Looking for His glorious appearing! Titus 2:13

U.S.: Hizbullah Has One of World’s Largest Missile Arsenals
Apr 28th, 2010
Daily NewsArutz Sheva - Tzvi Ben Gedalyahu
Categories: Today's Headlines;Anti-Israel

Syria is helping Hizbullah stockpile “far more rockets and missiles than most governments in the world,” U.S.  Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Tuesday at a joint press conference with visiting Defense Minister Ehud Barak.

Without specifically mentioning the Scud missile, which Hizbullah reportedly is adding to its arsenal with Syria’s and Iran’s help, Secretary Gates stated, "Syria and Iran are providing Hizbullah with rockets and missiles of ever-increasing capability… and this is obviously destabilizing for the whole region.”

His comments came at the same time that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has tried to assure Lebanon that Israel has no intention of attacking Hizbullah. The latter's forces have blended in with the Lebanese army to the level that Prime Minister Netanyahu said it is hard to distinguish between the two.

Defense Minister Barak (pictured at left with Gates) also tried to soothe fears, saying at the press conference that "we do not intend to provoke any kind of major clash in Lebanon or vis-a-vis Syria.” Israel and Hizbullah fought the 34-day Second Lebanon War in 2006, which ended with United Nations guarantees that Hizbullah would be disarmed. However, commanders of UN Interim Forces in Lebanon (UNIFIL) said at the outset that they were not able to carry out the mandate.

The United Nations has ignored most of Israel’s appeals to put a stop to Hizbullah’s smuggling of missiles, which now number three or four times the 20,000 missiles it possessed before the war and which are far more sophisticated. The Scud missile, used by Iraq against Israel in the 1991 Gulf War, can easily strike Tel Aviv from Lebanon.

Although the United States has not confirmed that Hizbullah has Scuds, the reports on their being shipped by Syria actually may have been leaked by the United States in order to put pressure on UNIFIL. Hizbullah’s dominance in southern Lebanon and its alliance with the Lebanese government would make any counterterrorist measures or diplomatic moves ineffective.

Following the report last week, which was confirmed by President Shimon Peres, the U.S. State Department summoned Syria’s chief of mission for a warning of Damascus’ “provocative behavior,” but Syria has rejected all accusations.

Obama Admin Takes Aim At Jerusalem Mayor
Apr 28th, 2010
Daily NewsIsrael Today
Categories: Today's Headlines;The Nation Of Israel

Senior Obama Administration officials on Tuesday expressed frustration and anger over criticism leveled against them by Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat in a series of interview with American media.

Barkat is currently in Washington for meetings and interviews set up for him by top congressional leaders. During the interviews, he has constantly referred to US pressure on Israel to halt Jewish construction in eastern Jerusalem as "illegal," and has suggested that Obama is anti-Israel.

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak is also in Washington, and during meetings with top administration officials, he has been pressed to reign in Barkat and halt what they called his unproductive behavior.

Some American media referred to Barkat as a possible future prime ministerial candidate.

Moscow Markets Cruise Missile Launched from a Freight Container
Apr 28th, 2010
Daily NewsDEBKAfile Special Report
Categories: Today's Headlines;Warning

This relatively cheap, extra-smart, easy-to-use Club-K Container Missile System, which Moscow has put on the open market, allows cruise missiles concealed in freight containers to be launched from a prepositioned or moving land or sea platform. It is virtually undetectable by radar until activated. No wonder, Iran and Venezuela were keenly interested when the Club-K was put on the market at the Defense Services Asia exhibition in Malaysia this week for $15 million.

Western military experts are calling it a "real maritime fear for anyone with a waterfront."  The container-cum-missiles, carried by a ship, fishing vessel or truck can approach a targeted coast, highway or international railway and strike behind the target's missile defenses without alerting radar monitors or even surveillance drones and satellites.

In Iranian hands, it would make the targeting of its nuclear facilities very difficult. Able to wipe out an aircraft carrier up to 400 kilometers away, the system's manufacturer, Novator, is directing its marketing tactics at anyone under threat of military action from the United States. One expert accused the Russians of proliferating ballistic missiles on an unheard-of scale.

At the Malaysian exhibition, the marketing film showed the Club-K being activated from an ordinary truck. (See picture.) The truck pulls up, whereupon the container roof lifts up to reveal four 3?-54?E, 3?-54?E1 and 3?-14?E cruise missiles ready to fire. The operator then pushes a button and the missiles, which have a range of 350 km, are launched without further preparation.

debkafile's military sources warn that the sale of Club-K cruise missile systems to Iran or Syria and their transfer to Hizballah would give them an edge substantial enough to be a game-changer into the Middle East balance of strength. They are capable of surreptitiously approaching Israeli, Iraqi and any other coastlines in the region, and send missiles flying against an American, Arab or Israeli strategic or military target before their targets know they are under attack.

The missile specialist Novator, which maintains a manufacturing plant in Yekaterinburg in the Ural Mountains, produces an array of missiles against air, sea and land targets, including cruise missiles launched from submarines, as well as the advanced S-300 missile interceptor, which Russia contracted to sell Iran but has so far not delivered.

Iran, Syria, Hizballah Gear Up to Provoke Summer War
Apr 28th, 2010
Daily NewsDEBKAfile Special Report
Categories: Today's Headlines;Warning;War

US defense secretary Robert Gates said Tuesday night, April 27: "Hizballah has far more rockets and missile than most governments in the world." He and Israeli defense minister Ehud Barak were talking to reporters after their talks in the Pentagon. Military sources did not see his as high commendation for Barak's achievements as defense minister. All he had to contribute on this occasion was: "We do not intend to provoke any kind of major collision in Lebanon or with Syria, but are watching closely these developments."
Gates went on to accuse Syria and Iran of "providing Hizballah with rockets of ever-increasing capability," adding, "This is obviously destabilizing for the whole region and we're watching it very carefully.

Both defense chiefs seemed to think that careful watching would somehow erase the hostile buildup of deadly hardware. In fact, Barak's comment told Iran, Syria and Hizballah they had nothing to fear from continuing their "carefully watched" buildup, even though Syria took it a step forward this month. As debkafile's military sources reported last week, Syrian instructors have trained two Hizballah brigades in the use of mobile Scud missiles which carry one-ton warheads. It does not matter if those missiles are moved physically across the border to Lebanon, because those brigades can operate them against Israel at short notice from either side of the border.
Our Washington sources report that Syrian president Bashar Assad, under heavy pressure from Washington to keep the Scuds out of Hizballah's hands, explained to the Obama administration through diplomatic channels that as long as they were kept inside Syria, the Scuds must be seen as a defensive and deterrent weapon against a possible Israeli attack on Lebanon and Syria. He thus placed on Israel the onus for any future outbreak of hostilities.

Gates' accusation of Iran and Syria Tuesday was the administration's way of telling Damascus that it does not buy that message.
Unlike the United States, Israel has a ringside seat for watching the rockets and missiles pile up just across its 70-kilometer long border with Lebanon. Gates' comment - and even more Barak's assurance - gave Syria and the Hizballah space to carry on building a mighty arsenal, which is aimed at only one country, Israel.  
Barak as defense minister, prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Israel's security chiefs need to explain how Hizballah was allowed in the four years since the 2006 war to pile up tens of thousands of rockets and missiles, which in volume and sophistication have already overtaken the weaponry that battered northern Israel then and which have extended their reach to all parts of Israel.
"Careful watch" - without corresponding action to interrupt the massive flow of weapons shipments constantly smuggled in from Syria to Hizballah - is a repeat of the misplaced self-restraint which invited the Hizballah to launch the last Lebanon conflict in the summer of 2006. Dragging Israeli and its homeland into war in the summer of 2010 would serve the political and military interests of Iran, Syria and Hizballah well. It would generate a Middle East crisis overwhelming enough to focus international efforts on calming the situation, so distracting the world's attention Iran's arrival at the critical stages of its nuclear bomb program and its drive for sanctions against the Islamic Republic.

Healed By Christ
Apr 28th, 2010
CommentaryA. B. Simpson
Categories: Inspirational

A friend... said, "You were healed by faith." "Oh, no," I said, "I was healed by Christ." What is the difference? There is a great difference. There came a time when even faith seemed to come between me and Jesus. I thought I should have to work up the faith, so I laboured to get the faith. At last I thought I had it; that if I put my whole weight upon it, it would hold. I said, when I thought I had got the faith, "Heal me." I was trusting in myself, in my own heart, in my own faith. I was asking the Lord to do something for me because of something in me, not because of something in Him.

Has Noah's Ark Been Found on Turkish Mountaintop?
Apr 28th, 2010
Daily NewsFOXNews.com
Categories: Today's Headlines;Inspirational

The remains of Noah's Ark have been discovered 13,000 feet up a Turkish mountain -- according to a sensational claim by evangelical explorers.

A group of Chinese and Turkish evangelical explorers say wooden remains they have discovered on Mount Ararat in eastern Turkey are the remains of Noah's Ark. 

The group claims that carbon dating proves the relics are 4,800 years old, meaning they date to around the same time the ark was said to be afloat. Mt. Ararat has long been suspected as the final resting place of the craft by evangelicals and literalists hoping to validate biblical stories. 

Yeung Wing-Cheung, from the Noah's Ark Ministries International research team that made the discovery, said: "It's not 100 percent that it is Noah's Ark, but we think it is 99.9 percent that this is it." 

There have been several reported discoveries of the remains of Noah's Ark over the years, most notably a find by archaeologist Ron Wyatt in 1987. At the time, the Turkish government officially declared a national park around his find, a boat-shaped object stretched across the mountains of Ararat.

Search ... worker examines wooden beams inside 'Noah's Ark'

 

 

 

France Joins U.S. in Blaming Israel for Lack of Peace
Apr 28th, 2010
Daily NewsIsrael Today
Categories: Today's Headlines;The Nation Of Israel

French President Nicolas Sarkozy reportedly told Israeli President Shimon Peres when the two met in Paris two weeks ago that the current failure of the Middle East peace process is almost entirely the fault of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Senior Israeli officials were briefed on the meeting recently, and told Ha'aretz under condition of anonymity that it was a "very difficult" encounter for Peres.

Sarkozy reportedly spent the first 15 minutes of the meeting railing against Netanyahu.

"I'm disappointed with him," the French president reportedly said.. "With the friendship, sympathy and commitment we have toward Israel, we still can't accept this foot-dragging. I don't understand where Netanyahu is going or what he wants."

Sarkozy's increasingly hostile position mirrors that of the Obama Administration, which has made clear that it sees Netanyahu and the right-wing elements in his government as the reason the peace process is not moving forward.

That despite the fact that Netanyahu has already gone against his election platform by publicly accepting the idea of a Palestinian state, has frozen Jewish building in Judea and Samaria and has repeatedly stated that he is ready to immediately restart direct bilateral negotiations with the Palestinians.

That Palestinian leaders outright refuse to sit with Netanyahu and discuss these issues has been almost completely ignored in Western capitals.

Art's Commentary....The position of world leaders is hardening against Israel. This undoubtedly because Obama is leading the charge against Israel. The only outcome now acceptable, is the total surrender of Israel on Palestinian terms, which would mean the end of the  the Jewish State.

European Envoys Reportedly Attend Palestinian Civil Disobedience Summit
Apr 28th, 2010
Daily NewsIsrael Today
Categories: Today's Headlines;Anti-Israel

Contradicting their own public position that Israel and the Palestinians should negotiating their differences, European ambassadors and envoys last week reportedly attended a Palestinian conference aimed at encouraging "popular resistance" as a means of further defaming Israel and pressuring it to meet Arab demands.

The conference was held in the Palestinian village of Bil'in under the banner of the Bil'in Popular Struggle Committee, and was addressed by Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Salam Fayyad.

Bil'in has become a flash point of tension in recent years after Israel placed part of its new security barrier between it and neighboring Jewish towns. Popular Struggle Committee members and other Palestinians purportedly committed to non-violent means of protest hold a weekly demonstration there against the barrier.

However, despite their claims of non-violence, the demonstrations almost always include acts of stone throwing and damaging of property. Israeli security forces respond with gas canisters and rubber bullets.

In an interview with The Jerusalem Post, Rami Burnat, one of the committee's leading activists, acknowledged that while the veneer of non-violent protest has lured international support, he and other Palestinians taking this path are not embracing non-violence as a philosophy or way of life. They are not the new Gandhis or Martin Luther Kings.

Burnat called the decision to focus on non-violence popular resistance a strategical one. "It’s about seeing benefits," Burnat said. "If we don’t see them, it’s up to us to decide what kind of resistance we would then use next."

But even that is going too far for most Palestinians, evidenced by the fact that the popular resistance movement simply isn't very popular among most Palestinians, who public opinion polls continue to show favor the use of terrorist violence against Israeli Jews as a means of achieving their goals.