NORTH AMERICAN UNION LEADERS MEET

1-WORLD QUAKES LAST 2 DAYS.2-Minor quake shakes Bay Area. 3-Moderate quake rocks southern Chile. 4-Two-sided storm. 5-Israelis Would Like to Join European Union. 6-Report: Israel wants to fly over Iraq. 7-Safeguarding Jerusalem. 8-New lakes beneath Antarctic ice. 9-Canada, Mexico, US pitch trade fixes for North America.

EARTHQUAKES

MATTHEW 24:7-8
7 For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places.
8 All these are the beginning of sorrows.

MARK 13:8
8 For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom:(ETHNIC GROUP AGAINST ETHNIC GROUP) and there shall be earthquakes in divers places, and there shall be famines and troubles: these are the beginnings of sorrows.

LUKE 21:11
11 And great earthquakes shall be in divers places, and famines, and pestilences; and fearful sights and great signs shall there be from heaven.

WORLD QUAKES LAST 2 DAYS (USGS)

Update time = Sun Feb 25 12:09 AM EDT

FEB 24,07
MAP 5.3 KURIL ISLANDS
MAP 5.2 KEPULAUAN SULA, INDONESIA
MAP 2.9 NORTHERN CALIFORNIA
MAP 2.9 CENTRAL ALASKA
MAP 2.9 CENTRAL CALIFORNIA
MAP 2.6 ISLAND OF HAWAII, HAWAII
MAP 2.5 ISLAND OF HAWAII, HAWAII
MAP 5.2 POTOSI, BOLIVIA
MAP 4.8 OFF THE COAST OF ECUADOR
MAP 2.5 ALASKA PENINSULA
MAP 2.9 RAT ISLANDS, ALEUTIAN ISLANDS, ALASKA
MAP 5.2 VANUATU REGION
MAP 5.2 OFF THE COAST OF ECUADOR
MAP 3.1 RAT ISLANDS, ALEUTIAN ISLANDS, ALASKA
MAP 3.1 RAT ISLANDS, ALEUTIAN ISLANDS, ALASKA
MAP 5.0 KALIMANTAN, INDONESIA
MAP 6.2 NEAR THE COAST OF NORTHERN PERU
MAP 3.2 ALASKA PENINSULA
MAP 2.6 SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA

FEB 23,07
MAP 3.4 SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA, CALIFORNIA
MAP 3.5 FOX ISLANDS, ALEUTIAN ISLANDS, ALASKA
MAP 5.6 AISEN, CHILE
MAP 3.3 HAWAII REGION, HAWAII
MAP 2.5 ANDREANOF ISLANDS, ALEUTIAN IS., ALASKA
MAP 5.0 TRINIDAD REGION, TRINIDAD AND TOBAGO
MAP 5.0 ECUADOR
MAP 2.6 ANDREANOF ISLANDS, ALEUTIAN IS., ALASKA
MAP 4.4 GUATEMALA
MAP 4.4 OFF THE COAST OF OREGON
MAP 4.8 KURIL ISLANDS
MAP 4.7 GULF OF CALIFORNIA
MAP 4.7 GULF OF CALIFORNIA
MAP 2.5 KODIAK ISLAND REGION, ALASKA
MAP 4.3 GULF OF CALIFORNIA
MAP 3.3 ANDREANOF ISLANDS, ALEUTIAN IS., ALASKA
MAP 2.5 CENTRAL ALASKA
MAP 3.5 NEVADA

Minor quake shakes Bay Area Fri Feb 23, 7:53 PM ET

BERKELEY, Calif. - A minor earthquake shook the San Francisco Bay area Friday, but there were no immediate reports of damage or injury. The magnitude-3.4 temblor struck on the Hayward fault about two miles southeast of Berkeley at 3:46 p.m., according to the U.S. Geological Survey. The jolt was felt in downtown San Francisco and throughout the Bay Area.

Bay Area Rapid Transit trains were stopped for about five minutes for inspection as a precaution. No trains or stations were damaged, spokesman Linton Johnson said.

Moderate quake rocks southern Chile Fri Feb 23, 6:49 PM ET

SANTIAGO, Chile - A moderate earthquake shook southern Chile on Friday in a sparsely populated region that seismologists say has recently seen a series of tremors due to the birth of an undersea volcano.

There were no immediate reports of damage or injuries.The quake had a preliminary magnitude of 5.6, according to the U.S. Geological Survey in Colorado.It struck about 20 miles north of Coyhaique, the largest city in the Aysen region, 1,300 miles south of the capital, said Chilean officials.There was alarm because it was somewhat stronger and longer than the many tremors felt in the area in recent weeks, said Juan Azocar, head of the Emergency Bureau in Coyhaique.Authorities say the region has registered about 2,000 tremors in the last month, though most have not been felt.

According to seismologists, the quakes are being caused by a magma buildup that is pressing upward beneath a fjord.Chile, a nation with a high seismic activity, has some 2,900 volcanoes nearly 500 of which are active.

STORMS HURRICANES-TORNADOES

LUKE 21:25-26
25 And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; 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, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.

Two-sided storm Wayne Verno, Meteorologist, The Weather Channel
Sat Feb 24, 10:53 AM ET

Midwest

Low pressure will continue to develop rapidly across the central Plains today, and track east toward the Great Lakes Heavy snow will spread across eastern Colorado, western Nebraska, Minnesota and Wisconsin through today. Rain and thunderstorms will change to snow from west to east across Kansas and the central and eastern Nebraska later today and tonight. Strong winds, gusting to over 50 mph at times, in these areas will create blizzard conditions with considerable blowing and drifting snow. A messy mix of snow, sleet and freezing rain will stretch from northern and eastern Iowa to northern Illinois and northern Indiana including Chicago during the day Saturday. Some areas will see significant ice accumulations and that could lead to power outages. A line of strong thunderstorms is forecast to spread eastward into the mid-Mississippi Valley. The threat for tornadoes, damaging winds, and large hail will impact areas from Kansas City to just south of St. Louis including the Ozarks. Heavy rain will be likely in the lower Missouri Valley and will spread eastward across the southern half of Illinois. Flooding is a distinct possibility in these areas. Sunday will feature strong winds and heavy snow from the Upper Mississippi Valley to the Great Lakes including Lower Michigan, with rain changing to snow across parts of the mid-Mississippi and Ohio Valleys. Snow accumulations could exceed a foot over parts of Minnesota and Wisconsin with considerable blowing snow. Blizzard conditions are possible in some locations. Precipitation will linger over the Midwest Monday and possibly into Tuesday with light snow from Minnesota to Michigan and Ohio.

South

Strong to severe thunderstorms will sweep eastward out of the southern Plains and head toward the Mississippi Valley today and this evening. Damaging winds, large hail and tornadoes are all possible from eastern Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Louisiana, and Mississippi today. By tonight, thunderstorms will shift east of the Mississippi River into Tennessee, Alabama and the Florida Panhandle. Although damaging wind gusts and hail will still be possible, the overall severe threat will be diminishing by that time. By Sunday, thunderstorms will move through the Southeast toward the coastal Carolinas and Georgia but only a few thunderstorms will be strong. With no plunges of cold air in sight, temperatures will remain mild for awhile across the region.

Northeast

Most of the Northeast will experience a dry but chilly day today. There will be a few scattered snow showers across parts of Upstate New York and northern New England, however.

An approaching storm system will bring an increase in cloudiness from the southwest, leading to the development of wintry precipitation on Sunday. Several inches of snow may blanket southern New York, northern Pennsylvania, northern New Jersey, Connecticut, Rhode Island and Cape Cod. A wintry mix of sleet and freezing rain will glaze much of the remainder of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, Maryland, Delaware and northern and western Virginia. This event will be relatively minor but there may be some travel or commuting woes overnight Sunday into early Monday morning from the Middle Atlantic to southern sections of New England.

West

Blizzard conditions are forecast to continue though Saturday night across eastern Colorado, western Nebraska, and western Kansas with sustained winds between 30-40mph and gusts above 50mph. A new storm system will move into the Pacific Northwest today bringing rain to Seattle, Portland, and San Francisco. Wind will be a major component to this storm system as it moves across the Western half of the country. This afternoon and evening winds between 25-30mph will spread across central and northern California with wind gusts between 50-60mph across the northern Sierra Mountains. Various wind advisories are active across California. Snow levels will range from 1500 feet in the Washington Cascades to 7000 feet in the central Sierra. More systems will affect the West Coast early next week with rain slowly edging southward through California with more rain/snow increasing over the Great Basin and snow expanding from the northern Rockies into the central Rockies. This is good news for those traveling to favorite ski destinations in states like Utah and Colorado.

Israelis Would Like to Join European Union
February 24, 2007

(Angus Reid Global Monitor) - Many Israelis believe their country should become a member of the European Union (EU), according to a poll by the Konrad Adenauer Foundation. 75 per cent of respondents would support a bid by Israel to join the continental group.Bulgaria and Romania were the latest countries to join the European Union, in January 2007. On Jan. 19, Romanian president Traian Basescu urged all member states to support the continuation of the open-door policy, saying, There is a new European reality, the fifth post-wave, which must not be neglected. The European neighbourhood policy is already a vehicle for the spread of values and standards in the East and we are decided to contribute to its evolution towards more consistency.

The EU has repeatedly urged the Palestinian government, integrated partly by the political wing of Hamas an organization accused of staging violent attacks against Israel to renounce violence and recognize the legitimacy of the Israeli state in exchange for foreign aid and support. While Israel signed an association agreement with the EU in November 1995 which incorporates specific free trade regulations the prospect of Israel’s full membership in the EU has never been seriously considered by either Israeli or European leaders.

Polling Data - Would you support or oppose Israel joining the European Union (EU)?
Support 75%,Oppose 18%,Not sure 7% .Source: Konrad Adenauer Foundation
Methodology: Interviews with 511 Israeli adults, conducted in February 2007. Margin of error is 4.5 per cent.

Report: Israel wants to fly over Iraq By DAVID STRINGER, Associated Press Writer Sat Feb 24, 6:56 AM ET

LONDON - Israel opened negotiations to fly through U.S. controlled airspace in Iraq to carry out strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities, a British newspaper reported Saturday. Israel's deputy defense minister denied the claim. The Daily Telegraph newspaper quoted an unnamed Israeli defense official as saying the talks were aimed at planning for all scenarios, including any future decision to target Iran's nuclear program.Israeli bombers would need a corridor through U.S.-administered airspace in Iraq to carry out any strikes, the official was quoted as saying by the newspaper.Ephraim Sneh, Israel's Deputy Defense Minister, told The Associated Press on Saturday that the report was incorrect. This is baseless information, Sneh said. Maybe people like to divert (attention from) the need for immediate economic sanctions (with) stories about imminent Israeli action, which is not on the agenda.

The international community's focus should be on imposing economic sanctions on Iran for defying U.N. Security Council resolutions, he said.Senior officials of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council Britain, the U.S., France, China and Russia and Germany are meeting Monday for an emergency summit in London to discuss measures against Tehran.The U.S. and its Western allies insist Iran must suspend uranium enrichment before any negotiations over its nuclear program take place and accused Tehran of using a civilian program as a cover to develop weapons.Iran, has rejected the condition to suspend enrichment and insists that its nuclear program is peaceful.Associated Press Writer Amy Tiebel in Jerusalem contributed to this report.

Safeguarding Jerusalem
By Yehuda Ben Meir (HAARETZ)

It's become very clear that the clash over the construction work near the Mugrabi Gate is not a struggle against the archaeological excavations or the construction of a bridge, but part of a broader campaign for the control of Jerusalem.

After all, this construction work has no connection to the Al-Aqsa Mosque nor any effect on it. Indeed, even among some of the Arab MKs - those same leaders mobilizing the war and the incitement against the construction - there were those who admitted, some through winks and nods and others more directly, that whether the work really threatens the mosque does not matter. In their view, Israel has no sovereignty in the Old City and has no right to carry out any sort of construction work in the Temple Mount environs. At the root of this war is the intensifying effort by the Palestinians and their supporters, from within and without Israel, to deny any link or rights of the Jewish people to the Temple Mount or to Jerusalem, and thus to undermine not only our right to sovereignty in Jerusalem, but also Israel's right to exist as a Jewish state.

We have no choice but to succeed in this struggle, and possess all the possible elements for such an outcome. The way to succeed is to show and prove, by means of complete transparency, that the deceiving claims and baseless incitements are nothing more than false propaganda. The government acted along these lines, launching a Web site with real-time, round-the-clock video footage of the excavations. Israel has finally learned to utilize the Internet. And indeed, the disorderly conduct of Sheikh Ra'ad Salah and the remonstrations of Khaled Meshal and the Islamic organizations are not having any significant effect in the broader world, and their anti-Israel campaign has failed to take off.

As part of this important effort, the prime minister agreed, during an official visit to Turkey a large Muslim country, with strategic ties of utmost importance to Israel to meet the request of the Turkish prime minister and allow a delegation from there to evaluate the conditions on the ground. This was a smart, wise and appropriate move on the part of the prime minister, and there is no justification for the criticism against him.

One needn't be a former deputy foreign minister or a seasoned diplomat to appreciate the diplomatic significance and the implications of such a move; let's not forget that the real dispute is over the sovereignty of Jerusalem. The fact that the Turkish prime minister is sending a delegation to this site near the Western Wall and the Temple Mount following an invitation by the prime minister of Israel, is a clear expression of support of Israel's position. After all, this is not a United Nations delegation nor one imposed on Israel by an international body, but an authorized delegation of Turkey to Israel (and not of the Palestinian Authority or Jordan). Israel really has nothing to hide. So there should be no surprise that the Arab MKs responded with anger and frustration, demanding: What business does Turkey have with this issue? They understood what many MKs on the right have not: that this is a diplomatic gain for Israel and a wise way of conducting an important campaign.

New lakes beneath Antarctic ice FEB 24,07 BBC

Sub-glacial lakes can affect how quickly ice reaches the sea Scientists have discovered four giant lakes under the Antarctic ice. Together the four are as big as Lake Vostok, the biggest body of water so far discovered in Antarctica. Researchers say the newly found lakes appear to affect how rapidly ice is transported from the interior of the continent to the sea. Writing in the journal Nature, they say that understanding the interaction of lakes and ice is crucial to forecasting the impacts of climate change.

The four lakes lie under the Recovery ice stream which brings ice from hundreds of kilometres inland into the Weddell Sea. They were found using a combination of radar data gathered by satellite, and records of an expedition mounted to the area in the 1960s on which scientists had used a pioneering ice-penetrating radar. Sub-glacial lakes create tell-tale shapes in the surface of the ice above, while readings taken through the ice had detected, in the words of the 1960s expedition, a possible melt layer at the bottom of the ice-cap. About 150 lakes have been discovered under the frozen Antarctic surface.

Speed merchants

In recent years there has been a lot of interest in water under the Antarctic ice, for various reasons. Biologists have been intrigued by the possibility of finding new organisms in ecosystems which may have been cut off from the rest of the world for thousands of years. Two of the new lakes are only exceeded in size by Lake Vostok .Climate scientists have become increasingly keen to understand the process of accelerated melting, where lubrication of ice flows by water and the disintegration of ice shelves could speed up the transfer of ice to the sea. The research team found that the Recovery stream accelerates significantly as it passes over the lakes. Upstream of the lakes, it flows at two to three metres per year; after passing them, at about 50 metres per year. Whether there is a link to climate change is another question. The lakes lie in the eastern portion of Antarctica, where evidence suggests the icecap may be gaining mass rather than losing it.

It is the west of the continent that primarily concerns climate researchers. Much of the Antarctic rock here lies below sea level, meaning that a warming of the oceans could lubricate ice flow on a significant scale. But if sub-glacial lakes are affecting ice flow, that is something scientists will want to study further. As this research team puts it: The Recovery sub-glacial lakes and the associated Recovery ice stream tributaries have the potential greatly to affect the drainage of the East Antarctic ice sheet, and its influence on sea level rise in the near future.Another expedition to the area, part of International Polar Year, is planned for 2008.

Canada, Mexico, US pitch trade fixes for North America
24-Feb-2007 05:03 hrs

Top foreign affairs, security and trade officials of Canada, the United States and Mexico met Friday under the auspices of a business-friendly alliance that critics allege is unfairly opaque.The meeting of the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America (SPP) was expected to discuss border security, trade and energy, the Canadian government said Friday. The US State Department said the deadly bird flu would also feature on the agenda.The complete agenda, however, was not made public, prompting protests.The talks are the second since the 2005 creation of the SPP, at the initiative of the White House.They are aimed at preparing a summit of the heads of state and government of the three countries, said Tom Shannon, US assistant secretary of state for Western Hemisphere affairs.

Canadian Foreign Minister Peter MacKay, Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day and Industry Minister Maxime Bernier hosted the meeting.The United States sent US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff and Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez.Mexico was represented by Foreign Affairs Secretary Patricia Espinosa, Interior Secretary Francisco Javier Ramirez Acuna and Commerce Secretary Eduardo Sojo Garza-Aldape.The ministers were meeting to discuss how the three democracies are working together to ensure continued prosperity and how we can provide greater security for all of North America, Rice's spokesman Sean McCormack said in a statement.They were also presented 50 recommendations from the National American Competitiveness Council, a tri-national working group of the SPP comprised of some 30 chief executives from some of the continent's largest companies, to speed people and goods safely across borders, harmonize trade regulations and improve energy security and production by 2010.

The group, after nine months of consultations and deliberations, called for border infrastructure expansion and improvement; a reduction of unnecessary differences in rules and standards, particularly in the food and agriculture, financial services, and transportation sectors; and for enhanced cooperation to protect intellectual property rights.The group also called for better cross-border oil and gas distribution systems, joint development of clean energy technologies and faster development of Mexico's oil and gas resources.The NACC simply sees huge potential for greater cooperation in managing borders, regulation, energy and many other issues affecting the quality of life of the citizens of Canada, Mexico and the United States, from responses to emergencies and pandemics to the environment and education, the group said.

In the United States, right-wing commentators have criticized further integration of North America, saying it would erode US security and long-term economic prosperity.In Canada, condemnation of the SPP has come from the left.The Council of Canadians said the high-level talks have elevated corporate interests above the public interest, and seek to lower environmental and labor standards in each country.The big-business community has been an integral part of these negotiations, while the public and most of our elected officials have been left out, said John Urquhart, executive director of the Council of Canadians.

In Canada's House of Commons, Jack Layton, leader of the socialist New Democratic Party, accused Prime Minister Stephen Harper's minority Conservative government of conspiring to sell out Canadian sovereignty.The discussions ... affect ordinary people, but this whole process is very, very obscure, he lamented.These are secret discussions about security, transportation, the environment, health, increasing integration, without Parliament's involvement, without the public being able to participate in the debate.

Government House leader Peter Van Loan replied that Layton was imagining conspiracies, but the reality is this is a very open, transparent process.The three North American neighbors launched the SPP in March 2005 to bolster cooperation on border security, trade and energy.The three economies were already integrated by the North American Free Trade Agreement, which went into effect in 1994. AFP .