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)
MIGRATING BIRDS IN ISRAEL EATS HUMANS FLESH FOR COMING AGAINST ISRAEL-JERUSALEM
EZEKIEL 39:11-12,18
11 And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will give unto Gog (RUSSIA/ARAB/MUSLIMS) a place there of graves in Israel, the valley of the passengers (EAST OF THE DEAD SEA IN JORDAN VALLEY) on the east of the sea: and it shall stop the noses of the passengers: and there shall they bury Gog (RUSSIAN) and all his multitude:(ARAB/MUSLIM HORDE) and they shall call it The valley of Hamongog.(BURIEL SITE OF THE 300 MILLION,RUSSIAN/ARAB/MUSLIMS)
12 And seven months shall the house of Israel be burying of them, that they may cleanse the land.(OF ISRAEL)
16 And also the name of the city shall be Hamonah. Thus shall they cleanse the land.(OF THE ISRAEL-GOD HATERS)
EZEKIEL 39:17-21
17 And, thou son of man, thus saith the Lord GOD; Speak unto every feathered fowl, and to every beast of the field, Assemble yourselves, and come; gather yourselves on every side to my sacrifice that I do sacrifice for you, even a great sacrifice upon the mountains of Israel, that ye may eat flesh, and drink blood.(OF RUSSIAN/ISLAMIC HORDES AGAINST ISRAEL)
18 Ye shall eat the flesh of the mighty, and drink the blood of the princes of the earth, of rams, of lambs, and of goats, of bullocks, all of them fatlings of Bashan.
19 And ye shall eat fat till ye be full, and drink blood till ye be drunken, of my sacrifice which I have sacrificed for you.
20 Thus ye shall be filled at my table with horses and chariots, with mighty men, and with all men of war, saith the Lord GOD.
21 And I will set my glory among the heathen, and all the heathen shall see my judgment that I have executed, and my hand that I have laid upon them.
22 So the house of Israel shall know that I am the LORD their God from that day and forward.
REVELATION 19:17-18
17 And I saw an angel standing in the sun; and he cried with a loud voice, saying to all the fowls that fly in the midst of heaven, Come and gather yourselves together unto the supper of the great God;(AGAINST ALL NATIONS ARMIES THAT COME AGAINST JERUSALEM AND ISRAEL)
18 That ye may eat the flesh of kings, and the flesh of captains, and the flesh of mighty men, and the flesh of horses, and of them that sit on them, and the flesh of all men, both free and bond, both small and great.
EZEKIEL 38:1-7
1 And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,
2 Son of man, set thy face against Gog,(RULER) the land of Magog,(RUSSIA) the chief prince of Meshech (MOSCOW) and Tubal,(TOBOLSK) and prophesy against him,
3 And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog,(LEADER OF RUSSIA) the chief prince of Meshech(MOSCOW) and Tubal:TOBOLSK)
4 And I (GOD) will turn thee back, and put hooks into thy jaws,(GOD FORCES THE RUSSIA-MUSLIMS TO MARCH) and I will bring thee forth, and all thine army, horses and horsemen, all of them clothed with all sorts of armour, even a great company with bucklers and shields, all of them handling swords:
5 Persia,(IRAN,IRAQ) Ethiopia, and Libya with them; all of them with shield and helmet:
6 Gomer,(GERMANY) and all his bands; the house of Togarmah (TURKEY) of the north quarters, and all his bands: and many people with thee.(AFRICAN MUSLIMS,SUDAN,TUNESIA ETC)
7 Be thou prepared, and prepare for thyself, thou, and all thy company that are assembled unto thee, and be thou a guard unto them.
EZEKIEL 39:1-8
1 Therefore, thou son of man, prophesy against Gog,(LEADER OF RUSSIA) and say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech (MOSCOW) and Tubal: (TUBOLSK)
2 And I will turn thee back,(RUSSIA-ARAB MUSLIM ISRAEL HATERS) and leave but the sixth part of thee,(5/6TH OR 300 MILLION DEAD RUSSIAN/ARAB/MUSLIMS I BELIEVE) and will cause thee to come up from the north parts,(RUSSIA) and will bring thee upon the mountains of Israel:
3 And I will smite thy bow out of thy left hand, and will cause thine arrows to fall out of thy right hand.
4 Thou shalt fall upon the mountains of Israel, thou, and all thy bands,( ARABS) and the people that is with thee: I will give thee unto the ravenous birds of every sort, and to the beasts of the field to be devoured.
5 Thou shalt fall upon the open field: for I have spoken it, saith the Lord GOD.
6 And I will send a fire on Magog,(NUCLEAR ATOMIC BOMB) and among them that dwell carelessly in the isles: and they shall know that I am the LORD.
7 So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, the Holy One in Israel.
8 Behold, it is come, and it is done, saith the Lord GOD; this is the day whereof I have spoken.
CHINA AND KINGS OF THE EAST MARCH TO ISRAEL 2ND WAVE OF WW3 (200 MILLION MAN ARMY)
REVELATION 16:12-16
12 And the sixth angel poured out his vial upon the great river Euphrates;(WERE WW3 STARTS IN IRAQ OR SYRIA OR TURKEY) and the water thereof was dried up, that the way of the kings of the east might be prepared.(THE TURKEY ATATURK DAM ON THE EUPHRATES CAN BE SHUT AND DRIED UP ALREADY BY TURKEY)
13 And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon,(SATAN) and out of the mouth of the beast,(WORLD DICTATOR) and out of the mouth of the false prophet.(FALSE POPE)
14 For they are the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty.(WERE 2 BILLION DIE FROM NUKE WAR)
15 Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame.
16 And he gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon.(ITS AT THIS TIME I BELIEVE WHEN AMERICA GETS NUKED BY RUSSIA ON THE WAY TO THE MIDEAST)
DANIEL 11:44 (2ND WAVE OF WW3)
44 But tidings out of the east(CHINA) and out of the north(RUSSIA, MUSLIMS WHATS LEFT FROM WAVE 1) shall trouble him:(EU DICTATOR IN ISRAEL) therefore he shall go forth with great fury to destroy, and utterly to make away many.( 1/3RD OF EARTHS POPULATION)
REVELATION 9:12-18
12 One woe is past; and, behold, there come two woes more hereafter.
13 And the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God,
14 Saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose the four(DEMONIC WAR) angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates.(WORLDWIDE WAR)(TURKEY-IRAQ-SYRIA)(EUPHRATES RIVER CONSISTS OF 760 MILES IN TURKEY,440 MILES IN SYRIA AND 660 MILES IN IRAQ)
15 And the four(DEMONIC WAR) angels were loosed,(WORLDWIDE WAR) which were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, for to slay the third part of men.(1/3 Earths Population die in WW 3 2ND WAVE-2 billion)
16 And the number of the army of the horsemen were two hundred thousand thousand:(200 MILLION MAN ARMY FROM CHINA AND THE KINGS OF THE EAST) and I heard the number of them.
17 And thus I saw the horses in the vision, and them that sat on them, having breastplates of fire, and of jacinth, and brimstone: and the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions; and out of their mouths issued fire and smoke and brimstone.(NUCLEAR BOMBS)
18 By these three was the third part of men killed, by the fire, and by the smoke, and by the brimstone, which issued out of their mouths.(NUCLEAR BOMBS)
North Korea seen 'moving ballistic missile towards the border overnight'-Anthony Pearce-Yahoo News UK-September 5, 2017
Is North Korea preparing another missile launch? North Korea has been seen moving what appears to be an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) towards its west coast, according to reports.The manoeuvre follows North Korea’s latest nuclear test, which has been met by international condemnation.At an emergency security council meeting at the United Nations in New York City, the US envoy said Kim Jong-un is “begging for war”.“Enough is enough,” she said. “We have taken an incremental approach, and despite the best of intentions, it has not worked.”According to reports, the rocket was moved at night to avoid surveillance, to a location where North Korea has launch facilities.Asia Business Daily in South Korea broke the story, citing an unidentified intelligence source.However, South Korea’s defense ministry said they were unable to confirm the contents of the report, according to Reuters.Yesterday, South Korea’s ambassador to the UN Cho Tae-yul said a resolution had to be “truly biting.”“Now is the time to take measures that are strong and robust enough to compel North Korea to seriously engage in dialogue,” he said.“The new resolution must include not only additional measures to further block funds that could possibly flow into North Korea’s illegal nuclear program, but also truly biting and robust measures that Pyongyang finds very painful,” he added.On Tuesday, South Korea’s navy carried out live-fire naval drills and warned that if the North provoked them “we will immediately hit back and bury them at sea”.It said the North is considered ready to launch more missiles.Pyongyang has trialled nuclear weapons on six occasions, but this is the first time it has claimed to have developed a two-stage hydrogen bomb.Previously, North Korea has tested atomic bombs — similar to those used by the US on Japan in 1945 — but hydrogen, or thermonuclear, bombs can be 1,000 times more powerful.The bomb was thought to have a power range from 50 kilotonnes to 120 kilotonnes, which would make it at least three times the size of the bomb that destroyed Hiroshima.It is not yet known if the bomb, which caused a 6.3magnitude earthquake, is a hydrogen bomb, or a less powerful fission-boosted bomb.Following the US’s calls for the strongest possible sanctions, Russian president Vladimir Putin condemned the nuclear test as “provocative”.However, he said new sanctions against the regime would be “useless” and “ineffective”, and also warned against creating “global catastrophe” by making military threats.
Sanctions doubts grow as North Korea warns of 'gift packages' for U.S.[Reuters]-By Stephanie Nebehay and Christine Kim-yahoonews-September 5, 2017
GENEVA/SEOUL (Reuters) - A top North Korean diplomat warned on Tuesday that his country is ready to send "more gift packages" to the United States as world powers struggled for a response to Pyongyang's latest nuclear weapons test.Han Tae Song, ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, confirmed that North Korea, officially known as the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), had successfully conducted its sixth and largest nuclear bomb test on Sunday."The recent self-defense measures by my country, DPRK, are a gift package addressed to none other than the U.S.," Han told a disarmament conference."The U.S. will receive more 'gift packages' from my country as long as its relies on reckless provocations and futile attempts to put pressure on the DPRK," he added without elaborating.U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley on Monday accused North Korean leader Kim Jong Un of "begging for war" with a series of nuclear bomb and missile tests. She urged the 15-member Security Council to impose the "strongest possible" sanctions to deter him and shut down his trading partners.But Russia’s U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said on Tuesday that a U.S. bid for the Security Council to vote on Sept. 11 on new sanctions is “a little premature.” Russia is a permanent member of the Security Council and has veto power.“I don’t think we’ll be able to rush it so fast,” Nebenzia told reporters. Russian President Vladimir Putin earlier on Tuesday described more sanctions as a "road to nowhere."Sanctions have done little to stop North Korea boosting its nuclear and missile capacity as it faces off with U.S. President Donald Trump who has vowed to stop Pyongyang from being able to hit the mainland United States with a nuclear weapon.Haley acknowledged on Tuesday that more sanctions on North Korea are unlikely to change its behavior but would cut off funding for its ballistic missile and nuclear programs."Do we think more sanctions are going to work on North Korea? Not necessarily," she told the American Enterprise Institute think tank in Washington. "But what does it do? It cuts off the revenue that allows them to build ballistic missiles."-MORE SANCTIONS?-Diplomats have said the Security Council could consider banning North Korean textile exports, banishing its national airline and stopping supplies of oil to the government and military.Other measures could include preventing North Koreans from working abroad and adding top officials to a blacklist aiming at imposing asset freezes and travel bans.China accounted for 92 percent of North Korea's trade in 2016, according to South Korea’s government. China's foreign ministry said on Tuesday it would take part in Security Council discussions in "a responsible and constructive manner".The U.S. dollar fell on Tuesday, hitting a one-week low against the yen and on track for its biggest decline in eight days against a basket of currencies, partly on concerns about North Korea.German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe spoke by telephone on Tuesday and agreed that sanctions against Pyongyang should be stepped up.South Korea said on Tuesday an agreement with its ally the United States to scrap a weight limit on its warheads would help it respond to North Korea's nuclear and missile threat.South Korea's Asia Business Daily, citing an unidentified source, reported that North Korea had been observed moving a rocket that appeared to be an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) toward its west coast.The rocket started moving on Monday and was spotted moving only at night to avoid surveillance, the newspaper said.South Korea's defense ministry, which warned that North Korea was ready to launch an ICBM at any time, said it was not able to confirm the report.Analysts and South Korean policymakers believe North Korea may test another weapon on or around Sept. 9, when it celebrates its founding day.North Korea says it needs to develop its weapons to defend itself against what it sees as U.S. aggression.South Korea, after weeks of rising tension, is talking to the United States about deploying aircraft carriers and strategic bombers to the Korean peninsula, and has been ramping up its own defenses.Trump and his South Korean counterpart, Moon Jae-in, agreed on Monday to scrap a warhead weight limit on South Korea's missiles, South Korea's presidential office said, enabling it to strike North Korea with greater force in the event of war.The White House said Trump gave "in-principle approval" to the move.South Korea and the United States are technically still at war with North Korea after the 1950-53 Korean conflict ended with a truce, not a peace treaty.Both sides have thousands of rockets and artillery pieces aimed at each other across the world's most heavily armed border.(Reporting by Christine Kim and Stephanie Nebehay; Additional reporting by Christian Shepherd in Beijing, Michelle Nichols at the United Nations and Tim Ahmann and David Shepardson in Washington; Writing by Alistair Bell; Editing by Robert Birsel and James Dalgleish)
US envoy tells UN: North Korean leader is 'begging for war'-[The Canadian Press]-September 4, 2017-yahoonews
NEW YORK — North Korea's leader is "begging for war," the U.S. ambassador said Monday at an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council, as members called for punishing the country with even stronger sanctions for its powerful nuclear test.Ambassador Nikki Haley said the U.S. would look at countries doing business with the North — which include China — and planned to circulate a resolution this week with the goal of getting it approved Sept. 11."Enough is enough. War is never something the United States wants. We don't want it now. But our country's patience is not unlimited," Haley said."The United States will look at every country that does business with North Korea as a country, that is giving aid to their reckless and dangerous nuclear intentions," she said.The move came as South Korea said it was seeing preparations in the North for an ICBM test and fired missiles into the sea to simulate an attack on the North's main nuclear test site.Also on Monday, President Donald Trump spoke by phone with South Korean President Moon Jae-in and agreed that Sunday's underground nuclear test by North Korea was an unprecedented provocation. The two leaders also agreed to remove the limit on the payload of South Korean missiles.The emergency U.N. session was scheduled after North Korea said it detonated the hydrogen bomb and came six days after the council strongly condemned what it called Pyongyang's "outrageous" launch of a ballistic missile over Japan. Less than a month ago, the council imposed its stiffest sanctions yet on Kim Jong Un's reclusive nation.Still, the U.S. resolution faces an uncertain future. Russia and China have both proposed a two-pronged approach: North Korea would suspend its nuclear and missile development, and the United States and South Korea would suspend their joint military exercises.Washington and Seoul say the manoeuvrs are defensive, but Pyongyang views them as a rehearsal for invasion. The North recently requested a Security Council meeting about the war games.The U.S. says there is no comparison between its openly conducted, internationally monitored military drills and North Korea's weapons programs, which the international community has banned.Russian Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia told reporters after the meeting that sanctions alone will not solve the issue and that negotiations are needed as well."Resolutions aimed solely at sanctioning North Korea have not worked well before," he said.Diplomats from France, Britain, Italy and other countries reiterated demands for the Kim regime to halt its ballistic missile and nuclear weapons programs and urged further sanctions.French Ambassador Francois Delattre said France was urging the adoption of new U.N. sanctions, swift implementation of existing ones and new, separate sanctions by the European Union."Pyongyang poses a clear threat to international peace and security and is increasingly and seriously challenging the global nonproliferation regime," said Ambassador Sebastiano Cardi of Italy, which heads the North Korea sanctions compliance committee. He noted that North Korea is the only country to have tested a nuclear device in the 21st century.The North trumpeted that its sixth nuclear test blast since 2006 was a "perfect success.""We cannot waste any more time. And in order to do that, we need North Korea to feel the pressure, but if they go down this road there will be consequences," Japanese Ambassador Koro Bessho told reporters before the meeting.Chinese Ambassador Liu Jieyi said the situation on the Korean peninsula "is deteriorating constantly as we speak, falling into a vicious circle." He called for restarting talks and asked Washington and Seoul to suspend their exercises.The council aimed to take a big bite out of the North Korean economy earlier this month by banning the North from exporting coal, iron, lead and seafood. Together, those are worth about a third of the country's $3 billion in exports last year.The council could look to sanction other profitable North Korean exports, such as textiles. Another possibility could be tighter limits on North Korean labourers abroad; the recent sanctions barred giving any new permits for such workers. The United States suggested other ideas earlier this summer, including air and maritime restrictions and restricting oil to North Korea's military and weapons programs.___Associated Press writer Youkyung Lee contributed from Seoul, South Korea.Maria Sanminiatelli And Jennifer Peltz, The Associated Press.
Putin warns U.S. not to supply Ukraine with defensive weapons-[Reuters]-yahoonews-September 5, 2017
XIAMEN, China (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that any decision by the United States to supply defensive weapons to Ukraine would fuel the conflict in eastern Ukraine and possibly prompt pro-Russian separatists to expand their campaign there.On a visit to Kiev last month, U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said he was actively reviewing sending lethal weapons to Ukraine to help it defend itself, an option that previous U.S. president Barack Obama vetoed.Ukraine and Russia are at loggerheads over a war in eastern Ukraine between pro-Russian separatists and Ukrainian government forces that has killed more than 10,000 people in three years. Kiev accuses Moscow of sending troops and heavy weapons to the region, which Russia denies.Putin, answering a question after a BRICS summit in China about the possibility of the United States supplying Ukraine with heavy weapons, said it was for Washington to decide whom it sold or gave weapons to, but he warned against the move, something Kiev wants."The delivery of weapons to a conflict zone doesn't help peacekeeping efforts, but only worsens the situation," Putin told a news briefing."Such a decision would not change the situation but the number of casualties could increase."In comments likely to be interpreted as a veiled threat, Putin suggested that pro-Russian separatists were likely to respond by expanding their own campaign."The self-declared (pro-Russian) republics (in eastern Ukraine) have enough weapons, including ones captured from the other side" said Putin."It's hard to imagine how the self-declared republics would respond. Perhaps they would deploy weapons to other conflict zones."Putin also said Russia intended to draft a resolution for consideration in the United Nations Security Council, suggesting armed U.N. peacekeepers be deployed to eastern Ukraine to help protect ceasefire monitors from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) there."It would help resolve the problem in eastern Ukraine," said Putin, saying that a slew of preconditions would need to be met before any such deployment happened.(Reporting by Denis Pinchuk; Writing by Andrew Osborn; Editing by Gareth Jones/Christian Lowe)
STORMS HURRICANES-TORNADOES
LUKE 21:25-26
25 And there shall be signs in the sun,(HEATING UP-SOLAR ECLIPSES) and in the moon,(MAN ON MOON-LUNAR ECLIPSES) and in the stars;(ASTEROIDS ETC) and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity;(MASS CONFUSION) the sea and the waves roaring;(FIERCE WINDS)
26 Men’s hearts failing them for fear,(TORNADOES,HURRICANES,STORMS) and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth:(DESTRUCTION) for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.(FROM QUAKES,NUKES ETC)
THE FIRST JUDGEMENT OF THE EARTH STARTED WITH WATER-IT ONLY MAKES SENSE THE LAST GENERATION WILL BE HAVING FLOODING
GENESIS 7:6-12
6 And Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of waters was upon the earth.
7 And Noah went in, and his sons, and his wife, and his sons’ wives with him, into the ark, because of the waters of the flood.
8 Of clean beasts, and of beasts that are not clean, and of fowls, and of every thing that creepeth upon the earth,
9 There went in two and two unto Noah into the ark, the male and the female, as God had commanded Noah.
10 And it came to pass after seven days, that the waters of the flood were upon the earth.
11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.
12 And the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights.
GOD PROMISED BY A RAINBOW-THE EARTH WOULD NEVER BE DESTROYED TOTALLY WITH A FLOOD AGAIN.BUT FLOODIING IS A SIGN OF JUDGEMENT.
Extremely dangerous' Irma barrels toward Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico-[Reuters]-By Ian Simpson-yahoonews-September 5, 2017
(Reuters) - Hurricane Irma strengthened into a highly dangerous Category 5 storm on Tuesday as it barreled toward the Caribbean and the southern United States, even as Texas and Louisiana still reeled from devastating Hurricane Harvey.Hurricane warnings were in effect for much of the Leeward Islands, the British and U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico as the storm packed winds of up to 175 miles per hour (280 km/h), the U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) said."Irma becomes an extremely dangerous Category 5 hurricane," the NHC said on Tuesday, adding that it could strengthen. "Preparations should be rushed to completion in the hurricane warning area." Category 5 is the highest NHC designation.Irma was about 270 miles (440 km) east of the island of Antigua and moving west at about 14 mph (22 kph), the NHC said. It was too early to forecast Irma's exact path or any effects have on the continental United States, it cautioned.Puerto Rican Governor Ricardo Rossello urged the 3.4 million residents of the U.S. territory to leave areas expected to be lashed by high winds and torrential rains as early as Tuesday night and seek refuge in one of 460 hurricane shelters."This is something without precedent," Rossello told a news conference. He will ask U.S. President Donald Trump to declare a federal state of emergency even before the storm passes to allow disbursement of U.S. emergency funds.Florida Governor Rick Scott said on Tuesday he also asked Trump to make a "pre-landfall" emergency declaration. Irma is expected to reach southern Florida on Saturday.Scott said he spoke with Trump on Monday night after the governor declared a state of emergency for all of Florida's 67 counties. He said the president "offered the full resources of the federal government."-"TODAY I'M NERVOUS"-TV station WIPR in Puerto Rico showed long lines of shoppers stocking up on bottled water, flashlights, batteries and food.Gary Randall, chief executive officer of the Blue Waters Resort on Antigua's north coast, said staff had boarded up windows and stripped trees of coconuts and fronds and secured anything that could become a hazard."I wasn't that nervous yesterday, but today I'm nervous," Randall said by telephone, adding that he expected the hotel's beach to be swept away and much of the 108-room property to be flooded.Antigua and Barbuda Prime Minister Gaston Browne urged residents to stay in their homes during the storm.Airlines canceled some flights to the region, and American Airlines added two extra flights on Tuesday from St. Kitts and St. Maarten to Miami.The NHC also issued a hurricane watch for the Turks and Caicos Islands and the southeastern Bahamas as well as the northern coast of Haiti near its border with the Dominican Republic.Irma would be the second powerful hurricane to thrash the United States in as many weeks.Residents of Texas and Louisiana were still reeling from Hurricane Harvey, which struck Texas as a Category 4 hurricane on Aug. 25. It dumped several feet of rain, destroying thousands of homes and businesses, killing an estimated 60 people and displacing more than 1 million others.(Reporting by Brendan O'Brien in Milwaukee, Alana Wise in New York and Ian Simpson in Washington; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)
Irma strengthens to a Category 5 hurricane: U.S. NHC-[Reuters]-yahoonews-September 5, 2017
(Reuters) - Irma on Tuesday intensified into an extremely dangerous Category 5 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson wind scale, the U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) said in its latest advisory.Hurricane Irma is about 270 miles (440 km) east of Antigua and packing maximum sustained winds of 175 mph (280 km/h), the Miami-based weather forecaster said.Irma, which is forecast to remain a powerful category 4 or 5 hurricane during the next couple of days, will move near or over portions of the northern Leeward Islands Tuesday night and early Wednesday, the NHC said.(Reporting by Swati Verma in Bengaluru)
RCMP receive dozens of calls from Alberta to B.C. about reported fireball in sky-[CBC]-September 5, 2017-yahoonews
Hundreds of people in Alberta and B.C. took to social media to report seeing a giant fireball illuminate the night sky late Monday, and the RCMP told media it received dozens of calls about what seemed to be the same event. Posting to Twitter from locations as far apart as Calgary and Hornby Island, B.C., the amazed stargazers described seeing a flaming object turn the sky an eerie green before fading into a dark orange as it approached the horizon.CBC News received multiple emails describing the flash that took place at around 10:14 pm PT. Some described a loud bang that shook homes and high rise buildings.Kevin Skrepnek, chief fire information officer for B.C., tweeted that he was on a patio in Nelson when "the entire sky lit up."Huge boom about 1m later," he wrote.Skrepnek later said he initially thought it was a power surge."Then, to the east, I saw a reddish fireball streak and break up," he said in a brief statement posted on Twitter."Nothing happened afterward, then within 60 seconds there was a massive sound (like a long, rolling thunderclap) for about five seconds."Skrepnek added that the wildfire smoke still sitting over large swaths of Alberta and B.C. likely intensified the flash of light.While there were some reports that parts of the object may have hit the ground — which would then make it a meteorite — this has not been confirmed and a number of landing locations conflicted with others. -Witness reports from across the West-The American Meteor Society says it received over 90 reports about the fireball event all the way from British Columbia to Saskatchewan to the states of Washington, Idaho and Montana.According to its latest estimated trajectory, the society believes the fireball entered the atmosphere near Boswell, B.C. and terminated near Meadow Creek, B.C., roughly 100 kilometres away.CBC News has not independently confirmed videos posted to Twitter claiming to have captured the spectacle, many on automated security cameras.RCMP Staff-Sgt. Troy Gross told CKNW in Kelowna that police received calls from places such as Nelson, the Okanagan Valley and the Comox Valley in B.C., and from as far away as Calgary.He said it's unusual for so many people across such a large area to make similar reports."Of course we have no idea what it is, but I'm assuming it's probably a meteor shower. It's obviously bright enough for people all over to see it."
OZONE DEPLETION JUDGEMENT ON THE EARTH DUE TO SIN
ISAIAH 30:26-27
26 Moreover the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold,(7X OR 7-DEGREES HOTTER) as the light of seven days, in the day that the LORD bindeth up the breach of his people,(ISRAEL) and healeth the stroke of their wound.
27 Behold, the name of the LORD cometh from far, burning with his anger, and the burden thereof is heavy: his lips are full of indignation, and his tongue as a devouring fire:
MATTHEW 24:21-22,29
21 For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.
22 And except those days should be shortened,(DAY LIGHT HOURS SHORTENED) there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake (ISRAELS SAKE) those days shall be shortened (Daylight hours shortened)(THE ASTEROID HITS EARTH HERE)
29 Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken:
REVELATION 16:7-9
7 And I heard another out of the altar say, Even so, Lord God Almighty, true and righteous are thy judgments.
8 And the fourth angel poured out his vial upon the sun; and power was given unto him to scorch men with fire.
9 And men were scorched with great heat, and blasphemed the name of God, which hath power over these plagues: and they repented not to give him glory.
FIRES AND EXPLOSIONS
REVELATION 8:7
7 The first angel sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled with blood, and they were cast upon the earth: and the third part of trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up.
Wind-whipped wildfires bear down on Glacier, Yosemite parks-[The Canadian Press]-September 5, 2017-yahoonews
HELENA, Mont. — Firefighters across the U.S. West struggled with wind-driven flames, hot temperatures and dry conditions even after the unofficial end to a summer of devastating wildfires, including those bearing down on two popular national parks.The dozens of fires burning across the Western United States and Canada have blanketed the air with choking smoke from Oregon, where ash fell on the town of Cascade Locks, to Colorado, where health officials issued an air quality advisory alert.A fire in Montana's Glacier National Park emptied its busiest tourist spot as wind gusts drove the flames toward the doorstep of an iconic lodge.Lake McDonald Lodge, a 103-year-old Swiss chalet-style hotel, sits on a lake as the famed Going-to-the-Sun-Road begins its vertigo-inducing climb up the Continental Divide, making it an endearing park symbol for many visitors.Firefighters on Monday were keeping the blaze in check about a mile (1.6 kilometres ) from the lodge though the fire expanded elsewhere in the park and had burned 21 square miles (54 square kilometres ).Losing Lake McDonald Lodge on top of the destruction of Sperry Chalet, a historic backcountry building consumed by the fire last week, would be "unimaginably devastating," said Mark Hufstetler, a historian who worked at the lodge for several years in the late 1970s and early 1980s."These are some of the most remarkable buildings anywhere in the United States and they are an integral part of the Glacier experience and the Glacier tradition," Hufstetler said.Fire crews understood the significance of the lodge and were ready to protect it, fire information officer Diane Sine said."It's important to all of us and a very high priority to do whatever we can to preserve that," she said.Outside California's Yosemite National Park, a wind-fueled fire made its way deeper into a grove of 2,700-year-old giant sequoia trees on Labor Day. Officials said the fire had gone through about half the grove but had not killed any trees.Giant sequoias are resilient and can withstand low-intensity fires. The blaze burned brush and left scorch marks on some big trees that survived, said Cheryl Chipman, a fire information officer."They have thick bark and made it through pretty well," Chipman said.There are about 100 giant sequoias in Nelder Grove, including the roughly 24-story-high Bull Buck sequoia, one of the world's largest. Fire crews also wrapped 19th-century cabins in shiny, fire-resistant material to protect them from the flames.The fire threatening the grove was among several in the area — one of which closed some trails in Yosemite. A road leading to the park's southern entrance also shut down.Brenda Negley woke up Monday in her Oakhurst home 14 miles (23 kilometres ) away and found her truck covered with ash. Her mother was there, too, after evacuating her own home, but Negley's thoughts were with the peaceful and secluded sequoia grove that she has regularly visited since childhood."I've been sick with worry over Nelder Grove," she said. "As much as Nelder Grove is my home, and I don't want to lose my home, I want to save my mom's home and everyone else's home."Elsewhere in Northern California, a fire destroyed 72 homes and forced the evacuation of about 2,000 people from their houses. The fire has burned 14 square miles (36 square kilometres ) in the community of Helena about 150 miles (240 kilometres ) south of the Oregon line.In Los Angeles, a fire that destroyed four homes and threatened hillside neighbourhoods is no longer actively burning, but firefighters kept watch in case the wind reignited the blaze, Fire Department Chief Ralph Terrazas said.___Thanawala reported from San Francisco.Matt Volz And Sudhin Thanawala, The Associated Press.
Dublin refuses to be 'backdoor' to EU single market By Eszter Zalan-sep 5,17-euobserver
BRUSSELS, Today, 09:24-Ireland cannot be part of creating a "backdoor" into the EU's single market after Brexit, Irish foreign minister Simon Coveney said on Monday (4 September).The minister - who met with the EU's chief Brexit negotiator, Michel Barnier, on Monday - criticised the UK's plan for implementing an "invisible border" between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland."The response from Ireland's border customs team was one of real skepticism," Coveney said of the UK's proposals published two weeks ago, adding that Ireland is also keen on preserving an invisible border."We cannot be part of essentially creating some kind of a backdoor into the single market that is not properly regulated," he told reporters."There is more that could be done to add credibility to the solution before we move to transitional issues," he said of the UK's plans.Britain wants to keep free trade between Ireland and Northern Ireland, but its proposed methods have been met with doubts both in Dublin and in Brussels."The EU task force is not convinced the UK's approach is going to solve the issues," the minister added.The UK plans not to have any physical infrastructure at the border and wants technical solutions as a substitute, and see British authorities taking the responsibility of monitoring the border - even collecting EU duties.Ireland is also interested in maintaining the status quo on the free movement of people, goods and services, but wants to avoid creating a possible hole in the single market's borders.The minister recalled that 90 percent of Ireland's production is exported, and most of it goes into the EU market.The European Commission is expected to come out with its own proposals on the issue of Northern Ireland later this week, and Coveney praised the good cooperation between Barnier's task force and Dublin."So far we have really been in unison," he said.-Good Friday agreement-Coveney said there has been good progress made between UK and EU negotiators last week on the common travel area, which allows UK and Irish citizens to travel without passport checks across the border.But he added that there is a "lot more work" that needs to be done to make sure that the Good Friday agreement, the 1998 peace accord, is not endangered by Brexit."There is an obligation to achieve more progress to reassure people that it [Brexit] won't have damaging effect on the peace process," Coveney said, admitting that the complete solution and the final, new relationship between the UK and Ireland will not be known in detail until the future trading relationship is fully negotiated.He echoed what EU officials have been saying, that unless there is progress on the issue of financial settlement between the UK and the EU, those second phase negotiations on the the UK's future relationship with the bloc cannot begin."There is a very strongly held view that more progress needs to be made and can be made on the financial issue and Ireland," he said.
Syrian army, allies break Islamic State siege in eastern city-[Reuters]-By Ellen Francis-yahoonews-September 5, 2017
BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syrian government forces on Tuesday reached troops besieged for years by Islamic State in the eastern city of Deir al-Zor, the militants' last major stronghold in Syria, the army said.Tanks and troops pressed quickly toward a government-held enclave in the city, where Islamic State has trapped thousands of civilians and Syrian soldiers since 2014. The advance has opened a land route linking that territory to the outside.The advance into strategic prize Deir al-Zor, a city on the Euphrates river and once the center of Syria's oil industry, is a significant victory for President Bashar al-Assad against Islamic State and another stinging blow to the group.The group is being fought in Syria by government forces, backed by allies Iran and Russia, and separately by a U.S.-led alliance of Arab and Kurdish fighters. In Iraq, the jihadists were driven out of their Mosul stronghold earlier this year.Islamic State still holds half of Deir al-Zor city and much of the province, however, as well as parts of its former stronghold Raqqa to the northwest, where the U.S.-backed offensive is being fought."Our armed forces and allies, with support from Syrian and Russian warplanes, achieved the second phase of their operations in the Syrian desert," Syria's military said. "They have managed to break the siege."State media and a war monitoring group said advancing forces had linked up with the besieged troops at a garrison on the western edge of the city.Footage on Syrian state TV showed soldiers cheering near the garrison. State media said residents in government-held parts of the city were celebrating the advance.The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said a nearby military air base and three districts remained under siege by IS. Battles still raged around the city, the British-based war monitor said.Deir al-Zor governor Mohammed Ibrahim Samra told Reuters that government troops were also pushing toward the air base."The forces have begun to lift the siege," he said. "Our residents have been waiting for this moment ... forces are (trying to) break the siege on the military airport as well.""The coming days will see the clearing of Deir al-Zor city (of militants)" and advances on nearby countryside under Islamic State control, Samra added.Assad congratulated the troops in a statement from his office.The army and its allies made rapid advances in recent days pushing through Islamic State lines with the help of heavy artillery and Russian air strikes.A Russian warship in the Mediterranean sea fired cruise missiles at Islamic State positions near Deir al-Zor to boost the offensive, Russia's defense ministry said.-ISLAMIC STATE SQUEEZED-The city has been cut off from government-held Syria since 2013, after rebel groups rose up against Assad during the first flush of Syria's six-year war. Islamic State then overran rebel positions and encircled the army enclave and nearby air base in 2014.The United Nations said in August it estimated 93,000 civilians were living there in "extremely difficult" conditions. During the siege, high-altitude air drops have supplied them.Deir al-Zor lies southeast of Islamic State's former base in Raqqa.Hemmed in on all sides, Islamic State fighters have fallen back on footholds downstream of Deir al-Zor in towns near the Iraq border.The Deir al-Zor gains "form an important launching pad for expanding military operations in the area," the army said.For Damascus, the latest advance caps months of steady progress as the army and its allies turned from victories over rebels in western Syria to push east against Islamic State.The eastwards march has on occasion brought them into conflict with U.S.-backed forces.Still, the rival campaigns have mostly stayed out of each other's way, and the U.S.-led coalition has stressed it is not seeking war with Assad.In a statement on Sunday an alliance of Iran-backed Shi'ite militias allied to Damascus, including Lebanon's Hezbollah, accused Washington of trying to hinder the advance to Deir al-Zor.An official in the pro-Assad alliance said senior Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps commander Qassem Soleimani was closely monitoring fighting, a sign of Iran's close military involvement.(Reporting by Ellen Francis; Additional reporting by Laila Bassam in Beirut and Kinda Makieh in Damascus; Writing by John Davison; Editing by Andrew Roche and Toby Davis)
EZEKIEL 39:11-12,18
11 And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will give unto Gog (RUSSIA/ARAB/MUSLIMS) a place there of graves in Israel, the valley of the passengers (EAST OF THE DEAD SEA IN JORDAN VALLEY) on the east of the sea: and it shall stop the noses of the passengers: and there shall they bury Gog (RUSSIAN) and all his multitude:(ARAB/MUSLIM HORDE) and they shall call it The valley of Hamongog.(BURIEL SITE OF THE 300 MILLION,RUSSIAN/ARAB/MUSLIMS)
12 And seven months shall the house of Israel be burying of them, that they may cleanse the land.(OF ISRAEL)
16 And also the name of the city shall be Hamonah. Thus shall they cleanse the land.(OF THE ISRAEL-GOD HATERS)
EZEKIEL 39:17-21
17 And, thou son of man, thus saith the Lord GOD; Speak unto every feathered fowl, and to every beast of the field, Assemble yourselves, and come; gather yourselves on every side to my sacrifice that I do sacrifice for you, even a great sacrifice upon the mountains of Israel, that ye may eat flesh, and drink blood.(OF RUSSIAN/ISLAMIC HORDES AGAINST ISRAEL)
18 Ye shall eat the flesh of the mighty, and drink the blood of the princes of the earth, of rams, of lambs, and of goats, of bullocks, all of them fatlings of Bashan.
19 And ye shall eat fat till ye be full, and drink blood till ye be drunken, of my sacrifice which I have sacrificed for you.
20 Thus ye shall be filled at my table with horses and chariots, with mighty men, and with all men of war, saith the Lord GOD.
21 And I will set my glory among the heathen, and all the heathen shall see my judgment that I have executed, and my hand that I have laid upon them.
22 So the house of Israel shall know that I am the LORD their God from that day and forward.
REVELATION 19:17-18
17 And I saw an angel standing in the sun; and he cried with a loud voice, saying to all the fowls that fly in the midst of heaven, Come and gather yourselves together unto the supper of the great God;(AGAINST ALL NATIONS ARMIES THAT COME AGAINST JERUSALEM AND ISRAEL)
18 That ye may eat the flesh of kings, and the flesh of captains, and the flesh of mighty men, and the flesh of horses, and of them that sit on them, and the flesh of all men, both free and bond, both small and great.
EZEKIEL 38:1-7
1 And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,
2 Son of man, set thy face against Gog,(RULER) the land of Magog,(RUSSIA) the chief prince of Meshech (MOSCOW) and Tubal,(TOBOLSK) and prophesy against him,
3 And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog,(LEADER OF RUSSIA) the chief prince of Meshech(MOSCOW) and Tubal:TOBOLSK)
4 And I (GOD) will turn thee back, and put hooks into thy jaws,(GOD FORCES THE RUSSIA-MUSLIMS TO MARCH) and I will bring thee forth, and all thine army, horses and horsemen, all of them clothed with all sorts of armour, even a great company with bucklers and shields, all of them handling swords:
5 Persia,(IRAN,IRAQ) Ethiopia, and Libya with them; all of them with shield and helmet:
6 Gomer,(GERMANY) and all his bands; the house of Togarmah (TURKEY) of the north quarters, and all his bands: and many people with thee.(AFRICAN MUSLIMS,SUDAN,TUNESIA ETC)
7 Be thou prepared, and prepare for thyself, thou, and all thy company that are assembled unto thee, and be thou a guard unto them.
EZEKIEL 39:1-8
1 Therefore, thou son of man, prophesy against Gog,(LEADER OF RUSSIA) and say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech (MOSCOW) and Tubal: (TUBOLSK)
2 And I will turn thee back,(RUSSIA-ARAB MUSLIM ISRAEL HATERS) and leave but the sixth part of thee,(5/6TH OR 300 MILLION DEAD RUSSIAN/ARAB/MUSLIMS I BELIEVE) and will cause thee to come up from the north parts,(RUSSIA) and will bring thee upon the mountains of Israel:
3 And I will smite thy bow out of thy left hand, and will cause thine arrows to fall out of thy right hand.
4 Thou shalt fall upon the mountains of Israel, thou, and all thy bands,( ARABS) and the people that is with thee: I will give thee unto the ravenous birds of every sort, and to the beasts of the field to be devoured.
5 Thou shalt fall upon the open field: for I have spoken it, saith the Lord GOD.
6 And I will send a fire on Magog,(NUCLEAR ATOMIC BOMB) and among them that dwell carelessly in the isles: and they shall know that I am the LORD.
7 So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, the Holy One in Israel.
8 Behold, it is come, and it is done, saith the Lord GOD; this is the day whereof I have spoken.
CHINA AND KINGS OF THE EAST MARCH TO ISRAEL 2ND WAVE OF WW3 (200 MILLION MAN ARMY)
REVELATION 16:12-16
12 And the sixth angel poured out his vial upon the great river Euphrates;(WERE WW3 STARTS IN IRAQ OR SYRIA OR TURKEY) and the water thereof was dried up, that the way of the kings of the east might be prepared.(THE TURKEY ATATURK DAM ON THE EUPHRATES CAN BE SHUT AND DRIED UP ALREADY BY TURKEY)
13 And I saw three unclean spirits like frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon,(SATAN) and out of the mouth of the beast,(WORLD DICTATOR) and out of the mouth of the false prophet.(FALSE POPE)
14 For they are the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty.(WERE 2 BILLION DIE FROM NUKE WAR)
15 Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame.
16 And he gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon.(ITS AT THIS TIME I BELIEVE WHEN AMERICA GETS NUKED BY RUSSIA ON THE WAY TO THE MIDEAST)
DANIEL 11:44 (2ND WAVE OF WW3)
44 But tidings out of the east(CHINA) and out of the north(RUSSIA, MUSLIMS WHATS LEFT FROM WAVE 1) shall trouble him:(EU DICTATOR IN ISRAEL) therefore he shall go forth with great fury to destroy, and utterly to make away many.( 1/3RD OF EARTHS POPULATION)
REVELATION 9:12-18
12 One woe is past; and, behold, there come two woes more hereafter.
13 And the sixth angel sounded, and I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God,
14 Saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose the four(DEMONIC WAR) angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates.(WORLDWIDE WAR)(TURKEY-IRAQ-SYRIA)(EUPHRATES RIVER CONSISTS OF 760 MILES IN TURKEY,440 MILES IN SYRIA AND 660 MILES IN IRAQ)
15 And the four(DEMONIC WAR) angels were loosed,(WORLDWIDE WAR) which were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, for to slay the third part of men.(1/3 Earths Population die in WW 3 2ND WAVE-2 billion)
16 And the number of the army of the horsemen were two hundred thousand thousand:(200 MILLION MAN ARMY FROM CHINA AND THE KINGS OF THE EAST) and I heard the number of them.
17 And thus I saw the horses in the vision, and them that sat on them, having breastplates of fire, and of jacinth, and brimstone: and the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions; and out of their mouths issued fire and smoke and brimstone.(NUCLEAR BOMBS)
18 By these three was the third part of men killed, by the fire, and by the smoke, and by the brimstone, which issued out of their mouths.(NUCLEAR BOMBS)
North Korea seen 'moving ballistic missile towards the border overnight'-Anthony Pearce-Yahoo News UK-September 5, 2017
Is North Korea preparing another missile launch? North Korea has been seen moving what appears to be an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) towards its west coast, according to reports.The manoeuvre follows North Korea’s latest nuclear test, which has been met by international condemnation.At an emergency security council meeting at the United Nations in New York City, the US envoy said Kim Jong-un is “begging for war”.“Enough is enough,” she said. “We have taken an incremental approach, and despite the best of intentions, it has not worked.”According to reports, the rocket was moved at night to avoid surveillance, to a location where North Korea has launch facilities.Asia Business Daily in South Korea broke the story, citing an unidentified intelligence source.However, South Korea’s defense ministry said they were unable to confirm the contents of the report, according to Reuters.Yesterday, South Korea’s ambassador to the UN Cho Tae-yul said a resolution had to be “truly biting.”“Now is the time to take measures that are strong and robust enough to compel North Korea to seriously engage in dialogue,” he said.“The new resolution must include not only additional measures to further block funds that could possibly flow into North Korea’s illegal nuclear program, but also truly biting and robust measures that Pyongyang finds very painful,” he added.On Tuesday, South Korea’s navy carried out live-fire naval drills and warned that if the North provoked them “we will immediately hit back and bury them at sea”.It said the North is considered ready to launch more missiles.Pyongyang has trialled nuclear weapons on six occasions, but this is the first time it has claimed to have developed a two-stage hydrogen bomb.Previously, North Korea has tested atomic bombs — similar to those used by the US on Japan in 1945 — but hydrogen, or thermonuclear, bombs can be 1,000 times more powerful.The bomb was thought to have a power range from 50 kilotonnes to 120 kilotonnes, which would make it at least three times the size of the bomb that destroyed Hiroshima.It is not yet known if the bomb, which caused a 6.3magnitude earthquake, is a hydrogen bomb, or a less powerful fission-boosted bomb.Following the US’s calls for the strongest possible sanctions, Russian president Vladimir Putin condemned the nuclear test as “provocative”.However, he said new sanctions against the regime would be “useless” and “ineffective”, and also warned against creating “global catastrophe” by making military threats.
Sanctions doubts grow as North Korea warns of 'gift packages' for U.S.[Reuters]-By Stephanie Nebehay and Christine Kim-yahoonews-September 5, 2017
GENEVA/SEOUL (Reuters) - A top North Korean diplomat warned on Tuesday that his country is ready to send "more gift packages" to the United States as world powers struggled for a response to Pyongyang's latest nuclear weapons test.Han Tae Song, ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, confirmed that North Korea, officially known as the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), had successfully conducted its sixth and largest nuclear bomb test on Sunday."The recent self-defense measures by my country, DPRK, are a gift package addressed to none other than the U.S.," Han told a disarmament conference."The U.S. will receive more 'gift packages' from my country as long as its relies on reckless provocations and futile attempts to put pressure on the DPRK," he added without elaborating.U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley on Monday accused North Korean leader Kim Jong Un of "begging for war" with a series of nuclear bomb and missile tests. She urged the 15-member Security Council to impose the "strongest possible" sanctions to deter him and shut down his trading partners.But Russia’s U.N. Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said on Tuesday that a U.S. bid for the Security Council to vote on Sept. 11 on new sanctions is “a little premature.” Russia is a permanent member of the Security Council and has veto power.“I don’t think we’ll be able to rush it so fast,” Nebenzia told reporters. Russian President Vladimir Putin earlier on Tuesday described more sanctions as a "road to nowhere."Sanctions have done little to stop North Korea boosting its nuclear and missile capacity as it faces off with U.S. President Donald Trump who has vowed to stop Pyongyang from being able to hit the mainland United States with a nuclear weapon.Haley acknowledged on Tuesday that more sanctions on North Korea are unlikely to change its behavior but would cut off funding for its ballistic missile and nuclear programs."Do we think more sanctions are going to work on North Korea? Not necessarily," she told the American Enterprise Institute think tank in Washington. "But what does it do? It cuts off the revenue that allows them to build ballistic missiles."-MORE SANCTIONS?-Diplomats have said the Security Council could consider banning North Korean textile exports, banishing its national airline and stopping supplies of oil to the government and military.Other measures could include preventing North Koreans from working abroad and adding top officials to a blacklist aiming at imposing asset freezes and travel bans.China accounted for 92 percent of North Korea's trade in 2016, according to South Korea’s government. China's foreign ministry said on Tuesday it would take part in Security Council discussions in "a responsible and constructive manner".The U.S. dollar fell on Tuesday, hitting a one-week low against the yen and on track for its biggest decline in eight days against a basket of currencies, partly on concerns about North Korea.German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe spoke by telephone on Tuesday and agreed that sanctions against Pyongyang should be stepped up.South Korea said on Tuesday an agreement with its ally the United States to scrap a weight limit on its warheads would help it respond to North Korea's nuclear and missile threat.South Korea's Asia Business Daily, citing an unidentified source, reported that North Korea had been observed moving a rocket that appeared to be an intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) toward its west coast.The rocket started moving on Monday and was spotted moving only at night to avoid surveillance, the newspaper said.South Korea's defense ministry, which warned that North Korea was ready to launch an ICBM at any time, said it was not able to confirm the report.Analysts and South Korean policymakers believe North Korea may test another weapon on or around Sept. 9, when it celebrates its founding day.North Korea says it needs to develop its weapons to defend itself against what it sees as U.S. aggression.South Korea, after weeks of rising tension, is talking to the United States about deploying aircraft carriers and strategic bombers to the Korean peninsula, and has been ramping up its own defenses.Trump and his South Korean counterpart, Moon Jae-in, agreed on Monday to scrap a warhead weight limit on South Korea's missiles, South Korea's presidential office said, enabling it to strike North Korea with greater force in the event of war.The White House said Trump gave "in-principle approval" to the move.South Korea and the United States are technically still at war with North Korea after the 1950-53 Korean conflict ended with a truce, not a peace treaty.Both sides have thousands of rockets and artillery pieces aimed at each other across the world's most heavily armed border.(Reporting by Christine Kim and Stephanie Nebehay; Additional reporting by Christian Shepherd in Beijing, Michelle Nichols at the United Nations and Tim Ahmann and David Shepardson in Washington; Writing by Alistair Bell; Editing by Robert Birsel and James Dalgleish)
US envoy tells UN: North Korean leader is 'begging for war'-[The Canadian Press]-September 4, 2017-yahoonews
NEW YORK — North Korea's leader is "begging for war," the U.S. ambassador said Monday at an emergency meeting of the U.N. Security Council, as members called for punishing the country with even stronger sanctions for its powerful nuclear test.Ambassador Nikki Haley said the U.S. would look at countries doing business with the North — which include China — and planned to circulate a resolution this week with the goal of getting it approved Sept. 11."Enough is enough. War is never something the United States wants. We don't want it now. But our country's patience is not unlimited," Haley said."The United States will look at every country that does business with North Korea as a country, that is giving aid to their reckless and dangerous nuclear intentions," she said.The move came as South Korea said it was seeing preparations in the North for an ICBM test and fired missiles into the sea to simulate an attack on the North's main nuclear test site.Also on Monday, President Donald Trump spoke by phone with South Korean President Moon Jae-in and agreed that Sunday's underground nuclear test by North Korea was an unprecedented provocation. The two leaders also agreed to remove the limit on the payload of South Korean missiles.The emergency U.N. session was scheduled after North Korea said it detonated the hydrogen bomb and came six days after the council strongly condemned what it called Pyongyang's "outrageous" launch of a ballistic missile over Japan. Less than a month ago, the council imposed its stiffest sanctions yet on Kim Jong Un's reclusive nation.Still, the U.S. resolution faces an uncertain future. Russia and China have both proposed a two-pronged approach: North Korea would suspend its nuclear and missile development, and the United States and South Korea would suspend their joint military exercises.Washington and Seoul say the manoeuvrs are defensive, but Pyongyang views them as a rehearsal for invasion. The North recently requested a Security Council meeting about the war games.The U.S. says there is no comparison between its openly conducted, internationally monitored military drills and North Korea's weapons programs, which the international community has banned.Russian Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia told reporters after the meeting that sanctions alone will not solve the issue and that negotiations are needed as well."Resolutions aimed solely at sanctioning North Korea have not worked well before," he said.Diplomats from France, Britain, Italy and other countries reiterated demands for the Kim regime to halt its ballistic missile and nuclear weapons programs and urged further sanctions.French Ambassador Francois Delattre said France was urging the adoption of new U.N. sanctions, swift implementation of existing ones and new, separate sanctions by the European Union."Pyongyang poses a clear threat to international peace and security and is increasingly and seriously challenging the global nonproliferation regime," said Ambassador Sebastiano Cardi of Italy, which heads the North Korea sanctions compliance committee. He noted that North Korea is the only country to have tested a nuclear device in the 21st century.The North trumpeted that its sixth nuclear test blast since 2006 was a "perfect success.""We cannot waste any more time. And in order to do that, we need North Korea to feel the pressure, but if they go down this road there will be consequences," Japanese Ambassador Koro Bessho told reporters before the meeting.Chinese Ambassador Liu Jieyi said the situation on the Korean peninsula "is deteriorating constantly as we speak, falling into a vicious circle." He called for restarting talks and asked Washington and Seoul to suspend their exercises.The council aimed to take a big bite out of the North Korean economy earlier this month by banning the North from exporting coal, iron, lead and seafood. Together, those are worth about a third of the country's $3 billion in exports last year.The council could look to sanction other profitable North Korean exports, such as textiles. Another possibility could be tighter limits on North Korean labourers abroad; the recent sanctions barred giving any new permits for such workers. The United States suggested other ideas earlier this summer, including air and maritime restrictions and restricting oil to North Korea's military and weapons programs.___Associated Press writer Youkyung Lee contributed from Seoul, South Korea.Maria Sanminiatelli And Jennifer Peltz, The Associated Press.
Putin warns U.S. not to supply Ukraine with defensive weapons-[Reuters]-yahoonews-September 5, 2017
XIAMEN, China (Reuters) - Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that any decision by the United States to supply defensive weapons to Ukraine would fuel the conflict in eastern Ukraine and possibly prompt pro-Russian separatists to expand their campaign there.On a visit to Kiev last month, U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said he was actively reviewing sending lethal weapons to Ukraine to help it defend itself, an option that previous U.S. president Barack Obama vetoed.Ukraine and Russia are at loggerheads over a war in eastern Ukraine between pro-Russian separatists and Ukrainian government forces that has killed more than 10,000 people in three years. Kiev accuses Moscow of sending troops and heavy weapons to the region, which Russia denies.Putin, answering a question after a BRICS summit in China about the possibility of the United States supplying Ukraine with heavy weapons, said it was for Washington to decide whom it sold or gave weapons to, but he warned against the move, something Kiev wants."The delivery of weapons to a conflict zone doesn't help peacekeeping efforts, but only worsens the situation," Putin told a news briefing."Such a decision would not change the situation but the number of casualties could increase."In comments likely to be interpreted as a veiled threat, Putin suggested that pro-Russian separatists were likely to respond by expanding their own campaign."The self-declared (pro-Russian) republics (in eastern Ukraine) have enough weapons, including ones captured from the other side" said Putin."It's hard to imagine how the self-declared republics would respond. Perhaps they would deploy weapons to other conflict zones."Putin also said Russia intended to draft a resolution for consideration in the United Nations Security Council, suggesting armed U.N. peacekeepers be deployed to eastern Ukraine to help protect ceasefire monitors from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) there."It would help resolve the problem in eastern Ukraine," said Putin, saying that a slew of preconditions would need to be met before any such deployment happened.(Reporting by Denis Pinchuk; Writing by Andrew Osborn; Editing by Gareth Jones/Christian Lowe)
STORMS HURRICANES-TORNADOES
LUKE 21:25-26
25 And there shall be signs in the sun,(HEATING UP-SOLAR ECLIPSES) and in the moon,(MAN ON MOON-LUNAR ECLIPSES) and in the stars;(ASTEROIDS ETC) and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity;(MASS CONFUSION) the sea and the waves roaring;(FIERCE WINDS)
26 Men’s hearts failing them for fear,(TORNADOES,HURRICANES,STORMS) and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth:(DESTRUCTION) for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.(FROM QUAKES,NUKES ETC)
THE FIRST JUDGEMENT OF THE EARTH STARTED WITH WATER-IT ONLY MAKES SENSE THE LAST GENERATION WILL BE HAVING FLOODING
GENESIS 7:6-12
6 And Noah was six hundred years old when the flood of waters was upon the earth.
7 And Noah went in, and his sons, and his wife, and his sons’ wives with him, into the ark, because of the waters of the flood.
8 Of clean beasts, and of beasts that are not clean, and of fowls, and of every thing that creepeth upon the earth,
9 There went in two and two unto Noah into the ark, the male and the female, as God had commanded Noah.
10 And it came to pass after seven days, that the waters of the flood were upon the earth.
11 In the six hundredth year of Noah’s life, in the second month, the seventeenth day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened.
12 And the rain was upon the earth forty days and forty nights.
GOD PROMISED BY A RAINBOW-THE EARTH WOULD NEVER BE DESTROYED TOTALLY WITH A FLOOD AGAIN.BUT FLOODIING IS A SIGN OF JUDGEMENT.
Extremely dangerous' Irma barrels toward Virgin Islands, Puerto Rico-[Reuters]-By Ian Simpson-yahoonews-September 5, 2017
(Reuters) - Hurricane Irma strengthened into a highly dangerous Category 5 storm on Tuesday as it barreled toward the Caribbean and the southern United States, even as Texas and Louisiana still reeled from devastating Hurricane Harvey.Hurricane warnings were in effect for much of the Leeward Islands, the British and U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico as the storm packed winds of up to 175 miles per hour (280 km/h), the U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) said."Irma becomes an extremely dangerous Category 5 hurricane," the NHC said on Tuesday, adding that it could strengthen. "Preparations should be rushed to completion in the hurricane warning area." Category 5 is the highest NHC designation.Irma was about 270 miles (440 km) east of the island of Antigua and moving west at about 14 mph (22 kph), the NHC said. It was too early to forecast Irma's exact path or any effects have on the continental United States, it cautioned.Puerto Rican Governor Ricardo Rossello urged the 3.4 million residents of the U.S. territory to leave areas expected to be lashed by high winds and torrential rains as early as Tuesday night and seek refuge in one of 460 hurricane shelters."This is something without precedent," Rossello told a news conference. He will ask U.S. President Donald Trump to declare a federal state of emergency even before the storm passes to allow disbursement of U.S. emergency funds.Florida Governor Rick Scott said on Tuesday he also asked Trump to make a "pre-landfall" emergency declaration. Irma is expected to reach southern Florida on Saturday.Scott said he spoke with Trump on Monday night after the governor declared a state of emergency for all of Florida's 67 counties. He said the president "offered the full resources of the federal government."-"TODAY I'M NERVOUS"-TV station WIPR in Puerto Rico showed long lines of shoppers stocking up on bottled water, flashlights, batteries and food.Gary Randall, chief executive officer of the Blue Waters Resort on Antigua's north coast, said staff had boarded up windows and stripped trees of coconuts and fronds and secured anything that could become a hazard."I wasn't that nervous yesterday, but today I'm nervous," Randall said by telephone, adding that he expected the hotel's beach to be swept away and much of the 108-room property to be flooded.Antigua and Barbuda Prime Minister Gaston Browne urged residents to stay in their homes during the storm.Airlines canceled some flights to the region, and American Airlines added two extra flights on Tuesday from St. Kitts and St. Maarten to Miami.The NHC also issued a hurricane watch for the Turks and Caicos Islands and the southeastern Bahamas as well as the northern coast of Haiti near its border with the Dominican Republic.Irma would be the second powerful hurricane to thrash the United States in as many weeks.Residents of Texas and Louisiana were still reeling from Hurricane Harvey, which struck Texas as a Category 4 hurricane on Aug. 25. It dumped several feet of rain, destroying thousands of homes and businesses, killing an estimated 60 people and displacing more than 1 million others.(Reporting by Brendan O'Brien in Milwaukee, Alana Wise in New York and Ian Simpson in Washington; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)
Irma strengthens to a Category 5 hurricane: U.S. NHC-[Reuters]-yahoonews-September 5, 2017
(Reuters) - Irma on Tuesday intensified into an extremely dangerous Category 5 hurricane on the Saffir-Simpson wind scale, the U.S. National Hurricane Center (NHC) said in its latest advisory.Hurricane Irma is about 270 miles (440 km) east of Antigua and packing maximum sustained winds of 175 mph (280 km/h), the Miami-based weather forecaster said.Irma, which is forecast to remain a powerful category 4 or 5 hurricane during the next couple of days, will move near or over portions of the northern Leeward Islands Tuesday night and early Wednesday, the NHC said.(Reporting by Swati Verma in Bengaluru)
RCMP receive dozens of calls from Alberta to B.C. about reported fireball in sky-[CBC]-September 5, 2017-yahoonews
Hundreds of people in Alberta and B.C. took to social media to report seeing a giant fireball illuminate the night sky late Monday, and the RCMP told media it received dozens of calls about what seemed to be the same event. Posting to Twitter from locations as far apart as Calgary and Hornby Island, B.C., the amazed stargazers described seeing a flaming object turn the sky an eerie green before fading into a dark orange as it approached the horizon.CBC News received multiple emails describing the flash that took place at around 10:14 pm PT. Some described a loud bang that shook homes and high rise buildings.Kevin Skrepnek, chief fire information officer for B.C., tweeted that he was on a patio in Nelson when "the entire sky lit up."Huge boom about 1m later," he wrote.Skrepnek later said he initially thought it was a power surge."Then, to the east, I saw a reddish fireball streak and break up," he said in a brief statement posted on Twitter."Nothing happened afterward, then within 60 seconds there was a massive sound (like a long, rolling thunderclap) for about five seconds."Skrepnek added that the wildfire smoke still sitting over large swaths of Alberta and B.C. likely intensified the flash of light.While there were some reports that parts of the object may have hit the ground — which would then make it a meteorite — this has not been confirmed and a number of landing locations conflicted with others. -Witness reports from across the West-The American Meteor Society says it received over 90 reports about the fireball event all the way from British Columbia to Saskatchewan to the states of Washington, Idaho and Montana.According to its latest estimated trajectory, the society believes the fireball entered the atmosphere near Boswell, B.C. and terminated near Meadow Creek, B.C., roughly 100 kilometres away.CBC News has not independently confirmed videos posted to Twitter claiming to have captured the spectacle, many on automated security cameras.RCMP Staff-Sgt. Troy Gross told CKNW in Kelowna that police received calls from places such as Nelson, the Okanagan Valley and the Comox Valley in B.C., and from as far away as Calgary.He said it's unusual for so many people across such a large area to make similar reports."Of course we have no idea what it is, but I'm assuming it's probably a meteor shower. It's obviously bright enough for people all over to see it."
OZONE DEPLETION JUDGEMENT ON THE EARTH DUE TO SIN
ISAIAH 30:26-27
26 Moreover the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold,(7X OR 7-DEGREES HOTTER) as the light of seven days, in the day that the LORD bindeth up the breach of his people,(ISRAEL) and healeth the stroke of their wound.
27 Behold, the name of the LORD cometh from far, burning with his anger, and the burden thereof is heavy: his lips are full of indignation, and his tongue as a devouring fire:
MATTHEW 24:21-22,29
21 For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.
22 And except those days should be shortened,(DAY LIGHT HOURS SHORTENED) there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake (ISRAELS SAKE) those days shall be shortened (Daylight hours shortened)(THE ASTEROID HITS EARTH HERE)
29 Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken:
REVELATION 16:7-9
7 And I heard another out of the altar say, Even so, Lord God Almighty, true and righteous are thy judgments.
8 And the fourth angel poured out his vial upon the sun; and power was given unto him to scorch men with fire.
9 And men were scorched with great heat, and blasphemed the name of God, which hath power over these plagues: and they repented not to give him glory.
FIRES AND EXPLOSIONS
REVELATION 8:7
7 The first angel sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled with blood, and they were cast upon the earth: and the third part of trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up.
Wind-whipped wildfires bear down on Glacier, Yosemite parks-[The Canadian Press]-September 5, 2017-yahoonews
HELENA, Mont. — Firefighters across the U.S. West struggled with wind-driven flames, hot temperatures and dry conditions even after the unofficial end to a summer of devastating wildfires, including those bearing down on two popular national parks.The dozens of fires burning across the Western United States and Canada have blanketed the air with choking smoke from Oregon, where ash fell on the town of Cascade Locks, to Colorado, where health officials issued an air quality advisory alert.A fire in Montana's Glacier National Park emptied its busiest tourist spot as wind gusts drove the flames toward the doorstep of an iconic lodge.Lake McDonald Lodge, a 103-year-old Swiss chalet-style hotel, sits on a lake as the famed Going-to-the-Sun-Road begins its vertigo-inducing climb up the Continental Divide, making it an endearing park symbol for many visitors.Firefighters on Monday were keeping the blaze in check about a mile (1.6 kilometres ) from the lodge though the fire expanded elsewhere in the park and had burned 21 square miles (54 square kilometres ).Losing Lake McDonald Lodge on top of the destruction of Sperry Chalet, a historic backcountry building consumed by the fire last week, would be "unimaginably devastating," said Mark Hufstetler, a historian who worked at the lodge for several years in the late 1970s and early 1980s."These are some of the most remarkable buildings anywhere in the United States and they are an integral part of the Glacier experience and the Glacier tradition," Hufstetler said.Fire crews understood the significance of the lodge and were ready to protect it, fire information officer Diane Sine said."It's important to all of us and a very high priority to do whatever we can to preserve that," she said.Outside California's Yosemite National Park, a wind-fueled fire made its way deeper into a grove of 2,700-year-old giant sequoia trees on Labor Day. Officials said the fire had gone through about half the grove but had not killed any trees.Giant sequoias are resilient and can withstand low-intensity fires. The blaze burned brush and left scorch marks on some big trees that survived, said Cheryl Chipman, a fire information officer."They have thick bark and made it through pretty well," Chipman said.There are about 100 giant sequoias in Nelder Grove, including the roughly 24-story-high Bull Buck sequoia, one of the world's largest. Fire crews also wrapped 19th-century cabins in shiny, fire-resistant material to protect them from the flames.The fire threatening the grove was among several in the area — one of which closed some trails in Yosemite. A road leading to the park's southern entrance also shut down.Brenda Negley woke up Monday in her Oakhurst home 14 miles (23 kilometres ) away and found her truck covered with ash. Her mother was there, too, after evacuating her own home, but Negley's thoughts were with the peaceful and secluded sequoia grove that she has regularly visited since childhood."I've been sick with worry over Nelder Grove," she said. "As much as Nelder Grove is my home, and I don't want to lose my home, I want to save my mom's home and everyone else's home."Elsewhere in Northern California, a fire destroyed 72 homes and forced the evacuation of about 2,000 people from their houses. The fire has burned 14 square miles (36 square kilometres ) in the community of Helena about 150 miles (240 kilometres ) south of the Oregon line.In Los Angeles, a fire that destroyed four homes and threatened hillside neighbourhoods is no longer actively burning, but firefighters kept watch in case the wind reignited the blaze, Fire Department Chief Ralph Terrazas said.___Thanawala reported from San Francisco.Matt Volz And Sudhin Thanawala, The Associated Press.
Dublin refuses to be 'backdoor' to EU single market By Eszter Zalan-sep 5,17-euobserver
BRUSSELS, Today, 09:24-Ireland cannot be part of creating a "backdoor" into the EU's single market after Brexit, Irish foreign minister Simon Coveney said on Monday (4 September).The minister - who met with the EU's chief Brexit negotiator, Michel Barnier, on Monday - criticised the UK's plan for implementing an "invisible border" between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland."The response from Ireland's border customs team was one of real skepticism," Coveney said of the UK's proposals published two weeks ago, adding that Ireland is also keen on preserving an invisible border."We cannot be part of essentially creating some kind of a backdoor into the single market that is not properly regulated," he told reporters."There is more that could be done to add credibility to the solution before we move to transitional issues," he said of the UK's plans.Britain wants to keep free trade between Ireland and Northern Ireland, but its proposed methods have been met with doubts both in Dublin and in Brussels."The EU task force is not convinced the UK's approach is going to solve the issues," the minister added.The UK plans not to have any physical infrastructure at the border and wants technical solutions as a substitute, and see British authorities taking the responsibility of monitoring the border - even collecting EU duties.Ireland is also interested in maintaining the status quo on the free movement of people, goods and services, but wants to avoid creating a possible hole in the single market's borders.The minister recalled that 90 percent of Ireland's production is exported, and most of it goes into the EU market.The European Commission is expected to come out with its own proposals on the issue of Northern Ireland later this week, and Coveney praised the good cooperation between Barnier's task force and Dublin."So far we have really been in unison," he said.-Good Friday agreement-Coveney said there has been good progress made between UK and EU negotiators last week on the common travel area, which allows UK and Irish citizens to travel without passport checks across the border.But he added that there is a "lot more work" that needs to be done to make sure that the Good Friday agreement, the 1998 peace accord, is not endangered by Brexit."There is an obligation to achieve more progress to reassure people that it [Brexit] won't have damaging effect on the peace process," Coveney said, admitting that the complete solution and the final, new relationship between the UK and Ireland will not be known in detail until the future trading relationship is fully negotiated.He echoed what EU officials have been saying, that unless there is progress on the issue of financial settlement between the UK and the EU, those second phase negotiations on the the UK's future relationship with the bloc cannot begin."There is a very strongly held view that more progress needs to be made and can be made on the financial issue and Ireland," he said.
Syrian army, allies break Islamic State siege in eastern city-[Reuters]-By Ellen Francis-yahoonews-September 5, 2017
BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syrian government forces on Tuesday reached troops besieged for years by Islamic State in the eastern city of Deir al-Zor, the militants' last major stronghold in Syria, the army said.Tanks and troops pressed quickly toward a government-held enclave in the city, where Islamic State has trapped thousands of civilians and Syrian soldiers since 2014. The advance has opened a land route linking that territory to the outside.The advance into strategic prize Deir al-Zor, a city on the Euphrates river and once the center of Syria's oil industry, is a significant victory for President Bashar al-Assad against Islamic State and another stinging blow to the group.The group is being fought in Syria by government forces, backed by allies Iran and Russia, and separately by a U.S.-led alliance of Arab and Kurdish fighters. In Iraq, the jihadists were driven out of their Mosul stronghold earlier this year.Islamic State still holds half of Deir al-Zor city and much of the province, however, as well as parts of its former stronghold Raqqa to the northwest, where the U.S.-backed offensive is being fought."Our armed forces and allies, with support from Syrian and Russian warplanes, achieved the second phase of their operations in the Syrian desert," Syria's military said. "They have managed to break the siege."State media and a war monitoring group said advancing forces had linked up with the besieged troops at a garrison on the western edge of the city.Footage on Syrian state TV showed soldiers cheering near the garrison. State media said residents in government-held parts of the city were celebrating the advance.The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said a nearby military air base and three districts remained under siege by IS. Battles still raged around the city, the British-based war monitor said.Deir al-Zor governor Mohammed Ibrahim Samra told Reuters that government troops were also pushing toward the air base."The forces have begun to lift the siege," he said. "Our residents have been waiting for this moment ... forces are (trying to) break the siege on the military airport as well.""The coming days will see the clearing of Deir al-Zor city (of militants)" and advances on nearby countryside under Islamic State control, Samra added.Assad congratulated the troops in a statement from his office.The army and its allies made rapid advances in recent days pushing through Islamic State lines with the help of heavy artillery and Russian air strikes.A Russian warship in the Mediterranean sea fired cruise missiles at Islamic State positions near Deir al-Zor to boost the offensive, Russia's defense ministry said.-ISLAMIC STATE SQUEEZED-The city has been cut off from government-held Syria since 2013, after rebel groups rose up against Assad during the first flush of Syria's six-year war. Islamic State then overran rebel positions and encircled the army enclave and nearby air base in 2014.The United Nations said in August it estimated 93,000 civilians were living there in "extremely difficult" conditions. During the siege, high-altitude air drops have supplied them.Deir al-Zor lies southeast of Islamic State's former base in Raqqa.Hemmed in on all sides, Islamic State fighters have fallen back on footholds downstream of Deir al-Zor in towns near the Iraq border.The Deir al-Zor gains "form an important launching pad for expanding military operations in the area," the army said.For Damascus, the latest advance caps months of steady progress as the army and its allies turned from victories over rebels in western Syria to push east against Islamic State.The eastwards march has on occasion brought them into conflict with U.S.-backed forces.Still, the rival campaigns have mostly stayed out of each other's way, and the U.S.-led coalition has stressed it is not seeking war with Assad.In a statement on Sunday an alliance of Iran-backed Shi'ite militias allied to Damascus, including Lebanon's Hezbollah, accused Washington of trying to hinder the advance to Deir al-Zor.An official in the pro-Assad alliance said senior Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps commander Qassem Soleimani was closely monitoring fighting, a sign of Iran's close military involvement.(Reporting by Ellen Francis; Additional reporting by Laila Bassam in Beirut and Kinda Makieh in Damascus; Writing by John Davison; Editing by Andrew Roche and Toby Davis)
