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hundreds of first responders.
• The days ahead were tough as the two rookies and their colleagues attended dozens of funerals, while thousands of their fellow firefighters came from around the country to show support.
• It's that camaraderie among firefighters that drew Benitez, Larosa and nearly a dozen others from their department, including the chief, to a massive memorial service in Arizona honoring 19 members of the Prescott-based Granite Mountain Hotshots. The elite crew died June 30 when a wind-fueled, out-of-control fire overran them as they tried to protect a former gold-mining town from the inferno.
• "It's very important to have a big showing ... show the family there are people there for them," Benitez said Tuesday after the service that drew some 8,000 people to the minor league hockey arena.
• "I always feel like the best part of it is when wives, siblings, get to see the amount of people showing up," Larosa added.
• ___

• CAIRO (AP) -- A spokesman for Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood says the group will reject any offer to join an interim government to replace the administration of ousted President Mohammed Morsi.
• Newly appointed Prime Minister Hazem el-Beblawi is to begin forming a Cabinet on Wednesday, and has said he will offer the Brotherhood -- which helped propel Morsi to the presidency -- posts in a new government.
• A Brotherhood spokesman dismissed any talk of joining a military-backed administration, and said talk of national reconciliation is "irrelevant." He spoke on condition of anonymity because of concerns for his security.
• Morsi was deposed on July 3 after four days of massive protests demanding he step down, prompting the military to step in and oust him.
• ___

• LAC-MEGANTIC, Quebec (AP) -- Quebec police are pursuing a painstaking, wide-ranging criminal investigation of the inferno ignited by the derailment of a run

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