90 CATHOLIC PRIESTS, SCHOLARS - STOP SAME SEX UNION BLESSINGS.

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)

 
90 CATHOLIC PRIESTS, SCHOLARS - STOP SAME SEX UNION BLESSINGS.


A FALSE PROPHET COMES FROM THE VATICAN ALSO AT THIS TIME.

ISAIAH 23:15-17
15  And it shall come to pass in that day, that Tyre shall be forgotten seventy years, according to the days of one king: after the end of seventy years shall Tyre sing as an harlot.
16  Take an harp, go about the city, thou harlot that hast been forgotten; make sweet melody, sing many songs, that thou mayest be remembered.
17  And it shall come to pass after the end of seventy years, that the LORD will visit Tyre, and she shall turn to her hire, and shall commit fornication with all the kingdoms of the world upon the face of the earth.(COULD THIS BE 70 YEARS AFTER ISRAEL BECAME A NATION IN 1948)(IF SO THIS SATANIC ONE WORLD WHORE CHURCH WILL MINGLE TOGETHER BY 2018)(AND NOW ISLAM AND CHRISTIANITY AND ALL RELIGIONS ARE MINGLING AS ONE PEACE-LOVE-JOY-GET ALONG RELIGION LEAD BY THE VATICAN RIGHT NOW 4 YEARS FROM THE 70 YEAR TIME WHEN ISRAEL BECAME A NATION).AND IN CONTROL OF JERUSALEM.

REVELATION 13:11-18
11 And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth;(FALSE VATICAN POPE) and he had two horns like a lamb,(JESUS IS THE LAMB OF GOD) and he spake as a dragon.(HES SATANICALLY INSPIRED,HES A CHRISTIAN DEFECTOR FROM THE FAITH)
12 And he exerciseth all the power of the first beast before him,(WORLD DICTATOR) and causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed.(THE WORLD DICTATOR CREATES A FALSE RESURRECTION AND IS CROWNED LEADER OF THE NEW WORLD ORDER).
13 And he doeth great wonders, so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men,
14 And deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast; saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live.
15 And he had power to give life unto the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak, and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed.
16 And he(FALSE POPE) causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:(CHIP IMPLANT)
17 And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.
18 Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.(6-6-6) A NUMBER SYSTEM

REVELATION 17:1-18
1 And there came one of the seven angels which had the seven vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come hither; I will shew unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters:
2 With whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication,(VATICAN IN POLITICS) and the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication.
3 So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns.
4 And the woman (FALSE CHURCH) was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour,(VATICAN COLOURS)(ANOTHER REASON WE KNOW THE FALSE POPE COMES FROM THE VATICAN) and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication:
5 And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.
6 And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration.
7 And the angel said unto me, Wherefore didst thou marvel? I will tell thee the mystery of the woman, and of the beast that carrieth her, which hath the seven heads and ten horns.
8 The beast that thou sawest was, and is not; and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit, and go into perdition: and they that dwell on the earth shall wonder, whose names were not written in the book of life from the foundation of the world, when they behold the beast that was, and is not, and yet is.
9 And here is the mind which hath wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains, on which the woman sitteth.(THE VATICAN IS BUILT ON 7 HILLS OR MOUNTAINS)
10 And there are seven kings: five are fallen,(1-ASSYRIA,2-EGYPT,3-BABYLON,4-MEDO-PERSIA,5-GREECE) and one is,(IN POWER IN JOHNS AND JESUS DAY-6-ROME) and the other is not yet come; and when he cometh, he must continue a short space.(7TH-REVIVED ROMAN EMPIRE OR THE EUROPEAN UNION TODAY AND THE SHORT SPACE IS-THE EUROPEAN UNION WILL HAVE WORLD CONTROL FOR THE LAST 3 1/2 YEARS.BUT WILL HAVE ITS MIGHTY WORLD POWER FOR THE FULL 7 YEARS OF THE 7 YEAR TRIBULATION PERIOD.AND THE WORLD DICTATOR WILL BE THE BEAST FROM THE EU.AND THE VATICAN POPE WILL BE THE WHORE THAT RIDES THE EUROPEAN UNION TO POWER.AND THE 2 EUROPEAN UNION POWER FREAKS WILL CONTROL AND DECIEVE THE WHOLE EARTH INTO THEIR DESTRUCTION.IF YOU ARE NOT SAVED BY THE BLOOD OF JESUS.YOU WILL BE DECIEVED BY THESE TWO.THE WORLD POLITICIAN-THE EUROPEAN UNION DICTATOR.AND THE FALSE PROPHET THAT DEFECTS CHRISTIANITY-THE FALSE VATICAN POPE.
11 And the beast that was, and is not, even he is the eighth, and is of the seven, and goeth into perdition.
12 And the ten horns which thou sawest are ten kings, which have received no kingdom as yet; but receive power as kings one hour with the beast.
13 These have one mind, and shall give their power and strength unto the beast.
14 These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them: for he is Lord of lords, and King of kings: and they that are with him are called, and chosen, and faithful.
15 And he saith unto me, The waters which thou sawest, where the whore sitteth, are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues.(VATICAN-CATHOLICS ALL AROUND THE WORLD OVER 1 BILLION)
16 And the ten horns which thou sawest upon the beast,(WORLD DICTATOR) these shall hate the whore, and shall make her desolate and naked, and shall eat her flesh, and burn her with fire.
17 For God hath put in their hearts to fulfil his will, and to agree, and give their kingdom unto the beast, until the words of God shall be fulfilled.
18 And the woman which thou sawest is that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the earth.

END SAME SEX UNIONS.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gvcm38060NQ&list=PL91feG5gFxM-BWVlE28PXVCgTTKnOWjP2&index=1

Catholics Across the World Commemorate Good Friday-By Matthew Norman March 29, 2024

Now that Good Friday is upon us, it is useful to understand what this day and the rest of the Easter holiday means to Catholics, who see the day as a time for fasting and mourning.Good Friday and Easter Sunday reminds people of Jesus’ journey to the cross, and ultimately, his death, burial, and the perils of evil defeating good. It is also emblematic of good triumphing once again with the resurrection of Christ.The twelve gospels are read on Holy Thursday evening while five are read on Good Friday morning. These narrate the tragic events from the Evangelists’ point of view.Good Friday is a reminder for the faithful of Christ’s betrayal and subsequent arrest, his interrogation and humiliation, his death sentence ordered by the high priests and Pilate, and Peter’s denial and repentance. It also recounts Christ’s road to calvary, as well as his crucifixion, death, burial, and the closing of his tomb.Jesus was crucified at nine o’clock in the morning, and his unfathomable pain allegedly lasted for six hours until three in the afternoon, when he died, saying: “It is finished.” At sunset, Joseph of Arimathea and Nicodemus, two of Christ’s secret disciples, removed his body from the cross and buried him in a rock-covered tomb.Pope Francis presided over the liturgy of the Passion and Death of Our Lord Jesus Christ in St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican on Good Friday afternoon. Good Friday is the only day of the year on which there is no Holy Mass.The Church celebrates the Solemn Liturgy of the Passion of the Lord, consisting of three parts. These include the Liturgy of the Word, culminating in the chanting of the Passion according to St. John; the Adoration of the Cross; and reception of Holy Communion.HIGHLIGHTS | On Good Friday, Pope Francis presided over the Celebration of the Lord's Passion in St. Peter's Basilica, one of the most beautiful liturgical traditions of the Catholic Church #HolyWeek2024 pic.twitter.com/LxX4XYZjoR— EWTN Vatican (@EWTNVatican) March 29, 2024-After the proclamation of the Passion, Cardinal Raniero Cantalamessa, the Preacher of the Pontifical Household, delivered the homily, taking as his starting point the passage: “When you lift up the Son of Man, then you will realize that I Am” (Jn 8:28).Another part of Easter Weekend at the Vatican is the Urbi et orbi blessing, which is a cherished tradition in the city, where the Pope delivers his blessing to the city of Rome and the entire world, from the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica.This blessing is said to symbolize the universal reach of the Catholic Church and the message of hope and peace during Easter.An Easter Vigil is also held at the Vatican on Saturday evening. This includes lighting the Paschal candle, readings from scripture, and the celebration of the Eucharist. This ceremony marks the anticipation of Easter Sunday and the resurrection of Christ.Vatican Easter Mass usually takes place on the morning of Easter Sunday, and this year it will begin at 9:30 AM.Alongside these activities, during Easter week, more generally, the Pope holds special papal audiences in the Vatican. Pilgrims and visitors gather in St. Peter’s Square to receive blessings and teachings from the Pope.Catholic Good Friday in Jerusalem-Even amid the tumult of the current war in Gaza, the timeless tradition of the humble observance of Good Friday by Christian Catholic pilgrims and clergy members unfolds in Jerusalem’s Old City.Christians in Jerusalem mark Good Friday with procession through Old City-Thousands solemnly cross the Via Dolorosa and head towards the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, some carrying wooden crosses, while echoing chants and hymns reverberate in the background. This commemorates the sufferings of Christ in a ritual aligned with the Catholic calendar.The Via Dolorosa, a religious route within Jerusalem’s Old City, is said to mark Jesus’ journey to the cross after judgement by Pontius Pilate. While the accuracy or authenticity of its historical location is debated, it remains extremely significant as an ancient tradition.Christians marked this year’s Good Friday in the Old City of Jerusalem, where they followed the path which they believe was walked by Jesus Christ as he carried his cross, known as the Via Crucis. pic.twitter.com/dWBCwSZGAX— VOA Africa (@VOAAfrica) March 29, 2024-According to the Catholic calendar, Holy Week began this year on Palm Sunday, March 24th and will run until Easter Sunday, March 31st, with Good Friday being celebrated today. The Orthodox Church, which utilizes the old Julian calendar, observes Holy Friday (Good Friday) on May 3rd with Easter falling on Sunday, May 5th.Philippines: Catholic devotees nailed to crosses to re-enact crucifixion-In the Philippines, Catholic devotees were nailed to crosses amidst sweltering heat north of the capital, Manila, on Good Friday, in a re-enactment of Jesus Christ’s crucifixion. Approximately 20,000 Filipino and foreign tourists gathered in San Pedro Cutud village in Pampanga province to witness this annual display of devotion, which the Roman Catholic Church in the Philippines disapproves of.Actors, dressed as Roman soldiers, whipped devotees who carried crosses and hammered three-inch nails through the hands and feet of three individuals. These crucifixions represented the most extreme displays of faith in the Philippines, a country where about 80% of its more than 110 million people identify as Roman Catholics.Filipino Catholics reenact crucifixion of Jesus in Good Friday tradition

90 Catholic priests, scholars ask Church leaders to oppose same-sex blessings-By Tyler Arnold-Washington, D.C. Newsroom, Feb 6, 2024 / 17:00 pm

A group of 90 Catholic priests, scholars, and authors are asking bishops and cardinals to reject a Vatican declaration that approved the pastoral, nonliturgical blessings of same-sex couples and to refuse to implement it within their dioceses.The coalition signed a “Filial Appeal” addressed to the leaders of the Church, which asks them to forbid any blessings of same-sex couples within their jurisdictions and to directly ask Pope Francis to withdraw the document. The signatories claim that the declaration Fiducia Supplicans contradicts “both Scripture and the universal and uninterrupted Tradition of the Church” and “produces a serious scandal.”“It is definitely not justifiable, especially for a cardinal or a bishop, to remain silent, since the scandal that has already occurred is serious and public, and if it is not stopped, it is bound to be more and more amplified,” the letter reads. “The threat does not become smaller but more serious, since the error comes from the Roman See and is destined to scandalize all the faithful.”The Vatican has justified the declaration by emphasizing a distinction between liturgical blessings, which are not available to same-sex couples, and pastoral blessings, which are now allowed. The scholars in the letter are contesting the legitimacy of this distinction as a means of justifying the blessings. Globally, bishops have been divided on how to implement the declaration or whether to implement it at all. What does Fiducia Supplicans say? The Vatican declaration, which was published by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith on Dec. 18, 2023, emphasizes a distinction between “liturgical” and “pastoral” blessings.Liturgical blessings, the declaration asserts, are not permitted for same-sex couples, because such a blessing “requires that what is blessed be conformed to God’s will.” The Church does not have the power to confer such blessings on same-sex couples because it would “offer a form of moral legitimacy to a union that presumes to be a marriage or to an extra-marital sexual practice,” the declaration states.However, the declaration claims that pastoral blessings are different. It states that pastoral blessings “are meant for everyone” and “no one is to be excluded from them.” It states that priests can provide pastoral blessings for same-sex couples “without officially validating their status or changing in any way the Church’s perennial teaching on marriage.” Such blessings, it adds, cannot “be performed with any clothing, gestures, or words that are proper to a wedding.” “Rites and prayers that could create confusion between what constitutes marriage — which is the ‘exclusive, stable, and indissoluble union between a man and a woman, naturally open to the generation of children’ — and what contradicts it are inadmissible,” the document reads.hy do these scholars oppose the declaration? The scholars voicing objections to Fiducia Supplicans say in their letter that the attempt to create a distinction between liturgical and pastoral blessings is “impossible.” Pastoral care, they argue “always presupposes a theory and … if pastoral care performs something that does not correspond to the doctrine, what is actually being proposed is a different doctrine.”Regardless of whether the blessing is liturgical or pastoral, the letter claims that a blessing has an “immediate communicative effect … [that] always implies an approval of what is being blessed” even if the declaration claims that is not the intent. It argues that the declaration has already been interpreted as approval “by those few episcopates and prelates that for decades have been openly advocating a change in the doctrine on sexual morality” and by much of the public. “In practice, the faithful will not even be aware of the subtle theoretical justifications introduced by the declaration…,” the filial appeal continues. “The message that is effectively launched, and that the people of God, and the entire world, will inevitably register and are already registering is that: The Catholic Church has finally evolved, and now accepts homosexual unions, and, more generally, extramarital unions.”They add that the traditional doctrines on sexual morality “must be considered infallible” and that “this is a doctrine of the natural law, which does not allow for any change.”“In this difficult moment, a clear word of truth would be the best example of your faithful and courageous dedication to the people of God entrusted to you, a sign of fidelity to the true mission of the papacy and at the same time the best help for the pope himself, an eloquent ‘fraternal correction,’ which he urgently needs in this last and most critical period of his pontificate and probably of his life,” the signatories implore the bishops and cardinals. Who has signed the document so far? The 90 signatories include Catholic priests, scholars, and authors from across North America, South America, Africa, Europe, and Australia. The group aims to increase the number of signatories by a Feb. 15 deadline and intends to publish a larger, more comprehensive list by Feb. 17.Among the signatories are Thomas Ward, president of the John Paul II Academy on Human Life and the Family; Dr. Michael Pakaluk, professor of ethics and social philosophy at the Catholic University of America and Father Robert Sirico, president of the St. John Henry Newman Institute and founder of the Acton Institute.Other signatories include German sociologist and author Gabriele Kuby, Dr. César Félix Sánchez Martínez, professor of philosophy at the Universidad Nacional de San Agustín, Perú; The Cornerstone Forum President Gil Bailie and Father Gerald Murray, pastor of the Church of the Holy Family in New York City.The letter has been published in several languages, including English, Spanish, Italian, French, and German. How has the Vatican responded to the controversy? Bishops around the world have taken a variety of different approaches to the declaration. In some cases, bishops have taken a broad view of the declaration, and in others, they have taken a very narrow view. Some bishops, including numerous bishops’ conferences, have refused to implement it.Cardinal Victor Manuel Fernández, prefect of the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, responded to some of the backlash in a five-page press release on Jan. 5. “There is no room to distance ourselves doctrinally from this declaration or to consider it heretical, contrary to the Tradition of the Church or blasphemous,” Fernández said, noting the declaration’s language about marriage and sexual morality. “We can help God’s people to discover that these kinds of blessings are just simple pastoral channels that help people give expression to their faith, even if they are great sinners,” the cardinal added. “For this reason, in giving a blessing to two people who come together to ask for it spontaneously, we are not consecrating them nor are we congratulating them nor indeed are we approving that type of union.”

Pope formally allows priests to bless same-sex couples-World Dec 18, 2023 9:29 AM EDT

ROME (AP) — Pope Francis has formally approved allowing priests to bless same-sex couples, with a new document explaining a radical change in Vatican policy by insisting that people seeking God’s love and mercy shouldn’t be subject to “an exhaustive moral analysis” to receive it.The document from the Vatican’s doctrine office, released Monday, elaborates on a letter Francis sent to two conservative cardinals that was published in October. In that preliminary response, Francis suggested such blessings could be offered under some circumstances if they didn’t confuse the ritual with the sacrament of marriage.The new document repeats that rationale and elaborates on it, reaffirming that marriage is a lifelong sacrament between a man and a woman. And it stresses that blessings should not be conferred at the same time as a civil union or even with the clothing and gestures that belong in a wedding.But it says requests for such blessings should not be denied full stop. It offers an extensive definition of the term “blessing” in Scripture to insist that people seeking a transcendent relationship with God and looking for his love and mercy should not be subject to “an exhaustive moral analysis” as a precondition for receiving it.“Ultimately, a blessing offers people a means to increase their trust in God,” the document said. “The request for a blessing, thus, expresses and nurtures openness to the transcendence, mercy, and closeness to God in a thousand concrete circumstances of life, which is no small thing in the world in which we live.”He added: “It is a seed of the Holy Spirit that must be nurtured, not hindered.”

POPE FRANCIS GOES AGAINST TRUE CATHOLIC PRIESTS BUT ALLOWS SAME SEX UNIONS.THE POPE IS WELL ON HIS WAY TO BEING THE FALSE RELIGOUS LEADER OF REVELATION 13:11-18 AND REVELATION 17.

Pope Francis denounces ‘backward’ attitudes of conservatives in U.S. Catholic Church-World Aug 28, 2023 1:17 PM EDT

ROME (AP) — Pope Francis has blasted the “backwardness” of some conservatives in the U.S. Catholic Church, saying they have replaced faith with ideology and that a correct understanding of Catholic doctrine allows for change over time.Francis’ comments were an acknowledgment of the divisions in the U.S. Catholic Church, which has been split between progressives and conservatives who long found support in the doctrinaire papacies of St. John Paul II and Benedict XVI, particularly on issues of abortion and same-sex marriage.Many conservatives have blasted Francis’ emphasis instead on social justice issues such as the environment and the poor, while also branding as heretical his opening to letting divorced and civilly remarried Catholics receive the sacraments.Francis made the comments in a private meeting with Portuguese members of his Jesuit religious order while visiting Lisbon on Aug. 5; the Jesuit journal La Civilta Cattolica, which is vetted by the Vatican secretariat of state, published a transcript of the encounter Monday.During the meeting, a Portuguese Jesuit told Francis that he had suffered during a recent sabbatical year in the United States because he came across many Catholics, including some U.S. bishops, who criticized Francis’ 10-year papacy as well as today’s Jesuits.The 86-year-old Argentine acknowledged his point, saying there was “a very strong, organized, reactionary attitude” in the U.S. church, which he called “backward.” He warned that such an attitude leads to a climate of closure, which was erroneous.“Doing this, you lose the true tradition and you turn to ideologies to have support. In other words, ideologies replace faith,” he said.“The vision of the doctrine of the church as a monolith is wrong,” he added. “When you go backward, you make something closed off, disconnected from the roots of the church,” which then has devastating effects on morality.“I want to remind these people that backwardness is useless, and they must understand that there’s a correct evolution in the understanding of questions of faith and morals,” that allows for doctrine to progress and consolidate over time.Francis has previously acknowledged the criticism directed at him from some U.S. conservatives, once quipping that it was an “honor” to be attacked by Americans.

What we know about the Baltimore bridge collapse-A container ship lost power and rammed into a major bridge in Baltimore early Tuesday, causing it to snap and plunge into the river below. Several vehicles fell into the chilly waters, and rescuers are searching for survivors.By BEN FINLEY and JAMES POLLARD-March 29, 2024

A cargo ship rammed into Baltimore’s Francis Scott Key Bridge, causing the span to collapse and presumably killing six construction workers. On Wednesday, a day after the early-morning crash, officials with the National Transportation Safety Board boarded the ship and planned to recover information from its electronics and paperwork while divers searched for the bodies of workers who were still missing.Here’s what we know so far about the collapse:WHAT EXACTLY HAPPENED? The operators of the Dali cargo ship issued a mayday call moments before the crash early Tuesday saying the vessel had lost power. But the 985-foot-long (300-meter-long) ship still struck one of the 1.6-mile (2.6-kilometer) bridge’s supports at 8 knots, which is roughly 9 mph (15 kph). That caused the span to break and fall into the water within seconds.Eight construction workers were filling potholes on the bridge when the crash happened. Two were rescued soon after the collapse. Divers recovered the bodies of two others and the other four are presumed dead. Jeffrey Pritzker, executive vice president of Brawner Builders, said they were working in the middle of the span when it collapsed.An inspection of the Dali last June at a port in Chile identified a problem with the ship’s “propulsion and auxiliary machinery,” according to Equasis, a shipping information system. The deficiency involved gauges and thermometers, but the website’s online records didn’t elaborate.A “standard examination” conducted by the U.S. Coast Guard in New York in September didn’t identify any deficiencies, according to the Equasis data.Given the vessel’s massive weight, it struck the bridge support with significant force, said Roberto Leon, a Virginia Tech engineering professor. The post can resist the impact by bending, Leon said, but cannot absorb the energy brought by such a “humongous ship.”AP AUDIO: What we know about the Baltimore bridge collapse.At a news conference, NTSB Chair Jennifer Homendy says they will be looking at the bridge structure.Last June, federal inspectors rated the 47-year-old bridge in fair condition. But the structure did not appear to have pier protection to withstand the crash, experts said.“If a bridge pier without adequate protection is hit by a ship of this size, there is very little that the bridge could do,” Leon said.Federal and state investigators have said the crash appears to have been an accident.HOW MANY PEOPLE ARE MISSING? Two of the construction workers who were on the bridge were rescued. The bodies of four of the six others were still missing Thursday. Searchers recovered the bodies of 35-year-old Alejandro Hernandez Fuentes and 26-year-old Dorlian Ronial Castillo Cabrera on Wednesday. They were in a pickup truck submerged in about 25 feet (7.6 meters) of water.The workers came to the Maryland area from Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico, according to diplomats from those countries.One worker, 38-year-old Maynor Yassir Suazo Sandoval, came to the U.S. from Honduras nearly two decades ago. His brother described him as an entrepreneurial and hard-working husband and father of two. And El Salvador’s foreign minister, Alexandra Hill Tinoco, posted Wednesday on X that one Salvadoran citizen, Miguel Luna, was among the missing workers.The ship is owned by Singapore-based Grace Ocean Private Ltd., which said all crew members, including the two pilots, were accounted for and there were no reports of injuries.The ship’s warning enabled authorities to limit vehicle traffic on the span. Plus, the accident occurred at 1:30 a.m., long before the busy morning rush. The bridge carried an estimated 30,800 vehicles per day on average in 2019.WHAT IMPACT COULD THIS HAVE? The collapse will almost surely create a logistical nightmare, shutting down ship traffic at the Port of Baltimore and snarling cargo and commuter traffic.The port is a major East Coast hub for shipping. The bridge spans the Patapsco River, which massive cargo ships use to reach the Chesapeake Bay and then the Atlantic Ocean.The Dali was headed from Baltimore to Colombo, Sri Lanka, and flying under a Singapore flag, according to data from Marine Traffic.President Joe Biden said he expects the federal government to pick up the entire rebuilding cost. His administration approved $60 million in emergency federal aid to pay for debris removal and other initial costs.“This work is not going to take hours. This work is not going to take days. This work is not going to take weeks. We have a very long road ahead of us,” Maryland Gov. Wes Moore said Thursday.The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and a commercial salvage company have been surveying the site as they plan the salvage operation, according to U.S. Coast Guard Chief Petty Officer Cynthia Oldham.Coast Guard Rear Admiral Shannon Gilreath said Friday that the first goals are to reopen the shipping channel and remove the ship. The Maryland Department of Transportation and U.S. Coast Guard surveyed the damage Friday morning. Teams worked through high winds while determining how to safely cut the vessel — which weighs between 3,000 to 4,000 tons — into lighter sections that can be removed by four heavy lift cranes supplied by the U.S. Navy, according to Moore.In the coming weeks, the governor hopes to have 10 tugboats, seven floating cranes, nine barges, eight salvage vessels and five Coast Guard boats in the water.The collapse is not likely to have a big effect on worldwide trade because Baltimore is not a major port for container vessels, and proves more important when it comes to goods such as farm equipment and autos, said Judah Levine, head of research for global freight booking platform Freightos.But jobs for roughly 2,400 members of the International Longshoremen’s Association Local 333 could dry up until shipping traffic resumes, according to Scott Cowan, the union’s president. Cowan said union leaders are working with elected officials to fund compensation for longshoremen in the meantime.Authorities must also now handle a sheen in the water after some of the 56 containers onboard that were carrying hazardous materials were breached. Among the hazardous materials were corrosives, flammables and lithium ion batteries, according to the National Transportation Safety Board. But the Key Bridge Joint Information Center said Thursday that there’s no immediate environmental threat and that air monitoring has shown no volatile organic compounds. Adam Ortiz, the EPA’s regional administrator in the Mid-Atlantic states, said Friday that ongoing monitoring has not given any indication that the water contains materials hazardous to humans.HOW OFTEN DOES THIS HAPPEN? From 1960 to 2015, there were 35 major bridge collapses worldwide due to ship or barge collisions, with a total of 342 people killed, according to a 2018 report from the World Association for Waterborne Transport Infrastructure.Eighteen of those collapses happened in the United States.Among them were a 2002 incident in which a barge struck the Interstate 40 bridge over the Arkansas River at Webbers Falls, Oklahoma, sending vehicles plunging into the water. Fourteen people died and 11 were injured.And in 2001, a tugboat and barge struck the Queen Isabella Causeway in Port Isabel, Texas, causing a section of the bridge to tumble 80 feet (24 meters) into the bay below. Eight people were killed.___Lea Skene, Brian Witte and Sarah Brumfield contributed reporting. This story was updated to correct that there were more than 56 containers on the ship, but that 56 contained hazardous materials.

COUNTRIES WITH ISRAEL AND THE ENEMIES OF ISRAEL AND THE WEST

EZEKIEL 38:10-19
10 Thus saith the Lord GOD; It shall also come to pass, that at the same time shall things come into thy mind, and thou shalt think an evil thought:
11 And thou shalt say,(RUSSIA,ARAB,MUSLIMS) I will go up to the land of unwalled villages; I will go to them that are at rest, that dwell safely, all of them dwelling without walls, and having neither bars nor gates,
12 To take a spoil, and to take a prey; to turn thine hand upon the desolate places that are now inhabited, and upon the people that are gathered out of the nations, which have gotten cattle and goods, that dwell in the midst of the land.
13 Sheba, and Dedan,(SAUDIA ARABIA)(JORDAN) and the merchants of Tarshish,(ENGLAND) with all the young lions thereof,(USA,CANADA,AUSTRALIA,NEW ZEALAND,EU,ENGLAND,ENGLISH SPEAKING shall say unto thee, Art thou come to take a spoil? hast thou gathered thy company to take a prey? to carry away silver and gold, to take away cattle and goods, to take a great spoil?
14 Therefore, son of man, prophesy and say unto Gog, Thus saith the Lord GOD; In that day when my people of Israel dwelleth safely, shalt thou not know it?
PSALMS 83:3-7 (COUNTRIES AGAINST ISRAEL)(EXCEPT JORDAN)
3 They (ARABS,MUSLIMS) have taken crafty counsel against thy people,(ISRAEL) and consulted against thy hidden ones.
4 They have said, Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation; that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance.
5 For they (MUSLIMS) have consulted together with one consent: they are confederate against thee:(TREATIES)
6 The tabernacles of Edom,(JORDAN) and the Ishmaelites;(ARABS) of Moab, PALESTINIANS,JORDAN) and the Hagarenes;(EGYPT)
7 Gebal,(HEZZBALLOH,LEBANON) and Ammon,(JORDAN) and Amalek;(SYRIA,ARABS,SINAI) the Philistines (PALESTINIANS) with the inhabitants of Tyre;(LEBANON)
ISRAEL-WEST ENEMIES EZEK 38:4-6,15-19
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)
15 And thou shalt come from thy place out of the north parts,(RUSSIA-ARAB/MUSLIMS) thou, and many people with thee,(AFRICAN ISLAMIC COUNTRIES) all of them riding upon horses, a great company, and a mighty army:
16 And thou shalt come up against my people of Israel, as a cloud to cover the land; it shall be in the latter days, and I will bring thee against my land, that the heathen may know me, when I shall be sanctified in thee, O Gog, before their eyes.
17 Thus saith the Lord GOD; Art thou he of whom I have spoken in old time by my servants the prophets of Israel, which prophesied in those days many years that I would bring thee against them?
18 And it shall come to pass at the same time when Gog shall come against the land of Israel, saith the Lord GOD, that my fury shall come up in my face.
19 For in my jealousy and in the fire of my wrath have I spoken, Surely in that day there shall be a great shaking in the land of Israel;
DANIEL 11:44 (CHINA WITH RUSSIA-MUSLIMS)
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)
EZEKIEL 39:1-6 ISRAELS ENEMIES DESTROYED
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.

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.

JOEL 3:2 (WW3 OCCURS WHEN JERUSALEM IS DIVIDED)
2 I will also gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat, and will plead with them there for my people (ISRAEL) and for my heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and parted my land.(JERUSALEM)(WW3 STARTS BECAUSE JERUSALEM IS DIVIDED AND ISRAELIS UPROOTED FROM THEIR GOD GIVIN LAND BRINGS 3 DEAD BILLION IN WW3)

JUDE 14-16
14 And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints,
15 To execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hard speeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.
16 These are murmurers, complainers, walking after their own lusts; and their mouth speaketh great swelling words, having men's persons in admiration because of advantage.

WATCH THIS VIDEO-1/4 OF ISLAM MIGHT BE GONE BY MAY 2024
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZ7wh6BMTlw
THIS VIDEO COULD BE A SIGN BEING IT IS RADAM IN COCKROCH LANDS. WHILE IN THIS VIDEO A CROW TAKES AN ISRAEL FLAG OFF THE FLAG POLE. REPRESENTING THE MUSLIM COCKROACHES WANT ISRAEL OFF THE FACE OF THE EARTH. THEN ON THE VIDEO WE SEE THE CROWS TEARING UP THE ISRAELI FLAG. TO ME THIS SAYS BY MAY 2024. THESE MUSLIM COCHROACH HORDES WILL BE COMING AGAINST ISRAEL. AND ISRAE‎L WILL NUKE 1/4 OF ISLAM. THE 500 MILLION MIGRATING BIRDS WILL EAT THE MUSLIM COCKROACHES FLESH. AND THE 300 MILLION DEAD MUSLIMS WILL BE BURIED IN MASS GRAVES IN THE JORDAN VALLEY.   

DANIEL CHAPTER 9:24-27 EXPLAINED.
24 Seventy weeks (70X7=490 YEARS) are determined upon thy people (ISRAEL) and upon thy holy city,(JERUSALEM) to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins, and to make reconciliation for iniquity, and to bring in everlasting righteousness, and to seal up the vision and prophecy, and to anoint the most Holy.(JESUS ANNOINTED WITH HOLY OIL AS KING OF JERUSALEM FOREVER).
25 Know therefore and understand, that from the going forth of the commandment to restore and to build Jerusalem unto the Messiah the Prince shall be seven weeks, (7X7=49 YEARS) and threescore and two weeks:(62X7=434 YEARS) the street shall be built again, and the wall, even in troublous times.(490-49-434=7 YR PERIOD WERE GOD DEALS WITH ISRAEL AND JERUSALEM (NOT THE CHURCH-THE TRUE CHURCH IS IS IN HEAVEN WITH JESUS FOR THAT LAST 7 YEAR PERIOD.)(DANIEL 9:26-27 IS IN THE FUTURE WHEN GOD DEALS ON EARTH WITH ISRAEL AND JERUSALEM FOR THAT FINAL 7 TEAR PERIOD. WHEN ALL OF ISRAEL WILL BE SAVED BY MESSIAH JESUS.)(AT THE END OF IT)
26 And after threescore and two weeks (69X7=483 YEARS)(ONE 7 YEAR PERIOD UNTIL PROPHECY IS FULFILLED) shall Messiah be cut off, but not for himself: and the people of the prince (ROMANS) that shall come shall destroy the city and the sanctuary;(2ND TEMPLE AND JERUSALEM) and the end thereof shall be with a flood, and unto the end of the war desolations are determined.(NOW THE FINAL ISRAEL-JERUSALEM COUNTDOWN FOR MESSIAH JESUS RETURN THE LAST 7 YEARS)
27 And he (HE WHO? HE HERE IS THE REVIVED ROMAN EMPIRE LEADER THAT MAKES THE FINAL 7 YR CONTRACT WITH ISRAEL AND MANY MUSLIM COUNTRIES FOR A 7 YR PERIOD, AND THE EU WILL GUARENTEE ISRAELS SECURITY FOR THIS LAST PERIOD) shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: (7 YEARS) and in the midst of the week (3 1/2 YEARS IN) he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, (THIS FALSE MESSIAH OR ROMAN LEADER STOPS THE ANIMAL SACRIFICES IN THE 3RD TEMPLE AT THE MIDPOINT OF THE 7 YR DEAL. A JEW MURDERS HIM WITH A SWORD WOUND AND HE HAS A FALSE RESSURECTION-SATAN INCARNATES IN HIS BODY. AND BRINGS HIM BACK TO LIFE.AND HE THEN SITS IN THE 3RD TEMPLE CALLING HIMSELF GOD AS THE WORLD SAYS HES JESUS REINCARNATED. AND BY THIS FALSE RESURRECTION GOD SENDS THIS STRONG DELUTION ON THE EARTH THAT ALL THE LOST WILL WORSHIP THIS ROMAN LEADER AS GOD AND ACCEPT HIS NAME, NUMBER OR NUMBER OF HIS NAME IN THEIR MICROCHIP IMPLANT. THAT THEY MIGHT BE DOOMED, DAMNED TO THE LAKE OF FIRE FOREVER. WHO WORSHIPS THIS ROMAN LEADER AS GOD.) and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate.(WARS NON STOP DURING THE LAST 3 1/2 YEARS OF THE 7 YEAR PERIOD.

Heres the scripture 1 week = 7 yrs Genesis 29:27-28 (FROM DAN 9:27)
27 Fulfil her week,(7 YEARS) and we will give thee this also for the service which thou shalt serve with me yet seven other years.
28 And Jacob did so, and fulfilled her week:(7 YEARS) and he gave him Rachel his daughter to wife also.

1 THESSALONIANS 5:3
3 For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, (NUKE WARS BREAK OUT) as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape.
 
ISAIAH 33:8
8  The highways lie waste, the wayfaring man ceaseth: he hath broken the covenant,(7 YR TREATY) he hath despised the cities, he regardeth no man.(THE WORLD LEADER-WAR MONGER CALLS HIMSELF GOD)(1 LAST AND WORST HOLOCAUST IN HISTORY AGAINST ISRAEL BY THIS ROMAN LEADER.AFTER THIS LEADER STOPS THE ANIMAL SACRIFICES.A JEW KILLS HIM.HES RESURRECTED TO LIFE AND INCARNATED BY SATAN HIMSELF. AND SINCE SATAN HATES ISRAEL-NOW THAT HES POSSESSING THE ROMAN LEADERS BODY. HE FIRST POLLUTES THE 3RD TEMPLE BY SITTING IN THE 3RD TEMPLE CALLING HIMSELF GOD.HE THEN GOES AFTER ISRAELIS TO KILL EVERY ONE ON EARTH OF THEM.THE  FALSE MESSIAHS MASK IS OFF. AND THE ISRAELIS ARE FLOWN TO PETRA IN JORDAN WERE THEY WILL BE PROTECTED BY GOD FOR THE LAST 3 1/2 YEARS OF THE TRIBULATION PERIOD.BUT THERE WILL STILL BE LOTS OF ISRAELIS IN ISRAEL YET. GOD MUST JUST PROTECT THE SAVED ISRAELIS IN PETRA JORDAN.

7 WORLD EMPIRES IN WORLD HISTORY.

1-Egyptian (3000 BC – 858 BC)-Defeated by Assyrian invasion and succeeded by them.
2-Assyrian (858 BC – 612 BC)-Nineveh destroyed by Medes and Babylonians in 612 BC then defeated by Babylonians.
3-Babylonian (605 BC – 539 BC)-Begun by Nebuchadnezzar, ended by Medes and Persians.
4-Media-Persian (539 BC – 532 BC)-Together with Medes destroyed Babylon.Established by Cyrus the Great.Ended by defeat at hands of Alexander.
5-Grecian (331 – 31 BC)-Alexander defeated the Persians and established Greek world rule.   Ended by Roman.
6-Roman (31 BC through New Testament period with “ Holy Roman Empire.”Fell to Germanic invasion.(DIED FROM INTERNAL CORRUPTION).
7-Revived Roman Empire (1957, the Treaty of Rome-(REVIVED ROME TREATY-JESUS RETURNS) is a matter of end-time prophecy.JESUS DESTROYS AND RULES FROM JERUSALEM FOR 1,000 YEARS.THEN FOREVER.

Israel kills top Hezbollah rocket commander in Lebanon; 5 others slain in Syria-IDF strikes terror group’s facilities across southern Lebanon, as sirens sound in northern Israel amid repeated attacks-By Emanuel Fabian-Today, 11:40 pm-MAR 29,24

The Israel Defense Forces said it eliminated the deputy commander of Hezbollah’s rocket unit in a drone strike in southern Lebanon Friday morning, amid a series of attacks against the Lebanese terror group north of Israel’s border.The senior Hezbollah commander, Ali Naim, was struck while in a car in the town of Bazouriye, close to Tyre.According to the IDF, Naim was “considered to be a significant source of knowledge in the terror group, and leader in the field of rockets.”“He was also one of the leaders for heavy-warhead rocket fire and responsible for conducting and planning attacks against Israeli civilians,” the IDF added.Hezbollah confirmed Naim’s death but did not refer to him as a commander.The IDF released footage of the strike.Speaking following an assessment at the IDF Northern Command in Safed, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said he observed the strike on Naim.Hinting at Israel’s alleged overnight airstrike in Syria, in which 38 people were killed including five Hezbollah operatives and members of the Syrian army, Gallant said the military will “expand the campaign [against Hezbollah] and increase the rate of attacks in the north.Huge #Israel airstrikes in #Aleppo earlier tonight — targeted multiple #IRGC & #Assad regime weapons depots near the airport, Al-Safira & more.Sources claim 30+ dead.pic.twitter. com/eYpDYXZfqp— Charles Lister (@Charles_Lister) March 29, 2024-“Israel is turning from defending to pursuing Hezbollah, we will reach wherever the organization operates, in Beirut, Damascus, and in more distant places.”Gallant added, “The one responsible for the serious damage in Lebanon is Hezbollah and the one responsible for the many casualties in the Hezbollah group is [Hassan] Nasrallah personally. They have over 320 terrorists killed, and we will exact a price for any action that comes out of Lebanon.”Defense Minister Yoav Gallant visits the IDF Northern Command HQ in Safed, March 29, 2024. (Shachar Yurman/Defense Ministry)The official tally of Hezbollah members killed since hostilities between the sides escalated on October 8 was brought up to 264 following the strikes on Friday. Gallant’s tally of 320 seemingly included terrorists from other organizations north of Israel.Besides Naim, from the town of Selaa, Hezbollah said that its members killed in Syria were Ahmed Shehimi from Markaba; Mustafa Makki from Tebnine; Ibrahim al-Zein from Chehour; Ali al-Haf from Halloussiyeh; and Mustafa Nassif from Haffir.Another member named by Hezbollah, Ali Baka from Sidon, was killed in a separate strike in southern Lebanon.Also Friday, the IDF said it carried out an airstrike on a Hezbollah rocket launcher in southern Lebanon, minutes after the terror group used it to fire projectiles at the Biranit army base.According to a statement from the military, fighter jets later struck a Hezbollah “military building” adjacent to the launch site in the town of Ayta ash-Shaab.The IDF said fighter jets also struck a “military facility” in Mays al-Jabal where a Hezbollah operative was spotted.The IDF added that several more Hezbollah sites, including additional buildings, were targeted in Chebaa on Friday, and an observation post in Yaroun was hit late Thursday. Hezbollah appeared to have retaliated against Israel, as rocket warning sirens were activated in several towns in the Western Galilee, close to the Lebanese border, throughout Friday.Sirens also sounded twice in the northern city of Kiryat Shmona, with the IDF saying the first was due to an interceptor missile being fired at a “suspicious aerial target” that entered Israeli airspace from Lebanon. The IDF said the target was successfully downed, and the alarms were activated due to fears of falling shrapnel.The second set of sirens in Kiryat Shmona were false alarms, the IDF said.Since October 8, Hezbollah-led forces have attacked Israeli communities and military posts along the border on a near-daily basis, with the group saying it is doing so to support Gaza amid the war there.So far, the skirmishes on the border have resulted in eight civilian deaths on the Israeli side, as well as the deaths of ten IDF soldiers and reservists. There have also been several attacks from Syria, without any injuries.Of the 264 members Hezbollah says were killed by Israel during the ongoing skirmishes, most died in Lebanon, but some also in Syria. In Lebanon, another 50 operatives from other terror groups, a Lebanese soldier, and at least 60 civilians, three of whom were journalists, have been killed.The hostilities began as part of the regional turmoil which began on October 7 when Hamas terrorists infiltrated Israel from Gaza, killing nearly 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapping 253.Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.

ge would allow US to fund projects directly benefiting PA-PA in final stages of talks with US to reform ‘pay-to-slay’ policy – sources-One of the hold-ups has been receiving approval from Israel, which is viewed as critical for getting Congress on board; source fears initial leak of story may torpedo negotiations-By Jacob Magid-Today, 11:33 pm-MAR 29,24

The Palestinian Authority is in the final stages of talks with the Biden administration about reforming its controversial welfare policy, which includes payments to terrorists and their families, two sources familiar with the matter told The Times of Israel on Friday.Drafts of the policy have been vetted by the administration’s lawyers and the reform was on track to be announced in the coming weeks, one of the sources said, confirming reporting in Politico.The altered policy would base welfare stipends that Palestinian security prisoners receive on the recipient’s financial need rather than the length of their sentence, as is currently the case, the source told The Times of Israel, adding that there were a number of outstanding issues still being negotiated.The White House has sought for months — well before the outbreak of the war in Gaza — to receive a nod of approval from Israel, worried that its rejection could lead pro-Israel lawmakers in Congress to follow suit, thereby hampering the reform’s legitimacy in Washington, the source said. They indicated that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office has been dragging its feet on the matter, even as the premier regularly cites the controversial policy to argue that the PA cannot be trusted.The effort to coax the PA into implementing the reform was held tightly under wraps for the first three-plus years of the Biden administration, with only a small handful of people involved. But as progress was made in recent weeks and months, the circle of involvement had to be expanded, a second source familiar with the matter said, lamenting that Friday’s leak may well lead to the reform being scuttled entirely, as Ramallah didn’t want it to go public until the initiative was finalized.The practice of paying allowances to those convicted of carrying out terror attacks and to the families of those killed while carrying out attacks — often referred to by some Israeli officials as a pay-to-slay policy — has been pilloried by critics as incentivizing terror.Palestinian leaders have long defended the payments, describing them as a form of social welfare and necessary compensation for victims of Israel’s callous military justice system in the West Bank.The PA initially sought to leverage its willingness to reform the policy in order to secure gestures from Washington, such as the scrapping of congressional legislation from 1987 that labeled the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) “and its affiliates” a terror group.But Ramallah has long grown disillusioned by the Biden administration, which has failed to keep election promises to re-open missions for the Palestinians in Jerusalem and Washington and had decided to move forward with the reform without any assurance of gestures from the US in return, a Palestinian source familiar with the matter said.The source acknowledged that the reform would be domestically unpopular, given the widespread solidarity with those imprisoned for confronting Israel’s military rule in the West Bank. However, they noted that the PA is already historically unpopular, and had the move been done at the right time, it had the potential of passing without major pushback, while granting Ramallah a much-needed jolt of international legitimacy as it seeks to return to governing Gaza after the war.Reforming the welfare policy is designed to bring the PA into compliance with the 2018 congressional legislation known as the Taylor Force Act, which suspended US aid to the PA as long as it continued granting prisoners stipends based on time served.The US would still be barred from directly funding the PA due to legislation preventing such aid once Ramallah began advancing investigations against Israel in the International Criminal Court. However, if the reform is deemed sufficient enough to place the PA in compliance with the Taylor Force Act, the US would be able to fund projects that directly benefit the PA.Since entering office, US President Joe Biden has been largely limited to funding humanitarian projects in the West Bank and Gaza through the US Agency for International Development and donations to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees UNRWA — though this too was barred following allegations that staffers participated in Hamas’s October 7 onslaught.Israel also passed legislation similar to the Taylor Force Act that could be scrapped if Jerusalem deems the PA’s reforms as credible.Both the US and Israel will likely require a pilot period to test the reform’s implementation before they reach determinations regarding Ramallah’s compliance.The welfare policy reform could also make it easier for the US to re-open the PLO diplomatic office in Washington, which was shuttered during the Trump administration. However, obstacles remain given the PLO’s ties to the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a US-recognized terror organization.As for the US consulate in Jerusalem, which former president Donald Trump also closed down, the Biden administration has been unable to make due on its promise to reopen the mission, citing a lack of cooperation from Israel, which views the move as an encroachment of its sovereignty in the capital city.Pulling off the reform would be a major diplomatic achievement for Biden, succeeding in an endeavor previous administrations couldn’t pull off.It would also bolster his vision for post-war Gaza, which includes a reformed PA returning to govern the enclave as part of a pathway to a two-state solution with Israel.The US has a long list of areas in which it would like to see Palestinian reforms, but some international stakeholders place the welfare payments at the top of their lists.

For third straight week, Ramadan prayers at Temple Mount pass without incident-Waqf says 125,000 participated in al-Aqsa compound; Foreign Ministry places that number at just 50,000; police arrest 11 in Old City for alleged chants of incitement-By ToI Staff and AP Today, 8:17 pm-MAR 29,24

Afternoon prayers on the third Friday of Ramadan ended at the Al-Aqsa Mosque atop the Jerusalem Old City Temple Mount, with the Israel Police reporting they passed without incident.The Islamic Waqf, which administers the mosque compound, said 125,000 people took part in the prayers, slightly up from last week. But police put turnout in the tens of thousands and the Foreign Ministry said  “over 50,000” attended.Along with the Ramadan prayers, hundreds of Christians participated in a customary Good Friday procession through the limestone walls of the Old City, commemorating one of the faith’s most sacred days with noticeably thinner crowds amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas war.Police say they arrested 11 people in the Old City throughout the day, including several suspects for chants of “incitement and support for terrorism” following morning prayers at the Temple Mount.Nevertheless, this marked the third consecutive Friday of the Muslim holy month during which mass prayers took place largely peacefully, despite fears of disturbances after the Hamas terror group had called on Palestinian worshipers to barricade themselves inside the Al-Aqsa Mosque.At the beginning of the holy month, Hamas called on followers to “participate urgently in defending Al-Aqsa Mosque against the aggression that lurks in these critical times.”In past years during Ramadan, Palestinians have at times barricaded themselves inside the Al-Aqsa Mosque, some with explosives and rocks. Police operations to clear them out have often resulted in violence.This year’s Ramadan came amid tinderbox tensions stemming from the ongoing war against Hamas in Gaza, triggered by the group’s shock October 7 attack, when thousands of terrorists rampaged through southern Israel, killing some 1,200 people and taking 253 hostages.More than 32,000 Palestinians have been killed in the ensuing Gaza war launched by Israel, according to Hamas, which does not differentiate between civilians and combatants. At least 13,000 of those killed have been fighters, Israel says.Police officers scuffled with some attendees at the Temple Mount entrance on the first night of Ramadan, but the holy site has been relatively peaceful since.Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu pledged ahead of Ramadan that the number of worshipers allowed to pray on the Temple Mount would be the same as in previous years and that no restrictions would be imposed on Arab Israelis, overruling the wishes of National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, an ultranationalist firebrand who oversees the Israel Police.COGAT, the Israeli defense body in charge of civilian affairs in the West Bank, has ruled that Palestinian residents’ access to the site for Friday’s prayers will be limited to men over 55, women over 50, and children under 10.The Temple Mount is the holiest place in Judaism, where two biblical Temples once stood, and the Al-Aqsa Mosque is the third-holiest shrine in Islam, making the site a central flashpoint of the Israeli-Arab conflict.War-impacted Good Friday procession-As for the Good Friday procession, which normally draw thousands of foreign visitors, this year’s rendition was composed largely of locals. Most observers were Palestinian Christians, joined by some foreigners living in Jerusalem and a few undeterred tourists.The traditional Good Friday procession passes along the Way of the Cross, or Via Dolorosa, the route believed to have been walked by Jesus to his crucifixion. Squads of Israeli police set up barricades along the path, rerouting shoppers in the Old City’s bustling Muslim quarter to make way for hundreds of pilgrims.A young group of Palestinian Arab scouts led the day’s procession, past the 14 stations along the route, each marking an event that befell Jesus on his final journey. Hundreds of Palestinian Christians walked in their wake. Behind them was a small parade of the Franciscan religious order, composed mainly of foreigners who live in Jerusalem.“We wait for this every year,” said Munira Kamar, a Palestinian Christian from the Old City, who watched the parade pass, waving hello to cross-bearers, who stopped to give her young daughter a kiss on the cheek. “Of course, this year we are unhappy because of the situation with the ongoing war.”The procession’s final stations are inside the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, where Jesus is believed to have been crucified and laid to rest before his resurrection on Easter. There, the impact of the war was clear: instead of the crowds who normally queue for hours in the church courtyard, entrance to the site was easy.The city’s streets were noticeably devoid of Palestinian Christians from the West Bank, who normally flock to the Holy City for the Easter festivities. Since Oct. 7, Palestinian worshippers have needed special permission to cross checkpoints into Jerusalem.Despite the thinned crowds, shopkeepers, whose heavy metal doors are usually closed on Fridays, threw them open in for tourists seeking Catholic memorabilia. But interested shoppers were few and far between.“Comparing last year’s Easter festivities with this year is like light and day. Nobody’s here. Most of the people are locals,” said Fayaz Dakkak, a Palestinian storeowner whose family first opened the shop in 1942. His shop stood empty. “Usually people are joyful today and kids are excited. But when you compare children here who have water and food and a family to what’s happening in Gaza, how can you be happy?”An estimated 50,000 Christian Palestinians live in the West Bank and Jerusalem, according to the U.S. State Department’s international religious freedom report for 2022. Approximately 1,300 Christians lived in Gaza, it said. Some Christians are also citizens of Israel. Many Palestinian Christians live in diaspora communities.A few tourists braved the day. Carmen Ros, a lawyer who lives in Jerusalem, had managed to corral a group of pilgrims from Spain to visit the country for a religious tour. The group rested in the shade outside the church.“They were afraid of the situation at first,” she said, “but I told them here in Jerusalem, it’s safe, we don’t have violence. We are close to Gaza, but the Christian people are not the target of terrorism.”The celebrations coincided with the third Friday in the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, with worshippers once again flocking to the revered Al-Aqsa mosque for prayer. Despite fears the ongoing war would spark clashes at the revered Al-Aqsa mosque, the month has so far passed peacefully under tight Israeli security.Sister Harriet Kabaije, a pilgrim from Uganda who moved to Jerusalem three weeks ago to live in a monastery, said she was holding the people of Gaza in her prayers. She said she believed that peace could be achieved in the region.“Many people think that the war here is natural,” she said. “But when Jesus was in Bethlehem, it was peaceful. We know that people are suffering in Gaza so we carry them in our prayers and pray that peace can return to this land,” she said.

Netanyahu gives Shin Bet, Mossad chiefs go-ahead to resume hostage talks-After negotiations in Qatar apparently collapsed earlier in the week, premier tells Ronen Bar and David Barnea their teams have ‘room to operate’ in Doha and Cairo-By ToI Staff and Lazar Berman-MAR 29,24

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu gave an Israeli delegation approval on Friday to resume indirect negotiations with Hamas in the coming days for a truce and hostage deal.Israel will send Shin Bet and Mossad officials to conduct the negotiations in Cairo, an Israeli official said, clarifying that Mossad chief David Barnea and Shin Bet head Ronen Bar are not expected to attend the talks, but may join subsequent consultations in Doha later on, an Israeli official said.According to a statement from his office announcing the decision, Netanyahu gave the security chiefs “room to operate” in their negotiations.On Monday, Hamas rejected compromises hammered out between Israel, Egypt, Qatar and the United States in Doha, causing Jerusalem to recall most of its negotiating team.Several news outlets reported that a small Mossad team remained in Qatar to continue talks.Hamas said on Monday night that it had informed mediators that it has returned to its original demands for a permanent ceasefire, the withdrawal of Israeli troops from Gaza, a return of displaced Palestinians and a “real” exchange of “prisoners” — demands Israel has repeatedly rejected as delusional.On Wednesday, Barnea reportedly informed the war cabinet that a hostage deal was still possible if Israel would be willing to be more lenient regarding the return of Gazans to their home in the northern part of the Strip. Israel has largely rejected the idea, as it seeks to prevent a resurgence of Hamas activity in areas that it has already cleared of the terror group.Besides Barnea, war cabinet minister Benny Gantz and war cabinet observers Gadi Eisenkot and Ron Dermer supported the Mossad chief’s stance, according to Channel 12.Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and IDF Chief of Staff Herzi Halevi opposed Barnea’s approach, saying that now is not the time to be lenient in negotiations. Instead, the pair argued that the IDF should prepare for an invasion of Rafah, but do so quietly to afford the US an opportunity to broker a deal.Netanyahu also rejected Barnea’s proposal and supported publicly declaring that the IDF is preparing to invade Rafah.Another cabinet meeting on the matter was supposed to take place Friday, but ministers received word of Netanyahu’s decision via the media, where the premier was quoted as saying during a Thursday meeting with hostage families: “We’re preparing for Rafah, and I am handling the negotiations myself.”The premier’s office issued a statement Friday night denying reports that he was in the minority in opposing the Mossad-Shin Bet-led negotiating team’s proposal to allow the unvetted return of Palestinians to northern Gaza.Relatedly, the Axios news site reported that several hostage relatives at the Thursday meeting castigated Netanyahu for his treatment of them, asserting that US President Joe Biden has shown the abductees’ families more respect than he has.A relative of one of the dual US-Israeli national hostages told Netanyahu that the White House both embraces the hostage families, but more critically, keeps them informed regarding the status of negotiations — things the premier has largely failed to do, Axios said.The relative reportedly implored Netanyahu not to further damage ties with the US, arguing that they are critical for securing a hostage deal.While Hamas has conditioned any further hostage releases on an Israeli commitment to end the war, Israel has insisted that its military campaign to destroy Hamas’s military and governance capabilities will resume once any hostage-truce deal is implemented.The compromise proposal Israel accepted on Sunday reportedly would’ve seen Jerusalem release twice as many Palestinian security prisoners as it had initially offered in exchange for 40 hostages — women, children, the sick and elderly — in the first phase of a 6-week truce deal.According to a Channel 12 report, Israel is now willing to release as many as 800 prisoners, including 100 inmates convicted of murder. Other Hebrew media reports suggested Israel was prepared to release 700 security prisoners in return for the 40.Some 130 hostages — not all of them alive — are believed to remain in Gaza since Hamas’s October 7 massacre, which saw terrorists kill some 1,200 people and abduct another 253, mostly civilians. Dozens of hostages were released under a previous truce deal in November, and some others were freed by Israel.Egypt, Qatar and the US have been trying to narrow differences between Israel and Hamas over what a ceasefire could look like, as the UN warns of a deepening humanitarian crisis, particularly in northern Gaza, where the roughly 300,000 people still living there could be facing imminent famine.Jacob Magid contributed reporting.

Amid hostility and kosher restrictions, Canadian Jews fear their ‘golden age’ is over-The community is mounting a legal fight against restrictions that coincide with Israel-skeptic policies and expressions of antisemitism-By Canaan Lidor-Today, 3:33 pm-MAR 29,24

Canada began feeling inhospitable to Moshe and Leah Appel, a Jewish Orthodox couple from Montreal, long before October 7.But the outbreak of war on that day between Israel and Hamas in Gaza, and the explosion of antisemitism it unleashed in Canada and beyond, “knocked down a couple of walls” that had been keeping the couple in Canada, Moshe Appel, a baker and father of three, told The Canadian Jewish News in a recent interview about his family’s aliyah, or immigration to Israel.“That is the reality in Montreal, where if you are visibly Jewish, you’re not safe,” Moshe Appel told CJN in January following his move to Jerusalem the previous month. He cited multiple incidents of violence and intimidation against Jews, including at their synagogues and schools.Whereas such concerns are not uncommon across North America and beyond, some Canadian Jews have begun to worry about the very viability of their community of some 400,000 people. They fear for its future amid growing hostility to Jews on the streets, antipathy in government toward Israel and bureaucratic regulation they say limits their ability to practice their faith.A recent example of the regulation was the government’s introduction last year of new animal welfare-related limitations on kosher meat production, which prompted Jewish community activists this month to prepare a lawsuit focused on defending the practice.Regardless of the legal action’s results and merits, however, many Canadian Jews view the move on kosher meat as fresh evidence that their society, which they had long considered a “golden medina,” as one rabbi called it, is becoming inhospitable.“I think it’s the first knocking on the door for a Jewish community,” continued Rabbi N. Daniel Korobkin of Beth Avraham Yoseph of Toronto, the city’s largest Orthodox congregation. “It’s a sign that things are becoming less and less hospitable in this country for its Jewish population,” he told The Times of Israel.The new regulations enforced by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency prohibit hoisting animals for processing until they are completely immobile.Orthodox Jewish law requires animals to be conscious and intact when their necks are cut. This precludes the use of stunning with a bolt to the brain, which is employed to instantly immobilize animals whose meat is not intended to be kosher.This stunning allows for processing non-kosher meat many times faster than kosher meat, rendering kosher meat production unprofitable for businesses involved.Since the guidelines went into effect, shechitah has stopped completely in the largest of the four abattoirs that Canadian kosher meat producers lease on an ad-hoc basis for shochtim to produce kosher meat there, said Korobkin. The remaining three cannot afford to continue much longer, according to the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, an umbrella organization that represents Canadian Jews.The production of halal, meanwhile, continues despite the regulations because local Muslim communities don’t regard bolt stunning as preclusive to D’biha, the Muslim counterpart of shechitah. In animals used for halal meat, their necks are cut immediately after stunning and they are hoisted, motionless, for processing as they bleed out.Taken on their own, the new regulations, which do not affect the production of kosher chicken meat, have a limited impact on kosher meat’s availability and price. Before and after the regulations, Canadian Jews have relied partly on kosher meat imported from the United States and Latin America.Richard Robertson, director of research and advocacy at B’nai Brith Canada, the local branch of that Jewish human rights group, downplayed the scope of the shechitah problem. “It has an isolated impact on the lives of Orthodox Jewry in Canada,” he said.The Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, he added, helped “expand the ability of our Orthodox community to practice their religion without encumbrance by rules or regulations,” Robertson, 33, said. The issues around shechitah, he added, were “a misunderstanding of the practice” by authorities.Loud and proud for 50 years… and counting? Toronto and Montreal have vibrant Jewish communities whose growth – mainly due to immigration from Europe and especially the former Soviet Union – has made Canada one of only six countries that had a larger Jewish population in 2020 than half a century earlier. The ranks of Canadian Jewry swelled by a whopping 37 percent in those 50 years, making the community the world’s fourth largest with more core members than in all of Latin America combined.Immigration to Israel, or aliyah, which is often indicative of malaise in Jewish communities, is relatively low for Canadian Jewry’s size, with an average of 361 newcomers a year in the years 2018-2023 (a 10% decrease from the average in the five previous years).Robertson said that he has confidence in the future of Canadian Jewry.Yet the meat regulation’s timing, which coincides with concern about the long-term future of Canadian Jewry, is making some view it as a harbinger that portends darker times. Many Canadian Jews had considered their country a haven from problems that are stunting Jewish life elsewhere in the West, and even those affecting the Jewish minority of the US.“Within all spheres of Canadian Jewish life, there are now attacks going on,” said Frank Dimant, the previous CEO of B’nai B’rith Canada. “Nothing is off limits anymore: Synagogues, Jewish schools, Jewish institutions. They can all be under attack at any given moment,” he said.Last week, a Canadian movie theater in Hamilton, Ontario postponed indefinitely a Jewish film festival due to unspecified “security and safety concerns” despite protest by the Hamilton Jewish Federation.In November, bullet holes were found on the façades of two Jewish schools in Montreal. Police believe it was an act of intimidation directed at local Jews over Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza.At the city’s Concordia University, three people were injured and one was arrested that month following an alleged assault against pro-Israel students.In another incident, a professor from the nearby University of Montreal, Yanise Arab, was suspended for allegedly shouting at a female pro-Israel demonstrator from Concordia: “Go back to Poland, whore.”Build a wall? Dimant said he is “not optimistic” about the future of Canadian Jewry also because of immigration, which amounts to almost 500,000 new immigrants per year in Canada, one of the highest rates per population of any country in the world. In 2023, Canada had 8 million immigrants with permanent residence, roughly a fifth of the total population.About 1.7 million of those immigrants are Muslim, meaning that in Canada, unlike in the US, Muslims are a major demographic for politicians, and outnumber Jews 4 to 1. In Europe, the arrival of waves of immigration from Muslim countries has been followed by an explosion of antisemitic violence, among other societal issues.Similar phenomena are on display in Canada, according to Korobkin, the rabbi.“A lot of it, unfortunately, has to do with the unbridled immigration policies of the current government, which has allowed hundreds of thousands of people from the Middle East to immigrate without vetting them,” he said.Many Canadian Jews support the government’s openness to taking in immigrants from less affluent countries, including Muslim ones, and dispute that doing so worsens Jewish communities’ circumstances.“It is far easier to blame a newcomer than to determine the root causes of systemic issues,” Shelly Markel and Elise Herzig, the chair and director, respectively, of the Toronto-based Jewish Immigrant Aid Services nonprofit, wrote in a newsletter last month. Each year, their nonprofit holds a Refugee Shabbat event that “reminds us of the Jewish imperative to remain committed to humanitarian immigration,” they added.Ripples of the war with Hamas-Meanwhile, the outbreak of war between Hamas and Israel is resulting in anti-Israel agitation in Canada that is reminiscent of scenes from Western European countries with large Muslim minorities.The hostility may have a chilling effect on Jewish life in Canada, but it is also emboldening some Canadian Jews to stand firm and push back.“In recent months, I started wearing my Star of David [pendant] proudly wherever I go. And I’m not afraid anymore,” one student of Concordia, Dinah Elmaleh, told The Times of Israel.For the Appels, who left Canada for Jerusalem, hostility was only part of the decision to leave, Appel told the CJN. While living in Victoria, where they had resided for years before moving to Montreal in the months before their aliyah, they encountered difficulties sourcing kosher dairy ingredients for their bakery. Leah had trouble finding modest clothing in Victoria, which has fewer than 5,000 Jews.Quebec – the French-speaking province of Canada – is sometimes seen as less hospitable to Jews than the rest of the country for a combination of reasons, including anti-Israel agitation and local nationalism. (Quebec, where most Jews speak English at home, recently tightened legislation that facilitated enrolling some children to English-language schooling. This has complicated life for non-Quebecois rabbis whom the community needs to hire to maintain its growth).Korobkin said, “They may be more boisterousness in Quebec against the Jewish population,” but this attitude is not unique to that province. The rabbi described the events in Quebec as manifestations of worrisome national trends.Following Hamas’s October 7 onslaught, in which its terrorists murdered some 1,200 people in Israel and abducted another 253, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called Hamas “terrorists,” adding that “no one in Canada should be supporting them, much less celebrating them.”But his Liberal Party and government have since taken steps that signal their criticism of Israel, whose invasion of Gaza has left more than 31,000 dead, according to Hamas’ health ministry. The statistics are unverified and do not distinguish between civilians and terrorists, of whom Israel says it has killed more than 13,000.Canada’s parliament passed this month a non-binding motion calling on the international community to work toward a two-state solution to resolve the conflict between Israel and Hamas. Canada has also frozen the sale of arms to Israel to ensure they are used legally.The Canadian government may adopt a warmer stance on Israel if the Conservatives beat Trudeau’s Liberal Party in next year’s election, Dimant said. But any honeymoon with the pro-Israel contingent of Canada’s Jewish community “will be short-lived, because the pendulum will swing back the other way, to ‘woke’ society,'” Dimant said. Aliyah will increase, especially by Orthodox Canadian Jews, he added.The anti-Israel sentiment is manifesting itself “literally on the doorstep” of Canadian Jews, Korobkin said. His synagogue for the first time in its history had demonstrators picketing outside it this month because it featured a real-estate show with assets on sale in Israel for immigrants. It was “offensive and disturbing,” Korobkin said of the protest by anti-Israel demonstrators.“My community is terrified. We are being intimidated over and over by people protesting outside of Jewish buildings,” Benjamin Rubin, a former chair of Limmud Toronto, wrote in his blog in The Times of Israel Wednesday. The post is titled “Swan Song to Canada’s Jewish Golden Age.”Combined, these developments are “almost like a shock to the system,” Korobkin said.“This is really the first time that we’re seeing a convergence of multiple factors that are making Jews feel highly unwelcome in Canada, especially since October 7,” he said. “We’re starting to feel like maybe we were living in a fool’s paradise, and things are not the way we thought they were.”

Israel turning back entire trucks with 'luxury' items inside-Integrating PA into Gaza aid efforts offers pilot to post-war governance, say experts-Report argues move would reduce bottlenecks, reliance on UNRWA while boosting West Bank economy; author says Israel, UN both responsible for hunger crisis, but former has more issues-By Jacob Magid-Today, 12:37 pm-MAR 29,24

A new report from a group of Israeli policy experts recommends including the Palestinian Authority in the Gaza humanitarian effort in order to give Ramallah accountability over the process, and smooth its transition to eventually return to governing the enclave after the war.Involving the PA in the humanitarian effort would ease some of the pressure on Israel, which doesn’t want to be responsible for distributing aid inside Gaza and is also seeking to limit the beleaguered UNRWA’s involvement in the process.The Biden administration on Thursday welcomed the establishment of a new PA government, expressing its hope that the cabinet led by freshly appointed PA Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa will be able to implement the reforms necessary for the authority to eventually take over the reins in Gaza.The US has not, however, spoken publicly about integrating Ramallah into the humanitarian process, which the Israel Policy Forum (IPF) report suggests would serve as a bridge to the administration’s post-war vision for Gaza.Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has thus far rejected efforts to include the PA in post-war planning, arguing that the more moderate foil to Hamas, which publicly backs a two-state solution, is actually no different than the Gaza-ruling terror group.However, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and others in the security establishment have argued that the PA represents Israel’s least bad option for who can manage Gaza after the war, the alternatives being Hamas or a state of anarchy, according to an Israeli official. This view has yet to become policy because it is rejected by far-right members of the coalition whom Netanyahu needs to stay in power.Returning the PA to Gaza is an integral part of the post-war planning in Washington, which envisions Arab allies assisting in the reconstruction of the Strip and temporarily managing its security before passing the baton to a reformed PA, establishing a pathway to a two-state solution with Israel, which will be awarded a normalization agreement with Saudi Arabia and other Arab countries in the region to bolster a united front against Iran.PA involvement can come in many forms, chiefly through the establishment of a direct aid route from the West Bank, says the report, written by IPF research director Shira Efron, analyst Jess Manville, and Economic Cooperation Foundation co-executive director Celine Touboul.Food production facilities and factories to produce tents and other sorely lacking temporary shelter equipment could be established in the West Bank, which would have the added benefit of bolstering the Palestinian economy while also limiting aid transport to areas that are already under Israeli control. The shipments would not need to go through customs and other inspections as they do when coming from Jordan or Egypt, and Israel would still be able to inspect them in a more streamlined process.The IPF report also recommends having the PA manage crossings in areas largely cleared of Hamas presence, such as Gate 96 in northern Gaza recently opened by the IDF. It urges the US to demand that the PA be responsible for managing the temporary pier it is building off the Gaza City coast to receive maritime aid shipments.The PA’s unarmed civil defense force could also be tasked with clearing rubble from buildings destroyed in the Gaza fighting, West Bank-based medical teams could be brought into Gaza to support international field hospitals and PA employees can also be integrated into relief agencies’ water testing campaigns, vaccination efforts and blood drives in the enclave, the report proposes.Most critically, the PA could be incorporated into mechanisms for monitoring goods and aid workers, to further place the onus on the PA to ensure a successful humanitarian operation.While involving the PA in inspections already being conducted by Israel could slow the process, if done efficiently, it will better position Ramallah to eventually take over the process when it has finished undergoing necessary reforms, the report says. That way, Israel won’t end up being responsible for managing civilian affairs in Gaza, which it claims it has no interest in doing.Hamas violently took control of Gaza in a 2007 coup, but the PA has remained the second-largest employer in the Strip, which puts Ramallah in a strong position to integrate into the humanitarian system.This effort is lower stakes for Israel from a security standpoint but can serve as a test for granting the PA greater responsibility once the war is over, the report’s authors surmise, adding that the recommendations could be within the realm of what is politically digestible in Jerusalem.Although the PA is historically unpopular and is unlikely to be fully embraced in Gaza, Ramallah is interested in gaining a larger foothold in the Strip, including on the humanitarian front, a senior Israeli official separately told The Times of Israel, speaking on condition of anonymity.Chocolates, croissants and bikinis-Shira Efron, one of the report’s authors, held a briefing with reporters on Monday to share her other reflections regarding the current state of the humanitarian effort, as someone who has followed Gaza closely for years.Efron has served as an adviser to both the UN’s Jerusalem office and the Defense Ministry after stints as special adviser on Israel at the RAND Corporation and senior fellow at Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies.Asked to weigh in on the debate between Israel and the UN regarding culpability over the lackluster humanitarian effort which has aid groups warning that famine is imminent in northern Gaza, Efron said both sides carry responsibility, though gave a longer list of problems on the Israeli side.For starters, she disputed the Israeli claim that it has the capacity to inspect 44 aid trucks an hour at both the Kerem Shalom and Nitzana Crossings, saying that in practice, it hasn’t been able to inspect much more than 200 trucks per day — far from the amount needed to support a population grappling with massive food shortages.As for the ongoing debate regarding the closure of Israel’s crossings on Saturdays, Efron also dismissed Jerusalem’s claim that this was part of an agreement it reached with the UN, saying that deal was only relevant at the beginning of the war when the UN was still building up its distribution capacity. It is now looking to deliver aid seven days a week, instead of the current five and a half days it is allowed due to the closing of Kerem Shalom.Moreover, she pointed to Israel’s half-day closure of Kerem Shalom on the Purim holiday as an indicator that the hours of operation have more to do with the religious calendar than with outdated agreements reached with the UN.The aforementioned senior Israeli official confirmed that candy, croissants, juice and cigarettes have been barred, explaining that it is part of Jerusalem’s policy to allow the minimum amount of humanitarian aid and to deny what it views as “luxury goods” while Hamas continues to hold onto 134 hostages.While recognizing the complicity of large sectors of the Palestinian public in Hamas’s October 7 terror onslaught as well as the sentiment in Israeli society in favor of strict limitations on aid, Efron said, “It’s in Israel’s interest to show that it has a fight with Hamas, and not with the Palestinian population.”“Counter-insurgency means that you try and buy hearts and minds, and this is not the way to buy hearts and minds,” she said, adding that such rejections of individual products on trucks create bottlenecks by temporarily grinding the entire operation to a halt.She described Israeli inspections more broadly as a bottleneck. “You can argue it’s not the main bottleneck at the moment, but it is a bottleneck.”Israel says these reviews are necessary to prevent the smuggling of weapons into Gaza, which Hamas has long been prone to do.Dr Shira Efron. (Diane Baldwin, RAND Corporation)-Moreover, Efron agreed with Jerusalem’s insistence that the UN has a major distribution problem, lacking trucks and workers capable of the dangerous task of delivering aid.“They’re not armed and the UN won’t work with criminal organizations to secure the convoys, [so] they’re scared,” she said of many prospective UN aid staff.Still, she said UN requests for more trucks, armored vehicles, satellite communication equipment, visas for aid workers and vetting of drivers can take months to be approved if at all by Israel.Efron also called out Egypt for running a “black box” humanitarian process on its side of the border where there is no transparency or coordination regarding what’s arriving at the El-Arish airport. “There are thousands — not hundreds — thousands of containers [sitting in the city of] Alarish. There is no system of pre-recording what’s coming in… That’s why you end up with things like a truck full of bikinis,” which has little use for aid-desperate Gazans at the moment, she said.“Israel is correct that the UN is lacking capacity, and the UN is correct that Israel is not opening all the crossings that it can, that it’s very stringent with inspections — which is understandable given the security threat from Gaza — and that it’s not taking steps to allow the UN to improve its capacities,” Efron summarized.“There’s a blame game and actually everyone is right, but the question is how we can constructively get out of it because all sides involved can do a better job,” she said.She recommended a more civil discourse between senior Israeli and UN officials, noting that improved personal relationships at the top levels of both sides can be leveraged to better tackle problems on the ground.Israel and the UN do not appear to be heading toward a rapprochement however, with Foreign Minister Israel Katz on Thursday tweeting at UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres that he “should be ashamed” of himself, days after the latter visited the Rafah Crossing and declared that Israeli obstacles on aid were responsible for looming famine in Gaza.IPC and UNRWA-Guterres cited the UN-backed Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC) report regarding hunger in Gaza, which further heightened global concerns regarding the humanitarian situation in the war-torn Strip.Efron said there was no question that there is hunger in Gaza, but raised several concerns regarding the IPC report’s methodological limitations.The report relied heavily on survey responses to text messages during a period when network coverage is limited; its survey sample was not geographically representative; and it relied on figures from the compromised, Hamas-run health ministry, she noted.Most critically, the IPC report makes “future projections based on a relatively extreme scenario where there is intense fighting, limited aid supply and a ground operation in Rafah that does not take into consideration addressing the population’s needs,” Efron continued.“In practice, the fighting has wound down substantially and the humanitarian supply has gradually improved and is still improving. And — there is not yet an operation in Rafah, and one is very unlikely to occur without safe evacuation of the population. This is not to say that an operation would not affect civilians and lead to displacement, but it’s not necessarily what the report predicts,” she added.Much of the bad blood between Israel and the UN stems from UNRWA, with Israel long arguing that the relief agency for Palestinian refugees is compromised.Israeli officials are determined to block UNRWA from involvement in post-war Gaza, but Efron argued that such a goal is little more than wishful thinking given that the international community is determined to ensure its survival.Eighteen countries suspended funding following allegations that 12 of UNRWA’s employees actively participated in Hamas’s October 7 onslaught during which close to 1,200 Israelis were massacred and another 253 taken hostage.The majority of those nations resumed funding, and a pair of countries added their names to the donor list after not being on it before the war.Efron speculated that pushing for meaningful reforms within the agency would be a more realistic route for Israel to take.While such steps will be incredibly difficult, Efron said they could include limiting UNRWA’s activities to its original mandate so that it serves as a humanitarian relief agency, not a political agency that is deeply intertwined with Hamas and lobbying for a Palestinian right of return.

Strikes in Syria near Aleppo kill 38, injure dozens, say security sources-UK-based Syrian Observatory says Israel attacked missile depots for Hezbollah near Aleppo airport, while state media says drone strikes by insurgent groups occurred simultaneously-By Agencies and ToI Staff Today, 9:46 amUpdated at 10:02 am-MAR 29,24

The Syrian army claimed that Israeli airstrikes early Friday near the northern city of Aleppo killed and wounded several people and caused material damage, while security sources cited by Reuters said that at least 38 people had been killed.Syrian state media quoted an unnamed military official as saying that the Israeli strikes coincided with drone attacks by Syrian insurgent groups on civilian targets in Aleppo and its suburbs. It did not give an exact number of casualties.The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, an opposition war monitor with questionable funding and sourcing, said Israeli strikes hit missile depots for Lebanon’s terrorist Hezbollah group in Aleppo’s southern suburb of Jibreen near the Aleppo International Airport. It added that 36 soldiers were killed and dozens were wounded in the strikes. The Observatory said explosions were still heard two hours after the strikes.Two security sources cited by Reuters said that the strikes killed 38 people, including five members of Hezbollah.Syrian state news agency SANA said the pre-dawn strike killed and wounded civilians, as well as military personnel, without providing a death toll.There was no immediate statement from Israeli officials on the strikes. Israel frequently launches strikes on Iran-linked targets in Syria but rarely acknowledges them.Huge #Israel airstrikes in #Aleppo earlier tonight — targeted multiple #IRGC & #Assad regime weapons depots near the airport, Al-Safira & more.Sources claim 30+ dead. ic.twitter.com/eYpDYXZfqp— Charles Lister (@Charles_Lister) March 29, 2024-On Thursday, Syrian state media reported airstrikes near the capital Damascus, saying it wounded two civilians.Aleppo, Syria’s largest city and once its commercial center, has come under such attacks in the past that led to the closure of its international airport. Friday’s strike did not affect the airport.The strikes have escalated over the past five months against the backdrop of the war in Gaza and ongoing clashes between Hezbollah and Israeli forces on the Lebanon-Israel border.The war began on October 7 with Hamas’s unprecedented attack on Israel in which terrorists murdered some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and kidnapped 253. The Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza claims that more than 32,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israel in the war, an unverified figure which includes more than 13,000 Hamas operatives killed by Israel.Israel has exchanged near-daily, cross-border fire with Hamas ally Hezbollah since the Gaza war began, sparking fears of a major regional conflagration.At least 346 people have been killed in Lebanon — mostly Hezbollah terrorists, but also including at least 68 civilians — in clashes with Israel over the last six months, according to an AFP tally.The fighting has also displaced tens of thousands of people in southern Lebanon and in northern Israel, where the IDF says 10 soldiers and eight civilians have been killed.While Iran-backed Hezbollah is Lebanese, it has sent terrorists into Syria to support its ally President Bashar al-Assad since an uprising against his rule erupted in 2011. The uprising quickly morphed into a civil war drawing in regional and global players. Hezbollah has continued to operate in the country since.

AI generates high-quality images 30 times faster in a single step-by Rachel Gordon | MIT CSAIL-Boston MA (SPX) Mar 22, 2024

In our current age of artificial intelligence, computers can generate their own "art" by way of diffusion models, iteratively adding structure to a noisy initial state until a clear image or video emerges. Diffusion models have suddenly grabbed a seat at everyone's table: Enter a few words and experience instantaneous, dopamine-spiking dreamscapes at the intersection of reality and fantasy. Behind the scenes, it involves a complex, time-intensive process requiring numerous iterations for the algorithm to perfect the image.MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) researchers have introduced a new framework that simplifies the multi-step process of traditional diffusion models into a single step, addressing previous limitations. This is done through a type of teacher-student model: teaching a new computer model to mimic the behavior of more complicated, original models that generate images. The approach, known as distribution matching distillation (DMD), retains the quality of the generated images and allows for much faster generation."Our work is a novel method that accelerates current diffusion models such as Stable Diffusion and DALLE-3 by 30 times," says Tianwei Yin, an MIT PhD student in electrical engineering and computer science, CSAIL affiliate, and the lead researcher on the DMD framework. "This advancement not only significantly reduces computational time but also retains, if not surpasses, the quality of the generated visual content. Theoretically, the approach marries the principles of generative adversarial networks (GANs) with those of diffusion models, achieving visual content generation in a single step - a stark contrast to the hundred steps of iterative refinement required by current diffusion models. It could potentially be a new generative modeling method that excels in speed and quality."This single-step diffusion model could enhance design tools, enabling quicker content creation and potentially supporting advancements in drug discovery and 3D modeling, where promptness and efficacy are key.Distribution dreams-DMD cleverly has two components. First, it uses a regression loss, which anchors the mapping to ensure a coarse organization of the space of images to make training more stable. Next, it uses a distribution matching loss, which ensures that the probability to generate a given image with the student model corresponds to its real-world occurrence frequency. To do this, it leverages two diffusion models that act as guides, helping the system understand the difference between real and generated images and making training the speedy one-step generator possible.The system achieves faster generation by training a new network to minimize the distribution divergence between its generated images and those from the training dataset used by traditional diffusion models. "Our key insight is to approximate gradients that guide the improvement of the new model using two diffusion models," says Yin. "In this way, we distill the knowledge of the original, more complex model into the simpler, faster one, while bypassing the notorious instability and mode collapse issues in GANs."Yin and colleagues used pre-trained networks for the new student model, simplifying the process. By copying and fine-tuning parameters from the original models, the team achieved fast training convergence of the new model, which is capable of producing high-quality images with the same architectural foundation. "This enables combining with other system optimizations based on the original architecture to further accelerate the creation process," adds Yin.When put to the test against the usual methods, using a wide range of benchmarks, DMD showed consistent performance. On the popular benchmark of generating images based on specific classes on ImageNet, DMD is the first one-step diffusion technique that churns out pictures pretty much on par with those from the original, more complex models, rocking a super-close Frechet inception distance (FID) score of just 0.3, which is impressive, since FID is all about judging the quality and diversity of generated images. Furthermore, DMD excels in industrial-scale text-to-image generation and achieves state-of-the-art one-step generation performance. There's still a slight quality gap when tackling trickier text-to-image applications, suggesting there's a bit of room for improvement down the line.Additionally, the performance of the DMD-generated images is intrinsically linked to the capabilities of the teacher model used during the distillation process. In the current form, which uses Stable Diffusion v1.5 as the teacher model, the student inherits limitations such as rendering detailed depictions of text and small faces, suggesting that DMD-generated images could be further enhanced by more advanced teacher models."Decreasing the number of iterations has been the Holy Grail in diffusion models since their inception," says Fredo Durand, MIT professor of electrical engineering and computer science, CSAIL principal investigator, and a lead author on the paper. "We are very excited to finally enable single-step image generation, which will dramatically reduce compute costs and accelerate the process.""Finally, a paper that successfully combines the versatility and high visual quality of diffusion models with the real-time performance of GANs," says Alexei Efros, a professor of electrical engineering and computer science at the University of California at Berkeley who was not involved in this study. "I expect this work to open up fantastic possibilities for high-quality real-time visual editing."Yin and Durand's fellow authors are MIT electrical engineering and computer science professor and CSAIL principal investigator William T. Freeman, as well as Adobe research scientists Michael Gharbi SM '15, PhD '18; Richard Zhang; Eli Shechtman; and Taesung Park. Their work was supported, in part, by U.S. National Science Foundation grants (including one for the Institute for Artificial Intelligence and Fundamental Interactions), the Singapore Defense Science and Technology Agency, and by funding from Gwangju Institute of Science and Technology and Amazon. Their work will be presented at the Conference on Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition in June.

GITAI's robotic system triumphs in ISS demo-With this successful demonstration, GITAI is poised to advance the development of its robotic satellites, reinforcing its commitment to innovating in the field of on-orbit satellite servicing.-by Clarence Oxford-Los Angeles CA (SPX) Mar 20, 2024

GITAI USA Inc. reports the completion of its technological demonstration, which involved a 1.5-meter-long autonomous dual robotic arm system (S2) performing tasks outside the International Space Station (ISS). This demonstration represents a critical advancement in on-orbit satellite servicing, demonstrating capabilities critical for satellite maintenance, repair, and assembly in space.This achievement is part of GITAI's broader initiative to provide on-orbit satellite servicing across both Geostationary Orbit (GEO) and Low Earth Orbit (LEO), encompassing a wide range of operations including rendezvous, docking, inspection, de-orbiting, and life extension services. GITAI is actively developing robotic satellites designed to autonomously execute these operations, with the goal of launching on-orbit servicing solutions by 2026.The recent demonstration at the ISS involved the S2 system performing a series of in-space servicing, assembly, and manufacturing (ISAM) tasks from the ISS Bishop Airlock. The successful completion of these tasks highlights the system's operational efficacy and reliability in the space environment. Although the primary objectives of the demonstration have been achieved, GITAI plans to conduct additional reliability tests over the next five months to further validate the system's performance.The demonstration's success has resulted in the S2 system achieving NASA's Technology Readiness Level (TRL) 7, indicating its operational readiness in space. This milestone is important, as it demonstrates the potential of GITAI's technology for practical applications in space operations. The technology developed for the S2 system also informs the design of GITAI's inchworm-type robotic arm, which shares many components with the S2 and has similarly achieved a high level of technological readiness.With this successful demonstration, GITAI is poised to advance the development of its robotic satellites, reinforcing its commitment to innovating in the field of on-orbit satellite servicing. This development represents a significant step forward in the utilization of autonomous robotic systems for complex operations in space, offering potential for enhanced efficiency and capabilities in satellite servicing and beyond.

France eyes spent uranium plant to bypass Russia: ministry-Paris, March 29 (AFP) Mar 29, 2024

The French government has said it is "seriously" studying the option of building a plant to convert and enrich reprocessed uranium to cut its reliance on Russia following the invasion of Ukraine.The only plant in the world that currently converts reprocessed uranium for use in nuclear power plants is in Russia."The option of carrying out an industrial project to convert reprocessed uranium in France is being seriously examined," the French industry and energy ministry told AFP late Thursday."The associated conditions are still being studied," the ministry said.The announcement came after French daily Le Monde said that state-owned power utility EDF had no immediate plans to halt uranium trade with Russia, as Moscow's war against Ukraine stretches into its third year.Environment and climate NGO Greenpeace condemned the continuing uranium trade between Russia and France despite Moscow's invasion of Ukraine, and urged France to cut ties with Russia's state nuclear power company Rosatom."If Emmanuel Macron wants to have a coherent stance on Ukraine, he must stop the French nuclear industry's collaboration with Rosatom and demand the termination of Russian contracts," Pauline Boyer of Greenpeace France said in a statement to AFP on Friday."For the time being, his 'support without limits' for Ukraine has one limit: his business with Rosatom," she said.According to Le Monde, Jean-Michel Quilichini, head of the nuclear fuel division at EDF, said the company planned to continue to "honour" its 2018 contract with Tenex, a Rosatom subsidiary.The contract stipulates that reprocessed uranium from French nuclear power plants is to be sent to a facility in the town of Seversk (formerly Tomsk-7) in western Siberia to be converted and then re-enriched before being reused in nuclear plants.Since Russian President Vladimir Putin sent troops into Ukraine in February 2022, the West has imposed several rounds of sanctions on Moscow, but Russia's nuclear power has remained largely unscathed.Contacted by AFP, EDF said it was "maximising the diversification of its geographical sources and suppliers", without specifying the proportion of its enriched reprocessed uranium supplies that comes from Russia.- 'Neither legitimate nor ethical' -Greenpeace said it was "scandalous" that EDF insisted on continuing honouring its agreement with Rosatom."It is neither legitimate nor ethical for EDF to continue doing business with Rosatom, a company in the service of Vladimir Putin, which has illegally occupied the Zaporizhzhia power plant in Ukraine for over two years, and is participating in the nuclear threat whipped up by Russia in this war," Boyer said.EDF said it and several partners were discussing "the construction of a reprocessed uranium conversion plant in Western Europe by 2030"."The fact that the French nuclear industry has never invested in the construction of such a facility on French soil indicates a lack of interest in a tedious and unprofitable industrial process," Greenpeace said in a report in 2021.It accused France of using Siberia "as a garbage dump for the French nuclear industry".In recent years France has been seeking to resuscitate its domestic uranium reprocessing industry.In early February, a reactor at the Cruas nuclear power station in southeastern France was restarted using its first recycled uranium fuel load, EDF said at the time.nal-as/jh/js