EU states to join border-free zone
Oct 4, 2007 8:40 AM
The European Union's border-free zone will be extended to nine additional member states on December 21, the bloc's Portuguese Presidency said.From that date, people travelling from the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Lithuania, Latvia, Malta, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia will be able to travel to the existing 15 states of the Schengen border-free zone without having to show their passports, a presidency spokeswoman said.They will open on December 21, she said. All the nine borders will be opened. The nine countries all joined the European Union in 2004.EU ministers will officially endorse the move next month, the spokeswoman said.
Thirteen EU countries, plus Norway and Iceland, are currently part of the border-free zone. Britain and Ireland have chosen not to be part of it.Cyprus, which also joined the EU in 2004, has asked for one year's delay. Romania and Bulgaria, which became EU members only this year, need to do more work to meet security criteria.
Spain, European Commission President express confidence in EU reform treaty October 02, 2007
Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso on Monday expressed confidence in the reform treaty of the 25-nation bloc ahead of an Intergovernment Conference slated to be held later this month in Lisbon.Both said at their Madrid meeting that they were confident the Intergovernment Conference would swiftly approve a final text for the EU reform, at its Oct. 18-19 session.According to a statement by the Spanish Communications Ministry, the two reviewed the timetable for the EU reform, which still awaits ratification by all its member states.In 2005, French and Dutch voters rejected the EU constitution treaty in referendums, fearing their countries would lose too much power. The EU leaders agreed in June to abandon the idea and replace it with a less ambitious reform treaty.
Zapatero and Barroso also discussed the creation of a single market for energy and the development of a European Border Agency (Frontex).Earlier this month, the commission unveiled a proposal that would force European energy generators to give up their pipelines and transmission networks as a step toward uniting the continent's patchwork of gas and electric systems.Spain urges more money for Frontex aimed at intensifying patrolling in the Mediterranean to deter illegal migrants from north Africa.EU Development Commissioner Louis Michel said in April that he expected the number of African refugees in EU countries to drop this year below 30,000, a record level reached in 2006. Source: Xinhua
Jerusalem: Idea Raised of 2 Capitals
Thursday, Oct. 04, 2007 By AP/BARRY SCHWEID Article
(WASHINGTON) — Five former State Department and Pentagon officials are proposing Israeli and Palestinian capitals in Jerusalem and excluding Arab refugees from returning to Israel as part of an Middle East accord. In a six-page policy statement submitted to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, they also suggested a series of peace conferences following the one she hopes to convene next month, probably in Annapolis, Md. The militant Hamas group, which controls Gaza and about one-third of Palestinian-held land, has not met U.S. terms for attending. Those conditions are recognizing Israel's right to exist and abandoning violence against the Jewish state. But the ex-officials suggested Hamas might be drawn to attend a second conference, which implicitly would accept the first one and Israel's existence. They called the role of Hamas the most difficult issue in peacemaking. Jerusalem's future and that of Palestinian refugees have snarled past U.S. peace efforts. Former President Clinton's mediation efforts between the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat and then-Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak envisioned sharing of Jerusalem.
Clinton ruled out requiring Israel to take in most Palestinians or their families who claimed to have been forced out of Israel during creation of the Jewish state in 1947-8. It will be very difficult, but not impossible, said Robert Pelletreau, a former U.S. ambassador to Egypt and ex-assistant secretary of state for the region. There is a little bit of momentum starting to build with talks between Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas, and with former British Prime Minister Tony Blair as a mediator, he said in a telephone interview. Along with announcement of the conference, he said, you have several things that can reinforce each other if they are framed properly.The refugee issue is the most difficult, he said. And Jerusalem is right up with it.Edward S. Walker, a former ambassador to Israel and Egypt, said Hamas was the most difficult issue. Unless Hamas changes its stripes there is no way to deal with them on the current situation, he said in an interview.
But, Walker added, a lot of things that appear to be impossible now might well become possible if there is hope that a true and real peace can be established.The policy paper was prepared by Israel Policy Forum, a nonpartisan American group that promotes sustained U.S. diplomacy to end the conflict between Israel and its neighbors. Next month's conference should reaffirm that the goal is two independent and sovereign states, with borders roughly along the lines that separated Israel from the Arabs before the 1967 Middle East war, the statement said. It also called for a just solution to refugee questions that recognizes the suffering and the plight of the Palestinian refugees. They would be permitted to move only to the new Palestinian state, with compensation from Israel, the Palestinian state and other nations.
Besides Pelletreau and Walker, the former U.S. diplomats included Thomas Pickering, an ex-undersecretary of state and ambassador to Israel and Jordan; Samuel Lewis, former ambassador to Israel; and Frederic C. Hof, Mideast official in the Pentagon. The report was written and coordinated primarily by Steven L. Spiegel, political science professor at the University of California, Los Angeles.
Rice has been meeting with former U.S. negotiators and ex-American diplomats, and has not replied to the policy paper, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Wednesday.
Iran summons French envoy over nuclear remarks by Farhad Pouladi Wed Oct 3, 8:58 AM ET
TEHRAN (AFP) - Iran on Wednesday summoned a top French diplomat to protest at remarks by Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner suggesting Tehran could be seeking the atomic bomb, state media reported.
French charge d'affaires Jean Graebling was summoned... to the foreign ministry to receive the protest and hear of the Islamic republic of Iran's dissatisfaction with France's recent positions and its negative tone, according to a ministry statement carried on state television's website.Since the election of President Nicolas Sarkozy, France has considerably toughened its position towards Iran, and called for new sanctions to oblige Tehran to suspend its uranium enrichment programme.Kouchner -- who caused a stir last month by saying the world must prepare for war with Iran -- told Europe 1 radio on Tuesday that nothing is more dangerous than the situation in Iran.
The Iranians must stop enriching uranium, because what they are doing encourages the experts to think they are possibly moving towards the atomic bomb and not the civil nuclear power to which they have absolute right.It is absolutely vital to have peace, he said. I did not call for war, I called for peace.Iran noted that France's stance was despite Tehran last month agreeing a timetable with the International Atomic Energy Agency for it to answer outstanding questions about its nuclear activities.Tehran said it was also strongly protesting at France's push for another UN Security resolution and encouraging European nations to impose additional sanctions on Iran, according to the foreign ministry statement.OPEC member Iran vehemently rejects charges it is seeking a nuclear weapon, saying the atomic drive is aimed solely at generating electricity for a growing population.Major world powers have agreed to wait for November reports by IAEA director Mohamed ElBaradei and EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana before deciding whether to push for a third round of sanctions against Tehran.The Security Council has already passed two resolutions imposing sanctions over Tehran's refusal to heed ultimatums to suspend uranium enrichment, a process which creates nuclear fuel but can be diverted to make the core of an atomic bomb.
ElBaradei said in an interview with the Financial Times on Wednesday that Iran must provide key details on its programme by late November or its unwillingness to work with the international community will backfire.He said the two key issues that required clarification had to do with Iran's research capabilities and its nuclear weaponisation capacity.I've told the Iranians: This is your litmus test. You committed yourself to come clean. If you don't, nobody will be able to come to your support.Iran's foreign ministry had also lashed out at France's stance last month, saying Paris was mimicking hawkish US policy and was being more American than the White House itself.President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has warned that France's attitude could hurt its economic interests in the country, with major companies including oil giant Total as well as carmakers Renault and Peugeot doing business in Iran.
The Sarkozy presidency has said it wants European firms not to bid for new business in Iran and for financial institutions to scale back investments, in drive to pressure Iran parallel to UN sanctions moves.Total had agreed in 2006 a major deal to exploit phase 11 of Iran's giant South Pars gas field to produce liquefied natural gas (LNG) for export but is still yet to execute the project. Iran has bluntly warned it will go ahead with Iranian firms alone if the deal is not swiftly implemented.
Iran-Syria sign billion dollar gas deal Thu Oct 4, 8:30 AM ET
TEHRAN (AFP) - Fellow US foes Iran and Syria have signed an agreement for Tehran to export a billion dollars worth of gas every year to its chief regional ally, Iranian state television reported on Thursday. Iranian caretaker Oil Minister Gholam Hossein Nozari and Syrian counterpart Sufian Allaw signed the memorandum of understanding in Tehran that will see Iran exporting three billion cubic metres (105 billion cubic feet) of natural gas annually to Syria.The agreement is the latest sign of the expanding political and economic ties between the two allies, which are both accused by the United States of fomenting the violence in Iraq, allegations that both deny.With the signing of these agreements, experts will start work to define the transit cost and examine the other aspects of the contract, said Nozari.
State television said that the exports are set to start in 2009 and will be worth one billion dollars to Iran annually.Nozari said the gas would be supplied to Syria via its northern neighbour Turkey, which already receives Iranian gas through a pipeline linking the northern city of Tabriz and Ankara.Iran has the world's second largest gas reserves after Russia but until now has remained a relatively minor player in the global export market. It also faces huge consumption demands from its growing population at home.The Islamic republic supplies several billion cubic metres of gas to Turkey annually and has signed a preliminary deal with Ankara for exporting gas into Europe, a move bitterly criticised by the United States.Supplies to Turkey have on occasion been hit by wrangling about price and quality, the high demand in Iran as well as sporadic attacks on the pipeline blamed on Kurdish militants.The gas deal is the latest example of the expanding cooperation between Iran and Syria, one of the very few Arab nations to back Tehran during its 1980-1988 war with Iraq.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Iran's Vice President Parviz Davoudi had earlier this year unveiled a joint car factory outside Damascus to produce 10,000 units of the new Sham car every year.
The two ministers meanwhile also spoke about constructing an oil refinery with a refining capacity of 140,000 barrels a day in Syria in cooperation with Iran and its chief Latin American ally Venezuela.
Russian dissident: Country effectively controlled by new KGB Chad Groening OneNewsNow.com October 4, 2007
A Russian-born author and political activist says virtually every aspect of Russian life is controlled by what used to be known as the KGB.Yuri Felshtinski was born in the Soviet Union. However, he and fellow dissident Alexander Litvinenko managed to escape to the West -- Felshtinski to the United States and Litvinenko to Great Britain. During 2001 and 2002 they collaborated on a book that would eventually be published with the title, Blowing Up Russia: The Secret Plot to Bring Back KGB Terror.Felshtinski says at the time no one wanted to accept what the book purported, that the dreaded KGB under the new name Federal Security Bureau (FSB) effectively controlled the country. Basically everybody who holds a significant position in Russia now belonged to KGB during the previous period of their lives, he says. Between 70 and 80 percent of major political and government positions, both on the regional level and on central level, are taken by the FSB. So they do control the country.
He says that back in 2000-2001 people did not see it this way, indeed. Now he states that it has become obvious how the government and FSB control everything in Russia -- from the economy, to all political activity, to all major TV channels and all major newspapers.Felshtinski says he is convinced that Russian President Vladimir Putin and the FSB were not happy with the revelations of the book, and were responsible for the radioactive poisoning that took the life of Litvinenko on November 1, 2006.
American Family News Network.
Russia warns of arms war in space: report
Wed Oct 3, 2007 3:35pm EDT
MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia's military space commander vowed to retaliate with an arms race if any country started putting weapon systems into orbit, he said in remarks published on Wednesday.We need to have strong rules about space, to avoid its militarization and if any country will place a weapon in space, then our response will be the same, Space Forces Commander Colonel-General Vladimir Popovkin told the newspaper Trud.Popovkin's remarks were the latest in a series of increasingly assertive statements from the Russian military, which is alarmed at what it sees as a growing hardware imbalance with the West.Stung by NATO expansion up to Russia's borders, President Vladimir Putin has given notice that Russia intends to pull out of a treaty limiting conventional forces in Europe.Tensions between Russia and Washington have deepened over U.S. plans to rekindle the stalled Star Wars program from the 1980s with a new generation of missile defense shields.
Popovkin said no country had the right to declare itself the master of space, so strike forces shouldn't be deployed there.He avoided naming names but his comments follow growing friction over space between Moscow, Washington and Beijing. Earlier this year China tested an anti-satellite missile and the U.S. has been developing weapons which can hit satellites.Russia has more than 60 military and dual-purpose satellites in orbit for communications and intelligence, Popovkin said.Russia's space forces have responsibility for military and dual-use spacecraft launch as well as helping defend the country from hostile intercontinental missile attacks.Although the forces were left blind in some areas after the break-up of the Soviet Union, they were now reorganized, Popovkin said.In 2009, we'll begin testing a new generation satellite. Already, Russia can detect any ballistic missile being launched from earth towards Russia, he said.
This Week with Rabbi Eckstein
October 5, 2007
Dear Friend of The Fellowship,
I want to share with you today news about an exciting new initiative from The Fellowship. Journey to Zion is a unique, weekly half-hour television teaching program that began airing nationwide last weekend. It is my hope that this show will help Christians grow in their faith as they learn about the Jewish roots of Christianity, and strengthen Christian-Jewish relations by teaching Christians about Jewish history, traditions, and culture. If the overwhelmingly positive response we received from the first airing of the show is an accurate indication of results, we are well on our way to making a significant difference in the lives of people across the country.We’ve tried hard to make Journey to Zion an educational, engaging, and spiritually uplifting experience. In each show, I teach before a live studio audience on a subject related to Jewish faith and observance and the Jewish roots of Christianity. Journey to Zion also features segments filmed on location in Israel, audience question and answer sessions, and explorations of current and historic events related to Israel and the Jewish people. Most shows also include a live performance of traditional Jewish music!
I encourage you to visit our website to learn more about Journey to Zion. There, you can find a station running the show in your area, and even view episodes online following their network broadcast. Please visit today and don’t forget to spread the word about Journey to Zion by using the forward to a friend feature on the page.My friends, we are living in exciting times. Christians and Jews are coming together in a spirit of cooperation and understanding that I have not seen in my lifetime. At the same time, Christians are rediscovering the Jewish roots of their faith. Our new television program is part of this coming together of God’s people, and I hope you’ll be a part of it! Please join us every week as we Journey to Zion.
LOOK UNDER LINKS RIGHT AFTER 7 YR TREATY AT BEGGINING OF LINKS TO SEE.
With prayers for shalom, peace,
Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein
President INTERNATIONAL FELLOWSHIP OF CHRISTIANS AND JEWS
David's Comment: Shalom, Shalom Jerusalem
Psalm 122:7 Shalom Shalom Jerusalem, peace be to you
When Messiah comes to take us May His peace be found in you
OUT OF ZION MINISTRY
Josie and I spent 3 days in Jerusalem to savour the celebration of Succot or the Feast of Tabernacles. We arrived on Friday in the midst of an incredible traffic jam caused by the combination of the last few hours of shopping time before the Sabbath, thousands of visitors who had driven up to be in Jerusalem for Succot. and 80,000 mourners attending the funeral of a famous 96 year old rabbi. As we attempted to drive to our hotel in East Jerusalem (which is still mainly populated by Muslim Arabs) the chaos was added to by the fact that it was Ramadan. The driving was even more hair-raising than usual in Israel. Then there was the incident of the very large, freaked out police horse charging out of control along the footpath, posing a danger to the humans in its path. Just another day in the City of the King !
As the Sabbath came in later that afternoon, the city became much more quiet and still until Saturday evening, when multitudes of cars, buses and people hit the streets once again. As frustrating and annoying as the hectic pace of Jerusalem can be, there is something about this city, like no other city. On Sunday night we attended the ICEJ Feast of Tabernacles evening celebration. One of the performers was a famous Israeli tenor, Dudu Fisher. He is an orthodox Jew with a passion for the God of Israel and for the nation of Israel, and of course for Jerusalem. Near the climax of his inspiring performance he began to talk about Jerusalem. He said there is no city like it. Other famous cities have had one song written about them, or perhaps 2 songs, maybe a few have had even 3 songs. But Jerusalem has had hundreds if not thousands of songs written about her.
Jerusalem has also endured a 3000 year history of grief, death and destruction. The City where Yeshua laid down His life for you and me, has been destroyed and raised more than 20 times. Millions have died in her streets over the last 3000 years. And many more may yet meet their end there, as the whole world is about to come against this extremely controversial city in a desparate bid to bring peace to the Middle East. Politicians are tripped up over her and much of the focus of the world's media is on Jerusalem.
Most people in the world today probably wish that Jerusalem did not exist - it would make the world a more simple and much better place to live - or so they think. And much of the professing Church of Yeshua ha Machiach either dont give care about Jerusalem or think the same as the secular world. But last nite in the Jerusalem Convention Centre, I saw 7000 Christians with a different spirit. I saw 7000 people from almost every nation, worshipping the God of Israel and His Son, only 1 or 2 kms from where He is about to set up His Holy Throne, from where the Lion of the Tribe of Judah will rule and reign for 1000 years. I saw the joy, and I saw the tears, as many peoples emotions ran high, seeing their dream of being in the City of the King come to pass. For everyone there, it was a Heavenly moment.
As each year passes, more and more Christians are having a personal Holy Spirit inspired revelation of the relevance of the restoration of Israel in 1948, and the re-unification of Jerusalem in 1967. The 7000 at the ICEJ celebration this year are only a small representation of Christians from their respective nations. For each one at the Feast this year, there are probably hundreds or even thousands who would be there if they could afford the airfare. If you ask any of the 7000 what it was like to be in the City of the King, their face will light up and they will say things like I feel I am home or this is the most awesome experience of my life or something similar.
Every Bible believing Christian should feel the same as these 7000. An unbiased reading of the Word cannot but impart to the reader that Son of God, Yeshua the Messiah is returning to Jerusalem to set up His Father's eternal Kingdom there in the undivided capital city of Israel. And that fact should cause everyone who is looking forward t doo His return, as we are told to do in 2 Peter 3:12, to be a non-compromising Zionist and as much a lover of Jerusalem as the 7000 who are rejoicing in at the Feast of Tabernacles this week. How can we not love Israel, Jerusalem and the Jewish people - because YHVH and Yeshua do, and because our future and destiny is in that city, and with the Jewish people. When not rejoicing, every Christian should be praying for Israel, Jerusalem and the Jewish people.
Alas, that is far from the situation today. So many Christians simply aren't interested and many even oppose the Jewish right to call Jerusalem their capital city. Most of the Christians who dont have a revelation of the strategic relevance of Israel to the re-establishment of YHVH's Kingdom are missing out on the most exciting, faith inspiring events, since the resurrection of Yeshua. Please remember to pray for pastors, leaders and all others who need to have this blindness lifted from them, so that one day they will find themselves standing in the Holy City singing ....
Shalom Shalom Jerusalem, peace be to you
When Messiah comes to take us May His peace be found in you
PLEASE NOTE: Make sure your local church is participating in the international Day of Prayer on October 7th. The Day of Prayer for the Peace of Jerusalem is NOT a single location event but rather a worldwide celebration with local churches and individual believers remembering to pray for Jerusalem in their Sunday services. While there will be a Jerusalem Celebration carried live on GOD TV around the world, the real thrust of the initiative is on the local level.
Please be sure that your church is participating! Resources, posters and prayer cards for your local church are available at http://www.daytopray.com/
The Lord bless you as you bless Israel by standing in defense of her right to exist on the land given to the Jewish people by the God of Israel . Lets pray that Israel will turn back to their God. Do not be silent, but share this with your fellow Christians, share it with your pastors, and with anyone you have a chance to speak to. Lets also pray for that breakthrough to the Muslims, and please remember to pray for our son Jordan, and all of his fellow soldiers in the IDF.
Shabbat Shalom ... David & Josie
Doubts Greet Evangelical Christians in Israel
Morning Edition: October 4, 2007
STEVE INSKEEP, host:
This week, Israelis have a close and sometimes uncomfortable look at some of their most important backers. Thousands of evangelical Christians are visiting to show support for the Jewish state.
NPR's Linda Gradstein explains why some Israelis are concerned.
(Soundbite of music)
LINDA GRADSTEIN: Waving flags, singing and dancing, thousands of evangelical Christian pilgrims in colorful costumes thronged the streets of Jerusalem this week. They marched as part of the city's traditional parade for the Jewish holiday of Sukkot. Although Israel's chief rabbis ruled that Jews should not attend the events, most of those watching said they either hadn't heard of the ruling or didn't care. Wearing large Styrofoam cowboy hats and beaming with joy, Sandy and Greg Cassee from Amarillo, Texas said this was their first visit to Israel.
Ms. SANDY CASSEE (Tourist): It's been a spiritual journey. This has been a quest. And to meet God's chosen people, to see where it all happened in the Bible to be here, and to be here with them and to praise and worship with them. Awesome.
GRADSTEIN: The Cassees are among the growing number of devout Protestants, many of them Americans, who fervently support Israel. For many Israelis, more used to sharp criticism of their country because of its occupation of the West Bank, this support is welcome. It's also lucrative. Over the past 20 years, evangelical Christians have contributed billions of dollars to Israel. They have given money directly to many of the Jewish settlements in the West Bank, building synagogues, schools and playgrounds there. This week's events included visits to the settlements. Leon Ferguson, an African-American from New York, wore a white skullcap and Jewish prayer shawl to the march, describing himself as a gentile with a Jewish heart. He was close to tears as he contemplated the possibility of an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank.
Mr. LEON FERGUSON (Tourist): The true and living God wants his people to be in an undivided Israel, undivided Jerusalem, and there should be no more give-backs. Every time we give back the land of Israel, something happens in the United States. Katrina followed the give-back of the Gaza.
GRADSTEIN: The fervor of these evangelicals worries many Israelis. Mina Fenton, a Jerusalem city councilwoman from the National Religious Party, says missionary activity has increased in recent years. But she says she is even more disturbed by the theology of many of the evangelical Christians who are waiting for the second coming of Christ.
Ms. MINA FENTON (City Councilwoman, Jerusalem, Israel): Everything is linked with the belief in their messiah. And they want, ultimately, any one of them, when you speak more than 10 minutes - after the support - the economical support and the political support - they say what their aim is: The Jewish people have to convert.
GRADSTEIN: Spokesmen for the organizers of this week's march, the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem, say that while spreading the gospel is part of the evangelical Christian faith, it is clearly discouraged here.
Gershom Gorenberg, who has written a book on Christian fundamentalism called The End of Days, says that many evangelical Christians do want Jews to convert to Christianity.
Mr. GERSHOM GORENBERG (Author, The End of Days): That vision is one in which the Jews eventually disappear. And if you say that at the end of days in the perfected world there aren't going to be any Jews, then what you're saying is that right now you don't accept the legitimacy of Judaism.
GRADSTEIN: But for the Christian pilgrims visiting Israel, and for the Israelis who came to greet them, the Christian economic and political support now is more important than any vague theological future. Linda Gradstein, NPR News, Jerusalem. 2007 National Public Radio®.
Sunday, October 07, 2007
Saturday, October 06, 2007
ARABS FLOCK TO JERUSALEM
STORMS HURRICANES-TORNADOES
LUKE 21:25-26
25 And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity;(MASS CONFUSION) the sea and the waves roaring;(FIERCE WINDS)
26 Men’s hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.
Tropical depression may form in U.S. Gulf or Atlantic Thu Oct 4, 10:28 AM ET
NEW YORK (Reuters) - A tropical or subtropical depression could form in the Gulf of Mexico or the western Atlantic over the next day or two, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said in a report.
The NHC will name the next two tropical storms Noel and Olga. Tropical storms pack winds of 39 to 73 miles per hour, while tropical depressions have winds below 39 mph.In the Gulf, a low-pressure system could become a tropical or subtropical depression as it moves northwest at about 10 mph.All of the weather models show the Gulf system will make landfall in Louisiana after crossing the oil and natural gas producing northern Gulf Coast over the next day or so.Forecaster AccuWeather said there is a chance the Gulf system could become a tropical or subtropical depression before it makes landfall over southern Louisiana by Thursday evening.
AccuWeather noted the system would likely not have time to develop into much of a tropical system.A subtropical system has high winds and thunderstorms near the outer edge of the system, while a tropical system has high winds and thunderstorms near the center.
Hence, the biggest damage caused by a tropical system is usually near the center of the storm, while in a subtropical system the most damage is closer to the outer edge of the storm.
BAHAMAS SYSTEM
In the Atlantic over portions of the Bahamas, winds were favorable for development of a tropical depression as it moved slowly westward, the NHC said.All of the weather models forecast the Bahamas system would move into the Gulf of Mexico through the Straits of Florida over the next few days.AccuWeather expects the Bahamas system to move westward through the Bahamas on Friday then over Cuba or through the Straits of Florida during the weekend before moving into the southeast Gulf of Mexico or perhaps northwest Caribbean by early next week.AccuWeather said there was some chance for tropical development with this system within the next few days.
OTHER SYSTEMS
Elsewhere in the Atlantic, the NHC expects winds over the next day or two to become less favorable for development of a low-pressure system associated with a tropical wave located about 1,150 miles east of the southern Windward Islands (Dominica, Martinique, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent, the Grenadines and Grenada).The weather models forecast the Windward system would approach the eastern Caribbean but turn toward the north before reaching the islands over the next five days.Finally, the NHC does not expect the remnants of Melissa to redevelop over the next day or two due to unfavorable winds.
Typhoon Lekima kills 12 in Southeast Asia Thu Oct 4, 2:31 AM ET
KY ANH, Vietnam (Reuters) - Typhoon Lekima lashed Vietnam and southern China with torrential rains and high winds, killing at least seven people, damaging hundreds of homes and disrupting air, sea and train travel, officials said on Thursday. The storm, which killed at least five people in the Philippines last weekend, swept into central Vietnam from the sea on Wednesday night, blowing roofs off houses, sinking scores of fishing vessels and grounding flights before moving to Laos.The typhoon raised rivers to dangerous levels in Ha Tinh and Quang Binh provinces, but the damage caused was not as serious as feared.Thanks to good preparatory work the damage from the storm is not large, Deputy Prime Minister Hoang Trung Hai, supervising the response to the storm, told Reuters TV in Ky Anh in Ha Tinh.Trees were felled and electricity cut off in the provinces of Nghe An and Ha Tinh where residents returned to clean up debris after evacuating on Wednesday.
A Vietnamese government report said many areas reported blackouts due to Lekima, the Vietnamese name of a local fruit.The national weather centre in Hanoi warned residents to take precautions against flash floods and landslides.It said the centre of the storm passed through Quang Binh, crossed Laos on Wednesday night and advanced into northern Thailand where it weakened into a depression.Vietnam is hit by up to 10 storms a year, causing millions of dollars in damage and sometimes killing hundreds of people.Lekima, the fifth storm of 2007, killed 7 people, while 3 others were missing, officials said.The storm hit China's beach resort of Sanya on Hainan island on Tuesday, trapping tourists and forcing the evacuation of 225,000 people. Vietnamese authorities evacuated tens of thousands of people before the storm hit.Three cargo vessels capsized while taking shelter at a port in Quang Binh, a Reuters reporter traveling in the region said.National carrier Vietnam Airlines and Pacific Airlines, the second-largest airliner, cancelled flights to the central cities of Vinh, Hue and Danang on Wednesday.The southern Chinese provinces of Guangdong and Guangxi were hit with heavy rain and strong winds.Most shipping and rail services linking Hainan with the mainland resumed late on Wednesday, Xinhua news agency said.(Additional reporting by Nguyen Van Vinh)
Flooding from Vietnam typhoon kills 14 By TRAN VAN MINH, Associated Press Writer OCT 5,07
HANOI, Vietnam - Downpours from a typhoon in coastal Vietnam unleashed flash floods across several mountainous regions, claiming the lives of 14 people. Officials said Friday the death toll from Typhoon Lekima, which now stands at 17, could climb further.Communications with some villages worst affected by the floods were disrupted and the death toll from the floods could rise, said provincial disaster official Nguyen Truong Son.With 80 mph winds, the typhoon made landfall late Wednesday in Ha Tinh and Quang Binh provinces, according to disaster officials and the Department of Floods and Storms Control.Lekima, named after a local fruit, has damaged about 77,000 homes, the Department of Floods and Storms Control said. The department set the initial damage estimate at $41 million.Vietnam is prone to floods and storms that kill hundreds of people each year.
DISEASES
REVELATION 6:7-8
7 And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, Come and see.
8 And I looked, and behold a pale horse:(CHLORES GREEN) and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword,(WEAPONS) and with hunger,(FAMINE) and with death,(INCURABLE DISEASES) and with the beasts of the earth.(ANIMAL TO HUMAN DISEASE).
Iraq struggles with cholera outbreak By KATARINA KRATOVAC, Associated Press Writer Fri Oct 5, 5:46 AM ET
BAGHDAD - Majida Hamid Ibrahim seemed no different from any other victim in Iraq — her body was put in a plastic bag and sent to the morgue for relatives to collect. But authorities were already bemoaning her death. Just days before, the 40-year-old woman from Baghdad's southern outskirts became the first confirmed cholera case in the Iraqi capital from an outbreak spreading around the country. The World Health Organization has confirmed more than 3,300 cholera cases in Iraq and at least 14 deaths from the acute and rapid dehydration it causes.The troubles, however, also point beyond the immediate struggle to control the deadly advance.They highlight the creeping fractures throughout the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, the country's deepening sectarian gulf and a gangland-style lawlessness in which even medical supplies are fair game for bandits.
The health minister, Ali al-Shemari, fled the country after U.S. forces raided offices in February and arrested his deputy, accused of diverting millions of dollars to the biggest Shiite militia and of allowing death squads' use of ambulances and hospitals to carry out kidnappings and killings.The government official overseeing Iraqis living abroad was brought in as acting health minister in al-Maliki's shaky Cabinet — which was further jolted by the walkout of six Sunni ministers in August.Hospitals also are divided along Iraq's sectarian split, with Shiites and Sunnis often too scared to venture into any facility controlled by the other. For health workers, this leaves worrying gaps with cholera cases now reaching half of Iraq's 18 provinces.The main hospital in Baqouba — the city al-Qaida in Iraq earlier this year claimed as its base in the Diyala province — was twice overrun by Sunni gunmen who kidnapped some of the Shiite patients, said a provincial health official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of fears for his safety.
Fourteen Baqouba physicians and five ambulance drivers have been killed and 12 doctors kidnapped since Diyala fighting escalated earlier this year. Gunmen often steal medical equipment and medicine from health centers and force pharmacists to give up their supplies, the official said.Saeed al-Shimary recounted how four months ago, as he lay sick in the Baqouba hospital, gunmen fatally shot a hospital guard and took several patients away, including his relative.I was horrified, said al-Shimary, a teacher. The relative's body was found days later, dumped by a road.The bad security situation ... is preventing medical teams from reaching the residents, said Hom Suhail al-Khishali, head of the Diyala health department.WHO has confirmed at least 3,315 cholera cases and registered more than 30,000 cases of acute watery diarrhea — which could also prove to be cholera in its more common, milder form. The group has also warned that — as the weather cools and temperatures become more favorable for transmission — the bacteria could spread further.
Dr. Naeema al-Gasseer, the WHO representative in Iraq, says the grim numbers fuel the panic, when in fact the death rate has been very much less than 1 percent of the total outbreak.Let's not focus on numbers, that's not the way to deal with cholera, she said. We must look at ways to contain it.Cholera, usually spread by drinking contaminated water, typically causes severe diarrhea that in extreme cases can lead to fatal dehydration and kidney failure. There are normally about 30 cases registered each year in Iraq. The last major outbreak was in 1999, when 20 cases were discovered in one day.Cholera can be controlled by treating drinking water with chlorine. But authorities want to keep tight controls on chlorine supplies after extremists earlier this year placed chlorine tanks on suicide truck bombs, killing some two dozen people in several attacks and sending noxious clouds that left hundreds of panicked people gasping for breath.
A shipment of 100,000 tons of chlorine was held up for a week at the Jordanian border last month, amid fears for its safe passage through Iraq. Naeem al-Qabi, from Baghdad's municipal council, said the city now has a two month's supply of chlorine and more shipments are expected.A July report by the relief agency Oxfam and the NGO Coordination Committee network in Iraq said that about 70 percent of Iraqis are without adequate water supplies, up from 50 percent in 2003. That includes more than 2 million people who have been displaced inside Iraq by the fighting, which has forced many to live in unsanitary conditions where sewage can infest food and water and easily spread cholera. Tom Timberman, leader of a reconstruction team with the 4th Brigade, 25th infantry Division, said water purification and canal clearing systems have broken down due to a lack of maintenance and replacement parts. Many purification plant workers have been killed or fled the violence, leaving the area with a lack of expertise, Timberman said. Tests at one of the water purification facilities near Iskandariyah, a town 30 miles south of Baghdad, found the filtration system wasn't working, so dirty water was just passing through the pipes.
In Mosul, about 225 miles northwest of Baghdad, officials complain that Baghdad sent them 20 tons of chlorine, while the city needs about 60 tons. Now we fear cholera more than the violence, said Shawan Karim, 33, a resident in the northern city of Kirkuk, which has accounted for more than two-thirds of the confirmed cholera cases. Associated Press writers Sameer N. Yacoub, Kim Gamel, Saad Abdul-Kadir and Yahya Barzanji contributed to this story.
REVELATION 13:16-18
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
PREMEDITATED MERGER
Amero coming within decade - Strategist expects currency changes as Canadian dollar matches greenback October 5, 2007
1:00 a.m. Eastern - By Jerome R. Corsi - 2007 WorldNetDaily.com
A commemorative amero coin
BankIntroductions.com, a Canadian company that specializes in global banking strategies and currency consulting, is advising clients that the amero may be the currency of North America within the next 10 years. The amero would compete against other regional currency blocks, BankIntroductions.com says. At present, with the Canadian dollar approaching par, more talk for an amero currency unit will become popular in Canada.The company says that with the successful implementation of NAFTA, the one dragging component for the amero will be Mexico, but in time this will change.
Implementation of the amero currency may actually give Mexico an economic boost, thus helping to alleviate Mexican immigration pressures into the United States for those Mexicans seeking financial gain, BankIntroductions.com advises. The amero one day may well be circulating throughout North America.Matt Bell, president of BankIntroductions.com, told WND in an e-mail to feel free to quote our currency research on Canada. Our general opinion on the amero stands as stated.As WND reported, coin designer Daniel Carr has issued for sale a series of private-issue fantasy pattern amero coins that have drawn attention on the Internet.
WND also reported the African Union is moving down the path of regional economic integration, with the African Central Bank planning to create the Gold Mandela as a single African continental currency by 2010. The Council on Foreign Relations also has supported regional and global currencies designed to replace nationally issued currencies. In an article in the May/June issue of Foreign Affairs, entitled The End of National Currency, CFR economist Benn Steil asserted the dollar is a temporary currency. Steil concluded countries should abandon monetary nationalism, moving to adopt regional currencies, on the road to a global one world currency.WND previously reported Steve Previs, a vice president at Jeffries International Ltd. in London, said the amero is the proposed new currency for the North American Community which is being developed right now between Canada, the U.S., and Mexico. A video clip of the CNBC interview in November with Jeffries is now available at YouTube.com. WND also has reported a continued slide in the value of the dollar on world currency markets could set up conditions in which the adoption of the amero as a North American currency gains momentum.
MUSLIM NATIONS
EZEKIEL 38:1-12
1 And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,
2 Son of man, set thy face against Gog,(RULER) the land of Magog,(RUSSIA) the chief prince of Meshech(MOSCOW)and Tubal,(TOBOLSK) and prophesy against him,
3 And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech(MOSCOW) and Tubal:
4 And I will turn thee back, and put hooks into thy jaws,(GOD FORCES THE 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:(SUDAN,AFRICA) and many people with thee.
7 Be thou prepared, and prepare for thyself, thou, and all thy company that are assembled unto thee, and be thou a guard unto them.
8 After many days thou shalt be visited: in the latter years thou shalt come into the land that is brought back from the sword, and is gathered out of many people, against the mountains of Israel, which have been always waste: but it is brought forth out of the nations, and they shall dwell safely all of them.
9 Thou shalt ascend and come like a storm, thou shalt be like a cloud to cover the land, thou, and all thy bands, and many people with thee.(RUSSIA-EGYPT AND MUSLIMS)
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, 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.
ISAIAH 17:1
1 The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap.
PSALMS 83:3-7
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 have consulted together with one consent: they are confederate against thee:(TREATIES)
6 The tabernacles of Edom,and the Ishmaelites;(ARABS) of Moab, and the Hagarenes;
7 Gebal, and Ammon,(JORDAN) and Amalek;(SYRIA) the Philistines (PALESTINIANS) with the inhabitants of Tyre;(LEBANON)
EZEKIEL 39:1-8
1 Therefore, thou son of man, prophesy against Gog,(LEADER OF RUSSIA) and say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech (MOSCOW) and Tubal: (TUBOLSK)
2 And I will turn thee back, and leave but the sixth part of thee, 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 BOMB) and among them that dwell carelessly in the isles: and they shall know that I am the LORD.
7 So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, the Holy One in Israel.
8 Behold, it is come, and it is done, saith the Lord GOD; this is the day whereof I have spoken.
JOEL 2:3,20,30-31
3 A fire(NUCLEAR BOMB) devoureth before them;(RUSSIA-ARABS) and behind them a flame burneth: the land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea, and nothing shall escape them.
20 But I will remove far off from you the northern army,(RUSSIA,MUSLIMS) and will drive him into a land barren and desolate, with his face toward the east sea, and his hinder part toward the utmost sea, and his stink shall come up, and his ill savour shall come up, because he hath done great things.(SIBERIAN DESERT)
30 And I will shew wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke.(NUCLEAR BOMB)
31 The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the LORD come.
Iran accuses Israel of Palestinian genocide By Reza Derakhshi Fri Oct 5, 6:57 AM ET
TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran's president accused Israel on Friday of using the Holocaust as a pretext for genocide against Palestinians. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who outraged the West in 2005 by calling Israel a tumor to be wiped off the map, said the truth should be told about World War Two and the Holocaust.
Six million Jews were killed in the Nazi genocide.
Iran condemns fabricating such a pretext (the Holocaust) for the Zionist regime to commit genocide against the Palestinian nation and occupy Palestine, Ahmadinejad said in a live broadcast to mark the annual Al-Quds (Jerusalem) Day in the Islamic Republic.The Iranian nation and countries in the region will not rest until Palestine is free and criminals punished, he said in the speech before Friday prayers.Ahmadinejad has questioned the Holocaust but denied during a visit last month to the United States he was saying it never happened, only that the Palestinian issue was entirely separate.Opposition to Israel is one of the cornerstones of belief of Shi'ite Iran, which backs Palestinian and Lebanese Islamic militant groups opposed to peace with the Jewish state.
Ahmadinejad repeated calls for Canada to accept Jews.
Europeans cannot tolerate the Zionist regime's presence in their own region but want to impose it on the Middle East. Give them (the Jews) this vast land of Canada and Alaska to build themselves a home and resettle there, he said.Al-Quds Day was inaugurated by Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution founder Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. It is held on the last Friday of the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan.Tens of thousands marched in a rally to mark the day, including soldiers, students and clerics. Black-clad women with small children clutching balloons emblazoned Death to Israel were among those flocking the streets of central Tehran.Death to America, Death to Israel, chanted the marchers, many carrying portraits of Khomeini and his successor Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
MILITIA MARCH
Volunteer Basij militia, covering their faces with Palestinian headscarves, marched while roaring Hezbollah fights, Israel trembles -- referring to the Lebanese Shi'ite Muslim group Israel fought a war against last year.We came here to show our support to the Palestinian nation and their resistance, said retired teacher Abdollah Hassani, 58, who joined the rally with his wife, carrying a sign reading Israel must be obliterated.State television showed footage of similar marches, held in cities across Iran on Al-Quds Day. Demonstrators in Tehran burned flags of the United States and Israel, which Iran refuses to recognize.The United States and Israel accuse Iran of interference in Iraq, through backing Shi'ite militias, and of sponsoring terrorism, including the Palestinian group Hamas and Hezbollah. Tehran denies the charges.
The United States and Iran, who have not had diplomatic ties since shortly after Iran's revolution, are also embroiled in a deepening rift over Tehran's nuclear ambitions. Ahmadinejad said Iran would continue its nuclear program despite international pressure, adding Iran wants to remove international concerns over its atomic work through talks.But if they (the West) want to start a new game it will have no result for them but regret, he said. Six world powers agreed last Friday to delay toughening U.N. sanctions against Tehran over its nuclear program until November at the earliest to wait for reports by U.N. nuclear watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei and European Union negotiator Javier Solana.
The U.N. Security Council has imposed two sanctions resolutions on Iran after it failed to suspend sensitive activities such as uranium enrichment.
Hard times fall on storied West Bank city by Joseph Krauss
OCT 5,07
NABLUS, West Bank (AFP) - A walk through the ancient streets of the West Bank City of Nablus offers a rare glimpse into the Asiatic opulence that once adorned cities across the caravan routes of the Middle East. But what was once a major Palestinian tourist and commercial centre has since the outbreak of the intifada in 2000 wilted in the face of checkpoints and near-daily Israeli military incursions.They call this the economic capital of Palestine but these days it is the capital of the unemployed, says Bilal Hamouda, a merchant in the ancient quarter.Having seen some of the uprising's fiercest battles, the Old City of Nablus has been transformed into a crude memorial to local fighters, its limestone walls covered with blast stains, militia graffiti and martyrs' posters.Seven years on, the situation remains tense, and the Israeli military has sharply limited movement into and out of the city, leaving merchants like Hamouda with lots of time to share local lore with visitors.Nablus is the oldest city in the world. When it was founded in 2,500 B.C. they called it Shechem, which means two shoulders, he says, as he leans back in a plastic chair across the street from his shop.Then the Romans renamed it Neopolis, or 'New City' -- the source of the modern name, Hamouda says in halting, practiced English.It's also known as Jebel al-Nar -- Arabic for 'Fire Mountain' -- after a legend that the town repelled Napoleon's armies by lighting a bonfire and frightening packs of wild animals into attacking the French cavalry.
Others call Nablus Little Damascus because of its underground springs and its Turkish-style Old City, a labyrinth of meandering walkways, stone arches, and covered markets.The Israelis still call it Shechem, referring to the two peaks that guard approaches to the city, from which the army now looks down on what it considers to be the most volatile town in the West Bank.The Israeli military says its troops have discovered 10 bomb factories in Nablus this year alone, and that 117 of the 187 potential suicide bombers arrested in the West Bank in 2006 originated there.
In one of its regular incursions, the army carried out in early September a massive three-day operation in a refugee camp in the heart of the city, arresting 49 alleged militants from different Palestinian factions and destroying several houses.In the wake of the Islamist Hamas movement's violent takeover of the Gaza Strip, Israel and the West have vowed to improve daily life in the West Bank, still ruled by president Mahmud Abbas and the secular Palestinian Authority.
But Nablus -- with more than 130,000 residents -- remains under siege, with all traffic into or out of town having to pass through two checkpoints, and most vehicles banned from entering or exiting at all.It is supposed to be the economic centre of Palestine, but we have the worst economy in the West Bank, even worse than Gaza, says Majdi Abu Salha, who sells the sweet Nablus knafe pastries famous across the West Bank.In the Old City, which once thrived on Arab tourists from across Israel and the Palestinian territories, many merchants are struggling to stay in business.The economic situation is tied to the tourism market, and that has stopped because of the closures, says Yusef al-Jabr, owner of one of Nablus's last functioning Turkish bathhouses.The entrance, tucked away in the heart of the Old City, opens into a series of vaulted chambers with scattered stained-glass windows and marble floors heated by hot subterranean springs, a rare surviving relic of Ottoman luxury.Turkish baths, part of an ancient spa tradition handed down from Greece and Rome, can still be found in old cities across the Middle East and North Africa. But in Nablus, the baths are facing extinction. Jabr says his bathhouse is around 450-500 years old, but people still refer to it as the new bathhouse because the city once had far older ones. In 2002 the main steam room was struck by an Israeli missile. Jabr was able to repair the damage with some help from a brother living in the United Arab Emirates, but now he worries the bath's days are numbered.
I'm trying to preserve our heritage here but it is very hard, Jabr says. The people come, but just to look. They don't use the baths and so I hardly have any income. I would make more if I turned it into a more touristy place, like a restaurant.When Israel occupied the West Bank in 1967 there were nine bathhouses in the city, but since then most have been destroyed or transformed into other things. A few alleys down from Jabr's bathhouse another doorway opens into a vaulted chamber, its dry central fountain now surrounded by a handful of simple machines, all of them idle. The owner, Hamed Herzullah, converted the baths into a family-run candy factory decades ago, but now even he is feeling the crunch.
We used to have 20 employees working all day every day. Now it's just me and my family, and we only work two or three hours a day, he says. Behind him sits a table with stacks of tiny boxes, all filled with sweet powdered sugar-coated loukoum, or Turkish Delight. When they have money the people come and buy, but not now, Herzullah says. It's (the Muslim holy month of) Ramadan, so business should be good. But the families around here are struggling to buy bread -- not sweets.
Bush says very optimistic on Mideast peace Fri Oct 5, 9:31 AM ET
DUBAI (Reuters) - President George W. Bush said in comments aired on Friday he was very optimistic a Palestinian state could be set up alongside Israel and that next month's Middle East conference could lead towards peace in the region. The U.S.-sponsored conference is due to take place in the Washington area in mid to late November, although there are doubts over how far it will go towards ending decades of conflict and uncertainty over which Arab states will attend.I am very optimistic that we can achieve a two-state solution, Bush said in comments on Al Arabiya television that were dubbed in Arabic.We will host the international peace conference and it will be attended by the interested parties and a delegation from the Arab League and it is an opportunity for serious ... discussions over the road forward to lead to a two-state solution and efforts will be made to reach this objective, Bush said.
I want to affirm that the two-state solution is part of a comprehensive peace in the Middle East and that our strategy is for all parties to attend at the table for the sake of a comprehensive peace. We want to push this issue.Israeli and Palestinian leaders agreed on Wednesday that formal negotiations on Palestinian statehood would begin after the peace conference.
But Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has balked at Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's call for setting a specific timeframe for the resolution of key issues including borders and the fate of Jerusalem and the Palestinian refugees.Abbas said on Thursday that formal negotiations for statehood could be completed six months after the conference.There is a lot of dialogue between the two men and I believe the Palestinians and the Israelis have realized that there is a vision that is worth working to achieve, Bush said.
ARAB DOUBTS
Aside from the Israel and the Palestinians, the United States would like key Arab states to attend the conference but is unclear how many will.Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has said Damascus would not join unless the agenda also includes the Golan Heights, captured by Israel from Syria in the 1967 war at the same time as the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza.U.S.-ally Saudi Arabia, driving force behind an Arab peace proposal relaunched earlier this year, has also indicated it would not attend unless the conference addresses core issues.The peace conference is part of a U.S.-led effort to bolster Abbas and his West Bank-based government and to isolate Islamist group Hamas, which seized control of the Gaza Strip in June.Hamas, which has carried out dozens of suicide and rocket attacks on Israel, has rejected the conference.No one wants the establishment of a state that will be a launch pad for attacks on others, Bush said.We must support the Palestinian security forces, help President Abbas and offer him financial support so that Palestinian citizens can be assured that the life that lies ahead of them is better.
Palestinians flock to Jerusalem to pray By KARIN LAUB, Associated Press Writer OCT 5,07
QALANDIA CHECKPOINT, West Bank - Thousands of Palestinians thronged military checkpoints on the outskirts of Jerusalem on Friday, trying to reach a major Muslim shrine in the city for Ramadan prayers despite an Israeli army closure. Israeli troops in jeeps, on foot and horseback were deployed at crossings from the West Bank into Jerusalem to control the crowds trying to get to the Al Aqsa Mosque, Islam's third-holiest site, before the Muslim holy month of Ramadan draws to a close next week.At the Qalandia checkpoint north of Jerusalem, harried troops waved clubs, shouted and occasionally used stun grenades as tempers flared and frustrated Palestinians surged toward the roadblock. One elderly man fainted, and was treated by an army medic. No serious injuries were reported.Friday prayers at Al Aqsa regularly draw thousands of worshippers, and crowds are bigger than usual during Ramadan. Around 135,000 filled the mosque compound in Jerusalem's Old City on Friday, and prayers ended with no disturbances, police said.
Israel clamped a closure on the West Bank last week, barring Palestinians from entering Israel, citing concern of possible attacks during the seven-day Jewish festival of Sukkot. The festival ended Thursday, but the closure was slated to end Saturday night, the military said.Despite the closure, Israeli police had orders to let in West Bank men over the age of 50 and women over 40, Israeli police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said. More than 3,000 Israeli police were stationed around Jerusalem's Old City to keep order during the prayers, he said.At Qalandia, north of Jerusalem, hundreds of Palestinians, most of them elderly, pushed toward troops controlling access to the passage and argued with police checking ID cards.Maher Walweil, 43, said he left his home in the West Bank city of Nablus at 4 a.m. to get to Jerusalem in time for prayers — even though he knew the Israeli age restrictions left him little chance of getting in.There's a lot of soldiers here. What am I going to do against these soldiers? he said.In Iran, meanwhile, millions attended nationwide rallies Friday in support of the Palestinians and to protest Israel's continued hold on Jerusalem.The demonstrations for Al-Quds Day — Al-Quds is the Arabic name for Jerusalem — also spilled over into anti-American protests because of U.S. support for Israel. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Israel's continued existence was an insult to human dignity.In Afghanistan, hundreds of Kabul University students marched in a Jerusalem Day demonstration there, burning effigies of President Bush and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.A possible division of Jerusalem, a city claimed by Israelis and Palestinians as a capital, is one of the key issues in a future peace agreement.Ahead of a U.S.-hosted Mideast conference, to be held later this fall, Israeli and Palestinian drafting teams are to write a joint document with principles guiding future negotiations.The document would address the so-called core issues, including the fate of Jerusalem, but not provide detailed solution, Palestinian negotiators have said.
Palestinian leaders want the conference to set a six-month deadline for negotiating a permanent Israeli-Palestinian peace treaty with Israel, Palestinian information minister Riad Malki said Thursday. Israeli and U.S. officials were cool to the idea of locking talks into a timeline.Malki said the conference is expected to back the declaration, and said the sides should then move swiftly to finalize the details. After six months of negotiations, all the participants would return to a peace conference, to endorse our agreement with Israel, he said of the Palestinian proposal. David Baker, an Israeli government official, said Israel is serious about negotiating a deal, but that this is not merely a product of how much time elapses.A Western diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to publicly discuss the conference, said the U.S. is not looking at timelines.The U.S. has not yet set a date for the conference or released a list of participants. The Israeli daily Haaretz on Friday quoted Israeli officials as saying it would take place Nov. 26. Palestinian officials said they were unaware of a date, but were told the conference would not be held before Nov. 22.
LUKE 21:25-26
25 And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity;(MASS CONFUSION) the sea and the waves roaring;(FIERCE WINDS)
26 Men’s hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.
Tropical depression may form in U.S. Gulf or Atlantic Thu Oct 4, 10:28 AM ET
NEW YORK (Reuters) - A tropical or subtropical depression could form in the Gulf of Mexico or the western Atlantic over the next day or two, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said in a report.
The NHC will name the next two tropical storms Noel and Olga. Tropical storms pack winds of 39 to 73 miles per hour, while tropical depressions have winds below 39 mph.In the Gulf, a low-pressure system could become a tropical or subtropical depression as it moves northwest at about 10 mph.All of the weather models show the Gulf system will make landfall in Louisiana after crossing the oil and natural gas producing northern Gulf Coast over the next day or so.Forecaster AccuWeather said there is a chance the Gulf system could become a tropical or subtropical depression before it makes landfall over southern Louisiana by Thursday evening.
AccuWeather noted the system would likely not have time to develop into much of a tropical system.A subtropical system has high winds and thunderstorms near the outer edge of the system, while a tropical system has high winds and thunderstorms near the center.
Hence, the biggest damage caused by a tropical system is usually near the center of the storm, while in a subtropical system the most damage is closer to the outer edge of the storm.
BAHAMAS SYSTEM
In the Atlantic over portions of the Bahamas, winds were favorable for development of a tropical depression as it moved slowly westward, the NHC said.All of the weather models forecast the Bahamas system would move into the Gulf of Mexico through the Straits of Florida over the next few days.AccuWeather expects the Bahamas system to move westward through the Bahamas on Friday then over Cuba or through the Straits of Florida during the weekend before moving into the southeast Gulf of Mexico or perhaps northwest Caribbean by early next week.AccuWeather said there was some chance for tropical development with this system within the next few days.
OTHER SYSTEMS
Elsewhere in the Atlantic, the NHC expects winds over the next day or two to become less favorable for development of a low-pressure system associated with a tropical wave located about 1,150 miles east of the southern Windward Islands (Dominica, Martinique, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent, the Grenadines and Grenada).The weather models forecast the Windward system would approach the eastern Caribbean but turn toward the north before reaching the islands over the next five days.Finally, the NHC does not expect the remnants of Melissa to redevelop over the next day or two due to unfavorable winds.
Typhoon Lekima kills 12 in Southeast Asia Thu Oct 4, 2:31 AM ET
KY ANH, Vietnam (Reuters) - Typhoon Lekima lashed Vietnam and southern China with torrential rains and high winds, killing at least seven people, damaging hundreds of homes and disrupting air, sea and train travel, officials said on Thursday. The storm, which killed at least five people in the Philippines last weekend, swept into central Vietnam from the sea on Wednesday night, blowing roofs off houses, sinking scores of fishing vessels and grounding flights before moving to Laos.The typhoon raised rivers to dangerous levels in Ha Tinh and Quang Binh provinces, but the damage caused was not as serious as feared.Thanks to good preparatory work the damage from the storm is not large, Deputy Prime Minister Hoang Trung Hai, supervising the response to the storm, told Reuters TV in Ky Anh in Ha Tinh.Trees were felled and electricity cut off in the provinces of Nghe An and Ha Tinh where residents returned to clean up debris after evacuating on Wednesday.
A Vietnamese government report said many areas reported blackouts due to Lekima, the Vietnamese name of a local fruit.The national weather centre in Hanoi warned residents to take precautions against flash floods and landslides.It said the centre of the storm passed through Quang Binh, crossed Laos on Wednesday night and advanced into northern Thailand where it weakened into a depression.Vietnam is hit by up to 10 storms a year, causing millions of dollars in damage and sometimes killing hundreds of people.Lekima, the fifth storm of 2007, killed 7 people, while 3 others were missing, officials said.The storm hit China's beach resort of Sanya on Hainan island on Tuesday, trapping tourists and forcing the evacuation of 225,000 people. Vietnamese authorities evacuated tens of thousands of people before the storm hit.Three cargo vessels capsized while taking shelter at a port in Quang Binh, a Reuters reporter traveling in the region said.National carrier Vietnam Airlines and Pacific Airlines, the second-largest airliner, cancelled flights to the central cities of Vinh, Hue and Danang on Wednesday.The southern Chinese provinces of Guangdong and Guangxi were hit with heavy rain and strong winds.Most shipping and rail services linking Hainan with the mainland resumed late on Wednesday, Xinhua news agency said.(Additional reporting by Nguyen Van Vinh)
Flooding from Vietnam typhoon kills 14 By TRAN VAN MINH, Associated Press Writer OCT 5,07
HANOI, Vietnam - Downpours from a typhoon in coastal Vietnam unleashed flash floods across several mountainous regions, claiming the lives of 14 people. Officials said Friday the death toll from Typhoon Lekima, which now stands at 17, could climb further.Communications with some villages worst affected by the floods were disrupted and the death toll from the floods could rise, said provincial disaster official Nguyen Truong Son.With 80 mph winds, the typhoon made landfall late Wednesday in Ha Tinh and Quang Binh provinces, according to disaster officials and the Department of Floods and Storms Control.Lekima, named after a local fruit, has damaged about 77,000 homes, the Department of Floods and Storms Control said. The department set the initial damage estimate at $41 million.Vietnam is prone to floods and storms that kill hundreds of people each year.
DISEASES
REVELATION 6:7-8
7 And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, Come and see.
8 And I looked, and behold a pale horse:(CHLORES GREEN) and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with sword,(WEAPONS) and with hunger,(FAMINE) and with death,(INCURABLE DISEASES) and with the beasts of the earth.(ANIMAL TO HUMAN DISEASE).
Iraq struggles with cholera outbreak By KATARINA KRATOVAC, Associated Press Writer Fri Oct 5, 5:46 AM ET
BAGHDAD - Majida Hamid Ibrahim seemed no different from any other victim in Iraq — her body was put in a plastic bag and sent to the morgue for relatives to collect. But authorities were already bemoaning her death. Just days before, the 40-year-old woman from Baghdad's southern outskirts became the first confirmed cholera case in the Iraqi capital from an outbreak spreading around the country. The World Health Organization has confirmed more than 3,300 cholera cases in Iraq and at least 14 deaths from the acute and rapid dehydration it causes.The troubles, however, also point beyond the immediate struggle to control the deadly advance.They highlight the creeping fractures throughout the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, the country's deepening sectarian gulf and a gangland-style lawlessness in which even medical supplies are fair game for bandits.
The health minister, Ali al-Shemari, fled the country after U.S. forces raided offices in February and arrested his deputy, accused of diverting millions of dollars to the biggest Shiite militia and of allowing death squads' use of ambulances and hospitals to carry out kidnappings and killings.The government official overseeing Iraqis living abroad was brought in as acting health minister in al-Maliki's shaky Cabinet — which was further jolted by the walkout of six Sunni ministers in August.Hospitals also are divided along Iraq's sectarian split, with Shiites and Sunnis often too scared to venture into any facility controlled by the other. For health workers, this leaves worrying gaps with cholera cases now reaching half of Iraq's 18 provinces.The main hospital in Baqouba — the city al-Qaida in Iraq earlier this year claimed as its base in the Diyala province — was twice overrun by Sunni gunmen who kidnapped some of the Shiite patients, said a provincial health official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of fears for his safety.
Fourteen Baqouba physicians and five ambulance drivers have been killed and 12 doctors kidnapped since Diyala fighting escalated earlier this year. Gunmen often steal medical equipment and medicine from health centers and force pharmacists to give up their supplies, the official said.Saeed al-Shimary recounted how four months ago, as he lay sick in the Baqouba hospital, gunmen fatally shot a hospital guard and took several patients away, including his relative.I was horrified, said al-Shimary, a teacher. The relative's body was found days later, dumped by a road.The bad security situation ... is preventing medical teams from reaching the residents, said Hom Suhail al-Khishali, head of the Diyala health department.WHO has confirmed at least 3,315 cholera cases and registered more than 30,000 cases of acute watery diarrhea — which could also prove to be cholera in its more common, milder form. The group has also warned that — as the weather cools and temperatures become more favorable for transmission — the bacteria could spread further.
Dr. Naeema al-Gasseer, the WHO representative in Iraq, says the grim numbers fuel the panic, when in fact the death rate has been very much less than 1 percent of the total outbreak.Let's not focus on numbers, that's not the way to deal with cholera, she said. We must look at ways to contain it.Cholera, usually spread by drinking contaminated water, typically causes severe diarrhea that in extreme cases can lead to fatal dehydration and kidney failure. There are normally about 30 cases registered each year in Iraq. The last major outbreak was in 1999, when 20 cases were discovered in one day.Cholera can be controlled by treating drinking water with chlorine. But authorities want to keep tight controls on chlorine supplies after extremists earlier this year placed chlorine tanks on suicide truck bombs, killing some two dozen people in several attacks and sending noxious clouds that left hundreds of panicked people gasping for breath.
A shipment of 100,000 tons of chlorine was held up for a week at the Jordanian border last month, amid fears for its safe passage through Iraq. Naeem al-Qabi, from Baghdad's municipal council, said the city now has a two month's supply of chlorine and more shipments are expected.A July report by the relief agency Oxfam and the NGO Coordination Committee network in Iraq said that about 70 percent of Iraqis are without adequate water supplies, up from 50 percent in 2003. That includes more than 2 million people who have been displaced inside Iraq by the fighting, which has forced many to live in unsanitary conditions where sewage can infest food and water and easily spread cholera. Tom Timberman, leader of a reconstruction team with the 4th Brigade, 25th infantry Division, said water purification and canal clearing systems have broken down due to a lack of maintenance and replacement parts. Many purification plant workers have been killed or fled the violence, leaving the area with a lack of expertise, Timberman said. Tests at one of the water purification facilities near Iskandariyah, a town 30 miles south of Baghdad, found the filtration system wasn't working, so dirty water was just passing through the pipes.
In Mosul, about 225 miles northwest of Baghdad, officials complain that Baghdad sent them 20 tons of chlorine, while the city needs about 60 tons. Now we fear cholera more than the violence, said Shawan Karim, 33, a resident in the northern city of Kirkuk, which has accounted for more than two-thirds of the confirmed cholera cases. Associated Press writers Sameer N. Yacoub, Kim Gamel, Saad Abdul-Kadir and Yahya Barzanji contributed to this story.
REVELATION 13:16-18
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
PREMEDITATED MERGER
Amero coming within decade - Strategist expects currency changes as Canadian dollar matches greenback October 5, 2007
1:00 a.m. Eastern - By Jerome R. Corsi - 2007 WorldNetDaily.com
A commemorative amero coin
BankIntroductions.com, a Canadian company that specializes in global banking strategies and currency consulting, is advising clients that the amero may be the currency of North America within the next 10 years. The amero would compete against other regional currency blocks, BankIntroductions.com says. At present, with the Canadian dollar approaching par, more talk for an amero currency unit will become popular in Canada.The company says that with the successful implementation of NAFTA, the one dragging component for the amero will be Mexico, but in time this will change.
Implementation of the amero currency may actually give Mexico an economic boost, thus helping to alleviate Mexican immigration pressures into the United States for those Mexicans seeking financial gain, BankIntroductions.com advises. The amero one day may well be circulating throughout North America.Matt Bell, president of BankIntroductions.com, told WND in an e-mail to feel free to quote our currency research on Canada. Our general opinion on the amero stands as stated.As WND reported, coin designer Daniel Carr has issued for sale a series of private-issue fantasy pattern amero coins that have drawn attention on the Internet.
WND also reported the African Union is moving down the path of regional economic integration, with the African Central Bank planning to create the Gold Mandela as a single African continental currency by 2010. The Council on Foreign Relations also has supported regional and global currencies designed to replace nationally issued currencies. In an article in the May/June issue of Foreign Affairs, entitled The End of National Currency, CFR economist Benn Steil asserted the dollar is a temporary currency. Steil concluded countries should abandon monetary nationalism, moving to adopt regional currencies, on the road to a global one world currency.WND previously reported Steve Previs, a vice president at Jeffries International Ltd. in London, said the amero is the proposed new currency for the North American Community which is being developed right now between Canada, the U.S., and Mexico. A video clip of the CNBC interview in November with Jeffries is now available at YouTube.com. WND also has reported a continued slide in the value of the dollar on world currency markets could set up conditions in which the adoption of the amero as a North American currency gains momentum.
MUSLIM NATIONS
EZEKIEL 38:1-12
1 And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,
2 Son of man, set thy face against Gog,(RULER) the land of Magog,(RUSSIA) the chief prince of Meshech(MOSCOW)and Tubal,(TOBOLSK) and prophesy against him,
3 And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech(MOSCOW) and Tubal:
4 And I will turn thee back, and put hooks into thy jaws,(GOD FORCES THE 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:(SUDAN,AFRICA) and many people with thee.
7 Be thou prepared, and prepare for thyself, thou, and all thy company that are assembled unto thee, and be thou a guard unto them.
8 After many days thou shalt be visited: in the latter years thou shalt come into the land that is brought back from the sword, and is gathered out of many people, against the mountains of Israel, which have been always waste: but it is brought forth out of the nations, and they shall dwell safely all of them.
9 Thou shalt ascend and come like a storm, thou shalt be like a cloud to cover the land, thou, and all thy bands, and many people with thee.(RUSSIA-EGYPT AND MUSLIMS)
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, 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.
ISAIAH 17:1
1 The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap.
PSALMS 83:3-7
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 have consulted together with one consent: they are confederate against thee:(TREATIES)
6 The tabernacles of Edom,and the Ishmaelites;(ARABS) of Moab, and the Hagarenes;
7 Gebal, and Ammon,(JORDAN) and Amalek;(SYRIA) the Philistines (PALESTINIANS) with the inhabitants of Tyre;(LEBANON)
EZEKIEL 39:1-8
1 Therefore, thou son of man, prophesy against Gog,(LEADER OF RUSSIA) and say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech (MOSCOW) and Tubal: (TUBOLSK)
2 And I will turn thee back, and leave but the sixth part of thee, 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 BOMB) and among them that dwell carelessly in the isles: and they shall know that I am the LORD.
7 So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, the Holy One in Israel.
8 Behold, it is come, and it is done, saith the Lord GOD; this is the day whereof I have spoken.
JOEL 2:3,20,30-31
3 A fire(NUCLEAR BOMB) devoureth before them;(RUSSIA-ARABS) and behind them a flame burneth: the land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea, and nothing shall escape them.
20 But I will remove far off from you the northern army,(RUSSIA,MUSLIMS) and will drive him into a land barren and desolate, with his face toward the east sea, and his hinder part toward the utmost sea, and his stink shall come up, and his ill savour shall come up, because he hath done great things.(SIBERIAN DESERT)
30 And I will shew wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke.(NUCLEAR BOMB)
31 The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the LORD come.
Iran accuses Israel of Palestinian genocide By Reza Derakhshi Fri Oct 5, 6:57 AM ET
TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran's president accused Israel on Friday of using the Holocaust as a pretext for genocide against Palestinians. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who outraged the West in 2005 by calling Israel a tumor to be wiped off the map, said the truth should be told about World War Two and the Holocaust.
Six million Jews were killed in the Nazi genocide.
Iran condemns fabricating such a pretext (the Holocaust) for the Zionist regime to commit genocide against the Palestinian nation and occupy Palestine, Ahmadinejad said in a live broadcast to mark the annual Al-Quds (Jerusalem) Day in the Islamic Republic.The Iranian nation and countries in the region will not rest until Palestine is free and criminals punished, he said in the speech before Friday prayers.Ahmadinejad has questioned the Holocaust but denied during a visit last month to the United States he was saying it never happened, only that the Palestinian issue was entirely separate.Opposition to Israel is one of the cornerstones of belief of Shi'ite Iran, which backs Palestinian and Lebanese Islamic militant groups opposed to peace with the Jewish state.
Ahmadinejad repeated calls for Canada to accept Jews.
Europeans cannot tolerate the Zionist regime's presence in their own region but want to impose it on the Middle East. Give them (the Jews) this vast land of Canada and Alaska to build themselves a home and resettle there, he said.Al-Quds Day was inaugurated by Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution founder Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. It is held on the last Friday of the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan.Tens of thousands marched in a rally to mark the day, including soldiers, students and clerics. Black-clad women with small children clutching balloons emblazoned Death to Israel were among those flocking the streets of central Tehran.Death to America, Death to Israel, chanted the marchers, many carrying portraits of Khomeini and his successor Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
MILITIA MARCH
Volunteer Basij militia, covering their faces with Palestinian headscarves, marched while roaring Hezbollah fights, Israel trembles -- referring to the Lebanese Shi'ite Muslim group Israel fought a war against last year.We came here to show our support to the Palestinian nation and their resistance, said retired teacher Abdollah Hassani, 58, who joined the rally with his wife, carrying a sign reading Israel must be obliterated.State television showed footage of similar marches, held in cities across Iran on Al-Quds Day. Demonstrators in Tehran burned flags of the United States and Israel, which Iran refuses to recognize.The United States and Israel accuse Iran of interference in Iraq, through backing Shi'ite militias, and of sponsoring terrorism, including the Palestinian group Hamas and Hezbollah. Tehran denies the charges.
The United States and Iran, who have not had diplomatic ties since shortly after Iran's revolution, are also embroiled in a deepening rift over Tehran's nuclear ambitions. Ahmadinejad said Iran would continue its nuclear program despite international pressure, adding Iran wants to remove international concerns over its atomic work through talks.But if they (the West) want to start a new game it will have no result for them but regret, he said. Six world powers agreed last Friday to delay toughening U.N. sanctions against Tehran over its nuclear program until November at the earliest to wait for reports by U.N. nuclear watchdog chief Mohamed ElBaradei and European Union negotiator Javier Solana.
The U.N. Security Council has imposed two sanctions resolutions on Iran after it failed to suspend sensitive activities such as uranium enrichment.
Hard times fall on storied West Bank city by Joseph Krauss
OCT 5,07
NABLUS, West Bank (AFP) - A walk through the ancient streets of the West Bank City of Nablus offers a rare glimpse into the Asiatic opulence that once adorned cities across the caravan routes of the Middle East. But what was once a major Palestinian tourist and commercial centre has since the outbreak of the intifada in 2000 wilted in the face of checkpoints and near-daily Israeli military incursions.They call this the economic capital of Palestine but these days it is the capital of the unemployed, says Bilal Hamouda, a merchant in the ancient quarter.Having seen some of the uprising's fiercest battles, the Old City of Nablus has been transformed into a crude memorial to local fighters, its limestone walls covered with blast stains, militia graffiti and martyrs' posters.Seven years on, the situation remains tense, and the Israeli military has sharply limited movement into and out of the city, leaving merchants like Hamouda with lots of time to share local lore with visitors.Nablus is the oldest city in the world. When it was founded in 2,500 B.C. they called it Shechem, which means two shoulders, he says, as he leans back in a plastic chair across the street from his shop.Then the Romans renamed it Neopolis, or 'New City' -- the source of the modern name, Hamouda says in halting, practiced English.It's also known as Jebel al-Nar -- Arabic for 'Fire Mountain' -- after a legend that the town repelled Napoleon's armies by lighting a bonfire and frightening packs of wild animals into attacking the French cavalry.
Others call Nablus Little Damascus because of its underground springs and its Turkish-style Old City, a labyrinth of meandering walkways, stone arches, and covered markets.The Israelis still call it Shechem, referring to the two peaks that guard approaches to the city, from which the army now looks down on what it considers to be the most volatile town in the West Bank.The Israeli military says its troops have discovered 10 bomb factories in Nablus this year alone, and that 117 of the 187 potential suicide bombers arrested in the West Bank in 2006 originated there.
In one of its regular incursions, the army carried out in early September a massive three-day operation in a refugee camp in the heart of the city, arresting 49 alleged militants from different Palestinian factions and destroying several houses.In the wake of the Islamist Hamas movement's violent takeover of the Gaza Strip, Israel and the West have vowed to improve daily life in the West Bank, still ruled by president Mahmud Abbas and the secular Palestinian Authority.
But Nablus -- with more than 130,000 residents -- remains under siege, with all traffic into or out of town having to pass through two checkpoints, and most vehicles banned from entering or exiting at all.It is supposed to be the economic centre of Palestine, but we have the worst economy in the West Bank, even worse than Gaza, says Majdi Abu Salha, who sells the sweet Nablus knafe pastries famous across the West Bank.In the Old City, which once thrived on Arab tourists from across Israel and the Palestinian territories, many merchants are struggling to stay in business.The economic situation is tied to the tourism market, and that has stopped because of the closures, says Yusef al-Jabr, owner of one of Nablus's last functioning Turkish bathhouses.The entrance, tucked away in the heart of the Old City, opens into a series of vaulted chambers with scattered stained-glass windows and marble floors heated by hot subterranean springs, a rare surviving relic of Ottoman luxury.Turkish baths, part of an ancient spa tradition handed down from Greece and Rome, can still be found in old cities across the Middle East and North Africa. But in Nablus, the baths are facing extinction. Jabr says his bathhouse is around 450-500 years old, but people still refer to it as the new bathhouse because the city once had far older ones. In 2002 the main steam room was struck by an Israeli missile. Jabr was able to repair the damage with some help from a brother living in the United Arab Emirates, but now he worries the bath's days are numbered.
I'm trying to preserve our heritage here but it is very hard, Jabr says. The people come, but just to look. They don't use the baths and so I hardly have any income. I would make more if I turned it into a more touristy place, like a restaurant.When Israel occupied the West Bank in 1967 there were nine bathhouses in the city, but since then most have been destroyed or transformed into other things. A few alleys down from Jabr's bathhouse another doorway opens into a vaulted chamber, its dry central fountain now surrounded by a handful of simple machines, all of them idle. The owner, Hamed Herzullah, converted the baths into a family-run candy factory decades ago, but now even he is feeling the crunch.
We used to have 20 employees working all day every day. Now it's just me and my family, and we only work two or three hours a day, he says. Behind him sits a table with stacks of tiny boxes, all filled with sweet powdered sugar-coated loukoum, or Turkish Delight. When they have money the people come and buy, but not now, Herzullah says. It's (the Muslim holy month of) Ramadan, so business should be good. But the families around here are struggling to buy bread -- not sweets.
Bush says very optimistic on Mideast peace Fri Oct 5, 9:31 AM ET
DUBAI (Reuters) - President George W. Bush said in comments aired on Friday he was very optimistic a Palestinian state could be set up alongside Israel and that next month's Middle East conference could lead towards peace in the region. The U.S.-sponsored conference is due to take place in the Washington area in mid to late November, although there are doubts over how far it will go towards ending decades of conflict and uncertainty over which Arab states will attend.I am very optimistic that we can achieve a two-state solution, Bush said in comments on Al Arabiya television that were dubbed in Arabic.We will host the international peace conference and it will be attended by the interested parties and a delegation from the Arab League and it is an opportunity for serious ... discussions over the road forward to lead to a two-state solution and efforts will be made to reach this objective, Bush said.
I want to affirm that the two-state solution is part of a comprehensive peace in the Middle East and that our strategy is for all parties to attend at the table for the sake of a comprehensive peace. We want to push this issue.Israeli and Palestinian leaders agreed on Wednesday that formal negotiations on Palestinian statehood would begin after the peace conference.
But Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has balked at Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's call for setting a specific timeframe for the resolution of key issues including borders and the fate of Jerusalem and the Palestinian refugees.Abbas said on Thursday that formal negotiations for statehood could be completed six months after the conference.There is a lot of dialogue between the two men and I believe the Palestinians and the Israelis have realized that there is a vision that is worth working to achieve, Bush said.
ARAB DOUBTS
Aside from the Israel and the Palestinians, the United States would like key Arab states to attend the conference but is unclear how many will.Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has said Damascus would not join unless the agenda also includes the Golan Heights, captured by Israel from Syria in the 1967 war at the same time as the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza.U.S.-ally Saudi Arabia, driving force behind an Arab peace proposal relaunched earlier this year, has also indicated it would not attend unless the conference addresses core issues.The peace conference is part of a U.S.-led effort to bolster Abbas and his West Bank-based government and to isolate Islamist group Hamas, which seized control of the Gaza Strip in June.Hamas, which has carried out dozens of suicide and rocket attacks on Israel, has rejected the conference.No one wants the establishment of a state that will be a launch pad for attacks on others, Bush said.We must support the Palestinian security forces, help President Abbas and offer him financial support so that Palestinian citizens can be assured that the life that lies ahead of them is better.
Palestinians flock to Jerusalem to pray By KARIN LAUB, Associated Press Writer OCT 5,07
QALANDIA CHECKPOINT, West Bank - Thousands of Palestinians thronged military checkpoints on the outskirts of Jerusalem on Friday, trying to reach a major Muslim shrine in the city for Ramadan prayers despite an Israeli army closure. Israeli troops in jeeps, on foot and horseback were deployed at crossings from the West Bank into Jerusalem to control the crowds trying to get to the Al Aqsa Mosque, Islam's third-holiest site, before the Muslim holy month of Ramadan draws to a close next week.At the Qalandia checkpoint north of Jerusalem, harried troops waved clubs, shouted and occasionally used stun grenades as tempers flared and frustrated Palestinians surged toward the roadblock. One elderly man fainted, and was treated by an army medic. No serious injuries were reported.Friday prayers at Al Aqsa regularly draw thousands of worshippers, and crowds are bigger than usual during Ramadan. Around 135,000 filled the mosque compound in Jerusalem's Old City on Friday, and prayers ended with no disturbances, police said.
Israel clamped a closure on the West Bank last week, barring Palestinians from entering Israel, citing concern of possible attacks during the seven-day Jewish festival of Sukkot. The festival ended Thursday, but the closure was slated to end Saturday night, the military said.Despite the closure, Israeli police had orders to let in West Bank men over the age of 50 and women over 40, Israeli police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said. More than 3,000 Israeli police were stationed around Jerusalem's Old City to keep order during the prayers, he said.At Qalandia, north of Jerusalem, hundreds of Palestinians, most of them elderly, pushed toward troops controlling access to the passage and argued with police checking ID cards.Maher Walweil, 43, said he left his home in the West Bank city of Nablus at 4 a.m. to get to Jerusalem in time for prayers — even though he knew the Israeli age restrictions left him little chance of getting in.There's a lot of soldiers here. What am I going to do against these soldiers? he said.In Iran, meanwhile, millions attended nationwide rallies Friday in support of the Palestinians and to protest Israel's continued hold on Jerusalem.The demonstrations for Al-Quds Day — Al-Quds is the Arabic name for Jerusalem — also spilled over into anti-American protests because of U.S. support for Israel. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Israel's continued existence was an insult to human dignity.In Afghanistan, hundreds of Kabul University students marched in a Jerusalem Day demonstration there, burning effigies of President Bush and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.A possible division of Jerusalem, a city claimed by Israelis and Palestinians as a capital, is one of the key issues in a future peace agreement.Ahead of a U.S.-hosted Mideast conference, to be held later this fall, Israeli and Palestinian drafting teams are to write a joint document with principles guiding future negotiations.The document would address the so-called core issues, including the fate of Jerusalem, but not provide detailed solution, Palestinian negotiators have said.
Palestinian leaders want the conference to set a six-month deadline for negotiating a permanent Israeli-Palestinian peace treaty with Israel, Palestinian information minister Riad Malki said Thursday. Israeli and U.S. officials were cool to the idea of locking talks into a timeline.Malki said the conference is expected to back the declaration, and said the sides should then move swiftly to finalize the details. After six months of negotiations, all the participants would return to a peace conference, to endorse our agreement with Israel, he said of the Palestinian proposal. David Baker, an Israeli government official, said Israel is serious about negotiating a deal, but that this is not merely a product of how much time elapses.A Western diplomat, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to publicly discuss the conference, said the U.S. is not looking at timelines.The U.S. has not yet set a date for the conference or released a list of participants. The Israeli daily Haaretz on Friday quoted Israeli officials as saying it would take place Nov. 26. Palestinian officials said they were unaware of a date, but were told the conference would not be held before Nov. 22.
Friday, October 05, 2007
RELIGION AND FOREIGN POLICY
Israel lifts veil of silence over Syria strike by Jacques Pinto Tue Oct 2, 10:23 AM ET
JERUSALEM (AFP) - Israel lifted its official veil of silence over last month's strike in Syria on Tuesday as army radio said that the Jewish state carried out the attack deep inside its arch foe's territory. The Israeli military censor lifted a blackout on publishing the information on the September 6 strike, in which Syria had said its air defences fired on Israeli warplanes that dropped ammunition deep inside its territory.The military censor has authorised for the first time the publication of the fact that Israeli combat planes attacked a military target deep inside Syrian territory on September 6, the radio said.It is the only element that the censor allowed to be published, it added.Israeli officials have up to now refused to make any comment on the strike and on Tuesday the army and the prime minister's office stuck to this line, even after the military censorship was lifted.
Amid the Israeli blackout, most of the speculation on the raid has come from foreign media, with one version saying that Israel bombed a suspected nuclear facility in its northern neighbour that was allegedly being built with the help of North Korea, reports denied by both Damascus and Pyongyang.In an interview aired by the BBC on Monday, Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad identified the target of the strike as an unused military building and said that the warplanes had hit nothing of consequence.In his first public reaction to the strike on northern Syria, the president said in the rare interview with a foreign journalist that it showed Israel's visceral antipathy towards peace.The BBC quoted Assad as saying Syria reserved the right to respond to the attack.Retaliate does not mean missile for missile and bomb for bomb. We have our means to retaliate, maybe politically, maybe in other ways, said Assad.But if we want to retaliate militarily, this means we're going to work according to the Israeli agenda, something we don't look for in the runup to the US-sponsored Middle East peace conference expected in November, he said.Syria has filed a formal complaint with the United Nations over the strike, which has raised tensions between the two neighbours who remain in an official state of war.Amid the tension, Israel scrambled fighter planes three times in a space of a week after concerns were raised about activity over Syrian airspace, with all of the incidents turning out to be false alarms -- the first one sparked by migratory birds appearing on Israeli radar near the Syrian border.
Syrian Vice President Faruq al-Shara said on Saturday that the raid was meant to provide justification for future aggression against his country.Those who continue to talk about this raid and to invent inaccurate details (about it), are aiming to justify a future aggression againt Syria, he said at a press conference.
Peace talks between Israel and Syria collapsed in 2000 over disagreements over the Golan Heights, the strategic plateau Israel captured from Damascus in 1967 and annexed in 1981.
Putin eyes prime minister's job OCT 2,07
Mr Putin has made it clear that he intends to stay active in politics - Russian President Vladimir Putin has raised the possibility of becoming a future prime minister by agreeing to enter the December parliamentary polls. Mr Putin, who must leave office as president next year, said suggestions he might seek to become Russian prime minister were entirely realistic. He said he accepted the proposal by the United Russia to head the party's list - without becoming a member. By being on the list he is guaranteed a seat in the next parliament. The BBC's Mike Sanders says Mr Putin's announcement comes as a shock, but is the clearest indication yet that he is determined to stay at the centre of power in Russia. According to the Russian constitution, he is not allowed to run for a third consecutive term as president in March.
Radical change
As far as heading the government is concerned - this is a quite realistic suggestion but it is still too early to think about it, Mr Putin told the congress of the United Russia. We can forget our favourite cliche that the president is tsar in Russia Gleb Pavlovsky Russian analyst
Press excited by Putin hint Putin seeks new role Should Putin be Russian PM?
Two conditions must be met first - United Russia must win the election and a decent, capable and modern person with whom I work as a team should be elected as president, he added. His announcement follows years of speculation about what he might do after his last presidential term ends. Pro-Kremlin political analyst Gleb Pavlovsky described it as a radical change. We can forget our favourite cliche that the president is tsar in Russia, Mr Pavlovsky told AFP news agency. It's the most politically logical solution to the problem of what Putin does when he leaves office, he said. Andrei Ryabov from the Carnegie Moscow Center told the BBC he sees Mr Putin's decision as a tactical step:
It's hard to imagine Putin would become prime minister after being a super-popular president. The dual system is bad for Russia - Putin must be worried... he would not want to be junior to the president, he said. For Putin to be the most senior figure, the constitution would have to be changed. And Putin has always made it clear he wants no changes to the constitution, he added.
12 NATO countries have war game in Croatia
Published: 1, 2007 at 12:24 PM
Croatia, Oct. 1 (UPI) -- Military, naval and air forces of 12 NATO countries Monday began a 12-day exercise in Croatia and the Adriatic Sea.The Noble Midas ’07 war games are the largest of its kind being organized by a country that isn't member of the alliance, Croatia’s Nova TV television channel reported Monday.
The exercises started when war ships left the area around the Croatian Central Adriatic port city of Split and sailed toward open seas.Croatia is a candidate for NATO membership and its leaders expect the country might join the alliance by the end of this decade.About 8,000 troops -- including 800 U.S. Marines -- 40 vessels, six submarines, 29 war planes and 23 helicopters were taking part in the exercises.In the meantime, in the Croatian capital Zagreb, about 100 activists of non-governmental organizations staged peaceful protests against the war games, displaying banners reading, We want tourists, not terrorists. United Press International.
Gaza's place in Bible's prophecies
By Hal Lindsay September 28, 2007 - 1:00 a.m. Eastern
The Jerusalem-based Institute for Contemporary Affairs recently released a report authored by Lt. Col. Jonathan Dahoah-Halevi that concludes, to nobody's particular surprise, that the Gaza Strip has become a haven for al-Qaida terrorists. Gaza, part of the biblical land of the Philistines was the place where Samson toppled the Temple of Dagon on his enemies, giving his life in the process. Gaza was first conquered for Israel by King David and subsequently fell to the Assyrians, the Egyptians, the Babylonians, Persians and Greeks. But in the days of King David, it was part of Israel. In Jesus' day, it was part of the Hasmonean Kingdom that ended with Herod the Great. In 1967, Gaza again became part of Israel when Egypt lost it in the Six Day's War.
In September 2004, Ariel Sharon announced his controversial disengagement plan under the title, Gaza First. Sharon intended to turn Gaza completely over to Palestinian rule, hoping to accomplish two goals in the process. The first and official goal was contained within its slogan, Gaza First. Israel would allow Gaza to govern itself, then use Gaza's success or failure as a template for future negotiations over the West Bank. Israel pulled out of Gaza Sept. 12, 2005, leaving behind 1,000 Israeli settler greenhouses to spare the jobs of the 4,000 Palestinians who worked in them. Before that day was over, the Associated Press was reporting that: Palestinians looted dozens of greenhouses on Tuesday, walking off with irrigation hoses, water pumps and plastic sheeting in a blow to fledgling efforts to reconstruct the Gaza Strip.As the Israeli settlers were being dragged from their homes, the Palestinians torched the 19 synagogues left standing. Within sight of the smoking synagogues, in a somber farewell ceremony, Gen. Aviv Kochavi, the Gaza commander, expressed his hope the pullout would be a step toward peace. The gate that will close behind us is also the gate that will open, he said. We hope it will be a gate of peace and quiet, a gate of hope and goodwill, a gate of neighborliness.As the gate closed, Kassam rockets began roaring out the abandoned settlements and into the homes and shops of the Israeli cities on the other side.
Within a year, the residents of Gaza elected Hamas on their foundational platform that calls for the destruction of Israel and its replacement with an Islamic state. A year after that, finds the Halavi Report, The declared policy of Hamas to provide sanctuary to any jihad fighter invites additional terrorist groups associated with al-Qaida to plant themselves in the Gaza Strip.
Here's the amazing part. I believe that this is exactly what Ariel Sharon expected to happen. His only miscalculation was in thinking that, having seen a preview of what a Palestinian state would look like, the world would come to its collective senses. Sharon underestimated two things: the almost palpable fear among Western governments to do anything that might offend Islam, and the depth of nascent global anti-Semitism. The world fears Islam, but it despises Israel on a level so deep that it is defies logical explanation. Seen at that level, if Islam destroyed Israel and then went back into hibernation, it would be a fair trade. Maybe it would, maybe it wouldn't, but for some, especially at the U.N., it's worth the risk. All they have to lose is Israel. It is almost impossible to fathom, but, barring that explanation, how does one account for the fact the world is still clamoring for the creation of a Palestinian state? In every possible area of measurement, the Palestinians have failed the test for statehood. As a people, the formerly Egyptian residents of Gaza immediately declared independence from the government run by the formerly Jordanian residents of the West Bank and launched a civil war. They are not one people, but two. As a government, the only thing the Palestinian Authority has proved consistently efficient at is looting the national treasury.
As a society, the moment they were handed a working infrastructure, they looted it out of existence. They exercised their first opportunity at self-government by electing the terrorists who walk among them as their leaders. Ariel Sharon handed them everything they demanded in Gaza, and they turned Gaza into Afghanistan. Evidently satisfied with the results, the Quartet is now pressuring Israel to allow the PA to turn the West Bank into Saudi Arabia and Jerusalem into Mecca. Even blindness can't account for such widespread ignorance of the danger. It goes beyond blindness, skids right past ignorance, and stops squarely in front of delusional.Why would the world side with an openly terrorist entity – in the midst of a war on terror – at the expense of the only reliable Western allied democracy in the region, leaving it adrift in a sea of rapacious Islamic dictatorships? Try, for a moment, to substitute some other Western representative democracy instead of Israel into this scenario in your imagination. Israel is an ally to every nation fighting the war on Islamic terror. Those same allied nations are advancing a policy of granting statehood to terrorists sworn to the destruction of that ally ... never mind. The more I try to explain it, the crazier it sounds. And that's the point. This is exactly the scenario outlined by the Hebrew prophets as signs of the soon coming of Israel's Messiah.
The prophet Zechariah predicted the whole world would be united against Israel over the Jerusalem Question (Zechariah 12:1-3); the prophet Daniel (Daniel 9:27) predicted an agreement that seemingly settles the Temple Mount Question; and the prophet Ezekiel predicts that, in the end, Israel will still face a massive Islamic invasion reluctantly overseen by Russia and led by Persia (Iran) (Ezekiel 38:5). Think about this for a second. Since it is absolutely illogical, and yet it is also exactly the situation we find ourselves witnessing, do you really believe it was all just a really good guess? It would be amazing enough if the prophets had forecast a scenario that made sense and it came to pass. But the scenario they predicted defies all natural explanation – and yet is coming to pass as literally as it was forecast. The fact is the Bible is true, and the setup for the fulfillment of Bible prophecies for the final seven years of Tribulation are almost complete. There is only a short time left to choose where you will spend eternity. Jesus Christ purchased a pardon on your behalf with His own blood at Calvary's Cross. He extends it to you now. All you need do is accept it. Allow Jesus Christ to come into your life and He will transform it forever. The choice is yours.
OPERATION EPICENTER
Evangelicals to offer $120 million in relief supplies to Israel and her neighbors as Ahmadinejad says Mahdi's arrival imminent.
By Joel C. Rosenberg
(Washington, D.C., September 27, 2007) -- How close is war in the Middle East? It's hard to say for certain, but Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is certainly ratcheting up the rhetoric. In the summer of 2005, the newly-elected Ahmadinejad told followers the end of the world was just two or three years away, and that the way to hasten the coming of the Islamic Messiah known as the Mahdi or the Twelfth Imam was to annihilate Israel and the United States. Since then, his anti-American and anti-Israeli rhetoric has intensified dramatically. Now, two years into his cryptic but apocalyptic countdown, Ahmadinejad is telling the Muslim world that the return of the Mahdi is imminent.In an address to the International Seminar on the Doctrine of Mahdism in Tehran last month (August 25-26), Ahmadinejad warned that the West's day is almost finished and the preparations for the Hidden Imam will soon be complete. In a speech translated from Farsi by MEMRI.org, Ahmadinejad said: The current situation in the world has led the nations to reject in disgust the rule of the oppressors. Now is the time to invite people to accept the rule of the righteous, and [especially that] of the most righteous of [rulers] -- the Hidden Imam....The oppressors and tyrants are responsible for all the difficulties and problems currently faced by the nations, and the only way to establish justice is through popular uprising and determined resistance in the face of these oppressors....[the day] of these aggressors...who are oppressing and controlling the nations, is now coming to an end....The time of the righteous rulers will come, and the most righteous of rulers, [i.e. the Hidden Imam], will form a government and thereby instate the monotheism of Abraham [throughout the world]. That day is not far away....Our enemies naturally feel threatened by the call to [believe in] the Mahdi, for they do not want people to think about justice. But our reply to them is that the era of the aggressive [powers] has come to an end. We believe that it is time for the righteous to rule.
A few days later, during a speech he delivered on August 28, Ahmadinejad went a step further, saying the Mahdi's return is imminent.The current problems faced by the world result from [the rule] of unworthy rulers. The ultimate solution is to replace these unworthy regimes and rulers, and to establish the rule of the Hidden Imam....Those who are not versed in [the doctrine of Mahdism] believe that the return [of the Hidden Imam] will occur only in a very long time, but, according to the divine promise, [his return] is imminent.Perhaps this is why Ahmadinejad opened rather than closed his speeches at Columbia University and at the United Nations this week with a prayer for Allah to hasten the Mahdi's arrival, because he is more convinced than ever that this apocalyptic moment is close at hand. Political leaders in the U.S., Europe and the Middle East who believe we should negotiate with Iran are missing the big picture. Ahmadinejad is not operating by the norms of conventional, civilized behavior. He is actively trying to bring about the end of the world. He believes it is his mission, his divine calling. We should not expect any amount of diplomatic logic to dissuade or distract him.
The sad but sobering conclusion we must draw is that war is coming to the Middle East. Either the U.S. or Israel will soon launch an attack to stop Iran from becoming a nuclear-armed nightmare, or Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, Hamas and al-Qaeda will launch a cataclysmic war against the Jewish State, and possibly against U.S. targets and/or interests. When? No one knows for sure, but millions of innocent Israelis, Palestinians, Lebanese, Syrians and Jordanians are likely to be caught in the crossfire either way.
In light of this mounting threat, The Joshua Fund -- a humanitarian relief organization my wife and I formed in the summer of 2006 -- has just launched a three-year initiative known as OPERATION EPICENTER. The goal is to form a global alliance of evangelical Christians, Messianic Jews, Arab and Iranian believers, and other people of goodwill around the world who will join together to send $120 million worth of humanitarian relief aid into the region over the next three years. This aid will be used to bless the poor and needy in Israel and the Muslim world and to pre-position relief supplies ahead of coming wars. We have been working around the clock this summer to develop strategic allies with whom we will work to get the job done as quickly and efficiently as possible. We working closely with local believers and relief organizations in the region, helping them acquire warehouse space, buy trucks, buy forklifts, hire staff, train staff, and fill those warehouses with urgently needed relief supplies. To find out more about OPERATION EPICENTER, including our primary strategic allies, specific projects, and the initial budget, please visit our web site at www.joshuafund.net (see the links below). There you can also learn more about the first year operations of The Joshua Fund.
By God's grace and the generosity of people throughout North America, we have already raised more than $600,000 to get started on the most urgent elements of this effort. We are currently seeking to raise $1 million by December 1, 2007 to help finance the acquisition of a major warehouse in Israel and to begin loading a ship in the U.S. with relief supplies to be sent to Israel early next year. If you would like to make a tax-deductible contribution to The Joshua Fund for this effort, please visit our website where you can give securely on-line or send a check to our P.O. Box in Colorado. Also, we would be grateful if you would pray faithfully for us and our strategic allies as we seek to bless Israel and her neighbors in the name of Jesus in every way we possibly can before the next war breaks out. Thanks so much.
This Week with Rabbi Eckstein
September 27, 2007
Dear Friend of The Fellowship
At sundown on Wednesday, September 26, Jews began the celebration of the festival of Sukkot. In contrast to the solemnity and introspection of the High Holy Days that just ended, Sukkot brings an atmosphere of gladness and joy, following the biblical commandment to Be joyful at your feast (Deuteronomy 16:13-15).
As described in Leviticus 23:33-44, Sukkot is both a harvest festival celebrating God’s blessings and a time during which Jews remember their Exodus from Egypt. Recalling this pivotal event, Jews build sukkot (booths for temporary dwelling) that resemble the booths in which Israelites lived in the desert. Because of this, Sukkot is known as the Festival of Booths. The sukkah (the singular form of sukkot) is built of improvised walls and a roof covered with branches or leaves, so that its interior is partially exposed to the sky. Decorated with flowers, fruit and paper chains, it becomes our temporary shelter during the seven day holiday, and serves as a colorful gathering place for family and friends.
Our time spent in the sukkah serves a deeper purpose as well. By spending time there we give up, at least temporarily, the physical comforts of our well-built homes. Thus we are forced to become more mindful of the transitory nature of material things and ultimately to remember that God is our refuge and strength (Psalm 46:1). We are reminded that, in times of plenty and times of need, we must recognize our dependence upon and place our trust in God, the ultimate source of both our material and our spiritual blessings.During Sukkot, I often think not only of the exiled Israelites whose story is told in the Bible, but of the Jews in modern times who have endured great hardship and deprivation to come to Israel, many of whom we have assisted through The Fellowship’s On Wings of Eagles program. I recall one story of a family of Iranian Jews who arrived in Israel penniless after having their life savings seized by Iranian authorities while leaving their country. I think of the thousands of Ethiopian Jews who risked their lives to make the long journey to Israel on foot during the time when they were greatly oppressed in their own country and aliyah (immigration to Israel) was prohibited by Ethiopian authorities.
And yet, even among those who have made aliyah in the harshest of circumstances, I have seen the deepest gratitude for the opportunity to at long last be in the land of Israel. Though stripped of their material possessions, these olim (immigrants) have held fast to God’s promise, and can see His hand at work in their return. What a wonderful lesson for us all -- one very appropriate to this Sukkot holiday.My friends, today I hope you will continue to support the ministry of On Wings of Eagles that helps Jews return to Israel. By doing so, you’ll not only be funding aliyah for Jews from the four corners of the earth, you’ll be providing them critical klitah (resettlement) assistance in the form of food, shelter, medical care and other essentials to help ensure they will become full, productive citizens in their new home. Thank you for your generous heart for these suffering people -- may you be blessed, even as you have blessed God’s children
With prayers for shalom, peace,
Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein
President International Fellowship Of Christians and Jews.
David's Comment: Bush & Olmert Are Committing Israel to National Suicide - Why Are So Many Silent ?
Jeremiah 30:7 Alas! For that day is great, so that none is like it; and it is the time of Jacob's trouble, but he shall be saved out of it. (NKJ)
This is an extremely difficult and painful comment to write. Fifteen years ago I came to live in an Israel that was growing physically and spiritually towards the day that King Yeshua will return to reign over the Kingdom of His Father. It is only the promise of that day that offers any hope for the future of the planet Earth. And for all our sake, the sooner the better ! But according to Acts 3:21 Yeshua will only be released from Heaven once the words of the prophets are fulfilled.I believe we are approaching the most decisive time in history for both the Jewish people and the people of all nations. As I sit on Mt Carmel closely monitoring all that is taking place in the Middle East and the rest of the world, I can clearly see the Time of Jacobs Trouble approaching with alarming speed. On one hand I am encouraged and strengthened by the promises of God's protection over the Land of Israel - His Land, but on the other hand I see the Muslims and the Nations hovering like vultures ready to finish off a rapidly failing nation. And I see the leader of the USA pressuring the unbelievably weak leader of Israel to bow down and give into the Muslim pressure. Just a few days ago, former president of the US Federal Reserve, Alan Greenspan, revealed Bush's real motivation behind his Middle East policy - the oil supply from Saudi Arabia. Bush has lied to the whole world. Andf now he expects Israel to pay an extremely high price for the promise of continued oil supplies.
The following quotations are from an article titled WE HAVE BEEN WARNED! by Elyakim Haetzni, a former Israeli government minister.
Some day we'll recall these tranquil months of headlines devoted to road accidents and minor scandals the headlines of a society free from existential cares -- as a fool’s paradise whose fools turned a blind eye to the erupting volcano threatening to bury us all. There was another summer like this one preceding Yom Kippur in ’73, but this time the surprise attack is being readied from within, and the calamity will be diplomatic.I’m referring to the ritual sacrifice that the Bush administration is preparing for us this November that goes by the name of a peace conference. The role of the sacrificial lamb will be filled by Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, hundreds of Jewish communities, and hundreds of thousands of Jews that will become refugees in their own land all this on the backdrop of national, societal, and diplomatic collapse.
I agree that unless God intervenes, ( and I believe He will ) Israel's future is in serious jeopardy. Judea and Samaria is the heart of the country. Jerusalem is in the centre of both areas. Understanding the future of Jerusalem as the capital of the Kingdom of God and the location of the throne of the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, it is no wonder the enemy wants to steal it. Satan knows well that if he can tear the heart of the nation away, the nation will die.Josie and I are astounded that most Israelis are not prepared to stand up and if necessary, physically remove Olmert and the others who are preparing to give away the Lord's land from their offices. Most of the nation is silent. Last week a religious woman, Ruth Matar, called for Israelis to come to Jerusalem to protest outside the location of the meeting between Olmert & Condalesa Rice. She expected thousands to come, but only 150 people turned up. This dismall show of support for those opposed to giving the land away, gives the leaders a green light to move ahead. Even more astounding is the fact that most Messianic Jewish believers are also silent. There are only a few other ministries in the Land who take a stand against this godless government and the manipulation of the Bush government. We, the local believers, should be the most vocal, as we know what the scriptures say about the Land and how precious it is to our Heavenly Father.
And then there is the Church ! Sixty years ago, the majority of the Church, sat silently in their pews as six million Jews were reduced to smoke and ash in the Holocaust. Not much has changed. Today most of the Church is silent again as the Devil carries out his latest plan to destroy Israel and the Jewish people, to ensure the Messiah remains in Heaven and he remains the god of this world. When was the last time your pastor taught on Israel's right to the Land, or when did your church last pray for Israel's victory over her ememies ? Praise the Lord that is changing. Over the last 40 years an ever increasing number of Christians have had a revelation of God's plans and purposes for Israel. I even know of a few churches that give Israel priority in their prayer life and in their missions giving. But it is a mere remnant that has had this degree of revelation. The primary reason I write these comments each week is to motivate and inspire as many Christians as possible to take action against the plans of the enemy. To take action in prayer and intercession. To take action in the media, and wherever possible to openly stand with Israel's right to occupy all of the land that God promised to Abraham. And to take action in prayer against all those opposed to God and His chosen nation. There are many scripture verses we can pray against Israel's enemies - for example Psalm 83, Psalm 9: 19-20 - Arise O Lord let not man triumph - let the nations be judged in your presence. Strike them with terror, O Lord, let the nations know they are but men. Habakkuk 3:2 - Lord I have heard of your fame, I stand in awe of your deeds O Lord renew them in our day in our time make them known . In wrath remember mercy. Isaiah 8:9-19 - Raise the war cry, you nations and be shattered - Listen all you distant lands, Prepare for battle, and be shattered. Prepare for battle and be shattered ! Devise your strategy but it will be thwarted, propose your plan, but it will not stand, for God is with us. There are many, many more.
Please do not be like the majority of Israelis, Messianic Jews and Christians. Do not be SILENT but dare to be different - Be like Esther and SPEAK UP. Father I pray that you will anoint everyone reading this email message with a new and greater level of boldness, wisdom and authority to stand up for Israel - In the name of Yeshua I pray. The Lord bless you as you bless Israel by standing in defense of her right to exist on the land given to the Jewish people by the God of Israel . Lets pray that Israel will turn back to their God. Do not be silent, but share this with your fellow Christians, share it with your pastors, and with anyone you have a chance to speak to. Lets also pray for that breakthrough to the Muslims, and please remember to pray for our son Jordan, and all of his fellow soldiers in the IDF.
Shabbat Shalom ... David & Josie
Politics By Other Means
Religion and Foreign Policy
By CONN HALLINAN OCT 2,07
Religion, sometimes, is a continuation of politics by other means, notes Jon Alterman, director of the Center for Strategic and International Studies Middle East division, and it was hard to avoid that thought about last month's conference of Christians United for Israel (CUFI) in Washington D.C.There was Gary Bauer, former head of the right-wing evangelical Christian organization, the Family Research Council, bringing a crowd of 4,000 conventioneers to their feet with a prayer that the people of Israel-even under American pressure-never give up even one centimeter of land in the Occupied Territories.According to the weekly Jewish newspaper, The Forward, a choir struck up Blow the Trumpets in Zion, Zion, while delegates danced between the rows waving Israeli and American flags; some people wept.
If there was something slightly bizarre about apocalyptic Christians weeping over the fact that Israel might trade land for peace, there was nothing fringy about the foreign policy heavy weights CUFI has gathered under its wing. On hand to address the convention was Senator Joseph Lieberman, Republican heavy weight Newt Gingrich and the man who will quite likely to be the next prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu.The force behind CUFI, Texas Pastor John Hagee, counts President George Bush, Republican Presidential hopeful Senator John McCain, and the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee among his supporters, as well as a number of Democratic legislators, including U.S. Rep. Eliot Engel of New York.Hagee's organization-active in all 50 states-is currently pressuring Congress to confront Hezbollah in Lebanon, increase aid to Israel, and toughen sanctions on Iran, although the Texas minister himself doesn't think Teheran will respond to anything but war: It is time for America to adopt Senator Lieberman's words and consider a military pre-emptive strike against Iran. Hagee also advocates attacking Syria and the Palestinians.
Lieberman and Hagee are not the only ones talking about attacking Iran these days. President Bush recently told the American Legion convention, Iran's actions threaten the security of nations everywherewe will confront this danger before it is too late. According to an informal poll taken by ex-Middle East CIA field officer, Robert Baer, The feeling is we will hit the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps within six months. The Sunday Times reported Sept. 2 The Pentagon has drawn up plans for massive air strikes against 1200 targets in Iran, designed to annihilate the Iranian military capacity in three days.Are Christian evangelicals, in what is arguably the most religious administration in U.S. history, driving the Bush Administration's agenda in the Middle East and Africa? Or is the religious content of U.S. foreign policy politics by other means? Is the current culture war against Islam by people like historian Bernard Lewis, philosopher Francis Fukuyama and Pope Benedict XVI, a return to the religious mania of the First Crusade, or does it have more in common with TV evangelists whose concerns are the contents of their parishioner's wallets rather than the state of their souls?
Certainly the Bush Administration has appointed religious activists to key policy positions. Long-time religious activist and neo-conservative Elliot Abrams, former chair of U.S. Commission on Religious Freedom, has helped focus U.S. foreign policy on religious persecution in Sudan, Russia and China. According to Newsweek, his co-chair, right-wing Catholic activist Nina Shea, made Christian persecution Washington's hottest topic.
The Bush Administration's Special Envoy to the Sudan, Robert Seiple, is the former CEO of World Vision, a Christian aid and advocacy organization. According to John Eibner, chief executive officer of Christian Solidarity International, pressure from Christian groups played an important role in pushing the U.S. to get involved in Sudan.But is U.S. Africa policy driven by religious activists, or by the fact that by the year 2015 some 25 percent of U.S. oil imports will come from that continent?
Christian evangelicals have also made deep inroads into the American military.Lt. Gen. William Boykin, currently a deputy undersecretary of defense for intelligence, argues that the fight in Iraq is between a Christian nation and Satan, and can only be won if we come against them in the name of Jesus.The Pentagon is a strong supporter of Operation Straight Up (OSU), which delivers entertainment and sermons to troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. OSU describes its mission as a crusade-an incendiary word in the Middle East-and distributes a left behind video game where players fight the Antichrist represented by the United Nations. Former Air Force Academy graduate Mickey Weinstein, who heads up the Military Freedom Foundation, describes OSU as the Christian Taliban. According to a 2006 study for the U.S. War College by Col. William Millonig, Christian evangelical influence in the armed forces began during the Vietnam War. He concludes that conservative Christian and Republican values have affected the military's decision making and policy recommendations, warning that America's strategic thinkers, both military and civilian, must be aware of this and its potential implications on policy formulation.Again, however, are the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan driven by a religious agenda, or the fact that 65 percent of the world's remaining oil reserves are in the Middle East?
Religion has long played a role in the West's relationship to the rest of the world, but more as a way to divide populations than convert them. Ireland and India are cases in point.England invaded Ireland in 1170, but for the first 439 years it was a conquest in name only. In 1609, however, James I founded the Plantation of Ulster, imported 20,000 Protestant settlers, and introduced religious strife as a political tactic. By favoring Protestants over the native Catholics in politics and economics-the so-called Ulster Privilege-the English pitted both groups against one another.The tactic was enormously successful, and England used it throughout its colonial empire. Nowhere were the British so successful in transplanting the Irish model than in India.But in India's case it was unnecessary to import a foreign religion. The colonial authorities had India's Muslim and Sikh minorities to use as their wedge. As the historian Alex von Tunzelmann argues in Indian Summer, it was the British who defined India's communities on the basis of religion: Many Indians stopped accepting the diversity of their own thoughts and began to ask themselves in which of the boxes they belonged.
Muslims and Sikhs were favored for the few civil jobs and university slots open to Indians, a favoritism that generated tensions among the three communities, just as it had in Northern Ireland. The colonial regimes exploited everyone in both countries, but for some the burden was heavier. When communities in both countries fell to fighting over the few crumbs available to them, the British authorities stepped in to keep order, sadly shaking their heads about the inability of people in both countries ever to govern themselves.While Sir John Davis was describing the Irish as degenerate with the heart of a beast, Lord Hastings was arguing that the Hindoo appears a being nearly limited to animal functions and even in them indifferentwith no higher intellect than a dog.Lest one dismiss the above characterizations as typical 19th Century colonial racism, Winston Churchill once commented, I hate the Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion.Churchill's intolerance, however, had a very practical side to it. As prime minister he once said that he hoped that the tension between Hindus and Muslims would remain A bulwark of British rule in India.The British were not alone in using religion as a tactic to divide and conquer. The French employed it quite successfully in Lebanon and Vietnam. In the former, Paris favored Maronite Christians over Muslims (and Sunni Muslims over Shiite Muslims), and in the latter, Catholics over Buddhists.
No colonial tactic is successful forever, however, and in the aftermath of World War II the empires collapsed. But the use of religion as a device to divide and conquer leaves considerable wreckage in its wake.The current peace between Catholics and Protestants in Ulster is holding, but it took countless lives and almost 400 years to achieve.The partition of India on religious grounds cost more than a million lives and displaced some 12 million people. Pakistan and India have fought four wars since 1947, and the last one came distressingly close to going nuclear.
And tensions between communities in India are still high. The right-wing Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party led nationwide riots over a 16th Century mosque in Ayodhya, and five years ago, 2000 Muslims were massacred in Gujarat by Hindu extremists.
Exploiting religious differences hardly ended with the demise of the great colonial empires.The French continue to exploit religious divisions in Lebanon, and the U.S. is currently trying to cobble together a Sunni united front to confront Washington's three opponents in the Middle East: Iran, Syria, and Hezbollah in southern Lebanon. Syria is mostly Sunni, but Bashar al-Assad's regime is dominated by Alawites, a variety of Shiism. Some 60 percent of Lebanon is Shiite.But Shiites only constitute about 12 percent of Islam, and while Washington talks of a Shiia crescent as if it constituted some kind of united front, in fact there are enormous differences between Arab Syria and Lebanon, and non-Arabic speaking Iran.
Islam is a polyglot of cultures and ethnicities-the largest Muslim country is Indonesia- but that point gets lost in the current culture war directed at Islam.Historian Bernard Lewis recently told the Jerusalem Post that Muslims seem about to take over Europe because Europeans have surrendered to Islam in the name of political correctness and multi-culturalism. Philosopher Francis Fukuyama argues that France's opposition to the Iraq War was in part to appease Muslim opinion, and Omer Taspinar of the Brookings Institute claims that European Muslims are becoming a more powerful political force than the fabled Arab street.But as Jytte Klausen of Brandeis University points out, since only 10.25 percent of the Muslim population in Europe can vote, there is very little cost for political parties to ignore the concerns of Muslim communities.Researchers Jonathan Laurence and Justin Vaisse, who studied France's Muslims, conclude there is no such thing as a Muslim community, and polls found that French Muslims listed economic inequality as their first concern. Foreign policy came in twelfth.Indeed, as Patrick Weil of the Sorbonne points out, the myth that Muslims somehow influenced France's foreign policy is the same argument as saying the Bush decision to go to Iraq was because of the Israeli lobby. Muslims did oppose the war, as did most Europeans.If religion influences foreign policy, it is because it dovetails with the policies of powerful economic interests, which is not to say that religion always defers to secular self-interest. Once conjured up, it can take on a life of its own.
In Les Blancs, Lorraine Hansberry's edgy play about colonial Kenya, the play's central character, Tshembe, points out that while concepts like race and religion are indeed instruments which men use to rule over one another, those contrivances create their own reality. Men invoke the device of religion to cloak their conquests, Tshembe tells a clueless American reporter. You and I may recognize the fraudulence of the device, but the fact remains that a man who has a sword run through him because he refuses to become a Moslem or a Christianis suffering the utter reality of the device. And it is pointless to pretend that it doesn't exist-merely because it is lie.In the Middle East and Sudan, religion certainly appears to be the continuation of politics by other means. Whether it is President George Bush invoking the threat of a world-wide Muslim Caliphate, or Pope Benedict XVI warning that Islam promotes violence, religion is increasingly being used to ramp up the fear factor in international politics. But as with Europe's great religious wars, in the end religion in foreign policy is a device that allows the strong to seize the resources of the weak in the name of a higher power.Conn Hallinan is an analyst for Foreign Policy in Focus, a winner of a Project Censored Award, and did his PhD dissertation on the history of insurrectionary organizations in Ireland.
JERUSALEM (AFP) - Israel lifted its official veil of silence over last month's strike in Syria on Tuesday as army radio said that the Jewish state carried out the attack deep inside its arch foe's territory. The Israeli military censor lifted a blackout on publishing the information on the September 6 strike, in which Syria had said its air defences fired on Israeli warplanes that dropped ammunition deep inside its territory.The military censor has authorised for the first time the publication of the fact that Israeli combat planes attacked a military target deep inside Syrian territory on September 6, the radio said.It is the only element that the censor allowed to be published, it added.Israeli officials have up to now refused to make any comment on the strike and on Tuesday the army and the prime minister's office stuck to this line, even after the military censorship was lifted.
Amid the Israeli blackout, most of the speculation on the raid has come from foreign media, with one version saying that Israel bombed a suspected nuclear facility in its northern neighbour that was allegedly being built with the help of North Korea, reports denied by both Damascus and Pyongyang.In an interview aired by the BBC on Monday, Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad identified the target of the strike as an unused military building and said that the warplanes had hit nothing of consequence.In his first public reaction to the strike on northern Syria, the president said in the rare interview with a foreign journalist that it showed Israel's visceral antipathy towards peace.The BBC quoted Assad as saying Syria reserved the right to respond to the attack.Retaliate does not mean missile for missile and bomb for bomb. We have our means to retaliate, maybe politically, maybe in other ways, said Assad.But if we want to retaliate militarily, this means we're going to work according to the Israeli agenda, something we don't look for in the runup to the US-sponsored Middle East peace conference expected in November, he said.Syria has filed a formal complaint with the United Nations over the strike, which has raised tensions between the two neighbours who remain in an official state of war.Amid the tension, Israel scrambled fighter planes three times in a space of a week after concerns were raised about activity over Syrian airspace, with all of the incidents turning out to be false alarms -- the first one sparked by migratory birds appearing on Israeli radar near the Syrian border.
Syrian Vice President Faruq al-Shara said on Saturday that the raid was meant to provide justification for future aggression against his country.Those who continue to talk about this raid and to invent inaccurate details (about it), are aiming to justify a future aggression againt Syria, he said at a press conference.
Peace talks between Israel and Syria collapsed in 2000 over disagreements over the Golan Heights, the strategic plateau Israel captured from Damascus in 1967 and annexed in 1981.
Putin eyes prime minister's job OCT 2,07
Mr Putin has made it clear that he intends to stay active in politics - Russian President Vladimir Putin has raised the possibility of becoming a future prime minister by agreeing to enter the December parliamentary polls. Mr Putin, who must leave office as president next year, said suggestions he might seek to become Russian prime minister were entirely realistic. He said he accepted the proposal by the United Russia to head the party's list - without becoming a member. By being on the list he is guaranteed a seat in the next parliament. The BBC's Mike Sanders says Mr Putin's announcement comes as a shock, but is the clearest indication yet that he is determined to stay at the centre of power in Russia. According to the Russian constitution, he is not allowed to run for a third consecutive term as president in March.
Radical change
As far as heading the government is concerned - this is a quite realistic suggestion but it is still too early to think about it, Mr Putin told the congress of the United Russia. We can forget our favourite cliche that the president is tsar in Russia Gleb Pavlovsky Russian analyst
Press excited by Putin hint Putin seeks new role Should Putin be Russian PM?
Two conditions must be met first - United Russia must win the election and a decent, capable and modern person with whom I work as a team should be elected as president, he added. His announcement follows years of speculation about what he might do after his last presidential term ends. Pro-Kremlin political analyst Gleb Pavlovsky described it as a radical change. We can forget our favourite cliche that the president is tsar in Russia, Mr Pavlovsky told AFP news agency. It's the most politically logical solution to the problem of what Putin does when he leaves office, he said. Andrei Ryabov from the Carnegie Moscow Center told the BBC he sees Mr Putin's decision as a tactical step:
It's hard to imagine Putin would become prime minister after being a super-popular president. The dual system is bad for Russia - Putin must be worried... he would not want to be junior to the president, he said. For Putin to be the most senior figure, the constitution would have to be changed. And Putin has always made it clear he wants no changes to the constitution, he added.
12 NATO countries have war game in Croatia
Published: 1, 2007 at 12:24 PM
Croatia, Oct. 1 (UPI) -- Military, naval and air forces of 12 NATO countries Monday began a 12-day exercise in Croatia and the Adriatic Sea.The Noble Midas ’07 war games are the largest of its kind being organized by a country that isn't member of the alliance, Croatia’s Nova TV television channel reported Monday.
The exercises started when war ships left the area around the Croatian Central Adriatic port city of Split and sailed toward open seas.Croatia is a candidate for NATO membership and its leaders expect the country might join the alliance by the end of this decade.About 8,000 troops -- including 800 U.S. Marines -- 40 vessels, six submarines, 29 war planes and 23 helicopters were taking part in the exercises.In the meantime, in the Croatian capital Zagreb, about 100 activists of non-governmental organizations staged peaceful protests against the war games, displaying banners reading, We want tourists, not terrorists. United Press International.
Gaza's place in Bible's prophecies
By Hal Lindsay September 28, 2007 - 1:00 a.m. Eastern
The Jerusalem-based Institute for Contemporary Affairs recently released a report authored by Lt. Col. Jonathan Dahoah-Halevi that concludes, to nobody's particular surprise, that the Gaza Strip has become a haven for al-Qaida terrorists. Gaza, part of the biblical land of the Philistines was the place where Samson toppled the Temple of Dagon on his enemies, giving his life in the process. Gaza was first conquered for Israel by King David and subsequently fell to the Assyrians, the Egyptians, the Babylonians, Persians and Greeks. But in the days of King David, it was part of Israel. In Jesus' day, it was part of the Hasmonean Kingdom that ended with Herod the Great. In 1967, Gaza again became part of Israel when Egypt lost it in the Six Day's War.
In September 2004, Ariel Sharon announced his controversial disengagement plan under the title, Gaza First. Sharon intended to turn Gaza completely over to Palestinian rule, hoping to accomplish two goals in the process. The first and official goal was contained within its slogan, Gaza First. Israel would allow Gaza to govern itself, then use Gaza's success or failure as a template for future negotiations over the West Bank. Israel pulled out of Gaza Sept. 12, 2005, leaving behind 1,000 Israeli settler greenhouses to spare the jobs of the 4,000 Palestinians who worked in them. Before that day was over, the Associated Press was reporting that: Palestinians looted dozens of greenhouses on Tuesday, walking off with irrigation hoses, water pumps and plastic sheeting in a blow to fledgling efforts to reconstruct the Gaza Strip.As the Israeli settlers were being dragged from their homes, the Palestinians torched the 19 synagogues left standing. Within sight of the smoking synagogues, in a somber farewell ceremony, Gen. Aviv Kochavi, the Gaza commander, expressed his hope the pullout would be a step toward peace. The gate that will close behind us is also the gate that will open, he said. We hope it will be a gate of peace and quiet, a gate of hope and goodwill, a gate of neighborliness.As the gate closed, Kassam rockets began roaring out the abandoned settlements and into the homes and shops of the Israeli cities on the other side.
Within a year, the residents of Gaza elected Hamas on their foundational platform that calls for the destruction of Israel and its replacement with an Islamic state. A year after that, finds the Halavi Report, The declared policy of Hamas to provide sanctuary to any jihad fighter invites additional terrorist groups associated with al-Qaida to plant themselves in the Gaza Strip.
Here's the amazing part. I believe that this is exactly what Ariel Sharon expected to happen. His only miscalculation was in thinking that, having seen a preview of what a Palestinian state would look like, the world would come to its collective senses. Sharon underestimated two things: the almost palpable fear among Western governments to do anything that might offend Islam, and the depth of nascent global anti-Semitism. The world fears Islam, but it despises Israel on a level so deep that it is defies logical explanation. Seen at that level, if Islam destroyed Israel and then went back into hibernation, it would be a fair trade. Maybe it would, maybe it wouldn't, but for some, especially at the U.N., it's worth the risk. All they have to lose is Israel. It is almost impossible to fathom, but, barring that explanation, how does one account for the fact the world is still clamoring for the creation of a Palestinian state? In every possible area of measurement, the Palestinians have failed the test for statehood. As a people, the formerly Egyptian residents of Gaza immediately declared independence from the government run by the formerly Jordanian residents of the West Bank and launched a civil war. They are not one people, but two. As a government, the only thing the Palestinian Authority has proved consistently efficient at is looting the national treasury.
As a society, the moment they were handed a working infrastructure, they looted it out of existence. They exercised their first opportunity at self-government by electing the terrorists who walk among them as their leaders. Ariel Sharon handed them everything they demanded in Gaza, and they turned Gaza into Afghanistan. Evidently satisfied with the results, the Quartet is now pressuring Israel to allow the PA to turn the West Bank into Saudi Arabia and Jerusalem into Mecca. Even blindness can't account for such widespread ignorance of the danger. It goes beyond blindness, skids right past ignorance, and stops squarely in front of delusional.Why would the world side with an openly terrorist entity – in the midst of a war on terror – at the expense of the only reliable Western allied democracy in the region, leaving it adrift in a sea of rapacious Islamic dictatorships? Try, for a moment, to substitute some other Western representative democracy instead of Israel into this scenario in your imagination. Israel is an ally to every nation fighting the war on Islamic terror. Those same allied nations are advancing a policy of granting statehood to terrorists sworn to the destruction of that ally ... never mind. The more I try to explain it, the crazier it sounds. And that's the point. This is exactly the scenario outlined by the Hebrew prophets as signs of the soon coming of Israel's Messiah.
The prophet Zechariah predicted the whole world would be united against Israel over the Jerusalem Question (Zechariah 12:1-3); the prophet Daniel (Daniel 9:27) predicted an agreement that seemingly settles the Temple Mount Question; and the prophet Ezekiel predicts that, in the end, Israel will still face a massive Islamic invasion reluctantly overseen by Russia and led by Persia (Iran) (Ezekiel 38:5). Think about this for a second. Since it is absolutely illogical, and yet it is also exactly the situation we find ourselves witnessing, do you really believe it was all just a really good guess? It would be amazing enough if the prophets had forecast a scenario that made sense and it came to pass. But the scenario they predicted defies all natural explanation – and yet is coming to pass as literally as it was forecast. The fact is the Bible is true, and the setup for the fulfillment of Bible prophecies for the final seven years of Tribulation are almost complete. There is only a short time left to choose where you will spend eternity. Jesus Christ purchased a pardon on your behalf with His own blood at Calvary's Cross. He extends it to you now. All you need do is accept it. Allow Jesus Christ to come into your life and He will transform it forever. The choice is yours.
OPERATION EPICENTER
Evangelicals to offer $120 million in relief supplies to Israel and her neighbors as Ahmadinejad says Mahdi's arrival imminent.
By Joel C. Rosenberg
(Washington, D.C., September 27, 2007) -- How close is war in the Middle East? It's hard to say for certain, but Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is certainly ratcheting up the rhetoric. In the summer of 2005, the newly-elected Ahmadinejad told followers the end of the world was just two or three years away, and that the way to hasten the coming of the Islamic Messiah known as the Mahdi or the Twelfth Imam was to annihilate Israel and the United States. Since then, his anti-American and anti-Israeli rhetoric has intensified dramatically. Now, two years into his cryptic but apocalyptic countdown, Ahmadinejad is telling the Muslim world that the return of the Mahdi is imminent.In an address to the International Seminar on the Doctrine of Mahdism in Tehran last month (August 25-26), Ahmadinejad warned that the West's day is almost finished and the preparations for the Hidden Imam will soon be complete. In a speech translated from Farsi by MEMRI.org, Ahmadinejad said: The current situation in the world has led the nations to reject in disgust the rule of the oppressors. Now is the time to invite people to accept the rule of the righteous, and [especially that] of the most righteous of [rulers] -- the Hidden Imam....The oppressors and tyrants are responsible for all the difficulties and problems currently faced by the nations, and the only way to establish justice is through popular uprising and determined resistance in the face of these oppressors....[the day] of these aggressors...who are oppressing and controlling the nations, is now coming to an end....The time of the righteous rulers will come, and the most righteous of rulers, [i.e. the Hidden Imam], will form a government and thereby instate the monotheism of Abraham [throughout the world]. That day is not far away....Our enemies naturally feel threatened by the call to [believe in] the Mahdi, for they do not want people to think about justice. But our reply to them is that the era of the aggressive [powers] has come to an end. We believe that it is time for the righteous to rule.
A few days later, during a speech he delivered on August 28, Ahmadinejad went a step further, saying the Mahdi's return is imminent.The current problems faced by the world result from [the rule] of unworthy rulers. The ultimate solution is to replace these unworthy regimes and rulers, and to establish the rule of the Hidden Imam....Those who are not versed in [the doctrine of Mahdism] believe that the return [of the Hidden Imam] will occur only in a very long time, but, according to the divine promise, [his return] is imminent.Perhaps this is why Ahmadinejad opened rather than closed his speeches at Columbia University and at the United Nations this week with a prayer for Allah to hasten the Mahdi's arrival, because he is more convinced than ever that this apocalyptic moment is close at hand. Political leaders in the U.S., Europe and the Middle East who believe we should negotiate with Iran are missing the big picture. Ahmadinejad is not operating by the norms of conventional, civilized behavior. He is actively trying to bring about the end of the world. He believes it is his mission, his divine calling. We should not expect any amount of diplomatic logic to dissuade or distract him.
The sad but sobering conclusion we must draw is that war is coming to the Middle East. Either the U.S. or Israel will soon launch an attack to stop Iran from becoming a nuclear-armed nightmare, or Iran, Syria, Hezbollah, Hamas and al-Qaeda will launch a cataclysmic war against the Jewish State, and possibly against U.S. targets and/or interests. When? No one knows for sure, but millions of innocent Israelis, Palestinians, Lebanese, Syrians and Jordanians are likely to be caught in the crossfire either way.
In light of this mounting threat, The Joshua Fund -- a humanitarian relief organization my wife and I formed in the summer of 2006 -- has just launched a three-year initiative known as OPERATION EPICENTER. The goal is to form a global alliance of evangelical Christians, Messianic Jews, Arab and Iranian believers, and other people of goodwill around the world who will join together to send $120 million worth of humanitarian relief aid into the region over the next three years. This aid will be used to bless the poor and needy in Israel and the Muslim world and to pre-position relief supplies ahead of coming wars. We have been working around the clock this summer to develop strategic allies with whom we will work to get the job done as quickly and efficiently as possible. We working closely with local believers and relief organizations in the region, helping them acquire warehouse space, buy trucks, buy forklifts, hire staff, train staff, and fill those warehouses with urgently needed relief supplies. To find out more about OPERATION EPICENTER, including our primary strategic allies, specific projects, and the initial budget, please visit our web site at www.joshuafund.net (see the links below). There you can also learn more about the first year operations of The Joshua Fund.
By God's grace and the generosity of people throughout North America, we have already raised more than $600,000 to get started on the most urgent elements of this effort. We are currently seeking to raise $1 million by December 1, 2007 to help finance the acquisition of a major warehouse in Israel and to begin loading a ship in the U.S. with relief supplies to be sent to Israel early next year. If you would like to make a tax-deductible contribution to The Joshua Fund for this effort, please visit our website where you can give securely on-line or send a check to our P.O. Box in Colorado. Also, we would be grateful if you would pray faithfully for us and our strategic allies as we seek to bless Israel and her neighbors in the name of Jesus in every way we possibly can before the next war breaks out. Thanks so much.
This Week with Rabbi Eckstein
September 27, 2007
Dear Friend of The Fellowship
At sundown on Wednesday, September 26, Jews began the celebration of the festival of Sukkot. In contrast to the solemnity and introspection of the High Holy Days that just ended, Sukkot brings an atmosphere of gladness and joy, following the biblical commandment to Be joyful at your feast (Deuteronomy 16:13-15).
As described in Leviticus 23:33-44, Sukkot is both a harvest festival celebrating God’s blessings and a time during which Jews remember their Exodus from Egypt. Recalling this pivotal event, Jews build sukkot (booths for temporary dwelling) that resemble the booths in which Israelites lived in the desert. Because of this, Sukkot is known as the Festival of Booths. The sukkah (the singular form of sukkot) is built of improvised walls and a roof covered with branches or leaves, so that its interior is partially exposed to the sky. Decorated with flowers, fruit and paper chains, it becomes our temporary shelter during the seven day holiday, and serves as a colorful gathering place for family and friends.
Our time spent in the sukkah serves a deeper purpose as well. By spending time there we give up, at least temporarily, the physical comforts of our well-built homes. Thus we are forced to become more mindful of the transitory nature of material things and ultimately to remember that God is our refuge and strength (Psalm 46:1). We are reminded that, in times of plenty and times of need, we must recognize our dependence upon and place our trust in God, the ultimate source of both our material and our spiritual blessings.During Sukkot, I often think not only of the exiled Israelites whose story is told in the Bible, but of the Jews in modern times who have endured great hardship and deprivation to come to Israel, many of whom we have assisted through The Fellowship’s On Wings of Eagles program. I recall one story of a family of Iranian Jews who arrived in Israel penniless after having their life savings seized by Iranian authorities while leaving their country. I think of the thousands of Ethiopian Jews who risked their lives to make the long journey to Israel on foot during the time when they were greatly oppressed in their own country and aliyah (immigration to Israel) was prohibited by Ethiopian authorities.
And yet, even among those who have made aliyah in the harshest of circumstances, I have seen the deepest gratitude for the opportunity to at long last be in the land of Israel. Though stripped of their material possessions, these olim (immigrants) have held fast to God’s promise, and can see His hand at work in their return. What a wonderful lesson for us all -- one very appropriate to this Sukkot holiday.My friends, today I hope you will continue to support the ministry of On Wings of Eagles that helps Jews return to Israel. By doing so, you’ll not only be funding aliyah for Jews from the four corners of the earth, you’ll be providing them critical klitah (resettlement) assistance in the form of food, shelter, medical care and other essentials to help ensure they will become full, productive citizens in their new home. Thank you for your generous heart for these suffering people -- may you be blessed, even as you have blessed God’s children
With prayers for shalom, peace,
Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein
President International Fellowship Of Christians and Jews.
David's Comment: Bush & Olmert Are Committing Israel to National Suicide - Why Are So Many Silent ?
Jeremiah 30:7 Alas! For that day is great, so that none is like it; and it is the time of Jacob's trouble, but he shall be saved out of it. (NKJ)
This is an extremely difficult and painful comment to write. Fifteen years ago I came to live in an Israel that was growing physically and spiritually towards the day that King Yeshua will return to reign over the Kingdom of His Father. It is only the promise of that day that offers any hope for the future of the planet Earth. And for all our sake, the sooner the better ! But according to Acts 3:21 Yeshua will only be released from Heaven once the words of the prophets are fulfilled.I believe we are approaching the most decisive time in history for both the Jewish people and the people of all nations. As I sit on Mt Carmel closely monitoring all that is taking place in the Middle East and the rest of the world, I can clearly see the Time of Jacobs Trouble approaching with alarming speed. On one hand I am encouraged and strengthened by the promises of God's protection over the Land of Israel - His Land, but on the other hand I see the Muslims and the Nations hovering like vultures ready to finish off a rapidly failing nation. And I see the leader of the USA pressuring the unbelievably weak leader of Israel to bow down and give into the Muslim pressure. Just a few days ago, former president of the US Federal Reserve, Alan Greenspan, revealed Bush's real motivation behind his Middle East policy - the oil supply from Saudi Arabia. Bush has lied to the whole world. Andf now he expects Israel to pay an extremely high price for the promise of continued oil supplies.
The following quotations are from an article titled WE HAVE BEEN WARNED! by Elyakim Haetzni, a former Israeli government minister.
Some day we'll recall these tranquil months of headlines devoted to road accidents and minor scandals the headlines of a society free from existential cares -- as a fool’s paradise whose fools turned a blind eye to the erupting volcano threatening to bury us all. There was another summer like this one preceding Yom Kippur in ’73, but this time the surprise attack is being readied from within, and the calamity will be diplomatic.I’m referring to the ritual sacrifice that the Bush administration is preparing for us this November that goes by the name of a peace conference. The role of the sacrificial lamb will be filled by Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, hundreds of Jewish communities, and hundreds of thousands of Jews that will become refugees in their own land all this on the backdrop of national, societal, and diplomatic collapse.
I agree that unless God intervenes, ( and I believe He will ) Israel's future is in serious jeopardy. Judea and Samaria is the heart of the country. Jerusalem is in the centre of both areas. Understanding the future of Jerusalem as the capital of the Kingdom of God and the location of the throne of the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords, it is no wonder the enemy wants to steal it. Satan knows well that if he can tear the heart of the nation away, the nation will die.Josie and I are astounded that most Israelis are not prepared to stand up and if necessary, physically remove Olmert and the others who are preparing to give away the Lord's land from their offices. Most of the nation is silent. Last week a religious woman, Ruth Matar, called for Israelis to come to Jerusalem to protest outside the location of the meeting between Olmert & Condalesa Rice. She expected thousands to come, but only 150 people turned up. This dismall show of support for those opposed to giving the land away, gives the leaders a green light to move ahead. Even more astounding is the fact that most Messianic Jewish believers are also silent. There are only a few other ministries in the Land who take a stand against this godless government and the manipulation of the Bush government. We, the local believers, should be the most vocal, as we know what the scriptures say about the Land and how precious it is to our Heavenly Father.
And then there is the Church ! Sixty years ago, the majority of the Church, sat silently in their pews as six million Jews were reduced to smoke and ash in the Holocaust. Not much has changed. Today most of the Church is silent again as the Devil carries out his latest plan to destroy Israel and the Jewish people, to ensure the Messiah remains in Heaven and he remains the god of this world. When was the last time your pastor taught on Israel's right to the Land, or when did your church last pray for Israel's victory over her ememies ? Praise the Lord that is changing. Over the last 40 years an ever increasing number of Christians have had a revelation of God's plans and purposes for Israel. I even know of a few churches that give Israel priority in their prayer life and in their missions giving. But it is a mere remnant that has had this degree of revelation. The primary reason I write these comments each week is to motivate and inspire as many Christians as possible to take action against the plans of the enemy. To take action in prayer and intercession. To take action in the media, and wherever possible to openly stand with Israel's right to occupy all of the land that God promised to Abraham. And to take action in prayer against all those opposed to God and His chosen nation. There are many scripture verses we can pray against Israel's enemies - for example Psalm 83, Psalm 9: 19-20 - Arise O Lord let not man triumph - let the nations be judged in your presence. Strike them with terror, O Lord, let the nations know they are but men. Habakkuk 3:2 - Lord I have heard of your fame, I stand in awe of your deeds O Lord renew them in our day in our time make them known . In wrath remember mercy. Isaiah 8:9-19 - Raise the war cry, you nations and be shattered - Listen all you distant lands, Prepare for battle, and be shattered. Prepare for battle and be shattered ! Devise your strategy but it will be thwarted, propose your plan, but it will not stand, for God is with us. There are many, many more.
Please do not be like the majority of Israelis, Messianic Jews and Christians. Do not be SILENT but dare to be different - Be like Esther and SPEAK UP. Father I pray that you will anoint everyone reading this email message with a new and greater level of boldness, wisdom and authority to stand up for Israel - In the name of Yeshua I pray. The Lord bless you as you bless Israel by standing in defense of her right to exist on the land given to the Jewish people by the God of Israel . Lets pray that Israel will turn back to their God. Do not be silent, but share this with your fellow Christians, share it with your pastors, and with anyone you have a chance to speak to. Lets also pray for that breakthrough to the Muslims, and please remember to pray for our son Jordan, and all of his fellow soldiers in the IDF.
Shabbat Shalom ... David & Josie
Politics By Other Means
Religion and Foreign Policy
By CONN HALLINAN OCT 2,07
Religion, sometimes, is a continuation of politics by other means, notes Jon Alterman, director of the Center for Strategic and International Studies Middle East division, and it was hard to avoid that thought about last month's conference of Christians United for Israel (CUFI) in Washington D.C.There was Gary Bauer, former head of the right-wing evangelical Christian organization, the Family Research Council, bringing a crowd of 4,000 conventioneers to their feet with a prayer that the people of Israel-even under American pressure-never give up even one centimeter of land in the Occupied Territories.According to the weekly Jewish newspaper, The Forward, a choir struck up Blow the Trumpets in Zion, Zion, while delegates danced between the rows waving Israeli and American flags; some people wept.
If there was something slightly bizarre about apocalyptic Christians weeping over the fact that Israel might trade land for peace, there was nothing fringy about the foreign policy heavy weights CUFI has gathered under its wing. On hand to address the convention was Senator Joseph Lieberman, Republican heavy weight Newt Gingrich and the man who will quite likely to be the next prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu.The force behind CUFI, Texas Pastor John Hagee, counts President George Bush, Republican Presidential hopeful Senator John McCain, and the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee among his supporters, as well as a number of Democratic legislators, including U.S. Rep. Eliot Engel of New York.Hagee's organization-active in all 50 states-is currently pressuring Congress to confront Hezbollah in Lebanon, increase aid to Israel, and toughen sanctions on Iran, although the Texas minister himself doesn't think Teheran will respond to anything but war: It is time for America to adopt Senator Lieberman's words and consider a military pre-emptive strike against Iran. Hagee also advocates attacking Syria and the Palestinians.
Lieberman and Hagee are not the only ones talking about attacking Iran these days. President Bush recently told the American Legion convention, Iran's actions threaten the security of nations everywherewe will confront this danger before it is too late. According to an informal poll taken by ex-Middle East CIA field officer, Robert Baer, The feeling is we will hit the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps within six months. The Sunday Times reported Sept. 2 The Pentagon has drawn up plans for massive air strikes against 1200 targets in Iran, designed to annihilate the Iranian military capacity in three days.Are Christian evangelicals, in what is arguably the most religious administration in U.S. history, driving the Bush Administration's agenda in the Middle East and Africa? Or is the religious content of U.S. foreign policy politics by other means? Is the current culture war against Islam by people like historian Bernard Lewis, philosopher Francis Fukuyama and Pope Benedict XVI, a return to the religious mania of the First Crusade, or does it have more in common with TV evangelists whose concerns are the contents of their parishioner's wallets rather than the state of their souls?
Certainly the Bush Administration has appointed religious activists to key policy positions. Long-time religious activist and neo-conservative Elliot Abrams, former chair of U.S. Commission on Religious Freedom, has helped focus U.S. foreign policy on religious persecution in Sudan, Russia and China. According to Newsweek, his co-chair, right-wing Catholic activist Nina Shea, made Christian persecution Washington's hottest topic.
The Bush Administration's Special Envoy to the Sudan, Robert Seiple, is the former CEO of World Vision, a Christian aid and advocacy organization. According to John Eibner, chief executive officer of Christian Solidarity International, pressure from Christian groups played an important role in pushing the U.S. to get involved in Sudan.But is U.S. Africa policy driven by religious activists, or by the fact that by the year 2015 some 25 percent of U.S. oil imports will come from that continent?
Christian evangelicals have also made deep inroads into the American military.Lt. Gen. William Boykin, currently a deputy undersecretary of defense for intelligence, argues that the fight in Iraq is between a Christian nation and Satan, and can only be won if we come against them in the name of Jesus.The Pentagon is a strong supporter of Operation Straight Up (OSU), which delivers entertainment and sermons to troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. OSU describes its mission as a crusade-an incendiary word in the Middle East-and distributes a left behind video game where players fight the Antichrist represented by the United Nations. Former Air Force Academy graduate Mickey Weinstein, who heads up the Military Freedom Foundation, describes OSU as the Christian Taliban. According to a 2006 study for the U.S. War College by Col. William Millonig, Christian evangelical influence in the armed forces began during the Vietnam War. He concludes that conservative Christian and Republican values have affected the military's decision making and policy recommendations, warning that America's strategic thinkers, both military and civilian, must be aware of this and its potential implications on policy formulation.Again, however, are the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan driven by a religious agenda, or the fact that 65 percent of the world's remaining oil reserves are in the Middle East?
Religion has long played a role in the West's relationship to the rest of the world, but more as a way to divide populations than convert them. Ireland and India are cases in point.England invaded Ireland in 1170, but for the first 439 years it was a conquest in name only. In 1609, however, James I founded the Plantation of Ulster, imported 20,000 Protestant settlers, and introduced religious strife as a political tactic. By favoring Protestants over the native Catholics in politics and economics-the so-called Ulster Privilege-the English pitted both groups against one another.The tactic was enormously successful, and England used it throughout its colonial empire. Nowhere were the British so successful in transplanting the Irish model than in India.But in India's case it was unnecessary to import a foreign religion. The colonial authorities had India's Muslim and Sikh minorities to use as their wedge. As the historian Alex von Tunzelmann argues in Indian Summer, it was the British who defined India's communities on the basis of religion: Many Indians stopped accepting the diversity of their own thoughts and began to ask themselves in which of the boxes they belonged.
Muslims and Sikhs were favored for the few civil jobs and university slots open to Indians, a favoritism that generated tensions among the three communities, just as it had in Northern Ireland. The colonial regimes exploited everyone in both countries, but for some the burden was heavier. When communities in both countries fell to fighting over the few crumbs available to them, the British authorities stepped in to keep order, sadly shaking their heads about the inability of people in both countries ever to govern themselves.While Sir John Davis was describing the Irish as degenerate with the heart of a beast, Lord Hastings was arguing that the Hindoo appears a being nearly limited to animal functions and even in them indifferentwith no higher intellect than a dog.Lest one dismiss the above characterizations as typical 19th Century colonial racism, Winston Churchill once commented, I hate the Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion.Churchill's intolerance, however, had a very practical side to it. As prime minister he once said that he hoped that the tension between Hindus and Muslims would remain A bulwark of British rule in India.The British were not alone in using religion as a tactic to divide and conquer. The French employed it quite successfully in Lebanon and Vietnam. In the former, Paris favored Maronite Christians over Muslims (and Sunni Muslims over Shiite Muslims), and in the latter, Catholics over Buddhists.
No colonial tactic is successful forever, however, and in the aftermath of World War II the empires collapsed. But the use of religion as a device to divide and conquer leaves considerable wreckage in its wake.The current peace between Catholics and Protestants in Ulster is holding, but it took countless lives and almost 400 years to achieve.The partition of India on religious grounds cost more than a million lives and displaced some 12 million people. Pakistan and India have fought four wars since 1947, and the last one came distressingly close to going nuclear.
And tensions between communities in India are still high. The right-wing Hindu Bharatiya Janata Party led nationwide riots over a 16th Century mosque in Ayodhya, and five years ago, 2000 Muslims were massacred in Gujarat by Hindu extremists.
Exploiting religious differences hardly ended with the demise of the great colonial empires.The French continue to exploit religious divisions in Lebanon, and the U.S. is currently trying to cobble together a Sunni united front to confront Washington's three opponents in the Middle East: Iran, Syria, and Hezbollah in southern Lebanon. Syria is mostly Sunni, but Bashar al-Assad's regime is dominated by Alawites, a variety of Shiism. Some 60 percent of Lebanon is Shiite.But Shiites only constitute about 12 percent of Islam, and while Washington talks of a Shiia crescent as if it constituted some kind of united front, in fact there are enormous differences between Arab Syria and Lebanon, and non-Arabic speaking Iran.
Islam is a polyglot of cultures and ethnicities-the largest Muslim country is Indonesia- but that point gets lost in the current culture war directed at Islam.Historian Bernard Lewis recently told the Jerusalem Post that Muslims seem about to take over Europe because Europeans have surrendered to Islam in the name of political correctness and multi-culturalism. Philosopher Francis Fukuyama argues that France's opposition to the Iraq War was in part to appease Muslim opinion, and Omer Taspinar of the Brookings Institute claims that European Muslims are becoming a more powerful political force than the fabled Arab street.But as Jytte Klausen of Brandeis University points out, since only 10.25 percent of the Muslim population in Europe can vote, there is very little cost for political parties to ignore the concerns of Muslim communities.Researchers Jonathan Laurence and Justin Vaisse, who studied France's Muslims, conclude there is no such thing as a Muslim community, and polls found that French Muslims listed economic inequality as their first concern. Foreign policy came in twelfth.Indeed, as Patrick Weil of the Sorbonne points out, the myth that Muslims somehow influenced France's foreign policy is the same argument as saying the Bush decision to go to Iraq was because of the Israeli lobby. Muslims did oppose the war, as did most Europeans.If religion influences foreign policy, it is because it dovetails with the policies of powerful economic interests, which is not to say that religion always defers to secular self-interest. Once conjured up, it can take on a life of its own.
In Les Blancs, Lorraine Hansberry's edgy play about colonial Kenya, the play's central character, Tshembe, points out that while concepts like race and religion are indeed instruments which men use to rule over one another, those contrivances create their own reality. Men invoke the device of religion to cloak their conquests, Tshembe tells a clueless American reporter. You and I may recognize the fraudulence of the device, but the fact remains that a man who has a sword run through him because he refuses to become a Moslem or a Christianis suffering the utter reality of the device. And it is pointless to pretend that it doesn't exist-merely because it is lie.In the Middle East and Sudan, religion certainly appears to be the continuation of politics by other means. Whether it is President George Bush invoking the threat of a world-wide Muslim Caliphate, or Pope Benedict XVI warning that Islam promotes violence, religion is increasingly being used to ramp up the fear factor in international politics. But as with Europe's great religious wars, in the end religion in foreign policy is a device that allows the strong to seize the resources of the weak in the name of a higher power.Conn Hallinan is an analyst for Foreign Policy in Focus, a winner of a Project Censored Award, and did his PhD dissertation on the history of insurrectionary organizations in Ireland.
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