ABBAS'S SON SAID TO TELL US ENVOY HE OPPOSES TWO STATE SOLUTION.

JEWISH KING JESUS IS COMING AT THE RAPTURE FOR US IN THE CLOUDS-DON'T MISS IT FOR THE WORLD.THE BIBLE TAKEN LITERALLY- WHEN THE PLAIN SENSE MAKES GOOD SENSE-SEEK NO OTHER SENSE-LEST YOU END UP IN NONSENSE.GET SAVED NOW- CALL ON JESUS TODAY.THE ONLY SAVIOR OF THE WHOLE EARTH - NO OTHER. 1 COR 15:23-JESUS THE FIRST FRUITS-CHRISTIANS RAPTURED TO JESUS-FIRST FRUITS OF THE SPIRIT-23 But every man in his own order: Christ the firstfruits; afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming.ROMANS 8:23 And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.(THE PRE-TRIB RAPTURE)

LUKE 21:28-29
28 And when these things begin to come to pass,(ALL THE PROPHECY SIGNS FROM THE BIBLE) then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption (RAPTURE) draweth nigh.
29 And he spake to them a parable; Behold the fig tree,(ISRAEL) and all the trees;(ALL INDEPENDENT COUNTRIES)
30 When they now shoot forth, ye see and know of your own selves that summer is now nigh at hand.(ISRAEL LITERALLY BECAME AND INDEPENDENT COUNTRY JUST BEFORE SUMMER IN MAY 14,1948.)

JOEL 2:3,30
3 A fire devoureth (ATOMIC BOMB) before them;(RUSSIAN-ARAB-MUSLIM ARMIES AGAINST ISRAEL) and behind them a flame burneth: the land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea, and nothing shall escape them.
30 And I will shew wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke.(ATOMIC BOMB AFFECT)

ZECHARIAH 14:12-13
12 And this shall be the plague wherewith the LORD will smite all the people that have fought against Jerusalem; Their flesh shall consume away while they stand upon their feet,(DISOLVED FROM ATOMIC BOMB) and their eyes shall consume away in their holes,(DISOLVED FROM ATOMIC BOMB) and their tongue shall consume away in their mouth.(DISOLVED FROM ATOMIC BOMB)(BECAUSE NUKES HAVE BEEN USED ON ISRAELS ENEMIES)(GOD PROTECTS ISRAEL AND ALWAYS WILL)
13 And it shall come to pass in that day, that a great tumult from the LORD shall be among them; and they shall lay hold every one on the hand of his neighbour, and his hand shall rise up against the hand of his neighbour.(1/2-3 BILLION DIE IN WW3)(THIS IS AN ATOMIC BOMB EFFECT)

EZEKIEL 20:47
47 And say to the forest of the south, Hear the word of the LORD; Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I will kindle a fire in thee, and it shall devour every green tree in thee, and every dry tree: the flaming flame shall not be quenched, and all faces from the south to the north shall be burned therein.

ZEPHANIAH 1:18
18 Neither their silver nor their gold shall be able to deliver them in the day of the LORD'S wrath; but the whole land shall be devoured by the fire of his jealousy: for he shall make even a speedy riddance of all them that dwell in the land.

MALACHI 4:1
1 For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven;(FROM ATOMIC BOMBS) and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the LORD of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch.

And here are the bounderies of the land that Israel will inherit either through war or peace or God in the future. God says its Israels land and only Israels land. They will have every inch God promised them of this land in the future.
Egypt east of the Nile River, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, The southern part of Turkey and the Western Half of Iraq west of the Euphrates. Gen 13:14-15, Psm 105:9,11, Gen 15:18, Exe 23:31, Num 34:1-12, Josh 1:4.ALL THIS LAND ISRAEL WILL DEFINATELY OWN IN THE FUTURE, ITS ISRAELS NOT ISHMAELS LAND.12 TRIBES INHERIT LAND IN THE FUTURE

Abbas’s son said to tell US envoy he opposes two-state solution-TOI-AUG 21,18

One of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas’s sons told the US envoy for Middle East peace that, unlike his father, he does not support a two-state solution, Channel 10 news reports.Tarek Abbas met Jason Greenblatt on the the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York last year, according to the report, and said as he does not believe a two-solution is still possible, he favors one-state with equal rights for all citizens.“I support a one-state solution between the Jordan [river] and the Mediterannean Sea, with equal rights for all its citizens,” the report quotes him saying.According to Channel 10, Greenblatt wanted to meet with Tarek Abbas in order to reach out to one of the closest people to the PA leader and enlist him to help advance the Trump administration’s peace efforts.

Israeli Arabs look to establish an International Israel Apartheid Day-Former MK Mohamad Barakeh says July 19 should be marked to commemorate Jerusalem passing Jewish nation-state law-By JTA-TOI-AUG 21,18

Israeli Arabs have proposed the establishment of an International Israel Apartheid Day, to be held every year on July 19, in commemoration of the passage of Israel’s controversial nation-state law, which states that only Jews have the right to self-determination in the land of Israel.“That is the day of the apartheid law being passed, which makes Israeli Arabs second-class citizens,” former Knesset member Mohammad Barakeh told the Jerusalem Post. Barakeh is the head of the Higher Arab Monitoring Committee, an umbrella group representing Israeli-Arab civil society organizations.Barakeh, who served in the Knesset for 16 years, was adamant that Israel was a racist state. He told the Post that “our defining it as apartheid is based on a study that found our situation similar to apartheid in South Africa and the American South before the Civil War. It’s not a political decision but a fact.”Barakeh will seek to bring the Palestinian Authority on board during a meeting slated for early next month. A spokesman for the committee told the Post that the organizers of International Israel Apartheid Day could “learn from what has been done successfully by BDS activists on North American college campuses and implement their ideas.”Many campuses around the world already hold annual Israel Apartheid Week events. Those events rarely distinguish between Arab citizens of Israel and Palestinians living under Israeli control in the West Bank.Tens of thousands of Israeli Arabs, some waving Palestinian flags, attended a protest organized by the Higher Arab Monitoring Committee in Tel Aviv’s Rabin Square on Saturday, August 11. Speakers at the rally railed against what they described as a law that formalized a racial hierarchy among Israeli citizens in which Arabs enjoyed a diminished legal status compared to Jews.Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held up the flags as an example of why the law was needed in the first place, saying that “many of the demonstrators want to abrogate the Law of Return, cancel the national anthem, fold up our flag and cancel Israel as the national state of the Jewish people.”On its page of frequently asked questions, Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs rejects the apartheid charge.“Like most other Western democracies with a sizeable minority population, Israel still has a great deal to do before absolute equality can be achieved,” the page reads. “However, the disparity between the situation of Arab-Israelis and the situation that existed in South Africa is so vast that no legitimate comparison can be made.”The page notes that “Arab Israelis can vote, live where they want, receive excellent medical care and practice whatever profession they” choose. It also notes that Arab Israelis serve on the Supreme Court, in the Knesset, in diplomatic positions, and “in almost every sphere of Israeli life.”

Assailing Mueller, Trump says investigator ‘looking for trouble’-US president claims special counsel is 'enjoying ruining people's lives' and 'looking to impact the elections'-By Anne Flaherty and Jill Colvin-TOI-AUG 21,18

WASHINGTON (AP) — US President Donald Trump pressed his criticism of special counsel Robert Mueller on Monday, accusing Mueller’s team of “enjoying ruining people’s lives” and “looking to impact the election.”Trump’s tweets followed a New York Times report that the White House general counsel, Don McGahn, has been cooperating extensively with the special counsel team investigating Russian election meddling and potential collusion with Trump’s Republican campaign.Over the weekend, Trump insisted his general counsel is not a “RAT” like President Richard Nixon’s and accused Mueller’s team of “looking for trouble.” He contrasted McGahn with John Dean, the White House counsel for Nixon during the Watergate scandal. Dean ultimately cooperated with prosecutors and helped bring down the Nixon presidency in 1974, though he served a prison term for obstruction of justice.“The failing @nytimes wrote a Fake piece today implying that because White House Councel Don McGahn was giving hours of testimony to the Special Councel, he must be a John Dean type ‘RAT,'” Trump wrote Sunday, misspelling “counsel.”“But I allowed him and all others to testify – I didn’t have to. I have nothing to hide …” he wrote.On Monday, he called Mueller “disgraced and discredited.”“Anybody needing that much time when they know there is no Russian Collusion is just someone looking for trouble,” he wrote. “They are enjoying ruining people’s lives and REFUSE to look at the real corruption on the Democrat side – the lies, the firings, the deleted Emails and soooo much more!”Dean, Nixon’s White House counsel and a frequent critic of Trump, tweeted Sunday that he doubts the president has “ANY IDEA what McGahn has told Mueller. Also, Nixon knew I was meeting with prosecutors, b/c I told him. However, he didn’t think I would tell them the truth!”Trump’s original legal team had encouraged McGahn and other White House officials to cooperate with Mueller, and McGahn spent hours in interviews.Trump’s personal attorney, Rudy Giuliani, said in an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that Trump did not raise executive privilege or attorney-client privilege during those interviews because his team believed — he says now, wrongly — that fully participating would be the fastest way to bring the investigation to a close.“The president encouraged him to testify, is happy that he did, is quite secure that there is nothing in the testimony that will hurt the president,” Giuliani said.McGahn’s attorney, William Burck, added in a statement: “President Trump, through counsel, declined to assert any privilege over Mr. McGahn’s testimony, so Mr. McGahn answered the Special Counsel team’s questions fulsomely and honestly, as any person interviewed by federal investigators must.”Giuliani, in his interview, also acknowledged that the reason for the June 2016 Trump Tower meeting between Trump campaign aides and a Russian lawyer, arranged by Trump’s son Donald Trump Jr., was that they had been promised dirt on Trump’s 2016 Democratic rival, Hillary Clinton.“The meeting was originally for the purpose of getting information about Clinton,” he said, adding that the Trump team did not know that Natalia Veselnitskaya was Russian — even though emails later released by Trump Jr. show that she had been described as a “Russian government attorney.”Giuliani also tried to make the case that having Trump sit down for an interview with Mueller’s team would not accomplish much because of the he-said-she-said nature of witnesses’ recollections.“It’s somebody’s version of the truth, not the truth,” he said, telling NBC: “Truth isn’t truth.”

France’s Total gas giant has officially left Iran, oil minister says-Tehran confirms company pulled out of South Pars gas field, as promised, due to US sanctions-By AFP-TOI-AUG 21,18

French energy giant Total has officially quit its multi-billion-dollar gas project in Iran, Oil Minister Bijan Namdar Zanganeh said on Monday, following the reimposition of US sanctions.“Total has officially left the agreement for the development of phase 11 of South Pars (gas field). It has been more than two months that it announced that it would leave the contract,” he told parliament’s news agency ICANA.Zanganeh also appeared before parliament to underline the dire state of Iran’s oil and gas facilities, which he said were “worn out” and in need of renovation that Iran could not afford.The United States said in May that it was abandoning the 2015 nuclear deal and reimposing sanctions on Iran in two phases in August and November.The second phase will target Iran’s oil industry.The other parties to the nuclear deal — Britain, France, Germany, China and Russia — have vowed to stay in the accord but their companies risk huge penalties if they keep doing business in Iran.Total had already said it would be impossible to remain in Iran unless it received a specific waiver from Washington, which was not granted.Total signed up in July 2017 for the $4.8 billion (4.1 billion euro) project to develop the field off Iran’s southern coast, as the lead partner alongside the China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) and Iran’s Petropars.It was due to make an initial $1 billion investment, but the company said in May that it had spent less than 40 million euros on the project to date, as uncertainty over US actions mounted.Total would have been highly vulnerable to US penalties for remaining in Iran.The company has $10 billion of capital employed in its US assets, and US banks are involved in 90 percent of its financing operations, Total said in May.It remains unclear whether CNPC will take over Total’s stake in the project.Iran remains wary of relying on Chinese firms after bad experiences in the past. A previous contract for CNPC to develop the field at South Pars was suspended in 2011 after it failed to make progress.The urgent need for investment to upgrade Iran’s dilapidated energy infrastructure was a key motivator behind its decision to join the 2015 nuclear deal.Zanganeh appeared in parliament on Monday to answer questions on safety concerns following a number of recent fires at refineries.“A big part of the oil industry has been worn out and the necessary renovation has not taken place,” he told parliament, according to the official IRNA news agency.He said there were 10 cases per day of tubes perforating in Iran’s southern facilities, and that some refineries were as much as 80 years old, “whereas the useful life of an industrial unit is 30 years.”“We have no resources for renovating them,” he added.

In Jerusalem, Bolton and Netanyahu blast ‘wretched,’ ‘disastrous’ Iran deal-US national security adviser says Washington pushing Europe to take more aggressive stance on Tehran; PM: 'Everyone in the region' grateful for Trump's decision to leave accord-By TOI staff and Agencies-AUG 21,18

US President Donald Trump’s national security adviser on Monday bemoaned the “wretched” Iranian nuclear deal in his talks with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem, as the senior US aide and Israeli premier called for stepped-up global pressure on Tehran to curb its military activities.Ahead of a day of discussions between Israeli and American security officials, John Bolton told Netanyahu that the United States sees the “highest importance” in preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons and that’s why Trump withdrew from the deal negotiated by the Obama administration and was reapplying stiff sanctions.Bolton has been a strident critic of the nuclear deal and has pushed for greater pressure on Tehran to ensure it halts its support for terror groups in the Mideast and stops development of ballistic missiles. A former ambassador to the United Nations under president George W. Bush, Bolton is a longtime hawkish advocate for Israel.Bolton said Washington was working to convince European allies “of the need to take stronger steps against the Iranian nuclear weapons and ballistic missile program.”Netanyahu agreed the deal was “disastrous” and called Trump’s decision to drop out historic. He repeated his oft-used refrain that “the nuclear deal did not block Iran’s path to the bomb, it paved Iran’s path to an entire nuclear arsenal.”“By removing the sanctions [the deal] enabled Iran to bring in billions and billions of dollars to its coffers which only fueled Iran’s war machine in Syria, in Lebanon, in Yemen and elsewhere,” said Netanyahu.The premier stated that Israel’s gratitude for Trump’s decision to walk away from the accord “is shared by all our Arab neighbors… practically everyone in this region,” and added that “all countries that care about peace and security in the Middle East should follow America’s lead and ratchet up the pressure on Iran. Because the greater the pressure on Iran, the greater the chance that the regime will roll back its aggression.”“It’s important the people of Iran understand that our fight is not with them. Our fight is with the regime that brutally represses them, that arrests women for uncovering their hair, that hangs gays in the public squares, that defies the aspirations for freedom of millions and millions of Iranians,” declared Netanyahu.Bolton, an Iran hawk, was seen as a central player in the US decision to withdraw from the nuclear deal in May.Netanyahu lauded Bolton for “dedicating three days of meetings and discussions to your visit to Israel. That’s no small matter.“Your visit here gives us an opportunity to make [the relationship] even stronger and to ally our policies even more closely on Iran, on Syria, on Gaza, and on the many challenges that face both our countries in this region.”Both men said ties between the two nations had never been better. Bolton made a point of noting his “privilege and an honor to be here in Jerusalem, Israel’s capital.”Netanyahu thanked the Trump administration for its commitment to Israeli security. “Israel believes it has no greater friend and ally than the United States. And I believe that the United States has no greater friend and ally than Israel,” he said.On Sunday, ahead of a joint dinner, Netanyahu had said the talks would focus mainly on “rolling back Iran’s aggression” in the Middle East. Netanyahu called Bolton a “tremendous friend” of Israel, and praised Trump’s decision to move the US Embassy to Jerusalem.Bolton was on his first visit to Israel since he replaced H.R. McMaster as Trump’s national security adviser in April. Following his trip to Israel, Bolton will travel to Ukraine and Geneva, where he will follow up with Russian officials on Trump’s meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin last month in Helsinki.From Israel, Bolton earlier on Sunday told ABC’s “This Week” that getting Iranian forces to withdraw from Syria was a goal shared by the Washington, Jerusalem, and Moscow.“Certainly the objective of the United States, of Israel, President Putin said it was Russia’s objective is to get Iran — Iranian forces, Iranian militias, Iranian surrogates out of the offensive operations they’re in in both Syria and Iraq and frankly, to end Iran’s support for Hezbollah,” he said.During their meeting in Helsinki, both Trump and Putin expressed their commitment to Israel’s security, with the latter saying the two agreed on securing Israel’s northern border with Syria in accordance with the 1974 disengagement agreement following the Yom Kippur War.As pro-regime Syrian troops have returned to the border in recent months as part of a Russian-backed offensive, Israel has called for the upholding of the disengagement accord and maintaining the buffer zone on the Golan frontier, amid concerns Iranian-aligned forces could establish themselves in the area.Few details were released on Bolton’s itinerary or his agenda for talks with Israeli officials. A US embassy official said the discussions with Netanyahu and other Israeli officials would include “regional security issues.”

MIGRATING BIRDS IN ISRAEL EATS HUMANS FLESH FOR COMING AGAINST ISRAEL-JERUSALEM

EZEKIEL 39:11-12,18
11 And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will give unto Gog (RUSSIA/ARAB/MUSLIMS) a place there of graves in Israel, the valley of the passengers (EAST OF THE DEAD SEA IN JORDAN VALLEY) on the east of the sea: and it shall stop the noses of the passengers: and there shall they bury Gog (RUSSIAN) and all his multitude:(ARAB/MUSLIM HORDE) and they shall call it The valley of Hamongog.(BURIEL SITE OF THE 300 MILLION,RUSSIAN/ARAB/MUSLIMS)
12 And seven months shall the house of Israel be burying of them, that they may cleanse the land.(OF ISRAEL)
16 And also the name of the city shall be Hamonah. Thus shall they cleanse the land.(OF THE ISRAEL-GOD HATERS)

EZEKIEL 39:17-21
17  And, thou son of man, thus saith the Lord GOD; Speak unto every feathered fowl, and to every beast of the field, Assemble yourselves, and come; gather yourselves on every side to my sacrifice that I do sacrifice for you, even a great sacrifice upon the mountains of Israel, that ye may eat flesh, and drink blood.(OF RUSSIAN/ISLAMIC HORDES AGAINST ISRAEL)
18  Ye shall eat the flesh of the mighty, and drink the blood of the princes of the earth, of rams, of lambs, and of goats, of bullocks, all of them fatlings of Bashan.
19  And ye shall eat fat till ye be full, and drink blood till ye be drunken, of my sacrifice which I have sacrificed for you.
20  Thus ye shall be filled at my table with horses and chariots, with mighty men, and with all men of war, saith the Lord GOD.
21  And I will set my glory among the heathen, and all the heathen shall see my judgment that I have executed, and my hand that I have laid upon them.
22  So the house of Israel shall know that I am the LORD their God from that day and forward.

REVELATION 19:17-18
17 And I saw an angel standing in the sun; and he cried with a loud voice, saying to all the fowls that fly in the midst of heaven, Come and gather yourselves together unto the supper of the great God;(AGAINST ALL NATIONS ARMIES THAT COME AGAINST JERUSALEM AND ISRAEL)
18 That ye may eat the flesh of kings, and the flesh of captains, and the flesh of mighty men, and the flesh of horses, and of them that sit on them, and the flesh of all men, both free and bond, both small and great.

EZEKIEL 38:1-7
1 And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,
2 Son of man, set thy face against Gog,(RULER) the land of Magog,(RUSSIA) the chief prince of Meshech (MOSCOW) and Tubal,(TOBOLSK) and prophesy against him,
3 And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog,(LEADER OF RUSSIA) the chief prince of Meshech(MOSCOW) and Tubal:TOBOLSK)
4 And I (GOD) will turn thee back, and put hooks into thy jaws,(GOD FORCES THE RUSSIA-MUSLIMS TO MARCH) and I will bring thee forth, and all thine army, horses and horsemen, all of them clothed with all sorts of armour, even a great company with bucklers and shields, all of them handling swords:
5 Persia,(IRAN,IRAQ) Ethiopia, and Libya with them; all of them with shield and helmet:
6 Gomer,(GERMANY) and all his bands; the house of Togarmah (TURKEY) of the north quarters, and all his bands: and many people with thee.(AFRICAN MUSLIMS,SUDAN,TUNESIA ETC)
7 Be thou prepared, and prepare for thyself, thou, and all thy company that are assembled unto thee, and be thou a guard unto them.

EZEKIEL 39:1-8
1 Therefore, thou son of man, prophesy against Gog,(LEADER OF RUSSIA) and say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech (MOSCOW) and Tubal: (TUBOLSK)
2 And I will turn thee back,(RUSSIA-ARAB MUSLIM ISRAEL HATERS) and leave but the sixth part of thee,(5/6TH OR 300 MILLION DEAD RUSSIAN/ARAB/MUSLIMS I BELIEVE) and will cause thee to come up from the north parts,(RUSSIA) and will bring thee upon the mountains of Israel:
3 And I will smite thy bow out of thy left hand, and will cause thine arrows to fall out of thy right hand.
4 Thou shalt fall upon the mountains of Israel, thou, and all thy bands,( ARABS) and the people that is with thee: I will give thee unto the ravenous birds of every sort, and to the beasts of the field to be devoured.
5 Thou shalt fall upon the open field: for I have spoken it, saith the Lord GOD.
6 And I will send a fire on Magog,(NUCLEAR ATOMIC BOMB) and among them that dwell carelessly in the isles: and they shall know that I am the LORD.
7 So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, the Holy One in Israel.
8 Behold, it is come, and it is done, saith the Lord GOD; this is the day whereof I have spoken.

Muslims at haj blame Arab disunity for Jerusalem embassy move-[Reuters]-By Muhammad Yamany and Seham El-Oraby-YAHOONEWS-August 21, 2018
ARAFAT, Saudi Arabia (Reuters) - Muslims at the annual haj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia criticized what they described as discordant Arab leaders for failing to block President Donald Trump's decision to move the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem after he recognized the city as Israel's capital.It was a reversal of decades of American policy and the embassy opened in May at a high-profile ceremony attended by Trump's daughter Ivanka and his son-in-law Jared Kushner, the U.S. envoy to the Middle East.The status of Jerusalem - home to sites holy to the Muslim, Jewish and Christian religions - is one of the biggest obstacles to any peace agreement between Israel and the Palestinians.The United Nations says the status of the ancient city - whose eastern sector was captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war - can only be resolved by negotiations. Palestinians claim East Jerusalem for the capital of an independent state they seek. Israel says Jerusalem is its eternal and indivisible capital."This happened with the complicity of the Arab leaders," 53-year-old Saad Awad from Sudan said on Monday as he walked east of Mecca with more than 2 million fellow Muslims from around the world."If the Arab leaders were united and adhering to the Koran and the Sunna (Islamic practice based on words and deeds of the Prophet), it would be impossible for the Americans or anyone else to do something like this."Saudi Arabia, which stakes its reputation on its guardianship of Islam's holiest sites - Mecca and Medina - and organizing the haj, has urged pilgrims to put aside political concerns and focus on spirituality.The five-day ritual, the world's largest annual gathering of Muslims, is a religious duty once in a lifetime for every able-bodied adherent who can afford it.Few pilgrims openly censured the host country, but dismay among ordinary Arabs at the embassy move has been tinged with anger at regional governments - particularly those of the oil-rich Gulf monarchies - for failing to stop, or even strongly protest against, Trump's decision last December."The Arabs are weak and have not taken a stand on the issue of Jerusalem," said Algerian pilgrim Hilal Issa, 70.Some critics accuse Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Islam, of surrendering Palestinian rights for the sake of its alliance with Trump and his tough stand on Iran.While Saudi Arabia and its fellow monarchies have previously criticized the embassy decision, they have also welcomed Trump's harder line against Iran, which has cast itself as the guardian of Palestinian rights.In recent years the bitter regional rivalry that pits Shi'ite Muslim Iran and its allies against a bloc led by Sunni Muslim-majority Saudi Arabia has increasingly pushed the decades-old Arab-Israeli struggle into the background.King Salman has reassured Arab allies Riyadh would not endorse any peace plan that fails to address Jerusalem's status or other key issues, Reuters reported last month, easing concerns that the kingdom might back a nascent U.S. deal which largely aligns with Israel."If the Arabs were united, nobody would have dared make such a move," Yemeni pilgrim Amr Ahmed Ali said of the embassy transfer. "But God willing, the Arabs will unite, and this city will unite the Arabs and Muslims behind one cause which is the Palestinian cause."(Writing by Stephen Kalin; Editing by Mark Heinrich)

Liberman thanks US for giving Israel ‘room to maneuver’ against enemies-Defense minister shows John Bolton map of Hamas attack tunnels destroyed by Israel, praises 'supportive' administration-By TOI staff and Agencies-AUG 21,18

Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman met Monday with US President Donald Trump’s National Security Adviser John Bolton in Jerusalem, and praised the Trump administration for giving Israel “significant maneuvering room” to operate against its enemies.The two met in Jerusalem following Bolton’s meeting earlier in the day with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in which the two bemoaned the “wretched” Iran nuclear deal and called for stepped-up global pressure on Tehran to curb its military activities-According to Liberman’s office, he and Bolton discussed a range of security issues, among them Iran, Syria, Lebanon and the Gaza Strip.“We have a very supportive president in the White House and a very supportive administration and this gives us significant maneuvering room vis a vis our enemies to the north and south,” Liberman’s office quoted him as saying.“Thank you John for your great contribution to Israel’s national security,” he told Bolton.On his Facebook account, Liberman wrote he showed Bolton a map of all the underground tunnels in the Gaza Strip destroyed by Israel.“This is a tremendous operational intelligence accomplishment that was achieved thanks to the creative genius of the members of the security establishment,” he wrote in Hebrew.Jerusalem has for years accused Hamas, the Palestinian terror group which controls Gaza and openly seeks to destroy Israel, of digging tunnels into Israeli territory to carry out terror attacks.Earlier, Bolton told Netanyahu that the United States sees the “highest importance” in preventing Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons and that’s why Trump withdrew from the deal negotiated by the Obama administration and was reapplying stiff sanctions.Bolton has been a strident critic of the nuclear deal and has pushed for greater pressure on Tehran to ensure it halts its support for terror groups in the Middle East and stops development of ballistic missiles. A former ambassador to the United Nations under president George W. Bush, Bolton is a longtime hawkish advocate for Israel.Bolton said Washington was working to convince European allies “of the need to take stronger steps against the Iranian nuclear weapons and ballistic missile program.”Bolton was on his first visit to Israel since he replaced H.R. McMaster as Trump’s national security adviser in April. Following his trip to Israel, Bolton will travel to Ukraine and Geneva, where he will follow up with Russian officials on Trump’s meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin last month in Helsinki.

Russian military braces for largest drill in almost 40 years-Moscow puts forces in east on high alert ahead of massive 5-day exercise with China and Mongolia-By AP-TOI-AUG 21,18

MOSCOW, Russia — Russia’s military forces in the country’s east were put on high alert Monday ahead of massive war games that also involve China and Mongolia, the largest show of power in nearly 40 years, the Russian defense minister said.Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said the five days of military drills will pave the way for the Vostok (East) 2018 military exercise. Shoigu said those maneuvers, set for next month, will be the largest since the massive Soviet war games in 1981.The Kremlin spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, said President Vladimir Putin could attend the exercise.Speaking to the top Russian military brass, Shoigu said army, air force and navy units will take part in the exercise that will be held across the Far East and Siberia. He added that military units from China and Mongolia will also take part.As part of a smaller, separate military exercise this week under the auspices of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, a security group dominated by Moscow and Beijing, Chinese warplanes landed Monday at a Russian air base in the Chelyabinsk region in the Ural Mountains.The Russian military has increased both the scope and frequency of its maneuvers amid tensions with the West. It also has expanded military ties with China.Moscow and Beijing have conducted a series of joint military maneuvers, including exercises in the South China Sea and navy drills in the Baltics last summer.The two countries have forged what they described as a “strategic partnership,” expressing their shared opposition to the “unipolar” world — the term they use to describe perceived US global domination.

Palestinian leader mourns passing of peace activist Uri Avnery-'He will remain an icon of real and permanent peace,' PA President Mahmoud Abbas tells close friend of former MK, who was first prominent Israeli to meet Arafat publicly-By Adam Rasgon and AP-TOI-AUG 21,18

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas praised Israeli writer, peace activist and former lawmaker Uri Avnery, who died overnight at the age of 94.Avnery died between Sunday night and Monday morning, after suffering a stroke more than a week ago, according to a spokesman at Ichilov hospital in Tel Aviv.“With great sadness, we received the news of the death of the excellent journalist and politician Uri Avnery,” Abbas said in a letter addressed to Avnery’s family and friends and peace activists in Israel Monday.“We knew him throughout his life as a distinguished journalist who defended the truth and fought for the achievement of coexistence and peace.”Avnery was the first prominent Israeli to meet publicly with former PLO chairman Yasser Arafat in 1982 in Beirut, at the height of the first Lebanon War, though the chairman was considered a terrorist by many Israelis.Earlier this year, Avnery wrote that he first met Abbas during a meeting with Arafat in Tunis later that year, and the two formed a bond over a shared connection to Safed, which Abbas had fled as a child.“I met with Abu Mazen every time I visited Arafat in Tunis. When I heard that he was originally from Safed, the mixed Arab-Jewish town in northern Palestine, this was an additional bond. Safed was the second home of my wife, Rachel, who, as a child, went there every summer. Her father, a children’s physician, practiced there in the summers, too. Abu Mazen could not remember whether he was ever treated by him as a child, before his family had to flee in 1948,” he wrote, using Abbas’s nom de guerre.Abbas and Avnery frequently met over the past many decades, but more recently they saw each other less regularly because of the latter’s deteriorating health, according to Elias Zananiri, a 40-year friend of the peace activist.Abbas and Avnery have long “had a close relationship of mutual-interest and respect,” said Zananiri. “Their relationship was based on both of their desires to end the conflict and achieve peace.”According to Wafa, Abbas also called Avnery’s friends and offered them his condolences.“He will remain an icon of real and permanent peace,” the PA president said of the late peace activist in a phone call with Anat Saragusti, a a close friend of Avnery, according to the official PA news site Wafa.The President of the Palestinian Authority send his condolences for Uri Avnery, "that dedicated his life to protect the truth and acted to reach peace and shared society for both peoples." pic.twitter.com/hxBFKZFo06— Anat Saragusti (@saragusti) August 20, 2018-Avnery, for decades one of the Israeli left wing’s most prominent political voices, had served as a member of the Knesset and as editor of the weekly Haolam Hazeh (“This World”) magazine.Avnery was born in 1923 into a well-to-do bankers’ family in Germany that emigrated to Israel in 1933 when the Nazis came to power. He grew up poor in Tel Aviv and was forced to work instead of going to school.At age 15, Avnery joined the pre-state paramilitary group Irgun, where he served for four years. He later fought in the 1948 Independence War as a member of the Givati Brigade, and was seriously wounded in one of the battles.A member of Israel’s founding generation, he had the ear of prime ministers, even while shaking up the establishment with his weekly magazine, a mix of hard-hitting exposes, gossip, and photos of nude women.In 1965, he formed a political party, Meri, and served as its representative in the Knesset for 10 years.Avnery was perhaps the first prominent Israeli to call for the establishment of a Palestinian state, saying it was the only way to secure peace for a democratic Israel with a Jewish majority.His unwavering convictions won him respect from political rivals such as Geula Cohen, a long-time advocate of Jewish settlement in the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem.“He is the political father of the (idea of) the Palestinian state,” Cohen said of Avnery in 2013. “He is the first one who raised it politically. I don’t accept his ideas, but I admire his strength to continue to fight for his ideas.Avnery came by his beliefs early on, saying that, even as a young man in pre-state Palestine, during the period of the British Mandate, he was convinced that “the Arabs will never be satisfied with less than [what] we are satisfied with, namely freedom and independence.”Avnery was one of the few constants in Israel’s “peace camp,” increasingly fractured and politically sidelined since the 1990s when the Labor Party under then-prime minister Yitzhak Rabin led talks with the Palestinians on interim peace deals.In 1993, he formed Gush Shalom or “Peace Bloc,” a group of several hundred activists that has staged hundreds of protests, often side by side with Palestinian activists.Over the years, he also wrote several books, including two about the War of Independence, and collected peace prizes and awards.He was to have celebrated his 95th birthday next month.Many Israeli leaders issued statements following Avnery’s death.Opposition leader Tzipi Livni lamented Avnery’s death. “He was a brave journalist and a rare and revolutionary man,” she said. “He stood for his positions despite the attacks (he faced) and planted within the people of Israel the notions of peace and moderation, when they were not yet in the lexicon, with a sharp and clear-eyed view that he maintained till the day he died. Israel will miss him.”Meretz party chief Tamar Zandberg said Avnery “molded Israeli history as few have done, precisely because conscience and truth were his compass.”MK Ayman Odeh, head of the Joint (Arab) List party, called Avnery “a dear man who dedicated his life to peace, to a better future for both peoples and to the establishment of a Palestinian state. His voice, vision and outlook will continue to reverberate after his passing.”On the right, former Likud minister Gideon Sa’ar said Avnery “was as far from myself and my positions as east is from west. His words and actions often angered me. But in nascent Israel he was a model of fearless opposition, in times when it was difficult to oppose the Mapai (precursor to Labor) regime, which hounded him. And there is no democracy without opposition.”Jewish Home leader Naftali Bennett told Army Radio that Avnery “contributed to the establishment of the state… I very much opposed his positions, but we are a democratic country.”

EARTH DESTROYED WITH THE EARTH IN NOAHS DAY(BECAUSE OF SIN,VIOLENCE AND GODLESS PEOPLE)

GENESIS 6:11-13
11 The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.(WORLD TERRORISM,MURDERS)(HAMAS IN HEBREW IS VIOLENCE)
12 And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.
13 And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence (TERRORISM)(HAMAS) through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.

HOSEA 4:1-3
1 Hear the word of the LORD, ye children of Israel: for the LORD hath a controversy with the inhabitants of the land, because there is no truth, nor mercy, nor knowledge of God in the land.
2 By swearing, and lying, and killing, and stealing, and committing adultery, they break out, and blood toucheth blood.
3 Therefore shall the land mourn, and every one that dwelleth therein shall languish, with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven; yea, the fishes of the sea also shall be taken away.

DEUTORONOMY 28:22-24
22  The LORD shall smite thee with a consumption, and with a fever, and with an inflammation, and with an extreme burning, and with the sword, and with blasting, and with mildew; and they shall pursue thee until thou perish.
23  And thy heaven that is over thy head shall be brass, and the earth that is under thee shall be iron.
24  The LORD shall make the rain of thy land powder and dust: from heaven shall it come down upon thee, until thou be destroyed.

STORMS HURRICANES-TORNADOES

LUKE 21:25-26
25 And there shall be signs in the sun,(HEATING UP-SOLAR ECLIPSES) and in the moon,(MAN ON MOON-LUNAR ECLIPSES) and in the stars;(ASTEROIDS ETC) and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity;(MASS CONFUSION) the sea and the waves roaring;(FIERCE WINDS)
26 Men’s hearts failing them for fear,(TORNADOES,HURRICANES,STORMS) and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth:(DESTRUCTION) for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.(FROM QUAKES,NUKES ETC)

THE FIRST JUDGEMENT OF THE EARTH STARTED WITH WATER-IT ONLY MAKES SENSE THE LAST GENERATION WILL BE HAVING FLOODING
GENESIS 7:6-12
6 And Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of waters was upon the earth.
7 And Noah went in, and his sons, and his wife, and his sons’ wives with him, into the ark, because of the waters of the flood.
8 Of clean beasts, and of beasts that are not clean, and of fowls, and of every thing that creepeth upon the earth,
9 There went in two and two unto Noah into the ark, the male and the female, as God had commanded Noah.
10 And it came to pass after seven days, that the waters of the flood were upon the earth.
11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.
12 And the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights.
GOD PROMISED BY A RAINBOW-THE EARTH WOULD NEVER BE DESTROYED TOTALLY WITH A FLOOD AGAIN.BUT FLOODIING IS A SIGN OF JUDGEMENT.

FIRES AND EXPLOSIONS

REVELATION 8:7
7 The first angel sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled with blood, and they were cast upon the earth: and the third part of trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up.

Flash flood hits hikers in gorge in southern Italy; 8 dead-[Associated Press]-YAHOONEWSAugust 21, 2018

MILAN (AP) — Heavy rain flooded a gorge filled with hikers Monday in the southern region of Calabria, killing at least eight people, Italy's civil protection agency said.It said the dead included four men and four women.The head of civil protection in Calabria, Carlo Tansi, told Sky TG24 that 12 other people, including a 10-year-old boy, were brought to safety in the flash flood in the Raganello Gorge, a popular aquatic trekking spot. The boy suffered hypothermia and was among six people who were injured, the agency said.It was unclear how many people were missing but at least three groups of hikers were said to be in the gorge."The problem is we don't know how many people were knocked over by this flood," Tansi said. "This is a split in the terrain that is very tight and high. Imagine nearly a kilometer (half a mile) in height. And just a few meters (yards) wide. Imagine people who were in this hole."Tansi said it would take hours to know the possible toll.The gorge on the eastern side of the Pollino National Park boasts aquatic trekking along the stream that cuts through the massive rock, where hikers pass by water falls, water tubs and natural slipways, according to a website. The 12-kilometer- (71/2-mile-) long gorge is broken down into three sections, the upper, mid and lower canyons, with hikes averaging between 2 ½ and 3 ½ hours. Guides include spelunkers and rescue instructors.

Bodies found as floods recede in India's Kerala-[AFP]-Bhuvan Bagga and Manjunath Kiran-YAHOONEWS-August 21, 2018

Kochi (India) (AFP) - Floodwaters receded in Kerala on Monday, leaving Indian rescuers the grim task of retrieving bodies as the death toll from the worst monsoon rains in a century rose above 400.With nearly three quarters of a million people packed into relief camps in the southern state, known for its tourist beaches and hill resorts, authorities also fear outbreaks of disease.After more than a week of fierce downpours, rainfall eased Monday and flood levels fell in some districts. Army helicopters and boats kept up missions to find trapped survivors and drop food and water in isolated villages.The Indian government has declared the floods a "calamity of severe nature", a home ministry official told AFP.Officials said 22,000 people were rescued on Sunday. At least 30 bodies were also found, taking the death toll above 200 since the torrential rain started falling on August 8 and more than 400 since the monsoon started in June.At least 1,000 were feared stranded in five villages around Chengannur, one of the districts worst hit by the deluge.An Indian Navy team made a temporary rope bridge across a stream in Thrissur district on Sunday to rescue 100 people stranded for days.Commercial flight operations to Kochi, the state's main city, resumed Monday after the navy opened its airstrips for small passenger aircraft. The city's international airport has been ordered shut until Sunday.The floods have left widespread desolation in the city.Mumthaz fled her home in the Malikapeedika district of Kochi with her daughters aged 13 and nine last Thursday.She went to her husband's parents in another neighbourhood but within a few hours even that was also flooded and they had to be rescued and taken to a relief camp.- Hunt for missing -"It was surreal. The water was close to the knees at one point and within a few minutes it was touching five feet with a current so strong that we saw big cars floating like tin cans," said Mumthaz, who has only one name.Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said the priority now was to provide clean drinking water and restore power supplies to the state of 33 million people."The total number of people taking refuge at the 5,645 relief camps has risen to 724,649," Vijayan told reporters Sunday.He said health officers would be deployed in each village to check the spread of communicable diseases.Thousands of army, navy and air force personnel have fanned out to help those stranded in remote and hilly areas. Dozens of helicopters have been dropping tonnes of food, medicine and water over areas cut off due to damaged roads and bridges.In the worst-hit areas such as Thrissur and Chengannur, rescuers searched inundated houses, discovering the bodies of those trapped by the fast rising floodwaters."They didn't think that it would rise this high -- 10 to 15 feet (3-4.5 metres) at some places -- when the initial warnings were issued," said Ashraf Ali K.M., who is leading the search in the small town of Mala in Thrissur.Fishermen have sailed inland from Kerala's coast to join the search, as volunteers set up soup kitchens and an international appeal was made for financial help.The state government said each fishing boat would get 3,000 rupees ($43) for each day of work and that authorities would pay for any damage to them.The floods have caused an estimated $3 billion in damage but the bill is likely to rise as the scale of devastation becomes clearer.

Wildfire moves closer to Glacier National Park's scenic road-[Associated Press]-YAHOONEWS-August 20, 2018

MISSOULA, Mont. (AP) — A wildfire in Montana's Glacier National Park is forcing more evacuations and has burned within a half-mile of the scenic Going-to-the-Sun Road.Protecting the highway through the park is officials' priority, with firefighters installing hoses and sprinklers to prevent it from spreading there, The Missoulian newspaper reported Sunday.If that happens, destabilization could lead rock and trees to fall for years, operations chief Rocky Gilbert said.Part of the 50-mile, two-lane road is closed. The road spans the width of the park and crosses the Continental Divide, according to the Visit Montana website.Officials evacuated the Fish Creek Campground and told residents in the small town of Apgar on Lake McDonald that they might have to leave.Other campgrounds, the historic Lake McDonald Lodge and private cabins along Going-to-the-Sun Road are already under evacuation orders.Brothers Craig and Sean Simpson, and their father, Henry, were evacuated from their campground Sunday, the Missoulian reported."It's kind of scary, being woken up and told you have to evacuate," Craig Simpson told the newspaper.Sean Simpson commended Glacier staff for their handling of the situation. "They got us out with plenty of time to be safe, and we felt taken care of."The Simpsons had arrived from New England on Saturday. While they had to relocate to Apgar Campground and cancel their plans to hike in the North Fork, they still planned to stay for five nights.Businesspeople who serve tourists in the park said the fire has already hurt them."The smoke is what's affecting us," Glacier Outfitters co-owner Shelby Handlin Hampton told the Missoulian. The fire deterred Glacier visitors from the outdoor activities that her shop supports.The fire in Glacier National Park comes as officials said a wildfire near California's Yosemite National Park has been fully contained following a recent weekslong closure.Yosemite's closure came at the height of tourist season, costing the park and nearby communities millions of dollars. The park draws more than 600,000 visitors during a typical August, according to the National Park Service.___Information from: Missoulian, http://www.missoulian.com

Quake swarm jolts Indonesian islands, killing at least 12-[Associated Press]-ROSIDIN SEMBAHULUN-YAHOONEWS-August 20, 2018

SEMBALUN, Indonesia (AP) — Multiple strong earthquakes killed at least a dozen people on the Indonesian islands of Lombok and Sumbawa as the region was trying to recover from a temblor earlier this month that killed hundreds of people.A shallow magnitude 6.9 quake that hit about 10 p.m. was one of several powerful earthquakes Sunday in the northeast of Lombok that also caused landslides. The nighttime quake was followed by strong aftershocks.At least 10 people on Lombok and neighboring Sumbawa island were killed by collapsing buildings or heart attacks, National Disaster Mitigation Agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho said Monday. Two people died earlier Sunday on Lombok during a magnitude 6.3 quake.More than 1,800 houses were damaged, at least half of them severely, he said.The swarm of quakes caused panic in Sembalun subdistrict on Lombok in the shadow of Mount Rinjani, but many people were already staying in tents following the deadly jolt in early August and its hundreds of aftershocks. On Sumbawa, a neighborhood was engulfed by a fire that started in a collapsed house."People panicked and scattered," Nugroho said. "Some people are hysterical because they feel earthquake aftershocks that are harder than before. They heard a roar that probably came from landslides in the hills and Mount Rinjani."Dwikorita Karnawatim, who heads Indonesia's Meteorology and Geophysics Agency, said buildings that haven't collapsed so far have suffered repeated stress, and authorities have urged people to avoid both the mountain's slopes and weakened buildings.Sunday night's tremor occurred on a different fault and was not an aftershock of the magnitude 7.0 quake on Aug. 5 that killed 460 people, damaged tens of thousands of homes and displaced several hundred thousand people.The quake lasting five to 10 seconds also was felt in the neighboring island of Bali and as far away as East Java and Makassar in Sulawesi.Quakes earlier Sunday caused landslides on Rinjani, an active volcano. Video shot by the Indonesian Red Cross showed huge clouds of dust billowing from the mountain's slopes.Rinjani has been closed to visitors following a July earthquake that killed 16 people, triggered landslides and stranded hundreds of tourists on the mountain.Indonesia, a sprawling archipelago that straddles the Pacific "Ring of Fire," is prone to earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.

Science Says: Hotter weather turbocharges US West wildfires-[The Canadian Press]-YAHOONWS-August 20, 2018

As temperatures rise in the U.S. West, so do the flames.The years with the most acres burned by wildfires have some of the hottest temperatures, an Associated Press analysis of fire and weather data found. As human-caused climate change has warmed the world over the past 35 years, the land consumed by flames has more than doubled.Experts say the way global warming worsens wildfires comes down to the basic dynamics of fire. Fires need ignition, oxygen and fuel. And what's really changed is fuel — the trees, brush and other plants that go up in flames."Hotter, drier weather means our fuels are drier, so it's easier for fires to start and spread and burn more intensely," said University of Alberta fire scientist Mike Flannigan.It's simple, he said: "The warmer it is, the more fire we see."Federal fire and weather data show higher air temperatures are turbocharging fire season.The five hottest Aprils to Septembers out West produced years that on average burned more than 13,500 square miles (35,000 square kilometres ), according to data at the National Interagency Fire Center and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration .That's triple the average for the five coldest Aprils to Septembers.The Western summer so far is more than 3 degrees Fahrenheit (1.7 degrees Celsius) warmer than the 20th century average. California in July logged its hottest month in 124 years of record-keeping.The five years with the most acres burned since 1983 averaged 63.4 degrees from April to September. That's 1.2 degrees warmer than average and 2.4 degrees hotter than the years with the least acres burned, AP's data analysis shows.In California, the five years with the most acres burned (not including this year) average 2.1 degrees warmer than the five years with the least acres burned.A degree or two may seem like not much, but it is crucial for fuel. The hotter it is, the more water evaporates from plants. When fuel dries faster, fires spread more and burn more intensely, experts said.For every 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit that the air warms, it needs 15 per cent more rain to make up for the drying of the fuel, Flannigan said.Fuel moisture levels in California and Oregon are flirting with record dry levels, NOAA western regional climate centre director Tim Brown said.And low humidity is "the key driver of wildfire spread," according to University of Colorado fire scientist Jennifer Balch who says the Western U.S. soon will start to see wildfires of 1 million acres (1,562 square miles).Veteran Colorado hotshot firefighter Mike Sugaski used to consider 10,000-acre (16-square-mile) fires big, now he fights ones 10 times that or more."You kind of keep saying, 'How can they get much worse?' But they do," Sugaski said.The number of U.S. wildfires hasn't changed much over the last few decades, but the area consumed has soared."The year 2000 seemed to be some kind of turning point," said Randy Eardley, the fire centre 's chief spokesman.From 1983 to 1999, the United States didn't reach 10,000 square miles burned annually. Since then, 10 years have had more than 10,000 square miles burned, including 2017, 2015 and 2006 when more than 15,000 square miles burned.Some people who reject mainstream climate science point to statistics that seem to show far more acres burned in the 1930s and 1940s. But Eardley said statistics before 1983 are not reliable because fires "may be double-counted, tripled-counted or more."Nationally, more than 8,900 square miles (23,050 kilometres ) have burned this year, about 28 per cent more than the 10-year average as of mid-August. California is having one of its worst years.Scientists generally avoid blaming global warming for specific extreme events without extensive analysis, but scientists have done those extensive examinations on wildfire.John Abatzgolou of the University of Idaho looked at forest fires and dry conditions in the Western United States from 1979 to 2015 and compared that to computer simulations of what would be expected with no human-caused climate change. He concluded that global warming had a role in an extra 16,200 square miles (42,000 square kilometres ) of forests burning since 1984.A study of the 2015 Alaska fire season — the second biggest on record — did a similar simulation analysis, concluding that climate change from the burning of coal, oil and gas increased the risk of the fire season being that severe by 34 to 60 per cent .One 2015 study said globally fire seasons are about 18.7 per cent longer since 1979. Another study that year says climate change is increasing extreme wildfire risk in California where wildfires already are year-round.Also, drought and bark beetles have killed 129 million trees in California since 2016, creating more fuel.Contrary to fire scientists, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke this week told Breitbart radio that "what's driving" increased wildfires is an increase in fuel. He said the government has "been held hostage by environmental terrorist groups" that oppose clearing dead trees that they say provide wildlife habitat. Zinke, however, has acknowledged that climate change was a factor in worsening wildfires.___Follow Seth Borenstein on Twitter: @borenbears .___The Associated Press Health & Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute's Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.Seth Borenstein, The Associated Press.

B.C. Wildfires 2018: Flights cancelled as smoke chokes airports-[CBC]-YAHOONEWS-August 20, 2018

Flights at several airports in B.C.'s Interior and West Kootenay regions have been cancelled or delayed as wildfire smoke continues to choke the province.Kelowna International Airport, Penticton Regional Airport and the West Kootenay Airport in Castlegar all reported several flights cancelled by noon PT Sunday.Sean Parker, the on-call airport manager in Kelowna, said there's less than one kilometre of visibility, which means smaller planes can't land safely.Parker says he hasn't seen such thick wildfire smoke in years."To be honest with you, I've personally never seen it this bad," he said. "You look out the window here in Kelowna​ … It's like we're in a fog."In a statement, Air Canada said its flights to and from the Interior could continue to be affected due to smoke and visibility.Those with travel plans are advised to check the flight information page on their airport's official website or social media channels.Andrea Purcell arrived in Vancouver from Toronto on Sunday at 2 p.m. PT only to discover her Air Canada flight to Castlegar was cancelled due to smoke.She is spending the night in Vancouver and will drive to Castlegar on Monday, but says she wishes the airline did more to help her."I would have stayed in Toronto longer had I known," she said.Environment Canada said much of the province is under a special weather statement because of smoke. Only the far north and part of the western coast are clear.Air quality in Castlegar, Kamloops, Prince George, Quesnel, Whistler and Williams Lake was set at a "very high" health-risk rating of 10 or higher on Sunday.The Okanagan, eastern Fraser Valley and Metro Vancouver regions had the same rating.The elderly, children and people with pre-existing health conditions in those areas should stay inside.The conditions forced some people to change their plans, such as not spending the weekend outdoors or cutting camping trips short.That's what Anita Sparrow and her family did at Golden Ears Provincial Park east of Vancouver on Sunday."It's supposed to be 33 C, clear skies," she said about the cool temperatures due to hazy conditions.She says the conditions made her feel like she had a cold. One of her children has been having to use an inhaler.Still, she says it could be worse, considering the South Coast is mostly just suffering from smoke and not flames."We're lucky here, so even for us to say, 'Oh it ruined our vacation,' well it's ruining peoples' homes, it's ruining wildlife, it's ruining full communities, so I feel blessed living in this part of B.C."Environment Canada meteorologist Allan Coldwells said smoke "is going to be an issue for the next five days," compounded by even more smoke that has floated north from wildfires in Washington state.The status of the wildfires across the province has largely held over the weekend.On Sunday, fire information officer Kyla Fraser said the corridor between Smithers and Prince George is still the biggest area of concern given the size and intensity of the fires there.The Shovel Lake fire — the province's largest — has scorched 85,000 hectares west of Prince George.In the southeast corner of the province, thousands of people in Kimberley are still on evacuation alert.Fraser said the nearby Meachen Creek wildfire stayed relatively the same size on Saturday night.More fire information: - B.C. is in its fifth day of a province-wide state of emergency. There are more than 560 wildfires burning across the province. - People living in more than 2,800 properties have been forced to leave, while 11,300 more properties are under evacuation alerts. - On Friday, the province announced it would match donations to the Red Cross for people affected by wildfires up to $20 million. - The B.C. Wildfire Service said its cost for fighting fires so far this season has topped $242 million. - More than 100 Canadian Armed Forces have been deployed to help B.C. personnel. - Wildfire smoke over western Canada is visible from NASA's DSCOVR satellite — about 1.6 million kilometres away.With files from Anis Heydari, Allison Dempster, Zahra Premji and The Canadian Press.

DISEASES

REVELATION 6:7-8
7 And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, Come and see.
8 And I looked, and behold a pale horse:(CHLORES GREEN) and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword,(WEAPONS) and with hunger,(FAMINE) and with death,(INCURABLE DISEASES) and with the beasts of the earth.(ANIMAL TO HUMAN DISEASE).

Europe sees sharp rise in measles: 41,000 cases, 37 deaths-[Associated Press]-YAHOONEWS-August 21, 2018

BERLIN (AP) — The World Health Organization says the number of measles cases in Europe jumped sharply during the first six months of 2018 and at least 37 people have died.The U.N. agency's European office said Monday more than 41,000 measles cases were reported in the region during the first half of the year — more than in all 12-month periods so far this decade.The previous highest annual total was 23,927 cases in 2017. A year earlier, only 5,273 cases were reported.The agency said half — some 23,000 cases — this year occurred in Ukraine, where an insurgency backed by Russia has been fighting the government for four years in the east in a conflict that has killed over 10,000 people.France, Georgia, Greece, Italy, Russia and Serbia also had more than 1,000 measles infections each so far this year.Measles, among the world's most contagious diseases, is a virus that's spread in the air through coughing or sneezing. It can be prevented with a vaccine that's been in use since the 1960s, but health officials say vaccination rates of at least 95 percent are needed to prevent epidemics.Vaccine skepticism remains high in many parts of Europe after past immunization problems.Measles typically begins with a high fever and also causes a rash on the face and neck. While most people who get it recover, measles is one of the leading causes of death among young children, according to the WHO.Italy has introduced a new law requiring parents to vaccinate their children against measles and nine other childhood diseases. Romania also passed a similar bill, including hefty fines for parents who didn't vaccinate their children.The U.N. agency on Monday called for better surveillance of the disease and increased immunization rates to prevent measles from becoming endemic.___Why Europe still has so many measles outbreaks: https://www.apnews.com/fe39445a21d4482680bcf2b0dc656ae8

U.S. Catholics 'sickened' by sex abuse report, stand by their faith-[Reuters]-By Gabriella Borter-YAHOONEWS-August 21, 2018

YORK, Pa. (Reuters) - Many churchgoers said they were sickened and saddened by a grand jury report detailing widespread sexual abuse by hundreds of priests in Pennsylvania but they would not let the Roman Catholic Church's cover-up dissuade them from their faith.Nearly 200 parishioners filled almost all the pews for Saturday’s Mass at St. Patrick’s Church in York, Pennsylvania, where six priests who at one time worked in that parish are accused in the report https://bit.ly/2vTa9oY of sexually abusing children.“I can't talk about it without crying," said Kathy Morris, a retired steelworker and a member of St. Patrick's for over 15 years. "I'm going to Mass to try to find some peace."“I’m disappointed that it happened but as far as the faith goes, I’ll never give my faith up,” said Anthony Giuffrida, 66, an usher and lifelong member at St. Patrick’s. “I was raised Roman Catholic and that’s what I’ll be till the day I die."Few people attended the 9 a.m. service at St. Margaret Mary in Harrisburg where the report accuses Rev. Richard Barry of abusing boys in the 1980s. The parking lot was nearly empty, and a busload of seniors from a retirement community were among the few who entered the church.Most attending the Mass declined to comment or made brief statements without giving their names."Our faith goes on," one woman said.The grand jury report was the most comprehensive report on clergy abuse in American history, accusing hundreds of priests in six of Pennsylvania's eight dioceses of assaulting children for decades while the diocese covered it up, often sending priests to treatment centers and reassigning them to different parishes.The results of the grand jury’s two-year investigation were the latest revelation in a scandal that has shaken the Catholic Church since the Boston Globe in 2002 reported on decades of clergy abuse and the attempt by the diocese to cover it up.Allegations of clergy abuse in Europe, Australia and Chile have also emerged and prompted the resignation of several leaders within the Church, which has about 1.2 billion members worldwide.Rev. Keith Carroll of St. Patrick’s Church said in his sermon Saturday that "What is contained in that report is sickening and saddening." He said he was “struggling personally” with “anger, utter embarrassment and sadness.”Carroll implored his parish to not spurn the church because of the grand jury’s findings: “Only God himself can bring us out of this darkness.”Many churchgoers echoed Carroll's hope that Catholics would not abandon their faith out of disgust with the church leadership's past behavior. Over 3 million people, about a quarter of Pennsylvania's population, are Catholic according to the Pennsylvania Catholic Conference.Over 100 people attended Sunday Mass at St. Columba Church in Bloomsburg, formerly the parish of Rev. James Beeman whom the report accused of raping a 7-year-old girl while she was in the hospital."I’m praying for our church community to hold onto our faith because that’s still the best thing we have," said parishioner Mary Howe, 63, who has been a member at St. Columba since 1956.Victims and their advocates said they were grateful that the report outed so many abusive priests. The report cited 301 priests, some of whom have died. Only two of the priests are still subject to prosecution."This is only the tip," said Mary McHale, 46, who testified before the grand jury and said she was abused by Rev. James Gaffney at her Catholic high school in Reading. "It just multiplied inside me over the years. The shame and the guilt and the low self-esteem, that never leaves you."McHale supports her former classmate and state Representative Mark Rozzi, who said he was raped by his parish priest and is pushing to change a law to give victims of child sex abuse more time to file claims against their abusers.State legislators expect to take up the bill in September, said Steve Miskin, a spokesman for House Majority Leader Representative Dave Reed.(Reporting by Gabriella Borter; Additional reporting by David Dekok in Harrisburg; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)

Ebola deaths in DR Congo rises to 49 with 2,000 feared 'contacts'-[AFP]-YAHOONEWS-August 20, 2018

Kinshasa (AFP) - The deadly Ebola outbreak in eastern DR Congo has now claimed 49 lives since the start of the month, the government has said, and the World Health Organization expects more cases.The gradually increasing death toll, with a further 2,000 people feared to have come into contact with the virus, adds to the woes of a country already facing violence, displacement and political uncertainty.First reported on August 1 in the North Kivu province, the current outbreak has killed 49 of the 90 cases reported, according to the latest health ministry bulletin on Saturday.It said of the 49 deaths from the haemorrhagic fever, 63 were confirmed and 27 were probable. Confirmed cases are verified through laboratory tests on samples taken from patients. The cases treated as "probable" often concern sick people with a close epidemiological link to confirmed cases, but who have not been tested.Most deaths -- 39 -- were recorded in the agricultural village of Mangina 30 kilometres (some 20 miles) southwest of the city of Beni. Three deaths occurred in the neighbouring province of Ituri.Field teams also identified 2,157 "contacts" -- people who may have been in contact with the virus -- according to the health ministry.WHO spokesman Tarik Jasarevic told reporters on Friday from the UN agency's Geneva headquarters that it "expects more cases"."We do not know if all the chains of transmission have been identified," he added.The outbreak is the 10th to strike the DRC since 1976, when Ebola was first identified and named after a river in the north of the country.Ebola has long been considered incurable, though swift isolation and the rapid treatment of symptoms such as vomiting, diarrhoea and dehydration has helped some patients to survive.The quest for a vaccine grew increasingly urgent during an Ebola epidemic that killed more than 11,300 people in the West African states of Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone in 2013-15.

WORLD POWERS IN THE LAST DAYS (END OF AGE OF GRACE NOT THE WORLD)

EUROPEAN UNION-KING OF WEST-DAN 9:26-27,DAN 7:23-24,DAN 11:40,REV 13:1-10
EGYPT-KING OF THE SOUTH-DAN 11:40
RUSSIA-KING OF THE NORTH-EZEK 38:1-2,EZEK 39:1-3
CHINA-KING OF THE EAST-DAN 11:44,REV 9:16,18
VATICAN-RELIGIOUS LEADER-REV 13:11-18,REV 17:4-5,9,18

WORLD TERRORISM

OH BY THE WAY WHEN THE MEDIA SAYS ALLU-AK-BAR MEANS GOD IS GREAT LIE. IN ISLAM ALLU-AK-BAR MEANS OUR GOD IS GREATER OR GREATEST. THIS IS HOW THE MEDIA SUCK HOLES UP TO ISLAMIC-QURANIC-MUSLIMS. BY WATERING DOWN THE REAL MEANING OF THE SEX FOR MURDER DEATH CULT ISLAM. TO MAKE IT SOUND LIKE A PEACEFUL RELIGION (CULT OF DEATH AND WORLD DOMINATION).

GENESIS 6:11-13
11 The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.(WORLD TERRORISM,MURDERS)(HAMAS IN HEBREW IS VIOLENCE)
12 And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.
13 And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence (TERRORISM)(HAMAS) through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.

GENESIS 16:11-12
11 And the angel of the LORD said unto her,(HAGAR) Behold, thou art with child, and shalt bear a son, and shalt call his name Ishmael;(FATHER OF THE ARAB/MUSLIMS) because the LORD hath heard thy affliction.
12 And he (ISHMAEL-FATHER OF THE ARAB-MUSLIMS) will be a wild (DONKEY-JACKASS) man;(ISLAM IS A FAKE AND DANGEROUS SEX FOR MURDER CULT) his hand will be against every man,(ISLAM HATES EVERYONE) and every man's hand against him;(PROTECTING THEMSELVES FROM BEING BEHEADED) and he (ISHMAEL ARAB/MUSLIM) shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.(LITERAL-THE ARABS LIVE WITH THEIR BRETHERN JEWS)

ISAIAH 14:12-14
12  How art thou fallen from heaven, O Lucifer,(SATAN) son of the morning!(HEBREW-CRECENT MOON-ISLAM) how art thou cut down to the ground, which didst weaken the nations!
13  For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of God: I will sit also upon the mount of the congregation, in the sides of the north:
14  I (SATAN HAS EYE TROUBLES) will ascend above the heights of the clouds; I will be like the most High.(AND 1/3RD OF THE ANGELS OF HEAVEN FELL WITH SATAN AND BECAME DEMONS)

JOHN 16:2
2 They shall put you out of the synagogues: yea, the time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service.(ISLAM MURDERS IN THE NAME OF MOON GOD ALLAH OF ISLAM)

Iranian journalist jailed for 10 years for ‘insulting’ imam on Twitter-Mir Mohammad-Hossein Mir-Esmaili convicted for saying 9th-century Muslim leader would have allowed concerts, after city of Mashhad bans them-By AFP-TOI-AUG 21,18

TEHRAN, Iran — An Iranian journalist has been sentenced to 10 years in prison for “insulting” an imam from the ninth century on Twitter, his lawyer told local media on Monday.Mir Mohammad-Hossein Mir-Esmaili, a journalist for the Jahan-e Sanat daily, was arrested while trying to leave the country in April 2017.It followed a Twitter post in which he said Imam Reza, one of the 12 revered figures in Iran’s dominant strand of Shiite Islam, was “one of us,” implying that he would have allowed young people to enjoy themselves.He made the statement as a criticism of Friday prayer leader Ayatollah Ahmad Alamolhoda, who has banned concerts in the holy city of Mashhad which is home to the Imam Reza shrine.“Alamolhoda says that dancing and music is an insult to Imam Reza! Come on, don’t lie, Imam Reza is one of us,” wrote Mir-Esmaili in a tweet which is no longer available but was reprinted by numerous media.Mir-Esmaili was found guilty of insulting Islam and government officials, spreading falsehoods and publishing immoral content, his lawyer Hossein Ahmadiniyaz told ISNA on Monday.“There are many faults to this verdict as my client criticized officials in the form of satire but unfortunately they have considered this as an insult,” said Ahmadiniyaz.He planned to appeal after being informed of the sentence on Sunday, the lawyer added.Mir-Esmaili apologized shortly after the initial post, saying: “I did not insult Imam Reza in any way. I am Muslim and a Shiite and I only wanted to criticize Alamolhoda.”He implied he had been physically threatened, saying: “To those who claim they are Muslims, why do they threaten to throw acid and murder?”

Palestinians hail Corbyn for refusal to ‘give in’ on anti-Semitism definition-PA envoy Manuel Hassassian urges Labour party leader not to adopt Holocaust Remembrance Alliance clause on unfair criticism of Israel; Hamas terror group 'salutes' Corbyn-By TOI staff-AUG 21,18

The Palestinian Authority is backing the British Labour Party over its controversial adoption of a definition of anti-Semitism that does not include Israel criticism and has called on party leader Jeremy Corbyn not to “give in” to pressure to change it.The definition adopted by Labour, which strips out clauses from the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition dealing with criticism of Israel, has been met with anger from British Jewry and further added to criticism the party has been soft on dealing with anti-Semitism under Corbyn.Manuel Hassassian, the PA’s ambassador to the United Kingdom, hailed Corbyn for his “principled stance” on the matter, the UK Times newspaper reported on Monday.“Pro-Israeli interest groups in Britain are using the anti-Semitism row to silence criticism of Israel,” Hassassian was quoted saying.He applauded Labour for not adopting the full IHRA definition, under which he claims “accusations of racism against Israel could be deemed anti-Semitic.”“Labour rightly judged that this example could be used as a tool to challenge criticism of nationalist tendencies and violations of human rights in Israel and legitimize its prolonged occupation of the Palestinians rather than protecting Jews worldwide,” Hassassian said.On Sunday, the Hamas terror group said that it “salutes” Corbyn for his views.After tweeting the rhetorical question “Do you endorse Jeremy Corbyn for UK Prime Minister?” the terror group, which seeks to destroy Israel, gave its answer.“We Salute Jeremy Corbyn’s supportive positions to the Palestinians, but the issue of him as prime minister is an internal British issue and we respect the choice of the British people.”The Labour leader, long a supporter of the Palestinian cause and a strident critic of Israel, has in the past been criticized for calling terror groups Hamas and Hezbollah “friends” when inviting members for a parliamentary meeting in 2009. He later downplayed the comment and said he regretted using the term.Still, several reports have surfaced in recent weeks showing Corbyn’s ties to Palestinian terrorists. On Sunday night, the Telegraph reported that Corbyn sat on a panel in 2012 alongside Hamas terror leaders, including at least two people who had recently been freed from Israeli jails, where they served time for their involvement in a series of deadly suicide bombings.A spokesperson for Corbyn told the Telegraph that the Labour leader supports Palestinians in his quest for peace in the region.“Jeremy has a long and principled record of solidarity with the Palestinian people and engaging with actors in the conflict to support peace and justice in the Middle East. That is the right thing to do,” he said.Last week, Corbyn was criticized when it emerged that he laid a wreath at an event in Tunis honoring Palestinian terrorists who carried out the 1972 attack on the Munich Olympics, in which 11 Israeli athletes were killed.

Spanish police treating Barcelona would-be stabbing as terror attack-Algerian man shouts 'Allahu akbar' before lunging at police with knife; is shot dead by officers-By Agencies-TOI-AUG 21,18

Spanish officers on Monday shot dead an Algerian man who tried to attack them with a knife at a police station while shouting “Allahu akbar” (God is greatest), police said.Barcelona police said they are treating the attack as a terrorist incident.“We are treating it as a terrorist attack. The officer used his gun to save his own life,” Rafel Comes, a commissioner with the Catalan regional police, told a news conference in Cornella de Llobregat where the attack took place.But he said police have found no evidence linking the incident to last year’s terror attacks in Barcelona and nearby Cambrils, which killed 16 people.“An investigation has been launched following the events that occurred this morning at our police station in Cornella in order to clarify the reasons for the attack,” Catalonia regional police said in a statement.The central government’s representative in Catalonia, Teresa Cunillera, called for “prudence” before deciding what the attacker’s motive was and until police had finished their investigation.“Until there have been a minimum of checks, of looking into the whys, it is very difficult to draw any conclusions,” she told public radio.Catalan police were due to give more details about the attack at a Barcelona press conference scheduled for noon (1000 GMT).The police station was cordoned off and funeral home employees removed the attacker’s body from the building, an AFP photographer at the scene said.Officers searched the man’s home, which was located just a few hundred meters (yards) from the site of the attack.The incident occurred just days after the first anniversary of a deadly jihadist rampage in Catalonia.Sixteen people were killed on August 17, 2017, when a van drove into crowds on Barcelona’s popular Las Ramblas boulevard and in a knife attack in the nearby resort of Cambrils.The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the terror attacks, Spain’s worst since the Madrid train bombings in 2004 when 191 people died and more than 1,800 were injured.IS targets police-Spain has kept its terrorist alert at the second-highest level since 2015.Catalonia, which is home to a significant number of second-generation immigrants, has had a long history of Islamic terrorist activity.Spain’s first Muslim extremist — a member of the Algerian Armed Islamic Group (GIA) — was uncovered in Catalonia in 1995.Mohammed Atta, the pilot who slammed a passenger plane into one of New York’s World Trade Center towers on Sept 11, 2001, spent time in Catalonia shortly before the attacks.And in 2008, a plot targeting Barcelona’s underground trains was foiled when it was already in advanced stages.One in four people detained in Spain in relation to extremist Muslim-linked terrorism come from the province of Barcelona in Catalonia, according to a study published last year by the Real Instituto Elcano, a Spanish think-tank, which called the province the country’s “main center of jihadist activity.”There have been a string of similar incidents in neighboring France targeting police and soldiers, including one in January 2016 in which police shot dead a man wielding a cleaver and yelling “Allahu akbar” (God is greatest) as he tried to attack a police station in northern Paris.That incident came on the one-year anniversary of the terrorist attack on satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo.

Egyptian army captain killed in northern Sinai roadside blast-Medics say officer was hit by improvised bomb, as military wages campaign against jihadists-By AFP-TOI-AUG 21,18

An Egyptian army captain has been killed by an improvised explosive device blast in North Sinai during a campaign to eliminate jihadists, medics said on Monday.The officer died Sunday evening after an explosion hit his vehicle west of the coastal city of El-Arish, a local medical source said.The Egyptian army has since February been conducting a major operation focused on the Sinai Peninsula to wipe out jihadists from the Islamic State group.The military says that over 250 suspected jihadists and at least 35 soldiers have been killed in its “Sinai 2018” operation.Jihadists launched an insurgency in Sinai after the 2013 military overthrow of Egypt’s Islamist president Mohamed Morsi, who was forced out by the military in the face of mass protests against his rule.

Iranians rage against elites’ nepotism, corruption in social media campaign-Anger grows online over the privileges and apparently extravagant lifestyles of government officials' family members-By TOI staff-AUG 21,18

Amid growing public unrest over their country’s economic difficulties, increasingly angry Iranians are shining a spotlight on the nepotism and corruption they believe is prevalent among the nation’s elite.A recent social media campaign, under the hashtag #where_is_your_kid, has been calling on members of government and other officials to give details on their children’s education and employment.Photos of the country’s “Aghazadeh,” or rich kids, living apparently opulent and extravagant lives and attending glitzy events, have incensed Iranians, amid reports that many are enjoying privileges not available to others, and winning high-paying state jobs not justified by their credentials or experience.“Are they reaping the fruit of their own effort or eating from our riches? Are they appointed on merit?” one person quoted by Bloomberg tweeted.According to The Telegraph, Mahmoud Bahmani, a former governor of Iran’s Central Bank, has joined the critics, telling Iranian press over 5,000 such “rich kids” live outside Iran.“Together they have $148 billion in their bank accounts,” he said, “which is more than Iran’s foreign currency reserves. We need to know what are they up to in those foreign countries when only 300 of them are registered as university students.”Social media users have also expressed outrage over photos of the lavish wedding of the son of Iran’s ambassador to Denmark.They’ve also been infuriated by the son of a former vice president whose business ventures thrived while his father served in government, and who attributed his success during an interview to “good genes.”Another such story, according to The Iran Project, is that of Ahmad Araghchi, nephew of deputy foreign minister Abbas Araghchi, who was appointed the nation’s top foreign currency official though his experience did not appear to merit such a position. He was fired and arrested earlier this month amid a probe into corruption at the Central Bank.Some Iranian officials have cooperated with the campaign and disclosed their children’s employment and education, including Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and Culture Minister Abbas Salehi.Iranian economist Manouchehr Farahbakhsh, who lives in London, told the Telegraph Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s own family would likey be at the top of any nepotism list, which would show how “from simple farmers [before the Islamic revolution] they have become billionaires today.”Since the US pulled out of the nuclear deal with Iran in May, the Iranian rial has slipped to record lows, which has consequently led many in the authoritarian country to explicitly call for an end to the rule of Iran’s Islamist leadership.Protests have sprung up in several major cities including Isfahan, Shiraz, Mashhad and Tehran, driven by concerns over the economy as well as wider anger at the political system.Videos have shown demonstrators cry out against “the dictator” in reference to Khamenei.The numerous protests are a continuation of sorts of a nationwide anti-government movement that started gaining ground in late December and continued protesting sporadically throughout the year.The Islamic Republic’s First Vice President Eshaq Jahangiri admitted Saturday that Iran’s economic situation was serious, but stressed that the nation was not at a dead-end.

Taliban reject Afghan ceasefire, kidnap nearly 200 bus passengers-[Reuters]-By Abdul Qadir Sediqi, Rupam Jain and Jibran Ahmad-YAHOONEWS-August 21, 2018

KABUL/PESHAWAR, Pakistan (Reuters) - The Taliban rejected on Monday an Afghan government offer of a ceasefire and said they would persist with their attacks, militant commanders said, while insurgents ambushed three buses and nearly 200 passengers traveling for a holiday.Two Taliban commanders said their supreme leader rejected President Ashraf Ghani's Sunday offer of a three-month ceasefire, beginning with this week's Eid al-Adha Muslim holiday.In June, the Taliban observed a government ceasefire over the three-day Eid al-Fitr festival, leading to unprecedented scenes of government soldiers and militants embracing on front lines, and raising hopes for talks.But one of the Taliban commanders said the June ceasefire had helped U.S. forces, who the Taliban are trying to drive out of the country. Taliban leader Sheikh Haibatullah Akhunzada rejected the new offer on the grounds that it too would only help the American-led mission."Our leadership feels that they'll prolong their stay in Afghanistan if we announced a ceasefire now," a senior Taliban commander, who declined to be identified, said by telephone.An official in Ghani's office said the three-month-long ceasefire declared by the government was conditional, and if the Taliban did not respect it, the government would maintain military operations.The Taliban have launched a wave of attacks in recent weeks, including on the city of Ghazni, southwest of Kabul. Hundreds of people have been killed in the fighting.Government officials are trying to secure the release of at least 170 civilians and 20 members of the security forces who were taken hostage by Taliban from three buses in the northern province of Kunduz.Esmatullah Muradi, a spokesman for the governor of Kunduz, said the kidnapping happened when the buses were traveling through Kunduz from Takhar province."The buses were stopped by the Taliban fighters, passengers were forced to step down and they have been taken to an undisclosed location," Muradi said.A Taliban commander in neighboring Pakistan said civilian hostages were being divided into small groups to be sent back home. However, members of Afghan security forces had been shifted to the Taliban’s secret jail. "Most probably we would exchange them for our prisoners later,” said the commander.-'TRAVELING FOR HOLIDAY'-The Taliban confirmed they had captured "three buses packed with passengers"."We decided to seize the buses after our intelligence inputs revealed that many men working with Afghan security forces were traveling to Kabul," Zabihullah Mujahid, a spokesman for the Taliban, said by telephone."We are now identifying members of the security forces," he said, adding that civilians would be released.Kunduz provincial council member Sayed Assadullah Sadat said people on the buses were traveling to be with family in Kabul for the holiday.A senior interior ministry official in Kabul said officials in the area were talking to Taliban leaders in Kunduz to get the estimated 190 hostages released. "We're are trying our level best to secure freedom for all passengers," the official said.Separately, Mujahid said the Taliban would release at least 500 prisoners, including members of the security forces, on Monday, a day before Eid celebrations begin.Sporadic clashes between Taliban fighters and Afghan forces erupted on the outskirts of Ghazni on Monday as aid workers tried to get help into the city, aid agency officials said.The government has said its forces had secured the city after the Taliban laid siege to it for five days this month.At least 150 soldiers and 95 civilians were killed and hundreds were injured. Aid agencies officials said their teams had entered the city but clashes in the outskirts prevented them from launching large-scale operations.(Editing by Paul Tait, Robert Birsel and editing by David Stamp)