A mob of several hundred people attacked the Cairo campaign headquarters of Egyptian presidential candidate Ahmed Shafiq on Monday. They broke windows, destroyed campaign posters, and set the building on fire, according to witnesses. Shafiq took second in last week’s round of voting and he will be running against the Muslim Brotherhood candidate Mohammed Morsi during the runoff election in June. Shafiq served as Hosni Mubarak’s last prime minister, and there is fear that his presidency would be an extension of the Mubarak regime.

Tell us what you really think, Mitt. Speaking at a veterans museum in San Diego on Monday, the presumptive Republican nominee said the “world is not safe” under President Obama and charged that the president has weakened the military. Saying there are “two courses” the nation could follow, Romney said “one is to follow the pathway of Europe, to shrink our military smaller and smaller to pay our social needs … and hope for the best. But if we followed that course, there would be no one to protect us.” The event, sponsored by the Veterans Museum and Memorial Center and the Vietnam Veterans of America, attracted 5,000 people, although the organizers had asked Romney not to say anything political as it is their annual event.

Kofi Annan began negotiations in Syria on Monday in an effort to save his peace plan, while Russia, one of Syria’s allies, said the government should take most of the blame for the violence in Houla. The United Nations envoy will meet with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Tuesday, in a trip that was planned before the violent massacre took place on Friday. “I urge the government to take bold steps to signal that it is serious in its intention to resolve this crisis peacefully, and for everyone involved to help create the right context for a credible political process,” Annan said. Separately, Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, claimed that he has prepared military options for the crisis in Syria. Meanwhile Australia, Canada, Germany, Spain, France, Britain, and Italy all announced Tuesday that they would expel all Syrian diplomats immediately, a move coordinated with the U.S.’s hardline action.

Nineteen people were killed Monday in a fire at high-end shopping mall in Doha, Qatar, the country’s interior minister confirmed. Among the dead were 13 children. The fire started late in the morning near a children’s play area in the Villaggio Mall, which is frequented by many expats who live in Doha. The nationalities of the children were not released, and another local news reports said no Qatari children died. The cause of the fire has not yet been released, and a relative of one of the dead children said there didn’t appear to be any sprinklers or fire alarms in the mall.

Extended federal unemployment benefits are soon to start running out, despite the decision by Congress to renew the program. The federal benefit extensions supported unemployment payments for up to 99 weeks to help the unemployed until the job market improved. When the program expired in February, Congress renewed it but reduced the number of weeks payments could be sent and made it hard for states to get the maximum amount of aid. Since then, 23 states have lost months of benefits and roughly 500,000 people are expected to lose their jobless benefits prematurely this year, including 70,000 in the next month alone.

At least 33 people were wounded on Monday in an explosion in a busy downtown area of Nairobi. Police said it was caused by an electrical malfunction, but the prime minister insisted the blast was deliberate. Al Qaeda’s wing in Somalia, Al-Shabab, had previously threatened such an attack. One woman who was injured claimed to have seen a “bearded man” leave a bag behind at one of the stops. The explosion occurred at one-story building on Moi Avenue, sending smoke through the street, located just blocks away from the site of the 1998 U.S. Embassy bombing.

Authorities in Canada are looking into reports that falling debris from Air Canada Flight 001 damaged cars in southern Ontario. The Boeing 777 was en route from Toronto to Tokyo Monday afternoon when one of its engines shut down, prompting an emergency landing. But more than an hour before it touched down, people on the ground began reporting that they saw smoke and debris coming from the jet, and several reported damage to their cars. An Air Canada spokesman reported that he could not confirm any debris had fallen, but said, “There will be a full investigation into this incident, as there always is, and that will determine what happened.”

Mitt Romney will take a supporter where he can get one, thank you very much. The presidential candidate said Monday night that he “doesn’t agree with all the people who support” him but that he’s “appreciative to have” their help. Romney was addressing questions volleyed at him regarding the birther issue, as the former Massachusetts governor drew a day closer to a Donald Trump–hosted fundraiser set for Tuesday in Las Vegas. Trump has still not completely backed down from the birther issue, and Romney would not correct him or his followers. “I need to get 50.1 percent or more” of the vote, Romney said. “My guess is they don’t all agree with everything I believe in.” Newt Gingrich will be in attendance as well. The birther issue flared up again Friday when Trump told The Daily Beast that Obama’s “mother never spent a day in the hospital” in Hawaii.

Facebook is ready to bounce back from its rocky IPO. The social network may be planning to release its own smartphone by next year, according to Facebook employees and engineers. The company has hired more than six former Apple employees who worked on the iPhone and one who worked on the iPad. This is the company’s third attempt to create a smartphone, including a project last year, which was codenamed “Buffy.” One Facebook employee said, “Mark [Zuckerberg] is worried that if he doesn’t create a mobile phone in the near future, that Facebook will simply become an app on other mobile platforms.”

Wedding season has officially begun! Cynthia Nixon and longtime girlfriend Christine Marinoni were married Sunday in New York City. Nixon proposed to Marinoni at a rally for same-sex marriage three years ago—before it was even legal in New York. Nixon has two children from a previous relationship and Marinoni gave birth to a son in February 2011. In a statement, the Sex and the City star said she wore a custom-made Carolina Herrera dress. Nixon said in 2010 that they were waiting to get married until it is legal in New York state.

Los Angeles County sheriffs may have a chance to get autographs for their teenage daughters when they sit down with Justin Bieber on claims that he may have gotten into a scuffle with a photographer. The paparazzo told police that the pop superstar struck him after he tried to snap a photo of Bieber and girlfriend Selena Gomez in Calabasas, Calif. A spokesperson for Bieber did not immediately respond to media inquiries. The photographer reportedly complained of pain after the incident and was taken to the hospital by the Los Angeles County Fire Department.

Miami police are still trying to figure out exactly what happened in a grisly crime that has gathered international headlines: police shot and killed a naked man after he allegedly attacked another naked man and tried to eat his face on a major Miami highway. Neither man has been identified. Police said the victim is recovering in the hospital after his attacker allegedly tried to not only eat his face but also gouge out his eyes. A police officer responded to the scene and reportedly shot the attacker, who continued to chew the other man’s flesh—and the officer then reportedly fired again until the attacker died. Police are still trying to determine what motivated the attack—and whether drugs were involved.

Some actions speak, while others scream. Two Tibetan men set themselves on fire in the Tibetan regional capital of Lhasa on Sunday to protest what Tibetans say are Chinese attacks on their culture and way of life. “It’s further indication that the causes of the self-immolations across Tibet are still there,” Kate Saunders, a spokeswoman for the International Campaign for Tibet, told Bloomberg News. According to the Associated Press, there have been 34 self-immolations committed by Tibetans since March of last year. Large crowds were reportedly gathered around the Jokhang temple in Lhasa, where the immolations on Sunday took place, for a religious holiday celebrating the Buddha’s birth.

Romance, the firing of a CEO, and a news site’s paywall. It sounds like the plot of a Bravo television show, but it’s really the story of the firing of former New York Times CEO Janet Robinson in December—with an exit package of $24 million, or half the company’s profits in 2011. New York Magazine investigates the classic “whodunit” by rounding up a few suspects: publisher Arthur Sulzberger’s new girlfriend, the  print journalism advertising market, a cousin, and an Internet expert. Meanwhile, the New York Times is looking for a new CEO—and battling with the question of how much power the new hire will wield while the Sulzberger family is at the head of the paper of record.

Democratic leaders say they’re ready to take a stand on Bain. Weeks after President Obama’s reelection campaign ran a series of controversial ads attacking the private-equity firm founded by presumptive Republican nominee Mitt Romney, top Dems say it’s one hot-button issue they’re not afraid to push. “He wanted to have this conversation,” Pennsylvania Democratic Party chairman Jim Burn said of Romney. “We’re going to have it. There should be no hesitation or equivocation.” Romney has often touted his experience in the private sector as proof that he has the economic savvy to take on the country’s fiscal woes. Nevada Democratic Party chairwoman Roberta Lange said Obama’s message resonates in her state: “Obama is speaking to the things that are important to us."

One day at a time. European stocks recovered Monday as anxiety over the possibility of Greece exiting the euro zone eased off. New polls showed that political parties in Greece that support the bailout had gained a lead among voters, and though the margin was hardly enough to constitute an electoral landslide, it was enough. “Anything that allays fears over Greece is a positive,” said equities trader Adrian Slack. “People are just looking for a bit of respite.” A spoonful of positive news was more than enough to kick markets into gear, however, and investors say that trend may continue as Greek elections near. “Heading into the Greek elections ... reactions to any positive news may be bigger than those to negative news,” one currency analyst said.

Decades ago the man who claims to have killed Etan Patz may have unburdened himself to a prayer group. But they did nothing, according to alleged killer Pedro Hernandez’s sister and Tomas Rivera, the New Jersey prayer-group leader. Rivera told The New York Times that he never reported Hernandez’s story to police because he confessed “to the group,” not to Rivera individually. Rivera said that last week he was visited by New York City Police Department detectives who questioned him about the case. The New York Post reported Sunday that sources say Hernandez hid 6-year-old Patz’s body in a walk-in refrigerator before disposing of it after the 1979 killing. Hernandez was a stock boy at a SoHo bodega at the time.

Metropolitan Police announced the arrest of a 42-year-old British woman Monday in connection with ongoing phone-hacking investigations. The woman, who has not been identified, was arrested on suspicion of engaging in money laundering. The arrest was made as part of Operation Weeting, the task force launched in January 2011 to look into allegations of phone hacking at prominent British media outlets owned by Rupert Murdoch, including the now extinct Fleet Street tabloid the News of the World. Former British prime minister Tony Blair was grilled by the Leveson Inquiry on Monday regarding his connections with Murdoch’s family and media empire.

More than 1,851 American servicemen and -women have died in Afghanistan over more than a decade. On Monday, Marine Gen. John Allen, top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, read a letter from one of those soldiers. “There will be a child who will live because men left the security they enjoyed in their home to come to this,” wrote 23-year-old Marine Sgt. William Stacey, who was killed by an improvised explosive earlier this year. “He will have the gift of freedom, which I have enjoyed for so long myself, and if my life brings the safety of a child who will one day change the world, then I know that it was all worth it.” During Memorial Day ceremonies at NATO-coalition headquarters in Afghanistan, Allen also helped lay a wreath to honor those who gave their lives for “freedom, duty, selflessness, and sacrifice.”

The United Nations condemned a massacre that left 49 children and 34 women dead in Syria last week as the country’s ambassador called the U.N.’s response a “tsunami of lies.” The brutal massacre in the town of Houla has been internationally denounced, and special envoy Kofi Annan traveled to the fractious nation’s capital Monday even as other leaders said his attempts to forge a peace plan had failed. The U.K. foreign secretary backed the Annan initiative at a press conference, however, saying the alternative is “ever-increasing chaos and a descent closer and closer to all-out civil war and collapse.” While most nations have heaped the blame for the massacre on President Bashar al-Assad’s forces, Syrian ally Russia said “both sides” share responsibility for the killings.

Yikes, guys, take it outside. ABC News’s George Will and Donald Trump traded insults on Sunday, after the commentator said he didn’t understand why Mitt Romney would hold campaign with Trump. Will called Trump a “bloviating ignoramus” and said that Trump is “redundant evidence that if your net worth is high enough, your IQ can be very low and you can intrude on American politics.” Trump jumped to Twitter to defend himself, saying “George Will may be the dumbest (and most overrated) political commentator of all time. If the Republican listen to him, they will lose.”

In some ways, it’s a family thing. Former British prime minister Tony Blair, godfather to one of Rupert Murdoch’s daughters, faced the scrutiny of the Leveson Inquiry on Monday over his ties to the controversial News Corp. chairman. While Blair no longer holds political office in Britain, his testimony was one of a series of appearances by prominent British politicians and personalities that have exposed close connections between elites and the country’s ruling media family. An antiwar protester barged into the room and shouted that Blair was a "war criminal" before he was detained by security. The former prime minister said that he avoided public spats with the media while in power saying to do so "would have been a huge battle with no guarantee of winning."

Mamma mia. The Vatican denied that a cardinal is a suspect after Italian newspapers reported Monday that the papal butler arrested last week for leaking sensitive Vatican documents may have received substantial help from an unidentified higher authority. Paolo Gabriele, a member of the pope’s personal staff, was detained Friday after Vatican investigators allegedly found documents from the Holy See in his apartment. After the 46-year-old butler was detained, insiders said that they found Gabriele’s involvement in the case confusing. On Monday, a Vatican spokesman said that media pressure would not cause the Curia, the pope's administrative body, to rush its investigation.

Chen Guangcheng has taken to life in the Big Apple. The blind Chinese dissident who fled to America has signed on for a speaking engagement this Thursday at the Council on Foreign Relations in Manhattan alongside his mentor, New York University professor Jerome Cohen. The two men met when Chen came to the United States in 2003 as part of a State Department program. Chen, whose dramatic escape from house arrest in China caught the world’s attention weeks ago, has been living in faculty housing at NYU with his wife and children. The activist plans to study law at the university.

Their lives were precious and so is their memory, President Obama said of America’s fallen warriors on Monday. The commander in chief marked Memorial Day with a service at Arlington National Cemetery. Obama pledged there would be no more wars unless “absolutely necessary” and remarked that “for the first time in nine years, Americans are not fighting or dying in Iraq.” Obama then visited the Vietnam Veterans’ Memorial, where he called the treatment of that war’s veterans a “national shame” and a “disgrace that should never have happened.” The president also laid a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

It’s not much of a holiday weekend for folks on the east coast of Florida this Monday. Tropical Storm Beryl rolled into the area early in the morning on Memorial Day, causing Gov. Rick Scott to warn residents to “stay alert and aware.” The storm brought with it heavy rains and winds that neared hurricane strength, approaching 70 miles per hour. The storm was downgraded to a tropical depression just before noon, drenching the coast with much-needed rain, although holiday travel today is expected to be affected by the storm.