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
Police removing last protesters in Ofra settlement home demolition-Bulldozers to begin demolishing remaining eight houses as evacuation operation enters its second day-By Times of Israel staff March 1, 2017, 9:58 am
Police on Wednesday began clearing the last remaining protesters from the roof of a home slated for demolition in the West Bank settlement of Ofra, paving the way for structures to be bulldozed in accordance with a High Court of Justice order.The operation to evacuate the nine buildings — eight of them homes — built on private Palestinian land began on Tuesday, with police removing right-wing activists and youths from the houses in sometimes violent clashes throughout the day.After successfully evacuating all but one of the homes on Tuesday, police decided to wait until Wednesday morning to remove dozens of demonstrators barricaded on the second floor and roof of the last occupied house. Some 15 youths spent the night in the rain on the roof, Israel Radio reported.On Tuesday, the police began to bulldoze the buildings, razing the one uninhabited structure. The remaining eight houses are expected to be demolished on Wednesday after the final protesters holding out are removed.During the scuffles between protesters and police, at least 11 police officers suffered minor injuries as of Wednesday morning, according to Israel Radio.At least two of the injured officers reported being bitten by protesters.The Honenu legal-aid group, which provides legal defense to right-wing activists, said that at least five people were arrested, four of them for attacking police officers, including three female minors and a 30-year-old resident of Ofra.Another resident of the settlement was also arrested for trying to give food to the demonstrators barricaded on the roof using a remote-controlled drone, the group said.In a separate demonstration against the demolition of the homes, hundreds of youth protested at the Chords Bridge at the entrance to Jerusalem on Wednesday morning, blocking the road leading into the city and burning tires, Israel Radio reported.The operation to evacuate the homes came after the High Court of Justice struck down an appeal on Monday by residents of Ofra for the homes to be sealed rather than destroyed.Hundreds of mostly unarmed troops, dressed in bright blue sweaters, faced off Tuesday against the protesters, many of whom had barricaded themselves in some of the homes, climbing on roofs and calling on police to refuse orders to clear out the homes.Some of the activists were brought out on their feet, while others were carried away by police.In that fashion, “hundreds of young men and women” were removed from the area, police said.Other officers used bullhorns to tell the hundreds of protesters to refrain from violence.Due to the stiff resistance and large number of activists holed up in the final home, police used a hydraulic battering ram to force open the back door of the house. An additional 100 officers were brought in to assist with the evacuation.While many of the protesters agreed to leave peacefully, police said they sought the reinforcements after negotiations for the remaining demonstrators to leave the last house failed.Despite the calls for resistance by many protesters, the residents of the homes in question did not seek confrontation, saying in a statement earlier, “We will not use crowbars and we will not barricade ourselves” inside the homes.Eight families living in the buildings had already left by Tuesday, police said.The court issued its demolition ruling for the Ofra houses in February 2015, and, after a number of delays, set March 5 as the final deadline by which the buildings must be pulled down.The residents’ request to have the structures sealed off and not demolished would have made them eligible for being spared in accordance with legislation passed earlier this month known as the Regulation Law. The law legalizes Jewish homes constructed illegally on Palestinian land, if homeowners can prove they built their homes in good faith or received government assistance.Palestinians whose land is expropriated under the law are eligible to receive either financial compensation or alternative plots elsewhere.However, the judges ruled unanimously on Monday that the demolition of the buildings must go ahead.The original case against the nine Ofra buildings was brought before the High Court in 2008 by the left-wing Yesh Din legal aid group, which represented the Palestinian landowner.A report published in the same year by another Israeli rights group, B’Tselem, said some 60 percent of the built-up area of Ofra lies on land that is registered to Palestinians. The claims to private ownership of lands in settlements like Ofra and the Amona outpost are based on the pre-1967 Jordanian land registry, which Israel adopted after it captured the West Bank from the Jordanians that year.Judah Ari Gross, Raoul Wootliff and AFP contributed to this report.
Wiesenthal Center, US lawmaker call for federal funding of anti-Semitism monitors-Trump administration rumored to be considering dropping special envoy on anti-Semitism as part of budget cuts-By JTA March 1, 2017, 10:42 am-THE TIMES OF ISRAEL
A senior Republican congressman and a Jewish defense group called for the funding of federal positions to monitor anti-Semitism a day after reports that the Trump administration was considering nixing the international anti-Semitism monitor role.“Ever since its creation under President George W. Bush, the Special Envoy on anti-Semitism has made clear America’s unflinching commitment to fight history’s oldest hate,” said a statement Tuesday by the Simon Wiesenthal Center. “Given the reality of the multiplicity of anti-Semitic threats, our nation’s leadership should redouble America’s commitment to combat this scourge.”The Wiesenthal Center did not mention the report in Bloomberg News on Monday that the Trump administration was considering eliminating the position as part of budget cuts.Neither did Rep. Chris Smith, a Republican of New Jersey, who authored the 2004 law creating the position. However, Smith issued a statement noting his role in establishing the international anti-Semitism monitor and saying a similar position should be created to combat domestic anti-Semitism.“It is vital that one senior law enforcement official has the mandate to lead efforts across the government to anticipate, prevent and respond to threats and attacks — especially violent ones — against the American Jewish community,” he said in a statement, noting the recent waves of bomb threats that have targeted nearly 100 Jewish community institutions, as well as massive vandalism at several Jewish graveyards.
150 children at home after Hamas-linked East Jerusalem school shut-Parents of students from Sur Baher in East Jerusalem trade blame with municipality over failure to find new schools-By Times of Israel staff March 1, 2017, 12:09 pm
Nearly a week after a school in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sur Baher said to be operated by Hamas was shut down by authorities, some 150 former students have yet to find other schools, Israel Radio reported Wednesday.Authorities said last week that the Al-Nukhaba elementary school was established by Hamas with the aim of teaching “content that undermines the sovereignty of Israel” and was therefore closed.Parents blamed the Jerusalem Municipality for the children staying home, saying that the city had not found the children alternative education facilitates.However, the municipality told Israel Radio that the parents of the students have refused to cooperate with the city in attempts find a solution,and said it was working in the meantime to ensure no damage was done to the children’s education.The municipality said the delay partly stemmed from the fact that school was a private institution, as the students now need to first be registered in the city’s educational system.It also said that the city remains prepared to enroll the children at schools elsewhere in the city, to which it will provide transportation.The order to close Al-Nukhaba followed a months-long joint probe by the Education Ministry, Jerusalem Police and the Shin Bet security service into the elementary school’s activities, according to an Education Ministry statement.Its aims were consistent with the ideology of the terror organization, which calls for the destruction of Israel, according to the Education Ministry.“Each case of incitement will be dealt with and will continue to be dealt with, with maximum severity,” Education Minister Naftali Bennett said. “Schools in East Jerusalem that elect to follow the [Israeli] curriculum get the full set of tools to succeed, while those choosing incitement will be closed.”Jews and Palestinians study in separate school systems in Jerusalem. The Palestinian schools are run by either the city council or private bodies.The Education Ministry ordered the school not to open in September and when it continued to operate, issued the closure order.The school’s administration had sued to have the decision overturned, but the case was rejected by the Jerusalem District Court and upheld by the Supreme Court, citing the school’s failure to obtain a license as one of the reasons for siding with the ministry.East Jerusalem Palestinians regularly say the city discriminates against them in disbursing funds and municipal services.According to daily newspaper Haaretz, East Jerusalem Palestinian schools received less than half the funds that the Jerusalem Municipality transferred to West Jerusalem Jewish schools in 2016.The municipality said the paper’s figures were wrong.Sue Surkes contributed to this report.
Officials: New Trump order drops Iraq from travel ban list-Document will also no longer provide exemptions for religious minorities or single out Syrian refugees-By Matthew Lee and VIVIAN SALAMA March 1, 2017, 9:22 am-THE TIMES OF ISRAEL
WASHINGTON (AP) — US President Donald Trump’s new immigration order will remove Iraq from the list of countries whose citizens face a temporary travel ban, US officials said Tuesday, citing the latest draft in circulation. Trump is expected to sign the executive order in the coming days.Four officials told The Associated Press that the decision followed pressure from the Pentagon and State Department, which had urged the White House to reconsider Iraq’s inclusion given its key role in fighting the Islamic State group.Citizens of six other predominantly Muslim countries — Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen — will remain on the travel ban list, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to discuss the order before it is signed. Those bans are effective for 90 days.The new order includes other changes as well. The officials said the 12-page document no longer singles out Syrian refugees for an indefinite ban and instead includes them as part of a general, 120-day suspension of new refugee admissions.The officials also said the order won’t include any explicit exemption for religious minorities in the countries targeted by the travel ban. Critics had accused the administration of adding such language to help Christians get into the United States while excluding Muslims.The White House did not respond to a request for comment.Trump signed his original executive order in late January. It sparked immediate confusion, panic and outrage as some travelers were detained in US airports before being sent back overseas and others were barred from boarding flights at foreign airports.The government initially blocked US green card holders before offering those legal residents special permission to come into the country. It finally decided the order didn’t apply to them.The State Department provisionally revoked roughly 60,000 valid visas in all, before a federal judge in Washington state blocked the government from carrying out the ban. The 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals upheld that decision.Under the revised order, officials said, all existing visas will be honored.In his first address to a joint session of Congress, Trump on Tuesday evening defended his effort.“We will shortly take new steps to keep our nation safe and to keep out those who would do us harm,” he said.After Trump signed the original order, Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi refuted the ban and said he would consider reciprocal measures. Many Iraqi lawmakers urged the government to ban Americans from Iraq in response, despite the potential effects that might have on the anti-IS fight.Al-Abadi then met with Defense Secretary Jim Mattis in Baghdad this month and underscored the US-Iraqi partnership. And Mattis walked back comments made by Trump, suggesting that Americans could get another chance to seize Iraqi oil as compensation for its military efforts there.“We’re not in Iraq to seize anybody’s oil,” Mattis told reporters on that trip. Al-Abadi also met with Vice President Pence in Munich earlier this month, where the two publicly discussed ways of strengthening cooperation.The Trump administration’s changes to the immigration order follow a report by intelligence analysts at the Homeland Security Department, which found insufficient evidence that citizens of the seven Muslim-majority countries posed a terror threat to the United States. A draft of the analysis was obtained last week by the AP.
Trump wins cautious praise after speaking out on anti-Semitism-Jewish groups call for translating Congress speech into concrete actions; some doubt his sincerity-By Times of Israel staff and JTA March 1, 2017, 9:12 am
US President Donald Trump won cautious praise from Jewish groups after his condemnation of anti-Semitism in his first speech to Congress, but it was accompanied by a clear call for translating his words into concrete action.“B’nai B’rith International welcomes President Donald J. Trump calling attention to recent anti-Semitism during his address,” the group said in a statement.“We now look forward to forceful measures taken by the administration to respond to these anti-Semitic acts. Anti-Semitism is a human rights issue, a distinct phenomenon that must be addressed as such,” B’nai B’rith said.“Thanks @POTUS for condemning #hate against Jews & immigrants,” Jonathan Greenblatt, the Anti-Defamation League CEO, said on Twitter. “Now let’s fight it. See our plan. Let’s do it together.”Thanks @POTUS for condemning #hate ag Jews & immigrants. Now let's fight it. See our plan. Let's do it together. https://t.co/4olwW2fFP5— Jonathan Greenblatt (@JGreenblattADL) March 1, 2017-Former US ambassador to Israel Martin Indyk tweeted, “Good on Trump for his clear condemnation of anti-Semitism and racism at the top of his SOTU speech.”In his long-awaited speech to both Houses of Congress on Tuesday, the president said the recurrent bomb threats to Jewish institutions and desecration of Jewish cemeteries were a reminder “of our nation’s path toward civil rights and the work that remains.”“Recent threats targeting Jewish community centers and vandalism of Jewish cemeteries, as well as last week’s shooting in Kansas City, remind us that while we may be a nation divided on policies, we are a country that stands united in condemning hate and evil in all its forms,” said Trump, who was noticeably more subdued and conciliatory than during his previous speeches and press conferences.Close to a hundred Jewish institutions have been targeted with bomb threats since the beginning of the year. A bar patron in Kansas ejected from the establishment last week after hurling racial epithets at two workers from India allegedly returned with a gun and killed one of the men and wounded another as well as a man who tried to stop the attacker.In just the last week, hundreds of Jewish tombstones in Pennsylvania and Missouri have been vandalized and numerous Jewish institutions have received bomb threats, including 29 on Monday alone — the fifth wave of such scares since January.In all of these cases, Trump has come under fire for delayed responses. In the case of the threats on Jewish establishments, Trump at first deflected questions – and in one instance shouted abuse at a reporter – before calling the threats “horrible” last week. The White House did not address the Kansas shooting until Tuesday, six days after the attack.His condemnation also came just hours after he reportedly said that the wave of threats against Jewish communal institutions may be a false flag.Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro, who is Jewish and a Democrat, described a meeting of state attorney generals and Trump on Tuesday to a BuzzFeed reporter.Trump called the wave of bomb threats “reprehensible,” Shapiro said. But the US president also added: “Sometimes it’s the reverse, to make people – or to make others – look bad,” according to Shapiro’s account. Shapiro said Trump said it was “the reverse” two or three times but did not clarify what he meant.However, some groups were less impressed with Trump’s change of tone, doubting his sincerity.Venting on Twitter, executive director Steven Goldstein of the Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect said, “After weeks of our organization’s having to plead, cajole and criticize this President to speak out against #Antisemitism, we give him credit for doing the right thing tonight ….But his suddenly dulcet tones weren’t matched by substantive kindness.“Where’s the beef, Mr President? It was as if you wrapped the poison of prejudice in the veneer of cotton candy,” Goldstein said.“The President didn’t say exactly what he would do to fight anti-Semitism – how could he have stayed so vague?”“We’ve endured weeks of anti-Semitic attacks across America and we didn’t hear a single proposal from the President tonight to stop them.”REACTION TO #TrumpAddress #JointSession from @AnneFrankCenter NO SPECIFICS ON #ANTISEMITISM; COTTON-CANDY TONE COVERING POISON OF PREJUDICE pic.twitter.com/TwLl3U4k0M— AnneFrankCenter(US) (@AnneFrankCenter) March 1, 2017-Democrats sat silently through much of Trump’s speech, which opened with his comments on anti-Semitism.They refrained from applauding and made thumbs down movements when they disagreed.All the women in the House of Representatives’ Democratic caucus wore white, an initiative of Rep. Lois Frankel, a Democrat of Florida, who is Jewish.Frankel posted on her Twitter account that the white harked back to the suffragettes and was meant to protest Trump rollbacks of reproductive rights and other protections for women.Tonight, Democratic Members will wear suffragette white to oppose Republican attempts to roll back women's progress #WomenWearWhite pic.twitter.com/lh5YAIfVGW— Rep. Lois Frankel (@RepLoisFrankel) February 28, 2017-“White symbolically brings a reference back to the days of suffragettes,” Frankel told Fortune magazine.”But it also shows we don’t want to go back, we want to go forward [with women’s rights].”Good on Trump for his clear condemnation of anti-Semitism and racism at the top of his SOTU speech.— Martin Indyk (@Martin_Indyk) March 1, 2017
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
Police removing last protesters in Ofra settlement home demolition-Bulldozers to begin demolishing remaining eight houses as evacuation operation enters its second day-By Times of Israel staff March 1, 2017, 9:58 am
Police on Wednesday began clearing the last remaining protesters from the roof of a home slated for demolition in the West Bank settlement of Ofra, paving the way for structures to be bulldozed in accordance with a High Court of Justice order.The operation to evacuate the nine buildings — eight of them homes — built on private Palestinian land began on Tuesday, with police removing right-wing activists and youths from the houses in sometimes violent clashes throughout the day.After successfully evacuating all but one of the homes on Tuesday, police decided to wait until Wednesday morning to remove dozens of demonstrators barricaded on the second floor and roof of the last occupied house. Some 15 youths spent the night in the rain on the roof, Israel Radio reported.On Tuesday, the police began to bulldoze the buildings, razing the one uninhabited structure. The remaining eight houses are expected to be demolished on Wednesday after the final protesters holding out are removed.During the scuffles between protesters and police, at least 11 police officers suffered minor injuries as of Wednesday morning, according to Israel Radio.At least two of the injured officers reported being bitten by protesters.The Honenu legal-aid group, which provides legal defense to right-wing activists, said that at least five people were arrested, four of them for attacking police officers, including three female minors and a 30-year-old resident of Ofra.Another resident of the settlement was also arrested for trying to give food to the demonstrators barricaded on the roof using a remote-controlled drone, the group said.In a separate demonstration against the demolition of the homes, hundreds of youth protested at the Chords Bridge at the entrance to Jerusalem on Wednesday morning, blocking the road leading into the city and burning tires, Israel Radio reported.The operation to evacuate the homes came after the High Court of Justice struck down an appeal on Monday by residents of Ofra for the homes to be sealed rather than destroyed.Hundreds of mostly unarmed troops, dressed in bright blue sweaters, faced off Tuesday against the protesters, many of whom had barricaded themselves in some of the homes, climbing on roofs and calling on police to refuse orders to clear out the homes.Some of the activists were brought out on their feet, while others were carried away by police.In that fashion, “hundreds of young men and women” were removed from the area, police said.Other officers used bullhorns to tell the hundreds of protesters to refrain from violence.Due to the stiff resistance and large number of activists holed up in the final home, police used a hydraulic battering ram to force open the back door of the house. An additional 100 officers were brought in to assist with the evacuation.While many of the protesters agreed to leave peacefully, police said they sought the reinforcements after negotiations for the remaining demonstrators to leave the last house failed.Despite the calls for resistance by many protesters, the residents of the homes in question did not seek confrontation, saying in a statement earlier, “We will not use crowbars and we will not barricade ourselves” inside the homes.Eight families living in the buildings had already left by Tuesday, police said.The court issued its demolition ruling for the Ofra houses in February 2015, and, after a number of delays, set March 5 as the final deadline by which the buildings must be pulled down.The residents’ request to have the structures sealed off and not demolished would have made them eligible for being spared in accordance with legislation passed earlier this month known as the Regulation Law. The law legalizes Jewish homes constructed illegally on Palestinian land, if homeowners can prove they built their homes in good faith or received government assistance.Palestinians whose land is expropriated under the law are eligible to receive either financial compensation or alternative plots elsewhere.However, the judges ruled unanimously on Monday that the demolition of the buildings must go ahead.The original case against the nine Ofra buildings was brought before the High Court in 2008 by the left-wing Yesh Din legal aid group, which represented the Palestinian landowner.A report published in the same year by another Israeli rights group, B’Tselem, said some 60 percent of the built-up area of Ofra lies on land that is registered to Palestinians. The claims to private ownership of lands in settlements like Ofra and the Amona outpost are based on the pre-1967 Jordanian land registry, which Israel adopted after it captured the West Bank from the Jordanians that year.Judah Ari Gross, Raoul Wootliff and AFP contributed to this report.
Wiesenthal Center, US lawmaker call for federal funding of anti-Semitism monitors-Trump administration rumored to be considering dropping special envoy on anti-Semitism as part of budget cuts-By JTA March 1, 2017, 10:42 am-THE TIMES OF ISRAEL
A senior Republican congressman and a Jewish defense group called for the funding of federal positions to monitor anti-Semitism a day after reports that the Trump administration was considering nixing the international anti-Semitism monitor role.“Ever since its creation under President George W. Bush, the Special Envoy on anti-Semitism has made clear America’s unflinching commitment to fight history’s oldest hate,” said a statement Tuesday by the Simon Wiesenthal Center. “Given the reality of the multiplicity of anti-Semitic threats, our nation’s leadership should redouble America’s commitment to combat this scourge.”The Wiesenthal Center did not mention the report in Bloomberg News on Monday that the Trump administration was considering eliminating the position as part of budget cuts.Neither did Rep. Chris Smith, a Republican of New Jersey, who authored the 2004 law creating the position. However, Smith issued a statement noting his role in establishing the international anti-Semitism monitor and saying a similar position should be created to combat domestic anti-Semitism.“It is vital that one senior law enforcement official has the mandate to lead efforts across the government to anticipate, prevent and respond to threats and attacks — especially violent ones — against the American Jewish community,” he said in a statement, noting the recent waves of bomb threats that have targeted nearly 100 Jewish community institutions, as well as massive vandalism at several Jewish graveyards.
150 children at home after Hamas-linked East Jerusalem school shut-Parents of students from Sur Baher in East Jerusalem trade blame with municipality over failure to find new schools-By Times of Israel staff March 1, 2017, 12:09 pm
Nearly a week after a school in the East Jerusalem neighborhood of Sur Baher said to be operated by Hamas was shut down by authorities, some 150 former students have yet to find other schools, Israel Radio reported Wednesday.Authorities said last week that the Al-Nukhaba elementary school was established by Hamas with the aim of teaching “content that undermines the sovereignty of Israel” and was therefore closed.Parents blamed the Jerusalem Municipality for the children staying home, saying that the city had not found the children alternative education facilitates.However, the municipality told Israel Radio that the parents of the students have refused to cooperate with the city in attempts find a solution,and said it was working in the meantime to ensure no damage was done to the children’s education.The municipality said the delay partly stemmed from the fact that school was a private institution, as the students now need to first be registered in the city’s educational system.It also said that the city remains prepared to enroll the children at schools elsewhere in the city, to which it will provide transportation.The order to close Al-Nukhaba followed a months-long joint probe by the Education Ministry, Jerusalem Police and the Shin Bet security service into the elementary school’s activities, according to an Education Ministry statement.Its aims were consistent with the ideology of the terror organization, which calls for the destruction of Israel, according to the Education Ministry.“Each case of incitement will be dealt with and will continue to be dealt with, with maximum severity,” Education Minister Naftali Bennett said. “Schools in East Jerusalem that elect to follow the [Israeli] curriculum get the full set of tools to succeed, while those choosing incitement will be closed.”Jews and Palestinians study in separate school systems in Jerusalem. The Palestinian schools are run by either the city council or private bodies.The Education Ministry ordered the school not to open in September and when it continued to operate, issued the closure order.The school’s administration had sued to have the decision overturned, but the case was rejected by the Jerusalem District Court and upheld by the Supreme Court, citing the school’s failure to obtain a license as one of the reasons for siding with the ministry.East Jerusalem Palestinians regularly say the city discriminates against them in disbursing funds and municipal services.According to daily newspaper Haaretz, East Jerusalem Palestinian schools received less than half the funds that the Jerusalem Municipality transferred to West Jerusalem Jewish schools in 2016.The municipality said the paper’s figures were wrong.Sue Surkes contributed to this report.
Officials: New Trump order drops Iraq from travel ban list-Document will also no longer provide exemptions for religious minorities or single out Syrian refugees-By Matthew Lee and VIVIAN SALAMA March 1, 2017, 9:22 am-THE TIMES OF ISRAEL
WASHINGTON (AP) — US President Donald Trump’s new immigration order will remove Iraq from the list of countries whose citizens face a temporary travel ban, US officials said Tuesday, citing the latest draft in circulation. Trump is expected to sign the executive order in the coming days.Four officials told The Associated Press that the decision followed pressure from the Pentagon and State Department, which had urged the White House to reconsider Iraq’s inclusion given its key role in fighting the Islamic State group.Citizens of six other predominantly Muslim countries — Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen — will remain on the travel ban list, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to discuss the order before it is signed. Those bans are effective for 90 days.The new order includes other changes as well. The officials said the 12-page document no longer singles out Syrian refugees for an indefinite ban and instead includes them as part of a general, 120-day suspension of new refugee admissions.The officials also said the order won’t include any explicit exemption for religious minorities in the countries targeted by the travel ban. Critics had accused the administration of adding such language to help Christians get into the United States while excluding Muslims.The White House did not respond to a request for comment.Trump signed his original executive order in late January. It sparked immediate confusion, panic and outrage as some travelers were detained in US airports before being sent back overseas and others were barred from boarding flights at foreign airports.The government initially blocked US green card holders before offering those legal residents special permission to come into the country. It finally decided the order didn’t apply to them.The State Department provisionally revoked roughly 60,000 valid visas in all, before a federal judge in Washington state blocked the government from carrying out the ban. The 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals upheld that decision.Under the revised order, officials said, all existing visas will be honored.In his first address to a joint session of Congress, Trump on Tuesday evening defended his effort.“We will shortly take new steps to keep our nation safe and to keep out those who would do us harm,” he said.After Trump signed the original order, Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi refuted the ban and said he would consider reciprocal measures. Many Iraqi lawmakers urged the government to ban Americans from Iraq in response, despite the potential effects that might have on the anti-IS fight.Al-Abadi then met with Defense Secretary Jim Mattis in Baghdad this month and underscored the US-Iraqi partnership. And Mattis walked back comments made by Trump, suggesting that Americans could get another chance to seize Iraqi oil as compensation for its military efforts there.“We’re not in Iraq to seize anybody’s oil,” Mattis told reporters on that trip. Al-Abadi also met with Vice President Pence in Munich earlier this month, where the two publicly discussed ways of strengthening cooperation.The Trump administration’s changes to the immigration order follow a report by intelligence analysts at the Homeland Security Department, which found insufficient evidence that citizens of the seven Muslim-majority countries posed a terror threat to the United States. A draft of the analysis was obtained last week by the AP.
Trump wins cautious praise after speaking out on anti-Semitism-Jewish groups call for translating Congress speech into concrete actions; some doubt his sincerity-By Times of Israel staff and JTA March 1, 2017, 9:12 am
US President Donald Trump won cautious praise from Jewish groups after his condemnation of anti-Semitism in his first speech to Congress, but it was accompanied by a clear call for translating his words into concrete action.“B’nai B’rith International welcomes President Donald J. Trump calling attention to recent anti-Semitism during his address,” the group said in a statement.“We now look forward to forceful measures taken by the administration to respond to these anti-Semitic acts. Anti-Semitism is a human rights issue, a distinct phenomenon that must be addressed as such,” B’nai B’rith said.“Thanks @POTUS for condemning #hate against Jews & immigrants,” Jonathan Greenblatt, the Anti-Defamation League CEO, said on Twitter. “Now let’s fight it. See our plan. Let’s do it together.”Thanks @POTUS for condemning #hate ag Jews & immigrants. Now let's fight it. See our plan. Let's do it together. https://t.co/4olwW2fFP5— Jonathan Greenblatt (@JGreenblattADL) March 1, 2017-Former US ambassador to Israel Martin Indyk tweeted, “Good on Trump for his clear condemnation of anti-Semitism and racism at the top of his SOTU speech.”In his long-awaited speech to both Houses of Congress on Tuesday, the president said the recurrent bomb threats to Jewish institutions and desecration of Jewish cemeteries were a reminder “of our nation’s path toward civil rights and the work that remains.”“Recent threats targeting Jewish community centers and vandalism of Jewish cemeteries, as well as last week’s shooting in Kansas City, remind us that while we may be a nation divided on policies, we are a country that stands united in condemning hate and evil in all its forms,” said Trump, who was noticeably more subdued and conciliatory than during his previous speeches and press conferences.Close to a hundred Jewish institutions have been targeted with bomb threats since the beginning of the year. A bar patron in Kansas ejected from the establishment last week after hurling racial epithets at two workers from India allegedly returned with a gun and killed one of the men and wounded another as well as a man who tried to stop the attacker.In just the last week, hundreds of Jewish tombstones in Pennsylvania and Missouri have been vandalized and numerous Jewish institutions have received bomb threats, including 29 on Monday alone — the fifth wave of such scares since January.In all of these cases, Trump has come under fire for delayed responses. In the case of the threats on Jewish establishments, Trump at first deflected questions – and in one instance shouted abuse at a reporter – before calling the threats “horrible” last week. The White House did not address the Kansas shooting until Tuesday, six days after the attack.His condemnation also came just hours after he reportedly said that the wave of threats against Jewish communal institutions may be a false flag.Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro, who is Jewish and a Democrat, described a meeting of state attorney generals and Trump on Tuesday to a BuzzFeed reporter.Trump called the wave of bomb threats “reprehensible,” Shapiro said. But the US president also added: “Sometimes it’s the reverse, to make people – or to make others – look bad,” according to Shapiro’s account. Shapiro said Trump said it was “the reverse” two or three times but did not clarify what he meant.However, some groups were less impressed with Trump’s change of tone, doubting his sincerity.Venting on Twitter, executive director Steven Goldstein of the Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect said, “After weeks of our organization’s having to plead, cajole and criticize this President to speak out against #Antisemitism, we give him credit for doing the right thing tonight ….But his suddenly dulcet tones weren’t matched by substantive kindness.“Where’s the beef, Mr President? It was as if you wrapped the poison of prejudice in the veneer of cotton candy,” Goldstein said.“The President didn’t say exactly what he would do to fight anti-Semitism – how could he have stayed so vague?”“We’ve endured weeks of anti-Semitic attacks across America and we didn’t hear a single proposal from the President tonight to stop them.”REACTION TO #TrumpAddress #JointSession from @AnneFrankCenter NO SPECIFICS ON #ANTISEMITISM; COTTON-CANDY TONE COVERING POISON OF PREJUDICE pic.twitter.com/TwLl3U4k0M— AnneFrankCenter(US) (@AnneFrankCenter) March 1, 2017-Democrats sat silently through much of Trump’s speech, which opened with his comments on anti-Semitism.They refrained from applauding and made thumbs down movements when they disagreed.All the women in the House of Representatives’ Democratic caucus wore white, an initiative of Rep. Lois Frankel, a Democrat of Florida, who is Jewish.Frankel posted on her Twitter account that the white harked back to the suffragettes and was meant to protest Trump rollbacks of reproductive rights and other protections for women.Tonight, Democratic Members will wear suffragette white to oppose Republican attempts to roll back women's progress #WomenWearWhite pic.twitter.com/lh5YAIfVGW— Rep. Lois Frankel (@RepLoisFrankel) February 28, 2017-“White symbolically brings a reference back to the days of suffragettes,” Frankel told Fortune magazine.”But it also shows we don’t want to go back, we want to go forward [with women’s rights].”Good on Trump for his clear condemnation of anti-Semitism and racism at the top of his SOTU speech.— Martin Indyk (@Martin_Indyk) March 1, 2017
