DISEASES-ANIMAL TO HUMAN ( 500 million Dead )
REVELATION 6:7-8
7 And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, Come and see.
8 And I looked, and behold a pale horse:(CHLORES GREEN) and his name that sat on him was Death, and Hell followed with him. And power was given unto them over the fourth part of the earth,(2 billion) of (8 billion) to kill with sword,(WEAPONS)(500 million) and with hunger,(FAMINE)(500 million) and with death,(INCURABLE DISEASES)(500 million) and with the beasts of the earth.(ANIMAL TO HUMAN DISEASE)(500 million).
COVID 19 WORLD TOTALS AS OF THU NOV 19, 2020. CASES - 57,085,770 AND DEATHS - 1,362,742
Denmark says mink coronavirus strain ‘most likely eradicated’-Culling all of its 15-17 million minks, country’s health ministry says no case of mutated strain has been detected since September 15-By AFP and TOI STAFF-NOV 19,20-Today, 3:07 pm
A mutated version of the new coronavirus detected in Danish minks that raised concerns about the effectiveness of a future vaccine has likely been eradicated, Denmark’s health ministry said Thursday.“There have been no new cases of the ‘Cluster 5’ mink mutation since September 15, which has led the Danish infectious disease authority SSI to conclude that this variant has most likely been eradicated,” the ministry said in a statement, after the government ordered a cull of all the country’s 15 to 17 million minks in a bid to halt the spread of the variant.The government said most of the strict restrictions it had imposed on November 5 on seven municipalities in the North Jutland region, home to 280,000 people, would be lifted on Friday.They had originally been due to stay in place until December 3.All minks in the seven municipalities have been culled, totaling 10.2 million, and the slaughter is still ongoing in other parts of the country.With three times more minks than people, the Scandinavian country is the world’s biggest exporter, selling pelts for around 670 million euros ($792 million) annually, and the second-biggest producer behind China.Mink are buried in a mass grave as Danish health authorities, assisted by members of the Danish Armed Forces, dispose of the animals near Holstebro, Denmark, November 9 2020. (Morten Stricker/Ritzau Scanpix via AP)-The variant strain was feared at one point to have reached Israel after COVID-19 cases were detected among Israelis returning from Denmark. However, no cases of the mink mutation were identified among them.Viruses such as the novel coronavirus that emerged in China late last year mutate constantly and new variants are not necessarily worse than the previous ones. The mutations have even helped researchers track the sources of outbreaks in various countries.So far, no study has shown newer SARS-Cov-2 variants to be more contagious or dangerous than their predecessors.The contamination of minks is not new, with breeders in several countries, including the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden and the United States, reporting cases. A few cases of humans being infected by minks have also been reported.
HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH: STEP UNDERMINES FIGHT ON ANTI-SEMITISM-BDS outraged by ‘fraudulent,’ ‘McCarthyite’ US declaration it is anti-Semitic-After Pompeo announces crackdown, Palestinian-led boycott movement says ‘fanatic Trump-Netanyahu alliance’ is revising the definition of anti-Jewish bias-By TOI STAFF and RAPHAEL AHREN-NOV 19,20-Today, 3:05 pm
The anti-Israel boycott movement and some international rights activists on Thursday condemned the US declaration that it will formally designate BDS anti-Semitic and immediately start cracking down on groups affiliated with it.US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo made the announcement as he stood alongside Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a visit to Jerusalem, calling the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement a “cancer” and promising to withdraw US government funding from groups that engage in BDS conduct.Pompeo later tweeted that he was directing Elan Carr, the US envoy to Monitor and Combat Anti-Semitism, “to identify organizations engaged in politically motivated actions intended to penalize or limit commercial relations with Israel.”He also said the US would recognize exports from West Bank settlements as “made in Israel.” He made that announcement while making a visit to the Psagot Winery, which is located in the West Bank, marking the first time an American secretary of state visited an Israeli settlement.“It’s quite ironic that the Trump Administration, prompted by Israel’s apartheid regime, continues to enable and normalize white supremacy and antisemitism in the US and worldwide while simultaneously smearing BDS, a leading Palestinian-led human rights movement and its millions of supporters worldwide as ‘antisemitic,’” the Palestinian BDS National Committee, the movement’s coordinating body, said in a statement.“BDS has consistently and categorically rejected all forms of racism, including anti-Jewish racism, as a matter of principle,” it said.“The fanatic Trump-Netanyahu alliance is intentionally conflating opposition to Israel’s regime of occupation, colonization and apartheid… with anti-Jewish racism… in order to suppress advocacy of Palestinian rights under international law,” the statement said.“This fraudulent revision of the definition of antisemitism has been condemned by dozens of Jewish groups worldwide and by hundreds of leading Jewish and Israeli scholars, including world authorities on antisemitism and the Holocaust.“With our many partners, we shall resist these McCarthyite attempts to intimidate and bully Palestinian, Israeli and international human rights defenders into accepting Israeli apartheid and settler-colonialism as fate,” it said.Human Rights Watch argued that Washington’s step was “undermining” the fight against anti-Semitism.“Instead of combatting systemic racism and far-right extremism in the United States, the Trump administration is undermining the common fight against the scourge of anti-Semitism by equating it with peaceful advocacy of boycotts,” said Eric Goldstein, the group’s acting Middle East and North Africa director.“Americans have a long history of supporting peaceful boycotts to promote social justice and human rights, like the civil rights boycotts in Mississippi or those against apartheid in South Africa. The Trump administration has no business trying to tar groups because they back boycotts,” he added.Pompeo said earlier, during a statement to the press alongside Netanyahu, that he wanted to make “one announcement with respect to a decision by the State Department that we will regard the global anti-Israel BDS campaign as anti-Semitic.”“I know this may sound simple to you, Mr. Prime Minister, it seems like a statement of fact, but I want you to know that we will immediately take steps to identify organizations that engage in hateful BDS conduct and withdraw US government support for such groups. The time is right,” Pompeo declared.At that point, Netanyahu interrupted the US top diplomat’s comments, saying, “It doesn’t sound simple, it sounds simply wonderful.”“Look,” Pompeo went on, “we want to stand with all other nations that recognize the BDS movement for the cancer that it is. And we’re committed to combating it. Our record speaks for itself. During the Trump administration, America stands with Israel like never before.”BDS, which stands for Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions, is not a registered organization but rather a term for a worldwide movement of pro-Palestinian activists who embrace economic sanctions against Israel as the best nonviolent means to fight what they consider unjust policies of the government in Jerusalem.Leading European politicians have rejected the BDS movement on ideological grounds but have stopped short of banning it due to free speech laws.In May 2019, the German Bundestag passed with a large majority a resolution denouncing BDS, describing its methods as anti-Semitic and reminiscent of Nazi-era calls to boycott Jews.The motion called on the German government not to support events organized by BDS or groups that actively pursue its aims, and vowed that parliament wouldn’t finance any projects that call for a boycott of Israel or actively support the movement.The German motion stated that “the pattern of argument and methods of the BDS movement are anti-Semitic.”
Latest tunnel was Hamas’s deepest; it’s not what worries Israel most about Gaza-The IDF regards the Strip as calm for now, but a perpetual potential powder keg, and Southern Command deems most rounds of fighting in past 2.5 years to have been failures-By JUDAH ARI GROSS-NOV 19,20-Today, 6:34 pm
The Gaza Strip is a powder keg, alternately relatively calm and getting ready to blow. It is ruled by an authoritarian terrorist group, and it has an incredibly poor economy, limited access to electricity and virtually no potable water sources and only now is starting to be able to treat its sewage. It is struggling to contain a coronavirus outbreak, which the Israeli military believes is worse than the already-bad official tally indicates. And this situation does not appear likely to improve anytime soon.While the threats from Hezbollah in Lebanon and Iranian proxies in Syria are considered far more significant in terms of their potential damage to Israel, the Israel Defense Forces views the likelihood for conflict to be much greater with terror groups in Gaza.To that end, the bulk of the IDF Southern Command’s time is dedicated to preparing for the next war under an updated fighting approach dubbed Spirit of the South — Ru’ah Darom, in Hebrew — which is meant to end the conflict more quickly and effectively than previous strategies, relying on massive barrages to rapidly knock out enemy capabilities, improved use of intelligence and fast raids instead of longer ground maneuvers that would leave troops more vulnerable to attack.In addition to these preparations, Israel has also nearly completed construction of an underground concrete barrier studded with sensors around the Gaza Strip to detect tunnels from the enclave, a move that is expected to deny Hamas a powerful weapon in any future war.Multi-tiered defense-Last month, the IDF uncovered a Hamas attack tunnel using its new detection system, which is due to be fully constructed in March 2021. According to the military, the 2-kilometer tunnel was the deepest one ever dug by the terror group, dozens of meters below ground. The passage extended from the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis under the border into an area of Israeli territory that lies on the Gaza side of the subterranean barrier.For the IDF, which is confident in its new tunnel-busting prowess, this is not a major source of concern; indeed, the army sees Hamas’s tunneling efforts as serving only to drain the terror group’s resources as it digs deeper and deeper into the earth in what is expected to be a fruitless endeavor.The military is also developing a new multi-tiered defense system around the Gaza Strip, dubbed “Smart and Lethal Border,” which relies on advanced radar and optical sensors to detect intruders and on remote-controlled, armed vehicles and drones to inspect suspected border breaches, as well as physical barriers. Using these unmanned systems allows the military to scale back the number of troops needed and keep those soldiers that are required out of harm’s way, deploying them only for more complicated missions that require a human touch.This project is currently being tested on a six-kilometer stretch of the northern Gaza border. The pilot program should be completed in the next few months and will then be expanded to the entire 51-kilometer border.In addition to these efforts, the IDF is seeking to preemptively destroy the weapons and military infrastructure of terror groups in the Strip, keeping them from feeling sufficiently confident in their ability to wage war against Israel.Unmanned vehicles patrol the Gaza border on November 17, 2020. (Israel Defense Forces)-Though the military believes it will fare well in a war against Hamas, a future fight is not currently designed to fundamentally alter the situation in the Gaza Strip. Israel still prefers to have Hamas, which is officially dedicated to the Jewish state’s destruction, in charge of the enclave over the potential for chaos and complications in the Strip should Hamas be fully overthrown.Endless flare-ups spell trouble-The IDF also wants to keep even these smaller conflicts to a minimum, preventing them from turning into something like the 11 two-day battles that it has fought in Gaza over the past two and a half years.The IDF Southern Command sees those rounds of fighting in 2018, 2019, and 2020 as having ultimately been a failure. Typically those exchanges began following some type of violent incident along the border, leading to a strong response by the IDF, prompting rocket fire from Gaza, leading to an IDF response, and so on. After a day or two, a ceasefire would be unofficially declared.Israel and terror groups in the Strip fought nearly a dozen of these rounds from mid-2018 to today, the latest of them in February. In each of these, tens or hundreds of rockets and mortar shells were fired at Israeli cities and towns, and the IDF retaliated with dozens of airstrikes.To the IDF, The Times of Israel has learned, those rounds of fighting were fundamentally pointless — save for one last November, dubbed Operation Black Belt, which was kicked off with the killing of Islamic Jihad senior commander Baha Abu al-Ata and led to a wide campaign against the Iran-backed terror group, which the military believes has deterred it from the types of attacks that it had been carrying out until then. Vide: Despite internal pressure to mark the first anniversary of Abu al-Ata’s death with an attack on Israel, no such assault took place.With the exception of that campaign, the remaining 10 or so rounds of fighting were not found to have significantly advanced Israel’s goal. They were financially costly due to the large number of Iron Dome interceptor missiles used to shoot down incoming projectiles and large amounts of munitions used on targets that could easily be reconstructed; and the large number of interceptions by the Iron Dome — 245 in 2018, 481 in 2019 and 82 so far in 2020 — also provided critical intelligence to Hamas and the Islamic Jihad, and through them to Tehran.By reviewing the Iron Dome’s performance during these battles, the terror groups could potentially identify weaknesses in the system that could be exploited in future combat.It is not immediately clear how the IDF plans to act differently in light of this determination, though an indication can be found in the events of this August when despite growing tensions and violence along the border, as well as rocket fire at southern Israel, no intensive battle took place, and Israel and Hamas instead brokered a truce that has lasted — more or less — until now.This picture shows lightning above buildings during a thunderstorm in Gaza City, early on November 15, 2020. (Mahmud Hams / AFP)-That calm was broken last Sunday when two rockets were fired toward central Israel. Hamas quickly sent word to Israel that the projectiles were not launched deliberately, but were the result of a technical malfunction — they were triggered by a lightning strike. As the IDF did not see indications that Hamas was looking for a fight and in light of the strange hour of the attack — shortly after 2 a.m. — the military has generally accepted this explanation, though it continues to monitor the situation to see if the rockets were in fact fired intentionally.Long-term ceasefire unlikely-Though negotiations are ongoing to broker a long-term, comprehensive ceasefire with Hamas, the military believes that these talks — like those that preceding them — will ultimately reach an impasse and break down, The Times of Israel has learned. Hamas is unlikely to give up its arms and abandon the so-called “resistance,” which is its raison d’être; and Jerusalem is not prepared to offer major concessions until that happens, believing — justifiably — that Hamas would take advantage of any significant reduction in the blockade on Gaza to expand its war against Israel.The military similarly does not have high expectations for an agreement to secure the release of the remains of two fallen IDF soldiers and two live Israeli civilians who are currently being held by Hamas in Gaza, as the terror group is unlikely to do so without Israel agreeing to set free its operatives, something Jerusalem is unlikely to do.With little hope for a major change in the dynamic in Gaza, the IDF and the Defense Ministry’s coordinator of government activities in the territories (COGAT) is therefore working to improve conditions in the Strip — to a certain extent — seeing that as a way to keep the situation calm.This includes encouraging Qatar to continue sending economic aid to the Gaza Strip and other international organizations to also provide humanitarian assistance to the beleaguered enclave.In recent days, the Strip has seen a major spike in coronavirus cases, with nearly a quarter of tests coming back positive, bringing the total number of active cases in Gaza up to 3,806, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.The IDF believes that this figure is significantly lower than the true number, with people in Gaza too scared to get tested. Despite efforts made by Hamas and the international community to better prepare Gaza for an outbreak — nearly doubling the number of ventilators, increasing testing capability to 3,000 per day, and adding 500 hospital beds — the Strip’s health care system could easily be overrun, a situation with significant national security implications for Israel.
SYRIAN GOVERNMENT CONDEMNS 'PROVOCATIVE, CRIMINAL' TRIP-Pompeo makes unprecedented Golan Heights visit: ‘This is Israel’Secretary tours Syrian border with Israeli counterpart, scoffs at US elites and ‘salons of Europe’ who want Assad to control strategic ridge; is briefed on Iran’s influence in area-By AGENCIES and TOI STAFF-NOV 19,20-Today, 7:52 pm
Mike Pompeo on Thursday became the first US secretary of state to visit the Golan Heights, hours after becoming the first to visit a West Bank settlement.Pompeo toured parts of the Golan on Israel’s border with Syria under heavy security aboard a Blackhawk helicopter, alongside Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi.“You can’t stand here and stare out at what’s across the border and deny the central thing that President Donald Trump recognized, what the previous presidents have refused to do,” Pompeo said, referring to Trump’s decision to recognize Israeli sovereignty in the area last year.This is a part of Israel and central part of Israel,” Pompeo said.He condemned what he described as calls from “the salons in Europe and in the elite institutions in America,” for Israel to return the Golan to Syria, which the Jewish state captured in the 1967 Six Day War and later annexed.“Imagine with [Syrian President Bashar] Assad in control of this place, the risk of the harm to the West and to Israel,” Pompeo said.The Syrian government condemned the “provocative step before the end of the Trump administration’s term, and a flagrant violation of the sovereignty of the Syrian Arab Republic,” according to a foreign ministry statement, carried by state news agency SANA.“Syria affirms that such criminal visits encourage [Israel] to continue its dangerous hostile approach.”Ashkenazi praised Pompeo for recognizing “the strategic importance of the Golan Heights,” saying that because Pompeo has served as head of the Central Intelligence Agency, “he knows the facts, but he insisted to come, to see first hand.”While in the Golan, Pompeo received a military briefing and met with Avigdor Kahalani, a famous tank commander who fought there in the 1973 Yom Kippur War, with the US secretary of state saying he learned about the battles there when he was a cadet at West Point.The visit came days after military engineers discovered and disarmed explosives in Israeli territory along the border, prompting retaliatory strikes by the Israel Defense Forces on targets linked to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards and the Syrian military around Damascus.The IDF on Thursday blamed the mines on a unit of the IRGC’s Quds Force, whose former commander Qassem Soleimani was killed in Baghdad this January by a US airstrike.Ashkenazi said Pompeo was briefed about the security situation on Israel’s borders with Lebanon and Syria, “about Iranian influence, its allies in Syria and about Hezbollah.”“I stressed that we won’t tolerate any violation of sovereignty in any area… or Iranian entrenchment, certainly not near the border,” tweeted Ashkenazi, a former IDF chief of staff.He also said the strikes were meant to send a “clear message” to Iran and its allies, adding that Israel holds the Syrian regime responsible for any attacks from its territory.Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi, left, speaks alongside US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo after a security briefing on Mount Bental in the Golan Heights, near the Israeli-Syrian border, November 19, 2020. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky, Pool)-Before touring the Golan with Ashkenazi, Pompeo visited a West Bank winery, the first time a top American diplomat has visited an Israeli settlement.The vineyard near the Israeli settlement of Psagot had named one of its wines after Pompeo, a salute to his announcement last year that the Trump administration would no longer see Israeli settlements in the West Bank as contrary to international law.In a statement after the visit, Pompeo said the US will label exports from Jewish settlements as Israeli.-Israeli winemaker Yaakov Berg holds a bottle of his red blend named after US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo at the Psagot Winery in the settlers industrial park of Sha’ar Binyamin (Emmanuel Dunand/AFP)-Pompeo earlier Thursday announced another policy, stating that from now Washington would designate as “anti-Semitic” the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign, which seeks to isolate Israel over its treatment of the Palestinians.Israel sees BDS as a strategic threat and has long accused it of anti-Semitism, and a law passed in 2017 allows Israel to ban foreigners with links to BDS from entering the country. Activists strongly deny the charge, comparing the embargo to the economic isolation that helped bring down apartheid in South Africa.Following the Thursday morning press conference, Pompeo toured the City of David archeological site, located in East Jerusalem just outside the walls of the Old City, posting images from the visit to his official Twitter feed.Pompeo — who has so far backed Trump in his refusal to concede defeat to US President-elect Joe Biden — is on what is likely his final Europe and Middle East tour in the post.He had no scheduled meetings with Palestinian leaders, who have strongly rejected Trump’s stance on the decades-old conflict, including Washington’s recognition of Jerusalem as the Israeli capital.
In major shift, Pompeo says US to label settlement products ‘Made in Israel’-Unclear whether White House was consulted before secretary of state announced change, which marks latest American endorsement of Israeli presence beyond Green Line-By JACOB MAGID-NOV 19,20-Today, 7:04 pm
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Thursday announced new guidelines that will require goods made in Israeli controlled areas of the West Bank to be labeled as “Made in Israel,” following an unprecedented visit to a settlement winery on Thursday afternoon.Until now, US policy has required products made in the West Bank to be labeled as such. But with Pompeo’s newly announced rules, which he said were “consistent with our reality-based foreign policy approach,” all producers within areas where Israel exercises authority — most notably Area C under the Oslo Accords – will be required to mark goods as ’Israel,’ ’Product of Israel,’ or ‘Made in Israel’ when exporting to the United States.The announcement appeared to indicate that the policy would also cover goods made in Palestinian villages within Area C, where Israel exercises both civilian and security control. The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for clarification of the matter. Roughly 150,000 Palestinians are believed to live in Area C, which includes all Israeli settlements and covers about 60 percent of the West Bank’s The statement from Pompeo said the new policy “recognizes that Area C producers operate within the economic and administrative framework of Israel and their goods should be treated accordingly.”Pompeo said it would “eliminate the confusion” that may have been caused by the old policy, which in labeling all West Bank exports as having been made there, did not differentiate whether the producers were Israeli or Palestinian.US exports made in Areas A and B of the West Bank, under Palestinian Authority control, must still be marked as “Made in the West Bank.”“We will no longer accept “West Bank/Gaza” or similar markings, in recognition that Gaza and the West Bank are politically and administratively separate and should be treated accordingly,” the State Department announcement said.Pompeo insisted that the US still remains committed to achieving “sustainable peace” and will “continue to oppose those countries and international institutions which delegitimize or penalize Israel and Israeli producers in the West Bank through malicious measures that fail to recognize the reality on the ground.”The concluding remark of the statement appeared to take a direct shot at the European Union, which has led a policy obliging all 28 member states to label exports produced in Israeli towns beyond the Green Line as having been made in the settlements.Pompeo’s Twitter account posted several photos from the secretary of state’s visit to Psagot, including a picture of a nearby Palestinian village. That tweet was deleted less than an hour after it went up and replaced with an updated version without the picture of the Palestinian town.It had been US policy since 1967 to differentiate between Israel and the territories it captured in the Six Day War. A 1995 Treasury Department guidance requiring goods from the West Bank or Gaza Strip to be labeled as such still remains in force. The directive was republished in 2016 by the Obama administration, which warned that labeling goods as “made in Israel” could lead to fines.The new US doctrine appears to fall in line with existing Israeli policy, which similarly does not differentiate between goods produced on either side of the Green Line.According to the Walla news site, the new policy had been pushed by Pompeo and US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman, who has extensive ties to the settlement movement, having once served as the chairman of the American Friends of Beit El Institutions.“It’s unclear if the White House approved or even knew the announcement was coming,” Walla reported.It is also unclear whether such a policy will hold under the incoming Biden administration.Pompeo and Friedman are believed to run a more radical line on Israel within the administration, while Senior Adviser Jared Kushner and Special Envoy for International Negotiations Avi Berkowitz have pushed more moderate proposals on the Israeli-Palestinian issue.The two flanks came at odds in January when, after US President Donald Trump unveiled his peace plan which envisioned Israel eventually annexing all West Bank settlements, Friedman told reporters that Jerusalem had Washington’s blessing to move forward with the step immediately.Within hours though, Kushner put the breaks on the idea, clarifying that such a move would take time and would require a joint US-Israeli mapping team to demarcate the exact borders of the controversial move.After six months went by with little progress made, Kushner led a team of US negotiators that saw Israel shelve its plan to annex some 30 percent of the West Bank — covering all the settlements and the Jordan Valley — as a condition of the normalization treaty with the United Arab Emirates. While both Israeli and US officials have insisted that annexation is not off the table for good, sources with direct knowledge of the matter told The Times of Israel that Kushner committed to not backing the move until at least 2024. With Democrat Joe Biden’s victory in this month’s presidential election, prospects of US approval for annexation have dimmed further.Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu (L) greets US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo as he arrives at the Prime Minister’s Residence in Jerusalem on November 18, 2020. (Amos Ben Gershom/GPO)-The vast majority of the international community views Israeli settlements as illegal, but the Trump administration has taken several steps to shift US policy on the matter. Last year, Pompeo repudiated a 1978 State Department legal opinion maintaining that civilian settlements in the Palestinian territories are “inconsistent with international law.”Last month, Friedman and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu signed an agreement removing all previous geographic restrictions from their scientific cooperation.Pompeo met with Netanyahu on Thursday morning in Jerusalem and updated the premier on his plan to announce the policy shift on labeling for settlement exports, Walla reported.The doctrine appears to clash with the views of President-elect Joe Biden, who has long been a critic of Israeli settlement expansion, saying it places the viability of a two-state solution at risk. Biden has also spoken out against Netanyahu’s annexation plans. The Biden transition team declined to comment on the matter.“The president-elect firmly believes in the principle that there must be only one president at a time guiding our country’s foreign policy and national security as he is focused on preparing to govern,” a spokesman said.PA President Mahmoud Abbas’s spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeineh said in a statement that Pompeo’s announcement “blatantly violates international law.” He dismissed the policy change — along with the secretary of state’s visit to Psagot — as yet another biased, pro-Israeli move by the Trump administration.The Israel director for the liberal lobby J Street said in a statement that Pompeo was “cooperating with the BDS movement” by refusing to differentiate between either side of the Green Line, thereby allowing Israel’s detractors to morph the two as well and deem Israel on both sides of the line as illegitimate.“Instead of protecting Israeli exports, Pompeo’s decision could hurt them,” Adina Vogel-Ayalon said.Jill Jacobs, who runs the Tru’ah organization of progressive rabbis in North America, also blasted the policy change, tweeting “Who needs Netanyahu to annex Area C when the US government does it for him?”“In Area C, Israeli citizens live under Israeli law; Palestinians live under occupation,” she wrote. “Annexation means either making Palestinians citizens of Israel or having 2 systems of law for 2 ppl inside state.”For its part, the Yesha umbrella council of settler mayors lauded the move, calling it “an important milestone in the fight against the international boycott [of Israel] and the BDS movement.”“The decision recognizes the reality on the ground that Judea, Samaria and the Jordan Valley are integral parts of the State of Israel,” the group added, referring to the West Bank by its biblical names.Diaspora Affairs Minister Omer Yankelevich from the Blue and White party lauded the decision, telling Army Radio that West Bank settlements are as much part of Israel as anywhere else in the country.She also tweeted a photo of herself in the southern West Bank settlement of Sussiya holding a bottle of wine made in the nearby settlement of Yatir. “From today — made in Israel! Thank you Secretary of State Mike Pompeo,” the minister wrote.Pompeo earlier Thursday announced another new policy, stating that from now on Washington would designate as “anti-Semitic” the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaign, which seeks to isolate Israel over its treatment of the Palestinians, and would take practical steps against BDS groups.Pompeo’s visit to the Psagot winery in the central West Bank was the first time a secretary of state had visited an Israeli settlement. Pompeo later made his way to the Golan Heights, in another first for a top US diplomat.Netanyahu thanked Pompeo for his “unwavering support” of Israel, first as CIA director and then as secretary of state, saying that under US President Donald Trump the US-Israeli relationship had “reached unprecedented heights.”
Senior Israeli and PA officials meet, agree on transfer of critical tax revenue-Palestinian Authority will officially return to accepting monthly transfers of taxes that Israel collects on its behalf, which constitute over 60 percent of PA budget-By AARON BOXERMAN-NOV 19,20-Today, 6:34 pm
Senior Israeli and Palestinian officials tasked with handling coordination between the two sides held their first public meeting Thursday since Ramallah severed ties in May, the Palestinian Authority official tasked with managing relations with Israel said in a statement.“Today I held a meeting with the Israeli side. We emphasized that the bilateral agreements signed, which are based on international law, are what governs this relationship,” Hussein al-Sheikh said in a tweetAl-Sheikh said the Palestinians had reached an agreement with Israel which will see the transfer of hundreds of millions of dollars in tax revenues that Israel collects on its behalf.The PA cut off relations in protest of a since-shelved Israeli plan to annex parts of the West Bank.Al-Sheikh announced that Ramallah was renewing its ties with Israel on Tuesday night, ending a six-month-long crisis that saw coordination between Israel and the Palestinians collapse and hundreds of thousands of Palestinian civil servants go without their salaries.The shift came after the US presidential election was won by Democratic challenger Joe Biden, who Ramallah anticipates will prove more empathetic to their cause than President Donald Trump. The PA severed all dealings with the Trump administration three years ago, after he recognized Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and moved the US embassy there.Al-Sheikh said he had met with Israel’s military liaison to the Palestinians, Major-General Kamal Abu Rukun.Abu Rukun’s office, the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories, declined to comment on the meeting on the record.Palestinian officials are reportedly changing strategy following Biden’s victory, in an effort to reverse the harsh punitive measures the Trump administration applied to Ramallah.“This, for us, is not just a window, it’s a gate through which we can re-establish our relationship with the United States,” Al-Sheikh told Palestine TV on Tuesday night.Ramallah reportedly quietly returned its ambassadors to the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain recently, after having recalled them in protest of the countries’ decision to normalize ties with Israel.It is also considering reforming its controversial policy of paying salaries to Palestinians convicted by Israel of security offenses and terrorism. The prisoner issue has long hampered the PA’s diplomatic efforts in Washington, and Israel has repeatedly invoked the terror funding to criticize Ramallah in international forums.The PA announced in early June that it would refuse to accept the monthly transfer of over $100 million as part of ending coordination with Israel. The revenues constituted over 60 percent of Ramallah’s 2019 budget.With the PA facing a massive fiscal crisis, hundreds of thousands of public-sector employees — some 15 to 20 percent of the PA’s economy, according to an assessment by the World Bank — did not receive full salaries for nearly five months.While a report carried by the WAFA official news agency described the funds as “withheld,” Israeli officials have repeatedly said that they were willing to transfer the funds but the Palestinians refused to accept them.A Palestinian Finance Ministry spokesperson confirmed to The Times of Israel that the Ministry had not yet received the tax revenues and that a new date to pay out the salaries of PA civil servants was yet to be set.The Civil Affairs Commission did not respond to a request for comment as to when the funds would be transferred.
Iran presidential candidate: US attack risks ‘full-fledged war’-Hossein Dehghan warns limited, tactical conflict could escalate into ‘comprehensive crisis’ that world cannot stand; warns Israel’s expanding presence could be ‘strategic mistake’By NASSER KARIMI and JON GAMBRELL-nov 19,20-Today, 4:58 pm 0
TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — An adviser to Iran’s supreme leader who is a possible 2021 presidential candidate has warned that any American attack on the Islamic Republic could set off a “full-fledged war” in the Mideast in the waning days of the Trump administration.Speaking to The Associated Press, Hossein Dehghan struck a hardline tone familiar to those in Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, a force he long served in before becoming a defense minister under President Hassan Rouhani.A soldier has yet to serve as Iran’s top civilian leader since its 1979 Islamic Revolution, in part over the initial suspicion that its conventional military forces remained loyal to the toppled shah. But hardliners in recent years openly have suggested Iran move toward a military dictatorship given its economic problems and threats from abroad, particularly after US President Donald Trump pulled America out of Tehran’s 2015 nuclear deal with world powers.“We don’t welcome a crisis. We don’t welcome war. We are not after starting a war,” Dehghan said Wednesday. “But we are not after negotiations for the sake of negotiations either.”Dehghan, 63, described himself as a “nationalist” with “no conventional political tendency” during an interview in his wood-paneled office in downtown Tehran. He’s one of many likely to register to run in the June 18 election as Rouhani is term-limited from running again. Others likely include a young technocrat with ties to Iranian intelligence and former hardline president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.Dehghan’s military service came under presidencies representative of the groups that largely compose Iran’s tightly controlled political arena — reformists who seek to slowly change Iran’s theocracy from within, hardliners who want to strengthen the theocracy and the relative moderates between. Those calling for radical change are barred from running for office by Iran’s powerful constitutional watchdog known as the Guardian Council, which serves under Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.While discussing the world Iran finds itself in, Dehghan’s points mirrored many of Khamenei’s. The former head of the Guard’s air force who achieved the rank of brigadier general said any negotiations with the West could not include Iran’s ballistic missiles, which he described as a “deterrent” to Tehran’s adversaries.Propaganda involving Iran’s missile program has surged in recent weeks. The front page of the English-language Tehran Times on Wednesday showed a map of Iran’s missile ranges with red stars marking American bases across the region under the words “Back off!” printed in big, bold letters. A headline above warned Iran would respond to “any melancholy adventure by Trump.”“The Islamic Republic of Iran will not negotiate its defensive power… with anybody under any circumstances,” Dehghan said. “Missiles are a symbol of the massive potential that is in our experts, young people and industrial centers.”Dehghan warned against any American military escalation in Trump’s final weeks in office.“A limited, tactical conflict can turn into a full-fledged war,” he said. “Definitely, the United States, the region and the world cannot stand such a comprehensive crisis.”US President-elect Joe Biden has said he’s willing to return to the nuclear deal, which saw sanctions on Iran lifted in exchange for Tehran limiting its uranium enrichment, if Iran first complies with its limits. Since Trump’s withdrawal, Iran has gone beyond all the deal’s restrictions while still allowing United Nations nuclear inspectors to work in the country. Dehghan said those UN checks should continue so long as an inspector is not a “spy.”In the time since, an advanced centrifuge assembly plant at Iran’s Natanz nuclear site exploded and caught fire in July. Dehghan said that reconstruction at Natanz was ongoing after satellite photos showed new construction at the site. He described the incident as “industrial sabotage.”“Those who were in charge of installing some devices possibly made some changes there that led to the explosion,” Dehghan said, without elaborating.A Dehghan presidency likely would be looked upon with suspicion in Washington and Paris. As a young commander in the Guard, Dehghan oversaw its operations in Lebanon and Syria between 1982 and 1984, according to an official biography given to Iran’s parliament in 2013. Israel, Iran’s archenemy in the Mideast, had just invaded Lebanon amid that country’s civil war.In 1983, a suicide bomber in a truck loaded with military-grade explosives attacked a US Marine barracks in Beirut, killing 241 American troops and 58 French soldiers. While Iran long has denied being involved, a US District Court judge found Tehran responsible in 2003. That ruling said Iran’s ambassador to Syria at the time called “a member of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and instructed him to instigate the Marine barracks bombing.”Dehghan vehemently denied he was involved in the bombing, though he was the Guard’s top commander there at the time.“The US tries to link anything happening in the world to someone in Iran,” he said. “Do they really have evidence? Why do they link it to me?”While stressing he wanted to avoid conflict, Dehghan claimed Israel was expanding its presence in the Mideast and warned that could turn into a “strategic mistake.” Israel just reached normalization deals with Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates.“It is opening an extensive front,” he said. “Just imagine every Israeli in any military base can be a target for groups who are opposed to Israel.”Dehghan also said Iran continues to seek the expulsion of all American forces from the region as revenge for the US drone strike in Baghdad that killed Guard Gen. Qassem Soleimani, the head of its expeditionary Quds Force in January. That strike saw Iran launch a retaliatory ballistic missile strike on US troops in Iraq that injured dozens and nearly sparked a war.Iran’s retaliatory strikes were a mere “initial slap,” Dehghan said. And there would be no easy return to negotiations with the US in part due to that, he added.“We do not seek a situation in which (the other party) buys time to weaken our nation,” he said.
IMF urges Israel government to promptly pass 2021 budget-A budget would help prioritize spending, prepare economy for growth; steps taken to stem pandemic’s economic fallout have been ‘appropriate,’ but risks remain ‘unprecedented’-By SHOSHANNA SOLOMON-today, 4:44 pm 0
The International Monetary Fund on Thursday called on the Israeli government to quickly pass a budget for 2021 to help position the economy for growth.A “prompt passage” of the budget would “help prioritize spending, position the economy for growth, and reduce economic uncertainty associated with the pandemic,” IMF officials wrote in an initial summary of the 2020 report on the Israeli economy presented to the Bank of Israel on Thursday. A final report is expected in December.Political tensions between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his coalition partners, headed by Benny Gantz, have prevented the passage of the 2020 and 2021 budgets.In the report, the IMF said that policy measures implemented by Israel to contain the economic fallout from the pandemic have managed to calm markets and “limit the damage” to the economy.Even so, the outlook remains challenging, “risks are unprecedented” and gross domestic product is projected to contract, with unemployment likely to remain in the double digits.As the pandemic struck and social distancing requirements caused the economy to shut down, “an appropriately large fiscal package has aided the economy,” the authors said.This, together with monetary policies and the resilience stemming from Israel’s tech sector, has caused real output to contract “less than in other advanced economies so far in 2020,” the report said. Israel’s economy is expected to contract this year by 5%, S&P estimated earlier this month.Even so, unemployment, including those who were placed on unpaid leave, is likely to remain in the double digits, and the greater number of jobless among lower-income workers is likely to even further worsen the nation’s already high income inequality, the report said.Recovery is projected to start in 2021, the report said, but social distancing will likely continue to constrain domestic demand and impede GDP growth.More than 320,000 people have caught the coronavirus, which has claimed 2,700 deaths. Lockdowns introduced in March and September contained the spread of the virus but, together with social distancing, suppressed economic activity throughout 2020, the report said.Israel should continue its fiscal support policies in the 2021 budget, the report recommended, especially if the pandemic persists and partial lockdown measures are extended longer than envisaged.Authorities should consider additional funding for health services, extending unemployment benefits beyond mid-2021 and providing further grants for the self-employed, should the pandemic persist.Any eventual withdrawal of fiscal support “should be timed carefully, given the challenging outlook,” the report said.Fiscal policy should continue to prioritize health spending and gradually become more targeted. Funding should be channeled to ensure adequate hospital capacity, testing and tracing and to address other urgent needs.Beyond health, the government should focus on setting out labor market policies to improve job prospects for the unemployed.As the economy recovers and stimulus measures expire, the deficit is expected to decline, but the government will still need to address the higher debt levels accumulated during the crisis, to ensure it is “more firmly on a downward path.”“Tax reforms should be at the core of this effort,” the report said.As the pandemic struck-As the pandemic struck, Israeli authorities “mounted a large and rapid response to mitigate the impact of the pandemic.”The Bank of Israel launched “sizeable measures” to provide liquidity, prevent a credit crunch and ease access to financial services and credit, including for small businesses and households.Besides lower interest rates, the measures included programs to buy government and corporate bonds and funding to banks to extend loans to small and medium enterprises. Intervention in the foreign exchange market reduced pressures on the shekel, while the easing of requirements on banks allowed the lenders to support the economy.Several fiscal stimulus packages reaching 15.25 percent of GDP (of which 10.25% of GDP was planned for 2020) were also approved, including support for healthcare, benefits for unemployed and furloughed workers, grants for the self-employed and households, guaranteed loans for companies, and infrastructure support.Extending policies ‘remains appropriate’The IMF said that the “decisive” monetary policy measures taken by the Bank of Israel have helped provide market liquidity and sustain the flow of credit to households and businesses.The measures eased early pressures on exchange rates, bond yields, and corporate spreads.Extending the current set of policies “remains appropriate” at this time, the report said, given low near-term inflation expectations, growth projected to be below potential, and uncertainties regarding the duration of renewed lockdowns.Hard-hit firms and households should also continue to get financial aid, but criteria may need to be gradually adjusted and tightened to target viable firms, the report said.The importance of reforms-The government must also set out structural policies that should aim to “limit long-term scarring, strengthen the resilience of the economy, and promote inclusiveness.” The focus should be on labor policies and investment in human capital and infrastructure.These structural policies should include setting out programs to facilitate reemployment, efficiently reallocate workers from sectors and businesses that downsize, and mitigate the negative impact of the pandemic on low-income workers. Together with vocational training, these reforms “should promote reskilling and upskilling, encourage job search and reduce hiring costs.”Expanding digitalization, reforming education and boosting investment are other structural steps that the government needs to take.Policies that broaden digital penetration have “very high potential to increase knowledge diffusion and productivity, mitigate skill shortages, and improve the reach and effectiveness of government services,” the report said.And because the lockdowns have created educational setbacks that could have lasting productivity and inequality implications, students must be trained in math, sciences and tech subjects to arm them with “marketable skills” for an increasingly digitized world.Public investment, particularly in health care, transportation and digitalization infrastructure can create jobs, “mitigate the drop in demand, and encourage private investment, which has declined amidst low business confidence.” Public investment projects can also strengthen crisis resilience, the report said.Though Israel entered pandemic strong, risks are ‘unprecedented’Before the pandemic struck, real annual GDP growth in Israel was around 3.25% percent and the current account averaged 3.5% of GDP in the last 5 years. Unemployment had reached 3.6% at the end of 2019 — the lowest rate in the last two decades.Looking ahead, the “risks are unprecedented,” the report said. “In the near term, the evolution of the pandemic is expected to have a major impact on the economic outlook. Early widespread distribution of an effective vaccine would lead to a faster-than-projected recovery. However, an escalation of the pandemic could require a prolonged use of containment measures and social distancing, bringing further disruptions to economic activity.”Geopolitical risks, while still significant, have become more balanced, especially after the recent bilateral accords between Israel and Gulf nations, the report said.
13 Thou shalt not kill.(Murder)(THAT INCLUDES ABORTION)
MATTHEW 18:6
6 But whoso shall offend (HURT) one of these little ones (CHILDREN) which believe in me,(JESUS) it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.(THATS THE DEATH PENALTY FOLKS)
EXODUS 21:12
12 He that smiteth (MURDER)a man,(OR BABY) so that he die, shall be surely put to death.(THATS THE DEATH PENALTY PEOPLE)
REVELATION 9:20-21
20 And the rest of the men which were not killed by these plagues yet repented not of the works of their hands, that they should not worship devils,(OCCULT) and idols of gold, and silver, and brass, and stone, and of wood: which neither can see, nor hear, nor walk:
21 Neither repented they of their murders, nor of their sorceries,(DRUG ADDICTIONS) nor of their fornication,(SEX OUTSIDE OF MARRIAGE) nor of their thefts.(STEALING)
