfearn told reporters Sunday evening that it was too early to discuss a motive but that witnesses were being interviewed.

“It would be irresponsible for me to speculate on motive this early on,” he said.

The suspect was arrested at the scene

Mohamed Sabry Soliman, 45, was arrested at the scene. No charges were immediately announced, but officials said they expect to hold him “fully accountable.”

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Video from the scene showed him shirtless and wearing jeans and holding two clear bottles with a transparent liquid in them while shouting at onlookers.

Another video shows a witness shouting, “He’s right there. He’s throwing Molotov cocktails,” as a police officer with his gun drawn advanced on the suspect.

FBI leaders in Washington said they were treating the Boulder attack as an act of terrorism, and the Justice Department — which leads investigations into acts of violence driven by religious, racial or ethnic motivations — decried the attack as a “needless act of violence, which follows recent attacks against Jewish Americans.”

“This act of terror is being investigated as an act of ideologically motivated violence based on the early information, the evidence, and witness accounts. We will speak clearly on these incidents when the facts warrant it,” FBI Deputy Director Dan Bongino said in a post on X.

The cast of the Jungle Theater’s premiere production of Katie Ka Vang’s “Sixpack” features Pagnia Xiong (front) and, from left, Megan Kim, Dorothy Vang, Ashley Horiuchi, Phasoua Vang and Dexieng “Dae” Yang. It plays through June 29. (Courtesy Lauren B. Photography)

Fifty years ago, Hmong people first arrived in Minnesota as refugees from the wars of Southeast Asia. In their Laotian homeland, they were earmarked for destruction for having aided the U.S. side in the Vietnam War, and Minnesota became one of two states to help resettle the vast majority of those who escaped, California being the other.

Today, those of Hmong descent are an integral part of the Minnesota mosaic, but one of them, St. Paul-based playwright Katie Ka Vang, looked around and saw something missing. There were Hmong women with a certain style that never hit the pop culture radar: Tough, streetwise, cocksure and confident, deeply devoted to their families, friends and culture, but not the least bit demure or deferential.

Judging from her new play, “Sixpack,” which premiered this weekend at Minneapolis’ Jungle Theater, Vang knew just where to find them: the volleyball court. That’s where she saw these women’s aggressiveness, competitive fire and camaraderie come through. And she’s taking Twin Cities audiences there via a funny, absorbing and very rewarding 90-minute theater piece that chronicles the friendship of two St. Paul girls whose paths eventually diverged.

Deftly directed by Sara Pillatzki Warzeha, “Sixpack” entertainingly explores the ties that bind six women together, doing so with sharp-eared dialogue, vivid characterizations and an abundance of imagination in its design and choreography. On the latter account, Sandy Agustin has created some fascinating transitional interludes that blend volleyball movements with elements of religious ritual.

Pam (Ashley Horiuchi, left) and Auntie Windy (Phasoua Vang, center) make a plan to help their troubled volleyball teammate, Jou (Dorothy Vang), in the Jungle Theater’s premiere production of Katie Ka Vang’s “Sixpack,” playing through June 29. (Courtesy Lauren B. Photography)

When we first meet Pam and Jou, they seem strangers, but it soon becomes clear that they’re estranged friends. We’re then cast backward to their high school years, when they’re both starting to impress coaches and college recruiters as promising volleyball players. Pam feels ambivalent about leaving for college, while Jou desperately wants out, largely due to a troubled relationship with her mother.

They’re supported and sometimes antagonized by a colorful retinue of women, and each actor in the six-woman cast steps forward to steal at least one scene. Or several, in the case of Phasoua Vang as the comical Auntie Windy, most memorably when she proves the volleyball equivalent of a pool shark while crafting a con.

Pam is the engaging center of the story, and that’s thanks not only to the fine writing, but also to Ashley Horiuchi’s eminently believable portrayal. While Dorothy Vang could bring more of Jou’s exasperated restlessness to the surface, there’s little she can do to upstage what Dexieng “Dae” Yang does with her mother, Smiles, the most brassy, take-no-guff character in the show, a woman both fun-loving and bitter. It feels like a bold breakthrough performance for Yang, one of both force and subtlety.

They’re complemented very well by Megan Kim and Pagnia Xiong in multiple roles, the latter shining when this quite successful Hmong music artist breaks into a sweet-voiced song that no one recognizes until she fast-forwards to the chorus in funny fashion and it turns into an exuberant sing-along.

Four women share a song in the Jungle Theater’s premiere production of Katie Ka Vang’s “Sixpack,” which plays through June 29. From left are Megan Kim, Dexieng “Dae” Yang, Phasoua Vang and Pagnia Xiong. (Courtesy Lauren B. Photography)

Taking its title from the slang term for taking a spiked volleyball in the face, “Sixpack” deals with some jarring realities, but does so with a lot of humor and not a hint of melodrama. It’s a richly real and ultimately powerful production.

Rob Hubbard can be reached at wordhub@yahoo.com.

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‘Sixpack’

When: Through June 29

Where: Jungle Theater, 2951 Lyndale Ave. S., Mpls.

Tickets: $15-$45, available at 612-822-7063 or jungletheater.org

Capsule: A very well-crafted play and production about some very colorful Hmong women.

Today is Monday, June 2, the 153rd day of 2025. There are 212 days left in the year.

Today in history:

On June 2, 1953, Queen Elizabeth II was crowned at age 27 at a ceremony in London’s Westminster Abbey, 16 months after the death of her father, King George VI.

Also on this date:

In 1886, 49-year-old President Grover Cleveland became the first president to get married in the White House, wedding 21-year-old Frances Folsom.

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In 1924, Congress passed, and President Calvin Coolidge signed, the Indian Citizenship Act, a measure guaranteeing full American citizenship for all Native Americans born within U.S. territorial limits.

In 1941, baseball’s “Iron Horse,” Lou Gehrig, died in New York of the degenerative disease amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as ALS or Lou Gehrig’s disease; he was 37.

In 1966, U.S. space probe Surveyor 1 landed on the moon and began transmitting detailed photographs of the lunar surface.

In 1997, Timothy McVeigh was convicted of murder by a federal jury in the 1995 bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, which killed 168 people. (McVeigh would be sentenced to death and was executed in 2001.)

In 1999, South Africans went to the polls in their second post-apartheid election, giving the African National Congress a decisive victory; retiring President Nelson Mandela was succeeded by Thabo Mbeki.

In 2012, ousted Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak was sentenced to life in prison after a court convicted him on charges of complicity in the killing of protesters during the 2011 uprising that forced him from power (Mubarak was later acquitted and freed in March 2017; he died in February 2020).

In 2016, autopsy results revealed that musician Prince died of an accidental overdose of fentanyl, a powerful opioid painkiller.

Today’s Birthdays:

Actor Stacy Keach is 84.
Filmmaker Lasse Hallström is 79.
Actor Jerry Mathers is 77.
Actor Joanna Gleason is 75.
NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman is 73.
Actor Dennis Haysbert is 71.
Comedian Dana Carvey is 70.
TV personality-producer Andy Cohen is 57.
Actor-comedian Wayne Brady is 53.
Actor Wentworth Miller is 53.
Actor Zachary Quinto is 48.
Actor Justin Long is 47.
Actor Morena Baccarin is 46.
Olympic soccer gold medalist Abby Wambach is 45.
Actor-rapper Awkwafina is 37.

Maynard James Keenan knows how to throw a party.

When the Tool frontman turned 50, he performed a series of shows in Los Angeles with his two other bands, A Perfect Circle and Puscifer, along with his pals Primus. He called it “Cinquanta,” which is 50 in Italian.

Keenan was so pleased with the results, last year he took the show — now dubbed “Sessanta” — on the road to celebrate his 60th birthday. The outing was such a success, Keenan did it again this year. While “Sessantuno” is just sitting there ready to go, Keenan went with “Sessanta V2.0” instead.

Regardless of its title, the tour landed at St. Paul’s Xcel Energy Center Sunday night for a memorable show quite unlike anything seen in arenas. Rather than three distinct performances, Keenan turned the evening into a three-hour concert mashup that only stopped for a 10-minute intermission.

The bands played three separate sets of three to four songs each, one after another. To be clear, each has a distinct sound of their own. Primus specialize in bass-heavy, off-kilter rock with a goofy sense of humor. The most commercial of the trio, A Perfect Circle offer a guitar-driven take on alt-rock, while Puscifer boasts a more dramatic, and electronic, approach with help from a second vocalist, British signer/songwriter Carina Round.

Still, Sunday’s show brought out the acts’ similarities and obvious camaraderie. A giant riser at the back of the stage held three full drum kits as well as sofas, drink carts and stairs to the main stage on either side. Throughout the show, various band members who weren’t playing hung out in full view of the crowd. During Puscifer’s “Bullet Train to Iowa,” roadies even pulled out a ping pong table for two members of APC to use.

There were also plenty of collaborations, like when Keenan and Round added backup vocals to Primus’ new single “Little Lord Fentanyl,” their first recording with their terrific new drummer John Hoffman. (Primus reportedly auditioned more than 6,000 drummers before finding Hoffman.)

With the 200 level closed off, the show could have easily downgraded to the 8,400 capacity Armory in Minneapolis. Then again, it felt like the sort of spectacle custom made for arenas and amphitheaters. And the grand finale of Primus’ “Southbound Pachyderm” with all three drummers and Puscifer’s “Grand Canyon” with all three bands had fans cheering so loud it sounded like a full house.

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