MEXICO CITY (AP) — Thieves killed two Australians and an American on a surfing trip to Mexico in order to steal their truck, particularly because they wanted the tires, authorities said Sunday.

Baja California state prosecutors released grisly details of the slayings, but have not yet officially confirmed the identification of the bodies. They said family members of the victims are viewing the bodies to see if they can be identified by sight.

The corpses were decomposing after the thieves dumped them into a remote well about 50 feet (15 meters) deep, some 4 miles (6 kilometers) from where the foreigners were killed. If relatives can’t identify the bodies, further tests will be conducted. The well also contained a fourth cadaver that had been there much longer.

“The probability that it’s them is very high,” said chief state prosecutor María Elena Andrade Ramírez, noting the corpses still appeared to be identifiable by sight. “If they say that they are not completely certain that it is their relative, we would then have to carry out genetic testing.”

The three men were on a camping and surfing trip along a stretch of coast south of the city of Ensenada, posting idyllic photos on social media of waves and isolated beaches, before they went missing last weekend.

But Andrade Ramírez described the moments of terror that ended the trip for brothers Jake and Callum Robinson from Australia and American Jack Carter Rhoad.

She said the killers drove by and saw the foreigners’ pickup truck and tents, and wanted to steal their tires.

“The attackers drove by in their vehicle,” said Andrade Ramírez. “They approached, with the intention of stealing their vehicle and taking the tires and other parts to put them on the older-model pickup they were driving.

“When they (the foreigners) came up and caught them, surely, they resisted,” she said. “And these people, the assailants, took out a gun and first they killed the one who was putting up resistance against the vehicle theft, and then others came along and joined the fight to defend their property and their companion who had been attacked, and they killed them too.”

The assailants then apparently burned the foreigners’ tents.

The thieves then went to what she called “a site that is extremely hard to get to” and dumped the bodies into a well they apparently were familiar with. She said investigators were not ruling out the possibility the same suspects also dumped the first, earlier body in the well as part of previous crimes.

“They may have been looking for trucks in this area,” Andrade Ramírez said.

The thieves allegedly covered the well with boards. “It was literally almost impossible to find it,” Andrade Ramírez said, and it took two hours to winch the bodies out of the well.

The site where the bodies were discovered near the township of Santo Tomás was near the remote seaside area where the missing men’s tents and truck were found Thursday along the coast. From their last photo posts, the trip looked perfect. But even experienced local expats are questioning whether it is safe to camp along the largely deserted coast anymore.

The moderator of the local Talk Baja internet forum, who has lived in the area for almost two decades, wrote in an editorial Saturday that “the reality is, the dangers of traveling to and camping in remote areas are outweighing the benefits anymore.”

But in a way, adventure was key to the victims’ lifestyle.

Callum Robinson’s Instagram account contained the following slogan: “If you’re not living on the edge, you’re taking up too much room.”

At the news conference, Andrade Ramírez was questioned by one reporter who expressed approval that such a massive and rapid search was mounted for the foreigners, but asked why, when local people disappear in the area, little is often done for weeks, months, or years.

“Do you have to be a foreigner in Baja California in order for there to be an investigation if something happens to you?’ asked the reporter, who did not identify herself by name. ”Every investigation is different,” Andrade Ramírez replied.

As if to underscore that point, dozens of mourners, surfers and demonstrators gathered in a main plaza in Ensenada, the nearest city, to voice their anger and sadness at the deaths.

“Ensenada is a mass grave,” read one placard carried by protesters. “Australia, we are with you,” one man scrawled on one of the half-dozen surf boards at the demonstration.

A woman held up a sign that read “They only wanted to surf — we demand safe beaches.”

Baja California prosecutors had said they were questioning three people in the case, some of them because they were caught with methamphetamines. On Friday, the office said the three had been arrested on charges of a crime equivalent to kidnapping, but that was before the bodies were found. It was unclear if they might face more charges.

At least one of the suspects was believed to have directly participated in the killings. In keeping with Mexican law, prosecutors identified him by his first name, Jesús Gerardo, alias “el Kekas,” a slang word that means “quesadillas,” or cheese tortillas.

Last week, the mother of the missing Australians, Debra Robinson, posted on a local community Facebook page, appealing for help in finding her sons. Robinson said Callum and Jake had not been heard from since April 27. They had booked accommodation in the city of Rosarito, not far from Ensenada.

Robinson said Callum was diabetic. She also mentioned that the American who was with them was named Jack Carter Rhoad, but the U.S. Embassy in Mexico City did not immediately confirm that. The U.S. State Department said it was aware of reports of a U.S. citizen missing in Baja, but gave no further details.

In 2015, two Australian surfers, Adam Coleman and Dean Lucas, were killed in western Sinaloa state, across the Gulf of California — also known as the Sea of Cortez — from the Baja peninsula. Authorities said they were victims of highway bandits. Three suspects were arrested in that case.

SAO PAULO (Reuters) – Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro said on Sunday he had to be hospitalized again in the northern city of Manaus due to a skin infection caused by a bacteria, adding there is no forecast for when he could be discharged.

Bolsonaro said on social media he was hospitalized again with erysipelas, a skin disease which he had in 2022 and again on Saturday, when he was also briefly hospitalized, according to a spokesperson.

Bolsonaro is ineligible for political office until 2030 for spreading electoral misinformation during the 2022 election, when he lost a bid for reelection to leftist Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.

He also has been formally accused by police of fraud related to his COVID-19 vaccination records.

(Reporting by Andre Romani; Editing by Andrea Ricci)

BEIRUT (AP) — An Israeli airstrike Sunday in the town of Mays al Jabal in south Lebanon killed four civilians and wounded several others, Lebanese state media and the town’s municipality reported.

Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency reported that the strike took place “while a number of the town’s residents were inspecting their homes and shops and the damage they sustained” in previous strikes. Those attacks came over seven months of near-daily clashes between the Hezbollah militant group and Israeli forces against the backdrop of Israel’s war against Hezbollah ally Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

The Israeli military said its jet targeted military infrastructure in the southern Lebanese town belonging to Hezbollah, which has clashed with Israeli troops since Oct. 8.

Hezbollah on Sunday said it conducted at least 10 attacks targeting Israeli military positions and surveillance gear near the tense Lebanon-Israel border, while the Israeli military said it identified some 40 missiles that crossed into Israeli territory but did not cause any casualties.

Hezbollah and Israel fought a monthlong war in 2006 that ended in a tense stalemate. Israel considers the Iran-backed Shiite militant group its most serious immediate threat, estimating that Hezbollah has around 150,000 rockets and missiles aimed at Israel.

Western diplomats have made a series of so-far unsuccessful attempts to broker a de-escalation in the border region. Hezbollah has maintained that it would stop launching rockets towards northern Israel when there a cease-fire to end the monthslong war in Gaza. Israel has warned that it could launch a war against Hezbollah across its northern border should the fighting continue.

The Israeli military also reported it targeted what it said was Hezbollah military infrastructure in other parts of southern Lebanon.

Israeli strikes have killed more than 350 people in Lebanon, most of them fighters with Hezbollah and allied groups but also including more than 50 civilians. In Israel, strikes from Lebanon have killed at least 10 civilians and 12 soldiers.

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday rejected international pressure to halt the war in Gaza in a fiery speech marking the country’s annual Holocaust memorial day, declaring: “If Israel is forced to stand alone, Israel will stand alone.”

The message, delivered in a setting that typically avoids politics, was aimed at the growing chorus of world leaders who have criticized the heavy toll caused by Israel’s military offensive against Hamas militants and have urged the sides to agree to a cease-fire.

Netanyahu has said he is open to a deal that would pause nearly seven months of fighting and bring home hostages held by Hamas. But he also says he remains committed to an invasion of the southern Gaza city of Rafah, despite widespread international opposition because of the more than 1 million civilians huddled there.

“I say to the leaders of the world: No amount of pressure, no decision by any international forum will stop Israel from defending itself,” he said, speaking in English. “Never again is now.”

Yom Hashoah, the day Israel observes as a memorial for the 6 million Jews killed by Nazi Germany and its allies in the Holocaust, is one of the most solemn dates on the country’s calendar. Speeches at the ceremony generally avoid politics, though Netanyahu in recent years has used the occasion to lash out at Israel’s archenemy Iran.

The ceremony ushered in Israel’s first Holocaust remembrance day since the Oct. 7 Hamas attack that sparked the war, imbuing the already somber day with additional meaning.

Hamas militants killed some 1,200 people in the attack, making it the deadliest violence against Jews since the Holocaust.

Israel responded with an air and ground offensive in Gaza, where the death toll has soared to more than 34,500 people, according to local health officials, and about 80% of Gaza’s 2.3 million people are displaced. The death and destruction has prompted South Africa to file a genocide case against Israel in the U.N.’s world court. Israel strongly rejects the charges.

On Sunday, Netanyahu attacked those accusing Israel of carrying out a genocide against the Palestinians, claiming that Israel was doing everything possible to ensure the entry of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip.

The 24-hour memorial period began after sundown on Sunday with a ceremony at Yad Vashem, Israel’s national Holocaust memorial, in Jerusalem.

There are approximately 245,000 living Holocaust survivors around the world, according to the Claims Conference, an organization that negotiates for material compensation for Holocaust survivors. Approximately half of the survivors live in Israel.

On Sunday, Tel Aviv University and the Anti-Defamation League released an annual Antisemitism Worldwide Report for 2023, which found a sharp increase in antisemitic attacks globally.

It said the number of antisemitic incidents in the United States doubled, from 3,697 in 2022 to 7,523 in 2023.

While most of these incidents occurred after the war erupted in October, the number of antisemitic incidents, which include vandalism, harassment, assault, and bomb threats, from January to September was already significantly higher than the previous year.

The report found an average of three bomb threats per day at synagogues and Jewish institutions in the U.S., more than 10 times the number in 2022.

Other countries tracked similar rises in antisemitic incidents. In France, the number nearly quadrupled, from 436 in 2022 to 1,676 in 2023, while it more than doubled in the United Kingdom and Canada.

“In the aftermath of the October 7 war crimes committed by Hamas, the world has seen the worst wave of antisemitic incidents since the end of the Second World War,” the report stated.

Netanyahu also compared the recent wave of protests on American campuses to German universities in the 1930s, in the runup to the Holocaust. He condemned the “explosion of a volcano of antisemitism spitting out boiling lava of lies against us around the world.”

Nearly 2,500 students have been arrested in a wave of protests at U.S. college campuses, while there have been smaller protests in other countries, including France. Protesters reject antisemitism accusations and say they are criticizing Israel. Campuses and the federal government are struggling to define exactly where political speech crosses into antisemitism.

LONDON (AP) — Actor Bernard Hill, who delivered a rousing cry before leading his people into battle in “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King” and went down with the ship as the captain in “Titanic,” has died.

Hill, 79, passed away Sunday morning, agent Lou Coulson said.

Hill joined “The Lord Of The Rings” franchise in the second film of the trilogy, 2002’s “The Two Towers,” as Théoden, King of Rohan. The following year, he reprised the role in “Return of the King,” a movie that won 11 Oscars.

In one of the film’s most memorable scenes, Hill’s character fires up his overmatched forces by delivering a battle cry on horseback that sends his troops thundering downhill toward the enemy and his own imminent death.

“Arise, arise, riders of Théoden!” Hill hollers. “Spears shall be shaken, shields shall be splintered! A sword day, a red day, ere the sun rises! Ride now! Ride now! Ride! Ride for ruin and the world’s ending! Death! Death! Death!”

In “Titanic,” Hill played Captain Edward Smith, one of the only characters based on a real person in the 1997 tragic romance starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet. The film also won 11 Academy Awards.

As the doomed ship takes on water, Hill’s character silently retreats to the wheelhouse. As the cabin groans under the pressure of the waves, he takes a final breath and grabs the wheel as water bursts through the windows.

Hill first made a name for himself as Yosser Hughes in “Boys From the Blackstuff,” a 1982 British TV miniseries about five unemployed men.

He was nominated for an award in 1983 from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts for the role, and the show won the BAFTA for best drama series.

His death came the same day the second series of the BBC drama “The Responder” was to air, in which he played the father of the show’s star, Martin Freeman.

“Bernard Hill blazed a trail across the screen, and his long-lasting career filled with iconic and remarkable roles is a testament to his incredible talent, said Lindsay Salt, director of BBC Drama. “Our thoughts are with his loved ones at this sad time.”

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian forces have taken control of the village of Ocheretyne, in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, the Russian Defence Ministry said on Sunday.

The village, which lies northwest of the onetime Ukrainian stronghold of Avdiivka which Russia captured in February, had a pre-war population of around 3,000.

There was no comment from Ukrainian officials and no mention of Ocheretnye in the evening report of the Armed Forces General Staff.

Unofficial Ukrainian war bloggers, including the popular Deep State Map site, indicated that Russia was in control of the village.

Russia has made slow but steady advances since taking Avdiivka, with a string of villages in the area falling to Moscow’s forces.

(Writing by Felix Light; Editing by Angus MacSwan, Ron Popeski and Diane Craft)

By Michelle Nichols

NEW YORK (Reuters) -A top U.N. official on Sunday accused Israel of continuing to deny the United Nations humanitarian access in the Gaza Strip, where the U.N. food chief warned a “full-blown famine” has taken hold in the north of the enclave of 2.3 million people.

While not a formal famine declaration, World Food Programme Executive Director Cindy McCain said – in an NBC News interview broadcast on Sunday – that based on the “horror” on the ground: “There is famine, full-blown famine, in the north, and it’s moving its way south.”

Israel has continued to enhance its efforts to boost aid to Gaza, said COGAT, an Israeli Defense Ministry agency tasked with coordinating aid deliveries into Palestinian territories.

“In talks between Israeli and UN representatives, including @WFP, none of the entities indicated a risk of famine in northern Gaza,” COGAT said in a post on X. “Noting the improved situation, int’l orgs stated last week that the volume of goods transported to northern Gaza must be reduced since the quantities are too high in relation to the population.”

The head of the U.N. Palestinian refugee agency (UNRWA), Philippe Lazzarini, on Sunday accused Israel of continuing to deny the U.N. aid access in Gaza as it tries to avert famine.

“Only in the past 2 weeks, we have recorded 10 incidents involving shooting at convoys, arrests of UN staff including bullying, stripping them naked, threats with arms & long delays at checkpoints forcing convoys to move during the dark or abort,” Lazzarini posted on X.

Lazzarini also called on “Hamas and other armed groups to stop any attacks on humanitarian crossings, refrain from aid diversion and make sure assistance reaches all those in need.” The militants claimed responsibility on Sunday for an attack that shut down the main humanitarian aid crossing into Gaza.

‘ALREADY DYING’

A U.N.-backed report in March said famine was imminent and likely by May in northern Gaza, and could spread across the enclave by July. Famine is assessed as at least 20% of the population suffering extreme food shortages, with one in three children acutely malnourished and two people out of every 10,000 dying daily from starvation or from malnutrition and disease.

U.N. officials say that generally by the time a famine is formally declared somewhere it is too late to save many people. U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said last week that the most vulnerable in northern Gaza “are already dying of hunger and disease.”

The U.N. has complained about a lack of humanitarian aid access throughout the seven-month-long war between Israel and Palestinian militants Hamas in Gaza. Guterres has said the U.N. is trying to avert “an entirely preventable, human-made famine” in northern Gaza.

Israel is retaliating against Hamas over an Oct. 7 attack in which Israel says the militants killed about 1,200 people and took more than 250 people hostage. Gaza health authorities say Israel has killed more than 34,600 people in Gaza since then.

Hamas came to power in Gaza in 2006 after Israeli soldiers and settlers withdrew in 2005, but the enclave is still deemed as Israeli-occupied territory by the United Nations.

As the occupying power, the U.N. human rights chief has said Israel is obligated to ensure the provision of food and medical care to the population and to facilitate the work of humanitarian organizations trying to deliver aid.

(Reporting by Michelle Nichols, Additional reporting by Maytaal Angel and Hatem Maher; Editing by Andrea Ricci and Diane Craft)

By Vitalii Hnidyi

KHARKIV, Ukraine (Reuters) – Russian attacks on Orthodox Easter Sunday killed a woman buried under rubble and injured 17 in Ukraine’s northeastern city of Kharkiv and the surrounding region, regional officials said.

Regional Governor Oleh Syniehubov, writing on the Telegram messaging app, said six people were injured in an overnight drone attack on the Osnovyanskyi district of Kharkiv, Ukraine’s second-largest city.

Ten more were hurt in an attack later in the day by aerial bombs on the city centre.

“The next time it could hit my house. Why did it hit here? Just who is here? And on such a holy day. How? I cannot grasp it at all…” Natalia Avilova-Patrikeyeva said outside an apartment building with shattered balconies and windows blown out.

“I thought that at least on this day it would remain calm. At four in the morning there also was a strike. I don’t sleep, I don’t sleep at all.”

Kharkiv withstood a weeks-long Russian onslaught in the early days of the February 2022 Russian invasion and has been a frequent target of attacks in recent weeks.

Russia says it does not target civilian sites, but attacks have hit apartment blocks, schools and medical institutions.

Stunned residents milled about the courtyard outside a bloc of flats or surveyed debris in apartments or in stairwells. Forensic experts combed the ground for pieces of shrapnel.

“The explosion wave kicked out the door and I hid under the table. When I realised what was happening, there was smoke everywhere,” said resident Roza Kuzmenko.

“One woman from our block was wounded, the ambulance took her. Thank God, I only have a scratch (on my arm).”

Syniehubov also reported the death of an 88-year-old woman in the shelling of the village of Monachynivka, east of Kharkiv. Her body was recovered from the rubble of a house. A man was injured.

(Reporting by Vitalii Hnidyi, Writing by Ron Popeski; Editing by Andrea Ricci)