STORMS HURRICANES-TORNADOES
LUKE 21:25-26
25 And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity;(MASS CONFUSION) the sea and the waves roaring;(FIERCE WINDS)
26 Men’s hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.
Tropical Storm Gabrielle nears North Carolina SEPT 9,07
MIAMI (Reuters) - Tropical Storm Gabrielle strengthened slightly as it neared the North Carolina coast on Sunday but it was not expected to reach hurricane strength as it passed over the Outer Banks and curved back out into the Atlantic, U.S. forecasters said. With top sustained winds of 50 mph (85 km per hour), Gabrielle, the seventh named storm of the 2007 Atlantic hurricane season, was about 30 miles south-southeast of Cape Lookout, North Carolina, at 8 a.m.The system was moving toward the north-northwest at 10 mph (17 kph) and was expected to turn to the north later in the day and then to the northeast, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.
Gabrielle developed on Saturday as the six-month hurricane season neared its historical peak on September 10, having already produced two of the most ferocious hurricanes to ever tear through the Caribbean, Dean and Felix.Both those storms became maximum-strength Category 5 hurricanes before slamming into Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula and Central America, respectively.But conditions off the U.S. East Coast, where Gabrielle formed, are not as favorable for tropical cyclones as the deep warm water of the western Caribbean where Dean and Felix found the fuel they needed to grow into monster storms.Gabrielle's maximum sustained winds were expected to top out at 63 mph (102 kph), the Miami-based hurricane center said. Tropical storms become hurricanes when their top winds reach 74 mph (119 kph).
The storm was expected, however, to dump between 1 and 3 inches of rain across coastal North Carolina and southeastern Virginia, with some areas receiving up to 5 inches.Tropical storm warnings were issued from Surf City in North Carolina to Cape Charles Light in Virginia and a tropical storm watch was in effect for the lower Chesapeake Bay, south of New Point Comfort, in Virginia.A warning means tropical storm conditions are likely within 24 hours and a watch means tropical storm conditions can be expected within 36 hours.The National Weather Service predicted seas would build to 10 to 12 feet on Sunday, resulting in rough surf and minor beach erosion.The agency urged residents in affected areas to stock up on provisions and prepare for a loss of power.
Thousands flee homes as fresh floods hit Bangladesh Sun Sep 9, 6:53 AM ET
DHAKA (Reuters) - Large swathes of Bangladesh were underwater again on Sunday after heavy rains, adding to the misery of millions hit by flooding that has killed more than 830 people since late July. Weather officials said that nearly 20 of the country's 64 districts were flooded after three days of rain swelled major rivers flowing through India into Bangladesh.At least three people, including a child were drowned, raising the death toll to 833 from monsoon flooding since late July, officials said on Sunday.Heavy showers caused water logging in the Chittagong port city, disrupting traffic, local residents said.Hundreds of shanty homes were inundated along the country's Cox's Bazar coast as rain and winds set off a moderate surge in the Bay of Bengal, meteorology officials said.The rains have also triggered fresh floods in the Indian states of West Bengal, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Assam, Meghalaya and Arunachal Pradesh, the officials said.Thousands of Bangladeshi families that returned to devastated homes after the previous flood had receded in most areas were forced to flee again, disaster management officials said.
Witnesses in the northern Gaibandha district said many people had headed to highways and embankments for safety, while others had taken refuge on boats or on the roofs of houses.The floods covered vast areas in the country's northeast and southern areas, disrupting communications and, with rains continuing on Sunday, more areas were expected to be engulfed.The fresh floods inundated newly planted rice and other crops on more than a million hectares.The previous floods washed away my house, cattles and crops ... but I had started to piece life together, Gaibandha villager Shahed Ali told reporters. I managed to replant some seedlings but they have been destroyed again.Floods kill hundreds of people and wreck the lives of many more in Bangladesh every year, but this year's deluge has been the worst since 2004 when floods killed more than 3,000 people.The Flood Forecasting and Warning Centre (FFWC) in Dhaka said worse could lie ahead because the annual monsoon was still very active in the Ganges, Meghna, and Brahmaputra river basins.Experience shows that the floods of late August or September last longer, said FFWC head Saiful Hossain.The meteorological department forecast heavy to very heavy rain in various parts of the country over the next 24-48 hours.(Additional reporting by Nazimuddin Shyamol in Chittagong)
Typhoon moves away from Japan Sat Sep 8, 9:57 PM ET
TOKYO (AFP) - Typhoon Fitow moved out to the Sea of Okhotsk Saturday after cutting across Japan, leaving at least two dead and 82 others injured in torrential rains and violent winds, officials said. The typhoon was dwindling into an extra-tropical low pressure when it reached the sea from the northern Japanese island of Hokkaido at around 3:00 pm (0600 GMT), the Japan Meteorological Agency said.It was still packing winds of up to 72 kilometres (45 miles) per hour as it moved northeast at 35 kilometres (22 miles) per hour, the agency said.The storm system, named after a Micronesian flower, landed at the Pacific coast southwest of Tokyo early Friday and roared over the country's main island of Honshu and Hokkaido, felling trees, smashing windows and causing one bridge to snap in two.A 76-year-old man was killed in Karuizawa, a resort town north of Tokyo, and a 50-year-old worker died after being buried alive when a landslide hit his dam construction site in the southwestern prefecture of Fukui, officials said.
Apec leaders reach climate deal
Saturday's deal followed wrangling at the summit SEPT 8,07
Asia-Pacific leaders meeting in Sydney have agreed an aspirational goal to restrain the rise of greenhouse gas emissions to tackle climate change. China and the US - two of the world's biggest polluters - are among the 21 nations that have signed the statement, which contains no firm commitments. Australian Prime Minister John Howard called it a very important milestone towards an international deal.
Environmentalists said the declaration was symbolic rather than concrete.
The world needs to slow, stop and then reverse the growth of global greenhouse gas emissions, said Saturday's statement by the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation forum. We are serious about addressing in a sensible way, compatible with our different economic needs, the great challenge of climate change John Howard
Australian Prime Minister.Sydney has seen the biggest security operation ever mounted by Australia for the meeting. Isolated scuffles broke out on Saturday between police and a few of the 5,000 protesters who marched through the heart of Sydney for a rally in Hyde Park, but the day remained peaceful on the whole.
The Apec statement included a non-binding goal of reducing energy intensity - the amount of energy used to produce a dollar of gross domestic product - by at least 25% by 2030. The leaders also called for increased forest cover in the Asia-Pacific region of at least 20m hectares (50m acres) by 2020.
Stunt
And they agreed greenhouse gas reduction strategies should reflect differences in economic and social conditions in each country. The US has made China's involvement in moves to tackle global warming a priority, but both countries are opposed to binding targets. Summit host Mr Howard said: We are serious about addressing in a sensible way, compatible with our different economic needs, the great challenge of climate change.But Greenpeace said the agreement was a distraction rather than a declaration. A spokeswoman for the organisation, Catherine Fitzpatrick, said: Without supporting binding targets for developed countries, which is where the rubber really hits the road on climate action, it looks like a political stunt by John Howard.The Sydney declaration also included China's and other developing nations' calls for global warming negotiations to take place under United Nations auspices. The UN climate convention is scheduled to host talks in December on the Indonesian island of Bali. Apec's 21 members, which also include Russia and Japan, together account for about 60% of annual greenhouse gas emissions. Saturday's deal followed wrangling at the summit over the shape of a treaty to replace the landmark Kyoto Protocol of 1997.
MUSLIM NATIONS
EZEKIEL 38:1-12
1 And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,
2 Son of man, set thy face against Gog,(RULER) the land of Magog,(RUSSIA) the chief prince of Meshech(MOSCOW)and Tubal,(TOBOLSK) and prophesy against him,
3 And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech(MOSCOW) and Tubal:
4 And I will turn thee back, and put hooks into thy jaws,(GOD FORCES THE MUSLIMS TO MARCH) and I will bring thee forth, and all thine army, horses and horsemen, all of them clothed with all sorts of armour, even a great company with bucklers and shields, all of them handling swords:
5 Persia,(IRAN,IRAQ) Ethiopia, and Libya with them; all of them with shield and helmet:
6 Gomer,(GERMANY) and all his bands; the house of Togarmah (TURKEY)of the north quarters, and all his bands:(SUDAN,AFRICA) and many people with thee.
7 Be thou prepared, and prepare for thyself, thou, and all thy company that are assembled unto thee, and be thou a guard unto them.
8 After many days thou shalt be visited: in the latter years thou shalt come into the land that is brought back from the sword, and is gathered out of many people, against the mountains of Israel, which have been always waste: but it is brought forth out of the nations, and they shall dwell safely all of them.
9 Thou shalt ascend and come like a storm, thou shalt be like a cloud to cover the land, thou, and all thy bands, and many people with thee.(RUSSIA-EGYPT AND MUSLIMS)
10 Thus saith the Lord GOD; It shall also come to pass, that at the same time shall things come into thy mind, and thou shalt think an evil thought:
11 And thou shalt say, I will go up to the land of unwalled villages; I will go to them that are at rest, that dwell safely, all of them dwelling without walls, and having neither bars nor gates,
12 To take a spoil, and to take a prey; to turn thine hand upon the desolate places that are now inhabited, and upon the people that are gathered out of the nations, which have gotten cattle and goods, that dwell in the midst of the land.
ISAIAH 17:1
1 The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap.
PSALMS 83:3-7
3 They (ARABS,MUSLIMS) have taken crafty counsel against thy people,(ISRAEL) and consulted against thy hidden ones.
4 They have said, Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation; that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance.
5 For they have consulted together with one consent: they are confederate against thee:(TREATIES)
6 The tabernacles of Edom,and the Ishmaelites;(ARABS) of Moab, and the Hagarenes;
7 Gebal, and Ammon,(JORDAN) and Amalek;(SYRIA) the Philistines (PALESTINIANS) with the inhabitants of Tyre;(LEBANON)
EZEKIEL 39:1-8
1 Therefore, thou son of man, prophesy against Gog,(LEADER OF RUSSIA) and say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech (MOSCOW) and Tubal: (TUBOLSK)
2 And I will turn thee back, and leave but the sixth part of thee, and will cause thee to come up from the north parts,(RUSSIA) and will bring thee upon the mountains of Israel:
3 And I will smite thy bow out of thy left hand, and will cause thine arrows to fall out of thy right hand.
4 Thou shalt fall upon the mountains of Israel, thou, and all thy bands,( ARABS) and the people that is with thee: I will give thee unto the ravenous birds of every sort, and to the beasts of the field to be devoured.
5 Thou shalt fall upon the open field: for I have spoken it, saith the Lord GOD.
6 And I will send a fire on Magog,(NUCLEAR BOMB) and among them that dwell carelessly in the isles: and they shall know that I am the LORD.
7 So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, the Holy One in Israel.
8 Behold, it is come, and it is done, saith the Lord GOD; this is the day whereof I have spoken.
JOEL 2:3,20,30-31
3 A fire(NUCLEAR BOMB) devoureth before them;(RUSSIA-ARABS) and behind them a flame burneth: the land is as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness; yea, and nothing shall escape them.
20 But I will remove far off from you the northern army,(RUSSIA,MUSLIMS) and will drive him into a land barren and desolate, with his face toward the east sea, and his hinder part toward the utmost sea, and his stink shall come up, and his ill savour shall come up, because he hath done great things.(SIBERIAN DESERT)
30 And I will shew wonders in the heavens and in the earth, blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke.(NUCLEAR BOMB)
31 The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and the terrible day of the LORD come.
Iran's Leader: No Plans For Nuclear Bomb
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei Denies Country Is Working Toward Building Nuclear Weapons
TEHRAN, Sept. 9, 2007 - Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, shakes hands with former Revolutionary Guards chief General Yahya Rahim Safavi (center) as newly-appointed head of the elite Revolutionary Guards force, General Mohammad Ali Jaafari, looks on, in Tehran, Sept. 3, 2007. (Getty Images/AFP/STR) Quote - The Iranian nation has no atomic bomb and has no plans to create this deadly weapon. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei
(AP) Iran's supreme leader said Sunday his country has no plans to build nuclear weapons, even as the nation's president makes clear that its controversial nuclear energy program itself is not negotiable. Speaking to an audience of Revolutionary Guards, the elite military unit that answers directly to him, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei made a rare direct statement that Iran is not interested in nuclear weapons. While the Iranian nation has no atomic bomb and has no plans to create this deadly weapon, it is still a respected nation for its spiritual and revolutionary values, he told the Guards whose leader he had just replaced. Iran which has always vigorously defended its right to develop its nuclear program also denies allegations by the United States and other countries that it is looking to develop weapons as well. Earlier in the day, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad made it clear that Iran had no intention of slowing down or stopping its nuclear energy program despite two rounds of sanctions from the U.N. Security Council and increasing pressure from the United States.
Iranians are a nation of logic and dialogue but it will not negotiate about its rights with anybody, the official news agency quoted Ahmadinejad as saying. Enemies of this nation should known that Iran is not about to retreat.He noted that the recent report by the U.N. nuclear watchdog which applauded Iran for its increased cooperation showed that European nations have a more positive approach to the situation than certain other countries. There are only one or two countries that do not understand reality and they think that they can force Iranian nation to back down, Ahmadinejad said, in an apparent reference to the U.S. and Britain. The International Atomic Energy Agency report in August noted an increased willingness by the Iranians to answer questions after years of stonewalling and was seen as putting the brakes on the push for new sanctions. According to diplomats, however, that report has displeased the U.S., who are putting pressure on IAEA head Mohamed ElBaradei and accuse him of overstepping his authority in dealing with Iran. The U.S. continues to suspect that Iran is exploiting the agreement with the IAEA as a smoke screen to deflect attention away from its continued defiance of a Security Council ban on uranium enrichment, a potential pathway to nuclear arms. Iran insists it wants to master the technology only to meet future power needs and argues it is entitled to enrich uranium under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty provision giving all pact members the right to develop peaceful programs. The Associated Press.
Alleged neo-Nazi ring busted in Israel
Published: 9, 2007 at 7:07 AM
Print story Email to a friend JERUSALEM, 9 (UPI) -- Nine members of an alleged neo-Nazi ring have been arrested in Israel, it was reported Sunday.The youths, whose families immigrated from the former Soviet Union, were arrested in the Petah Tikva area after a yearlong investigation, the Jerusalem Post reported.The youths, eight of them Israeli citizens, promoted Nazi ideology and established relations with neo-Nazi groups overseas, The Post reported.Eli Boanitov, 19, the alleged head of the group, is accused of leading his followers to attack, in a cruel and brutal manner, citizens and innocent people belonging to various groups including Asians, drug addicts, gays, punks and kippa-wearing Jews, said a police statement. In a report released by police, Boanitov was quoted as saying, I'll never give up. I was a Nazi and I'll stay a Nazi. Until we kill all of them, I won't relax.The group was discovered during an investigation into two incidents in Petah Tikva last year in which synagogues were desecrated by swastikas. A bill to be considered by Israel lawmakers would revoke the youths' citizenship, if they are convicted, The Post reported.United Press International.
EUROPEAN UNION ARMY
DANIEL 7:23-25
23 Thus he said, The fourth beast (EU,REVIVED ROME) shall be the fourth kingdom upon earth,(7TH WORLD EMPIRE) which shall be diverse from all kingdoms, and shall devour the whole earth, and shall tread it down, and break it in pieces.(TRADING BLOCKS)
24 And the ten horns out of this kingdom are ten kings(10 NATIONS) that shall arise: and another shall rise after them;(#11 SPAIN) and he shall be diverse from the first, and he shall subdue three kings.( BE HEAD OF 3 NATIONS)
25 And he (EU PRESIDENT) shall speak great words against the most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most High, and think to change times and laws: and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time.(3 1/2 YRS)
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.
DANIEL 11:36-39
36 And the king (EU DICTATOR) shall do according to his will; and he shall exalt himself, and magnify himself above every god, and shall speak marvellous things against the God of gods, and shall prosper till the indignation be accomplished: for that that is determined shall be done.
37 Neither shall he regard the God of his fathers,(THIS EU DICTATOR IS JEWISH) nor the desire of women, nor regard any god: for he shall magnify himself above all.(CLAIM TO BE GOD)
38 But in his estate shall he honour the God of forces:(WAR) and a god whom his fathers knew not shall he honour with gold, and silver, and with precious stones, and pleasant things.
39 Thus shall he do in the most strong holds with a strange god,(DESTROY TERROR GROUPS) whom he shall acknowledge and increase with glory: and he shall cause them to rule over many,(HIS ARMY LEADERS) and shall divide the land for gain.
REVELATION 19:19
19 And I saw the beast,(EU LEADER) and the kings of the earth, and their armies, gathered together to make war against him that sat on the horse,(JESUS) and against his army.(THE RAPTURED CHRISTIANS)
Henault says Afghanistan important, but not make-or-break for NATO
Last Updated: Sunday, September 9, 2007 | 7:51 AM PT
The Canadian Press
NATO's future as a military alliance does not hinge on a successful mission in war-torn Afghanistan, says the Canadian chairman of the organization's high-ranking military committee.Gen. Ray Henault, a former Canadian chief of defence staff, said on Saturday that success in Afghanistan is NATO's top priority, but it's not holding the organization's future in the balance.Henault made the comments after NATO meetings in Victoria in response to questions from reporters who suggested defence critics and analysts are saying NATO's future as one of the world's major military organizations hinges on the success of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF), an international force of about 30,000 troops in Afghanistan.I would say to you that Afghanistan is, as I've already mentioned, a very important part of how we do business and job one, but from our perspective, it's not the make-or-break that perhaps is envisioned by people, Henault said.
We need to succeed in Afghanistan, said Henault. NATO is an important factor there. It's providing some capability and it's providing things for people there that are very important — if you look at the statistics with what we've done there in terms of the thousands of kilometres of roads that have been put in place, the millions of children that are in school.The defence chiefs are aware that Canada is currently considering pulling its 2,500 troops out of Afghanistan in 2009, said Henault, but he did not say anything about NATO's plans with regards to replacement nations or other strategies if Canada decides to withdraw its troops.Canada wasn't the only focus of problems in that respect, Henault said. Understanding though that Canada is in that debate, and we're aware in NATO that Canada is discussing its contribution and how long or in what form it might be beyond 2009.The chiefs of defence from the 26 NATO member countries on Saturday wrapped up two days of talks that focused on planning, preparing and conducting NATO operations, he said.
Henault said earlier the NATO alliance has not received formal notice from Ottawa that it intends to end its combat commitment as scheduled in February 2009.The opposition Liberals and Bloc Québécois want Canadian troops pulled out of Kandahar when the mandate of the mission expires in 2009. The NDP have long demanded an immediate withdrawal.Henault said earlier he hopes Canada will stay because progress is being made, but added that the final decision rests with the government.Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion said Canada should stand by its commitment in Afghanistan, but make it clear it is going home in February 2009.Dion has said he will bring a motion into the House of Commons setting Feb. 9, 2009, as the firm end to Canada's combat role.Defence Minister Peter MacKay has said the government wants a vote in the Commons, adding that Dion wasn't big on Commons approval when he was part of the former Liberal government.
Anti-war protesters rally
As the NATO chiefs mapped strategy, about 300 peaceful, but boisterous protesters gathered outside the fenced-in hotel where the military brass were meeting.The protesters marched to the NATO meeting hotel chanting anti-NATO slogans, but there were no signs of violence or tensions that have erupted at other world gatherings involving military and political leaders.The protesters called on Prime Minister Stephen Harper to pull Canada's troops out of Afghanistan, and one of the chants called Harper and U.S. President George Bush killers.
TO WATCH THE VIDEO FOR THIS STORY LOOK UNDER LINKS JUST BEFORE THE A'S START, ITS UNDER CHRISTIAN DEFECTOR TO JUDAISM.
Messianic Bible Project Shalom Stan,
We are definitely living in exciting times, and I believe we are in the End-times.
In Matthew 24:12, Yeshua says that in the end-times, the Believer's hearts will grow cold. In our August newsletter, you were able to read about Nati, who was once a Messianic Rabbi; BUT then he denied Yeshua and became an Orthodox Chassidic Rabbi in Israel ! At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. Matthew 24:10
My friend, Time is short, but as we partner together, we will reach God's Chosen People! We must keep at the forefront of our minds and hearts that 99.9% of the Jewish people do not believe in Yeshua. One main reason is because the Christian Church in general has not taken the Gospel to them.Every 4 minutes a Jewish person somewhere in the world dies. That's 350 Jewish people a day who depart from this life on earth, but their souls are still alive - eternally separated from God. Yeshua says that they are in a place of weeping and gnashing of teeth. So every day we have an opportunity to reach people with the Gospel - are we using our time and gifts effectively? Since you began reading this letter one or two Jewish people have died, imagine if they would have been able to read a Hebrew Prophecy Bible, and receive Yeshua.
Italy Update - we went to the synagogues in the Jewish communities of Milan , Rome , Florence , and Venice - we witnessed to many Italian Jews and we have many contacts for follow-up. The Messianic Prophecy Bible will be translated into Italian! Last Month's August Newsletter - I don't know of any ministry other than ours, that goes right into the Chassidic Yeshivas (or any Jewish Yeshiva for that matter) sharing the Gospel. Most people would consider it dangerous, however we are accepted and we preach the Good News of Yeshua.YOU can play an important role in these end-times by helping us fulfill our mission to publish a Free Hebrew Bible and support our Outreach to Israel. Please click here to give the best gift you can today to help save Jewish lives for eternity! P.S. Time is short, and today is the day of salvation for the Jewish people.
Monday, September 10, 2007
Sunday, September 09, 2007
ISRAEL - JUDAISM AND CHRISTIANS
David's Comment: Will the God of Israel Intervene Soon ? SEPT 9,07
Modern Israel's worst Israeli Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert is hanging on to his position with all of the means he can muster. Accused of a miserable performance as the nations leader during last year's Lebanon war, and facing charges of serious financial and political corruption, even many of his own Kadima party members of government are losing patience with him. Popularity polls have him with an embarrassing 1% of public approval, that in itself enough reason for any decent leader to resign. But Olmert, the dangling puppet dancing on the strings of the Bush administration, wont let go.
It is my opinion that this man is totally unfit to lead the nation of Israel, for the following reasons.
1/ his total lack of experience as evidenced by the failure to attain the goals in last years Lebanon War
2/ his apparent willingness to give away the entire West Bank and allow a Palestinian State in God's Land
3/ his refusal to protect Israeli citizens living under constant Hamas rocket attack in Sderot and the Western Negev
4/ his failure to rehouse the Israeli citizens violently evicted from their homes in Gaza
5/ the various and very serious charges of corruption that are pending against him
6/ his wife is a peace activist who must be influencing his decisions concerning the nations defense
7/ his son left the country to evade serving in the army
8/ his daughter is also a peace activist who has protested outside the home of the IDF Chief of Staff calling for him to resign over something the IDF was innocent of
As if all the above is not enough, the Olmert government tricked all of the citizens of Israel into trading in our present gas masks, in exchange for improved versions. The government is now refusing to issue the new masks, while Syria stocks up on chemical and biological warheads. Even if Israel had a few days warning of a Syrian strike, that would not be enough time to distribute the new masks to every resident of the larger Israeli cites which would be the target of any Syrian attack. What sort of prime minister leaves his people is such a precarious situation ?
Its time for a massive change in Israeli leadership. Please join with us as we beseech the Lord to make those changes. Let us petition the Lord of Hosts to either change Olmert's heart or to change the prime minister. We believe that the best candidate for the post is the former PM Benjamin Netanyahu. He wasnt so great last time he was Israel's leader, but we believe he will do better given another chance. One thing is for sure, he couldnt be any worse ! The situation is urgent and needs an urgent response............. in prayer and intercession.
Will the God of Israel Intervene Soon ? I surely hope so for all our sake !!!
The Lord bless you as you bless Israel by standing in defense of her right to exist on the land given to the Jewish people by the God of Israel . Lets pray that Israel will turn back to their God. Do not be silent, but share this with your fellow Christians, share it with your pastors, and with anyone you have a chance to speak to. Lets also pray for that breakthrough to the Muslims, and please remember to pray for our son Jordan, and all of his fellow soldiers in the IDF.
Shabbat Shalom ... David & Josie
This Week with Rabbi Eckstein
September 7 , 2007
Dear Friend of The Fellowship,
I’ve spoken before about the terrible plight of the city of Sderot, located in Israel’s Negev Desert just a few miles from the Gaza Strip. For the last seven years, terrorists operating out of Gaza have fired thousands of rockets at Sderot and surrounding communities.Over this time, eleven civilians have been killed in the attacks and more than 4,000 injured. Thousands more have suffered severe trauma requiring extensive counseling. By some estimates, 20 percent of Sderot’s population has fled, wreaking havoc on the city’s economy. The cost of these attacks, in both human and economic terms, has been staggering.Rocket attacks in the region have become so routine that the press barely pays attention to them anymore. But Sderot was again in the news this week when a rocket fell next to a kindergarten where children were attending their second day of school. Miraculously, no one was killed, but the incident illustrates the terrible danger and fear Israelis in this area live with every day. Recognizing this, Israeli Defense Minster Ehud Barak declared a state of emergency in the areas of Israel bordering Gaza.
Few cities are in greater need of protection than Sderot. That is why earlier this year, at the request of Sderot’s mayor, The Fellowship made a commitment to help protect citizens by providing desperately needed funds to refurbish 42 of the 56 public bomb shelters in this beleaguered, shell-shocked city.I am happy to report that at this critical time of need work on the shelters is well underway. Many renovations will be completed in the near future. As the work on the shelters is finished, they will be dedicated with plaques acknowledging the contributions of The Fellowship’s partners, whose generosity is providing life-saving protection for the people of Sderot. If and when, God forbid, the shelters ever need to be used, the residents will undoubtedly be praying for safety from the deadly rockets as well as for our friends, who helped provide that shelter and safety.
The total cost of this project is approximately $1.2 million. Today, I ask you to make a contribution to The Fellowship’s Guardians of Israel program to help us complete this urgent project in a timely fashion. It could truly mean the difference between life and death for the people of Sderot and the surrounding region, who have suffered so greatly for so long.May God bless you for your generosity. Please join me in prayer for the continued protection of the citizens of Sderot, and for peace in Jerusalem, Israel, and the Middle East.
With prayers for shalom, peace,
Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein
President INTERNATIONAL FELLOWSHIP OF CHRISTIANS AND JEWS.
WHAT'S AHEAD THIS FALL?
Dobson interviews on radical Islam to re-air Sept 10-11.
By Joel C. Rosenberg
(WASHINGTON, D.C., September 6, 2007) -- Rumors are that Osama bin Laden is planning to release a new video next week....Syria says it's ready for war after firing on an Israeli plane overnight....Tehran's ambassador to Damascus says violation of Syrian airspace by Israeli aircraft is intolerable attempt to create tension in the region, and adds that 'Israel must act reasonably and not cause another war.....but Israel says it didn't attack....so, how was your summer? It's been very full for Lynn, the boys and me....we've done a lot of traveling to speak at churches and conferences on the rising tensions in the Middle East and how Christians should respond....we had the privilege of meeting with many dear Joshua Fund supporters, and speaking on a lot of radio and TV shows....we've gotten a little r&r....and this morning I finally finished writing DEAD HEAT, the fifth and final political thriller in THE LAST JIHAD series....Lord willing, it will be released nationwide on March 18, 2008....that said, here's a quick snapshot of what's coming up this fall.
FALL SCHEDULE
* Sunday, September 9th: Pastor Raul Ries has invited me to be speak on Israel, Iran and The Joshua Fund at Calvary Chapel Golden Springs, California, a congregation of about 14,000. (Services are at 8am, 10am, 11:45am, and 6pm)
* Mon/Tues, September 10th and 11th: Focus on the Family will re-air the radio interview Dr. Dobson did with me on the threat of radical Islam to the U.S. and Israel and how evangelical Christians should respond in light of this serious threat. (Please check local listings for station and time in your area)
* Thursday, September 13th: Janet Parschall has invited me to be on her radio program from 2:15pm to 3:00pm eastern to discuss the Epicenter DVD and The Joshua Fund.
* Sat/Sun, September 15th and 16th: Pastor Ray Bentley has invited me to speak on Israel, Iran and The Joshua Fund at Marantha Chapel in San Diego, California, a congregation of about 8,000. (Services are at 6pm Saturday, and 8:30am, 10:30am and 6pm on Sunday)
* Tuesday, September 18th: Pastor Chuck Smith has asked me to speak on the latest developments in the Middle East and The Joshua Fund's new "Operation Epicenter" as part of the 2007 Calvary Chapel Prophecy Conference. (Event begins at 7:30pm pacific)
* Sat/Sun, September 22nd and 23rd in Sioux Falls, South Dakota
-- 9am (Sat): Businessman's breakfast at Abiding Savior Free Lutheran
-- 7pm (Sat): Public forum at Elmen Center, Augustana College
-- 9am, 10am (Sun): Central Baptist Church
* Mon/Tues, September 24th and 25: Taping 100 Huntley Street in Toronto, Canada (for airing in October)
* Tuesday, October 17th: Speak at the Pentagon (7am)
* Fri/Sat, October 19th and 20th: Address the Olive Tree Ministries prophecy conference, Minneapolis, Minnesota
* Sunday, October 21st: California
-- 8:15am/10:45am: Speak at Bakersfield First Assembly (Pastor Steven Hunt)
-- 7pm: Speak at Calvary Chapel Downey in Downey, CA (Pastor Jeff Johnson, 8,000 people)
* Friday, October 26th: Speak at fund-raiser for Ministry Architecture, Inc., Denver, Colorado
* Sunday, October 28th: Speak at Greenwood Community Church, Denver, Colorado
* Sat/Sun, November 3rd and 4th: Speak at McLean Bible Church (Pastor Lon Solomon, 9,000 people)
* November: Research in the Middle East for a new non-fiction book I'm writing called Revolution
* Thursday, November 29th: Speak at fund-raiser for E3 Partners, Dallas, Texas
* Sunday, December 2nd: Speak at Calvary Chapel Tucson (8,000 people)
WEBLOG with the latest on events in the Middle East and Russia, including articles mentioned in this Flash Traffic and the latest on Syria's plans to retake the Golan Heights. www.joelrosenberg.com (with link to Epicenter DVD, which includes an exclusive interview with former Prime Minister Netanyahu on the serious threats facing Israel, particularly from a nuclear Iran) www.joshuafund.net
Last update - 19:14 06/09/2007
TIMELINE: A chronology of Israel-Syria relations since 1947 By Reuters
Syria said Thursday that it had fired on an Israel Air Force jet that violated its territory and warned it retained the right to respond. The two countries are formally at war, but a cease-fire has held on the Golan Heights since 1974, a year after Syria launched a war that failed to regain the plateau captured by Israel seven years earlier. Here is a short timeline on Israel-Syrian relations since 1947:
November 1947: Syria opposes United Nations General Assembly partition plan envisaging Jewish and Arab states side by side.
May 1948: When British mandate ends, Jews proclaim State of Israel. Syria and other Arab armies invade.
July 1949: Israel and Syria sign armistice agreement but on-and-off hostilities continue.
June 1967: Israel captures Golan Heights in the Six-Day War.
October 1973: Syria joins Egypt in a surprise attack on Israel on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar in an attempt to regain the Golan Heights. Despite sustaining heavy losses, Israel thwarts the assault.
1974: Following postwar clashes on the Golan Heights, Syria and Israel sign an disengagement of forces agreement.
1981: Israel annexes the Golan Heights, a move condemned internationally, and gives its Druze Muslim occupants the option of Israeli citizenship. Most reject the offer.
June 1982: Israel sends forces into Lebanon and eventually drives out Yasser Arafat and his Palestine Liberation Organization. Syria, the main foreign power broker in Lebanon, loses dozens of aircraft in dogfights with Israel Air Force warplanes in eastern Lebanon.
December 1999: Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Syrian Foreign Minister Farouk Shara meet for the highest-level talks between the two countries.
January 2000: Israeli-Syrian talks on the return of most of the Golan Heights to Syria collapse over the fate of a few hundred square metres of land by the Sea of Galilee.
August 2003: IAF warplanes fly over the holiday residence of President Bashar Assad as a message to Syria to rein in the Hezbollah guerrilla group.
October 2003: Israel Defense Forces troops attack a training camp for Palestinian militants near Damascus.
January 2004: Prime Minister Ariel Sharon says he is ready for peace talks with Syria, but only if Damascus halts support for terrorist agents.
June 2006: IAF warplanes again fly low over one of Assad's palaces to warn Syria against supporting Palestinian militants who captured Israel Defense Forces soldier Gilad Shalit.
June 2007: Israel says it is willing to trade land for peace withg Syria, and is waiting to hear whether Assad would cut ties with Iran and terrorist groups in return.
August 2007: Syrian Vice President Farouk Shara says that it has no intention of waging war against Israel to regain the Golan Heights.
ANALYSIS: The question is, how will Damascus respond?
FUTURE FOR SYRIA - ISAIAH 17:1 The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap.
Why Is The Temple Mount So Important ?
Posted by The Editors on Friday, September 7, 2007 at 7:00 AM
One Jerusalem proudly brings you an important bloggers interview with one of the world's leading Biblical Archaeologists Dr. Gabriel Barkay and Yigal Caspi of the Committee Against the Destruction of Antiquities on the Temple Mount.Dr. Barkay succinctly articulates the meaning of the Temple Mount to Jews and Christians as he calls for the world to stop the destruction being carried out by the Waqf.Listening to Dr. Barkay explain the Jewish and Christian connections to the Temple Mount you further understand why it is vital to stop the destruction of Jewish antiquities on the Temple Mount:
The Temple Mount is the heart, soul, and spirit of the Jewish people. It is the only holy place that Jews have and it is the place that is identified with the place chosen by the almighty which is mentioned in Deutoronomy. This is the place which is believed to be the place of the binding of Isaac, this is the place where David built the altar on the threshing floor of Aravna the Jebusite to stop the plague, this is the place where the first temple was built and the second followed it built by the returnees to Zion from the Babylonian captivity. This is also the place of the third edifice built on the site by King Herod the Great – that is the building which is so frequently mentioned in the New Testament.The temple Mount occupies about 1/6th of the total area of the old city of Jerusalem and this is one of the most important cornerstones of Western Civilization. It is at the moment the focus of a political battle and it is embodies within it the crux of the Near-Eastern conflict as both parties claim to have historical linkage to the site.
The Temple Mount represents the Near Eastern conflict in a nutshell and whatever happens to the Temple Mount will happen to the rest of the country. If the Temple Mount is under Palestinian rule and there is no accessibility to Jews to the Temple Mount and no control upon the antiquities discovered there that means that the legitimacy of Jews in the entire country is questioned.The gigantic stones of the Temple Mount are mentioned in the New Testament; Jesus was presented upon the Temple Mount as an infant, and later in his career he chased away the money changers from the Temple Mount; there are approximately twenty references to the Temple Mount in the New Testament and beyond any doubt the Temple Mount is an integral part of the Christian Heritage… it should be sacred and important to any civilized person all around the world.I am amazed that there was a world outcry concerning the blowing up of the statues of Buddha in the Bamiyan Valley by the Taliban Authorities in Afghanistan while the destruction on the Temple Mount didn’t hit the media and there was no outrage expressed.
In this session, Mr. Caspi recounts his frustrating experiences with the Prime Minister's Office and calls on people to contact the Prime Minister and American elected officials on behalf of preserving the Temple Mount.Dr. Barkay makes his motivation clear when he says that he would support independent archaeologists carrying our excavations on the Temple Mount if that would save the irreplaceable antiquities that are now in harms way.
Source: The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Date: September 5, 2007
First Beehives In Ancient Near East Discovered
Science Daily — Archaeological proof of the Biblical description of Israel really as the land of milk and honey (or at least the latter) has been uncovered by researchers from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem Institute of Archaeology.Close-up of one of the ancient beehives found at Tel Rehov in Israel. (Credit: Hebrew University photo by Amihai Mazar).
Amihai Mazar, Eleazar L. Sukenik Professor of Archaeology at the Hebrew University, revealed that the first apiary (beehive colony) dating from the Biblical period has been found in excavations he directed this summer at Tel Rehov in Israel's Beth Shean Valley. This is the earliest apiary to be revealed to date in an archaeological excavation anywhere in the ancient Near East, said Prof. Mazar. It dates from the 10th to early 9th centuries B.C.E. Tel Rehov is believed to have been one of the most important cities of Israel during the Israelite monarchy. The beehives there were found in the center of a built-up area there that has been excavated since 1997 by Dr. Nava Panitz-Cohen of the Hebrew University. Three rows of beehives were found in the apiary, containing more than 30 hives. It is estimated, however, based on excavations to date, that in all the total area would have contained some 100 beehives. Each row contained at least three tiers of hives, each of which is a cylinder composed of unbaked clay and dry straw, around 80 centimeters long and 40 centimeters in diameter.
One end of the cylinder was closed and had a small hole in it, which allowed for the entry and exit of the bees. The opposite end was covered with a clay lid that could be removed when the beekeeper extracted the honeycombs. Experienced beekeepers and scholars who visited the site estimated that as much as half a ton of honey could be culled each year from these hives. Prof. Mazar emphasizes the uniqueness of this latest find by pointing out that actual beehives have never been discovered at any site in the ancient Near East. While fired ceramic vessels that served as beehives are known in the Hellenistic and Roman periods, none were found in situ, and beekeeping on an industrial level such as the apiary at Tel Rehov is hitherto unknown in the archaeological record. Pictorial depictions of apiaries are known from Pharaonic Egypt, showing extraction of honey from stacked cylinders which are very similar to those found at Tel Rehov. Cylindrical clay beehives placed in horizontal rows, similar to those found at Tel Rehov, are well-known in numerous contemporary traditional cultures in Arab villages in Israel, as well as throughout the Mediterranean. The various products of beehives are put to diverse use: the honey is, of course, a delicacy, but is also known for its medicinal and cultic value. Beeswax was also utilized in the metal and leather industries, as well as for writing material when coated on wooden tablets.
The term honey appears 55 times in the Bible, 16 of which as part of the image of Israel as the land of milk and honey. It is commonly believed that the term refers to honey produced from fruits such as dates and figs. Bees' honey, on the other hand, is mentioned explicitly only twice, both related to wild bees. The first instance is how Samson culled bees' honey from inside the corpse of the lion in the Soreq Valley (Judges 14: 8-9). The second case is the story of Jonathan, King Saul's son, who dipped his hand into a honeycomb during the battle of Mikhmash (Samuel I 14:27). While the Bible tells us nothing about beekeeping in Israel at that time, the discovery of the apiary at Tel Rehov indicates that beekeeping and the extraction of bees' honey and honeycomb was a highly developed industry as early as the First Temple period. Thus, it is possible that the term honey in the Bible indeed pertains to bees' honey. Cultic objects were also found in the apiary, including a four-horned altar adorned with figures of naked fertility goddesses, as well as an elaborately painted chalice. This could be evidence of deviant cultic practices by the ancient Israelites related to the production of honey and beeswax.
Study of the beehives found at Tel Rehov is being conducted with the participation of various researchers. Dr. Guy Bloch of the Silberman Institute of Life Sciences of the Hebrew University is studying the biological aspects of the finds; he already discovered parts of bees' bodies in the remains of honeycomb extracted from inside the hives. Dr. Dvori Namdar of the Weizmann Institute of Science succeeded in identifying beeswax molecules from the walls of the beehives, and Prof. Mina Evron from Haifa University is analyzing the pollen remains in the hives. Dating of the beehives was done by measuring the decaying of the 14C isotope in organic materials, using grains of wheat found next to the beehives. This grain was dated at the laboratory of Groningen University in Holland to the period between the mid-10th century B.C.E. until the early 9th century B.C.E. This is the time period attributed to the reign of King Solomon and the first kings of the northern Kingdom of Israel following the division of the monarchy. The city of Rehov is indeed mentioned in an Egyptian inscription dating to the time of the Pharaoh Shoshenq I (Biblical Shishak), whom the Bible notes as the contemporary of King Solomon and who invaded Israel following that monarch's death.
A particularly fascinating find at the site is an inscription on a ceramic storage jar found near the beehives that reads To nmsh. This name was also found inscribed on another storage jar from a slightly later occupation level at Tel Rehov, dated to the time of the Omride Dynasty in the 9th century BCE. Moreover, this same name was found on a contemporary jar from nearby Tel Amal, situated in the Gan HaShelosha National Park (Sachne). The name Nimshi is known in the Bible as the name of the father and in several verses the grandfather of Israelite King Jehu, the founder of the dynasty that usurped power from the Omrides (II Kings: 9-12). It is possible that the discovery of three inscriptions bearing this name in the same region and dating to the same period indicates that Jehu's family originated from the Beth Shean Valley and possibly even from the large city located at Tel Rehov. The large apiary discovered at the site might have belonged to this illustrious local clan.
The excavations at Tel Rehov were supported by John Camp from Minneapolis in the U.S. with the participation of archaeological students from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and numerous volunteers.
Fast-track treaty talks start in Portugal
07.09.2007 - 09:20 CET | By Honor Mahony
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The first test of whether the fast-track timetable for the new EU treaty has a chance of succeeding will take place today (7 September) when foreign ministers discuss the contentious points in the document.EU presidency Portugal, in charge of the talks, wants the treaty wrapped up and signed off by EU leaders in six weeks time. The new treaty – known as the Reform Treaty – overhauls the EU's creaking institutions and was pasted together from the remains of the more ambitiously named EU constitution that was rejected in 2005.But despite Lisbon's best efforts to keep a lid on the discussions, Friday's meeting is set to throw up a number of controversial points that have been slowly simmering since the treaty outline was agreed before the summer.
Among the most difficult issues are the British opt-outs on the Charter of Fundamental Rights and on justice and home affairs.Several questions have been raised about their scope and how they will affect other member states in practice.
Poland is also anxious that its hard-won concession on the voting system - in the shape of a legislation blocking mechanism - will not be downgraded to a protocol rather than being written into the treaty.The exact scope of the EU's common foreign and security policy is also set to be discussed as is the exact shape and power structures of the proposed EU diplomatic service. Another issue is the statute of the European Central Bank. Its chief Jean-Claude Trichet wrote to the Portuguese presidency expressing concern that the bank's independence may be undermined by new wording in the proposed treaty. Meanwhile there are a whole host of other problems that have cropped up with member states using the everything-on--the-table atmosphere of treaty talks to raise national bugbears – a time honoured strategy in EU negotiations.Falling into this category are concerns raised by Austria on foreign student access to its universities and by Poland on the European Investment Bank. Warsaw wants a change in the bank's statute to make voting unanimous – Polish paper Rzeczpospolita reports that it wants to be able to block possible EIB investment into Russian monopoly Gazprom.
Two external factors
While all power-sharing discussions that take place within the EU are politically charged, these treaty talks have two important external factors weighing into the mix - elections in Poland and the pressure for a referendum on the EU treaty in the UK.These two factors – the Poles go to the ballot box on 21 October - are set to make the countries negotiate even more toughly during the summit.Even with no election in sight in June, it was Poland that kept fellow summiteers debating into the wee hours of the morning on the merits of a different voting system for the bloc. And now prime minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski is in political trouble at home.
Meanwhile, the UK's Gordon Brown is fighting calls to have a referendum by arguing that the secured red lines means one is not needed, indicating he will not be in a position to make concessions. EU leaders are aiming to get the treaty done and dusted by the end of the year and ratified throughout the 27 member states before the 2009 elections – hoping to banish the political ghost of the rejected EU constitution that was spurned by French and Dutch voters just over two years ago.
6 September 2007
Religion can strengthen European values, says EU president
Stephen Brown
European Commission President José Manuel Barroso. Photo: Stephen Brown/ENI.
Sibiu, Romania (ENI). European Commission president José Manuel Barroso has praised the role of Christianity in promoting European unification, and has appealed to religions to strengthen the values on which the unity of the continent is based. A union that is reduced to its economic and geographic dimensions alone would lack unity, Barroso, who heads the executive arm of the 27-nation EU, told the Third European Ecumenical Assembly meeting in Sibiu, Romania, on 6 September. Your churches and confessional communities can contribute, and make a real contribution, to a better understanding between people through promoting mutual respect in a context of shared values, said Barroso in front of more than 2000 participants from all of Europe's main Christian traditions. Asked at a media conference, however, whether the new EU treaty should contain a specific reference to the continent's Christian heritage, as some church leaders have demanded, Barroso said his grouping had to respect all citizens equally, whatever their religion.
Christianity is obviously part of our great heritage in Europe. This is a historical fact, said the EC president. But it is also true that Europe is made up of diversity. We have many Muslims and we also have many people who have no religion at all.He added, What would be wrong is to pretend that religion does not exist in our society. That would be a big mistake.In his assembly speech, Barroso described Christianity as having been a force for unity in Europe throughout the centuries. At the same time, he added, Europe was now increasingly becoming a continent of many peoples, many cultures and many religions. Respect for diversity, openness to others and tolerance is firmly rooted in European culture. It is our trade mark, said Barroso. But this respect for diversity is based on the respect of deeper values that Europe must never be allowed to betray: freedom of expression, freedom of religion and freedom of creative values.
Barroso praised the assembly organizers for holding the meeting in Romania, which with its neighbour Bulgaria became part of the EU on 1 January, and had, he said, a long history as a meeting place of different peoples and cultures. He also praised the initiative that led to the first European Ecumenical Assembly in Basel, Switzerland in 1989, which brought together Christians from eastern and Western Europe at a time when the Iron Curtain still divided the continent. The Sibiu assembly runs until 9 September and is an initiative of the Conference of European Churches and the Council of European (Roman Catholic) Bishops' Conferences. The two groupings account for most of Europe's Roman Catholic, Protestant, Anglican and Orthodox churches. In addition to the Basel gathering, an assembly also took place in Graz, Austria in 1997.
ENI featured articles are taken from the full ENI Daily News Service. Subscribe online to the Daily News Service and receive around 1000 full-text articles a year. ENI featured articles may be re-printed, re-posted, re-produced or placed on Web sites if ENI is noted as the source and there is a link to the ENI Web site www.eni.ch - 1994 - 2007 Ecumenical News International.
Europeans want the EU to take more global responsibility
07.09.2007 - 09:29 CET | By Helena Spongenberg
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS – The vast majority of Europeans want the European Union to take greater responsibility on the world stage - according to a new poll by the US German Marshall Fund - especially in aid development, trade and peacekeeping missions.Almost 90% of Europeans want the EU to play a bigger role globally while slightly more than half (53%) feel that the EU should cooperate with the US in dealing with global threats, compared with 43% who feel the EU should address threats independently from Washington.France was the only country where a majority (58%) feels the EU would do better to address global threats alone.Of those Europeans who feel the EU should take greater responsibility, top support was for more money on aid for development (84%), the use of trade to influence other countries (74%), and committing troops for peacekeeping missions (68%).
There was little support (20%) for committing troops for combat missions. Few Europeans support combat operations in Afghanistan now or against Iran in the future, the annual Transatlantic Trend survey published on Thursday (6 September) showed.The survey polled about 13,000 people in 12 European countries - Bulgaria, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, Turkey and the UK – as well as in the US.
Europeans Blame Bush and Turkey feels isolated
US president George Bush's foreign policy attracted disapproval ratings of 77 percent of Europeans and 60 percent of Americans. Some 34 percent of Europeans blamed Mr Bush himself and 38 percent blamed the US management of the Iraq war for a deterioration in transatlantic relations.Only 4 percent named the treatment of terrorism suspects at the US prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba a reason.Turkish respondents expressed a decline in positive feelings toward both the EU and the US since similar polls in previous years. Forty percent of Turks said they viewed EU membership as a good thing, a drop of 14 percentage points since last year's survey.
When asked how likely it is that Turkey will join the EU, 56% of EU citizens asked felt it is likely that Turkey will join, compared with only 26% of Turkish respondents who agreed.The margin of error for the survey, which conducted interviews by telephone and in person during June, was plus or minus three percentage points.
Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, August 2007, pages 50-51
Israel and Judaism. Concern Growing About Jewish Groups’ Liaison With Evangelical Israel Supporters - By Allan C. Brownfeld
The growing alliance between Evangelical Christian supporters of Israel and groups such as the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) is stirring a growing debate.At AIPAC’s national conference in March, Pastor John Hagee, the evangelical minister from San Antonio, Texas who in 2006 founded Christians United for Israel (CUFI), the first Christian pro-Israel lobbying group, addressed the delegates and received a standing ovation.Hagee is a proponent of the theology known as dispensational premillennialism (see The Dangerous Potent Elixir of Christian Zionism by Pat Morrison, April 2007 Washington Report, p. 58). The author of several books setting forth his end days theology, Hagee’s latest volume, Jerusalem Countdown, depicts a scenario in which Iran and a coalition of Islamic countries, led by Russia, will unleash a nuclear attack on Israel, leading to the ultimate battle of Armageddon. According to Hagee, this battle between what he terms the Islamo-fascists and the Christians and Jews already is upon us.
Evangelical supporters of Israel vigorously oppose all peace efforts which involve territorial adjustments with the Palestinians. At the April 2002 Israel solidarity rally in Washington, DC, evangelical radio host Janet Parshall declared, We will not give back the Golan. When Prime Minister Ariel Sharon called for disengagement from Gaza, Christian Zionists opposed the government of Israel. The Rev. Pat Robertson even suggested that Sharon’s subsequent stroke was God’s punishment for abandoning land the Bible declared to be God’s patrimony to the Jews.Today, however, more and more Jewish voices are being heard expressing concern about the growing liaison between Jewish and evangelical groups.Writing in the May 2007 issue of Sh’ma, Gershon Gorenberg, author of The Accidental Empire: Israel and the Birth of the Settlements l967-l977 and The End of Days: Fundamentalism and the Struggle for The Temple Mount, described Israel’s Evangelical supporters as follows: This is the kind of friend your mother should have warned you about when you were young: the one you accept when you are feeling unpopular, who is loud, dares you to do dangerous things, gives you a bad name, drives other people away.
Evangelical Christians are antagonistic to any territorial division of the Holy Land.
The existence of Israel, Gorenberg noted, proves that prophecy is coming true. For that the Jews are loved, he wrote. Yet the Jews—says the same theology—live in obstinate error as deniers of Jesus and will pay the price. Radio evangelist Chuck Missler, for instance, has asserted that Auschwitz was just a little prelude to what will happen to Jews in the approaching Last Days…This kind of cheering squad poses two practical risks. The first is that Israeli politicians will be tempted to believe that they can count on support for intransigence—indeed, that American political support will be most firm when they are most unbending. Christian Zionists are encouraging Israel to live dangerously.Jews who welcome Christian Zionist support, Gorenberg noted, dismiss the Evangelical theology. Since they don’t believe in the apocalypse or Second Coming, he noted, they regard such predictions as irrelevant. What matters [to them] is here-and-now support. This attitude shows spectacular disrespect for allies who base their lives on theology…The believers look forward to war. Mike Evans, who has built an evangelical ministry on supporting Israel, writes in his book Jerusalem Betrayed that an apocalypse is coming in Israel and urges readers to pray for that to happen.I don’t like that they would not like to see Israel trade land for peace, said Rabbi Jonathan Biatch of Temple Beth El in Madison, Wisconsin, because in my view that’s a very important formula. The real bottom line is the fact that this organization [CUFI] would like to exacerbate tensions in the Middle East so it will lead to Armageddon.
In Sacramento, California, the city’s largest Reform synagogue, Congregation B’nai Israel, declined to participate in the local Christians United for Israel event. Elsewhere, however, Jewish groups have joined with Hagee’s organization. A recent Night To Honor Israel held outside Minneapolis raised $l00,000.David Elcott, executive director of the Israel Policy Forum and former director of Interreligious Affairs for the American Jewish Committee, said this of the Jewish-Evangelical alliance in the May 2007 Sh’ma:Christian Zionists, Evangelicals who know God’s will from their biblical insights and offer a literal reading of Scriptures, concern me…In fact, their support may endanger Israel’s future more than our fickle mainline Protestant friends…The last five governments of Israel have called for a Palestinian state living next to a secure, demographically viable Israel. Christian Zionists unequivocally condemn that solution.Elcott pointed out that Israelis support a two-state solution by a two-to-one margin. The last Hebrew University Truman Center study showed that 58 per cent of Israelis would negotiate with Hamas right now. A clear majority of American Jews polled in the latest American Jewish Committee survey also seek a Palestinian state as part of a negotiated settlement. Meanwhile, Evangelical Christians are antagonistic to any territorial division of the Holy Land, even if such an agreement could bring peace.Concluded Elcott: We should embrace in friendship and in dialogue all our Christian brothers and sisters, seek common cause where we can while engaging in respectful dialogue when we disagree…But it is time to unequivocally reframe the Middle East debate and make clear that the greatest defenders of the State of Israel…are those of us who advocate for an end to the conflict and peace for all those who reside in the land that all call holy.
In May, a typical Night To Honor Israel took place in Alexandria, Virginia. It was sponsored by The Jerusalem Connection International (JCI), under the auspices of CUFI. The Rev. Jim Hutchens, president of JCI and regional director of CUFI, was emphatic in his belief that Israel should not make any kind of territorial compromise with her neighbors. One of the speakers, the Rev. Jan Willem van der Hoeven, director of the International Christian Zionist Center in Jerusalem, received a standing ovation after urging President George W. Bush: Do not divide the land and give the terrorists a base.Another speaker, WorldNetDaily.com founder and writer Joseph Farah, called the 2005 Gaza disengagement ethnic cleansing by the Israeli government that was an invitation to another genocide. Republican presidential candidate Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-CA) said that it was on a trip to Israel a number of years ago that he decided he would never…support the giving up of one inch of the state of Israel. That will always be my position.Jewish participants in this meeting included Rabbi Marvin Bash, rabbi emeritus of Congregation Etz Hayim in Arlington, Virginia and chaplain at Fort Belvoir Jewish Military Congregation, and Rabbi Jack Moline of Agudas Achim Congregation in Alexandria. Rabbi Bash acknowledged that Jews who are more liberal about territorial compromise might have been uncomfortable with the program, but said he himself took a hard-line position and was not bothered by the opposition to giving back West Bank territory. Rabbi Moline thanked the group in his invocation for its love of the Jewish people and enduring love for the land of Israel and the state of Israel.
Also attending the meeting was Martin Peled-Flax, minister-counselor for domestic affairs at the Embassy of Israel. Thanking those in attendance for their past support for Israel, the Israeli diplomat urged them to continue to speak up and not be silent.Challenging those rabbis who agreed to participate in this Night To Honor Israel, Rabbi Gerald Serotta of Temple Shalom in Chevy Chase, Maryland, declared that, Most of us believe that Israel as a Jewish and democratic state cannot survive while controlling the entire Land of Israel. This is the most pressing reason not to give support to Christians United For Israel, and in fact to oppose their political impact. Serotta suggested that the rabbis should have told the audience that Kedushat Haam [survival of the Jewish people] is more important than Kedushat Haaretz [sanctity of the land].There is, of course, a certain irony in Jewish groups, which call for strict separation of church and state within the American political arena and sharply challenge the political role played by evangelical groups, to embrace—together with those very groups—a policy toward Israel based on an interpretation of biblical law. Philip Weiss, writing in the June 4, 2007 issue of The American Conservative, noted that, “Many Jews with strong feelings about Israel—many of whom…have never been there—are helping to shape public perceptions. Almost all these opinion-makers are self-described secular Jews who get worked up about separating church and state when it’s evangelical Christians trying to change laws on stem-cell research, abortion and gay marriage. Yet these seculars are often invested themselves, without being aware of it, in a religious ideology—a Jewish nationalist claim on the Holy Land inscribed in the Old Testament.
Jerry Falwell’s Role
The role of the late Jerry Falwell in forging the alliance between Christian fundamentalism and right-wing Zionism cannot be overestimated. In 1978, Falwell traveled to Israel on a trip sponsored for and by the Israeli government. In 1979, when Prime Minister Menachem Begin was building Jewish settlements throughout the West Bank, the Israelis extended another free trip. Falwell traveled the road toward the Palestinian town of Nablus, turned off the highway and stood at a cluster of prefabricated houses built by Jewish settlers. At the time, Falwell declared that God was kind to America only because America has been kind to the Jews. At a gala dinner in New York in 1980, Prime Minister Begin bestowed upon Falwell a medal named for Vladimir Jabotinsky, the right-wing Zionist leader. In 1981, when Israel bombed Iraq’s nuclear reactor, Begin immediately called Jerry Falwell for support.
Expressing this mindset in Congress, Sen. James M. Inhofe (R-OK) stated on March 4, 2002 on the Senate floor, I believe very strongly that we ought to support Israel…because God said so…Look it up in the Book of Genesis…This is not a political battle at all. It is a contest over whether or not the word of God is true.Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of the Union for Reform Judaism, believes that inviting John Hagee to address AIPAC, and the growing alliance between Jewish and evangelical groups, may be alienating Jewish young people. As he wrote in the May 18 Forward: We have learned from extensive research that these young people are more socially liberal than their baby-boomer parents. They are pluralistic in their thinking and they are tolerant of difference…They respond negatively to those who disparage other religious traditions and who make exclusivist religious claims. They are inherently centrist in their political views on the Middle East. And they are suspicious of a Jewish establishment that they see as too focused on money and insufficiently focused on values. And so whom do we offer to these young people as a spokesman for Israel? John Hagee, who is contemptuous of Muslims, dismissive of gays, possesses a triumphalist theology and opposes a two-state solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict. If our intention was to distance our young adults from the Jewish state, we could not have made a better choice.Beyond this, Yoffie wrote, Even worse, a primary motive here seems to be that we see Hagee and his Christians United for Israel as a source of dollars for federation coffers. The pattern has been that in return for federation sponsorship of dinners hosted by the lobbying group, contributions are made by Christians United for Israel to our federation fund-raising campaigns. The conclusion that our young people are most likely to draw from this arrangement is that we are simply selling our souls.
Allan C. Brownfeld is a syndicated columnist and associate editor of the Lincoln Review, a journal published by the Lincoln Institute for Research and Education, and editor of Issues, the quarterly journal of the American Council for Judaism.
Modern Israel's worst Israeli Prime Minister, Ehud Olmert is hanging on to his position with all of the means he can muster. Accused of a miserable performance as the nations leader during last year's Lebanon war, and facing charges of serious financial and political corruption, even many of his own Kadima party members of government are losing patience with him. Popularity polls have him with an embarrassing 1% of public approval, that in itself enough reason for any decent leader to resign. But Olmert, the dangling puppet dancing on the strings of the Bush administration, wont let go.
It is my opinion that this man is totally unfit to lead the nation of Israel, for the following reasons.
1/ his total lack of experience as evidenced by the failure to attain the goals in last years Lebanon War
2/ his apparent willingness to give away the entire West Bank and allow a Palestinian State in God's Land
3/ his refusal to protect Israeli citizens living under constant Hamas rocket attack in Sderot and the Western Negev
4/ his failure to rehouse the Israeli citizens violently evicted from their homes in Gaza
5/ the various and very serious charges of corruption that are pending against him
6/ his wife is a peace activist who must be influencing his decisions concerning the nations defense
7/ his son left the country to evade serving in the army
8/ his daughter is also a peace activist who has protested outside the home of the IDF Chief of Staff calling for him to resign over something the IDF was innocent of
As if all the above is not enough, the Olmert government tricked all of the citizens of Israel into trading in our present gas masks, in exchange for improved versions. The government is now refusing to issue the new masks, while Syria stocks up on chemical and biological warheads. Even if Israel had a few days warning of a Syrian strike, that would not be enough time to distribute the new masks to every resident of the larger Israeli cites which would be the target of any Syrian attack. What sort of prime minister leaves his people is such a precarious situation ?
Its time for a massive change in Israeli leadership. Please join with us as we beseech the Lord to make those changes. Let us petition the Lord of Hosts to either change Olmert's heart or to change the prime minister. We believe that the best candidate for the post is the former PM Benjamin Netanyahu. He wasnt so great last time he was Israel's leader, but we believe he will do better given another chance. One thing is for sure, he couldnt be any worse ! The situation is urgent and needs an urgent response............. in prayer and intercession.
Will the God of Israel Intervene Soon ? I surely hope so for all our sake !!!
The Lord bless you as you bless Israel by standing in defense of her right to exist on the land given to the Jewish people by the God of Israel . Lets pray that Israel will turn back to their God. Do not be silent, but share this with your fellow Christians, share it with your pastors, and with anyone you have a chance to speak to. Lets also pray for that breakthrough to the Muslims, and please remember to pray for our son Jordan, and all of his fellow soldiers in the IDF.
Shabbat Shalom ... David & Josie
This Week with Rabbi Eckstein
September 7 , 2007
Dear Friend of The Fellowship,
I’ve spoken before about the terrible plight of the city of Sderot, located in Israel’s Negev Desert just a few miles from the Gaza Strip. For the last seven years, terrorists operating out of Gaza have fired thousands of rockets at Sderot and surrounding communities.Over this time, eleven civilians have been killed in the attacks and more than 4,000 injured. Thousands more have suffered severe trauma requiring extensive counseling. By some estimates, 20 percent of Sderot’s population has fled, wreaking havoc on the city’s economy. The cost of these attacks, in both human and economic terms, has been staggering.Rocket attacks in the region have become so routine that the press barely pays attention to them anymore. But Sderot was again in the news this week when a rocket fell next to a kindergarten where children were attending their second day of school. Miraculously, no one was killed, but the incident illustrates the terrible danger and fear Israelis in this area live with every day. Recognizing this, Israeli Defense Minster Ehud Barak declared a state of emergency in the areas of Israel bordering Gaza.
Few cities are in greater need of protection than Sderot. That is why earlier this year, at the request of Sderot’s mayor, The Fellowship made a commitment to help protect citizens by providing desperately needed funds to refurbish 42 of the 56 public bomb shelters in this beleaguered, shell-shocked city.I am happy to report that at this critical time of need work on the shelters is well underway. Many renovations will be completed in the near future. As the work on the shelters is finished, they will be dedicated with plaques acknowledging the contributions of The Fellowship’s partners, whose generosity is providing life-saving protection for the people of Sderot. If and when, God forbid, the shelters ever need to be used, the residents will undoubtedly be praying for safety from the deadly rockets as well as for our friends, who helped provide that shelter and safety.
The total cost of this project is approximately $1.2 million. Today, I ask you to make a contribution to The Fellowship’s Guardians of Israel program to help us complete this urgent project in a timely fashion. It could truly mean the difference between life and death for the people of Sderot and the surrounding region, who have suffered so greatly for so long.May God bless you for your generosity. Please join me in prayer for the continued protection of the citizens of Sderot, and for peace in Jerusalem, Israel, and the Middle East.
With prayers for shalom, peace,
Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein
President INTERNATIONAL FELLOWSHIP OF CHRISTIANS AND JEWS.
WHAT'S AHEAD THIS FALL?
Dobson interviews on radical Islam to re-air Sept 10-11.
By Joel C. Rosenberg
(WASHINGTON, D.C., September 6, 2007) -- Rumors are that Osama bin Laden is planning to release a new video next week....Syria says it's ready for war after firing on an Israeli plane overnight....Tehran's ambassador to Damascus says violation of Syrian airspace by Israeli aircraft is intolerable attempt to create tension in the region, and adds that 'Israel must act reasonably and not cause another war.....but Israel says it didn't attack....so, how was your summer? It's been very full for Lynn, the boys and me....we've done a lot of traveling to speak at churches and conferences on the rising tensions in the Middle East and how Christians should respond....we had the privilege of meeting with many dear Joshua Fund supporters, and speaking on a lot of radio and TV shows....we've gotten a little r&r....and this morning I finally finished writing DEAD HEAT, the fifth and final political thriller in THE LAST JIHAD series....Lord willing, it will be released nationwide on March 18, 2008....that said, here's a quick snapshot of what's coming up this fall.
FALL SCHEDULE
* Sunday, September 9th: Pastor Raul Ries has invited me to be speak on Israel, Iran and The Joshua Fund at Calvary Chapel Golden Springs, California, a congregation of about 14,000. (Services are at 8am, 10am, 11:45am, and 6pm)
* Mon/Tues, September 10th and 11th: Focus on the Family will re-air the radio interview Dr. Dobson did with me on the threat of radical Islam to the U.S. and Israel and how evangelical Christians should respond in light of this serious threat. (Please check local listings for station and time in your area)
* Thursday, September 13th: Janet Parschall has invited me to be on her radio program from 2:15pm to 3:00pm eastern to discuss the Epicenter DVD and The Joshua Fund.
* Sat/Sun, September 15th and 16th: Pastor Ray Bentley has invited me to speak on Israel, Iran and The Joshua Fund at Marantha Chapel in San Diego, California, a congregation of about 8,000. (Services are at 6pm Saturday, and 8:30am, 10:30am and 6pm on Sunday)
* Tuesday, September 18th: Pastor Chuck Smith has asked me to speak on the latest developments in the Middle East and The Joshua Fund's new "Operation Epicenter" as part of the 2007 Calvary Chapel Prophecy Conference. (Event begins at 7:30pm pacific)
* Sat/Sun, September 22nd and 23rd in Sioux Falls, South Dakota
-- 9am (Sat): Businessman's breakfast at Abiding Savior Free Lutheran
-- 7pm (Sat): Public forum at Elmen Center, Augustana College
-- 9am, 10am (Sun): Central Baptist Church
* Mon/Tues, September 24th and 25: Taping 100 Huntley Street in Toronto, Canada (for airing in October)
* Tuesday, October 17th: Speak at the Pentagon (7am)
* Fri/Sat, October 19th and 20th: Address the Olive Tree Ministries prophecy conference, Minneapolis, Minnesota
* Sunday, October 21st: California
-- 8:15am/10:45am: Speak at Bakersfield First Assembly (Pastor Steven Hunt)
-- 7pm: Speak at Calvary Chapel Downey in Downey, CA (Pastor Jeff Johnson, 8,000 people)
* Friday, October 26th: Speak at fund-raiser for Ministry Architecture, Inc., Denver, Colorado
* Sunday, October 28th: Speak at Greenwood Community Church, Denver, Colorado
* Sat/Sun, November 3rd and 4th: Speak at McLean Bible Church (Pastor Lon Solomon, 9,000 people)
* November: Research in the Middle East for a new non-fiction book I'm writing called Revolution
* Thursday, November 29th: Speak at fund-raiser for E3 Partners, Dallas, Texas
* Sunday, December 2nd: Speak at Calvary Chapel Tucson (8,000 people)
WEBLOG with the latest on events in the Middle East and Russia, including articles mentioned in this Flash Traffic and the latest on Syria's plans to retake the Golan Heights. www.joelrosenberg.com (with link to Epicenter DVD, which includes an exclusive interview with former Prime Minister Netanyahu on the serious threats facing Israel, particularly from a nuclear Iran) www.joshuafund.net
Last update - 19:14 06/09/2007
TIMELINE: A chronology of Israel-Syria relations since 1947 By Reuters
Syria said Thursday that it had fired on an Israel Air Force jet that violated its territory and warned it retained the right to respond. The two countries are formally at war, but a cease-fire has held on the Golan Heights since 1974, a year after Syria launched a war that failed to regain the plateau captured by Israel seven years earlier. Here is a short timeline on Israel-Syrian relations since 1947:
November 1947: Syria opposes United Nations General Assembly partition plan envisaging Jewish and Arab states side by side.
May 1948: When British mandate ends, Jews proclaim State of Israel. Syria and other Arab armies invade.
July 1949: Israel and Syria sign armistice agreement but on-and-off hostilities continue.
June 1967: Israel captures Golan Heights in the Six-Day War.
October 1973: Syria joins Egypt in a surprise attack on Israel on Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the Jewish calendar in an attempt to regain the Golan Heights. Despite sustaining heavy losses, Israel thwarts the assault.
1974: Following postwar clashes on the Golan Heights, Syria and Israel sign an disengagement of forces agreement.
1981: Israel annexes the Golan Heights, a move condemned internationally, and gives its Druze Muslim occupants the option of Israeli citizenship. Most reject the offer.
June 1982: Israel sends forces into Lebanon and eventually drives out Yasser Arafat and his Palestine Liberation Organization. Syria, the main foreign power broker in Lebanon, loses dozens of aircraft in dogfights with Israel Air Force warplanes in eastern Lebanon.
December 1999: Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Syrian Foreign Minister Farouk Shara meet for the highest-level talks between the two countries.
January 2000: Israeli-Syrian talks on the return of most of the Golan Heights to Syria collapse over the fate of a few hundred square metres of land by the Sea of Galilee.
August 2003: IAF warplanes fly over the holiday residence of President Bashar Assad as a message to Syria to rein in the Hezbollah guerrilla group.
October 2003: Israel Defense Forces troops attack a training camp for Palestinian militants near Damascus.
January 2004: Prime Minister Ariel Sharon says he is ready for peace talks with Syria, but only if Damascus halts support for terrorist agents.
June 2006: IAF warplanes again fly low over one of Assad's palaces to warn Syria against supporting Palestinian militants who captured Israel Defense Forces soldier Gilad Shalit.
June 2007: Israel says it is willing to trade land for peace withg Syria, and is waiting to hear whether Assad would cut ties with Iran and terrorist groups in return.
August 2007: Syrian Vice President Farouk Shara says that it has no intention of waging war against Israel to regain the Golan Heights.
ANALYSIS: The question is, how will Damascus respond?
FUTURE FOR SYRIA - ISAIAH 17:1 The burden of Damascus. Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it shall be a ruinous heap.
Why Is The Temple Mount So Important ?
Posted by The Editors on Friday, September 7, 2007 at 7:00 AM
One Jerusalem proudly brings you an important bloggers interview with one of the world's leading Biblical Archaeologists Dr. Gabriel Barkay and Yigal Caspi of the Committee Against the Destruction of Antiquities on the Temple Mount.Dr. Barkay succinctly articulates the meaning of the Temple Mount to Jews and Christians as he calls for the world to stop the destruction being carried out by the Waqf.Listening to Dr. Barkay explain the Jewish and Christian connections to the Temple Mount you further understand why it is vital to stop the destruction of Jewish antiquities on the Temple Mount:
The Temple Mount is the heart, soul, and spirit of the Jewish people. It is the only holy place that Jews have and it is the place that is identified with the place chosen by the almighty which is mentioned in Deutoronomy. This is the place which is believed to be the place of the binding of Isaac, this is the place where David built the altar on the threshing floor of Aravna the Jebusite to stop the plague, this is the place where the first temple was built and the second followed it built by the returnees to Zion from the Babylonian captivity. This is also the place of the third edifice built on the site by King Herod the Great – that is the building which is so frequently mentioned in the New Testament.The temple Mount occupies about 1/6th of the total area of the old city of Jerusalem and this is one of the most important cornerstones of Western Civilization. It is at the moment the focus of a political battle and it is embodies within it the crux of the Near-Eastern conflict as both parties claim to have historical linkage to the site.
The Temple Mount represents the Near Eastern conflict in a nutshell and whatever happens to the Temple Mount will happen to the rest of the country. If the Temple Mount is under Palestinian rule and there is no accessibility to Jews to the Temple Mount and no control upon the antiquities discovered there that means that the legitimacy of Jews in the entire country is questioned.The gigantic stones of the Temple Mount are mentioned in the New Testament; Jesus was presented upon the Temple Mount as an infant, and later in his career he chased away the money changers from the Temple Mount; there are approximately twenty references to the Temple Mount in the New Testament and beyond any doubt the Temple Mount is an integral part of the Christian Heritage… it should be sacred and important to any civilized person all around the world.I am amazed that there was a world outcry concerning the blowing up of the statues of Buddha in the Bamiyan Valley by the Taliban Authorities in Afghanistan while the destruction on the Temple Mount didn’t hit the media and there was no outrage expressed.
In this session, Mr. Caspi recounts his frustrating experiences with the Prime Minister's Office and calls on people to contact the Prime Minister and American elected officials on behalf of preserving the Temple Mount.Dr. Barkay makes his motivation clear when he says that he would support independent archaeologists carrying our excavations on the Temple Mount if that would save the irreplaceable antiquities that are now in harms way.
Source: The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Date: September 5, 2007
First Beehives In Ancient Near East Discovered
Science Daily — Archaeological proof of the Biblical description of Israel really as the land of milk and honey (or at least the latter) has been uncovered by researchers from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem Institute of Archaeology.Close-up of one of the ancient beehives found at Tel Rehov in Israel. (Credit: Hebrew University photo by Amihai Mazar).
Amihai Mazar, Eleazar L. Sukenik Professor of Archaeology at the Hebrew University, revealed that the first apiary (beehive colony) dating from the Biblical period has been found in excavations he directed this summer at Tel Rehov in Israel's Beth Shean Valley. This is the earliest apiary to be revealed to date in an archaeological excavation anywhere in the ancient Near East, said Prof. Mazar. It dates from the 10th to early 9th centuries B.C.E. Tel Rehov is believed to have been one of the most important cities of Israel during the Israelite monarchy. The beehives there were found in the center of a built-up area there that has been excavated since 1997 by Dr. Nava Panitz-Cohen of the Hebrew University. Three rows of beehives were found in the apiary, containing more than 30 hives. It is estimated, however, based on excavations to date, that in all the total area would have contained some 100 beehives. Each row contained at least three tiers of hives, each of which is a cylinder composed of unbaked clay and dry straw, around 80 centimeters long and 40 centimeters in diameter.
One end of the cylinder was closed and had a small hole in it, which allowed for the entry and exit of the bees. The opposite end was covered with a clay lid that could be removed when the beekeeper extracted the honeycombs. Experienced beekeepers and scholars who visited the site estimated that as much as half a ton of honey could be culled each year from these hives. Prof. Mazar emphasizes the uniqueness of this latest find by pointing out that actual beehives have never been discovered at any site in the ancient Near East. While fired ceramic vessels that served as beehives are known in the Hellenistic and Roman periods, none were found in situ, and beekeeping on an industrial level such as the apiary at Tel Rehov is hitherto unknown in the archaeological record. Pictorial depictions of apiaries are known from Pharaonic Egypt, showing extraction of honey from stacked cylinders which are very similar to those found at Tel Rehov. Cylindrical clay beehives placed in horizontal rows, similar to those found at Tel Rehov, are well-known in numerous contemporary traditional cultures in Arab villages in Israel, as well as throughout the Mediterranean. The various products of beehives are put to diverse use: the honey is, of course, a delicacy, but is also known for its medicinal and cultic value. Beeswax was also utilized in the metal and leather industries, as well as for writing material when coated on wooden tablets.
The term honey appears 55 times in the Bible, 16 of which as part of the image of Israel as the land of milk and honey. It is commonly believed that the term refers to honey produced from fruits such as dates and figs. Bees' honey, on the other hand, is mentioned explicitly only twice, both related to wild bees. The first instance is how Samson culled bees' honey from inside the corpse of the lion in the Soreq Valley (Judges 14: 8-9). The second case is the story of Jonathan, King Saul's son, who dipped his hand into a honeycomb during the battle of Mikhmash (Samuel I 14:27). While the Bible tells us nothing about beekeeping in Israel at that time, the discovery of the apiary at Tel Rehov indicates that beekeeping and the extraction of bees' honey and honeycomb was a highly developed industry as early as the First Temple period. Thus, it is possible that the term honey in the Bible indeed pertains to bees' honey. Cultic objects were also found in the apiary, including a four-horned altar adorned with figures of naked fertility goddesses, as well as an elaborately painted chalice. This could be evidence of deviant cultic practices by the ancient Israelites related to the production of honey and beeswax.
Study of the beehives found at Tel Rehov is being conducted with the participation of various researchers. Dr. Guy Bloch of the Silberman Institute of Life Sciences of the Hebrew University is studying the biological aspects of the finds; he already discovered parts of bees' bodies in the remains of honeycomb extracted from inside the hives. Dr. Dvori Namdar of the Weizmann Institute of Science succeeded in identifying beeswax molecules from the walls of the beehives, and Prof. Mina Evron from Haifa University is analyzing the pollen remains in the hives. Dating of the beehives was done by measuring the decaying of the 14C isotope in organic materials, using grains of wheat found next to the beehives. This grain was dated at the laboratory of Groningen University in Holland to the period between the mid-10th century B.C.E. until the early 9th century B.C.E. This is the time period attributed to the reign of King Solomon and the first kings of the northern Kingdom of Israel following the division of the monarchy. The city of Rehov is indeed mentioned in an Egyptian inscription dating to the time of the Pharaoh Shoshenq I (Biblical Shishak), whom the Bible notes as the contemporary of King Solomon and who invaded Israel following that monarch's death.
A particularly fascinating find at the site is an inscription on a ceramic storage jar found near the beehives that reads To nmsh. This name was also found inscribed on another storage jar from a slightly later occupation level at Tel Rehov, dated to the time of the Omride Dynasty in the 9th century BCE. Moreover, this same name was found on a contemporary jar from nearby Tel Amal, situated in the Gan HaShelosha National Park (Sachne). The name Nimshi is known in the Bible as the name of the father and in several verses the grandfather of Israelite King Jehu, the founder of the dynasty that usurped power from the Omrides (II Kings: 9-12). It is possible that the discovery of three inscriptions bearing this name in the same region and dating to the same period indicates that Jehu's family originated from the Beth Shean Valley and possibly even from the large city located at Tel Rehov. The large apiary discovered at the site might have belonged to this illustrious local clan.
The excavations at Tel Rehov were supported by John Camp from Minneapolis in the U.S. with the participation of archaeological students from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and numerous volunteers.
Fast-track treaty talks start in Portugal
07.09.2007 - 09:20 CET | By Honor Mahony
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The first test of whether the fast-track timetable for the new EU treaty has a chance of succeeding will take place today (7 September) when foreign ministers discuss the contentious points in the document.EU presidency Portugal, in charge of the talks, wants the treaty wrapped up and signed off by EU leaders in six weeks time. The new treaty – known as the Reform Treaty – overhauls the EU's creaking institutions and was pasted together from the remains of the more ambitiously named EU constitution that was rejected in 2005.But despite Lisbon's best efforts to keep a lid on the discussions, Friday's meeting is set to throw up a number of controversial points that have been slowly simmering since the treaty outline was agreed before the summer.
Among the most difficult issues are the British opt-outs on the Charter of Fundamental Rights and on justice and home affairs.Several questions have been raised about their scope and how they will affect other member states in practice.
Poland is also anxious that its hard-won concession on the voting system - in the shape of a legislation blocking mechanism - will not be downgraded to a protocol rather than being written into the treaty.The exact scope of the EU's common foreign and security policy is also set to be discussed as is the exact shape and power structures of the proposed EU diplomatic service. Another issue is the statute of the European Central Bank. Its chief Jean-Claude Trichet wrote to the Portuguese presidency expressing concern that the bank's independence may be undermined by new wording in the proposed treaty. Meanwhile there are a whole host of other problems that have cropped up with member states using the everything-on--the-table atmosphere of treaty talks to raise national bugbears – a time honoured strategy in EU negotiations.Falling into this category are concerns raised by Austria on foreign student access to its universities and by Poland on the European Investment Bank. Warsaw wants a change in the bank's statute to make voting unanimous – Polish paper Rzeczpospolita reports that it wants to be able to block possible EIB investment into Russian monopoly Gazprom.
Two external factors
While all power-sharing discussions that take place within the EU are politically charged, these treaty talks have two important external factors weighing into the mix - elections in Poland and the pressure for a referendum on the EU treaty in the UK.These two factors – the Poles go to the ballot box on 21 October - are set to make the countries negotiate even more toughly during the summit.Even with no election in sight in June, it was Poland that kept fellow summiteers debating into the wee hours of the morning on the merits of a different voting system for the bloc. And now prime minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski is in political trouble at home.
Meanwhile, the UK's Gordon Brown is fighting calls to have a referendum by arguing that the secured red lines means one is not needed, indicating he will not be in a position to make concessions. EU leaders are aiming to get the treaty done and dusted by the end of the year and ratified throughout the 27 member states before the 2009 elections – hoping to banish the political ghost of the rejected EU constitution that was spurned by French and Dutch voters just over two years ago.
6 September 2007
Religion can strengthen European values, says EU president
Stephen Brown
European Commission President José Manuel Barroso. Photo: Stephen Brown/ENI.
Sibiu, Romania (ENI). European Commission president José Manuel Barroso has praised the role of Christianity in promoting European unification, and has appealed to religions to strengthen the values on which the unity of the continent is based. A union that is reduced to its economic and geographic dimensions alone would lack unity, Barroso, who heads the executive arm of the 27-nation EU, told the Third European Ecumenical Assembly meeting in Sibiu, Romania, on 6 September. Your churches and confessional communities can contribute, and make a real contribution, to a better understanding between people through promoting mutual respect in a context of shared values, said Barroso in front of more than 2000 participants from all of Europe's main Christian traditions. Asked at a media conference, however, whether the new EU treaty should contain a specific reference to the continent's Christian heritage, as some church leaders have demanded, Barroso said his grouping had to respect all citizens equally, whatever their religion.
Christianity is obviously part of our great heritage in Europe. This is a historical fact, said the EC president. But it is also true that Europe is made up of diversity. We have many Muslims and we also have many people who have no religion at all.He added, What would be wrong is to pretend that religion does not exist in our society. That would be a big mistake.In his assembly speech, Barroso described Christianity as having been a force for unity in Europe throughout the centuries. At the same time, he added, Europe was now increasingly becoming a continent of many peoples, many cultures and many religions. Respect for diversity, openness to others and tolerance is firmly rooted in European culture. It is our trade mark, said Barroso. But this respect for diversity is based on the respect of deeper values that Europe must never be allowed to betray: freedom of expression, freedom of religion and freedom of creative values.
Barroso praised the assembly organizers for holding the meeting in Romania, which with its neighbour Bulgaria became part of the EU on 1 January, and had, he said, a long history as a meeting place of different peoples and cultures. He also praised the initiative that led to the first European Ecumenical Assembly in Basel, Switzerland in 1989, which brought together Christians from eastern and Western Europe at a time when the Iron Curtain still divided the continent. The Sibiu assembly runs until 9 September and is an initiative of the Conference of European Churches and the Council of European (Roman Catholic) Bishops' Conferences. The two groupings account for most of Europe's Roman Catholic, Protestant, Anglican and Orthodox churches. In addition to the Basel gathering, an assembly also took place in Graz, Austria in 1997.
ENI featured articles are taken from the full ENI Daily News Service. Subscribe online to the Daily News Service and receive around 1000 full-text articles a year. ENI featured articles may be re-printed, re-posted, re-produced or placed on Web sites if ENI is noted as the source and there is a link to the ENI Web site www.eni.ch - 1994 - 2007 Ecumenical News International.
Europeans want the EU to take more global responsibility
07.09.2007 - 09:29 CET | By Helena Spongenberg
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS – The vast majority of Europeans want the European Union to take greater responsibility on the world stage - according to a new poll by the US German Marshall Fund - especially in aid development, trade and peacekeeping missions.Almost 90% of Europeans want the EU to play a bigger role globally while slightly more than half (53%) feel that the EU should cooperate with the US in dealing with global threats, compared with 43% who feel the EU should address threats independently from Washington.France was the only country where a majority (58%) feels the EU would do better to address global threats alone.Of those Europeans who feel the EU should take greater responsibility, top support was for more money on aid for development (84%), the use of trade to influence other countries (74%), and committing troops for peacekeeping missions (68%).
There was little support (20%) for committing troops for combat missions. Few Europeans support combat operations in Afghanistan now or against Iran in the future, the annual Transatlantic Trend survey published on Thursday (6 September) showed.The survey polled about 13,000 people in 12 European countries - Bulgaria, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Spain, Turkey and the UK – as well as in the US.
Europeans Blame Bush and Turkey feels isolated
US president George Bush's foreign policy attracted disapproval ratings of 77 percent of Europeans and 60 percent of Americans. Some 34 percent of Europeans blamed Mr Bush himself and 38 percent blamed the US management of the Iraq war for a deterioration in transatlantic relations.Only 4 percent named the treatment of terrorism suspects at the US prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba a reason.Turkish respondents expressed a decline in positive feelings toward both the EU and the US since similar polls in previous years. Forty percent of Turks said they viewed EU membership as a good thing, a drop of 14 percentage points since last year's survey.
When asked how likely it is that Turkey will join the EU, 56% of EU citizens asked felt it is likely that Turkey will join, compared with only 26% of Turkish respondents who agreed.The margin of error for the survey, which conducted interviews by telephone and in person during June, was plus or minus three percentage points.
Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, August 2007, pages 50-51
Israel and Judaism. Concern Growing About Jewish Groups’ Liaison With Evangelical Israel Supporters - By Allan C. Brownfeld
The growing alliance between Evangelical Christian supporters of Israel and groups such as the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) is stirring a growing debate.At AIPAC’s national conference in March, Pastor John Hagee, the evangelical minister from San Antonio, Texas who in 2006 founded Christians United for Israel (CUFI), the first Christian pro-Israel lobbying group, addressed the delegates and received a standing ovation.Hagee is a proponent of the theology known as dispensational premillennialism (see The Dangerous Potent Elixir of Christian Zionism by Pat Morrison, April 2007 Washington Report, p. 58). The author of several books setting forth his end days theology, Hagee’s latest volume, Jerusalem Countdown, depicts a scenario in which Iran and a coalition of Islamic countries, led by Russia, will unleash a nuclear attack on Israel, leading to the ultimate battle of Armageddon. According to Hagee, this battle between what he terms the Islamo-fascists and the Christians and Jews already is upon us.
Evangelical supporters of Israel vigorously oppose all peace efforts which involve territorial adjustments with the Palestinians. At the April 2002 Israel solidarity rally in Washington, DC, evangelical radio host Janet Parshall declared, We will not give back the Golan. When Prime Minister Ariel Sharon called for disengagement from Gaza, Christian Zionists opposed the government of Israel. The Rev. Pat Robertson even suggested that Sharon’s subsequent stroke was God’s punishment for abandoning land the Bible declared to be God’s patrimony to the Jews.Today, however, more and more Jewish voices are being heard expressing concern about the growing liaison between Jewish and evangelical groups.Writing in the May 2007 issue of Sh’ma, Gershon Gorenberg, author of The Accidental Empire: Israel and the Birth of the Settlements l967-l977 and The End of Days: Fundamentalism and the Struggle for The Temple Mount, described Israel’s Evangelical supporters as follows: This is the kind of friend your mother should have warned you about when you were young: the one you accept when you are feeling unpopular, who is loud, dares you to do dangerous things, gives you a bad name, drives other people away.
Evangelical Christians are antagonistic to any territorial division of the Holy Land.
The existence of Israel, Gorenberg noted, proves that prophecy is coming true. For that the Jews are loved, he wrote. Yet the Jews—says the same theology—live in obstinate error as deniers of Jesus and will pay the price. Radio evangelist Chuck Missler, for instance, has asserted that Auschwitz was just a little prelude to what will happen to Jews in the approaching Last Days…This kind of cheering squad poses two practical risks. The first is that Israeli politicians will be tempted to believe that they can count on support for intransigence—indeed, that American political support will be most firm when they are most unbending. Christian Zionists are encouraging Israel to live dangerously.Jews who welcome Christian Zionist support, Gorenberg noted, dismiss the Evangelical theology. Since they don’t believe in the apocalypse or Second Coming, he noted, they regard such predictions as irrelevant. What matters [to them] is here-and-now support. This attitude shows spectacular disrespect for allies who base their lives on theology…The believers look forward to war. Mike Evans, who has built an evangelical ministry on supporting Israel, writes in his book Jerusalem Betrayed that an apocalypse is coming in Israel and urges readers to pray for that to happen.I don’t like that they would not like to see Israel trade land for peace, said Rabbi Jonathan Biatch of Temple Beth El in Madison, Wisconsin, because in my view that’s a very important formula. The real bottom line is the fact that this organization [CUFI] would like to exacerbate tensions in the Middle East so it will lead to Armageddon.
In Sacramento, California, the city’s largest Reform synagogue, Congregation B’nai Israel, declined to participate in the local Christians United for Israel event. Elsewhere, however, Jewish groups have joined with Hagee’s organization. A recent Night To Honor Israel held outside Minneapolis raised $l00,000.David Elcott, executive director of the Israel Policy Forum and former director of Interreligious Affairs for the American Jewish Committee, said this of the Jewish-Evangelical alliance in the May 2007 Sh’ma:Christian Zionists, Evangelicals who know God’s will from their biblical insights and offer a literal reading of Scriptures, concern me…In fact, their support may endanger Israel’s future more than our fickle mainline Protestant friends…The last five governments of Israel have called for a Palestinian state living next to a secure, demographically viable Israel. Christian Zionists unequivocally condemn that solution.Elcott pointed out that Israelis support a two-state solution by a two-to-one margin. The last Hebrew University Truman Center study showed that 58 per cent of Israelis would negotiate with Hamas right now. A clear majority of American Jews polled in the latest American Jewish Committee survey also seek a Palestinian state as part of a negotiated settlement. Meanwhile, Evangelical Christians are antagonistic to any territorial division of the Holy Land, even if such an agreement could bring peace.Concluded Elcott: We should embrace in friendship and in dialogue all our Christian brothers and sisters, seek common cause where we can while engaging in respectful dialogue when we disagree…But it is time to unequivocally reframe the Middle East debate and make clear that the greatest defenders of the State of Israel…are those of us who advocate for an end to the conflict and peace for all those who reside in the land that all call holy.
In May, a typical Night To Honor Israel took place in Alexandria, Virginia. It was sponsored by The Jerusalem Connection International (JCI), under the auspices of CUFI. The Rev. Jim Hutchens, president of JCI and regional director of CUFI, was emphatic in his belief that Israel should not make any kind of territorial compromise with her neighbors. One of the speakers, the Rev. Jan Willem van der Hoeven, director of the International Christian Zionist Center in Jerusalem, received a standing ovation after urging President George W. Bush: Do not divide the land and give the terrorists a base.Another speaker, WorldNetDaily.com founder and writer Joseph Farah, called the 2005 Gaza disengagement ethnic cleansing by the Israeli government that was an invitation to another genocide. Republican presidential candidate Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-CA) said that it was on a trip to Israel a number of years ago that he decided he would never…support the giving up of one inch of the state of Israel. That will always be my position.Jewish participants in this meeting included Rabbi Marvin Bash, rabbi emeritus of Congregation Etz Hayim in Arlington, Virginia and chaplain at Fort Belvoir Jewish Military Congregation, and Rabbi Jack Moline of Agudas Achim Congregation in Alexandria. Rabbi Bash acknowledged that Jews who are more liberal about territorial compromise might have been uncomfortable with the program, but said he himself took a hard-line position and was not bothered by the opposition to giving back West Bank territory. Rabbi Moline thanked the group in his invocation for its love of the Jewish people and enduring love for the land of Israel and the state of Israel.
Also attending the meeting was Martin Peled-Flax, minister-counselor for domestic affairs at the Embassy of Israel. Thanking those in attendance for their past support for Israel, the Israeli diplomat urged them to continue to speak up and not be silent.Challenging those rabbis who agreed to participate in this Night To Honor Israel, Rabbi Gerald Serotta of Temple Shalom in Chevy Chase, Maryland, declared that, Most of us believe that Israel as a Jewish and democratic state cannot survive while controlling the entire Land of Israel. This is the most pressing reason not to give support to Christians United For Israel, and in fact to oppose their political impact. Serotta suggested that the rabbis should have told the audience that Kedushat Haam [survival of the Jewish people] is more important than Kedushat Haaretz [sanctity of the land].There is, of course, a certain irony in Jewish groups, which call for strict separation of church and state within the American political arena and sharply challenge the political role played by evangelical groups, to embrace—together with those very groups—a policy toward Israel based on an interpretation of biblical law. Philip Weiss, writing in the June 4, 2007 issue of The American Conservative, noted that, “Many Jews with strong feelings about Israel—many of whom…have never been there—are helping to shape public perceptions. Almost all these opinion-makers are self-described secular Jews who get worked up about separating church and state when it’s evangelical Christians trying to change laws on stem-cell research, abortion and gay marriage. Yet these seculars are often invested themselves, without being aware of it, in a religious ideology—a Jewish nationalist claim on the Holy Land inscribed in the Old Testament.
Jerry Falwell’s Role
The role of the late Jerry Falwell in forging the alliance between Christian fundamentalism and right-wing Zionism cannot be overestimated. In 1978, Falwell traveled to Israel on a trip sponsored for and by the Israeli government. In 1979, when Prime Minister Menachem Begin was building Jewish settlements throughout the West Bank, the Israelis extended another free trip. Falwell traveled the road toward the Palestinian town of Nablus, turned off the highway and stood at a cluster of prefabricated houses built by Jewish settlers. At the time, Falwell declared that God was kind to America only because America has been kind to the Jews. At a gala dinner in New York in 1980, Prime Minister Begin bestowed upon Falwell a medal named for Vladimir Jabotinsky, the right-wing Zionist leader. In 1981, when Israel bombed Iraq’s nuclear reactor, Begin immediately called Jerry Falwell for support.
Expressing this mindset in Congress, Sen. James M. Inhofe (R-OK) stated on March 4, 2002 on the Senate floor, I believe very strongly that we ought to support Israel…because God said so…Look it up in the Book of Genesis…This is not a political battle at all. It is a contest over whether or not the word of God is true.Rabbi Eric Yoffie, president of the Union for Reform Judaism, believes that inviting John Hagee to address AIPAC, and the growing alliance between Jewish and evangelical groups, may be alienating Jewish young people. As he wrote in the May 18 Forward: We have learned from extensive research that these young people are more socially liberal than their baby-boomer parents. They are pluralistic in their thinking and they are tolerant of difference…They respond negatively to those who disparage other religious traditions and who make exclusivist religious claims. They are inherently centrist in their political views on the Middle East. And they are suspicious of a Jewish establishment that they see as too focused on money and insufficiently focused on values. And so whom do we offer to these young people as a spokesman for Israel? John Hagee, who is contemptuous of Muslims, dismissive of gays, possesses a triumphalist theology and opposes a two-state solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict. If our intention was to distance our young adults from the Jewish state, we could not have made a better choice.Beyond this, Yoffie wrote, Even worse, a primary motive here seems to be that we see Hagee and his Christians United for Israel as a source of dollars for federation coffers. The pattern has been that in return for federation sponsorship of dinners hosted by the lobbying group, contributions are made by Christians United for Israel to our federation fund-raising campaigns. The conclusion that our young people are most likely to draw from this arrangement is that we are simply selling our souls.
Allan C. Brownfeld is a syndicated columnist and associate editor of the Lincoln Review, a journal published by the Lincoln Institute for Research and Education, and editor of Issues, the quarterly journal of the American Council for Judaism.
Saturday, September 08, 2007
BIN LADEN VIDEO
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.
Subtropical Storm Gabrielle forms SEPT 8,07
MIAMI - Subtropical Storm Gabrielle formed Friday off the southeast U.S. coast, and a tropical storm watch was issued for portions of the South Carolina and North Carolina coast. At 11 p.m, Gabrielle had top sustained winds near 45 mph and was centered about 385 miles southeast of Cape Lookout, N.C., the National Hurricane Center said. It was moving west northwest near 10 mph and was expected to continue along the same path during the next 24 hours.A tropical storm watch was issued for portions of the South Carolina and North Carolina coast from Edisto Beach northward to Oregon Inlet, including Pamlico Sound. A tropical storm watch means that tropical storm conditions are possible within the watch area within the next 36 hours.
Subtropical systems are hybrid weather formations that are typically weaker than hurricanes. They share characteristics of tropical storms, which get their power from warm ocean waters, and more normal storms that form when warm and cold fronts collide.Gabrielle is the second subtropical storm to form this year. Subtropical Storm Andrea formed in May about 150 miles northeast of Daytona Beach, before the June 1 official start to hurricane season. Andrea skirted the southern Atlantic coast but caused minimal damage.
Seven dead, one missing in Romania floods Fri Sep 7, 1:55 PM ET
BUCHAREST (AFP) - Seven people drowned and one was missing after severe floods following heavy rains in eastern Romania, the interior ministry said Friday, updating the toll. Three elderly women were found dead in their homes in the town of Tecuci in Galati county, the worst hit by the flooding, the ministry said.Nearly 1,400 people had been evacuated as a thousand homes were flooded, while train services were also badly disrupted.The labour ministry said it had released emergency aid totalling some two million euros for the victims.
Typhoon batters Tokyo By Hiroaki Watanabe
Fri Sep 7, 8:23 AM ET
TOKYO (Reuters) - A typhoon pounded Tokyo and surrounding areas on Friday, killing at least one man and snarling transport and power supplies, before weakening and moving north. The typhoon, the biggest to hit Tokyo since October 2002, brought down record rainfall in many parts of the capital, but by afternoon it had weakened to a tropical storm.Rescue workers searched for homeless people swept away by a swollen Tama river as they slept in shacks along its banks in western Tokyo.Many were winched to safety by helicopters, although local officials said they were not sure how many others had been living along the river bank. Kyodo news agency said 29 people had been rescued.By noon, the worst of Typhoon Fitow, whose name means beautiful fragrant flower in a Micronesian language, had passed to the north of Tokyo.The flood warning for the Tama river was lifted and train service in the capital had mostly returned to normal.The eye of the storm was near the Tsugaru Peninsula, some 600 km (375 miles) north of Tokyo, bringing with it winds gusting to 90 km (56 miles) an hour as of 7 p.m. (6 a.m. EDT), the Japan Meteorological Agency said.
It had picked up speed and was heading north at 40 km (25 miles) an hour.Apple growers in the path of the storm hurried to pick their crops as the storm approached.
If the apples get damaged by falling, all the effort and cost up until now will be wasted, a farmer told NHK as he harvested apples five days ahead of schedule.During the night, a 76-year-old man was killed by a falling tree northwest of Tokyo, local police said. At least 69 people had been injured and another was missing, NHK television said.A construction worker died after being trapped in a landslide that had hit a dam being built in Fukui, northwestern Japan, a local government official said. But it was not clear whether the death was linked to the typhoon, he added.
Bedraggled commuters struggled to get to work on Friday with some expressways closed and trains, including high-speed bullet services, delayed or cancelled on many lines. About 10 million people commute to work or school in Tokyo.
Some travelers blamed climate change.
It's rare for Tokyo to get hit directly like this, said Miho Kaido, a 36-year-old tourist who came by taxi to Tokyo station to catch a bus to Aomori in northern Japan. The worst thing is that the trains are not running. I think global warming is having an impact and making the weather more severe.In central Tokyo, tree branches and leaves littered the streets and broken umbrellas were snagged in fences and under parked cars after the stormy night, as clean-up crews moved methodically in the rain to remove the debris.In July, a typhoon killed three people and injured more than 70 when it hit the southern island of Kyushu and moved along the country's eastern coastline.(Additional reporting by Isabel Reynolds, Yoko Kubota, Linda Sieg, George Nishiyama and Teruaki Ueno)
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.
Is China quietly dumping US Treasuries?
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
Last Updated: 12:25am BST 06/09/2007
A sharp drop in foreign holdings of US Treasury bonds over the last five weeks has raised concerns that China is quietly withdrawing its funds from the United States, leaving the dollar increasingly vulnerable.
China threatens nuclear option of dollar sales
Data released by the New York Federal Reserve shows that foreign central banks have cut their stash of US Treasuries by $48bn since late July, with falls of $32bn in the last two weeks alone.This comes as a big surprise and it is definitely worrying, said Hans Redeker, currency chief at BNP Paribas.We won't know if China is behind this until the Treasury releases its TIC data in November, but what it does show is that world central banks are in a hurry to get out of the US. They don't seem to be switching into other currencies, so it is possible they are moving into gold instead. Gold is now gaining momentum across all currencies and has broken through resistance at 500 euros, he said.While the greenback has been resilient over recent weeks - even regaining something of a 'safe-haven' role as banks scrambled to buy the currency to cover dollar debts - most experts believe that America's $850bn current account deficit will eventually cause the dollar to resume its relentless slide.David Powell, an economist at IDEAglobal in New York, pointed the finger at Beijing as the main suspect in the sudden bond flight this summer.In a client note entitled Has China started to dump US Treasuries?, he said the sales appear to coincide with early moves by Beijing to launch its new $300bn sovereign wealth fund.
The scheme is part of the government's plan to diversify it $1,340bn reserves from bonds (mostly in the US) to a broader portfolio of investments and a better yield.
If so, the switch comes at a very delicate time, just as tempers flair on both sides of the Pacific over China's policy of holding down yuan by currency intervention. A bill in Congress calls for punitive tariff sanctions of 27.5pc against Chinese imports, and there has been a growing outcry over contaminated pet food and lead-tainted toys.Two top advisers to the Chinese government gave strong hints in August that Beijing should use its estimated $900bn holdings of US Treasuries and agency bonds as a bargaining chip, words taken as an implicit threat to trigger as US bond crash if provoked.The Chinese government has since put out an official statement clarifying that it has no intention in taking such an irresponsible step, which would in any case backfire by devaluing China's remaining holding.Mr Powell said the switch out of Treasuires was a purely commercial decision. If if turns out that the Chinese are behind this, it is merely an attempt to increase returns on investment. It has nothing to do with settling protectionist scores, he said.Any evidence that China was pulling out would risk setting off an unstoppable stampede, which is why such a policy would never be announced. It holds the world's biggest pool of resrves, followed by Japan.Robin Bhar, a metals analyst at UBS, said there was little evidence yet that Asian central banks were switching heavily into gold. Most of the recent buying of gold has been on the COMEX futures markets, the playground of hedge funds.Central banks tend to buy their bullion in London at the AM and PM fixings, leaving a footprint that is visible to experts. They seem to have been largely absent from the market so far.
Stocks drop after weak jobs report By TIM PARADIS, AP Business Writer
SEPT 8,07
NEW YORK - Wall Street plunged while bonds surged higher Friday after the government reported payrolls in August fell for the first time in four years rather than rising as had been expected. The Dow Jones industrial average fell nearly 250 points.
Investors were taken aback by the Labor Department's report that payrolls dropped by 4,000 in August, the first decline since August 2003. Economists had forecast payrolls would increase by 110,000. However, the unemployment rate held steady at 4.6 percent as expected.Wall Street had been awaiting the report all week as it sought to determine how well the economy was holding up under the weight of a faltering housing market, a rise in mortgage defaults and tightening availability of credit. While the report is backward looking, investors regard it as an important proxy of the economy's overall health.This certainly cements the case for a Fed action at the next meeting. The debate has really become about whether it will be 25 or 50 basis points, said Zach Pandl, economist at Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., referring to whether the central bank would reduce rates by a quarter point or a half percentage point. He expects the Fed will reduce rates by 25 basis points to 5 percent when it meets Sept. 18.
The Dow fell 249.97, or 1.87 percent, to 13,113.38.
Broader stock indicators also skidded. The Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 25.00, or 1.69 percent, to 1,453.55, and the Nasdaq composite index fell 48.62, or 1.86 percent, to 2,565.70.The three major indexes, though still in positive territory for the year, all finished the week down more than 1 percent.Bonds, meanwhile, soared following the jobs report as investors sought safety. The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note, which moves inversely to its price, skidded to 4.37 percent from 4.51 percent late Thursday.The dollar fell sharply following the report, as the likelihood of an interest rate cut appeared to increase. Dollar-based assets would earn less interest if the Fed were to cut rates. In addition, gold prices rose sharply because some investors would be expected to abandon a weakening dollar and move into gold if the central bank lowers rates.This is just the expected response, said Pandl, referring to Wall Street's reaction to the jobs report. The markets are repricing for lower growth and expectations of Fed cuts.While the employment report clearly unnerved an already jittery Wall Street, some investors had been looking for a weak showing, arguing that a drop in employment could offer adequate reason for the Federal Reserve to lower short-term interest rates. But the employment report appeared to signal too much weakness even for those pulling for a rate cut. Making matters worse, the Labor Department revised the jobs figures for June and July, saying the economy added fewer jobs than had been reported.The central bank has left its fed funds rate unchanged for more than a year as it has sought to hold down inflation. But recent upheavals in financial markets have stirred concerns of a slowing economy and led some investors to expect a rate cut.
Consumers who feel confident in their ability to continue to earn are likely to keep spending, investors reason, and consumer spending is responsible for about two-thirds of U.S. economic activity.It is a pretty solid data point that gives people real cause for concern, said James Sonneborn, wealth manager at RegentAtlantic Capital LLC, noting that he generally tries to avoid placing too much emphasis on a single economic reading.It certainly gives the Fed cover to cut rates and the rationale, he said, noting that the central bank has sounded fewer cautionary notes recently about inflation, always one of its chief concerns. Still, Sonneborn doesn't expect the employment report will prompt the Fed to cut rates before its meeting on the 18th.They never want to show a panic. You might get a change in the commentary or the tone when the Fed president's speak publicly. That might be their opportunity to verbally guide people toward what they're thinking.
Several regional Fed presidents are scheduled to speak next week.
Comments from one former Fed official — Alan Greenspan — perhaps added to Wall Street's unease Friday. The Wall Street Journal reported the former Fed chairman on Thursday told a group of economists in Washington that the recent market turmoil is similar to that of 1987, when the Black Monday crash occurred, and of 1998, when the big hedge fund Long-Term Capital Management came close to collapsing. Greenspan's comments come about a month ahead of the 20th anniversary of the stock market's crash on Oct. 19, 1987. The flurry of disappointing news came a day after stocks had posted sizable gains on the notion that mixed economic data revealed an economy that was holding up but not growing at such a pace to push inflation higher and rule out a rate cut. A variety of retailers posted stronger-than-expected sales for August, while a report on the nation's service sector, where most Americans work, showed it expanded in August at the same rate as in July. And on Wednesday, a series of anecdotal reports from the Fed's regional banks found only limited instances in which the jitters in the financial markets in the past seven weeks — particularly in August — had dampened business activity outside the real estate sector. Investors in oil appeared able to largely shake off concerns about the employment picture. Light, sweet crude rose 40 cents to $76.70 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
Declining issues outnumbered advancers by more than 3 to 1 on the New York Stock Exchange, where consolidated volume came to 3.19 billion shares, up from 2.74 billion on Thursday. The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies fell 17.13, or 2.16 percent, to 775.79. The U.S. jobs report prompted broader selling in markets overseas. Britain's FTSE 100 closed down 1.93 percent, Germany's DAX index fell 2.43 percent, and France's CAC-40 fell 2.63 percent. In Asia, Japan's Nikkei stock average closed down 0.83 percent. Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index fell 0.28 percent, while the often-volatile Shanghai Composite Index fell 2.16 percent. The Dow Jones industrial average ended the week down 244.36, or 1.83 percent, at 13,113.38. The Standard & Poor's 500 index finished down 20.44, or 1.39 percent, at 1,453.55. The Nasdaq composite index ended down 30.66, or 1.18 percent, at 2,565.70. The Russell 2000 index finished the week down 17.07, or 2.15 percent, at 775.79. The Dow Jones Wilshire 5000 Composite Index — a free-float weighted index that measures 5,000 U.S. based companies — ended Friday at 14,655.52, down 192.18, or 1.29 percent, for the week. A year ago, the index was at 12,948.96. On the Net: New York Stock Exchange: http://www.nyse.com ,Nasdaq Stock Market: http://www.nasdaq.com
THERE ARE 2 ELECTS THE CHURCH AND ISRAEL
ISRAEL ON EARTH DURING TRIBULATION 7 YR PEACE TREATY
ISAIAH 42:1
1 Behold my servant, whom I uphold; mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth; I have put my spirit upon him: he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.
ISAIAH 45:4
4 For Jacob my servant's sake, and Israel mine elect, I have even called thee by thy name: I have surnamed thee, though thou hast not known me.
ISAIAH 65:9,22
9 And I will bring forth a seed out of Jacob, and out of Judah an inheritor of my mountains: and mine elect shall inherit it, and my servants shall dwell there.
22 They shall not build, and another inhabit; they shall not plant, and another eat: for as the days of a tree are the days of my people, and mine elect shall long enjoy the work of their hands.
ROMANS 11:28
28 As concerning the gospel, they are enemies for your sakes: but as touching the election, they are beloved for the fathers' sakes.
THE CHURCH ELECT IN HEAVEN DURING 7 YR TREATY
1 PETER 1:2
1:2 Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace unto you, and peace, be multiplied.
Study finds U.S. Jews distance selves from Israel By Michael Conlon, Religion Writer Thu Sep 6, 1:12 AM ET
CHICAGO (Reuters) - Young U.S. non-Orthodox Jews are becoming increasingly lukewarm if not alienated in their support for Israel in a trend that is not likely to be reversed, according to a study released on Thursday. Blending into U.S. society, including marriage to non-Jews and a tendency to look on Judaism more in religious terms than ethnic ones, is part of what's happening, the study found.For our parent's generation, the question that mattered was, how do we regard Israel? For Generation Y (born after 1976) the question is indeed, why should we regard Israel? said Roger Bennett, a vice president of The Andrea and Charles Bronfman Philanthropies, which sponsored the study.Until people recognize that a healthy and animated dialogue about Israel is the first step to a meaningful connection, the 'Israel debate' that takes place in America is liable to become moot well before Israel celebrates its 100th birthday, he added.U.S. support backed by a vocal and politically powerful Jewish lobby has been a key feature of the Jewish state's success since its founding in 1948, an event that is widely backed by U.S. Jews and non-Jews.But the study found that feelings of attachment may well be changing as warmth gives way to indifference, and indifference gives way even to downright alienation.The study found only 48 percent of U.S. Jews under age 35 believe that Israel's destruction would be a personal tragedy for them, compared to 77 percent of those 65 and older.In addition, only 54 percent of those under the age of 35 are comfortable with the idea of a Jewish State as opposed to 81 percent of those 65 and older.It did find higher levels of support among U.S. Jews, regardless of age, who had visited Israel.
VARIOUS AFFILIATIONS
There are perhaps 6 million Jews in the United States, only about a third of them affiliated with a congregation. Of those who do attend a synagogue, perhaps 40 percent are classified as liberal Reform, 32 percent middle-ground Conservative and 8 percent Orthodox, according to surveys.The findings were based on a representative sample of 1,704 non-Orthodox Jews in 2006 and 2007 contacted in writing. Its error margin was plus or minus three percentage points. The authors said they excluded Orthodox Jews because they tend to be overwhelmingly supportive of Israel.In general U.S. Jews have increasingly adopted the American idea of what it means to be Jewish -- primarily a religious identity, Steven Cohen of Hebrew Union College, co-author of the study, said in an interview.The decline in attachment is widespread. It doesn't depend on how you measure it, Cohen added, with the disengagement no different among political liberals or conservatives.Cohen also said inter-marriage with other faiths had a strong impact with younger Jews being much more likely to be married to non-Jews.The trend is part of a long-term historic slide not likely to be reversed since people do not seem to significantly grow in their attachment to Israel as they age, the study said.Steven Bayme, director of contemporary Jewish life for the American Jewish Committee, a major pro-Israel lobbying group, said assimilation is the biggest problem with declining support among U.S. Jews, but he said it is not new.
People growing up where there always has been an Israel are more detached, he said.
But the study breaks new ground, he added, in finding that politics do not underpin declining support -- that it is not as many assume a response to Israel's handling of the peace process or problems with religious pluralism in the country. Bayme also said that even though Orthodox Jews were not included in the study, the segment represents strong signs of Jewish renewal -- children involved in the Hebrew faith in numbers far disproportionate to those of non-Orthodox families and who in the future will help counter the effects of assimilation outside their ranks, he said.
WORLD TERRORISM
GENESIS 6:11-13
11 The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.
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 through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.
2 PETER 2:5
5 And spared not the old world, but saved Noah the eighth person, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly;
2 PETER 3:7
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
LEVITICUS 26:16
16 I also will do this unto you; I will even appoint over you( sudden) terror, consumption, and the burning ague, that shall consume the eyes, and cause sorrow of heart: and ye shall sow your seed in vain, for your enemies shall eat it.
GENESIS 16:11-12
11 And the angel of the LORD said unto her, Behold, thou art with child, and shalt bear a son, and shalt call his name Ishmael; because the LORD hath heard thy affliction.
12 And he will be a wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man's hand against him; and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.
ISAIAH 33:1,18-19 Woe to thee that spoilest,(destroys) and thou wast not spoiled;(destroyed) and dealest treacherously, and they dealt not treacherously with thee! when thou shalt cease to spoil,(destroy) thou shalt be spoiled;(destroyed) and when thou shalt make an end to deal treacherously, they shall deal treacherously with thee.
18 Thine heart shall meditate terror. Where is the scribe? where is the receiver? where is he that counted the towers?
19 Thou shalt not see a fierce people, a people of a deeper speech than thou canst perceive; of a stammering tongue, that thou canst not understand.
JOHN 16:2
2 They shall put you out of the synagogues: yea, the time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service.
Bin Laden urges Americans to convert By LEE KEATH, Associated Press Writer
SEPT 8,07
CAIRO, Egypt - Osama bin Laden appeared for the first time in three years in a video Friday released ahead of the sixth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, telling Americans they should convert to Islam if they want the war in Iraq to end. American officials said the U.S. government had obtained a copy even though the video had not been posted yet by al-Qaida — and intelligence agencies were studying the video to determine whether it was authentic and looking for clues about bin Laden's health.
The 30-minute video was obtained by the SITE Institute, a Washington-based group that monitors terrorist messages, and provided to the Associated Press.The footage gives a rare look at the al-Qaida leader, who has likely avoided appearing in videos as a security measure. His emergence comes at a time when terrorism experts believe his terror network is regrouping in the lawless Pakistan-Afghanistan border region — and it underlines the U.S. failure to catch him.In the video, a short excerpt of which was broadcast to the Arab world by Al-Jazeera television, bin Laden wears a white robe, a white circular cap and a beige cloak seated behind a table while reading an address to the American people from papers in front of him.His trimmed beard is shorter than in his last video, in 2004, and is fully black — apparently dyed, since in past videos it was mostly gray. He speaks softly, as he usually does, and has dark bags under his eyes, but his appearance dispelled rumors that he had died.U.S. President George W. Bush made the rare move of speaking about an al-Qaida video. The tape is "a reminder about the dangerous world in which we live, he told reporters on the sidelines of a summit of Pacific Rim nations in Sydney, Australia.
It's important that we show resolve and determination to protect ourselves, deny al-Qaida safe haven and support young democracies, Bush said.In the video, Bin Laden makes no overt threats and does not directly call for attacks.Instead, he addresses Americans, lecturing them on the failures of their leaders to stop the war in Iraq despite growing public opposition in the U.S.He says there were two solutions to stopping the Iraq war. One is from our side, and it is to escalate the fighting and killing against you. This is our duty, and our brothers are carrying it out, bin Laden said.The second solution is from your side. ... I invite you to embrace Islam, he said.One result of that, bin Laden said, would be an end to the Iraq war. He said warmongering owners of the major corporations would rush to appease voters who showed they are looking for an alternative, and this alternative is Islam.
He derided Bush, saying events in Iraq have gotten out of control and the American leader is like the one who plows and sows the sea: He harvests nothing but failure.
Bin Laden frequently criticized capitalism, calling its leaders the real terrorists and threats to human freedom.This is why I tell you: as you liberated yourselves before from the slavery of monks, kings and feudalism, you should liberate yourselves from the deception, shackles and attrition of the capitalist system, he said.Bin Laden's attacks in the video on capitalism, multinational corporations and globalization led several current and former government officials to believe an American — 28-year-old Adam Gadahn — may have written at least part of the speech.
Gadahn, who has been charged with treason and supporting terrorism for serving as an al-Qaida propagandist, has appeared in several past al-Qaida-produced videos, lecturing against capitalism and globalization and making insider references to American culture. It has Adam Gadahn written all over it, one former senior intelligence official said of bin Laden's tape, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue. The video appeared to have been recently made. At one point, bin Laden mentions that several days ago Japan marked the 62nd anniversary of the Aug. 6, 1945, atomic bomb attack on Hiroshima. He also refers to the Democratic Party's congressional victory in last fall's election and to French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who was elected in May.He also shows a grasp of current events, dropping mentions of global warming and saying Americans are reeling under the burdens of a mortgage crisis.
And he praises author Noam Chomsky, an early critic of the Iraq war, as well as Michael Scheuer, former head of the CIA's bin Laden unit, who has said poor U.S. leadership was losing the war against terrorist groups. Bin Laden knows Bush has low approval ratings, knows the significance of a growing awareness of global warming, said Thomas Sanderson, deputy director of the Transnational Threats Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. He's trying to capitalize on what he sees as a shift back to the middle in American politics.Al-Qaida annually uses the anniversary of the Sept. 11 suicide attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon as a propaganda opportunity, issuing videotapes to rally supporters and mock the United States. But the appearance of bin Laden this year makes a bigger splash. The al-Qaida leader had not appeared in new video footage since October 2004, and he had not put out an audiotape in more than a year, his longest period without a message. His deputy, Egyptian-born Ayman al-Zawahri, has issued numerous videos and audiotapes in the meantime as al-Qaida has increased the sophistication and speed of its media operations.
Seth Jones, a terrorism expert at the RAND think tank, said that while the anniversary gives the pretext for the tape, it also comes at a time when the main al-Qaida leadership has managed to regroup. There clearly has been a resurgence of core al-Qaida in the tribal areas of Pakistan along the frontier with Afghanistan since 2005, Jones said. He said sympathy in that region for the Taliban has made it more receptive to militant Sunni groups, including al-Qaida. It's really created a sanctuary, Jones said. Rita Katz, director of the SITE Institute, said she believes strongly that al-Qaida has regrouped but that its core bases are more scattered than previously, comprising several training camps in Pakistan and Afghanistan. She said it was likely bin Laden is hidden in a more secure location, away from any of those sites. During the video, bin Laden's image moves for only a total of about 3 1/2 minutes in two segments, staying frozen the rest of the time while his remarks continue.A former senior U.S. intelligence official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said it might have resulted from a technical glitch while al-Qaida passed the video through a variety of computer sites to mask its cyber trail.
The United States intercepted the video before it was released on Islamic Web sites where al-Qaida usually posts its messages, a U.S. counterterrorism official said in Washington. U.S. officials had analyzed the video for hours before transcripts and videos were leaked, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue. The official said analysts were studying bin Laden's physical characteristics — for clues about his health after unconfirmed rumors earlier this year that he had died of kidney disease. Soon after word emerged that the United States had the video, Islamic militant Web sites that usually carry statements from al-Qaida went down and were inaccessible. Hours later, the sites were back up, but by late Friday, the video still had not been released on the militant Web sites. The reason for the shutdown was not immediately known. Evan H. Kohlmann, a terrorism expert at globalterroralert.com, said he suspected it was the work of al-Qaida itself, trying to find how the video leaked to U.S. officials.
Associated Press writers Lara Jakes Jordan, Pamela Hess and Matthew Lee in Washington and Sarah DiLorenzo in New York contributed to this report.
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.
Subtropical Storm Gabrielle forms SEPT 8,07
MIAMI - Subtropical Storm Gabrielle formed Friday off the southeast U.S. coast, and a tropical storm watch was issued for portions of the South Carolina and North Carolina coast. At 11 p.m, Gabrielle had top sustained winds near 45 mph and was centered about 385 miles southeast of Cape Lookout, N.C., the National Hurricane Center said. It was moving west northwest near 10 mph and was expected to continue along the same path during the next 24 hours.A tropical storm watch was issued for portions of the South Carolina and North Carolina coast from Edisto Beach northward to Oregon Inlet, including Pamlico Sound. A tropical storm watch means that tropical storm conditions are possible within the watch area within the next 36 hours.
Subtropical systems are hybrid weather formations that are typically weaker than hurricanes. They share characteristics of tropical storms, which get their power from warm ocean waters, and more normal storms that form when warm and cold fronts collide.Gabrielle is the second subtropical storm to form this year. Subtropical Storm Andrea formed in May about 150 miles northeast of Daytona Beach, before the June 1 official start to hurricane season. Andrea skirted the southern Atlantic coast but caused minimal damage.
Seven dead, one missing in Romania floods Fri Sep 7, 1:55 PM ET
BUCHAREST (AFP) - Seven people drowned and one was missing after severe floods following heavy rains in eastern Romania, the interior ministry said Friday, updating the toll. Three elderly women were found dead in their homes in the town of Tecuci in Galati county, the worst hit by the flooding, the ministry said.Nearly 1,400 people had been evacuated as a thousand homes were flooded, while train services were also badly disrupted.The labour ministry said it had released emergency aid totalling some two million euros for the victims.
Typhoon batters Tokyo By Hiroaki Watanabe
Fri Sep 7, 8:23 AM ET
TOKYO (Reuters) - A typhoon pounded Tokyo and surrounding areas on Friday, killing at least one man and snarling transport and power supplies, before weakening and moving north. The typhoon, the biggest to hit Tokyo since October 2002, brought down record rainfall in many parts of the capital, but by afternoon it had weakened to a tropical storm.Rescue workers searched for homeless people swept away by a swollen Tama river as they slept in shacks along its banks in western Tokyo.Many were winched to safety by helicopters, although local officials said they were not sure how many others had been living along the river bank. Kyodo news agency said 29 people had been rescued.By noon, the worst of Typhoon Fitow, whose name means beautiful fragrant flower in a Micronesian language, had passed to the north of Tokyo.The flood warning for the Tama river was lifted and train service in the capital had mostly returned to normal.The eye of the storm was near the Tsugaru Peninsula, some 600 km (375 miles) north of Tokyo, bringing with it winds gusting to 90 km (56 miles) an hour as of 7 p.m. (6 a.m. EDT), the Japan Meteorological Agency said.
It had picked up speed and was heading north at 40 km (25 miles) an hour.Apple growers in the path of the storm hurried to pick their crops as the storm approached.
If the apples get damaged by falling, all the effort and cost up until now will be wasted, a farmer told NHK as he harvested apples five days ahead of schedule.During the night, a 76-year-old man was killed by a falling tree northwest of Tokyo, local police said. At least 69 people had been injured and another was missing, NHK television said.A construction worker died after being trapped in a landslide that had hit a dam being built in Fukui, northwestern Japan, a local government official said. But it was not clear whether the death was linked to the typhoon, he added.
Bedraggled commuters struggled to get to work on Friday with some expressways closed and trains, including high-speed bullet services, delayed or cancelled on many lines. About 10 million people commute to work or school in Tokyo.
Some travelers blamed climate change.
It's rare for Tokyo to get hit directly like this, said Miho Kaido, a 36-year-old tourist who came by taxi to Tokyo station to catch a bus to Aomori in northern Japan. The worst thing is that the trains are not running. I think global warming is having an impact and making the weather more severe.In central Tokyo, tree branches and leaves littered the streets and broken umbrellas were snagged in fences and under parked cars after the stormy night, as clean-up crews moved methodically in the rain to remove the debris.In July, a typhoon killed three people and injured more than 70 when it hit the southern island of Kyushu and moved along the country's eastern coastline.(Additional reporting by Isabel Reynolds, Yoko Kubota, Linda Sieg, George Nishiyama and Teruaki Ueno)
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.
Is China quietly dumping US Treasuries?
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
Last Updated: 12:25am BST 06/09/2007
A sharp drop in foreign holdings of US Treasury bonds over the last five weeks has raised concerns that China is quietly withdrawing its funds from the United States, leaving the dollar increasingly vulnerable.
China threatens nuclear option of dollar sales
Data released by the New York Federal Reserve shows that foreign central banks have cut their stash of US Treasuries by $48bn since late July, with falls of $32bn in the last two weeks alone.This comes as a big surprise and it is definitely worrying, said Hans Redeker, currency chief at BNP Paribas.We won't know if China is behind this until the Treasury releases its TIC data in November, but what it does show is that world central banks are in a hurry to get out of the US. They don't seem to be switching into other currencies, so it is possible they are moving into gold instead. Gold is now gaining momentum across all currencies and has broken through resistance at 500 euros, he said.While the greenback has been resilient over recent weeks - even regaining something of a 'safe-haven' role as banks scrambled to buy the currency to cover dollar debts - most experts believe that America's $850bn current account deficit will eventually cause the dollar to resume its relentless slide.David Powell, an economist at IDEAglobal in New York, pointed the finger at Beijing as the main suspect in the sudden bond flight this summer.In a client note entitled Has China started to dump US Treasuries?, he said the sales appear to coincide with early moves by Beijing to launch its new $300bn sovereign wealth fund.
The scheme is part of the government's plan to diversify it $1,340bn reserves from bonds (mostly in the US) to a broader portfolio of investments and a better yield.
If so, the switch comes at a very delicate time, just as tempers flair on both sides of the Pacific over China's policy of holding down yuan by currency intervention. A bill in Congress calls for punitive tariff sanctions of 27.5pc against Chinese imports, and there has been a growing outcry over contaminated pet food and lead-tainted toys.Two top advisers to the Chinese government gave strong hints in August that Beijing should use its estimated $900bn holdings of US Treasuries and agency bonds as a bargaining chip, words taken as an implicit threat to trigger as US bond crash if provoked.The Chinese government has since put out an official statement clarifying that it has no intention in taking such an irresponsible step, which would in any case backfire by devaluing China's remaining holding.Mr Powell said the switch out of Treasuires was a purely commercial decision. If if turns out that the Chinese are behind this, it is merely an attempt to increase returns on investment. It has nothing to do with settling protectionist scores, he said.Any evidence that China was pulling out would risk setting off an unstoppable stampede, which is why such a policy would never be announced. It holds the world's biggest pool of resrves, followed by Japan.Robin Bhar, a metals analyst at UBS, said there was little evidence yet that Asian central banks were switching heavily into gold. Most of the recent buying of gold has been on the COMEX futures markets, the playground of hedge funds.Central banks tend to buy their bullion in London at the AM and PM fixings, leaving a footprint that is visible to experts. They seem to have been largely absent from the market so far.
Stocks drop after weak jobs report By TIM PARADIS, AP Business Writer
SEPT 8,07
NEW YORK - Wall Street plunged while bonds surged higher Friday after the government reported payrolls in August fell for the first time in four years rather than rising as had been expected. The Dow Jones industrial average fell nearly 250 points.
Investors were taken aback by the Labor Department's report that payrolls dropped by 4,000 in August, the first decline since August 2003. Economists had forecast payrolls would increase by 110,000. However, the unemployment rate held steady at 4.6 percent as expected.Wall Street had been awaiting the report all week as it sought to determine how well the economy was holding up under the weight of a faltering housing market, a rise in mortgage defaults and tightening availability of credit. While the report is backward looking, investors regard it as an important proxy of the economy's overall health.This certainly cements the case for a Fed action at the next meeting. The debate has really become about whether it will be 25 or 50 basis points, said Zach Pandl, economist at Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., referring to whether the central bank would reduce rates by a quarter point or a half percentage point. He expects the Fed will reduce rates by 25 basis points to 5 percent when it meets Sept. 18.
The Dow fell 249.97, or 1.87 percent, to 13,113.38.
Broader stock indicators also skidded. The Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 25.00, or 1.69 percent, to 1,453.55, and the Nasdaq composite index fell 48.62, or 1.86 percent, to 2,565.70.The three major indexes, though still in positive territory for the year, all finished the week down more than 1 percent.Bonds, meanwhile, soared following the jobs report as investors sought safety. The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note, which moves inversely to its price, skidded to 4.37 percent from 4.51 percent late Thursday.The dollar fell sharply following the report, as the likelihood of an interest rate cut appeared to increase. Dollar-based assets would earn less interest if the Fed were to cut rates. In addition, gold prices rose sharply because some investors would be expected to abandon a weakening dollar and move into gold if the central bank lowers rates.This is just the expected response, said Pandl, referring to Wall Street's reaction to the jobs report. The markets are repricing for lower growth and expectations of Fed cuts.While the employment report clearly unnerved an already jittery Wall Street, some investors had been looking for a weak showing, arguing that a drop in employment could offer adequate reason for the Federal Reserve to lower short-term interest rates. But the employment report appeared to signal too much weakness even for those pulling for a rate cut. Making matters worse, the Labor Department revised the jobs figures for June and July, saying the economy added fewer jobs than had been reported.The central bank has left its fed funds rate unchanged for more than a year as it has sought to hold down inflation. But recent upheavals in financial markets have stirred concerns of a slowing economy and led some investors to expect a rate cut.
Consumers who feel confident in their ability to continue to earn are likely to keep spending, investors reason, and consumer spending is responsible for about two-thirds of U.S. economic activity.It is a pretty solid data point that gives people real cause for concern, said James Sonneborn, wealth manager at RegentAtlantic Capital LLC, noting that he generally tries to avoid placing too much emphasis on a single economic reading.It certainly gives the Fed cover to cut rates and the rationale, he said, noting that the central bank has sounded fewer cautionary notes recently about inflation, always one of its chief concerns. Still, Sonneborn doesn't expect the employment report will prompt the Fed to cut rates before its meeting on the 18th.They never want to show a panic. You might get a change in the commentary or the tone when the Fed president's speak publicly. That might be their opportunity to verbally guide people toward what they're thinking.
Several regional Fed presidents are scheduled to speak next week.
Comments from one former Fed official — Alan Greenspan — perhaps added to Wall Street's unease Friday. The Wall Street Journal reported the former Fed chairman on Thursday told a group of economists in Washington that the recent market turmoil is similar to that of 1987, when the Black Monday crash occurred, and of 1998, when the big hedge fund Long-Term Capital Management came close to collapsing. Greenspan's comments come about a month ahead of the 20th anniversary of the stock market's crash on Oct. 19, 1987. The flurry of disappointing news came a day after stocks had posted sizable gains on the notion that mixed economic data revealed an economy that was holding up but not growing at such a pace to push inflation higher and rule out a rate cut. A variety of retailers posted stronger-than-expected sales for August, while a report on the nation's service sector, where most Americans work, showed it expanded in August at the same rate as in July. And on Wednesday, a series of anecdotal reports from the Fed's regional banks found only limited instances in which the jitters in the financial markets in the past seven weeks — particularly in August — had dampened business activity outside the real estate sector. Investors in oil appeared able to largely shake off concerns about the employment picture. Light, sweet crude rose 40 cents to $76.70 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
Declining issues outnumbered advancers by more than 3 to 1 on the New York Stock Exchange, where consolidated volume came to 3.19 billion shares, up from 2.74 billion on Thursday. The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies fell 17.13, or 2.16 percent, to 775.79. The U.S. jobs report prompted broader selling in markets overseas. Britain's FTSE 100 closed down 1.93 percent, Germany's DAX index fell 2.43 percent, and France's CAC-40 fell 2.63 percent. In Asia, Japan's Nikkei stock average closed down 0.83 percent. Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index fell 0.28 percent, while the often-volatile Shanghai Composite Index fell 2.16 percent. The Dow Jones industrial average ended the week down 244.36, or 1.83 percent, at 13,113.38. The Standard & Poor's 500 index finished down 20.44, or 1.39 percent, at 1,453.55. The Nasdaq composite index ended down 30.66, or 1.18 percent, at 2,565.70. The Russell 2000 index finished the week down 17.07, or 2.15 percent, at 775.79. The Dow Jones Wilshire 5000 Composite Index — a free-float weighted index that measures 5,000 U.S. based companies — ended Friday at 14,655.52, down 192.18, or 1.29 percent, for the week. A year ago, the index was at 12,948.96. On the Net: New York Stock Exchange: http://www.nyse.com ,Nasdaq Stock Market: http://www.nasdaq.com
THERE ARE 2 ELECTS THE CHURCH AND ISRAEL
ISRAEL ON EARTH DURING TRIBULATION 7 YR PEACE TREATY
ISAIAH 42:1
1 Behold my servant, whom I uphold; mine elect, in whom my soul delighteth; I have put my spirit upon him: he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles.
ISAIAH 45:4
4 For Jacob my servant's sake, and Israel mine elect, I have even called thee by thy name: I have surnamed thee, though thou hast not known me.
ISAIAH 65:9,22
9 And I will bring forth a seed out of Jacob, and out of Judah an inheritor of my mountains: and mine elect shall inherit it, and my servants shall dwell there.
22 They shall not build, and another inhabit; they shall not plant, and another eat: for as the days of a tree are the days of my people, and mine elect shall long enjoy the work of their hands.
ROMANS 11:28
28 As concerning the gospel, they are enemies for your sakes: but as touching the election, they are beloved for the fathers' sakes.
THE CHURCH ELECT IN HEAVEN DURING 7 YR TREATY
1 PETER 1:2
1:2 Elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: Grace unto you, and peace, be multiplied.
Study finds U.S. Jews distance selves from Israel By Michael Conlon, Religion Writer Thu Sep 6, 1:12 AM ET
CHICAGO (Reuters) - Young U.S. non-Orthodox Jews are becoming increasingly lukewarm if not alienated in their support for Israel in a trend that is not likely to be reversed, according to a study released on Thursday. Blending into U.S. society, including marriage to non-Jews and a tendency to look on Judaism more in religious terms than ethnic ones, is part of what's happening, the study found.For our parent's generation, the question that mattered was, how do we regard Israel? For Generation Y (born after 1976) the question is indeed, why should we regard Israel? said Roger Bennett, a vice president of The Andrea and Charles Bronfman Philanthropies, which sponsored the study.Until people recognize that a healthy and animated dialogue about Israel is the first step to a meaningful connection, the 'Israel debate' that takes place in America is liable to become moot well before Israel celebrates its 100th birthday, he added.U.S. support backed by a vocal and politically powerful Jewish lobby has been a key feature of the Jewish state's success since its founding in 1948, an event that is widely backed by U.S. Jews and non-Jews.But the study found that feelings of attachment may well be changing as warmth gives way to indifference, and indifference gives way even to downright alienation.The study found only 48 percent of U.S. Jews under age 35 believe that Israel's destruction would be a personal tragedy for them, compared to 77 percent of those 65 and older.In addition, only 54 percent of those under the age of 35 are comfortable with the idea of a Jewish State as opposed to 81 percent of those 65 and older.It did find higher levels of support among U.S. Jews, regardless of age, who had visited Israel.
VARIOUS AFFILIATIONS
There are perhaps 6 million Jews in the United States, only about a third of them affiliated with a congregation. Of those who do attend a synagogue, perhaps 40 percent are classified as liberal Reform, 32 percent middle-ground Conservative and 8 percent Orthodox, according to surveys.The findings were based on a representative sample of 1,704 non-Orthodox Jews in 2006 and 2007 contacted in writing. Its error margin was plus or minus three percentage points. The authors said they excluded Orthodox Jews because they tend to be overwhelmingly supportive of Israel.In general U.S. Jews have increasingly adopted the American idea of what it means to be Jewish -- primarily a religious identity, Steven Cohen of Hebrew Union College, co-author of the study, said in an interview.The decline in attachment is widespread. It doesn't depend on how you measure it, Cohen added, with the disengagement no different among political liberals or conservatives.Cohen also said inter-marriage with other faiths had a strong impact with younger Jews being much more likely to be married to non-Jews.The trend is part of a long-term historic slide not likely to be reversed since people do not seem to significantly grow in their attachment to Israel as they age, the study said.Steven Bayme, director of contemporary Jewish life for the American Jewish Committee, a major pro-Israel lobbying group, said assimilation is the biggest problem with declining support among U.S. Jews, but he said it is not new.
People growing up where there always has been an Israel are more detached, he said.
But the study breaks new ground, he added, in finding that politics do not underpin declining support -- that it is not as many assume a response to Israel's handling of the peace process or problems with religious pluralism in the country. Bayme also said that even though Orthodox Jews were not included in the study, the segment represents strong signs of Jewish renewal -- children involved in the Hebrew faith in numbers far disproportionate to those of non-Orthodox families and who in the future will help counter the effects of assimilation outside their ranks, he said.
WORLD TERRORISM
GENESIS 6:11-13
11 The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence.
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 through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth.
2 PETER 2:5
5 And spared not the old world, but saved Noah the eighth person, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood upon the world of the ungodly;
2 PETER 3:7
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
LEVITICUS 26:16
16 I also will do this unto you; I will even appoint over you( sudden) terror, consumption, and the burning ague, that shall consume the eyes, and cause sorrow of heart: and ye shall sow your seed in vain, for your enemies shall eat it.
GENESIS 16:11-12
11 And the angel of the LORD said unto her, Behold, thou art with child, and shalt bear a son, and shalt call his name Ishmael; because the LORD hath heard thy affliction.
12 And he will be a wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man's hand against him; and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.
ISAIAH 33:1,18-19 Woe to thee that spoilest,(destroys) and thou wast not spoiled;(destroyed) and dealest treacherously, and they dealt not treacherously with thee! when thou shalt cease to spoil,(destroy) thou shalt be spoiled;(destroyed) and when thou shalt make an end to deal treacherously, they shall deal treacherously with thee.
18 Thine heart shall meditate terror. Where is the scribe? where is the receiver? where is he that counted the towers?
19 Thou shalt not see a fierce people, a people of a deeper speech than thou canst perceive; of a stammering tongue, that thou canst not understand.
JOHN 16:2
2 They shall put you out of the synagogues: yea, the time cometh, that whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth God service.
Bin Laden urges Americans to convert By LEE KEATH, Associated Press Writer
SEPT 8,07
CAIRO, Egypt - Osama bin Laden appeared for the first time in three years in a video Friday released ahead of the sixth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, telling Americans they should convert to Islam if they want the war in Iraq to end. American officials said the U.S. government had obtained a copy even though the video had not been posted yet by al-Qaida — and intelligence agencies were studying the video to determine whether it was authentic and looking for clues about bin Laden's health.
The 30-minute video was obtained by the SITE Institute, a Washington-based group that monitors terrorist messages, and provided to the Associated Press.The footage gives a rare look at the al-Qaida leader, who has likely avoided appearing in videos as a security measure. His emergence comes at a time when terrorism experts believe his terror network is regrouping in the lawless Pakistan-Afghanistan border region — and it underlines the U.S. failure to catch him.In the video, a short excerpt of which was broadcast to the Arab world by Al-Jazeera television, bin Laden wears a white robe, a white circular cap and a beige cloak seated behind a table while reading an address to the American people from papers in front of him.His trimmed beard is shorter than in his last video, in 2004, and is fully black — apparently dyed, since in past videos it was mostly gray. He speaks softly, as he usually does, and has dark bags under his eyes, but his appearance dispelled rumors that he had died.U.S. President George W. Bush made the rare move of speaking about an al-Qaida video. The tape is "a reminder about the dangerous world in which we live, he told reporters on the sidelines of a summit of Pacific Rim nations in Sydney, Australia.
It's important that we show resolve and determination to protect ourselves, deny al-Qaida safe haven and support young democracies, Bush said.In the video, Bin Laden makes no overt threats and does not directly call for attacks.Instead, he addresses Americans, lecturing them on the failures of their leaders to stop the war in Iraq despite growing public opposition in the U.S.He says there were two solutions to stopping the Iraq war. One is from our side, and it is to escalate the fighting and killing against you. This is our duty, and our brothers are carrying it out, bin Laden said.The second solution is from your side. ... I invite you to embrace Islam, he said.One result of that, bin Laden said, would be an end to the Iraq war. He said warmongering owners of the major corporations would rush to appease voters who showed they are looking for an alternative, and this alternative is Islam.
He derided Bush, saying events in Iraq have gotten out of control and the American leader is like the one who plows and sows the sea: He harvests nothing but failure.
Bin Laden frequently criticized capitalism, calling its leaders the real terrorists and threats to human freedom.This is why I tell you: as you liberated yourselves before from the slavery of monks, kings and feudalism, you should liberate yourselves from the deception, shackles and attrition of the capitalist system, he said.Bin Laden's attacks in the video on capitalism, multinational corporations and globalization led several current and former government officials to believe an American — 28-year-old Adam Gadahn — may have written at least part of the speech.
Gadahn, who has been charged with treason and supporting terrorism for serving as an al-Qaida propagandist, has appeared in several past al-Qaida-produced videos, lecturing against capitalism and globalization and making insider references to American culture. It has Adam Gadahn written all over it, one former senior intelligence official said of bin Laden's tape, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue. The video appeared to have been recently made. At one point, bin Laden mentions that several days ago Japan marked the 62nd anniversary of the Aug. 6, 1945, atomic bomb attack on Hiroshima. He also refers to the Democratic Party's congressional victory in last fall's election and to French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who was elected in May.He also shows a grasp of current events, dropping mentions of global warming and saying Americans are reeling under the burdens of a mortgage crisis.
And he praises author Noam Chomsky, an early critic of the Iraq war, as well as Michael Scheuer, former head of the CIA's bin Laden unit, who has said poor U.S. leadership was losing the war against terrorist groups. Bin Laden knows Bush has low approval ratings, knows the significance of a growing awareness of global warming, said Thomas Sanderson, deputy director of the Transnational Threats Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. He's trying to capitalize on what he sees as a shift back to the middle in American politics.Al-Qaida annually uses the anniversary of the Sept. 11 suicide attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon as a propaganda opportunity, issuing videotapes to rally supporters and mock the United States. But the appearance of bin Laden this year makes a bigger splash. The al-Qaida leader had not appeared in new video footage since October 2004, and he had not put out an audiotape in more than a year, his longest period without a message. His deputy, Egyptian-born Ayman al-Zawahri, has issued numerous videos and audiotapes in the meantime as al-Qaida has increased the sophistication and speed of its media operations.
Seth Jones, a terrorism expert at the RAND think tank, said that while the anniversary gives the pretext for the tape, it also comes at a time when the main al-Qaida leadership has managed to regroup. There clearly has been a resurgence of core al-Qaida in the tribal areas of Pakistan along the frontier with Afghanistan since 2005, Jones said. He said sympathy in that region for the Taliban has made it more receptive to militant Sunni groups, including al-Qaida. It's really created a sanctuary, Jones said. Rita Katz, director of the SITE Institute, said she believes strongly that al-Qaida has regrouped but that its core bases are more scattered than previously, comprising several training camps in Pakistan and Afghanistan. She said it was likely bin Laden is hidden in a more secure location, away from any of those sites. During the video, bin Laden's image moves for only a total of about 3 1/2 minutes in two segments, staying frozen the rest of the time while his remarks continue.A former senior U.S. intelligence official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said it might have resulted from a technical glitch while al-Qaida passed the video through a variety of computer sites to mask its cyber trail.
The United States intercepted the video before it was released on Islamic Web sites where al-Qaida usually posts its messages, a U.S. counterterrorism official said in Washington. U.S. officials had analyzed the video for hours before transcripts and videos were leaked, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue. The official said analysts were studying bin Laden's physical characteristics — for clues about his health after unconfirmed rumors earlier this year that he had died of kidney disease. Soon after word emerged that the United States had the video, Islamic militant Web sites that usually carry statements from al-Qaida went down and were inaccessible. Hours later, the sites were back up, but by late Friday, the video still had not been released on the militant Web sites. The reason for the shutdown was not immediately known. Evan H. Kohlmann, a terrorism expert at globalterroralert.com, said he suspected it was the work of al-Qaida itself, trying to find how the video leaked to U.S. officials.
Associated Press writers Lara Jakes Jordan, Pamela Hess and Matthew Lee in Washington and Sarah DiLorenzo in New York contributed to this report.
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