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.
Flooding, flight troubles in North Texas Mon Oct 15, 8:06 PM ET
DALLAS - Heavy storms swept through North Texas on Monday, flooding roads, damaging buildings and knocking out power to thousands of homes and businesses. The rainy weather was blamed for at least one death and caused numerous accidents, snarled traffic and canceled more than 100 flights at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport.A driver in Denton was killed when his car slid into the path of an oncoming truck, authorities said. The driver appeared to be driving too fast on the wet roads, Denton police spokesman Jim Bryan said.One person was rescued after floodwaters submerged a stretch of roadway under elevated Interstate 635 in Dallas. Several vehicles were caught in the water, authorities said.A pickup truck and a school bus filled with students collided in Farmersville, about 35 miles northeast of Dallas. The impact knocked the bus on its side in a ditch, and a 15-year-old girl was taken to a hospital for back pain.At the storm's peak, 20,000 Dallas-Fort Worth customers were without power, according to Oncor Electric Delivery. Utility crews had restored power to most of them by early Monday evening, spokesman Jeamy Molina said.
Wind blew the roof off of a warehouse in Dallas and off a vacant building in Haltom City, a Fort Worth suburb.DFW reported 110 canceled flights and delays of up to 90 minutes, spokesman Ken Capps said. He said flights were slowly getting back on track. About 10 golfers became stranded when a flooded creek quickly rose. They were rescued by Garland firefighters using an inflatable raft and weren't injured.The storms were caused by a cold front rolling eastward across the region. More rain was expected in the evening before subsiding Tuesday, weather officials said.
Tropical cyclone may form in Gulf of Mexico: NHC Mon Oct 15, 11:44 AM ET
NEW YORK (Reuters) - A low-pressure system emerged from the Yucatan Peninsula in Mexico into the southwestern Gulf of Mexico and could develop into a tropical cyclone over the next day or two, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said Monday. Weather models show the system will move generally north across the Gulf and make landfall in the oil rich northern Gulf Coast between central Louisiana and western Florida over the next few days.The NHC will name the next tropical storm Noel. Tropical storms pack winds of 39 to 73 miles per hour.In addition, the system could disrupt some of Mexico's oil production in the Bay of Campeche in the southwestern Gulf.Mexico's Cantarell Complex lies in the Bay of Campeche. It is one of the most productive oil fields in the world, supplying about two-thirds of Mexico's crude oil output.
CARIBBEAN SYSTEM
The NHC is also watching a low-pressure system in the southwestern Caribbean off the coast of Nicaragua.The NHC however does not expect the Caribbean system to develop into a tropical cyclone before making landfall.Weather models show the system will make landfall in Nicaragua before moving northwest over Central America. A couple of the models showed the system emerging in the Bay of Campeche over the next five days.
EARTH DESTROYED WITH THE EARTH
GENESIS 6:11-13
11 The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.(WORLD TERRORISM,MURDERS)
12 And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.
13 And God said unto Noah, The end of all flesh is come before me; for the earth is filled with violence (TERRORISM) through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.
Death toll in Cent. American rains at 21 Sun Oct 14, 11:02 PM ET
TEGUCIGALPA, Honduras - Three children and a woman were killed when their boat capsized in Honduras, officials said Sunday, raising to 21 the death toll from days of torrential rains that have driven thousands from their homes across Central America.
The boat was carrying 20 children and three adults when it sank Saturday in the choppy waters of the Choluteca River during an evacuation in the town of El Chapernal south of the capital, chief firefighter Wilfredo Hernandez said.The victims were three children, ages 5 to 14, and a 23-year-old woman, he said.
Heavy rains have swept through Central America since the middle of the week, displacing thousands and prompting authorities to send the military to hard-hit areas.Police evacuated some 10,000 people in western Nicaragua on Sunday as rains caused rivers to overflow. Guatemalan officials reported that 1,400 people were evacuated from townships near the Mexico border.In Costa Rica, 14 people died Friday when a hillside collapsed in the town of La Fatima de Atenas northeast of the capital, according to the Red Cross.The following day an 87-year-old man was killed trying to cross a river in northwest Costa Rica, and a woman died when a rock fell on her car in Acosta, near the capital.In El Salvador, a 40-year-old man died after he was carried away by a river Friday. Panamanian authorities said Sunday two people were missing.Costa Rica's meteorological institute predicted the heavy rains would continue through at least Monday night.
Alert on Indonesian volcano raised to maximum OCT 16,07
JAKARTA (Reuters) - Indonesia raised on Tuesday the alert level for Mount Kelud volcano to the highest level, as residents started fleeing amid signs an eruption could be imminent, officials and a witness said. The number of volcanic earthquakes at Mount Kelud, 90 km (55 miles) southwest of Indonesia's second-largest city Surabaya, had soared to more than 300 in a six-hour period from late morning, the country's top volcano expert said by telephone.
An area 10 km from the crater should be evacuated, said Surono, head of the Centre for Volcanology and Geological Hazard Mitigation in Bandung.The alert level was raised to maximum based on the seismic activity, deformation, visual observation and the temperature of the crater lake going up, according to the centre's Web site (www.vsi.esdm.go.id).
An estimated 350,000 people live within 10 km of the volcano on Java island, growing coffee, sugar cane, pineapples and papayas on the rich volcanic soil or feeding their cattle on the volcano's slopes.People are panicking as they are heading towards the evacuation areas, a Reuters witness said by telephone from the area. They are facing water and sanitation problems as the evacuation sites have not been properly equipped.Surono, who said that the evacuation had started at 7 p.m. (1200 GMT), warned that residents should steer clear of rivers near the volcano in case of flows of lahar, a mix of hot stones and water.They were also urged to prepare face masks to protect against possible ash clouds from the 1,731-metre (5,712-foot) volcano causing eye irritation or respiratory problems.The crater lake on Kelud makes it harder to monitor than many of the other volcanoes scattered across Indonesia's archipelago, as some of the warning signs are concealed below the water's surface.Saut Simatupang, another official at the centre, said the crater lake had started to change color indicating increasing sulphur levels.On the east and the north of the lake, it has started to turn white with sulphur. When Kelud last erupted in 1990, at least 30 people were killed, while an eruption in 1919 killed about 5,000 as it ejected scalding water from its crater lake.Indonesia, which sits on a belt of intense seismic activity known as the Pacific Ring of Fire, has had several volcanic eruptions over the centuries.
Rethink on human hybrid experiments
Oct 8 02:42 PM US/Eastern
A radical Government re-think on the law governing hybrid embryos will allow scientists to carry out virtually any work they like - if it is approved by regulators.The move opens the door to experiments involving every known kind of human-animal hybrid. These could include both cytoplasmic embryos, which are 99.9% human, and true hybrids carrying both human and animal genes.In addition chimeras made of a mosaic-like mix of cells from different species, and human transgenic embryos - human embryos modified with animal DNA - will also be allowed under licence.
Provision has also been made for the regulation of hybrid embryo research to incorporate any unforeseen developments that might arise in the future.Ministers have moved a long way from original White Paper proposals for an outright ban on all human-animal embryos, prompting outrage from scientists.The new measures are contained in a revised version of the Human Tissue and Embryology Bill which will be included in the Queen's Speech next month. They have been set out as part of the Government's response to a parliamentary committee's verdict on the Bill.Another major change is that plans to combine two regulatory bodies into a single authority have been dropped. The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) and Human Tissue Authority (HTA) will now remain separate entities. They were to have been fused together to create a new Regulatory Authority for Tissue and Embryos (RATE).The Scrutiny Committee of MPs and peers that reported on the Bill in August had recommended putting the issue of whether or not to allow animal-human embryos to a free vote in both houses of Parliament. It said if a decision were taken in principle to permit such research, it should be up to regulators to decide what experiments can be licensed.
The revised Bill does more than even the committee asked for. It effectively removes the barriers completely, permitting the creation of all four currently envisaged types of hybrid embryo, subject to a licence being granted by the relevant regulatory authority - in this case the HFEA.Allowing scientists to work on human-animal hybrid embryos will greatly speed up progress in stem cell research. Researchers hope to use embryonic stem cells (ESCs), which can transform into virtually any kind of body tissue, to investigate the causes of human diseases and develop new therapies for currently incurable conditions such as Parkinson's and type 1 diabetes. Press Association Ltd 2007,
EU treaty talks near deal
Sun Oct 14, 2007 11:10pm BST
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Negotiations on a treaty to reform European Union institutions enter the home straight on Monday when foreign ministers meeting in Luxembourg try to clear the last land mines on the road to a summit agreement this week.Since the bloc's 27 leaders struck a deal on the political mandate in June, lawyers, linguists and diplomats have been working in the shadows to turn it into a treaty text, replacing the constitution rejected by French and Dutch voters in 2005.That work is now complete and only a handful of minor issues remain involving Poland, Italy and Bulgaria. None is considered serious enough to prevent EU leaders finalising the treaty in Lisbon on Friday, due to be signed in December.Like the defunct constitution, the treaty provides for a long-term president of the EU from 2009, a more powerful foreign policy chief, a simpler, more democratic decision-making system and more power for the European and national parliaments.
The general prognosis is that we should get it done this time. There is no obstacle that looks likely to call an agreement into question, an EU ambassador said.Given continent-wide fatigue after a decade of wrangling over European institutions, the desire to reach the finishing line and avoid new ratification problems is widespread.Only Ireland is bound to hold a referendum, although there is strong pressure from so-called Eurosceptics on Prime Minister Gordon Brown to hold a plebiscite, which he would likely lose. Barring such an accident, the treaty would take effect in 2009.
Poland fought a successful rearguard battle to delay the new population-based voting system until 2017 and is still pushing to incorporate in the treaty a provision allowing states short of a blocking minority to delay EU decisions for several months.Other states want the so-called Ioannina Compromise confined to a less binding, perhaps time-limited political declaration.Poland seems likely to win a consolation prize with the creation of an additional post of advocate-general at the European Court of Justice for a Polish nominee.Italy is angry at losing parity with France and Britain in the redistribution of European Parliament seats and wants that issue separated from the treaty and negotiated at a later date. The EU assembly proposed the reallocation to take account of population trends, with Spain the biggest beneficiary.
New member Bulgaria raised the stakes at the last minute by demanding that the European single currency be written as evro in its Cyrillic alphabet, as it was in its accession treaty.The European Central Bank has opposed alternative spellings of the euro.Sofia threatened to block the signing of an accord on closer ties between the EU and Montenegro on Monday, but agreed to back off provided EU ambassadors approve a declaration recognising a linguistic-technical problem and promising to solve it soon.
(additional reporting by Yves Clarisse)
DANIEL 8:23-25
23 And in the latter time of their kingdom, when the transgressors are come to the full, a king (EU DICTATOR) of fierce countenance, and understanding dark sentences,(FROM THE OCCULT) shall stand up.
24 And his power shall be mighty, but not by his own power:(SATANS POWER) and he shall destroy wonderfully, and shall prosper, and practise, and shall destroy the mighty and the holy people.
25 And through his policy also he shall cause craft to prosper in his hand; and he shall magnify himself in his heart, and by peace shall destroy many: he shall also stand up against the Prince of princes;(JESUS) but he shall be broken without hand.
THIS COULD BE THE START OF THE RESOLVE OF THE QUARTET. THE BIBLE SAYS THE EU WILL BE THE ONE THAT MAKES THE FINAL 7 YR PEACE CONTRACT WITH THE ISRAELI-ARABS AND MANY.
U.N. Human Rights Envoy Recommends U.N. Quit the Quartet
by Hana Levi Julian
(IsraelNN.com) John Dugard, employed as an independent expert (special rapporteur) to the United Nations’ Human Rights Commission, has called on the U.N. to quit the Quartet of Mideast peace brokers if the international body does not address alleged human rights violations by Israel.In my most recent report to the General Assembly, which I will present later this month, I will suggest that the Secretary-General withdraw the U.N. from the Quartet, if the Quartet fails to have regard to the human rights situation in the Palestinian Territories, he said.Dugard said in an interview with the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) Monday that the Quartet, which also includes Russia, the United States and the European Union, is heavily influenced by the U.S., weakening the international group’s effectiveness.Every time I visit, the situation seems to have worsened, he said. This time, I was very struck by the sense of hopelessness among the Palestinian people. That hopelessness was also noted in a report by the Economist magazine, albeit attributed to different causes.Dugard added that the U.N. does itself little good” by remaining in the Quartet, due to human rights violations by Israel in Judea, Samaria and Gaza.
Israel’s security checkpoints, which have enabled the IDF to prevent dozens of intended terrorist attacks, are actually used as a method of collective punishment against the Arab population, he said, to make the life of Palestinians as miserable as possible.
Dugard has assiduously dedicated himself to an unending condemnation of Israel, as has the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva which according to Israel’s Ambassador to the U.N. in Geneva, Yitzchak Levanon, is obsessed with the desire to continue with [its] unending odyssey of bashing a single U.N. member state.
At a meeting in Geneva last month, Lebanon also blasted a decision to hold a special debate on Israel during each session of the council, calling it a flagrant violation of the fundamental principles of equality.The retired South African professor of international law is considered an expert on apartheid. As permanent investigator of Israel’s actions in Judea, Samaria and Gaza, he has also been criticized in the past for accusing Israel of apartheid policies in the PA territories.Although he grudgingly acknowledged that Israel does indeed face a threat to its security, Dugard charged that its response is very disproportionate.
He also warned that the upcoming U.S. Mideast summit scheduled for next month might end in a third intifada by PA Arabs against Israel due to unrealistic expectations raised among the population by the PA leadership. Dugard added that this should come as no surprise, since in a military occupation, there are likely to be those engaged in resistance.The U.N. human rights expert said although some might refer to those who attack Israeli civilians as terrorists, history looks at the picture quite differently. He compared PA terrorists to members of the French resistance to the Nazi invaders during World War II and those in Namibia who fought occupation by South Africa. Now they are in the government and treated as heroes, he said.Dugard did not address the issue of the wide-scale human rights violations by Fatah and Hamas terrorists and militia forces perpetrated against their own people, in addition to their attacks on Israeli citizens.Instead, Dugard claimed the U.N. should be playing the role of mediator between the warring Hamas and Fatah terrorist factions who are fighting for control of the PA. Instead, the international community has given its support almost completely to one faction, to Fatah. That’s not the role the U.N. should take, he contended.
Hamas has ruthlessly squelched any attempt by journalists to document its human rights violations in Gaza, which it seized in June as part of its bloody civil war with Fatah.
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.
Putin warns US against attacking Iran By VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV, Associated Press Writer OCT 16,07
TEHRAN, Iran - Russian leader Vladimir Putin met his Iranian counterpart Tuesday and implicitly warned the U.S. not to use a former Soviet republic to stage an attack on Iran. He also said nations should not pursue oil pipeline projects that are not backed by regional powers. At a summit of the five nations that border the inland Caspian Sea, Putin said none of the nations' territory should be used by any outside countries for use of military force against any nation in the region. It was a clear reference to long-standing rumors that the U.S. was planning to use Azerbaijan, a former Soviet republic, as a staging ground for any possible military action against Iran.We are saying that no Caspian nation should offer its territory to third powers for use of force or military aggression against any Caspian state, Putin said.Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad also underlined the need to keep outsiders away from the Caspian.The Caspian Sea is an inland sea and it only belongs to the Caspian states, therefore only they are entitled to have their ships and military forces here, he said.A State Department spokesman, Tom Casey, said the United States is not planning military action against Iran.
We are pursuing a diplomatic course with respect to Iran that includes with respect to its nuclear program as well as with respect to its support for terrorism and other issues that are out there, he said.Putin, whose trip to Tehran is the first by a Kremlin leader since World War II, warned that energy pipeline projects crossing the Caspian could only be implemented if all five nations that border the Caspian support them.Putin did not name any specific country, but his statement underlined Moscow's strong opposition to U.S.-backed efforts to build pipelines to deliver hydrocarbons to the West bypassing Russia.Projects that may inflict serious environmental damage to the region cannot be implemented without prior discussion by all five Caspian nations, he said.Other nations bordering the Caspian Sea and in attendance at the summit are: Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan.The legal status of the Caspian — believed to contain the world's third-largest energy reserves — has been in limbo since the 1991 Soviet collapse, leading to tension and conflicting claims to seabed oil deposits.Iran, which shared the Caspian's resources equally with the Soviet Union, insists that each coastal nation receive an equal portion of the seabed. Russia, Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan want the division based on the length of each nation's shoreline, which would give Iran a smaller share.
Putin's visit took place despite warnings of a possible assassination plot and amid hopes that personal diplomacy could help offer a solution to an international standoff on Iran's nuclear program.Putin has warned the U.S. and other nations against trying to coerce Iran into reining in its nuclear program and insists peaceful dialogue is the only way to deal with Tehran's defiance of a U.N. Security Council demand that it suspend uranium enrichment.Threatening someone, in this case the Iranian leadership and Iranian people, will lead nowhere, Putin said Monday during his trip to Germany. They are not afraid, believe me.Iran's rejection of the council's demand and its previous clandestine atomic work has fed suspicions in the U.S. and other countries that Tehran is working to enrich uranium to a purity usable in nuclear weapons. Iran insists it is only wants lesser-enriched uranium to fuel nuclear reactors that would generate electricity.Putin's visit to Tehran is being closely watched for any possible shifts in Russia's carefully hedged stance in the nuclear standoff. The Russian president underlined his disagreements with Washington last week, saying he saw no objective data to prove Western claims that Iran is trying to construct nuclear weapons. Putin emphasized Monday that he would negotiate in Tehran on behalf of the five permanent U.N. Security Council members — United States, Russia, China, Britain and France — and Germany, a group that has led efforts to resolve the stalemate with Tehran. Associated Press writers Ali Akbar Dareini and Nasser Karimi contributed to this report.
Pentagon confirms accidental Patriot launch OCT 16,07
WASHINGTON (AFP) - A US Patriot missile was accidentally launched in Qatar and landed in an unpopulated farm area, causing no injuries, the Pentagon confirmed Tuesday.
HOARDING OF GOLD AND SILVER
DOCTOR DOCTORIAN FROM ANGEL OF GOD
then the angel said, Financial crisis will come to Asia. I will shake the world.
JAMES 5:1-3
1 Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you.
2 Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten.
3 Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days.
REVELATION 18:10,17,19
10 Standing afar off for the fear of her torment, saying, Alas, alas that great city Babylon, that mighty city! for in one hour is thy judgment come.
17 For in one hour so great riches is come to nought. And every shipmaster, and all the company in ships, and sailors, and as many as trade by sea, stood afar off,
19 And they cast dust on their heads, and cried, weeping and wailing, saying, Alas, alas that great city, wherein were made rich all that had ships in the sea by reason of her costliness! for in one hour is she made desolate.
EZEKIEL 7:19
19 They shall cast their silver in the streets, and their gold shall be removed: their silver and their gold shall not be able to deliver them in the day of the wrath of the LORD: they shall not satisfy their souls, neither fill their bowels: because it is the stumblingblock of their iniquity.
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
Stocks dip on Bernanke's sobering words By MADLEN READ, AP Business Writer OCT 16,07
NEW YORK - Wall Street sank for the second straight session Tuesday after Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said the night before that the slumping housing market remains a significant drag on the economy. Bernanke's speech at the New York Economic Club elevated concerns that the summer credit crisis might persist into the winter — a sobering thought for investors, who are sifting through mixed third-quarter earnings and watching energy costs rise.First of all, the worry is we're getting more bad news on housing. Number two is higher oil prices. That's a pretty bad combination, said Hugh Johnson, chief investment officer of Johnson Illington Advisors.He added: Of particular concern were the comments by Bernanke. That sort of injected a fairly high level of uncertainty into the economic and earnings outlook. That comes at a time when earnings results are not particularly exciting — in fact, are dismal.The stock market had its biggest drop in more than five weeks Monday after Citigroup Inc. reported a steep third-quarter profit drop and announced plans with a consortium of banks to set up a fund to help bail out the credit markets.
Then on Tuesday, Wells Fargo & Co. shares fell more than 3 percent after the bank said its third-quarter earnings increased less than analysts anticipated and that it boosted loan loss reserves in anticipation of further problems in consumer credit. KeyCorp shares also declined more than 3 percent after the Midwest regional bank posted a 33 percent drop in third-quarter profit. Most other financial and housing-related stocks fell, as did retailers. One of the few gainers in the financial sector was Bear Stearns Cos., after China Citic Bank expressed interest in buying a stake in the U.S. brokerage.In late morning trading, the Dow Jones industrial average fell 66.33, or 0.47 percent, to 13,918.47.
Broader indicators also fell. The Standard & Poor's 500 index slid 7.40, or 0.48 percent, to 1,541.31, and the Nasdaq composite index dipped 11.18, or 0.40 percent, to 2,768.87.Treasury bond prices rose, pushing down the yield on the 10-year Treasury note to 4.65 percent from 4.68 percent at Monday's close. Bond prices and yields move in opposite directions. The dollar rose against most currencies, and gold prices slipped.Bernanke said in his speech that the deepening housing slump probably will be a drag on economic growth. Still, he again pledged to act as needed to help financial markets that were sent reeling this summer, and said inflation remains in check. That could be a key factor for policymakers when deciding whether to cut interest rates at their Oct. 30-31 meeting.But while core inflation — which excludes volatile food and energy prices — is mild, oil prices are pushing further into record territory.
Despite expectations of higher inventories in the weekly U.S. supply report released on Wednesday, a barrel of light, sweet crude rose $1 to $87.13 on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Investors will get another reading on the housing market Tuesday at 1 p.m. EDT with the National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo housing market index for October. The report is expected to show a decline.Declining issues outnumbered advancers by about 7 to 3 on the New York Stock Exchange, where volume came to 395.5 million shares.Overseas, Japan's Nikkei stock average closed down 1.27 percent. Britain's FTSE 100 fell 0.42 percent, Germany's DAX index fell 0.36 percent, and France's CAC-40 fell 0.87 percent.
On the Net: New York Stock Exchange: http://www.nyse.com Nasdaq Stock Market: http://www.nasdaq.com
Rice wins Egypt's support for conference By MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press Writer OCT 16,07
CAIRO, Egypt - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Tuesday won tempered Egyptian support in her quest to nudge Israelis and Palestinians closer together ahead of a Mideast peace conference to be held in November or December. Egypt, a key mediator between the Arabs and Israel, and other key Arab allies have expressed skepticism over the conference in past weeks, fearing it would be merely symbolic without making real progress in the Israeli-Palestinian peace process. A day earlier, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit spoke of postponing it.But Aboul Gheit said his meeting with Rice on Tuesday gives us a lot of trust and confidence about American intentions for the conference, though he cautioned that preparations to hammer out the agenda could take more time.Rice has helped us to understand the American objective. She shed a great deal of light on the current American efforts, he told reporters.We feel encouraged regarding what we heard from Secretary Rice and promised her that we would help and we would help the parties as well in order to achieve the objective which is launching the permanent status negotiations that would lead to the establishment of a Palestinian state on both the Palestinian territories, he said.
Rice and Aboul Gheit said the timing of the conference depended on progress in Israeli-Palestinian talks on hammering out an agreement to be sealed at the gathering, expected to be in Annapolis, Md. The Palestinians want the document to address core issues of the peace negotiations, while Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert wants a vaguer statement.We will continue to work and help them to create this document and we will then be in a position I think fairly soon to talk about when this meeting ought to take place, Rice said.Rice was heading later in the day back to Jerusalem for further talks with Olmert.Still, Aboul Gheit said the conference should be put off if a strong deal is not reached.
We have to go into the meeting ready to launch negotiations, he said. It can be done if we have enough determination on the part of the (Bush) administration.Palestinian and Israeli negotiating teams met for a second time on Monday to try to thrash out details of the joint document. So far, no advances have been made, and we are not deluding ourselves, Palestinian negotiator Yasser Abed Rabbo said Tuesday.Last week, Arab League chief Amr Moussa — whom Rice was also meeting Tuesday — derided the conference, saying the Americans were just hoping for a photo opportunity between Saudi and Israeli officials.But Aboul Gheit on Tuesday suggested Egypt would work with the Palestinians and Israelis to help solidify the agenda. All of us are required to help in drafting the parameters, the principles, the understandings, whatever will launch the negotiations on a sound basis, he said.
There were some tensions over U.S. criticism of human rights in Egypt. Rice told their press conference that in her talks with Mubarak and Aboul Gheit she brought up the issue of the detentions of four independent newspaper editors given prison sentences or put on trial for criticizing Mubarak.When we touch on issues we considered sensitive and internal, I listen. But my response is always that it is due process, Aboul Gheit retorted. This government does not interfere in Egyptian legal procedures.On Monday and earlier Tuesday, Rice pressed Israeli and Palestinian leaders to push ahead in their talks on the conference agenda. In one of her strongest statements yet on the issue, Rice declared that creation of a Palestinian state is a key U.S. interest and urged the two sides to drop contentious demands and reach consensus on a substantive joint statement.After meeting both sides again Tuesday and Wednesday, Rice will travel to London to meet Jordan's King Abdullah II, trying to build support among skeptical Arab nations.
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
CANADIANS CALL FOR NAU VOTE
EARTHQUAKES
MATTHEW 24:7-8
7 For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places.
8 All these are the beginning of sorrows.
MARK 13:8
8 For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom:(ETHNIC GROUP AGAINST ETHNIC GROUP) and there shall be earthquakes in divers places, and there shall be famines and troubles: these are the beginnings of sorrows.
LUKE 21:11
11 And great earthquakes shall be in divers places, and famines, and pestilences; and fearful sights and great signs shall there be from heaven.
IN THE FUTURE THE GREATEST QUAKE IN HISTORY OCCURS WHEN JESUS RETURNS TO EARTH BODILY TO RULE AND REIGN FROM DAVIDS THRONE.
ZECHARIAH 14:4
4 And his feet shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east, and the mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst thereof toward the east and toward the west, and there shall be a very great valley; and half of the mountain shall remove toward the north, and half of it toward the south.
Mini-Earthquake Sets Off Predictions of a Larger One
by Hillel Fendel OCT 15,07
(IsraelNN.com) The Patzael region in the central Jordan Valley, just 20 kilometers north of Jericho, was touched by a small earthquake on Saturday night, registering 3.0 on the Richter scale. A similar quake occurred in the same area two months ago.
On Sunday morning, researchers at Tel Aviv University presented a new study on the timeline of earthquakes throughout history. No precise future earthquake dates can be extrapolated from the data, of course, but the researchers say one is on the way - as no major quake has hit the danger area between the Dead Sea and the Kineret in centuries.
It's like the first winter rain, said Dr. Shmuel Marko, who took part in the study. The longer the dry summer lasts, the closer the first rain is. Here, as well: The quiet is worrisome. The longer we go without a large quake, the more we can expect one.On the other hand, experts have said that Israel's earthquakes are in general less frequent than those in other quake-prone regions such as California, Japan and Turkey. Israel is located along the Syria-Africa rift, a friction point between two subterranean plates and is therefore considered earthquake-prone. In 1927, some 250 people were killed in an earthquake that hit Jericho and central Israel. In November 1995, a 6.2 quake caused injuries to several people in Eilat. A minor quake, 5.0 on the Richter scale, hit Israel in February 2004, shaking buildings in many cities and even causing damage to the Knesset building. No one was reported hurt. The northern city of Tzfat was hit by two earthquakes in recent centuries, in 1759 and in 1837. The latter one killed at least 2,000 people, when residents were buried under the ruins of their homes and help did not arrive for days.
PREMEDITATED MERGER
Canadians call for vote on SPP
Activists demand national referendum on continental divide
October 15, 2007 - 1:00 a.m. Eastern - By Jerome R. Corsi
2007 WorldNetDaily.com
Canadian activists are demanding Prime Minister Stephen Harper fulfill a promise and submit the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America to a national referendum for an up or down vote. The Prime Minister of Canada and his cabinet in both Liberal and Conservative regimes support the unification of North America as witnessed by the fact of [former Prime Minister] Paul Martin and [current Prime Minister] Stephen Harper being signatories to the SPP process, said Connie Fogal, leader of the Canadian Action Party. Fogal rejects the idea that the vote on SPP should be taken solely in the Canadian Parliament.
A decision about the restructuring of Canada into an integrated North America is not a decision for parliament, but for the citizens of Canada, Fogal says. What every Parliamentarian should do is call for a no confidence vote on this issue to cease unification of Canada, the USA and Mexico, and then run a campaign on the life of Canada not its death.Maude Barlow, the National Chairperson of the Council of Canadians, agrees. So far, only 30 CEOs from North America's richest corporations, including Lockheed Martin, Bank of Nova Scotia, Chevron, Power Corporation and Merck, have had any meaningful input, a news release on Barlow's website proclaims. Only they have been invited to annual closed-door meetings of SPP leaders and ministers, such as the one that took place in Montebello, Quebec, in August.As WND previously reported, the North American Competitiveness Council, or NACC, dominated the SPP closed-door meetings with the SPP trilateral working groups, the trilateral cabinet members in attendance and President Bush, Mexico's President Felipe Calderon, and Harper at the third annual SPP summit in Montebello, Quebec, on Aug. 20-21.
WND has also reported the NACC is a shadowy council of 30 top North American multinational corporations self-appointed by the Chambers of Commerce in each of the three countries to constitute the sole outside advisory to the SPP. The 30 companies composing the NACC are listed on a memo posted on the U.S. Chamber of Commerce website. In the United States, the companies on the NACC are: Campbell Soup Company,Chevron Corporation,Ford Motor Corporation,FedEx Corporation,General Electric Company,General Motors Corporation,Kansas City Southern,Lockheed Martin Corporation
Merck & Co., Inc.Mittal Steel USA,New York Life Insurance Company
Procter & Gamble,UPS,Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.
Whirlpool Corporation
No union leaders, public interest groups, environmental advocates or news media have ever attended the closed-door of the NACC with the SPP. According to a document on the Commerce Department's SPP website, the organization of the NACC was agreed upon by the three leaders on March 31, 2006. We are pleased to announce the creation of a North American Competitiveness Council, the White House announced the same day. The Council will comprise members of the private sector from each country, the White House said, and will provide us recommendations on North American competitiveness, including, among others, areas such as automotive and transportation, steel, manufacturing, and services. The Council will meet annually with security and prosperity Ministers and will engage with senior government officials on an ongoing basis.On Sept. 25, Harper made a speech to the Council on Foreign Relations in New York where he again endorsed SPP. In a transcript archived on the CFR website, Harper referred to the NACC, saying: At the North American summit that Canada hosted in Montebello last month, I was struck by the power of the message sent to us by the leaders from the American and Canadian private sectors. They appealed to us to see the connection between security and prosperity, Harper continued. They told us that without the and we won't have either.
The CFR website also has archived a video of Harper's Sept. 25 remarks.
Mayors From Around the World to Gather in Jerusalem
by Hillel Fendel OCT 15,07
(IsraelNN.com) The City as Capital and Metropolitan Center is the name of the 25th Jerusalem Conference of Mayors taking place this week in Jerusalem, sponsored by the American Jewish Congress Council for World Jewry. Jerusalem Mayor Uri Lupolianski will host the event, which is co-sponsored by Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Konrad Adenauer Foundation.Mayors from 40 cities are taking part in the five-day event, including Kiev, London, Dublin, Addis Ababa, Leipzig (Germany), Banja Luka (Bosnia and Herzegovina), Zagreb (Croatia), Tbilisi (the former USSR republic of Georgia), and others. The South American cities of Lima (Peru), Montevideo (Uruguay), Quito (Ecuador), and La-Paz (Bolivia) will also be represented. Participating US cities include Cincinnati (Ohio), Baton Rouge (Louisiana), Providence (Rhode Island), Madison (Wisconsin), and others.
The mayors will participate in round-table sessions exploring various challenges facing modern metropolitan areas. Among the topics to be discussed are the concept of metropolis and capital city as government centers, intercultural and economic challenges facing cities, the role of mayors in the international arena, and more. They will also tour various sights of Jerusalem and meet with local businessmen and volunteers.The visiting mayors will also meet with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, President Shimon Peres, and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni.Jerusalem Mayor Uri Lupolianski predicted that the conference will be the beginning of future cooperation between the cities, and especially with Jerusalem.
In sponsoring this annual gathering of mayors from around the world, Council for World Jewry Chairman Jack Rosen said, we hope to give them a fresh outlook of Jerusalem, and a new understanding of Israel and its achievements. Mayors Conference alumni are among Israel's best ambassadors of good will.The Council for World Jewry is a body that seeks, inter alia, to narrow the gaps between peoples of different backgrounds and faiths, combat world-wide anti-Semitism, and support Israel.Previous such conferences have been held under banners such as Excavating the Future: Tradition and Technology in the City, The Role of Mayor in Times of Crisis, and Mobilizing the Past for a Better Economic Future.
FROM WND'S JERUSALEM BUREAU
Rice: No Jewish building in eastern city
Says she'll push Israel to divide capital, blame Olmert if he doesn't comply - October 15, 2007 - By Aaron Klein
2007 WorldNetDaily.com
Condoleezza Rice
JERUSALEM – Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, in the region to prepare for an Israeli-Palestinian summit next month, told Palestinian officials yesterday she would pressure Israel against initiating any Jewish construction in eastern sections of Jerusalem, a senior Palestinian negotiator involved in talks with Rice told WND. The Palestinian negotiator stated Rice singled out Jerusalem areas as becoming part of a future Palestinian state and told his negotiating team she would publicly blame Israel for the failure of next month's U.S.-sponsored summit slated to be held in Maryland if the Jewish state didn't agree to evacuate eastern Jerusalem neighborhoods. The information follows a flurry of media reports last week Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was contemplating handing over sections of Jerusalem to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah organization. Vice Premier Haim Ramon, a member of Olmert's ruling Kadima party, last week reportedly mapped out a future partition of Jerusalem under a deal with the Palestinians.
Ramon was quoted by the popular Ynet Israeli website as writing in a letter to Jerusalem City Councilman Nir Barkat that under his plan, The Jewish neighborhoods (of Jerusalem) will be recognized as Israeli and under Israeli sovereignty. Accordingly, the Arab neighborhoods will be recognized as Palestinian. Passages between the Israeli neighborhoods will be open and secure – accordingly the same will be true for the Palestinian neighborhoods.According to Ramon's reported plan, There will be special sovereignty over the holy sites, taking into account Israel's unique interests in overseeing them. Within this framework, the Western Wall, the Jewish Quarter and other holy sites in the Jerusalem vicinity will remain under Israeli rule forever.Ramon's letter as quoted did not single out the fate of the Temple Mount, Judaism's holiest site.
Knesset Member Otniel Schneller, a Kadima party colleague of Olmert and Ramon known for his close relationship to the prime minister, claimed the plan violated the Kadima's platform. But WND first reported in 2006 it was Schneller who first floated a Kadima plan for dividing Jerusalem.
The Old City, Mount Scopus, the Mount of Olives, the City of David, Sheikh Jarra will remain in our hands, but [regarding] Kafr Akeb, Abu-Ram, Shuafat, Hizma, Abu-Zaim, Abu-Tur, Abu Dis, in the future, when the Palestinian state is established, they will become its capital, said Schneller at the small Jerusalem debate in May 2006, covered by WND. Days later, Schneller gave an interview to the Associated Press in which he stated We will not divide Jerusalem, we will share it.The Kadima lawmaker told AP most Jerusalem neighborhoods with large Arab populations would be given to the Palestinians. Those same neighborhoods will, in my assessment, be central to the makeup of the Palestinian capital ... al-Quds, said Schneller, calling Jerusalem by its Arabic name. Rice arrived in the region yesterday reportedly to help the Israeli and Palestinian sides formulate a joint statement ahead of November's conference. Palestinian leaders want the statement to specifically outline a Palestinian state including the Gaza Strip, West Bank and parts of Jerusalem, while Olmert officials have been quoted in recent days stating they prefer more vague commitments.
Olmert will forfeit Temple Mount
According to senior Palestinian negotiators, Olmert's team expressed willingness multiple times to divide Jerusalem and place the Temple Mount under pan-Arab control. WND in August quoted PA sources stating Olmert's office presented the Palestinians a formal plan in which the Jewish state would forfeit the Temple Mount to Muslim control under the joint management of Egypt, Jordan and the PA. The sources said Olmert's plan called for the entire Temple Mount plaza to fall under Arab sovereignty; Jerusalem's Old City holy sites near the Mount to be governed by a Jewish, Christian and Muslim task force; and the Western Wall plaza below the Mount to be controlled by Israel. David Baker, a spokesman for Olmert, would neither confirm nor deny the prime minister offered the Temple Mount.
Olmert hints Jerusalem could be shared
Signal to Palestinians comes as Rice visits region ahead of summit
OCT 15,07
RAMALLAH, West Bank - Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Monday raised questions about Israel's control of Arab neighborhoods in east Jerusalem, the first time he has openly signaled readiness to share control of the city with the Palestinians. Control of Jerusalem is at the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Israel claims all of the city, including east Jerusalem, which it captured in the 1967 Mideast war, as its capital. The Palestinians want the eastern sector for the capital of a future independent state. In a speech, Olmert noted that Israel has built a series of thriving Jewish neighborhoods in east Jerusalem, but signaled that Israel's control of Arab areas is not necessary. Was it necessary to also join the Shuafat refugee camp, Sawakra, Walaje and other villages and define them as part of Jerusalem? he asked. With that, I must confess it is possible to ask legitimate questions.
His comments came as U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza visited the region, saying Monday that President Bush has decided to make ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict one of the highest priorities of his administration.An international peace conference expected to take place in Annapolis, Md., in the fall has to be serious and substantive, Rice said at a news conference with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. We frankly have better things to do than invite people to Annapolis for a photo op, she said.
Israelis and Palestinians, Rice observed, are making their most serious effort in years to resolve the conflict. Frankly, it's time for the establishment of a Palestinian state, she added.
The two sides are trying to work out an outline for a final peace deal ahead of the Annapolis conference. But tensions arose on Sunday when Olmert told his Cabinet that he didn't regard that outline as a prerequisite for the conference to go ahead. The Palestinians said that without such a document, they wouldn't attend the meeting. Israel has been pushing for a vaguely worded document while the Palestinians want a detailed outline, complete with a timetable for establishing a Palestinian state.
Livni to lead Israel, Qureia for Palestinians
Israel said Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni would lead negotiations with the Palestinian team led by Ahmed Qureia, a former prime minister. Ahead of her meetings, Rice delivered a rare warning to Israel not to take any steps that might erode confidence in the peace process. This is a very delicate time, she said. It’s just a time to be extremely careful.Her comments referred to the renewal of a road project that Palestinians fear is intended to tighten Israeli control over strategic West Bank areas near Jerusalem. Israel says construction is not imminent and is meant to ease Palestinian movement. But those assertions did little to ease concerns. Shortly after she landed, Israeli officials said they had decided to resume an archaeological dig near a hotly disputed Jerusalem holy site, drawing more Palestinian charges that Israel is trying to scuttle the conference. Rice also met with Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak, who later issued a statement saying the military’s freedom of movement in the West Bank was a fundamental principle that must be demanded in the future as well.
The comments from Barak, who later headed to Washington for talks with the Bush administration, came despite long-standing Palestinian demands for a reduced Israeli presence in the West Bank.
Rice is on her third trip to the region since June, when the United States began to try to revive peace efforts after the Islamic militant group Hamas seized control of the Gaza Strip. That takeover has left the moderate Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, in control of just the West Bank. His expulsion of Hamas from the government has, in U.S. eyes, freed him to pursue a peace deal that would create a Palestinian state. To build Arab support for the conference, Rice plans stops in Egypt on Tuesday to see President Hosni Mubarak and in Britain on Thursday, where she will see King Abdullah of Jordan. The participation of the those countries, the only major Arab nations to have signed peace deals with Israel, along with Saudi Arabia is considered key to the success of the conference. All three have expressed doubts about the effectiveness of the meeting. MSNBC.com,AP
MATTHEW 24:7-8
7 For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places.
8 All these are the beginning of sorrows.
MARK 13:8
8 For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom:(ETHNIC GROUP AGAINST ETHNIC GROUP) and there shall be earthquakes in divers places, and there shall be famines and troubles: these are the beginnings of sorrows.
LUKE 21:11
11 And great earthquakes shall be in divers places, and famines, and pestilences; and fearful sights and great signs shall there be from heaven.
IN THE FUTURE THE GREATEST QUAKE IN HISTORY OCCURS WHEN JESUS RETURNS TO EARTH BODILY TO RULE AND REIGN FROM DAVIDS THRONE.
ZECHARIAH 14:4
4 And his feet shall stand in that day upon the mount of Olives, which is before Jerusalem on the east, and the mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst thereof toward the east and toward the west, and there shall be a very great valley; and half of the mountain shall remove toward the north, and half of it toward the south.
Mini-Earthquake Sets Off Predictions of a Larger One
by Hillel Fendel OCT 15,07
(IsraelNN.com) The Patzael region in the central Jordan Valley, just 20 kilometers north of Jericho, was touched by a small earthquake on Saturday night, registering 3.0 on the Richter scale. A similar quake occurred in the same area two months ago.
On Sunday morning, researchers at Tel Aviv University presented a new study on the timeline of earthquakes throughout history. No precise future earthquake dates can be extrapolated from the data, of course, but the researchers say one is on the way - as no major quake has hit the danger area between the Dead Sea and the Kineret in centuries.
It's like the first winter rain, said Dr. Shmuel Marko, who took part in the study. The longer the dry summer lasts, the closer the first rain is. Here, as well: The quiet is worrisome. The longer we go without a large quake, the more we can expect one.On the other hand, experts have said that Israel's earthquakes are in general less frequent than those in other quake-prone regions such as California, Japan and Turkey. Israel is located along the Syria-Africa rift, a friction point between two subterranean plates and is therefore considered earthquake-prone. In 1927, some 250 people were killed in an earthquake that hit Jericho and central Israel. In November 1995, a 6.2 quake caused injuries to several people in Eilat. A minor quake, 5.0 on the Richter scale, hit Israel in February 2004, shaking buildings in many cities and even causing damage to the Knesset building. No one was reported hurt. The northern city of Tzfat was hit by two earthquakes in recent centuries, in 1759 and in 1837. The latter one killed at least 2,000 people, when residents were buried under the ruins of their homes and help did not arrive for days.
PREMEDITATED MERGER
Canadians call for vote on SPP
Activists demand national referendum on continental divide
October 15, 2007 - 1:00 a.m. Eastern - By Jerome R. Corsi
2007 WorldNetDaily.com
Canadian activists are demanding Prime Minister Stephen Harper fulfill a promise and submit the Security and Prosperity Partnership of North America to a national referendum for an up or down vote. The Prime Minister of Canada and his cabinet in both Liberal and Conservative regimes support the unification of North America as witnessed by the fact of [former Prime Minister] Paul Martin and [current Prime Minister] Stephen Harper being signatories to the SPP process, said Connie Fogal, leader of the Canadian Action Party. Fogal rejects the idea that the vote on SPP should be taken solely in the Canadian Parliament.
A decision about the restructuring of Canada into an integrated North America is not a decision for parliament, but for the citizens of Canada, Fogal says. What every Parliamentarian should do is call for a no confidence vote on this issue to cease unification of Canada, the USA and Mexico, and then run a campaign on the life of Canada not its death.Maude Barlow, the National Chairperson of the Council of Canadians, agrees. So far, only 30 CEOs from North America's richest corporations, including Lockheed Martin, Bank of Nova Scotia, Chevron, Power Corporation and Merck, have had any meaningful input, a news release on Barlow's website proclaims. Only they have been invited to annual closed-door meetings of SPP leaders and ministers, such as the one that took place in Montebello, Quebec, in August.As WND previously reported, the North American Competitiveness Council, or NACC, dominated the SPP closed-door meetings with the SPP trilateral working groups, the trilateral cabinet members in attendance and President Bush, Mexico's President Felipe Calderon, and Harper at the third annual SPP summit in Montebello, Quebec, on Aug. 20-21.
WND has also reported the NACC is a shadowy council of 30 top North American multinational corporations self-appointed by the Chambers of Commerce in each of the three countries to constitute the sole outside advisory to the SPP. The 30 companies composing the NACC are listed on a memo posted on the U.S. Chamber of Commerce website. In the United States, the companies on the NACC are: Campbell Soup Company,Chevron Corporation,Ford Motor Corporation,FedEx Corporation,General Electric Company,General Motors Corporation,Kansas City Southern,Lockheed Martin Corporation
Merck & Co., Inc.Mittal Steel USA,New York Life Insurance Company
Procter & Gamble,UPS,Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.
Whirlpool Corporation
No union leaders, public interest groups, environmental advocates or news media have ever attended the closed-door of the NACC with the SPP. According to a document on the Commerce Department's SPP website, the organization of the NACC was agreed upon by the three leaders on March 31, 2006. We are pleased to announce the creation of a North American Competitiveness Council, the White House announced the same day. The Council will comprise members of the private sector from each country, the White House said, and will provide us recommendations on North American competitiveness, including, among others, areas such as automotive and transportation, steel, manufacturing, and services. The Council will meet annually with security and prosperity Ministers and will engage with senior government officials on an ongoing basis.On Sept. 25, Harper made a speech to the Council on Foreign Relations in New York where he again endorsed SPP. In a transcript archived on the CFR website, Harper referred to the NACC, saying: At the North American summit that Canada hosted in Montebello last month, I was struck by the power of the message sent to us by the leaders from the American and Canadian private sectors. They appealed to us to see the connection between security and prosperity, Harper continued. They told us that without the and we won't have either.
The CFR website also has archived a video of Harper's Sept. 25 remarks.
Mayors From Around the World to Gather in Jerusalem
by Hillel Fendel OCT 15,07
(IsraelNN.com) The City as Capital and Metropolitan Center is the name of the 25th Jerusalem Conference of Mayors taking place this week in Jerusalem, sponsored by the American Jewish Congress Council for World Jewry. Jerusalem Mayor Uri Lupolianski will host the event, which is co-sponsored by Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Konrad Adenauer Foundation.Mayors from 40 cities are taking part in the five-day event, including Kiev, London, Dublin, Addis Ababa, Leipzig (Germany), Banja Luka (Bosnia and Herzegovina), Zagreb (Croatia), Tbilisi (the former USSR republic of Georgia), and others. The South American cities of Lima (Peru), Montevideo (Uruguay), Quito (Ecuador), and La-Paz (Bolivia) will also be represented. Participating US cities include Cincinnati (Ohio), Baton Rouge (Louisiana), Providence (Rhode Island), Madison (Wisconsin), and others.
The mayors will participate in round-table sessions exploring various challenges facing modern metropolitan areas. Among the topics to be discussed are the concept of metropolis and capital city as government centers, intercultural and economic challenges facing cities, the role of mayors in the international arena, and more. They will also tour various sights of Jerusalem and meet with local businessmen and volunteers.The visiting mayors will also meet with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, President Shimon Peres, and Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni.Jerusalem Mayor Uri Lupolianski predicted that the conference will be the beginning of future cooperation between the cities, and especially with Jerusalem.
In sponsoring this annual gathering of mayors from around the world, Council for World Jewry Chairman Jack Rosen said, we hope to give them a fresh outlook of Jerusalem, and a new understanding of Israel and its achievements. Mayors Conference alumni are among Israel's best ambassadors of good will.The Council for World Jewry is a body that seeks, inter alia, to narrow the gaps between peoples of different backgrounds and faiths, combat world-wide anti-Semitism, and support Israel.Previous such conferences have been held under banners such as Excavating the Future: Tradition and Technology in the City, The Role of Mayor in Times of Crisis, and Mobilizing the Past for a Better Economic Future.
FROM WND'S JERUSALEM BUREAU
Rice: No Jewish building in eastern city
Says she'll push Israel to divide capital, blame Olmert if he doesn't comply - October 15, 2007 - By Aaron Klein
2007 WorldNetDaily.com
Condoleezza Rice
JERUSALEM – Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, in the region to prepare for an Israeli-Palestinian summit next month, told Palestinian officials yesterday she would pressure Israel against initiating any Jewish construction in eastern sections of Jerusalem, a senior Palestinian negotiator involved in talks with Rice told WND. The Palestinian negotiator stated Rice singled out Jerusalem areas as becoming part of a future Palestinian state and told his negotiating team she would publicly blame Israel for the failure of next month's U.S.-sponsored summit slated to be held in Maryland if the Jewish state didn't agree to evacuate eastern Jerusalem neighborhoods. The information follows a flurry of media reports last week Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was contemplating handing over sections of Jerusalem to Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah organization. Vice Premier Haim Ramon, a member of Olmert's ruling Kadima party, last week reportedly mapped out a future partition of Jerusalem under a deal with the Palestinians.
Ramon was quoted by the popular Ynet Israeli website as writing in a letter to Jerusalem City Councilman Nir Barkat that under his plan, The Jewish neighborhoods (of Jerusalem) will be recognized as Israeli and under Israeli sovereignty. Accordingly, the Arab neighborhoods will be recognized as Palestinian. Passages between the Israeli neighborhoods will be open and secure – accordingly the same will be true for the Palestinian neighborhoods.According to Ramon's reported plan, There will be special sovereignty over the holy sites, taking into account Israel's unique interests in overseeing them. Within this framework, the Western Wall, the Jewish Quarter and other holy sites in the Jerusalem vicinity will remain under Israeli rule forever.Ramon's letter as quoted did not single out the fate of the Temple Mount, Judaism's holiest site.
Knesset Member Otniel Schneller, a Kadima party colleague of Olmert and Ramon known for his close relationship to the prime minister, claimed the plan violated the Kadima's platform. But WND first reported in 2006 it was Schneller who first floated a Kadima plan for dividing Jerusalem.
The Old City, Mount Scopus, the Mount of Olives, the City of David, Sheikh Jarra will remain in our hands, but [regarding] Kafr Akeb, Abu-Ram, Shuafat, Hizma, Abu-Zaim, Abu-Tur, Abu Dis, in the future, when the Palestinian state is established, they will become its capital, said Schneller at the small Jerusalem debate in May 2006, covered by WND. Days later, Schneller gave an interview to the Associated Press in which he stated We will not divide Jerusalem, we will share it.The Kadima lawmaker told AP most Jerusalem neighborhoods with large Arab populations would be given to the Palestinians. Those same neighborhoods will, in my assessment, be central to the makeup of the Palestinian capital ... al-Quds, said Schneller, calling Jerusalem by its Arabic name. Rice arrived in the region yesterday reportedly to help the Israeli and Palestinian sides formulate a joint statement ahead of November's conference. Palestinian leaders want the statement to specifically outline a Palestinian state including the Gaza Strip, West Bank and parts of Jerusalem, while Olmert officials have been quoted in recent days stating they prefer more vague commitments.
Olmert will forfeit Temple Mount
According to senior Palestinian negotiators, Olmert's team expressed willingness multiple times to divide Jerusalem and place the Temple Mount under pan-Arab control. WND in August quoted PA sources stating Olmert's office presented the Palestinians a formal plan in which the Jewish state would forfeit the Temple Mount to Muslim control under the joint management of Egypt, Jordan and the PA. The sources said Olmert's plan called for the entire Temple Mount plaza to fall under Arab sovereignty; Jerusalem's Old City holy sites near the Mount to be governed by a Jewish, Christian and Muslim task force; and the Western Wall plaza below the Mount to be controlled by Israel. David Baker, a spokesman for Olmert, would neither confirm nor deny the prime minister offered the Temple Mount.
Olmert hints Jerusalem could be shared
Signal to Palestinians comes as Rice visits region ahead of summit
OCT 15,07
RAMALLAH, West Bank - Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Monday raised questions about Israel's control of Arab neighborhoods in east Jerusalem, the first time he has openly signaled readiness to share control of the city with the Palestinians. Control of Jerusalem is at the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Israel claims all of the city, including east Jerusalem, which it captured in the 1967 Mideast war, as its capital. The Palestinians want the eastern sector for the capital of a future independent state. In a speech, Olmert noted that Israel has built a series of thriving Jewish neighborhoods in east Jerusalem, but signaled that Israel's control of Arab areas is not necessary. Was it necessary to also join the Shuafat refugee camp, Sawakra, Walaje and other villages and define them as part of Jerusalem? he asked. With that, I must confess it is possible to ask legitimate questions.
His comments came as U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza visited the region, saying Monday that President Bush has decided to make ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict one of the highest priorities of his administration.An international peace conference expected to take place in Annapolis, Md., in the fall has to be serious and substantive, Rice said at a news conference with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. We frankly have better things to do than invite people to Annapolis for a photo op, she said.
Israelis and Palestinians, Rice observed, are making their most serious effort in years to resolve the conflict. Frankly, it's time for the establishment of a Palestinian state, she added.
The two sides are trying to work out an outline for a final peace deal ahead of the Annapolis conference. But tensions arose on Sunday when Olmert told his Cabinet that he didn't regard that outline as a prerequisite for the conference to go ahead. The Palestinians said that without such a document, they wouldn't attend the meeting. Israel has been pushing for a vaguely worded document while the Palestinians want a detailed outline, complete with a timetable for establishing a Palestinian state.
Livni to lead Israel, Qureia for Palestinians
Israel said Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni would lead negotiations with the Palestinian team led by Ahmed Qureia, a former prime minister. Ahead of her meetings, Rice delivered a rare warning to Israel not to take any steps that might erode confidence in the peace process. This is a very delicate time, she said. It’s just a time to be extremely careful.Her comments referred to the renewal of a road project that Palestinians fear is intended to tighten Israeli control over strategic West Bank areas near Jerusalem. Israel says construction is not imminent and is meant to ease Palestinian movement. But those assertions did little to ease concerns. Shortly after she landed, Israeli officials said they had decided to resume an archaeological dig near a hotly disputed Jerusalem holy site, drawing more Palestinian charges that Israel is trying to scuttle the conference. Rice also met with Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak, who later issued a statement saying the military’s freedom of movement in the West Bank was a fundamental principle that must be demanded in the future as well.
The comments from Barak, who later headed to Washington for talks with the Bush administration, came despite long-standing Palestinian demands for a reduced Israeli presence in the West Bank.
Rice is on her third trip to the region since June, when the United States began to try to revive peace efforts after the Islamic militant group Hamas seized control of the Gaza Strip. That takeover has left the moderate Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, in control of just the West Bank. His expulsion of Hamas from the government has, in U.S. eyes, freed him to pursue a peace deal that would create a Palestinian state. To build Arab support for the conference, Rice plans stops in Egypt on Tuesday to see President Hosni Mubarak and in Britain on Thursday, where she will see King Abdullah of Jordan. The participation of the those countries, the only major Arab nations to have signed peace deals with Israel, along with Saudi Arabia is considered key to the success of the conference. All three have expressed doubts about the effectiveness of the meeting. MSNBC.com,AP
Monday, October 15, 2007
ISRAEL STRUCK NUCLEAR SITE IN SYRIA
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.
Torrential rains kill nine in Tunisia Sat Oct 13, 6:48 PM ET
TUNIS (AFP) - At least nine people died and eight others went missing Saturday in torrential rains that caused serious damage in and around the Tunisian capital, national radio reported. President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali gave instructions to ensure the situation is monitored in all affected regions and to bring necessary help and assistance to the victims in these exceptional climatic conditions, a presidential spokesman said.Torrential rains fell mainly on the north of the country on Saturday, filling formerly dry river beds known as wadis and causing them to overflow.The rains and subsequent flooding blocked traffic on many roads and isolated some towns.Rescue services arrived just in time to help several stricken people on the roads ... which kept losses down, said TAP news agency.Eight people died and eight went missing in the Sabalet Ben Ammar area, northwest of the capital on the road to the port city of Bizerte, while another person was killed in Tunis after his car was swept away.The president's office said that a ceremony marking the 44th anniversary of the withdrawal of French troops from Bizerte's naval base scheduled for Monday had been cancelled.
Haitian villagers hit by deadly flooding pick up the pieces by Clarens Renois Sat Oct 13, 3:01 PM ET
CABARET, Haiti (AFP) - Residents of flooded villages where at least 47 people were killed just north of Haiti's capital, on Saturday started to try to pick up the scattered pieces of their lives. After driving rains let loose raging floodwaters in this mountainous Caribbean nation, the poorest in the Americas, two more bodies found on Saturday took the toll up to at least 47 dead here, authorities said.
But the toll remained preliminary.
Desperate locals were still struggling to cope with staggering losses, even as the teeming capital was spared.We cannot count the dead; we are burying in boxes the bodies we are finding without being able to identify them, one official in hard-hit Bretelle said privately.Cabaret's justice of the peace Ferdinand Senatus said that he had not even seen what may have happened further up the hills.From what he had seen here, though, there are easily 20,000 people left homeless by these floods.Everything came down from above, said resident Welene Nelson, pointing up the mountainside where few trees or rocks can be seen.Haiti, which shares the island of Hispaniola with the Dominican Republic to its east, faces regular flash-flooding during the rainy season. Deforestation, which heightens the risk of flooding, is rife here as in most rural towns as the poor collect every scrap of wood for cooking.
The water came down really strong from the mountains; it burst the river and swept into the houses in its path, said Nelson, exhausted after spending hours cleaning out what remains of her home.Civil protection authorities said thousands of families were displaced and hundreds of homes destroyed or damaged across the country. Roads were swamped and plantations wiped out.Farming has been particularly affected and many crops have been destroyed, Interior Minister Paul Antoine Bien-Aime said.Raoul, a villager who spent years working in the United States and had outfitted his home with electrical generators and modern appliances, was another one of the victim. He could not even get out in an all-terrain vehicle; all the roads were cut off.Another neighbor, a teacher, showed a reporter inside her home, where she said waters rose a meter high, and everything was lost.Haiti is a country where most people face acute distress and desolation daily, even without their homes being swept away.In the aftermath of this tragedy, the Haitian government really has been nowhere to be seen on the ground though it has released funds to send food and beds to the stricken areas.They are simply leaving victims to their fate, argued an enraged Pierre-Eric Jean-Jacques under the morning sun.
There is a foreign army on our soil, he said, referring to the UN stabilization mission that was deployed after former president Jean Bertrand Aristide fled an uprising in February 2004. We should ask the UN mission to help transport government members in, and bring aid for victims to them wherever they are, he said, a few hours before Prime Minister Jacques-Edouard Alexis scheduled a fly-in visit by helicopter, a UN spokesman said. Now that retaining walls have fallen down (on the hillsides), the next rains will do even more damage, lamented Jacquelin, a local teenager who had harsh words for the lack of assistance from authorities. For now some refugees are staying at churches, or town schools further away, she said.
INIQUITY(great wickedness or injustice) ABOUNDING.
MATTHEW 24:12
12 And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.
SCOFFERS MOCKING CHRISTS LITERAL 2ND COMING TO EARTH BODILY.
2 PETER 3:3-7
3 Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts,
4 And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.
5 For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water:
6 Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished:
7 But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.
JESUS RETURNS TO EARTH BODILY LIKE HE LEFT
ACTS 1:10-11
10 And while they looked stedfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel;
11 Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.
Miller, the Jesus-Mocking BeerFri Oct 12, 3:00 AM ET
The Miller Lite people have a new ad featuring beer drinkers being instructed by a pro-sports-type commissioner in etiquette for the More Taste League. But the entity needing a More Taste lesson is the Miller Brewing Co. itself.Last year, Miller infuriated opponents of illegal immigration when the Chicago Tribune reported it paid $30,000 for a convention and newspaper ads publicizing a march of illegal-alien advocates to protest against Speaker Dennis Hastert's congressional office in Batavia, Ill. Consumers launched a national boycott. Apparently, Miller learned nothing. What the brewing giant has now done is far more offensive. Now, Miller has chosen to associate itself with an event mocking the Last Supper of Jesus, one of the most precious religious occasions for Christians.
The Folsom Street Fair in San Francisco touts itself as the crowning finale of the city's Leather Pride Week festivities. It's not something you'd bring the children to, although in San Francisco those standards don't necessarily apply. Media accounts showed that in some cases whole families attended — with the toddlers dressed in dog collars. It is the kind of raunchy event that gives that city its reputation for decadence. But what really offended was the promotional poster for the fair. Seated at and standing behind a long table, Last Supper-style, are a set of men and women in various stages of leather dress/undress, including a man wearing a black dog mask. Sex toys, including a big red fist, are strewn across the table. As a spokesman for Concerned Women explained, The bread and wine representing Christ's broken body and life-giving blood are replaced with sadomasochistic sex toys in this twisted version of Da Vinci's The Last Supper.Prominently on display in the left-hand corner of the ad — the Miller Lite sponsorship logo. Miller Brewing would like consumers to think of it as a wholesome, all-American product. Instead, they're in danger of becoming the Honk If You Hate Jesus beer. Miller Lite was the only national advertiser underneath this Christ-mocking image. When pressed by the Catholic League and other offended groups, Miller spokesman Julian Green gave the standard — which is to say, slippery — corporate answer. While Miller has supported the Folsom Street Fair for several years, a nod to the gay community, we take exception to the poster the organizing committee developed this year. If you think that was weak, try the next sentence: We understand some individuals may find the imagery offensive.Some individuals? There are over 225 million Christians in the United States. May be offended? It is a poster designed to insult them by blaspheming Jesus Christ. And after putting out that Pablum, Miller still refused to remove its Lite or Genuine Draft logos from adorning the event or the event's promotional Website.
Then the Catholic League noticed that the Miller-funded event would also mock the Last Supper through the queer nun group the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, which would also receive funds from the event. On their Website, the nun-mockers promised: No gastric craving will go unsatisfied, no bag of silver will go unspent, and no sin will go unforgiven. ... Don't be a Judas! Come, eat, drink and be Mary! Be sure to mention The Last Supper With The Sisters when you make your reservation.When the Catholic League complained to Miller about this, they were unimpressed, the League reported. The League has now called for a nationwide boycott of Miller beer. (Full disclosure: I am on the Advisory Board of the Catholic League and have endorsed the boycott.)
In turn, Miller announced it was conducting an immediate full-scale audit of its marketing and promotional procedures, which sounds like the company is being responsive, except again there was a dodge. The last line in this message underlined its lack of a moral spine: It is important to understand that the Folsom Street Fair does not target the general public in its communications. The fair itself and the organization's Website are only intended for the adult alternative lifestyle community.
Translation: We market to Christians in the mass media. We also apply our logo to ads trashing those same Christians in our niche marketing to the alternative lifestyle community. Anything for a buck. The Miller Brewing Co. has a Distributor Agreement, which reads in part, Distributor shall preserve and enhance the high quality image, reputation and goodwill of Miller and its products through (i) the appearance and attitude of Distributor personnel. What do you suppose would be the corporate response if one of its drivers got into a truck cross-dressed as a Catholic nun? Or strolled into the company lunchroom and proceeded to dump on the table an assortment of X-rated sex toys? In 2005, a Miller worker in Wisconsin was fired when he was photographed in the newspaper drinking a Budweiser. Now that, that was intolerable. L. Brent Bozell III is the president of the Media Research Center. CREATORS SYNDICATE INC.
Fiery pileup kills 3 near Los Angeles By MICHAEL R. BLOOD, Associated Press Writer OCT 14,07
SANTA CLARITA, Calif. - Firefighters finished removing charred debris Sunday from a freeway tunnel where three people died in a fiery, 29-vehicle pileup that could keep a major interstate shut down for days. Investigators determined 28 commercial vehicles and one passenger vehicle were involved in the crash late Friday that killed three people and injured at least 10, Deputy Fire Chief John Tripp said. The search of the debris ended Sunday morning and confirmed no more fatalities.With the large numbers of vehicles trapped inside the tunnel, there was a potential for a greater number of critical injuries, let alone fatalities, Tripp said.
Officials hope to reopen the southbound lanes of the closed freeway by Tuesday morning, but they have been hampered by concern about how many repairs will have to be made for the tunnel to be safe.Our goal is to get the roadway open as quickly as possible, said Will Kempton, director of the California Department of Transportation.At least five big rigs burst into flames that spread to other vehicles and burned a full day after the crash on a rainy Friday night. At the height of the fire, flames shot out of both ends of the 550-foot-long tunnel, rising as high as 100 feet, firefighters said.About 300 firefighters were fighting the fire early Saturday, and the intense heat caused concrete to crack and melt, sending chucks falling onto a road below. Small fires lingered even as debris was being removed Saturday afternoon.
The bodies of two crash victims were found early Saturday and a third was found later in the day, authorities said. The dead were two adult males and one child, Los Angeles County Fire Inspector Jason Hurd said Sunday.The bodies of one man and the child were in the cab of a truck hauling cantaloupe, which appeared to have hit a pillar outside the tunnel, a fire official told The Associated Press on condition his name not be used because he was not authorized to speak about the crash.The other body was found in a truck about 12 feet short of the tunnel's exit, said the official.
The exact ages of the victims were unknown. County coroner's investigator Kelly Yagerlener said it could be several days before the names of the dead were released.
The pileup in the southbound truck tunnel of Interstate 5 began about 11 p.m. Friday when two big rigs collided on the rain-slickened highway, about 30 miles north of downtown Los Angeles.
There was an accident in front of me. I come to a stop and then they just start hitting me, one right after another, trucker Tony Brazil told reporters at the crash site.A couple drivers come over the top of the truck and (said), Get out of here, let's get out of here, so I got my wallet and my phone and I was able to squeeze between that truck there and the wall, Brazil said.
The cause of the crash is being investigated.
The pileup snarled traffic for miles in all directions as motorists had to navigate neighborhood streets and mountain roads to get around the wreck. Traveling 100 yards on one street just down the hill from the crash took an hour.Interstate 5 is a key route connecting Southern and Northern California, as well as a major commuter link between Los Angeles and its northern suburbs.
The tunnel, built in the 1970s, and its mix of curves and darkness has long been regarded by truckers as one of the most dangerous areas of the freeway. There's kind of a blind spot, so if you boogie around the bend too fast and there's somebody stopped in the tunnel, it'll be boom-boom-boom, Arthur Johnson, 45, of Buckeye, Ariz., told the Los Angeles Times. Truck driver Fausto Angelino said he's been driving that stretch of road for 23 years.
I hold my breath every time, he said. The stretch of freeway carries about 225,000 vehicles a day. Associated Press Writer Jacob Adelman contributed to this report from Los Angeles.
Obstacles slow Rice's Mideast diplomacy By The Associated Press OCT 14,07
TALKS: Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice opened an intense round of Mideast shuttle diplomacy Sunday.
DISAGREEMENT: Israelis and Palestinians are at bitter odds over the outline of an agreement that would be presented at a planned peace conference next month.
SPECIFICS: Israel is pressing for a vaguely worded document that would give it more room to maneuver, but the Palestinians want a detailed preliminary agreement.
UN peacekeepers prove blessing for south Lebanon economy by Lamia Radi OCT 14,07
TYRE, Lebanon (AFP) - Traders in Tyre's bustling souk say UN peacekeepers have brought baraka and a dose of good fortune to south Lebanon, making up at least in part for the ravages of last year's Israel-Hezbollah war. The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) has spent millions of dollars on food and housing, while employing hundreds of locals in the region where they are deployed to keep Israeli troops and the Shiite militants apart.The UNIFIL is a baraka (blessing), our business depends on them, said Ali Zeidan, a souvenir store owner.All these products are aimed at them, he said, pointing to a wooden dish encrusted with mother of pearl and adorned with the Lebanese flag as well as those of the 28 other nations contributing troops to the force.
He also has on offer portable nargilehs, or water pipes, in tinted glass with the countries' names in gilded arabesque writing.The market was frozen, but it is vibrant now, he said, adding that the Italians (the largest contingent) are the most generous; they have even learned to haggle.Following the July-August 2006 war which devastated the region, the UN Security Council boosted the number of UNIFIL troops to 13,500 -- from only 2,000 -- in south Lebanon, where the force has been deployed since 1978.The Lebanese army has since deployed up to the border with Israel for the first time in decades, and UNIFIL has reported no major incident between Hezbollah guerrillas and Israel.However, extra security measures were adopted during a deadly 15-week battle in northern Lebanon between Islamist militants and the Lebanese army that ended on September 2.The Spanish contingent of UNIFIL was targeted in a June 24 car bombing that cost six lives and was praised by Al-Qaeda.Amid an easing in tensions on the ground, 40 percent of the 90 million dollars (64,000 million euros) allocated to purchasing in 2006-2007 has been spent locally, UNIFIL's spokeswoman Yasmina Bouziane told AFP.
The troops, who themselves have spent 36 million dollars this year, buy fuel, food, mineral water, construction material, stationery and office supplies from local businesses, as well as souvenirs and pirated DVDs.UNIFIL employs about 600 local people. But the number could reach 4,000 if we consider those directly hired by each contingent, Bouziane said of interpreters, cashiers, drivers, mechanics, engineers, cleaners and secretaries.Even if each soldier spends a dollar a day it will bring in 13,000 dollars.
The region is also hosting hundreds of UNIFIL civilian personnel, some with their families, and foreign humanitarian workers such as demining experts and the Red Cross, who rent housing, buy food and send their children to school.The considerable funds available to UNIFIL and humanitarian organisations have created an economic effervescence prompting Beirut's big businesses to open branches in the south, said a manager of Banque Libano-Francaise, Antoine Hadid, in the port city of Tyre.
Financial transactions have increased by 40 percent since 2006 in the south compared to only six percent in Beirut, and seven banks have opened branches in Bint Jbeil, 125 kilometres (almost 80 miles) south of Beirut, Hadid said.The corniche seafront in Tyre is dotted with restaurants and cafes, including international chains. The monthly rent is set at 1,000 dollars for a cafe and 4,000 dollars for a restaurant, they would not open if they lost money, hotel owner Raymond Salha said. His 13-room family-run hotel overlooking the sea is usually booked up by UNIFIL's civil personnel families. I do not take advantage of their presence; I have not changed the rates: 60 dollars a night for a double room, including breakfast, he said. In a cell phone store, Fuad Hegazi is translating from Arabic to Portuguese for a high-ranking UNIFIL official. I have worked with them for eight months, and I have earned 2,500 dollars a month compared to the 500 dollars I would be paid by a Lebanese employer, said 30-year-old Hegazi, who also speaks Spanish, English, and Romanian. Things have started to look up for local carpenter Mounir too, who may take out a loan to refurbish three apartments which he rents out to UNIFIL's civilian personnel. The rents have ramped up, a three-room apartment that was 600 dollars a month in May is now worth 800 to 1,000 dollars, he said.
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.
Putin to visit Iran amid nuclear tension By VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV, Associated Press Writer Sun Oct 14, 11:02 AM ET
MOSCOW - When President Vladimir Putin visits Tehran this week, he will be closely watched for any sign he has moved closer to launching the nuclear reactor Russia is building for Iran. Russia has resisted the U.S. push for stronger sanctions against Tehran and strongly warned Washington against using force in its standoff with Iran over its nuclear program. But Moscow's position is carefully hedged. It has delayed completing the plant, Iran's first, and is urging the country to comply with international controls on its nuclear activities.Any show of support for Iran, such as a pledge by Putin to quickly complete the power plant, could embolden Iran and further cloud Russia's relations with the West.Putin bluntly spelled out his disagreements with Washington on Wednesday, saying he saw no objective data to prove Western claims that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons. And at talks Friday with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Defense Secretary Robert Gates, he ridiculed U.S. plans for a missile defense system in eastern Europe, supposedly to stop an Iranian attack.
His bluntness appeared to shock Rice and Gates.
Putin's visit, during which he will meet with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and attend Tuesday's summit of Caspian Sea nations, is a first. No Kremlin leader has traveled to Iran since Josef Stalin in 1943, for a wartime summit with Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt.Putin's trip is important for Iran even if it yields no agreements. It's a break in international isolation, a chance to show that Iran is an important country, said Alexander Pikayev, a leading expert on Iran with Russia's Institute for World Economy and International relations.But it will highlight a reality sometimes overlooked by a world focused on the West's confrontation with Iran: that the Kremlin also has its problems with the Islamic republic.Although Russia has shielded Iran from harsher sanctions in the U.N. Security Council, its relations with Tehran have been hurt by disputes over the $1 billion deal to build the nuclear plant. Russia warned earlier this year that the plant in the port of Bushehr wouldn't be launched this fall as planned — the latest in a series of delays — because Iran was slow in making payments. It has also delayed the shipment of uranium fuel for the plant.
Anxious to ease Western doubts — and possibly its own — about Iran's intentions, the Kremlin made Tehran sign a deal several years ago to return the fuel to Russia after its use so it cannot be used in weapons.Iranian officials deny being late with payments and accuse the Kremlin of yielding to Western pressure. Iran has started its own enrichment program, saying it wants to produce fuel by itself — an effort that has heightened international suspicions. Iran insists that its program is meant purely to generate electricity.Low-enriched uranium is used to fuel nuclear power plants. Highly enriched uranium can be used to build nuclear weapons.The upshot is a slew of mutual suspicions, says Fyodor Lukyanov, the editor of Russia in Global Affairs magazine.Tehran views Russia as an unreliable partner that uses Iran in its game with the West, he told The Associated Press. Iran has been very difficult to deal with and the Kremlin has felt strong irritation about it.Putin's Tehran trip has repeatedly been postponed, as has the launch of the nuclear plant.Moscow has said fuel delivery will start six months before the plant goes on line, but it keeps delaying the launch date, citing the payment dispute.Some analysts think Putin may use the summit to pledge to complete the plant next year.
It requires political will to turn the launch key at Bushehr, and there is no reason to think that Russia lacks it, said Vladimir Orlov, the head of PIR Center, a think tank specializing in nuclear issues. Other analysts predict Russia's balancing act will continue, to avoid angering either Iran or the West. Moscow has said repeatedly it doesn't want a nuclear-armed Iran, and has urged Tehran to freeze uranium enrichment and answer international inspectors' queries about its nuclear program. Vyacheslav Kantor, a Russian businessman who is president of the European Jewish Congress, said the Kremlin is bent on preventing Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons. We feel the intentions are very strong and positive, he said, voicing hope that Putin could persuade Tehran to meet international demands. Meanwhile, senior diplomats of the U.N. Security Council's five veto-wielding permanent members, joined by Germany, are giving Iran until November to show a positive response to questions about its nuclear program or face tougher sanctions. Permanent members Russia and China agreed to two previous sanctions resolutions but have cold-shouldered the effort by the U.S., Britain and France to impose harsher measures.
If Putin's trip to Iran doesn't yield answers to where the Kremlin is headed on the Iranian nuclear issue, next month's dealings at the U.N. may fill in some of the blanks.
ISAIAH 17:1
1 The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap.
October 14, 2007
Israel Struck a Nuclear Project in Syria, Analysts Say
By DAVID E. SANGER and MARK MAZZETTI
WASHINGTON, Oct. 13 — Israel’s air attack on Syria last month was directed against a site that Israeli and American intelligence analysts judged was a partly constructed nuclear reactor, apparently modeled on one North Korea has used to create its stockpile of nuclear weapons fuel, according to American and foreign officials with access to the intelligence reports.The description of the target addresses one of the central mysteries surrounding the Sept. 6 attack, and suggests that Israel carried out the raid to demonstrate its determination to snuff out even a nascent nuclear project in a neighboring state. The Bush administration was divided at the time about the wisdom of Israel’s strike, American officials said, and some senior policy makers still regard the attack as premature.
The attack on the reactor project has echoes of an Israeli raid more than a quarter century ago, in 1981, when Israel destroyed the Osirak nuclear reactor in Iraq shortly before it was to have begun operating. That attack was officially condemned by the Reagan administration, though Israelis consider it among their military’s finest moments. In the weeks before the Iraq war, Bush administration officials said they believed that the attack set back Iraq’s nuclear ambitions by many years. By contrast, the facility that the Israelis struck in Syria appears to have been much further from completion, the American and foreign officials said. They said it would have been years before the Syrians could have used the reactor to produce the spent nuclear fuel that could, through a series of additional steps, be reprocessed into bomb-grade plutonium. Many details remain unclear, most notably how much progress the Syrians had made in construction before the Israelis struck, the role of any assistance provided by North Korea, and whether the Syrians could make a plausible case that the reactor was intended to produce electricity. In Washington and Israel, information about the raid has been wrapped in extraordinary secrecy and restricted to just a handful of officials, while the Israeli press has been prohibited from publishing information about the attack.
The New York Times reported this week that a debate had begun within the Bush administration about whether the information secretly cited by Israel to justify its attack should be interpreted by the United States as reason to toughen its approach to Syria and North Korea. In later interviews, officials made clear that the disagreements within the administration began this summer, as a debate about whether an Israeli attack on the incomplete reactor was warranted then.The officials did not say that the administration had ultimately opposed the Israeli strike, but that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates were particularly concerned about the ramifications of a pre-emptive strike in the absence of an urgent threat.There wasn’t a lot of debate about the evidence, said one American official familiar with the intense discussions over the summer between Washington and the government of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel. “There was a lot of debate about how to respond to it.Even though it has signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, Syria would not have been obligated to declare the existence of a reactor during the early phases of construction. It would have also had the legal right to complete construction of the reactor, as long as its purpose was to generate electricity. In his only public comment on the raid, Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, acknowledged this month that Israeli jets dropped bombs on a building that he said was related to the military but which he insisted was not used.
A senior Israeli official, while declining to speak about the specific nature of the target, said the strike was intended to re-establish the credibility of our deterrent power, signaling that Israel meant to send a message to the Syrians that even the potential for a nuclear weapons program would not be permitted. But several American officials said the strike may also have been intended by Israel as a signal to Iran and its nuclear aspirations. Neither Iran nor any Arab government except for Syria has criticized the Israeli raid, suggesting that Israel is not the only country that would be disturbed by a nuclear Syria. North Korea did issue a protest. The target of the Israeli raid and the American debate about the Syrian project were described by government officials and nongovernment experts interviewed in recent weeks in the United States and the Middle East. All insisted on anonymity because of rules that prohibit discussing classified information. The officials who described the target of the attack included some on each side of the debate about whether a partly constructed Syrian nuclear reactor should be seen as an urgent concern, as well as some who described themselves as neutral on the question. The White House press secretary, Dana Perino, said Saturday that the administration would have no comment on the intelligence issues surrounding the Israeli strike. Israel has also refused to comment.Nuclear reactors can be used for both peaceful and non-peaceful purposes. A reactor’s spent fuel can be reprocessed to extract plutonium, one of two paths to building a nuclear weapon. The other path — enriching uranium in centrifuges — is the method that Iran is accused of pursuing with an intent to build a weapon of its own.Syria is known to have only one nuclear reactor, a small one built for research purposes. But in the past decade, Syria has several times sought unsuccessfully to buy one, first from Argentina, then from Russia. On those occasions, Israel reacted strongly but did not threaten military action. Earlier this year, Mr. Assad spoke publicly in general terms about Syria’s desire to develop nuclear power, but his government did not announce a plan to build a new reactor.
The Gulf Cooperation Council, a group of Persian Gulf states, has also called for an expansion of nuclear power in the Middle East for energy purposes, but many experts have interpreted that statement as a response to Iran’s nuclear program. They have warned that the region may be poised for a wave of proliferation. Israel is believed to be the only nuclear-armed nation in the region.The partly constructed Syrian reactor was detected earlier this year by satellite photographs, according to American officials. They suggested that the facility had been brought to American attention by the Israelis, but would not discuss why American spy agencies seemed to have missed the early phases of construction.North Korea has long provided assistance to Syria on a ballistic missile program, but any assistance toward the construction of the reactor would have been the first clear evidence of ties between the two countries on a nuclear program. North Korea has successfully used its five-megawatt reactor at the Yongbyon nuclear complex to reprocess nuclear fuel into bomb-grade material, a model that some American and Israeli officials believe Syria may have been trying to replicate. The North conducted a partly successful test of a nuclear device a year ago, prompting renewed fears that the desperately poor country might seek to sell its nuclear technology. President Bush issued a specific warning to the North on Oct. 9, 2006, just hours after the test, noting that it was leading proliferator of missile technology, including transfers to Iran and Syria. He went on to warn that the transfer of nuclear weapons or material by North Korea to states or non-state entities would be considered a grave threat to the United States, and we would hold North Korea fully accountable.While Bush administration officials have made clear in recent weeks that the target of the Israeli raid was linked to North Korea in some way, Mr. Bush has not repeated his warning since the attack. In fact, the administration has said very little about the country’s suspected role in the Syria case, apparently for fear of upending negotiations now under way in which North Korea has pledged to begin disabling its nuclear facilities.
While the partly constructed Syrian reactor appears to be based on North Korea’s design, the American and foreign officials would not say whether they believed the North Koreans sold or gave the plans to the Syrians, or whether the North’s own experts were there at the time of the attack. It is possible, some officials said, that the transfer of the technology occurred several years ago.According to two senior administration officials, the subject was raised when the United States, North Korea and four other nations met in Beijing earlier this month.Behind closed doors, however, Vice President Dick Cheney and other hawkish members of the administration have made the case that the same intelligence that prompted Israel to attack should lead the United States to reconsider delicate negotiations with North Korea over ending its nuclear program, as well as America’s diplomatic strategy toward Syria, which has been invited to join Middle East peace talks in Annapolis, Md., next month.Mr. Cheney in particular, officials say, has also cited the indications that North Korea aided Syria to question the Bush administration’s agreement to supply the North with large amounts of fuel oil. During Mr. Bush’s first term, Mr. Cheney was among the advocates of a strategy to squeeze the North Korean government in hopes that it would collapse, and the administration cut off oil shipments set up under an agreement between North Korea and the Clinton administration, saying the North had cheated on that accord. The new shipments, agreed to last February, are linked to North Korea’s carrying through on its pledge to disable its nuclear facilities by the end of the year. Nonetheless, Mr. Bush has approved going ahead with that agreement, even after he was aware of the Syrian program.Nuclear experts say that North Korea’s main reactor, while small by international standards, is big enough to produce roughly one bomb’s worth of plutonium a year. In an interview, Dr. Siegfried S. Hecker of Stanford University, a former director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory, said building a reactor based on North Korea’s design might take from three to six years. Reporting was contributed by William J. Broad in New York, Helene Cooper in Washington and Steven Erlanger in Jerusalem.
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.
Torrential rains kill nine in Tunisia Sat Oct 13, 6:48 PM ET
TUNIS (AFP) - At least nine people died and eight others went missing Saturday in torrential rains that caused serious damage in and around the Tunisian capital, national radio reported. President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali gave instructions to ensure the situation is monitored in all affected regions and to bring necessary help and assistance to the victims in these exceptional climatic conditions, a presidential spokesman said.Torrential rains fell mainly on the north of the country on Saturday, filling formerly dry river beds known as wadis and causing them to overflow.The rains and subsequent flooding blocked traffic on many roads and isolated some towns.Rescue services arrived just in time to help several stricken people on the roads ... which kept losses down, said TAP news agency.Eight people died and eight went missing in the Sabalet Ben Ammar area, northwest of the capital on the road to the port city of Bizerte, while another person was killed in Tunis after his car was swept away.The president's office said that a ceremony marking the 44th anniversary of the withdrawal of French troops from Bizerte's naval base scheduled for Monday had been cancelled.
Haitian villagers hit by deadly flooding pick up the pieces by Clarens Renois Sat Oct 13, 3:01 PM ET
CABARET, Haiti (AFP) - Residents of flooded villages where at least 47 people were killed just north of Haiti's capital, on Saturday started to try to pick up the scattered pieces of their lives. After driving rains let loose raging floodwaters in this mountainous Caribbean nation, the poorest in the Americas, two more bodies found on Saturday took the toll up to at least 47 dead here, authorities said.
But the toll remained preliminary.
Desperate locals were still struggling to cope with staggering losses, even as the teeming capital was spared.We cannot count the dead; we are burying in boxes the bodies we are finding without being able to identify them, one official in hard-hit Bretelle said privately.Cabaret's justice of the peace Ferdinand Senatus said that he had not even seen what may have happened further up the hills.From what he had seen here, though, there are easily 20,000 people left homeless by these floods.Everything came down from above, said resident Welene Nelson, pointing up the mountainside where few trees or rocks can be seen.Haiti, which shares the island of Hispaniola with the Dominican Republic to its east, faces regular flash-flooding during the rainy season. Deforestation, which heightens the risk of flooding, is rife here as in most rural towns as the poor collect every scrap of wood for cooking.
The water came down really strong from the mountains; it burst the river and swept into the houses in its path, said Nelson, exhausted after spending hours cleaning out what remains of her home.Civil protection authorities said thousands of families were displaced and hundreds of homes destroyed or damaged across the country. Roads were swamped and plantations wiped out.Farming has been particularly affected and many crops have been destroyed, Interior Minister Paul Antoine Bien-Aime said.Raoul, a villager who spent years working in the United States and had outfitted his home with electrical generators and modern appliances, was another one of the victim. He could not even get out in an all-terrain vehicle; all the roads were cut off.Another neighbor, a teacher, showed a reporter inside her home, where she said waters rose a meter high, and everything was lost.Haiti is a country where most people face acute distress and desolation daily, even without their homes being swept away.In the aftermath of this tragedy, the Haitian government really has been nowhere to be seen on the ground though it has released funds to send food and beds to the stricken areas.They are simply leaving victims to their fate, argued an enraged Pierre-Eric Jean-Jacques under the morning sun.
There is a foreign army on our soil, he said, referring to the UN stabilization mission that was deployed after former president Jean Bertrand Aristide fled an uprising in February 2004. We should ask the UN mission to help transport government members in, and bring aid for victims to them wherever they are, he said, a few hours before Prime Minister Jacques-Edouard Alexis scheduled a fly-in visit by helicopter, a UN spokesman said. Now that retaining walls have fallen down (on the hillsides), the next rains will do even more damage, lamented Jacquelin, a local teenager who had harsh words for the lack of assistance from authorities. For now some refugees are staying at churches, or town schools further away, she said.
INIQUITY(great wickedness or injustice) ABOUNDING.
MATTHEW 24:12
12 And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.
SCOFFERS MOCKING CHRISTS LITERAL 2ND COMING TO EARTH BODILY.
2 PETER 3:3-7
3 Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts,
4 And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.
5 For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water:
6 Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished:
7 But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.
JESUS RETURNS TO EARTH BODILY LIKE HE LEFT
ACTS 1:10-11
10 And while they looked stedfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel;
11 Which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? this same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.
Miller, the Jesus-Mocking BeerFri Oct 12, 3:00 AM ET
The Miller Lite people have a new ad featuring beer drinkers being instructed by a pro-sports-type commissioner in etiquette for the More Taste League. But the entity needing a More Taste lesson is the Miller Brewing Co. itself.Last year, Miller infuriated opponents of illegal immigration when the Chicago Tribune reported it paid $30,000 for a convention and newspaper ads publicizing a march of illegal-alien advocates to protest against Speaker Dennis Hastert's congressional office in Batavia, Ill. Consumers launched a national boycott. Apparently, Miller learned nothing. What the brewing giant has now done is far more offensive. Now, Miller has chosen to associate itself with an event mocking the Last Supper of Jesus, one of the most precious religious occasions for Christians.
The Folsom Street Fair in San Francisco touts itself as the crowning finale of the city's Leather Pride Week festivities. It's not something you'd bring the children to, although in San Francisco those standards don't necessarily apply. Media accounts showed that in some cases whole families attended — with the toddlers dressed in dog collars. It is the kind of raunchy event that gives that city its reputation for decadence. But what really offended was the promotional poster for the fair. Seated at and standing behind a long table, Last Supper-style, are a set of men and women in various stages of leather dress/undress, including a man wearing a black dog mask. Sex toys, including a big red fist, are strewn across the table. As a spokesman for Concerned Women explained, The bread and wine representing Christ's broken body and life-giving blood are replaced with sadomasochistic sex toys in this twisted version of Da Vinci's The Last Supper.Prominently on display in the left-hand corner of the ad — the Miller Lite sponsorship logo. Miller Brewing would like consumers to think of it as a wholesome, all-American product. Instead, they're in danger of becoming the Honk If You Hate Jesus beer. Miller Lite was the only national advertiser underneath this Christ-mocking image. When pressed by the Catholic League and other offended groups, Miller spokesman Julian Green gave the standard — which is to say, slippery — corporate answer. While Miller has supported the Folsom Street Fair for several years, a nod to the gay community, we take exception to the poster the organizing committee developed this year. If you think that was weak, try the next sentence: We understand some individuals may find the imagery offensive.Some individuals? There are over 225 million Christians in the United States. May be offended? It is a poster designed to insult them by blaspheming Jesus Christ. And after putting out that Pablum, Miller still refused to remove its Lite or Genuine Draft logos from adorning the event or the event's promotional Website.
Then the Catholic League noticed that the Miller-funded event would also mock the Last Supper through the queer nun group the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, which would also receive funds from the event. On their Website, the nun-mockers promised: No gastric craving will go unsatisfied, no bag of silver will go unspent, and no sin will go unforgiven. ... Don't be a Judas! Come, eat, drink and be Mary! Be sure to mention The Last Supper With The Sisters when you make your reservation.When the Catholic League complained to Miller about this, they were unimpressed, the League reported. The League has now called for a nationwide boycott of Miller beer. (Full disclosure: I am on the Advisory Board of the Catholic League and have endorsed the boycott.)
In turn, Miller announced it was conducting an immediate full-scale audit of its marketing and promotional procedures, which sounds like the company is being responsive, except again there was a dodge. The last line in this message underlined its lack of a moral spine: It is important to understand that the Folsom Street Fair does not target the general public in its communications. The fair itself and the organization's Website are only intended for the adult alternative lifestyle community.
Translation: We market to Christians in the mass media. We also apply our logo to ads trashing those same Christians in our niche marketing to the alternative lifestyle community. Anything for a buck. The Miller Brewing Co. has a Distributor Agreement, which reads in part, Distributor shall preserve and enhance the high quality image, reputation and goodwill of Miller and its products through (i) the appearance and attitude of Distributor personnel. What do you suppose would be the corporate response if one of its drivers got into a truck cross-dressed as a Catholic nun? Or strolled into the company lunchroom and proceeded to dump on the table an assortment of X-rated sex toys? In 2005, a Miller worker in Wisconsin was fired when he was photographed in the newspaper drinking a Budweiser. Now that, that was intolerable. L. Brent Bozell III is the president of the Media Research Center. CREATORS SYNDICATE INC.
Fiery pileup kills 3 near Los Angeles By MICHAEL R. BLOOD, Associated Press Writer OCT 14,07
SANTA CLARITA, Calif. - Firefighters finished removing charred debris Sunday from a freeway tunnel where three people died in a fiery, 29-vehicle pileup that could keep a major interstate shut down for days. Investigators determined 28 commercial vehicles and one passenger vehicle were involved in the crash late Friday that killed three people and injured at least 10, Deputy Fire Chief John Tripp said. The search of the debris ended Sunday morning and confirmed no more fatalities.With the large numbers of vehicles trapped inside the tunnel, there was a potential for a greater number of critical injuries, let alone fatalities, Tripp said.
Officials hope to reopen the southbound lanes of the closed freeway by Tuesday morning, but they have been hampered by concern about how many repairs will have to be made for the tunnel to be safe.Our goal is to get the roadway open as quickly as possible, said Will Kempton, director of the California Department of Transportation.At least five big rigs burst into flames that spread to other vehicles and burned a full day after the crash on a rainy Friday night. At the height of the fire, flames shot out of both ends of the 550-foot-long tunnel, rising as high as 100 feet, firefighters said.About 300 firefighters were fighting the fire early Saturday, and the intense heat caused concrete to crack and melt, sending chucks falling onto a road below. Small fires lingered even as debris was being removed Saturday afternoon.
The bodies of two crash victims were found early Saturday and a third was found later in the day, authorities said. The dead were two adult males and one child, Los Angeles County Fire Inspector Jason Hurd said Sunday.The bodies of one man and the child were in the cab of a truck hauling cantaloupe, which appeared to have hit a pillar outside the tunnel, a fire official told The Associated Press on condition his name not be used because he was not authorized to speak about the crash.The other body was found in a truck about 12 feet short of the tunnel's exit, said the official.
The exact ages of the victims were unknown. County coroner's investigator Kelly Yagerlener said it could be several days before the names of the dead were released.
The pileup in the southbound truck tunnel of Interstate 5 began about 11 p.m. Friday when two big rigs collided on the rain-slickened highway, about 30 miles north of downtown Los Angeles.
There was an accident in front of me. I come to a stop and then they just start hitting me, one right after another, trucker Tony Brazil told reporters at the crash site.A couple drivers come over the top of the truck and (said), Get out of here, let's get out of here, so I got my wallet and my phone and I was able to squeeze between that truck there and the wall, Brazil said.
The cause of the crash is being investigated.
The pileup snarled traffic for miles in all directions as motorists had to navigate neighborhood streets and mountain roads to get around the wreck. Traveling 100 yards on one street just down the hill from the crash took an hour.Interstate 5 is a key route connecting Southern and Northern California, as well as a major commuter link between Los Angeles and its northern suburbs.
The tunnel, built in the 1970s, and its mix of curves and darkness has long been regarded by truckers as one of the most dangerous areas of the freeway. There's kind of a blind spot, so if you boogie around the bend too fast and there's somebody stopped in the tunnel, it'll be boom-boom-boom, Arthur Johnson, 45, of Buckeye, Ariz., told the Los Angeles Times. Truck driver Fausto Angelino said he's been driving that stretch of road for 23 years.
I hold my breath every time, he said. The stretch of freeway carries about 225,000 vehicles a day. Associated Press Writer Jacob Adelman contributed to this report from Los Angeles.
Obstacles slow Rice's Mideast diplomacy By The Associated Press OCT 14,07
TALKS: Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice opened an intense round of Mideast shuttle diplomacy Sunday.
DISAGREEMENT: Israelis and Palestinians are at bitter odds over the outline of an agreement that would be presented at a planned peace conference next month.
SPECIFICS: Israel is pressing for a vaguely worded document that would give it more room to maneuver, but the Palestinians want a detailed preliminary agreement.
UN peacekeepers prove blessing for south Lebanon economy by Lamia Radi OCT 14,07
TYRE, Lebanon (AFP) - Traders in Tyre's bustling souk say UN peacekeepers have brought baraka and a dose of good fortune to south Lebanon, making up at least in part for the ravages of last year's Israel-Hezbollah war. The United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon (UNIFIL) has spent millions of dollars on food and housing, while employing hundreds of locals in the region where they are deployed to keep Israeli troops and the Shiite militants apart.The UNIFIL is a baraka (blessing), our business depends on them, said Ali Zeidan, a souvenir store owner.All these products are aimed at them, he said, pointing to a wooden dish encrusted with mother of pearl and adorned with the Lebanese flag as well as those of the 28 other nations contributing troops to the force.
He also has on offer portable nargilehs, or water pipes, in tinted glass with the countries' names in gilded arabesque writing.The market was frozen, but it is vibrant now, he said, adding that the Italians (the largest contingent) are the most generous; they have even learned to haggle.Following the July-August 2006 war which devastated the region, the UN Security Council boosted the number of UNIFIL troops to 13,500 -- from only 2,000 -- in south Lebanon, where the force has been deployed since 1978.The Lebanese army has since deployed up to the border with Israel for the first time in decades, and UNIFIL has reported no major incident between Hezbollah guerrillas and Israel.However, extra security measures were adopted during a deadly 15-week battle in northern Lebanon between Islamist militants and the Lebanese army that ended on September 2.The Spanish contingent of UNIFIL was targeted in a June 24 car bombing that cost six lives and was praised by Al-Qaeda.Amid an easing in tensions on the ground, 40 percent of the 90 million dollars (64,000 million euros) allocated to purchasing in 2006-2007 has been spent locally, UNIFIL's spokeswoman Yasmina Bouziane told AFP.
The troops, who themselves have spent 36 million dollars this year, buy fuel, food, mineral water, construction material, stationery and office supplies from local businesses, as well as souvenirs and pirated DVDs.UNIFIL employs about 600 local people. But the number could reach 4,000 if we consider those directly hired by each contingent, Bouziane said of interpreters, cashiers, drivers, mechanics, engineers, cleaners and secretaries.Even if each soldier spends a dollar a day it will bring in 13,000 dollars.
The region is also hosting hundreds of UNIFIL civilian personnel, some with their families, and foreign humanitarian workers such as demining experts and the Red Cross, who rent housing, buy food and send their children to school.The considerable funds available to UNIFIL and humanitarian organisations have created an economic effervescence prompting Beirut's big businesses to open branches in the south, said a manager of Banque Libano-Francaise, Antoine Hadid, in the port city of Tyre.
Financial transactions have increased by 40 percent since 2006 in the south compared to only six percent in Beirut, and seven banks have opened branches in Bint Jbeil, 125 kilometres (almost 80 miles) south of Beirut, Hadid said.The corniche seafront in Tyre is dotted with restaurants and cafes, including international chains. The monthly rent is set at 1,000 dollars for a cafe and 4,000 dollars for a restaurant, they would not open if they lost money, hotel owner Raymond Salha said. His 13-room family-run hotel overlooking the sea is usually booked up by UNIFIL's civil personnel families. I do not take advantage of their presence; I have not changed the rates: 60 dollars a night for a double room, including breakfast, he said. In a cell phone store, Fuad Hegazi is translating from Arabic to Portuguese for a high-ranking UNIFIL official. I have worked with them for eight months, and I have earned 2,500 dollars a month compared to the 500 dollars I would be paid by a Lebanese employer, said 30-year-old Hegazi, who also speaks Spanish, English, and Romanian. Things have started to look up for local carpenter Mounir too, who may take out a loan to refurbish three apartments which he rents out to UNIFIL's civilian personnel. The rents have ramped up, a three-room apartment that was 600 dollars a month in May is now worth 800 to 1,000 dollars, he said.
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.
Putin to visit Iran amid nuclear tension By VLADIMIR ISACHENKOV, Associated Press Writer Sun Oct 14, 11:02 AM ET
MOSCOW - When President Vladimir Putin visits Tehran this week, he will be closely watched for any sign he has moved closer to launching the nuclear reactor Russia is building for Iran. Russia has resisted the U.S. push for stronger sanctions against Tehran and strongly warned Washington against using force in its standoff with Iran over its nuclear program. But Moscow's position is carefully hedged. It has delayed completing the plant, Iran's first, and is urging the country to comply with international controls on its nuclear activities.Any show of support for Iran, such as a pledge by Putin to quickly complete the power plant, could embolden Iran and further cloud Russia's relations with the West.Putin bluntly spelled out his disagreements with Washington on Wednesday, saying he saw no objective data to prove Western claims that Iran is seeking nuclear weapons. And at talks Friday with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Defense Secretary Robert Gates, he ridiculed U.S. plans for a missile defense system in eastern Europe, supposedly to stop an Iranian attack.
His bluntness appeared to shock Rice and Gates.
Putin's visit, during which he will meet with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and attend Tuesday's summit of Caspian Sea nations, is a first. No Kremlin leader has traveled to Iran since Josef Stalin in 1943, for a wartime summit with Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt.Putin's trip is important for Iran even if it yields no agreements. It's a break in international isolation, a chance to show that Iran is an important country, said Alexander Pikayev, a leading expert on Iran with Russia's Institute for World Economy and International relations.But it will highlight a reality sometimes overlooked by a world focused on the West's confrontation with Iran: that the Kremlin also has its problems with the Islamic republic.Although Russia has shielded Iran from harsher sanctions in the U.N. Security Council, its relations with Tehran have been hurt by disputes over the $1 billion deal to build the nuclear plant. Russia warned earlier this year that the plant in the port of Bushehr wouldn't be launched this fall as planned — the latest in a series of delays — because Iran was slow in making payments. It has also delayed the shipment of uranium fuel for the plant.
Anxious to ease Western doubts — and possibly its own — about Iran's intentions, the Kremlin made Tehran sign a deal several years ago to return the fuel to Russia after its use so it cannot be used in weapons.Iranian officials deny being late with payments and accuse the Kremlin of yielding to Western pressure. Iran has started its own enrichment program, saying it wants to produce fuel by itself — an effort that has heightened international suspicions. Iran insists that its program is meant purely to generate electricity.Low-enriched uranium is used to fuel nuclear power plants. Highly enriched uranium can be used to build nuclear weapons.The upshot is a slew of mutual suspicions, says Fyodor Lukyanov, the editor of Russia in Global Affairs magazine.Tehran views Russia as an unreliable partner that uses Iran in its game with the West, he told The Associated Press. Iran has been very difficult to deal with and the Kremlin has felt strong irritation about it.Putin's Tehran trip has repeatedly been postponed, as has the launch of the nuclear plant.Moscow has said fuel delivery will start six months before the plant goes on line, but it keeps delaying the launch date, citing the payment dispute.Some analysts think Putin may use the summit to pledge to complete the plant next year.
It requires political will to turn the launch key at Bushehr, and there is no reason to think that Russia lacks it, said Vladimir Orlov, the head of PIR Center, a think tank specializing in nuclear issues. Other analysts predict Russia's balancing act will continue, to avoid angering either Iran or the West. Moscow has said repeatedly it doesn't want a nuclear-armed Iran, and has urged Tehran to freeze uranium enrichment and answer international inspectors' queries about its nuclear program. Vyacheslav Kantor, a Russian businessman who is president of the European Jewish Congress, said the Kremlin is bent on preventing Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons. We feel the intentions are very strong and positive, he said, voicing hope that Putin could persuade Tehran to meet international demands. Meanwhile, senior diplomats of the U.N. Security Council's five veto-wielding permanent members, joined by Germany, are giving Iran until November to show a positive response to questions about its nuclear program or face tougher sanctions. Permanent members Russia and China agreed to two previous sanctions resolutions but have cold-shouldered the effort by the U.S., Britain and France to impose harsher measures.
If Putin's trip to Iran doesn't yield answers to where the Kremlin is headed on the Iranian nuclear issue, next month's dealings at the U.N. may fill in some of the blanks.
ISAIAH 17:1
1 The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap.
October 14, 2007
Israel Struck a Nuclear Project in Syria, Analysts Say
By DAVID E. SANGER and MARK MAZZETTI
WASHINGTON, Oct. 13 — Israel’s air attack on Syria last month was directed against a site that Israeli and American intelligence analysts judged was a partly constructed nuclear reactor, apparently modeled on one North Korea has used to create its stockpile of nuclear weapons fuel, according to American and foreign officials with access to the intelligence reports.The description of the target addresses one of the central mysteries surrounding the Sept. 6 attack, and suggests that Israel carried out the raid to demonstrate its determination to snuff out even a nascent nuclear project in a neighboring state. The Bush administration was divided at the time about the wisdom of Israel’s strike, American officials said, and some senior policy makers still regard the attack as premature.
The attack on the reactor project has echoes of an Israeli raid more than a quarter century ago, in 1981, when Israel destroyed the Osirak nuclear reactor in Iraq shortly before it was to have begun operating. That attack was officially condemned by the Reagan administration, though Israelis consider it among their military’s finest moments. In the weeks before the Iraq war, Bush administration officials said they believed that the attack set back Iraq’s nuclear ambitions by many years. By contrast, the facility that the Israelis struck in Syria appears to have been much further from completion, the American and foreign officials said. They said it would have been years before the Syrians could have used the reactor to produce the spent nuclear fuel that could, through a series of additional steps, be reprocessed into bomb-grade plutonium. Many details remain unclear, most notably how much progress the Syrians had made in construction before the Israelis struck, the role of any assistance provided by North Korea, and whether the Syrians could make a plausible case that the reactor was intended to produce electricity. In Washington and Israel, information about the raid has been wrapped in extraordinary secrecy and restricted to just a handful of officials, while the Israeli press has been prohibited from publishing information about the attack.
The New York Times reported this week that a debate had begun within the Bush administration about whether the information secretly cited by Israel to justify its attack should be interpreted by the United States as reason to toughen its approach to Syria and North Korea. In later interviews, officials made clear that the disagreements within the administration began this summer, as a debate about whether an Israeli attack on the incomplete reactor was warranted then.The officials did not say that the administration had ultimately opposed the Israeli strike, but that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates were particularly concerned about the ramifications of a pre-emptive strike in the absence of an urgent threat.There wasn’t a lot of debate about the evidence, said one American official familiar with the intense discussions over the summer between Washington and the government of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel. “There was a lot of debate about how to respond to it.Even though it has signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, Syria would not have been obligated to declare the existence of a reactor during the early phases of construction. It would have also had the legal right to complete construction of the reactor, as long as its purpose was to generate electricity. In his only public comment on the raid, Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, acknowledged this month that Israeli jets dropped bombs on a building that he said was related to the military but which he insisted was not used.
A senior Israeli official, while declining to speak about the specific nature of the target, said the strike was intended to re-establish the credibility of our deterrent power, signaling that Israel meant to send a message to the Syrians that even the potential for a nuclear weapons program would not be permitted. But several American officials said the strike may also have been intended by Israel as a signal to Iran and its nuclear aspirations. Neither Iran nor any Arab government except for Syria has criticized the Israeli raid, suggesting that Israel is not the only country that would be disturbed by a nuclear Syria. North Korea did issue a protest. The target of the Israeli raid and the American debate about the Syrian project were described by government officials and nongovernment experts interviewed in recent weeks in the United States and the Middle East. All insisted on anonymity because of rules that prohibit discussing classified information. The officials who described the target of the attack included some on each side of the debate about whether a partly constructed Syrian nuclear reactor should be seen as an urgent concern, as well as some who described themselves as neutral on the question. The White House press secretary, Dana Perino, said Saturday that the administration would have no comment on the intelligence issues surrounding the Israeli strike. Israel has also refused to comment.Nuclear reactors can be used for both peaceful and non-peaceful purposes. A reactor’s spent fuel can be reprocessed to extract plutonium, one of two paths to building a nuclear weapon. The other path — enriching uranium in centrifuges — is the method that Iran is accused of pursuing with an intent to build a weapon of its own.Syria is known to have only one nuclear reactor, a small one built for research purposes. But in the past decade, Syria has several times sought unsuccessfully to buy one, first from Argentina, then from Russia. On those occasions, Israel reacted strongly but did not threaten military action. Earlier this year, Mr. Assad spoke publicly in general terms about Syria’s desire to develop nuclear power, but his government did not announce a plan to build a new reactor.
The Gulf Cooperation Council, a group of Persian Gulf states, has also called for an expansion of nuclear power in the Middle East for energy purposes, but many experts have interpreted that statement as a response to Iran’s nuclear program. They have warned that the region may be poised for a wave of proliferation. Israel is believed to be the only nuclear-armed nation in the region.The partly constructed Syrian reactor was detected earlier this year by satellite photographs, according to American officials. They suggested that the facility had been brought to American attention by the Israelis, but would not discuss why American spy agencies seemed to have missed the early phases of construction.North Korea has long provided assistance to Syria on a ballistic missile program, but any assistance toward the construction of the reactor would have been the first clear evidence of ties between the two countries on a nuclear program. North Korea has successfully used its five-megawatt reactor at the Yongbyon nuclear complex to reprocess nuclear fuel into bomb-grade material, a model that some American and Israeli officials believe Syria may have been trying to replicate. The North conducted a partly successful test of a nuclear device a year ago, prompting renewed fears that the desperately poor country might seek to sell its nuclear technology. President Bush issued a specific warning to the North on Oct. 9, 2006, just hours after the test, noting that it was leading proliferator of missile technology, including transfers to Iran and Syria. He went on to warn that the transfer of nuclear weapons or material by North Korea to states or non-state entities would be considered a grave threat to the United States, and we would hold North Korea fully accountable.While Bush administration officials have made clear in recent weeks that the target of the Israeli raid was linked to North Korea in some way, Mr. Bush has not repeated his warning since the attack. In fact, the administration has said very little about the country’s suspected role in the Syria case, apparently for fear of upending negotiations now under way in which North Korea has pledged to begin disabling its nuclear facilities.
While the partly constructed Syrian reactor appears to be based on North Korea’s design, the American and foreign officials would not say whether they believed the North Koreans sold or gave the plans to the Syrians, or whether the North’s own experts were there at the time of the attack. It is possible, some officials said, that the transfer of the technology occurred several years ago.According to two senior administration officials, the subject was raised when the United States, North Korea and four other nations met in Beijing earlier this month.Behind closed doors, however, Vice President Dick Cheney and other hawkish members of the administration have made the case that the same intelligence that prompted Israel to attack should lead the United States to reconsider delicate negotiations with North Korea over ending its nuclear program, as well as America’s diplomatic strategy toward Syria, which has been invited to join Middle East peace talks in Annapolis, Md., next month.Mr. Cheney in particular, officials say, has also cited the indications that North Korea aided Syria to question the Bush administration’s agreement to supply the North with large amounts of fuel oil. During Mr. Bush’s first term, Mr. Cheney was among the advocates of a strategy to squeeze the North Korean government in hopes that it would collapse, and the administration cut off oil shipments set up under an agreement between North Korea and the Clinton administration, saying the North had cheated on that accord. The new shipments, agreed to last February, are linked to North Korea’s carrying through on its pledge to disable its nuclear facilities by the end of the year. Nonetheless, Mr. Bush has approved going ahead with that agreement, even after he was aware of the Syrian program.Nuclear experts say that North Korea’s main reactor, while small by international standards, is big enough to produce roughly one bomb’s worth of plutonium a year. In an interview, Dr. Siegfried S. Hecker of Stanford University, a former director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory, said building a reactor based on North Korea’s design might take from three to six years. Reporting was contributed by William J. Broad in New York, Helene Cooper in Washington and Steven Erlanger in Jerusalem.
Sunday, October 14, 2007
15 TRUCK FIRE IN LA TUNNEL
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.
Haiti floods leave 45 dead Sat Oct 13, 2:12 AM ET
PORT-AU-PRINCE (AFP) - At least 45 people have died in the poverty-stricken island of Haiti as homes were swept away in floods triggered by heavy rain, the interior ministry said Friday. Interior Minister Paul Antoine Bien-Aime told AFP 23 bodies had been found Thursday in Cabaret, just north of the capital, and 12 were missing after floodwaters hit their hillside homes, sweeping them away in the current.The water carried off people living in houses built on the hillside, sweeping them into the town, the minister said.More than 6,000 people have had to leave their flooded homes in Cabaret, where neighborhoods have been completely submerged, witnesses told radio stations in Port-au-Prince.
The mountainous and impoverished Caribbean island nation faces regular flash-flooding during the rainy season. Deforestation, which heightens the risk of flooding, is rife as the poor collect every scrap of wood for cooking.Civil protection authorities said thousands of families were displaced and hundreds of homes destroyed or damaged across the country. Roads were swamped and plantations wiped out.Farming has been particularly affected and numerous crops have been destroyed, Bien-Aime said.Apart from Cabinet, further casualties were reported in other villages after more than a week of rain. The ministry said the provisional death toll for the whole of the country was at least 45.The government released funds to send food and beds to the stricken areas and the United Nations has offered to help. It already has thousands of peacekeepers in the country, whose problems were compounded by violent political strife in recent years.
In eastern Cuba, just west of Haiti, civil defense officials evacuated more than 18,000 people amid flooding concerns from the same weather system, which damaged at least 1,000 homes there.And in Nicaragua at least 1,000 were evacuated in the Chinandega region of the northeast, were a flood alert was issued, emergency services told AFP. Heavy rain there has caused major rivers to flood their banks.
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)
Rice worried by Putin's broad powers By MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press Writer OCT 13,07
MOSCOW - The Russian government under Vladimir Putin has amassed so much central authority that the power-grab may undermine Moscow's commitment to democracy, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Saturday. In any country, if you don't have countervailing institutions, the power of any one president is problematic for democratic development, Rice told reporters after meeting with human-rights activists.I think there is too much concentration of power in the Kremlin. I have told the Russians that. Everybody has doubts about the full independence of the judiciary. There are clearly questions about the independence of the electronic media and there are, I think, questions about the strength of the Duma, said Rice, referring to the Russian parliament.Telephone messages left with Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov were not immediately returned Saturday evening.The top American diplomat encouraged the activists to build institutions of democracy. These would help combat arbitrary state power amid increasing pressure from the Kremlin, she said.
The U.S. is concerned about the centralization of power and democratic backsliding ahead of Russia's legislative and presidential elections in December and March. Putin will step down next year as president. He has said he would lead the ticket of the main pro-Kremlin party in the parliamentary elections and could take the prime minister's job later.Rice sought opinions and assessments of the situation from eight prominent rights leaders.
I talked to people about the coming months and how they see the coming months. How these two elections are carried out will have an effect on whether Russia is making the next step on toward democracy, Rice said after the private sessions at Spaso House, the residence of the U.S. ambassador in Moscow.Rice and Defense Secretary Robert Gates on Friday received a chilly reception from Putin and senior Russian officials on U.S. proposals for cooperating on a missile defense system in Eastern Europe that Russia vehemently opposes.But as she has in the past, Rice declined comment on Putin's possible political future and said she did not raise the matter in her official discussions.Although she would not speculate about Putin's ambitions, Rice said there were signs that whatever transition occurs could be smooth.
To the degree that anyone can predict, it looks like it will be fairly stable, she said. But, I would just caution that change is change.Earlier, Rice said she hoped the efforts of rights activists would promote universal values of the rights of individuals to liberty and freedom, the right to worship as you please, and the right to assembly, the right to not have to deal with the arbitrary power of the state.In the meeting with business, media and civil society leaders, Rice said she was especially interested in talking about how you view (the) political evolution of Russia, the economic evolution of Russia.
Russia is a country that's in transition and that transition is not easy and there are a lot of complications and a lot of challenges, Rice said. If Russia is to emerge as a democratic country that can fully protect the rights of its people, it is going to emerge over years and you have to be a part of helping the emergence of that Russia.Participants in the meetings said they outlined their concerns but that she did not offer any judgments about the state of human rights and democracy under Putin.Lyudmila Alexeyeva of the Moscow Helsinki Group told the Interfax news agency her organization sees the purposeful construction of an authoritarian society and an onslaught on the people's rights, elections are being turned into farce, and human rights and opposition organizations are experiencing pressure.
Alexander Brod, head of the Moscow Human Rights Bureau, said the discussions touched on authoritarianism and the crisis of human rights. He said he disagreed with the opinion that we had a flourishing democracy in the 1990s and that we have a setback now.
Not all is ideal in America, either. We see protests against the war in Iraq and violations of human rights on the part of security services and violations of human rights in countering terrorism, Brod said.
Vladimir Lukin, the government-appointed human rights ombudsman, was quoted by Interfax as saying he told Rice that human rights should be discussed in a dialogue rather lecturing in a doomsday style. The State Department frequently has criticized what Washington regards as creeping authoritarianism among Putin and other top Russian leaders. Its most recent human-rights report on Russia notes continuing centralization of power in the Kremlin, a compliant legislature, political pressure on the judiciary, intolerance of ethnic minorities, corruption and selectivity in enforcement of the law, and media restrictions and self-censorship. Rice and Gates later met with Prime Minister Viktor Zubkov for talks on trade and economic relations, including negotiations for Russia's accession to the World Trade Organization. Moscow and Washington signed a trade agreement last November that removed the last major obstacle in Moscow's 13-year journey to join the 149-member group. Moscow must still conclude other outstanding bilateral deals and assuage the European Union's concerns about energy supplies. The Russian government press service said Zubkov also pressed the Americans to work to abolish the Jackson-Vanik amendment. The 1974 measure ties Russia's trade status to whether it freely allows Jewish emigration.
Iran calls on Muslims to boycott peace conference By Parisa Hafezi OCT 13,07
TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran's top cleric urged Muslim countries on Saturday to boycott a U.S.-sponsored international peace conference on Palestinian statehood next month. 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.When Palestinians consider this conference as deceitful and refuse to participate, how can Muslim countries take part in that?" Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in a sermon broadcast live on state media.Other (Muslim) countries also should consider it a deceitful conference.
The United States is optimistic Palestinians and Israelis will agree to a joint document on the tough issues that divide them before the conference in November.Washington has backed the idea of a small territorial exchange between Israel and a future Palestine so that Palestinians would be compensated for Jewish settlement blocs that would remain under Israeli control in any peace deal.Negotiations on core issues such as the borders of a Palestinian state and the future of Jerusalem and millions of Palestinian refugees broke down in 2001 amid surging violence. Since its 1979 Islamic revolution, Iran refuses to recognize Israel.Under the name of seizing peace, Americans are trying to impose their will on Palestinians. This conference's aim is to rescue the Zionist regime (Israel), Khamenei said..
Iran's most powerful authority also said the United States and its western allies were to be blamed for instability and the bloodshed in Iraq.The occupiers of Iraq are the ones to be blamed for the insecurity in Iraq. They are not capable or they do not want to establish security in Iraq, he said.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 program, which the West says is a cover to build nuclear weapons. Iran denies it.Khamenei, the spiritual heir of the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini who led Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution, addressed tens of thousands of worshippers who gathered at a large mosque in Tehran to mark the Muslim Eid al-Fitr holiday ending the Ramadan fasting month in Iran.America and its allies are responsible for ... human and political catastrophe in Iraq, he said.
This Week with Rabbi Eckstein
October 11, 2007
Dear Friend of The Fellowship,
Each spring, Israel celebrates Jerusalem Day, commemorating the reunification of the city under Israeli rule following the 1967 Six Day War. It is a joyous occasion a day set aside to reflect upon the significance of this ancient and Holy City to the Jewish people, and to celebrate the fact that, after thousands of years, it is once again the capital of a sovereign Jewish state.Just last week, another Jerusalem Day was observed throughout the Arab and Muslim Middle East. Supposedly meant to rally support for Palestinians and reaffirm the importance of Jerusalem to Muslims, it was instead little more than another occasion for hostile governments to issue hateful verbal attacks and threats against Israel.
These attacks were especially vicious. Speaking before a crowd shouting “death to Israel” in the Iranian capital of Tehran, Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad delivered a speech calling Israel’s existence an insult to human dignity. In Gaza, an Islamic Jihad terrorist leader declared, Israel is a cancerous tumor that has sprouted in the region, but we will continue the jihad and the resistance until Jerusalem is liberated. At a rally in the Syrian capital of Damascus, a banner read, Palestine is ours, from the sea to the river.Meanwhile, as her enemies come together to call for her destruction, Israel continues to seek peace. Recent news reports say that Israel is even considering giving the Palestinians control over parts of Jerusalem. This shows again that Israel is operating in good faith and is prepared to make painful sacrifices for real, lasting peace. However, Palestinian leadership has yet to show a similar willingness to compromise and fulfill commitments made at the negotiating table. For that reason, there is every reason for Israel to carefully consider the possible implications of such a transfer, to proceed with extreme caution, and to ensure that any agreement reached with the Palestinians on Jerusalem requires them to follow through on their promises.
Obviously, putting any part of the Holy City in the wrong hands could have devastating consequences for Israel. No one understands this better than Dore Gold, former Israeli ambassador to the United Nations. He has written a new book called “The Fight for Jerusalem” that I strongly recommend to help you stay informed and stand firm in your support for Israel.Ambassador Gold shows how Jerusalem has become the battleground in an increasingly heated conflict between the West and radical Islam. He highlights the historical and biblical connections of Jews and Christians to Jerusalem, and documents how Islamists are destroying precious archeological artifacts in an attempt to convince the world that those connections are merely myths. The Fight for Jerusalem also provides insight into how Jerusalem is seen as the launching pad for global jihadism. You can purchase this important book from our catalog and when you do, proceeds will go to fund The Fellowship’s lifesaving programs that benefit Israel and Jewish people worldwide.
I believe that Gold’s book makes a compelling case that we are witnessing a pivotal time in history. Now, more than ever, we need to heed the ancient words of the psalmist: Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: May those who love you be secure. May there be peace within your walls and security within your citadels (Psalm 122:6). Please join me today in this prayer for the Israel and the Holy City, which my friend, former Prime Minister of Israel Ariel Sharon, called, “the eternal capital of the Jewish people.
With prayers for shalom, peace,
Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein
President INTERNATIONAL FELLOWSHIP OF CHRISTIANS AND JEWS
Hamas warns Abbas peace talks a trap By IBRAHIM BARZAK, Associated Press Writer Sat Oct 13, 1:39 AM ET
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - Hamas' top leaders in Gaza and Syria warned the moderate Palestinian president Friday not to fall into the trap of an upcoming U.S.-sponsored peace conference with Israel. Ismail Haniyeh, who was deposed as Palestinian prime minister after Hamas violently seized Gaza in June, urged President Mahmoud Abbas to mend his rift with the Islamic militant group and criticized him for planning to attend the peace conference next month.Don't fall into the trap of the coming conference. Don't make new compromises on Jerusalem, on our sovereignty, Haniyeh said, speaking to thousands of cheering supporters for the Muslim Eid al-Fitr holiday.Hamas' Syria-based supreme leader, Khaled Mashaal, echoed the warning in his own holiday message, accusing Israel and the U.S. of taking advantage of the Palestinian rift to try to wrest concessions in peace negotiations.
Abbas retaliated for Hamas' takeover of the Gaza Strip by expelling the group from his government and setting up his own administration in the West Bank. Mashaal urged Abbas to accept the Islamists' invitations for dialogue.Abbas and his allies will find out that they are pursuing nothing but a mirage, Mashaal said on Hamas radio.Israel and the Palestinians hope to present the contours of a final peace accord at the conference, tentatively set for Annapolis, Md., at the end of November.Israel has been pressing for a vaguely worded document that would gloss over the toughest issues — borders, control over disputed Jerusalem and a solution for Palestinian refugees who lost their homes in the 1948 war that followed Israel's creation.Palestinians prefer a detailed preliminary agreement with a timetable for creating a Palestinian state.
But Thursday, a key Palestinian negotiator said agreement on peace was near, adding that he doubted the U.S. would convene the conference if the two sides did not agree in advance on outlines for an accord.We have never been closer to achieving the end game than we are now, negotiator Saeb Erekat said.In an interview with Israel's Channel 10 TV, Erekat discounted Hamas' ability to sabotage a peace accord. He acknowledged that Abbas' Fatah movement was not strong enough to retake Gaza by force, but insisted once you produce an end game agreement, Hamas is down without firing a shot.Although Abbas says he has authority over Gaza, in practice he has little influence there.Haniyeh, who now heads the Hamas government in Gaza, received a hero's welcome from the crowd when he arrived at the Palestine Stadium in Gaza City with around 20 black-uniformed bodyguards for festive prayers.He told supporters that Abbas could not negotiate without Hamas' support.Don't go to conference when you don't have the power card in your pocket — and the power card is Hamas, Haniyeh told his supporters.Gaza's international isolation, empty shelves and bitter internal rivalries cast a pall over the Eid al-Fitr holiday — meant to be one of the happiest dates on the Muslim calendar.Israel has barred the entrance of all goods to the territory except humanitarian aid, and Western governments have imposed a financial boycott.Deepening the misery are ongoing clashes between the Israeli military and Gaza militants who fire rockets almost daily into Israel.
Hamas said one of its fighters was killed and five other people were wounded in an Israeli ground missile attack early Saturday. The Israeli military said troops targeted a squad that had launched a rocket attack on Israel.Because tensions between members of Hamas and Fatah in Gaza remain high, Hamas security forces were deployed in the streets to keep order during the holiday. Even Friday's prayers were divided along factional lines, with separate locations for supporters of Gaza's Hamas rulers and their rivals from Abbas' Fatah.
Olmert, Abbas narrow land gap By Adam Entous
Fri Oct 12, 12:48 PM ET
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - The gap is narrowing between Israeli and Palestinian leaders over the amount of territory Israel would hand over to a Palestinian state, people close to the talks said a month ahead of a U.S.-sponsored conference. But Israeli, Palestinian and Western officials say sketching the boundaries of a future state may be the easy part -- real progress, they say, depends on narrowing differences over the fate of Jerusalem and Palestinian refugees, on which little progress can be discerned so far after closed-door meetings.Even vague talk of dividing the city has stirred opposition within Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's coalition cabinet.Israeli officials link easing their stance on Jerusalem -- which Israel wants to keep as its undivided capital -- to the Palestinians being prepared to soften their demand that refugees and their descendants be allowed to settle in Israel.
In this tortuous process, everything is difficult, everything is problematic. But Jerusalem and refugees are the most difficult issues, said Shlomo Ben-Ami, who was Israel's leftist Labor foreign minister when the last talks on the final status of a peace deal collapsed in 2001.Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas have said little in public about talks they have held in recent months.Western officials have told Reuters Olmert has privately signaled a willingness to consider handing over 90-something percent of the occupied West Bank and all of the Gaza Strip, with additional land swaps, as part of a final peace deal.
That may put the two sides within a few percentage points of consensus on the territory issue ahead of the Annapolis meeting.
ARITHMETIC
Western officials said it was unclear whether Olmert's 90-something percent means he might match Israel's last and best offer before negotiations broke down in 2001. At that time, Prime Minister Ehud Barak accepted ideas floated by U.S. President Bill Clinton that would have produced a Palestinian state in 97 percent of the West Bank and 100 percent of Gaza.Abbas's negotiating team considers the Clinton parameters and follow-up talks held in Taba, Egypt to be the basis for renewed negotiations with Olmert, Palestinian sources said.Abbas, in one of the rare public comments on the talks so far, said this week that a Palestinian state must have exactly as much land as that seized by Israel in the 1967 war.
Ben-Ami said: We don't need to invent the wheel ... These are the Clinton parameters. I don't see any other solution.But Olmert spokeswoman Miri Eisin said it would be wrong to see one past proposal as the one to guide future negotiations.U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will visit Jerusalem and the West Bank Ramallah next week to press Abbas and Olmert to reach agreement on a joint document addressing core issues for the conference, which President George W. Bush hopes will launch a final push to end the 60-year-old conflict.We feel a growing sense of urgency from Washington, said a senior Israeli official. He said he feared Israel's security concerns were not being taken fully into account in Bush's rush for some sort of deal before leaving office in early 2009.They are eager to get results, the official said.
Desperation breeds foolishness.
Western officials said heavy U.S. pressure on its Israeli ally would make it very difficult for Olmert to offer less than Clinton's 97 percent figure for West Bank land. Yet that could also trigger a backlash from within his own coalition. Everyone wants peace but they don't want to pay the price, said Ben-Ami. The maximum Olmert can offer falls short of the minimum for the Palestinians. If he makes proposals that are more far-reaching, he will lose his coalition.
FIRES AND EXPLOSIONS
REVELATION 8:7
7 The first angel sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled with blood, and they were cast upon the earth: and the third part of trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up.
15-truck pileup closes Calif. freeway
10 injured, at least one missing after fiery accident in L.A. County tunnel - Oct. 13: At least 10 people were injured in a chain-reaction pileup in Los Angeles County. NBC's Patrick Healy reports. MSNBC
SANTA CLARITA, Calif. - Smoke leaked from both ends of a tunnel early Saturday after a 15-truck pileup on a rain-slicked Southern California freeway left 10 people injured and at least one missing, authorities said. Fire Inspector Jason Hurd said the accident — the wreckage of which stretched for half a mile — began when two trucks collided late Friday and started a chain reaction in Interstate 5’s southbound truck-only tunnels that run under the regular freeway near the intersection with the Antelope Valley Freeway. Twenty people evacuated the fiery tunnel on foot, including the 10 injured, Hurd said, and five trucks were stuck inside. One truck driver was unaccounted for, and authorities were worried that more may be missing. We’re going to have to do a very methodical search, Deputy Chief John Tripp told KABC-TV. There could be unfortunately more people that were not able to escape.
Authorities said eight had minor injuries and two had moderate injuries, ranging from moderate burns to neck and back injuries. All 10 injured were taken to local hospitals. Smoke poured from both sides of the tunnel through the night. The majority of the flames had been doused by about 5 a.m., but firefighters had to stay out of the tunnel because of fears that fire damage could lead to its collapse. The tunnel may be structurally compromised, so we’re fighting the fire from outside right now, Tripp said. The freeway in northern Los Angeles County was expected to be closed all day Saturday, authorities said.
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.
Haiti floods leave 45 dead Sat Oct 13, 2:12 AM ET
PORT-AU-PRINCE (AFP) - At least 45 people have died in the poverty-stricken island of Haiti as homes were swept away in floods triggered by heavy rain, the interior ministry said Friday. Interior Minister Paul Antoine Bien-Aime told AFP 23 bodies had been found Thursday in Cabaret, just north of the capital, and 12 were missing after floodwaters hit their hillside homes, sweeping them away in the current.The water carried off people living in houses built on the hillside, sweeping them into the town, the minister said.More than 6,000 people have had to leave their flooded homes in Cabaret, where neighborhoods have been completely submerged, witnesses told radio stations in Port-au-Prince.
The mountainous and impoverished Caribbean island nation faces regular flash-flooding during the rainy season. Deforestation, which heightens the risk of flooding, is rife as the poor collect every scrap of wood for cooking.Civil protection authorities said thousands of families were displaced and hundreds of homes destroyed or damaged across the country. Roads were swamped and plantations wiped out.Farming has been particularly affected and numerous crops have been destroyed, Bien-Aime said.Apart from Cabinet, further casualties were reported in other villages after more than a week of rain. The ministry said the provisional death toll for the whole of the country was at least 45.The government released funds to send food and beds to the stricken areas and the United Nations has offered to help. It already has thousands of peacekeepers in the country, whose problems were compounded by violent political strife in recent years.
In eastern Cuba, just west of Haiti, civil defense officials evacuated more than 18,000 people amid flooding concerns from the same weather system, which damaged at least 1,000 homes there.And in Nicaragua at least 1,000 were evacuated in the Chinandega region of the northeast, were a flood alert was issued, emergency services told AFP. Heavy rain there has caused major rivers to flood their banks.
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)
Rice worried by Putin's broad powers By MATTHEW LEE, Associated Press Writer OCT 13,07
MOSCOW - The Russian government under Vladimir Putin has amassed so much central authority that the power-grab may undermine Moscow's commitment to democracy, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Saturday. In any country, if you don't have countervailing institutions, the power of any one president is problematic for democratic development, Rice told reporters after meeting with human-rights activists.I think there is too much concentration of power in the Kremlin. I have told the Russians that. Everybody has doubts about the full independence of the judiciary. There are clearly questions about the independence of the electronic media and there are, I think, questions about the strength of the Duma, said Rice, referring to the Russian parliament.Telephone messages left with Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov were not immediately returned Saturday evening.The top American diplomat encouraged the activists to build institutions of democracy. These would help combat arbitrary state power amid increasing pressure from the Kremlin, she said.
The U.S. is concerned about the centralization of power and democratic backsliding ahead of Russia's legislative and presidential elections in December and March. Putin will step down next year as president. He has said he would lead the ticket of the main pro-Kremlin party in the parliamentary elections and could take the prime minister's job later.Rice sought opinions and assessments of the situation from eight prominent rights leaders.
I talked to people about the coming months and how they see the coming months. How these two elections are carried out will have an effect on whether Russia is making the next step on toward democracy, Rice said after the private sessions at Spaso House, the residence of the U.S. ambassador in Moscow.Rice and Defense Secretary Robert Gates on Friday received a chilly reception from Putin and senior Russian officials on U.S. proposals for cooperating on a missile defense system in Eastern Europe that Russia vehemently opposes.But as she has in the past, Rice declined comment on Putin's possible political future and said she did not raise the matter in her official discussions.Although she would not speculate about Putin's ambitions, Rice said there were signs that whatever transition occurs could be smooth.
To the degree that anyone can predict, it looks like it will be fairly stable, she said. But, I would just caution that change is change.Earlier, Rice said she hoped the efforts of rights activists would promote universal values of the rights of individuals to liberty and freedom, the right to worship as you please, and the right to assembly, the right to not have to deal with the arbitrary power of the state.In the meeting with business, media and civil society leaders, Rice said she was especially interested in talking about how you view (the) political evolution of Russia, the economic evolution of Russia.
Russia is a country that's in transition and that transition is not easy and there are a lot of complications and a lot of challenges, Rice said. If Russia is to emerge as a democratic country that can fully protect the rights of its people, it is going to emerge over years and you have to be a part of helping the emergence of that Russia.Participants in the meetings said they outlined their concerns but that she did not offer any judgments about the state of human rights and democracy under Putin.Lyudmila Alexeyeva of the Moscow Helsinki Group told the Interfax news agency her organization sees the purposeful construction of an authoritarian society and an onslaught on the people's rights, elections are being turned into farce, and human rights and opposition organizations are experiencing pressure.
Alexander Brod, head of the Moscow Human Rights Bureau, said the discussions touched on authoritarianism and the crisis of human rights. He said he disagreed with the opinion that we had a flourishing democracy in the 1990s and that we have a setback now.
Not all is ideal in America, either. We see protests against the war in Iraq and violations of human rights on the part of security services and violations of human rights in countering terrorism, Brod said.
Vladimir Lukin, the government-appointed human rights ombudsman, was quoted by Interfax as saying he told Rice that human rights should be discussed in a dialogue rather lecturing in a doomsday style. The State Department frequently has criticized what Washington regards as creeping authoritarianism among Putin and other top Russian leaders. Its most recent human-rights report on Russia notes continuing centralization of power in the Kremlin, a compliant legislature, political pressure on the judiciary, intolerance of ethnic minorities, corruption and selectivity in enforcement of the law, and media restrictions and self-censorship. Rice and Gates later met with Prime Minister Viktor Zubkov for talks on trade and economic relations, including negotiations for Russia's accession to the World Trade Organization. Moscow and Washington signed a trade agreement last November that removed the last major obstacle in Moscow's 13-year journey to join the 149-member group. Moscow must still conclude other outstanding bilateral deals and assuage the European Union's concerns about energy supplies. The Russian government press service said Zubkov also pressed the Americans to work to abolish the Jackson-Vanik amendment. The 1974 measure ties Russia's trade status to whether it freely allows Jewish emigration.
Iran calls on Muslims to boycott peace conference By Parisa Hafezi OCT 13,07
TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iran's top cleric urged Muslim countries on Saturday to boycott a U.S.-sponsored international peace conference on Palestinian statehood next month. 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.When Palestinians consider this conference as deceitful and refuse to participate, how can Muslim countries take part in that?" Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said in a sermon broadcast live on state media.Other (Muslim) countries also should consider it a deceitful conference.
The United States is optimistic Palestinians and Israelis will agree to a joint document on the tough issues that divide them before the conference in November.Washington has backed the idea of a small territorial exchange between Israel and a future Palestine so that Palestinians would be compensated for Jewish settlement blocs that would remain under Israeli control in any peace deal.Negotiations on core issues such as the borders of a Palestinian state and the future of Jerusalem and millions of Palestinian refugees broke down in 2001 amid surging violence. Since its 1979 Islamic revolution, Iran refuses to recognize Israel.Under the name of seizing peace, Americans are trying to impose their will on Palestinians. This conference's aim is to rescue the Zionist regime (Israel), Khamenei said..
Iran's most powerful authority also said the United States and its western allies were to be blamed for instability and the bloodshed in Iraq.The occupiers of Iraq are the ones to be blamed for the insecurity in Iraq. They are not capable or they do not want to establish security in Iraq, he said.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 program, which the West says is a cover to build nuclear weapons. Iran denies it.Khamenei, the spiritual heir of the late Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini who led Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution, addressed tens of thousands of worshippers who gathered at a large mosque in Tehran to mark the Muslim Eid al-Fitr holiday ending the Ramadan fasting month in Iran.America and its allies are responsible for ... human and political catastrophe in Iraq, he said.
This Week with Rabbi Eckstein
October 11, 2007
Dear Friend of The Fellowship,
Each spring, Israel celebrates Jerusalem Day, commemorating the reunification of the city under Israeli rule following the 1967 Six Day War. It is a joyous occasion a day set aside to reflect upon the significance of this ancient and Holy City to the Jewish people, and to celebrate the fact that, after thousands of years, it is once again the capital of a sovereign Jewish state.Just last week, another Jerusalem Day was observed throughout the Arab and Muslim Middle East. Supposedly meant to rally support for Palestinians and reaffirm the importance of Jerusalem to Muslims, it was instead little more than another occasion for hostile governments to issue hateful verbal attacks and threats against Israel.
These attacks were especially vicious. Speaking before a crowd shouting “death to Israel” in the Iranian capital of Tehran, Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad delivered a speech calling Israel’s existence an insult to human dignity. In Gaza, an Islamic Jihad terrorist leader declared, Israel is a cancerous tumor that has sprouted in the region, but we will continue the jihad and the resistance until Jerusalem is liberated. At a rally in the Syrian capital of Damascus, a banner read, Palestine is ours, from the sea to the river.Meanwhile, as her enemies come together to call for her destruction, Israel continues to seek peace. Recent news reports say that Israel is even considering giving the Palestinians control over parts of Jerusalem. This shows again that Israel is operating in good faith and is prepared to make painful sacrifices for real, lasting peace. However, Palestinian leadership has yet to show a similar willingness to compromise and fulfill commitments made at the negotiating table. For that reason, there is every reason for Israel to carefully consider the possible implications of such a transfer, to proceed with extreme caution, and to ensure that any agreement reached with the Palestinians on Jerusalem requires them to follow through on their promises.
Obviously, putting any part of the Holy City in the wrong hands could have devastating consequences for Israel. No one understands this better than Dore Gold, former Israeli ambassador to the United Nations. He has written a new book called “The Fight for Jerusalem” that I strongly recommend to help you stay informed and stand firm in your support for Israel.Ambassador Gold shows how Jerusalem has become the battleground in an increasingly heated conflict between the West and radical Islam. He highlights the historical and biblical connections of Jews and Christians to Jerusalem, and documents how Islamists are destroying precious archeological artifacts in an attempt to convince the world that those connections are merely myths. The Fight for Jerusalem also provides insight into how Jerusalem is seen as the launching pad for global jihadism. You can purchase this important book from our catalog and when you do, proceeds will go to fund The Fellowship’s lifesaving programs that benefit Israel and Jewish people worldwide.
I believe that Gold’s book makes a compelling case that we are witnessing a pivotal time in history. Now, more than ever, we need to heed the ancient words of the psalmist: Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: May those who love you be secure. May there be peace within your walls and security within your citadels (Psalm 122:6). Please join me today in this prayer for the Israel and the Holy City, which my friend, former Prime Minister of Israel Ariel Sharon, called, “the eternal capital of the Jewish people.
With prayers for shalom, peace,
Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein
President INTERNATIONAL FELLOWSHIP OF CHRISTIANS AND JEWS
Hamas warns Abbas peace talks a trap By IBRAHIM BARZAK, Associated Press Writer Sat Oct 13, 1:39 AM ET
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip - Hamas' top leaders in Gaza and Syria warned the moderate Palestinian president Friday not to fall into the trap of an upcoming U.S.-sponsored peace conference with Israel. Ismail Haniyeh, who was deposed as Palestinian prime minister after Hamas violently seized Gaza in June, urged President Mahmoud Abbas to mend his rift with the Islamic militant group and criticized him for planning to attend the peace conference next month.Don't fall into the trap of the coming conference. Don't make new compromises on Jerusalem, on our sovereignty, Haniyeh said, speaking to thousands of cheering supporters for the Muslim Eid al-Fitr holiday.Hamas' Syria-based supreme leader, Khaled Mashaal, echoed the warning in his own holiday message, accusing Israel and the U.S. of taking advantage of the Palestinian rift to try to wrest concessions in peace negotiations.
Abbas retaliated for Hamas' takeover of the Gaza Strip by expelling the group from his government and setting up his own administration in the West Bank. Mashaal urged Abbas to accept the Islamists' invitations for dialogue.Abbas and his allies will find out that they are pursuing nothing but a mirage, Mashaal said on Hamas radio.Israel and the Palestinians hope to present the contours of a final peace accord at the conference, tentatively set for Annapolis, Md., at the end of November.Israel has been pressing for a vaguely worded document that would gloss over the toughest issues — borders, control over disputed Jerusalem and a solution for Palestinian refugees who lost their homes in the 1948 war that followed Israel's creation.Palestinians prefer a detailed preliminary agreement with a timetable for creating a Palestinian state.
But Thursday, a key Palestinian negotiator said agreement on peace was near, adding that he doubted the U.S. would convene the conference if the two sides did not agree in advance on outlines for an accord.We have never been closer to achieving the end game than we are now, negotiator Saeb Erekat said.In an interview with Israel's Channel 10 TV, Erekat discounted Hamas' ability to sabotage a peace accord. He acknowledged that Abbas' Fatah movement was not strong enough to retake Gaza by force, but insisted once you produce an end game agreement, Hamas is down without firing a shot.Although Abbas says he has authority over Gaza, in practice he has little influence there.Haniyeh, who now heads the Hamas government in Gaza, received a hero's welcome from the crowd when he arrived at the Palestine Stadium in Gaza City with around 20 black-uniformed bodyguards for festive prayers.He told supporters that Abbas could not negotiate without Hamas' support.Don't go to conference when you don't have the power card in your pocket — and the power card is Hamas, Haniyeh told his supporters.Gaza's international isolation, empty shelves and bitter internal rivalries cast a pall over the Eid al-Fitr holiday — meant to be one of the happiest dates on the Muslim calendar.Israel has barred the entrance of all goods to the territory except humanitarian aid, and Western governments have imposed a financial boycott.Deepening the misery are ongoing clashes between the Israeli military and Gaza militants who fire rockets almost daily into Israel.
Hamas said one of its fighters was killed and five other people were wounded in an Israeli ground missile attack early Saturday. The Israeli military said troops targeted a squad that had launched a rocket attack on Israel.Because tensions between members of Hamas and Fatah in Gaza remain high, Hamas security forces were deployed in the streets to keep order during the holiday. Even Friday's prayers were divided along factional lines, with separate locations for supporters of Gaza's Hamas rulers and their rivals from Abbas' Fatah.
Olmert, Abbas narrow land gap By Adam Entous
Fri Oct 12, 12:48 PM ET
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - The gap is narrowing between Israeli and Palestinian leaders over the amount of territory Israel would hand over to a Palestinian state, people close to the talks said a month ahead of a U.S.-sponsored conference. But Israeli, Palestinian and Western officials say sketching the boundaries of a future state may be the easy part -- real progress, they say, depends on narrowing differences over the fate of Jerusalem and Palestinian refugees, on which little progress can be discerned so far after closed-door meetings.Even vague talk of dividing the city has stirred opposition within Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's coalition cabinet.Israeli officials link easing their stance on Jerusalem -- which Israel wants to keep as its undivided capital -- to the Palestinians being prepared to soften their demand that refugees and their descendants be allowed to settle in Israel.
In this tortuous process, everything is difficult, everything is problematic. But Jerusalem and refugees are the most difficult issues, said Shlomo Ben-Ami, who was Israel's leftist Labor foreign minister when the last talks on the final status of a peace deal collapsed in 2001.Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas have said little in public about talks they have held in recent months.Western officials have told Reuters Olmert has privately signaled a willingness to consider handing over 90-something percent of the occupied West Bank and all of the Gaza Strip, with additional land swaps, as part of a final peace deal.
That may put the two sides within a few percentage points of consensus on the territory issue ahead of the Annapolis meeting.
ARITHMETIC
Western officials said it was unclear whether Olmert's 90-something percent means he might match Israel's last and best offer before negotiations broke down in 2001. At that time, Prime Minister Ehud Barak accepted ideas floated by U.S. President Bill Clinton that would have produced a Palestinian state in 97 percent of the West Bank and 100 percent of Gaza.Abbas's negotiating team considers the Clinton parameters and follow-up talks held in Taba, Egypt to be the basis for renewed negotiations with Olmert, Palestinian sources said.Abbas, in one of the rare public comments on the talks so far, said this week that a Palestinian state must have exactly as much land as that seized by Israel in the 1967 war.
Ben-Ami said: We don't need to invent the wheel ... These are the Clinton parameters. I don't see any other solution.But Olmert spokeswoman Miri Eisin said it would be wrong to see one past proposal as the one to guide future negotiations.U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will visit Jerusalem and the West Bank Ramallah next week to press Abbas and Olmert to reach agreement on a joint document addressing core issues for the conference, which President George W. Bush hopes will launch a final push to end the 60-year-old conflict.We feel a growing sense of urgency from Washington, said a senior Israeli official. He said he feared Israel's security concerns were not being taken fully into account in Bush's rush for some sort of deal before leaving office in early 2009.They are eager to get results, the official said.
Desperation breeds foolishness.
Western officials said heavy U.S. pressure on its Israeli ally would make it very difficult for Olmert to offer less than Clinton's 97 percent figure for West Bank land. Yet that could also trigger a backlash from within his own coalition. Everyone wants peace but they don't want to pay the price, said Ben-Ami. The maximum Olmert can offer falls short of the minimum for the Palestinians. If he makes proposals that are more far-reaching, he will lose his coalition.
FIRES AND EXPLOSIONS
REVELATION 8:7
7 The first angel sounded, and there followed hail and fire mingled with blood, and they were cast upon the earth: and the third part of trees was burnt up, and all green grass was burnt up.
15-truck pileup closes Calif. freeway
10 injured, at least one missing after fiery accident in L.A. County tunnel - Oct. 13: At least 10 people were injured in a chain-reaction pileup in Los Angeles County. NBC's Patrick Healy reports. MSNBC
SANTA CLARITA, Calif. - Smoke leaked from both ends of a tunnel early Saturday after a 15-truck pileup on a rain-slicked Southern California freeway left 10 people injured and at least one missing, authorities said. Fire Inspector Jason Hurd said the accident — the wreckage of which stretched for half a mile — began when two trucks collided late Friday and started a chain reaction in Interstate 5’s southbound truck-only tunnels that run under the regular freeway near the intersection with the Antelope Valley Freeway. Twenty people evacuated the fiery tunnel on foot, including the 10 injured, Hurd said, and five trucks were stuck inside. One truck driver was unaccounted for, and authorities were worried that more may be missing. We’re going to have to do a very methodical search, Deputy Chief John Tripp told KABC-TV. There could be unfortunately more people that were not able to escape.
Authorities said eight had minor injuries and two had moderate injuries, ranging from moderate burns to neck and back injuries. All 10 injured were taken to local hospitals. Smoke poured from both sides of the tunnel through the night. The majority of the flames had been doused by about 5 a.m., but firefighters had to stay out of the tunnel because of fears that fire damage could lead to its collapse. The tunnel may be structurally compromised, so we’re fighting the fire from outside right now, Tripp said. The freeway in northern Los Angeles County was expected to be closed all day Saturday, authorities said.
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