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
Israel targeted ‘key Hamas strategic assets’ in Sunday’s barrage-IDF takes advantage of rocket fire from Gaza to take out terrorist infrastructure; Liberman: ‘We won’t allow them to rearm’-By Judah Ari Gross August 23, 2016, 4:12 pm-THE TIMES OF ISRAEL
In Sunday night’s bombardment, the Israel Defense Forces struck “key Hamas strategic assets” in the northern Gaza Strip, military sources said Tuesday, shedding more light on the harsher-than-expected response to a rocket attack from the coastal enclave.After a projectile from Gaza landed in the southern Israeli town of Sderot on Sunday, the IDF retaliated with what has become the routine response of a limited strike, hitting two Hamas installations in the northern Gaza Strip, the army said.Hours later, the IDF conducted another, considerably larger barrage, carrying out approximately 50 strikes against Hamas infrastructure in the Gaza Strip, using both tanks and aircraft.These targets were not directly related to the rocket launch, nor were they only an attempt at creating a deterrent effect. Rather, the IDF took advantage of the opportunity presented by the attack to take out Hamas strategic assets.With few exceptions, the army’s policy toward Hamas in Gaza has been only to retaliate, not to initiate, an officer in the IDF’s Southern Command told The Times of Israel in November.Though the IDF often has extensive intelligence on the terrorist group’s dealings in the Gaza Strip, “we don’t respond to everything, because we don’t want to escalate the situation,” the officer said.When a rocket is fired into Israel, however, that dynamic changes and the IDF has a certain legitimacy in targeting terrorist infrastructure in the coastal enclave, as occurred on Sunday night.It was immediately noted that Israel’s bombardment on Sunday was larger than most retaliatory strikes.“There were approximately 50 airstrikes within two hours,” a senior military official told The Times of Israel. “But there is no intention to escalate the situation further.”Hamas quickly claimed the response was an attempt by Israel to change the status quo in Gaza — and Israel agreed.“You can’t expect the State of Israel to allow [Hamas] to rearm itself, to steal money from the residents of Gaza. They are levying taxes and not constructing buildings, but tunnels,” Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman said on Tuesday morning at an army base in the Galilee.Palestinian security sources in Gaza said several targets in the northern Strip were struck by Israeli fire, and that a reservoir in Beit Hanoun was damaged. Israel also hit a base belonging to Hamas’s military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, in nearby Beit Lahiya, witnesses said. Palestinian health and security sources said between two and five people were lightly wounded by Israel’s retaliatory fire.Hamas officials have decried the Israeli bombardment, but have not indicated that they intend to respond immediately.
Liberman: We won’t stand by while Hamas arms itself-Defense minister, touring northern army base, demands demilitarization as condition for rehabilitation of Gaza Strip-By Stuart Winer August 23, 2016, 4:11 pm-THE TIMES OF ISRAEL
Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman on Tuesday hinted at further Israeli military action against Hamas, saying Israel will not “stand by” while the Gaza-based terror group replenishes its weapons stockpiles.Liberman’s comments came two days after the Israel Air Force carried out dozens of strikes on the Palestinian coastal enclave in response to a rocket fired at the Israeli border town of Sderot earlier in the day.During a tour of the IDF’s Havat Hashomer education base in northern Israel, Liberman said that rehabilitation of the Gaza Strip would be conditioned on Hamas abandoning its arms.“Hamas is building tunnels and we will not stand by idly and let it arm itself,” Liberman said, referring to tunnels dug by Hamas under the Israeli-Gazan border and used to launch attacks inside Israel.The minister claimed that 70 percent of the tax money that Hamas collects is funneled toward digging tunnels, purchasing weapons, and rebuilding its fighting capabilities, much of which was devastated by the 2014 war with Israel.“They don’t want to take care of the residents, only rockets and tunnels,” he said. “My formula for the Gaza Strip is well known. What I demand is rehabilitation for demilitarization.”He did not, however, elaborate on what sort of rehabilitation he was referring to and how he would facilitate it if conditions permitted.On Monday, an Israeli military source said Israel struck Gaza some 50 times in two hours by air and tank the night before. Palestinian security sources in Gaza said several targets in the northern Strip were struck by Israeli fire, and that a reservoir in Beit Hanoun was damaged in the strikes. Israel also hit a base belonging to Hamas’s military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, in nearby Beit Lahiya, witnesses said. Palestinian health and security sources said two to five people were lightly wounded by Israel’s retaliatory fire.It was the second Israeli bombardment on Sunday. Immediately following the rocket attack from the Gaza Strip on Sunday afternoon, Israeli aircraft and tanks also targeted Hamas installations in the northern Gaza Strip.After the late-night airstrikes, the Islamist Hamas rulers of the Gaza Strip blamed Israel for escalating tensions in the Palestinian enclave.However, both sides indicated that they are not interested in further exchanges that might lead to an increase in fighting.The airstrikes mark the most intense Israeli reprisal attack on Gaza since the sides fought a bloody war in 2014, and could signal a shift in policy by newly installed Liberman.The rocket fire was claimed by a small Islamic State-linked Salafist group, but Israel says it holds Hamas — the Strip’s de facto rulers — responsible for any attacks emanating from Gaza and routinely responds to such launches with strikes against the terror organization.The rocket launch on Sderot struck inside the town but caused no casualties or damage. It landed between two homes on Hanehalim Street, near Sapir College and the city’s train station. Locals said it was “a miracle” that nobody was injured.
Dozens of illegal guns seized in West Bank crackdown-IDF, police, Shin Bet conduct raids in Bethlehem, Hebron as part of ongoing campaign against illicit weapons-By Judah Ari Gross August 23, 2016, 1:53 pm-THE TIMES OF ISRAEL
In the largest operation of the year, Israeli security forces seized dozens of weapons, confiscated equipment and made arrests in Hebron and Bethlehem early Tuesday morning as part of an ongoing effort to crack down on illegal guns in the West Bank, an IDF official said.In total, seven illegal gun workshops were raided and 22 pieces of gunsmithing machinery — drill presses and metal lathes — were seized, along with “approximately 50 weapons,” including handguns, shotguns, hunting rifles and Carlo-style submachine guns, a cheap and simple automatic weapon loosely based off the design of the Carl Gustav submachine gun, the official said.Security forces also recovered ammunition and dozens of gun pieces — grips, barrels, stocks, etc. — that would have been used to create more weapons, the official added.Two of the alleged manufacturers were arrested in the raids. The suspects do not appear to be connected to any terrorist groups, but were more likely driven by financial motives, the army source said.“It seems to be a combination of market demand and the ability to manufacture,” he said.Though the tools necessary to create Carlo-style submachine guns are “dual purpose” and can be found in almost any machine shop in the world, the factories raided early Tuesday morning appeared to be “specifically designed for the manufacturing of weapons,” the IDF official said.More arrests are expected to come, as Shin Bet and Israel Police investigators will now begin interrogating the two suspects in order to locate the manufacturing and distribution network, the official said.The joint operation was conducted between 1 a.m. and 5:30 a.m. by five battalions from the Israel Defense Forces — the elite Duvdevan unit, the Nahal Brigade’s 50th Battalion, soldiers from an artillery battery and two reservist battalions — along with representatives from the Israel Police and Shin Bet security service, according to spokespeople for the organizations.The raids in Bethlehem and Hebron were the culmination of months of gathering “signal intelligence, human intelligence and visual intelligence,” an IDF official said.There was no immediate indication that any of the guns sold by the two alleged manufacturers were specifically sold for use in terror attacks. These types of guns can be used for any number of reasons, including terrorist attacks, self-defense and criminal activity, the IDF official said.However, a weapon purchased for self-defense can still end up being used in a terror attack, the official added.“Someone who has one of these weapons at home [for self-defense] might hide it in a closet. And when his son gets carried away by incitement, he goes and takes this weapon to carry out attacks,” the officer said.This year over 30 shooting attacks have been carried out with illegally produced weapons. In response, the IDF and other security agencies have been cracking down on illegally produced weapons in recent months, arresting more than 140 people suspected of being involved in the creation or distribution of illicit arms, police said.Over 300 illegal guns and nearly 50 pieces of manufacturing equipment have also been confiscated in raids across the West Bank in recent months, according to police.The ongoing crackdown has already had an effect on the market, driving up the price of guns Col. Roman Gofman told the Associated Press last month. For example, a crude Carlo-style submachine gun cost around $500 a few months ago, whereas now it can cost upward of $2,500, he said.
A deeper political agenda behind Israel’s soaring housing market?-Op-ed: Tackling rocketing house prices with new taxes and various harebrained schemes, the government seems to be ignoring the obvious solution: free up more land. Or has the goal all along been to encourage people to move to settlements?-By David Horovitz August 23, 2016, 11:32 am-THE TIMES OF ISRAEL
Israel’s housing market has become completely insane. Israelis simply cannot afford to buy their own homes, and rental prices are soaring to lunatic heights too. In some areas of Tel Aviv, prices of homes have doubled in the past two-three years alone. A reasonably well-lit, 60-square-meter (645 square-foot), two-bedroom apartment in a fairly central Jerusalem neighborhood will cost you half a million dollars, if you’re lucky. A little more in Tel Aviv. These are prices that, when contemplated from the vantage point of an Israeli family with two breadwinners bringing in an about average combined salary of 20,000 shekels a month (a little more than $5,000), dispatch home ownership into the realm of science fiction. A Globes survey found that it takes 191 average Israeli salaries to buy a five-room apartment, compared to an OECD average of 96. And that was in 2012.Rather than tackle the problem at its root, by freeing up more land for construction, our various ministers have for years been engaged in a series of harebrained schemes ostensibly designed to cut prices but in fact reliably having the opposite effect.They’ve introduced lotteries designed to give young families access to affordable housing. They’ve sought to require that builders, as a condition for receiving building rights in new projects, construct a set proportion of low-cost homes.There’s a rage for something called Tama 38 — an arrangement whereby homeowners deliver the well-being of their apartment building into the hands of a building contractor who, in return for, say, the right to build penthouse apartments on the roof, is supposed to enlarge the building and install an elevator. Given the avarice of too many builders and the routine inadequacy of supervision, this can be a recipe for corruption and chaos. The apartment buildings in question can be turned into construction sites for years. Sometimes it turns out fine. But other times, the increased costs of running the building once the work is done, and the increased value of the homes, can wind up pushing out the original residents. In the worst cases, residents are driven to despair by the interminable building work, and curse the day they ever consented to the intrusion.Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon has pushed through a series of new taxes on those who buy apartments for investment purposes — the inevitable consequence of which has been to push prices up still higher. Such taxes also encourage those Israelis with money to invest to do so overseas. Every time an Israeli buys a new home or refurbishes a home here, that brings work for architects and builders and electricians and plumbers… Not so if the Israeli investor instead puts his money into a new housing project in the US or Germany.-Capital chaos-As a Jerusalemite, let me also note some of the housing absurdities that afflict this holy city. Housing prices in Rehavia recently shot up a level because of the imposition of an “improvement tax” on apartment sales, under which owners are effectively being penalized today to the tune of hundreds of thousands of shekels for the possibility, some time in the unknowable future, that they might want to expand their homes. Even if they’ve never sought permission to do so. Other neighborhoods are about to be similarly punished.The housing shortage in the capital is also exacerbated by the fact that a considerable number of properties, in prime neighborhoods, sit on land that is owned by the various churches, some of it on fairly short-term leases. Some of these leases are due to expire in the early 2030s. Nobody, but nobody, knows for sure what’s going to happen when they do. Nobody knows whether it will prove possible to extend the leases at affordable prices. In the interim, many properties on church-owned land in the city are increasingly hard to sell. What new buyer would take the risk of paying a fortune to buy a home that might involve considerably more expense in the near future? Consequence: even lower supply, and even higher housing prices.And then we come to the city’s unwinnable fight against overseas owners of apartments here. You might think it an act of Zionist solidarity for a non-citizen of Israel to want to buy a home in Jerusalem — to own a stake in the capital of the revived sovereign Jewish state, and perhaps to come and stay in the holy city, putting aside their usual routine, during the major annual Jewish festivals, as our ancestors did in ancient times. Well, if that is indeed what you think, the Jerusalem municipality begs to disagree with you. Far from an Israel-loving patriot, it considers you to be a damaging intruder. It has for years been trying to persuade foreign owners of what it calls ghost apartments to at least rent them out. To whom, you ask? To students. As though the owner of a multi-million dollar home in a prestigious Jerusalem neighborhood is going to turn it over to a group of youngsters, who are expected to keep it in pristine condition, oh and also to move out for a few weeks two or three times a year when the owners want to come for Pessah, the high holidays and/or Succot.The city has also now hit on the idea of checking people’s water and electricity bills to make life harder for non-resident owners. If your bills are too low, you see, indicating that you’re not living in your home enough, you’re charged a higher rate of municipal taxes — yes, a higher rate of taxes for the municipal services you barely use.-A three-word solution-Thing is, there is a solution to the national housing crisis. Really quite a simple one. Three words: Build more homes.That’s truly all it takes. Cut through the bureaucracy and liberate land for building — and not solely, not even primarily, in the dense, green-space-starved, high-demand central Tel Aviv and Jerusalem areas. No, build as well, build especially, to the north and to the south. For a start, do what David Ben-Gurion always wanted Israel to do: Populate the Negev, 55% of sovereign Israeli territory. Beersheba, driven by a trailblazing university, is in the process of transformation. The army, gradually moving much of its training and logistics activities to the south, is accelerating the trend. There is considerable construction in the Negev. But there is immensely more potential. Further improve the transportation infrastructure, allocate land, and build.The implementation of what Ben-Gurion always recognized as this strategic imperative would have dramatic and fundamental benefits for Israel. It would take the pressure off housing prices in the center, gradually restoring some sanity to the market there. It would enable more Israelis to own their homes, deepening their personal sense of stability and more firmly rooting them in this country. It would bring more infrastructure and industry to what is absurdly known as the periphery — those parts of Israel that are more than a cycling trip away from the center. It would help offset concerns, especially in the Negev, that the Jewish state is losing demographic control of parts of its own country.If all of this seems like common sense, you may ask, why is it not being done? Why was it not done years ago? Incompetence. Shortsightedness. The particular interests of certain sectors. Corruption. All of these surely play their part.One effect of the endlessly rising housing prices, and the otherwise incomprehensibly convoluted and snail-paced process of allocating land for new construction, however, is that more and more Israelis, over more and more years, have moved across the Green Line, to Jewish neighborhoods built since 1967 in the expanded Jerusalem and to West Bank settlements. Why sentence yourself to a life of financial hardship struggling to meet your mortgage payments on a broom closet in Jerusalem or Tel Aviv, when for the same price or less, and possibly with additional financial incentives, you can buy a decent apartment, maybe even a house, in, say, Ariel, Tekoa or Ma’ale Adumim? Jerusalem’s Begin Expressway, which has been extending over the years, has made traversing sections of the capital a simpler, faster prospect. Nowadays, you can drive south from Tel Aviv, join Road 443 past Modiin — with handy access to adjacent settlements — link directly to Begin, and continue all through Jerusalem to the southern, post-1967 neighborhood of Gilo. Only an interchange separates Begin from the tunnel road leading south out of the capital to the Etzion Bloc of settlements and Hebron in the West Bank. That interchange is now being worked on.As with housing policy, so with transportation: Our national planners moan about high housing prices, and introduce counterproductive taxes, but insistently restrict the allocation of land for building inside Israel, while they improve access to affordable housing over the Green Line. One might be forgiven for thinking that the whole housing crisis is part of a deeper political plan. What’s more Zionist than owning a home in Israel, in Tel Aviv, in Jerusalem, in the Galilee, in the Negev? Could it be that the government has effectively for years been answering: Owning a home at a settlement in the West Bank?And what’s wrong with that, you might ask? Nothing, if your goal is boosting the population over the Green Line to the detriment of the population within sovereign Israel.
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
Israel targeted ‘key Hamas strategic assets’ in Sunday’s barrage-IDF takes advantage of rocket fire from Gaza to take out terrorist infrastructure; Liberman: ‘We won’t allow them to rearm’-By Judah Ari Gross August 23, 2016, 4:12 pm-THE TIMES OF ISRAEL
In Sunday night’s bombardment, the Israel Defense Forces struck “key Hamas strategic assets” in the northern Gaza Strip, military sources said Tuesday, shedding more light on the harsher-than-expected response to a rocket attack from the coastal enclave.After a projectile from Gaza landed in the southern Israeli town of Sderot on Sunday, the IDF retaliated with what has become the routine response of a limited strike, hitting two Hamas installations in the northern Gaza Strip, the army said.Hours later, the IDF conducted another, considerably larger barrage, carrying out approximately 50 strikes against Hamas infrastructure in the Gaza Strip, using both tanks and aircraft.These targets were not directly related to the rocket launch, nor were they only an attempt at creating a deterrent effect. Rather, the IDF took advantage of the opportunity presented by the attack to take out Hamas strategic assets.With few exceptions, the army’s policy toward Hamas in Gaza has been only to retaliate, not to initiate, an officer in the IDF’s Southern Command told The Times of Israel in November.Though the IDF often has extensive intelligence on the terrorist group’s dealings in the Gaza Strip, “we don’t respond to everything, because we don’t want to escalate the situation,” the officer said.When a rocket is fired into Israel, however, that dynamic changes and the IDF has a certain legitimacy in targeting terrorist infrastructure in the coastal enclave, as occurred on Sunday night.It was immediately noted that Israel’s bombardment on Sunday was larger than most retaliatory strikes.“There were approximately 50 airstrikes within two hours,” a senior military official told The Times of Israel. “But there is no intention to escalate the situation further.”Hamas quickly claimed the response was an attempt by Israel to change the status quo in Gaza — and Israel agreed.“You can’t expect the State of Israel to allow [Hamas] to rearm itself, to steal money from the residents of Gaza. They are levying taxes and not constructing buildings, but tunnels,” Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman said on Tuesday morning at an army base in the Galilee.Palestinian security sources in Gaza said several targets in the northern Strip were struck by Israeli fire, and that a reservoir in Beit Hanoun was damaged. Israel also hit a base belonging to Hamas’s military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, in nearby Beit Lahiya, witnesses said. Palestinian health and security sources said between two and five people were lightly wounded by Israel’s retaliatory fire.Hamas officials have decried the Israeli bombardment, but have not indicated that they intend to respond immediately.
Liberman: We won’t stand by while Hamas arms itself-Defense minister, touring northern army base, demands demilitarization as condition for rehabilitation of Gaza Strip-By Stuart Winer August 23, 2016, 4:11 pm-THE TIMES OF ISRAEL
Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman on Tuesday hinted at further Israeli military action against Hamas, saying Israel will not “stand by” while the Gaza-based terror group replenishes its weapons stockpiles.Liberman’s comments came two days after the Israel Air Force carried out dozens of strikes on the Palestinian coastal enclave in response to a rocket fired at the Israeli border town of Sderot earlier in the day.During a tour of the IDF’s Havat Hashomer education base in northern Israel, Liberman said that rehabilitation of the Gaza Strip would be conditioned on Hamas abandoning its arms.“Hamas is building tunnels and we will not stand by idly and let it arm itself,” Liberman said, referring to tunnels dug by Hamas under the Israeli-Gazan border and used to launch attacks inside Israel.The minister claimed that 70 percent of the tax money that Hamas collects is funneled toward digging tunnels, purchasing weapons, and rebuilding its fighting capabilities, much of which was devastated by the 2014 war with Israel.“They don’t want to take care of the residents, only rockets and tunnels,” he said. “My formula for the Gaza Strip is well known. What I demand is rehabilitation for demilitarization.”He did not, however, elaborate on what sort of rehabilitation he was referring to and how he would facilitate it if conditions permitted.On Monday, an Israeli military source said Israel struck Gaza some 50 times in two hours by air and tank the night before. Palestinian security sources in Gaza said several targets in the northern Strip were struck by Israeli fire, and that a reservoir in Beit Hanoun was damaged in the strikes. Israel also hit a base belonging to Hamas’s military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, in nearby Beit Lahiya, witnesses said. Palestinian health and security sources said two to five people were lightly wounded by Israel’s retaliatory fire.It was the second Israeli bombardment on Sunday. Immediately following the rocket attack from the Gaza Strip on Sunday afternoon, Israeli aircraft and tanks also targeted Hamas installations in the northern Gaza Strip.After the late-night airstrikes, the Islamist Hamas rulers of the Gaza Strip blamed Israel for escalating tensions in the Palestinian enclave.However, both sides indicated that they are not interested in further exchanges that might lead to an increase in fighting.The airstrikes mark the most intense Israeli reprisal attack on Gaza since the sides fought a bloody war in 2014, and could signal a shift in policy by newly installed Liberman.The rocket fire was claimed by a small Islamic State-linked Salafist group, but Israel says it holds Hamas — the Strip’s de facto rulers — responsible for any attacks emanating from Gaza and routinely responds to such launches with strikes against the terror organization.The rocket launch on Sderot struck inside the town but caused no casualties or damage. It landed between two homes on Hanehalim Street, near Sapir College and the city’s train station. Locals said it was “a miracle” that nobody was injured.
Dozens of illegal guns seized in West Bank crackdown-IDF, police, Shin Bet conduct raids in Bethlehem, Hebron as part of ongoing campaign against illicit weapons-By Judah Ari Gross August 23, 2016, 1:53 pm-THE TIMES OF ISRAEL
In the largest operation of the year, Israeli security forces seized dozens of weapons, confiscated equipment and made arrests in Hebron and Bethlehem early Tuesday morning as part of an ongoing effort to crack down on illegal guns in the West Bank, an IDF official said.In total, seven illegal gun workshops were raided and 22 pieces of gunsmithing machinery — drill presses and metal lathes — were seized, along with “approximately 50 weapons,” including handguns, shotguns, hunting rifles and Carlo-style submachine guns, a cheap and simple automatic weapon loosely based off the design of the Carl Gustav submachine gun, the official said.Security forces also recovered ammunition and dozens of gun pieces — grips, barrels, stocks, etc. — that would have been used to create more weapons, the official added.Two of the alleged manufacturers were arrested in the raids. The suspects do not appear to be connected to any terrorist groups, but were more likely driven by financial motives, the army source said.“It seems to be a combination of market demand and the ability to manufacture,” he said.Though the tools necessary to create Carlo-style submachine guns are “dual purpose” and can be found in almost any machine shop in the world, the factories raided early Tuesday morning appeared to be “specifically designed for the manufacturing of weapons,” the IDF official said.More arrests are expected to come, as Shin Bet and Israel Police investigators will now begin interrogating the two suspects in order to locate the manufacturing and distribution network, the official said.The joint operation was conducted between 1 a.m. and 5:30 a.m. by five battalions from the Israel Defense Forces — the elite Duvdevan unit, the Nahal Brigade’s 50th Battalion, soldiers from an artillery battery and two reservist battalions — along with representatives from the Israel Police and Shin Bet security service, according to spokespeople for the organizations.The raids in Bethlehem and Hebron were the culmination of months of gathering “signal intelligence, human intelligence and visual intelligence,” an IDF official said.There was no immediate indication that any of the guns sold by the two alleged manufacturers were specifically sold for use in terror attacks. These types of guns can be used for any number of reasons, including terrorist attacks, self-defense and criminal activity, the IDF official said.However, a weapon purchased for self-defense can still end up being used in a terror attack, the official added.“Someone who has one of these weapons at home [for self-defense] might hide it in a closet. And when his son gets carried away by incitement, he goes and takes this weapon to carry out attacks,” the officer said.This year over 30 shooting attacks have been carried out with illegally produced weapons. In response, the IDF and other security agencies have been cracking down on illegally produced weapons in recent months, arresting more than 140 people suspected of being involved in the creation or distribution of illicit arms, police said.Over 300 illegal guns and nearly 50 pieces of manufacturing equipment have also been confiscated in raids across the West Bank in recent months, according to police.The ongoing crackdown has already had an effect on the market, driving up the price of guns Col. Roman Gofman told the Associated Press last month. For example, a crude Carlo-style submachine gun cost around $500 a few months ago, whereas now it can cost upward of $2,500, he said.
A deeper political agenda behind Israel’s soaring housing market?-Op-ed: Tackling rocketing house prices with new taxes and various harebrained schemes, the government seems to be ignoring the obvious solution: free up more land. Or has the goal all along been to encourage people to move to settlements?-By David Horovitz August 23, 2016, 11:32 am-THE TIMES OF ISRAEL
Israel’s housing market has become completely insane. Israelis simply cannot afford to buy their own homes, and rental prices are soaring to lunatic heights too. In some areas of Tel Aviv, prices of homes have doubled in the past two-three years alone. A reasonably well-lit, 60-square-meter (645 square-foot), two-bedroom apartment in a fairly central Jerusalem neighborhood will cost you half a million dollars, if you’re lucky. A little more in Tel Aviv. These are prices that, when contemplated from the vantage point of an Israeli family with two breadwinners bringing in an about average combined salary of 20,000 shekels a month (a little more than $5,000), dispatch home ownership into the realm of science fiction. A Globes survey found that it takes 191 average Israeli salaries to buy a five-room apartment, compared to an OECD average of 96. And that was in 2012.Rather than tackle the problem at its root, by freeing up more land for construction, our various ministers have for years been engaged in a series of harebrained schemes ostensibly designed to cut prices but in fact reliably having the opposite effect.They’ve introduced lotteries designed to give young families access to affordable housing. They’ve sought to require that builders, as a condition for receiving building rights in new projects, construct a set proportion of low-cost homes.There’s a rage for something called Tama 38 — an arrangement whereby homeowners deliver the well-being of their apartment building into the hands of a building contractor who, in return for, say, the right to build penthouse apartments on the roof, is supposed to enlarge the building and install an elevator. Given the avarice of too many builders and the routine inadequacy of supervision, this can be a recipe for corruption and chaos. The apartment buildings in question can be turned into construction sites for years. Sometimes it turns out fine. But other times, the increased costs of running the building once the work is done, and the increased value of the homes, can wind up pushing out the original residents. In the worst cases, residents are driven to despair by the interminable building work, and curse the day they ever consented to the intrusion.Finance Minister Moshe Kahlon has pushed through a series of new taxes on those who buy apartments for investment purposes — the inevitable consequence of which has been to push prices up still higher. Such taxes also encourage those Israelis with money to invest to do so overseas. Every time an Israeli buys a new home or refurbishes a home here, that brings work for architects and builders and electricians and plumbers… Not so if the Israeli investor instead puts his money into a new housing project in the US or Germany.-Capital chaos-As a Jerusalemite, let me also note some of the housing absurdities that afflict this holy city. Housing prices in Rehavia recently shot up a level because of the imposition of an “improvement tax” on apartment sales, under which owners are effectively being penalized today to the tune of hundreds of thousands of shekels for the possibility, some time in the unknowable future, that they might want to expand their homes. Even if they’ve never sought permission to do so. Other neighborhoods are about to be similarly punished.The housing shortage in the capital is also exacerbated by the fact that a considerable number of properties, in prime neighborhoods, sit on land that is owned by the various churches, some of it on fairly short-term leases. Some of these leases are due to expire in the early 2030s. Nobody, but nobody, knows for sure what’s going to happen when they do. Nobody knows whether it will prove possible to extend the leases at affordable prices. In the interim, many properties on church-owned land in the city are increasingly hard to sell. What new buyer would take the risk of paying a fortune to buy a home that might involve considerably more expense in the near future? Consequence: even lower supply, and even higher housing prices.And then we come to the city’s unwinnable fight against overseas owners of apartments here. You might think it an act of Zionist solidarity for a non-citizen of Israel to want to buy a home in Jerusalem — to own a stake in the capital of the revived sovereign Jewish state, and perhaps to come and stay in the holy city, putting aside their usual routine, during the major annual Jewish festivals, as our ancestors did in ancient times. Well, if that is indeed what you think, the Jerusalem municipality begs to disagree with you. Far from an Israel-loving patriot, it considers you to be a damaging intruder. It has for years been trying to persuade foreign owners of what it calls ghost apartments to at least rent them out. To whom, you ask? To students. As though the owner of a multi-million dollar home in a prestigious Jerusalem neighborhood is going to turn it over to a group of youngsters, who are expected to keep it in pristine condition, oh and also to move out for a few weeks two or three times a year when the owners want to come for Pessah, the high holidays and/or Succot.The city has also now hit on the idea of checking people’s water and electricity bills to make life harder for non-resident owners. If your bills are too low, you see, indicating that you’re not living in your home enough, you’re charged a higher rate of municipal taxes — yes, a higher rate of taxes for the municipal services you barely use.-A three-word solution-Thing is, there is a solution to the national housing crisis. Really quite a simple one. Three words: Build more homes.That’s truly all it takes. Cut through the bureaucracy and liberate land for building — and not solely, not even primarily, in the dense, green-space-starved, high-demand central Tel Aviv and Jerusalem areas. No, build as well, build especially, to the north and to the south. For a start, do what David Ben-Gurion always wanted Israel to do: Populate the Negev, 55% of sovereign Israeli territory. Beersheba, driven by a trailblazing university, is in the process of transformation. The army, gradually moving much of its training and logistics activities to the south, is accelerating the trend. There is considerable construction in the Negev. But there is immensely more potential. Further improve the transportation infrastructure, allocate land, and build.The implementation of what Ben-Gurion always recognized as this strategic imperative would have dramatic and fundamental benefits for Israel. It would take the pressure off housing prices in the center, gradually restoring some sanity to the market there. It would enable more Israelis to own their homes, deepening their personal sense of stability and more firmly rooting them in this country. It would bring more infrastructure and industry to what is absurdly known as the periphery — those parts of Israel that are more than a cycling trip away from the center. It would help offset concerns, especially in the Negev, that the Jewish state is losing demographic control of parts of its own country.If all of this seems like common sense, you may ask, why is it not being done? Why was it not done years ago? Incompetence. Shortsightedness. The particular interests of certain sectors. Corruption. All of these surely play their part.One effect of the endlessly rising housing prices, and the otherwise incomprehensibly convoluted and snail-paced process of allocating land for new construction, however, is that more and more Israelis, over more and more years, have moved across the Green Line, to Jewish neighborhoods built since 1967 in the expanded Jerusalem and to West Bank settlements. Why sentence yourself to a life of financial hardship struggling to meet your mortgage payments on a broom closet in Jerusalem or Tel Aviv, when for the same price or less, and possibly with additional financial incentives, you can buy a decent apartment, maybe even a house, in, say, Ariel, Tekoa or Ma’ale Adumim? Jerusalem’s Begin Expressway, which has been extending over the years, has made traversing sections of the capital a simpler, faster prospect. Nowadays, you can drive south from Tel Aviv, join Road 443 past Modiin — with handy access to adjacent settlements — link directly to Begin, and continue all through Jerusalem to the southern, post-1967 neighborhood of Gilo. Only an interchange separates Begin from the tunnel road leading south out of the capital to the Etzion Bloc of settlements and Hebron in the West Bank. That interchange is now being worked on.As with housing policy, so with transportation: Our national planners moan about high housing prices, and introduce counterproductive taxes, but insistently restrict the allocation of land for building inside Israel, while they improve access to affordable housing over the Green Line. One might be forgiven for thinking that the whole housing crisis is part of a deeper political plan. What’s more Zionist than owning a home in Israel, in Tel Aviv, in Jerusalem, in the Galilee, in the Negev? Could it be that the government has effectively for years been answering: Owning a home at a settlement in the West Bank?And what’s wrong with that, you might ask? Nothing, if your goal is boosting the population over the Green Line to the detriment of the population within sovereign Israel.
