Moolah from heaven or a devilish scam? That is a question Jerusalem police are asking on Wednesday after signed cheques worth around half a billion dollars were found at the Western Wall.

The 507 cheques were discovered in an envelope at the Jewish holy site in the Old City of Jerusalem and handed in to police by a good Samaritan, the Western Wall Heritage Foundation said in a statement.

A video of a golden eagle swooping down in Montreal and briefly snatching a toddler off the ground sparked an online buzz, but turned out on Wednesday to be a hoax that some said harms wildlife.

Coming just a week after a monkey wearing a sheepskin coat was found wandering around a parking lot in Toronto, the video purported to show the massive eagle -- which typically has a six-foot (two-meter) or more wingspan -- circling a public park.

Oscar-winning director James Cameron, who broke new ground with 3D technology with "Avatar," is bringing that knowhow to Cirque du Soleil, producing a 3D film featuring the high-flying acrobatic troupe.

Cameron acted as executive producer and camera operator for "Cirque du Soleil: Worlds Away" -- a movie spectacle which brings the group's breathtaking aerial routines to the big screen for the first time.

Violence in the Syria conflict has become openly sectarian and threatens whole communities, U.N. investigators reported Thursday following a visit to the region.

"As battles between government forces and anti-government armed groups approach the end of their second year, the conflict has become overtly sectarian in nature," the U.N. Commission of Inquiry on Syria said in a report.

Flash floods have killed at least 25 people in Sri Lanka and left more than a quarter of a million marooned in their homes, disaster officials said Thursday.

Heavy rains, which have battered the island for much of the week, were still being reported in 14 of Sri Lanka's 25 administrative districts, with the central highlands -- one of the world's key tea producing regions -- the worst hit.

Biologists say the human hand is a wonder of evolution, providing dexterity that lets our species perform activities as diverse as bricklaying, writing, ice hockey and brain surgery.

But what were the forces that, over thousands of years, sculpted our hand into the shape it is today?

The U.S. video-game company behind popular titles "Saints Row" and "Red Faction" said on Wednesday it had filed for bankruptcy while wrangling to sell its assets to "a stalking horse bidder."

California-based THQ Inc. planned to continue operating its business while positioning itself to be taken over.

Solo rock stars are twice as likely to die prematurely as counterparts who perform in groups, a study published in the journal BMJ Open said Wednesday.

British researchers examined the fate of 1,489 rock and pop performers who had risen to fame in a study period that spanned half a century, from Elvis Presley in 1956 to the Arctic Monkeys in 2006.

As members of the U.S. Senate struggle to bridge their all-too familiar differences on a looming fiscal crisis, perhaps the image of Abraham Lincoln will spur gridlocked lawmakers into action.

"Lincoln" star Daniel Day-Lewis and director Steven Spielberg on Wednesday found themselves at the U.S. Senate, where Democrats and Republicans bickering over gun laws, aid to superstorm Sandy victims and a looming "fiscal cliff" came together to watch the Hollywood drama about America's 16th president.

Norhima Hayral from the Philippines sought refuge in a shelter for abused Asian housemaids in Jordan to escape from employers she says both beat and raped her.

"The recruitment agency took my passport the second I arrived in Amman's airport" six months ago, 27-year-old Hayral told Agence France Presse at the shelter funded by Manila's Overseas Labor Office.