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World War 3 Has Started
May 29th, 2009
CommentaryYnet News - Eitan Haber
Categories: Commentary;The Nation Of Israel;War

Israeli leaders must understand broad implications of North Korean nuke test

One needs to be deaf, blind, and an idiot at this time in order not to understand that the nuclear bomb tested in North Korea two days ago also exploded in the Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem.

 The North Koreans blatantly disregarded the Americans and publically presented them as a meaningless power, yet officials in Jerusalem are still reciting the “Road Map” and making note of the evacuation of some minor West Bank outpost. The world is changing before our eyes, yet here we see Knesset members earnestly explaining that the Americans will agree that we stay in Judea and Samaria if we only evacuate some tin shacks.

Two days ago, in North Korea, World War III officially got underway – the war that would pit “crazy” states such as North Korea and Iran, for example, against states we shall characterize as “moderate,” including Egypt, Gulf states, and Saudi Arabia, which at this time leads the Arab initiative for peace with Israel.Two days ago, in North Korea, World War III officially got underway – the war that would pit “crazy” states such as North Korea and Iran, for example, against states we shall characterize as “moderate,” including Egypt, Gulf states, and Saudi Arabia, which at this time leads the Arab initiative for peace with Israel.

Ever since Sunday, the world has gone crazy, and this crazy world is monitoring with horror the struggle between the “moderate” and “crazy” states. The problem is that some of those crazy states – Iran, Pakistan, and North Korea – already have, or will have, a nuclear button to push, while the moderates, headed by the United States, are not eager to rush into battle.

 Why? Because America is already entangled in wars, and there was someone who recently won the presidential elections there, among other reasons because he pledged to remove US troops from the Iraqi and Afghani quagmire. That same president promised that we shall live in a world free of nuclear weapons. Remember that?

 A Gordian knot

This is the same North Korea that spat in America’s face three years ago, and this week it did it again. Based on the reactions in Washington (unless they are part of a deception campaign,) it doesn’t appear that the great America will respond. Now all we need is for Iran to blatantly disregard America and Israel in order to prompt us to slide into real emergency turmoil (as opposed to the drill planned for the coming days.)

 Iran is here already. There is a direct and intimate link between the Korean bomb and the planned Iranian bomb; between Iran’s and North Korea’s spit in America’s face, Washington’s desire and ability to lead the fight against the crazy world, and the Israeli government’s conduct.

One does not need to be a supporter or rival of the settlement enterprise in the territories to understand this Gordian knot – and the question is whether we want the American sword to undo it for us.

 If the answer is positive, we need to be familiar with the Americans to realize that three tin huts removed from the Maoz Ester outpost are not good enough.

Will Obama Trigger the ‘nuclear Option’?
May 29th, 2009
CommentaryHuman Events .com - Gary Bauer
Categories: Commentary;Warning

This week it became clear that President Obama’s choices may end up triggering the “nuclear option.”

No, I don’t mean that the Empathy President’s choice of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice David Souter will result in Democrats changing the Senate rules (the “nuclear option”) to end a Republican filibuster.  

Instead, I’m talking about Obama’s foreign policy choices, which are prompting tyrants the world over to thumb their noses at our new president and in some cases to test their nuclear capabilities.  As the world tries to determine whether President Obama’s empathy extends to maniacal foreign tyrants, one thing is clear: it will take more than eloquent words to compel America’s enemies to behave.  

On Monday, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (Why is it that the world’ most despotic regimes so often have the most democratic-sounding names?) defied international sanctions and conducted its second nuclear test, which preliminary seismic readings showed as much more potent than its first test in 2006.  

More than anything, North Korea’s misbehavior focuses attention on just how little leverage the United States has with China.  China is the one country that has any sway over North Korea, because it provides the North Koreans with most of their food, energy and protection.  In fact, without China’s help, the North Korean regime would topple.  Sadly, any influence the U.S. might have with the Chinese is diminishing as the Obama administration borrows more and more money from them to finance its socialist domestic agenda.   

 Though there is some concern that North Korea may use a nuclear weapon, the greater worry is its ongoing cooperation with Syria and Iran, whose foreign policy agenda includes the oft-repeated goal of “wip[ing] Israel off the map.”

To that end, Iran’s Hitler wannabe, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, test fired a missile capable of hitting Israel and American military facilities across the Middle East and southern Europe.

He also detonated a verbal bomb by rebuffing Barack Obama’s invitations to chat by announcing that he has no intention of negotiating with anyone about his nuclear weapons program.  

Instead Ahmadinejad said, “Our talks [with the major powers] will be only in the framework of cooperation for managing global issues, and nothing else.” And to demonstrate his intention to be a world power, he sent several Iranian warships into international waters.  

None of this is to say that Iran’s and North Korea’s nuclear pursuits are all about Obama.  Indeed, both have domestic reasons for acting out, and both nations’ nuclear programs have been going on for decades.  Kim Jong Il, the North Korean psychotic known by his slaves as “Dear Leader,” suffered a stroke last year, and his successful development of a nuclear bomb is a way to reassert his rule, to prove to his people and the world that he is still in charge.  Ahmadinejad is trying to play up his resistance to world powers ahead of Iran’s June 12th presidential election.  But both countries’ actions were clearly undertaken with Obama partly in mind.  

But it is not only North Korea and Iran that are rebuffing President Obama’s pleas to play nice.  Consider Sudan, whose “president,” Omar al-Bashir, recently became the first sitting head of state to be indicted for war crimes and crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court.  Bashir has said kind things about President Obama including that he “welcome[s] the positive signs sent by U.S. President Barack Obama to the Islamic world on more than one occasion.”  

Whatever those “positive signs” are, however, they clearly have not encouraged Bashir to stop savaging his own people. Last month, Bashir expelled 13 western aid agencies from Darfur, an act that placed millions of Darfuris at risk of disease and starvation.  Now there are signs that Bashir is preparing to renew war with Southern Sudan, where a fragile peace agreement is on the verge of collapse.

Then there’s Cuba, where Obama’s recent decision to ease the U.S. embargo against the Marxist regime has been met with derision.  This week, Fidel Castro ended any speculation that the U.S. and Cuba would soon be headed toward warmer relations.  Castro declared in an essay on the government’s website that any talk of freeing the roughly 250 political prisoners in Cuba’s gulag is a nonstarter.  Castro, who had previously expressed admiration for Obama, criticized the American president for showing signs of “superficiality.”  

 These past few days have made clear that Barack Obama’s charm and kindness offensive has accomplished little other than to validate a group of despotic leaders reassured in their belief that they can act with impunity.  All this comes at a bad time, just as the Obama administration’s budget proposals include a decrease in funding for our own missile defense programs.

On Memorial Day, President Obama paid homage to our military veterans, those who, in Obama’s words, “waged war so that we might know peace.” In what was described as a moving tribute, the president reassured Americans that there is “nothing I will not do to keep our country safe…”  

That’s good to hear.  But how long will it be before our president realizes that there is nothing our enemies will not do to keep our country in peril?

What Will History Record
May 29th, 2009
Daily NewsJerusalem Watchman
Categories: Today's Headlines;The Nation Of Israel;Warning

That in mid-May, 2009, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu appealed to the United States to make a priority of stopping Iran from pursuing the nuclear bomb that threatens Israel’s existence.

That the Obama administration refused.

And that just over one week later, America was standing on the edge of a potential nuclear conflict with North Korea, which test-fired an atomic warhead and launched a handful of surface-to-surface missiles in a defiant show of force.

Let me be clear: I do not claim that what I am about to write is “a word from the Lord.” Some of the thoughts I will express here have simply “dropped into my head” over the last 24 hours; they came without any leading from a third party and, while they resonate in my spirit, they have not been confirmed by two or three witnesses; or even one. Nor have I had any dreams or visions about this.

On May 18, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met in the White House with the president of the United States, Barack Obama.

Both the run-up to and aftermath of that much anticipated meeting have been spun every which way by the media, with a solid majority of columnists and talk show hosts focusing in on “the relationship,” on “reading between the lines” and on analyzing the “body language” between the two.

Some harked back to the days when frigid winds blew in the Clinton White House after a Netanyahu visit during the Israeli’s first tenure in office. Would “Bibi” again forget his “place?” Watchers saw a nervous “regional power medium weight” sitting opposite a self-assured “global superpower heavyweight,” and they gave the American kudos for not allowing Netanyahu to “deflect” him from the “real obstacle to peace,” that is, Jewish settlements. To other observers,Netanyahu strongly withstood the not inconsiderable pressures an American administration can bring to bear. He stuck to his guns, refused to subscribe to the “two-state solution” and should have been welcomed home as a hero. (He wasn’t.)

There was more; much more analysis, from serious reporters and from the fringe, underscoring why the profession is often referred to as a media circus.

But let’s put aside the fluff of press predilections and spinmeister speculations, and get to the substance of what’s really taken place.

It’s a matter of gravest consequence.

Netanyahu didn’t go to the White House seeking a photo opportunity. He went to ask for American leadership and support in dealing with the out-of-control Iranian nuclear threat that is primarily directed against the Jewish state.

From the day of his inauguration on March 31, Netanyahu has been looking for Washington to take Iran seriously.

“If you don’t stop Iran, I’ll have to,” he messaged Obama, just hours before being sworn in.

Instead of responding appropriately, the American dissembled. Get going with the two-state solution, Obama shot back, and we’ll be better able to deal with Tehran.

This was Obama’s response too when the two leaders spoke to the press after their May 18 meeting.

Netanyahu said “the worst danger Israel faces is that Iran would develop nuclear military capabilities.”

“Iran openly calls for our destruction, which is unacceptable. It threatens the moderate Arab regimes in the Middle East. It threatens US interests worldwide. But if Iran were to acquire nuclear weapons, it could give a nuclear umbrella to terrorists or worse, could actually give them nuclear weapons. And that would put us all in great peril.”

Netanyahu’s position was that it was necessary to deal with Iran first, and with the “Palestinian” question later.

Obama publicly disputed him.

“If there is a linkage between Iran and the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, I personally believe it actually runs the other way,” the American said. “To the extent that we can make peace with the Palestinians — between the Palestinians and the Israelis, then I actually think it strengthens our hand in the international community in dealing with the potential Iranian threat.”

The president went on to suggest that he might reassess his “let’s talk” approach to Iran if, by year’s end, there was no sign it was having an affect. Netanyahu expressed his appreciation, but administration officials “close to Obama” later quickly emphasized that no deadline had been set.

What, in fact, do we have here?

Israel’s leader has asked the US to help stop Iran from acquiring the means to inflict a holocaust on the Jews.

America’s leader is not willing to go that way. On the contrary, as The Jerusalem Post’s Caroline Glick wrote, the Obama “administration has made its peace with Iran’s nuclear aspirations. Senior administration officials acknowledge as much in off-record briefings. It is true, they say, that Iran may exploit its future talks with the US to run down the clock before they test a nuclear weapon. But, they add, if that happens, the US will simply have to live with a nuclear-armed mullocracy.”

Two days after Netanyahu met with Obama, Iran successfully test fired a ‘Sajil’ surface-to-surface missile with a 1,200 mile range. Israel is less than 1000 miles from Iran.

Two days later, on May 22, a public survey indicated that one in four Israelis is so fearful of the specter of a nuclear Iran that they plan to leave their homeland forever if the mullahs get their hands on the bomb.

On May 24 Iran’s former Revolutionary Guards chief Mohsen Rezai warned that his country “understands missiles and tanks as well as foreign policy and knows exactly where Israel’s sensitive spots are. It could stop them forever with one strike.”

On May 25, a grim-faced Bibi told his cabinet: If we don’t deal with Iran, no one will.

On May 27, a new poll found that 51 percent of Israelis want the IDF to strike Iran’s nuclear facilities now. This despite Bibi’s warning to expect a large number of Israeli casualties if a strike goes down. Iranians have boasted that they have the capability to destroy Israel within just 11 days.

Also on May 27, Iran deployed six warships and other vessels into international waters in what Fox News called a “saber-rattling” move.

For five days this coming week the world, and specifically the United States government, will watch the Israeli nation ready for full scale war in the largest ever national military exercise since 1948.

But Netanyahu’s appeal for America to step up to the plate has fallen on deaf ears.

Instead, the Obama administration finds the idea of “reaching out to the Muslim world” more appealing just now.

And it knows that one of the most effective ways it can do that is by pushing Israel into compliance with the ‘Arab Peace Initiative.’

Thus did Secretary of State Hillary Clinton emphasize Wednesday the American “expectation” that Israel would immediately comply with the Arab demand that it halt any and all settlement activity.

President Obama “wants to see a stop to settlements - not some settlements, not outposts, not ‘natural growth’ exceptions,” Clinton said. “We think it is in the best interests [of the peace process] that settlement expansion cease. That is our position. That is what we have communicated very clearly. … And we intend to press that point.”

Do they?

How interesting then, that exactly one week after spurning Israel’s appeal, the United States this week suddenly finds itself confronting a nuclear-detonating, missile launching North Korea?

Is it really just happenstance that Hillary Clinton Wednesday evening, at the same news conference, in almost the same breath, was leveling stern warnings at both Jerusalem and Pyongyang?

Or is Someone Else fighting for Israel?

History will tell.

Russia's First Persian Gulf Naval Presence Coordinated With Tehran
May 29th, 2009
Daily newswww.debka.com
Categories: Today's Headlines;Prophecy

Russian warships are due to call Wednesday, May 27, at the Bahrain port of Manama, seat of the US Fifth Fleet in the Persian Gulf, DEBKAfile's military sources reveal. They will be following in the wake of the Russian vessels already docked at the Omani port of Salalah, the first to avail themselves of facilities at Gulf ports.

Their arrival is fully coordinated between the Russian and Iranian naval commands.

According to our sources, this is the first time a Russian flotilla will have taken on provisions and fuel at the same Gulf ports which hitherto serviced only the US Navy. Moscow has thus gained its first maritime foothold in the Persian Gulf.

The flotilla consists of four vessels from Russia's Pacific Fleet: The submarine fighter Admiral Panteleyev is due at Manama Wednesday, escorted by the refueling-supply ship Izhorai, The supply-battleship Irkut and the rescue craft BM-37 are already docked in Salalah. 

DEBKAfile's military sources report that the Russians, like the Iranians, cover their stealthy advance into new waters by apparent movements for joining the international task force combating Somali pirates. While Iranian warships have taken up positions in the Gulf of Aden, the Russians are moving naval units southeast into the Persian Gulf.

Monday, May 25, the Iranian naval chief, Adm. Habibollah Sayyari, announced that six Iranian warships had been dispatched to "the international waters" of the Gulf of Aden in a "historically unprecedented move… to show its ability to confront any foreign threats." He did not bother to mention the pirates. 

Russian and Iranian naval movements in the two strategic seas are clearly synchronized at the highest levels in Tehran and Moscow.

Our military analysts find Russia and Iran seizing the moment for supplanting positions held exclusively by the US and other western fleets. They are taking advantage of two developments:

1. The number of US warships maintained in the Gulf has been reduced to its lowest level in two years; President Obama quietly reduced their presence near Iran's shores in order to generate a positive atmosphere for the coming US dialogue with the Islamic Republic. Not a single US aircraft carrier is consequently to be found anywhere in the Gulf region.

2. Monday, May 25, President Nicolas Sarkozy inaugurated France's first naval facility in the Gulf in Abu Dhabi. The Russian and Iranian policy-makers see no reason why Moscow cannot set up a military presence in the region if Paris can.

Editors Note.....The coming together of Russia Iran in military cooperation is a harbinger of the coming war of Ezekiel 38-39.

Relations With U.S. Plunge As Israel Snubs Barack Obama Over Settlements
May 29th, 2009
Daily Newsguardian.co.uk
Categories: Today's Headlines;The Church;Peace Process

Increasingly fractious relations between the US and Israel hit a low unseen in nearly two decades today after the Jewish state rejected President Barack Obama's demand for an end to settlement construction in the West Bank, and Washington threatened to "press the point".The dispute, which blew into the open hours before Obama was to meet the Palestinian leader, Mahmoud Abbas, reflects the depth of the shift in American policy away from accommodating Israel to pressuring it to end years of stalling on serious negotiations over the creation of a Palestinian state while continuing to grab land in the occupied territories.Obama put down a marker at a difficult meeting with the Israeli prime minister, Binyamin Netanyahu, in Washington this month when he demanded a halt to the expansion of settlements, which now house close to 500,000 Jews in the West Bank and occupied East Jerusalem and are a major obstacle to the establishment of an independent Palestine.The US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, made an unusually blunt call on Wednesday for a halt to settlement growth, including the construction of so-called "outposts" ? small informal settlements that are illegal even under Israeli law ? as well as the building of new houses in existing Jewish enclaves which the government describes as "natural growth".Clinton said Obama "wants to see a stop to settlements ? not some settlements, not outposts, not natural growth exceptions.We think it is in the best interests of the effort that we are engaged in that settlement expansion cease." She said the Americans "intend to press that point".Israel is committed to stop all settlement construction under the 2003 US road map to peace.
Yesterday the Israeli government spokesman, Mark Regev, said construction would continue inside existing settlements.
"Israel ...
will abide by its commitments not to build new settlements and to dismantle unauthorised outposts," he said.
"As to existing settlements, their fate will be determined in final status negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians.
In the interim period, normal life must be allowed to continue."Israel defines normal life as the construction of homes to accommodate the children of Jewish settlers when they grow up and marry.
Critics say that almost nowhere else in the world is it considered a right to build a house next to your parents' house.Netanyahu has offered to remove 26 of more than 120 outpost settlements, but both the US and Palestinians remain sceptical.
Israel has broken similar pledges repeatedly in recent years.The former prime minister, Ariel Sharon, promised President George Bush Jr to his face that the outposts would come down, but instead the Israeli government continued to allow new ones to be built, often with the assistance of the military and other state authorities.Settlements have long been viewed as a litmus test of Israel's intent.
Even at the height of the Oslo peace process, Israel more than doubled the number of Jews it moved to live in the West Bank, raising fundamental questions among the Palestinians as to whether it was more interested in grabbing land than peace.The dispute over settlements, and Netanyahu's defiance of Obama's call, is likely to set the tone for future relations as the White House attempts to radically change its approach by pressing Israel to move swiftly toward serious negotiations to end the occupation and establish an independent Palestinian state.Robert Malley, former special assistant for Arab-Israeli affairs to President Bill Clinton, said: "The surprise in this is not the Israeli position.
The surprise the forcefulness of the American one.
Rarely have we seen it at this pace and with this intensity and unambiguity.
The US has taken a position that doesn't give much wriggle room at all to the Israeli government".
But Malley said it remained unclear how far the White House would press Israel.Some US analysts say that the settlement issue is a good one for Obama to use to press Netanyahu because even among Israel's supporters in congress there is not much backing for the continued expansion of Jewish enclaves in the Palestinian territories.Other analysts say Obama will have to be careful not to allow a protracted dispute over the settlements to stall broader talks on the creation of a Palestinian state.But questions remain over how far Obama is prepared to push Israel when Congress remains strongly sympathetic to the Jewish state and the pro-Israel lobby continues to wield powerful influence.Obama's public stand on settlements is also intended to strengthen Abbas, who is politically weak and under pressure from Hamas.Palestinian officials say Abbas plans to raise the settlement issue as one of the major obstacles to the peace process.Israel's intelligence minister, Dan Meridor, met in London earlier this week with the US Middle East envoy, George Mitchell, for follow up meetings to Netanyahu's Washington visit, at which the settlement issue was also pressed.

Obama and Netanyahu Square Off
May 29th, 2009
Daily NewsJerusalem Newswire - Stan Goodenough
Categories: Today's Headlines;The Nation Of Israel;Peace Process

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and United States President Barack Obama were seen to be heading nearer confrontation this week over the right of Jews to live and raise their families in the Land of Israel.

Tension is growing between the two governments after Israel refused to bow to emphatically-expressed American expectations that any and all forms of "settlement activity" be halted immediately.

Obama made this demand when meeting with Netanyahu at the White House on May 18.

"There is a clear understanding that we have to make progress on settlements; that settlements have to be stopped in order for us to move forward," Obama said, seated next to the Israeli during a press conference after their meeting.

Netanyahu made no such commitment, and upon returning to Israel let Washington know that "natural growth" - which means that normal human daily life - will continue inside the established communities.

A few days after the Obama-Netanyahu meeting, Israeli Minister of Strategic Affairs Moshe Ya'alon stated publicly that this Israeli government will not comply with America's demands, adding that Israel will not let America "threaten us."

Obama's secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, was not willing to let this pass. Speaking to reporters Wednesday she stated categorically that the US sees stopping settlements as key to a peace deal that would see a Palestinian state created on half of the historical Jewish homeland.

Obama "wants to see a stop to settlements - not some settlements, not outposts, not 'natural growth' exceptions," Clinton said.

"We think it is in the best interests [of the land-for-peace process] that settlement expansion cease. That is our position."

Clinton bluntly warned that the United States "intend[s] to press that point."

Instead of being cowed, the Netanyahu government insisted that housing construction in the internationally-condemned Jewish communities will continue.

"Normal life in those communities must be allowed to continue," said government spokesman Mark Regev Thursday. The fate of the settlements would be determined, not by American dictates, but in peace negotiations with the Palestinian Arabs.

Ha'aretz, an ultra-leftist Israeli daily news service that is fearful of anything rupturing relations between Jerusalem and Washington, warned that Netanyahu's position "could set the stage for a showdown with the US."

Obama was described later the same day as trying to "gingerly" advance Mideast peace.

After meeting with Mahmoud Abbas, the leader of the PLO terrorist organization and the chairman of the terror-supporting Palestinian Authority (PA), the American recalled that he had pressed Netanyahu on the settlement matter just last week, reports the Associated Press, but that he wanted to give Israel a little more time, apparently before upping the pressure even more.

"I think it's important not to assume the worst, but to assume the best," Obama said.

Jews in Jerusalem and around the world stayed up all night to study the Bible
May 29th, 2009
News UpdateJimmy DeYoung
Categories: Jimmy DeYoung News

Early Friday morning tens of thousands of Jewish worshipers went to the Western Wall in Jerusalem at the Temple Mount for their morning prayers in honor of the holy day of Shavuot, the Jewish feast day of Pentecost, the Feast of Weeks with many of them having spent the night engrossed in study of the Torah, the first five books of the Bible. This Jewish feast day has an agricultural connection in accordance with the Biblical command to bring the first fruits of the wheat harvest to the temple. But without a temple in Jerusalem, the emphasis has been on celebrating the giving of the Torah at Mount Sinai some 3500 years ago - thus the all night study of the Bible.

Jimmy's Prophetic Prospective on the News

Even though the Jewish people celebrate Shavuot, the Feast of Pentecost, on the wrong day of the week, Jesus Christ has and will fulfill all all seven of the Jewish feasts on the right day - according to Bible prophecy.

God gave the seven Jewish feast days to the Jews before they had entered the Promised Land and He was very detailed with his instructions found in the Old Testament book of Leviticus 23. I mentioned that the Jews observe Pentecost, Shavuot, on the wrong day according to the command given in Leviticus 23. Leviticus 23:15-16 says that Pentecost should be observed on the day after the Sabbath, which would be Saturday, and in fact the seventh sabbath after the feast of Firstfruits which the Jews no longer observe. The feast should be celebrated on Sunday - not Friday.

It is interesting to note that Jesus was crucified on Passover, buried on Unleavened Bread, and He resurrected on Firstfruits, the first three Jewish feast days. Acts 2 says that the Day of Pentecost was when the Holy Spirit came upon the Church. Jesus actually fulfilled the first four Jewish feast days on the proper day called for in the Bible. Jesus the Messiah will come back to Earth on the Feast of Trumpets, go into the Holy of Holies on the Day of Atonement, and begin His reign during His Millenial Kingdom on the Feast of Tabernacles.

Jews celebrating the Feast of Pentecost is indeed a reminder that Bible prophecy will be fulfilled.

Israel Fears Hezbollah Anti - Aircraft Missiles Could Spark War
May 29th, 2009
Daily Newswww.alamanor.com
Categories: Today's Headlines;The Nation Of Israel;Warning

“The defense establishment is concerned that Hezbollah will try to smuggle advanced anti-aircraft missiles into Lebanon in the near future - yet another reason for the rising tension on the Israel-Lebanon border,” Haaretz newspaper said on Tuesday.

"Israel has made it clear in past statements that it will consider such a development as crossing a red line, which might necessitate preventative measures," the daily said. “It is believed that Hezbollah would like to deploy SA-8 batteries in Lebanon. Such weapons could pose a threat to Israel Air Force jets flying over the country.”

According to Haaretz, the Soviet-made missiles are part of Syria's military arsenal, and Hezbollah resistance fighters have received training on their use, inside Syrian territory.

It said Syria remains the main channel through which arms are transferred to Hezbollah, adding that almost a year ago, Israel relayed messages to both Damascus and Hezbollah, through several channels, warning that the Jewish state would consider launching air strikes against the convoys delivering the weapons, if they were brought into Lebanon.

"Then-prime minister Ehud Olmert and Defense Minister Ehud Barak hinted publicly that these weapons would "upset the (existing) balance" and that Israel would not tolerate such a development," Haaretz added. 

The Israeli daily said the past few weeks witnessed growing concern about the missile transfers in the wake of the June 7 Lebanese parliamentary elections in a show of force.

"The intelligence assessments regarding the missiles follow a long series of unusual developments in Lebanon that are contributing to rising tensions," including the discovery of Israeli spy rings, the Der Spiegel report on Hezbollah’s alleged involvement in the assassination of ex-Premier Rafik Hariri, and the unsettled score for the killing of Hezbollah military commander Martyr Imad Mughniyeh.

Islam Experts Wary of Plan for U.S. Muslim College
May 29th, 2009
Daily Newswww.christianpost.com
Categories: Today's Headlines;Warning

Two experts, one a Christian the other a devout Muslim, are both wary of a plan in progress to establish the first four-year accredited Islamic college in the United States.

Both fear that the proposed school, which could open as soon as next fall, would promote the idea of the Islamic state.

“Certainly, an attempt at the formation of an accredited college by Muslim academics can be a good thing if it is founded in the ideas of freedom and liberty and against Islamism (political Islam),” said Dr. M. Zuhidi Jasser, founder and president of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy (AIFD), to The Christian Post.

“But I’m not convinced that this college will be creating anti-Islamist Muslims who will reform sharia (Islamic law) and bring Muslim thought into an era where religious law can be separated from government as the Establishment Clause mandates,” he added.

Jasser, who is a devout practicing Muslim American and a former physician to the U.S. Congress, pointed out that one of the college’s main scholars, Imam Zaid Shakir, had said in a 2006 New York Times story that he hopes the United States will one day be a Muslim country ruled by Islamic law.

The “primary root cause” of Islamic radicalism, stressed Jasser, is the mission to establish an Islamic state.

“The leadership of Zaytuna [College] seems to be all about political Islam with no public critique of the global mission of the Muslim Brotherhood and other Islamist idealogies,” said Jasser, whose public critique of problems he sees in his faith has resulted in a backlash from the Muslim community.

He added, “I dream of the day where universities have established endowed chairs in the study of anti-Islamist studies from the viewpoint of freedom and with devout Muslims leading the charge and the academics.”

A group of American Muslims, including Zaid Shakir, is leading an effort to establish Zaytuna College, or what some call the “Muslim Georgetown.”

Shakir, who converted to Islam while serving in the U.S. Air Force, said the college will offer liberal arts education and Islamic studies, The Associated Press reported. The college plans to start with offering two majors: Arabic language and Islamic legal and theological studies.

In 1996, Shakir founded Zaytuna Institute based in Berkeley, Calif. The American Muslim imam, who now has tens of thousands of followers, was trained under Islamic scholars in North Africa and the Middle East for years after his conversion.

Shakir told the New York Times earlier that he wants the United States to be ruled by Islamic law “not by violent means, but by persuasion.”

Dr. William Wagner, author of How Islam Plans to Change the World, said he is not surprised about the plan to build a Muslim college in the United States. He said for years Islamists have planned to open universities in western countries.

“They see the value of education especially in educating their young leaders for eventual takeover of some western countries,” said Wagner, former professor of missions at Golden Gate Baptist Theological Seminary in San Francisco, to The Christian Post.

“Their strategy includes extensive student work in many U.S. universities and the start of a new university is only an extension of their main strategy,” he said.

Wagner served for over 30 years as a missionary in Europe, the Middle East and North Africa with the International Mission Board.

Currently, leaders of Zaytuna are in the midst of a fundraising campaign. They need $2 to $4 million to launch the school next year. A Zaytuna adviser told AP in a recent interview that the school will soon raise tens of millions of dollars to build a campus in the Bay area in the next few years.

Iran - Syria Alliance in Harmony
May 29th, 2009
Daily Newswww.globalpolitician.com
Categories: One World Church;Anti-Israel;Warning

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran and President Bashar Assad of Syria reconfirmed the close alliance between their two countries during the Iranian president's visit to Damascus this week.

Ahmadinejad's visit came on the eve of the return of two senior US officials, Jeffrey Feltman and Daniel Shapiro, to Damascus. Their visit is part of ongoing US efforts at engagement with Syria. The tone struck by Ahmadinejad and Assad this week, however, did not suggest a mood for compromise.

Syrian President Bashar Assad, in his address to the joint press conference held by the two presidents after their meeting, accurately summed up the Iranian-Syrian alliance as based upon both "principles and interests."

It is sometimes suggested that the Syrian-Iranian alliance is a marriage of convenience between two essentially incompatible regimes. This view is incorrect. The alliance is of long standing, is rooted in shared interests and expresses itself in a shared ideological conception - that of the idea of muqawama (resistance) to the supposed ambitions of the West and Israel in the region.

Ahmadinejad's and Assad's statements following their meeting offer evidence of the depth and nature of the alliance.

The Iranian president mocked US attempts at engagement, saying "We don't want honey from bees that sting us. Efforts must be made to rid the region of the presence of foreigners." He went on to demand US withdrawal from "Afghanistan and the borders of Pakistan."

Ahmadinejad's speech radiated the sense that Iranian defiance was bringing results. The Iranian president noted that those who once sought to put pressure on Syria and Iran were now obliged to seek the assistance of these countries.

"Harmony and steadfastness," he said, "are the secret of victory." He went on to demand reform of the United Nations, reiterating a claim he made in his recent Geneva speech that the international body failed to reflect a world in which the balance of forces was changing.

The Syrian president struck a similar tone. Assad said that Ahmadinejad's visit confirmed once more the "strategic relationship" between the two countries. He expressed the support of Syria and Iran for Palestinian "resistance."

Assad then detailed Syria and Iran's common satisfaction regarding current developments in Iraq, and noted Syria's support for the Iranian nuclear program. He also cast an eye over the history of the relationship between the two countries. He noted that Syria had supported Iran at the time of the Islamic Revolution and in the subsequent Iran-Iraq War, and that Damascus had in return benefited from Iranian support when under pressure in recent years.

The words of the two presidents, for those listening closely, are instructive in grasping both the principles and the interests underlying the Syrian-Iranian alliance.

Regarding principles - the two speeches reflect the joint adoption of a secular language of nationalist, anti-Western assertion which is reminiscent of earlier times.

These ideas may have faded from view in the West in recent years, but they retain popularity among broad populations in the Arab world. The Iranians - non-Sunnis and non-Arabs - want to enlist this appeal to their own banner, presenting themselves as the natural representative of all those countries and forces opposing the West in the region.

Syria, meanwhile, has long been the chief guardian among the Arabs of the archaic slogans of third-worldism and defiance. Iranian rhetoric of this kind sits well with the Syrians. The Assad regime, of course, is committed ultimately to its own survival, and not to any ideological path. But there is no sense that an alliance based on an appeal of this kind is in any way unnatural or uncomfortable for the Syrians. On the contrary, it fits perfectly the defiant stance that has enabled the Syrian Ba'athists to punch above their weight in the region for a generation.

Regarding interests, Assad's whistle-stop tour through the history of the relationship reminds us of its longevity.

The mullahs in Teheran and the Ba'athist family dictatorship in Damascus have stuck together for a long time.

The Syrian dictator's expressions of quiet satisfaction at the current turn of events in Iraq, and Ahmadinejad's characteristic tone of triumphalism confirm that the partnership continues to bear fruit.

The next arena for the meeting point of Syrian and Iranian principles and interests is Lebanon, which may shortly be added to the regional alliance headed by these countries. Next month's Lebanese elections formed the backdrop to Ahmadinejad's visit, and perhaps explain the hurried return of Feltman and Shapiro. No doubt the two US officials will reassert the need for noninterference in the upcoming polls, which the Hizbullah-led alliance is favored to win.

Lebanon has long been the ideal arena for the meeting of Iranian and Syrian principles and interests. It is worth remembering that as far back as 1982, it was Syrian facilitation of the entry of 1,500 Iranian Revolutionary Guards into the Lebanese Bekaa which made possible the subsequent foundation of Hizbullah. This long investment may be about to pay off.

In any case, the general direction of events in the region appears to the liking of the two good friends from Damascus and Teheran - offering the prospect of many good years of friendship to come.

America's Prison System Serves As Evangelism 101 for Islam
May 29th, 2009
Daily Newswashingtontimes.com
Categories: Today's Headlines;Warning

At least two of the Muslim ex-convicts arrested last week in the Bronx on charges of planning to bomb synagogues and shoot down airplanes came to Islam while in prison. Their arrest has raised the point that America's prison system often serves as Evangelism 101 for Islam. 

A few years ago, I visited several Muslims in a state penitentiary in Culpeper, Va., and combed local mosques for former inmates to learn why so many prisoners choose Islam. 

Dantes Augustin, a former Catholic, told me of a "humble, meek and very pious" Muslim prison chaplain he met in a federal penitentiary in Lewisburg, Pa. The chaplain took the time to explain the basics of the religion and Mr. Augustin converted within a year. 

In Islam, he explained, "Cleanliness is highly recommended; you should not use profanity, you should be courteous. I always wanted to practice virtues and Islam gave me the tools." 

Mr. Augustin added, "I met Muslims from all over the world in American prisons: Indonesians, Palestinians, Egyptians, even Chinese. Islam is the fastest growing religion in prison because people there see it for what it really is." 

There are anywhere from 200,000 to 340,000 Muslim inmates in local, federal and state prisons, or 9 percent to 15 percent of the nation's incarcerated population even though they are 2 percent of the total U.S. populace. The federal Bureau of Prisons told me Muslims comprised 5.7 percent of their inmates, and a spokeswoman for the District's jail system told me 18 percent of its inmates were Muslim. 

Prison is a fertile ground for inmates who already feel victimized by American society, according to Roy and Niger Innis of the Manhattan-based Congress of Racial Equality. 

"Prison is the best recruitment ground imaginable," Roy Innis said. "Young black men change their so-called white Christian slave names to a Muslim name. Then they are told it wasnt their crime, it was racism that put them in jail." 

Conversions to Islam, they said, are considered the ultimate rebellion against a white-controlled system. Black Christians, they added, are called traitors to their race and Christianity is labeled as a weak and powerless faith because of the killing of its founder. Islam, which honors Jesus as a prophet but denies that He rose from the dead, is portrayed as the religion of power. 

"Criminals are made to feel they are political prisoners and revolutionaries in the criminal system," Niger Innis said. "Once people are released, they go back to Watts or Harlem and integrate themselves into the black community. So, if they are part of a terrorist cell in prison, they spread that into the black community." 

Mahdi Bray, executive director of the Muslim American Society and the founder and former director of the National Islamic Prison Foundation, had a different read on why inmates convert. 

"Islam is organized in prison; there's prayer five times a day; and things that are organized run better," he says. "There's needs for boundaries and needs for certainties. Machismo has an important aspect in prisons and Islam has a strong concentration on being manly. That really resonates with people who come from homes without fathers around."