Looking for His glorious appearing! Titus 2:13

Yoram Sheftel: Did the U.S. Negotiate With Al Qaeda?
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsArutz Sheva
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Attorney Yoram Sheftel spoke with Arutz Sheva's weekly magazine, expressing his dismay at the way Operation Protective Edge is coming to an end.

"We are officially negotiating political agreements with a terror organization," he said. "The headlines may read 'Ceasefire', but it is actually only a ceasefire until Hamas feels like violating it," he continued, stressing that no civilized country in the world had ever succumbed to pressure to do anything like this before.

"The United States never negotiated with Al Qaeda to obtain their assurances that there would be no second Twin Towers attack for a few years.  There is no civilized Western country that negotiates with terror organizations," he said.

The Military Occupation of Ferguson, Missouri is Just a Preview of What is Coming to America
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsThe American Dream
Categories: Today's Headlines;Commentary

Let’s be honest – Ferguson, Missouri is under military occupation right now, and the entire world is watching in horror as militarized police fire tear gas and rubber bullets at unarmed protesters.  Yes, the rioting and looting in Ferguson needed to be stopped.  If order had not been restored, more stores and businesses would have been destroyed.  However, there is no excuse for the brutal tactics now being employed.  At one point, police snipers were even using laser scopes to target protesters that were obviously unarmed.  Sadly, this is just a preview of what is coming to America in the years ahead.  As the economy falls apart and people become even more angry and even more frustrated, there will be a lot more incidents of civil unrest like we have just witnessed in Ferguson.  And in response, the federal government and our overly militarized police will seek to crush those uprisings with overwhelming force.  How is it possible that our once very peaceful nation has fallen apart so dramatically?

What we just watched happen in Ferguson was truly bizarre.  If you didn’t know any better, you might have thought that you were looking at images from a really bad post-apocalyptic disaster movie.

The following is how the New Yorker described the scene…

Last night, as the images and stories from Ferguson, Missouri, joined the news churn, many who registered their thoughts via social media noted that what they were seeing—policemen with dogs and AR-15 assault rifles standing in a Stygian, blue-lit cloud of tear gas; crowds of protesters with their hands in the air, screaming “Hands up, don’t shoot”; members of the press being removed from the scene—did not look like America.

And I will certainly agree with that.

It did not look like America.  At least not the America that I grew up in.

In a WND article, one woman was quoted as saying that it looked “like something right off the streets of Iraq”…

Cheryl Chumley has been watching developments in Missouri, where Michael Brown was shot over the weekend, and just overnight two more people were shot, including one by police.

“Armored vehicles on patrol, Kevlar-wearing, camouflage dressed officials carting high-powered rifles, tear gas wafting through the air – sounds like something right off the streets of Iraq. But it’s not. It’s actually the scene that’s playing out in Ferguson right now, with SWAT-type police taking to the residential streets for crowd control duties,” she said.

Was all of this really necessary?

The rioting and the looting had already ended.  Was there really a need to fire tear gas at unarmed people?

And the more attention this gets, the more likely that it is that violence will spread to more cities.  Already, a major protest is being planned for Sunday directly in front of police headquarters in Los Angeles.  A man was shot and killed on Monday by the LAPD and people are upset about it.  They have seen what has been happening in Ferguson and now they want to take action.

But wherever civil unrest does erupt, our militarized police will certainly be there to quickly stamp it out.  As a recent Slate article detailed, the militarization of our police has reached unprecedented heights in recent years…

Since 2006, according to an analysis by the New York Times, police departments have acquired 435 armored vehicles, 533 planes, 93,763 machine guns, and 432 mine-resistant armored trucks. Overall, since Congress established its program to transfer military hardware, local and state police departments have received $4.3 billion worth of equipment. Accordingly, the value of military equipment used by these police agencies has increased from $1 million in 1990 to $324 million in 1995 (shortly after the program was established), to nearly $450 million in 2013.

And when police get all of this equipment, it is inevitable that they are going to use it.  One result of this has been the astounding increase in the number of SWAT team raids in America.  The following numbers come from my previous article entitled “10 Facts About The SWATification Of America That Everyone Should Know“…

#1 In 1980, there were approximately 3,000 SWAT raids in the United States.  Now, there are more than 80,000 SWAT raids per year in this country.

#2 79 percent of the time, SWAT teams are deployed to private homes.

#3 50 percent of the victims of SWAT raids are either black or Latino.

#4 In 65 percent of SWAT deployments, “a battering ram, boot, or some sort of explosive device” is used to gain forced entry to a home.

#5 62 percent of all SWAT raids involve a search for drugs.

#6 In at least 36 percent of all SWAT raids, “no contraband of any kind” is found by the police.

#7 In cases where it is suspected that there is a weapon in the home, police only find a weapon 35 percent of the time.

#8 More than 100 American families have their homes raided by SWAT teams every single day.

#9 Only 7 percent of all SWAT deployments are for “hostage, barricade or active-shooter scenarios”.

#10 Even small towns are getting SWAT teams now.  30 years ago, only 25.6 percent of communities with populations between 25,000 and 50,000 people had a SWAT team.  Now, that number has increased to 80 percent.

And of course African-American communities receive a greatly disproportionate amount of attention from our militarized police.  Just imagine how you would feel if every time you saw a police officer you cringed in fear because you might be about to get searched again.  The following is how author Michelle Alexander put it in her book “The New Jim Crow“…

Ultimately, these stop-and-frisk operations amount to much more than humiliating, demeaning rituals for young men of color, who must raise their arms and spread their legs, always careful not to make a sudden move or gesture that could provide an excuse for brutal — even lethal — force.

Like the days when black men were expected to step off the sidewalk and cast their eyes downward when a white woman passed, young black men know the drill when they see the police crossing the street toward them; it is a ritual of dominance and submission played out hundreds of thousands of times each year.

So what can we do about this?

How can we change the system?

How can we reverse this alarming militarization of our police?

Unfortunately, our system has become so corrupt that there is very little that we can do.  In fact, one newly released study discovered that average Americans have a “near-zero” statistical impact on public policy…

A startling new political science study concludes that corporate interests and mega wealthy individuals control U.S. policy to such a degree that “the preferences of the average American appear to have only a minuscule, near-zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy.”

The startling study, titled “Testing Theories of American Politics: Elites, Interest Groups, and Average Citizens,” is slated to appear in an upcoming issue of Perspectives on Politics and was authored by Princeton University Professor Martin Gilens and Northwestern University Professor Benjamin Page. An early draft can be found here.

Noted American University Historian Allan J. Lichtman, who highlighted the piece in a Tuesday article published in The Hill, calls Gilens and Page’s research “shattering” and says their scholarship “should be a loud wake-up call to the vast majority of Americans who are bypassed by their government.”

So what do you think about all of this?

Study Reveals Most American Pastors Silent on Current Issues Despite Biblical Beliefs
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsProphecy New Watch
Categories: Apostasy;Commentary

Most pastors believe that the Bible addresses the current issues of the day, but few speak about them from behind the pulpit, according to a recent study from a prominent research organization.

George Barna was a guest on the American Family Radio program “Today’s Issues” on Thursday, where he explained a research project that he has been working on for the past two years. 

In his study, Barna’s organization asked pastors across the country about their beliefs regarding the relevancy of Scripture to societal, moral and political issues, and the content of their sermons in light of their beliefs.

“‘What we’re finding is that when we ask them about all the key issues of the day, [90 percent of them are] telling us, ‘Yes, the Bible speaks to every one of these issues,” he explained. “Then we ask them: ‘Well, are you teaching your people what the Bible says about those issues?’ and the numbers drop…to less than 10 percent of pastors who say they will speak to it.”

Barna’s group also polled pastors about what factors they use to gauge whether or not a church is successful.

“There are five factors that the vast majority of pastors turn to,” he outlined. “Attendance, giving, number of programs, number of staff, and square footage.”

“What I’m suggesting is [those pastors] won’t probably get involved in politics because it’s very controversial. Controversy keeps people from being in the seats, controversy keeps people from giving money, from attending programs,” Barna said.

Pastor Chuck Baldwin, a radio broadcaster and former presidential candidate, commented on the study in an article published on Friday entitled Odds Are that Your Pastor is Keeping the Truth from You Instead of Preaching It. He opined that Barna’s research shows that most pastors deliberately choose not to speak on the issues of the day despite knowing that the Bible speaks to them.

“That 90% of America’s pastors are not addressing any of the salient issues affecting Christian people’s political or societal lives should surprise no one,” he wrote. “It has been decades since even a sizable minority of pastors have bothered to educate and inform their congregations as to the Biblical principles relating to America’s political, cultural and societal lives.”

“Please understand this: America’s malaise is directly due to the deliberate disobedience of America’s pastors—and the willingness of the Christians in the pews to tolerate the disobedience of their pastor. Nothing more! Nothing less!” Baldwin continued. “When Paul wrote his own epitaph, it read, ‘I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.’ (II Timothy 4:7) He didn’t say, ‘I had a large congregation, we had big offerings, we had a lot of programs, I had a large staff, and we had large facilities.’”

“It is time for Christians to acknowledge that these ministers are not pastors; they are CEOs. They are not Bible teachers; they are performers. They are not shepherds; they are hirelings,” he said. “It is also time for Christians to be honest with themselves: do they want a pastor who desires to be faithful to the Scriptures, or do they want a pastor who is simply trying to be ‘successful?’”

Nicaraguans Told to Eat Iguanas As Drought Threatens Food Crisis
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsThe Guardian
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

A boy holds up an iguana for sale on the highway in the north of Managua. Nicaraguans are being encouraged to eat the reptiles as a nutritious alternative to more conventional meat. Photograph: Oswaldo Rivas/Reuters

Nicaraguans struggling to afford meat as the country suffers its worst drought in 32 years should consider raising and eating iguanas, a government expert has suggested.

The advice comes amid warnings that Nicaragua, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador could require levels of humanitarian aid not seen since the aftermath of hurricane Mitch 16 years ago, as poor harvests and rapid increases in the prices of staple items threaten a food crisis.

“Breeding iguanas brings two benefits,” said Guillermo Membreño, a land management expert. “Not only does it supply dietary protein, it also offers a commercial use for the animals.”

Iguanas, he added, contained 24% protein compared with 18% in chicken.

Although Nicaragua’s environmental laws forbid the hunting of iguanas between 1 January and 30 April each year, the lizards can be kept for food and even exported under certain circumstances.

“Farming iguanas – and not hunting them in forests – is a good way to deal with the food shortages caused by the prolonged drought,” Membreño told the government-run online newspaper La Voz del Sandinismo.

“Even if you’ve only got 10 iguanas, you’ve got something that offers food – and cash if you sell the iguanas for their meat, their skins or as pets.”

He also suggested people grow moringa trees, which require little water and the leaves of which can be used as a highly nutritious animal feed.

A survey conducted by another Nicaraguan newspaper found that the cost of 15 of the 19 basic items in the average shopping basket – including such staples as beans, corn, tomatoes and peppers – had risen over the past week.

However, the government’s suggestions met with a mix of scorn and ridicule from some Nicaraguans.

“I was going to have an iguana for breakfast, but it ran away. I was going to have beans, but they’re up to 37 [Nicaraguan córdobas] a pound today,” tweeted one.

Another, mocking the Sandinista government’s motto – Christian, socialist, caring – posted a picture of an iguana with the caption: “Anyone fancy a caring mini-Godzilla?”

Despite the humour, the situation in Central America’s poorest country is growing increasingly serious. According to the national livestock commission, Conagan, the drought saw 2,500 cattle starve to death last month, while a further 600,000 of Nicaragua’s 4.1m livestock are on the verge of starvation.

On Monday the drought’s effect on crops and food prices led Nicaragua’s central bank to cut its economic growth outlook and raise its inflation forecast. The bank said it expected growth in gross domestic product to be between 4% and 4.5% this year, down from the 4.5% to 5% it forecast in the spring.

A day later the Famine Early Warning Systems Network (Fewsnet) released an alert highlighting the risk of widespread food shortages in the region next year.

“As a result of projected poor harvests in 2014, the reduction in coffee-sector income for day labourers, and a more rapid than usual increase in the prices of some staple foods, extremely poor households across large areas of Guatemala, Nicaragua, Honduras and El Salvador will experience a rapid deterioration in their food security in early 2015,” it said.

With the drought and the forthcoming El Niño affecting both the livestock and fishing industries – and coffee rust disease ravaging the crop on which the region is heavily dependent – Fewsnet warned that “atypically high” levels of human assistance would probably be needed to avert a food crisis.

“Depending on the performance of rainfall and markets over the coming months, the number of people in need of assistance could be the largest since hurricane Mitch in 1998,” it said. “Governments and their partners should begin response planning immediately to protect livelihoods and household consumption over the coming year.”

Nasrallah Worried About the Islamic State 'Monster'
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsArutz Sheva
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Hassan Nasrallah

Reuters

After reports last week that the Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS) has gained a foothold in Lebanon's Arsal, Hezbollah terrorist leader Hassan Nasrallah expressed a definite note of fear as he warned of the IS "monster."

Nasrallah's Hezbollah is an Iran-proxy Shi'ite terror group in Lebanon, and as of yet has avoided conflict with the Sunni group IS in Lebanon, leaving the fighting to the Lebanese army. IS has already overrun vast portions of Iraq and Syria in a blitz campaign over the last two months, in the process committing atrocities and acts of ethnic cleansing.

IS is planning "on expanding toward Jordan and Saudi Arabia by undermining the security and stability of these countries," Nasrallah said in a meeting with the Druze leader Walid Jumblatt, according to the Lebanese The Daily Star on Thursday, which cited a Hezbollah official.

The terror leader went on to say of IS that the "takfiri (apostate) monster is on the loose," adding that "everyone is aware of the seriousness."

Confronting IS is "a battle of life and death no less important than fighting the Israeli enemy, as (IS) actions and objectives only serve Israel,” continued Nasrallah, calling for Lebanese unity in facing IS.

The bizarre connecting of IS and Israel comes despite the fact that IS terrorists have been documented attacking Israel from Gaza. It also comes after Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas's official daily claimed in five articles in the last six weeks that the US established IS to sow division in the Muslim world. 

Hezbollah is so far avoiding confrontation with IS, saying that it might intervene if they advance from Arsal to Labweh, a Hezbollah bastion 11 kilometers away.

However, Nasrallah bragged to Jumblatt that "we are the largest force capable and willing to make material, military and human sacrifices. We are willing to fight for the next 10 years."

Speaking in an interview Friday in the Lebanese Al-Akhbar, Nasrallah elaborated on the IS threat, saying "Turkey and Qatar are supporting ISIS, and I am convinced that Saudi Arabia fears it."

"There is a support for ISIS wherever there is a following of Takfiri (apostate) thinking, and this applies to Jordan, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states," added the terrorist leader.

Even as he spoke about how the IS "monster" threatens countries in the area, Nasrallah called Israel "an illegal entity and...a longstanding threat to the region. We cannot live with this threat. This is why the ultimate goal for this (region) is to eliminate (Israel)."

Let the Headlines Speak
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsFrom the internet
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Pregnant woman sucker-punched in unprovoked attack
A pregnant woman was sucker-punched in the back of the head Thursday afternoon — and may be the latest victim of the creepy “knockout game,” law enforcement sources said.

I guess it’s Islamophobic to report this
This 2-minute report from New Jersey serves to prove that Islamic terrorism is here on our shores. The black ISIS flag was flown right next to the Turkish flag – that’s the red one with the crescent. And in case you’ve missed it, Turkey has taken a turn towards Islamism under Prime Minister Recip Tayyip Erdogan, Barack Obama’s friend.  

Stirring The Pot: DOJ Sends ‘Marshals’ To ‘Coach’ The Protesters In Ferguson
“Protest marshals” from the same Department of Justice division that organized protests against George Zimmerman in the aftermath of the shooting of Trayvon Martin have been deployed to the troubled city.  

Judaism: The Temple Institute on the Parsha: The Land is Ours
Video. The land of Israel - every grain of it - belongs to the people of Israel. It was given to them by G-d in his covenant with Abraham.  

Nasrallah: Islamic State is a monster coming to devour region
In the second part of an interview to Al-Akhbar, the Hezbollah leader called the group and "uncontrollable monster conducting horrible massacres," and said "They have no reservations: Not ideological, not moral, not religious and not human."  

Poll finds 1/2 of Dems like socialism
“Half of Democrats, 50 percent, have a favorable opinion of socialism, nearly identical to the 53 percent who have a favorable opinion of capitalism,” it said.  

Growing number of atheist churches' in Bible Belt
'People hear about it and email saying, 'I've been waiting for this my entire life''  

Palestinian officials: War behind us, Gaza ceasefire deal imminent
Deal reportedly reached to see calm in Gaza extended based on two-pronged formula: Ceasefire in return for rehabilitation of Gaza and redevelopment in return for demilitarization; meanwhile, Israeli Cabinet convenes, Islamic Jihad says: War has ended.  

Ferguson focus turns from riots to militarized cops
“Why armored vehicles in a Midwestern inner suburb? Why would cops wear camouflage gear against a terrain patterned by convenience stores and beauty parlors? Why are the authorities in Ferguson, Missouri, so given to quasi-martial crowd control methods (such as bans on walking on the street) and, per the reporting of Riverfront Times, the firing of tear gas at people in their own yards?”  

Ebola outbreak scale ‘vastly underestimated’ – WHO
“[WHO] staff at the outbreak sites see evidence that the numbers of reported cases and deaths vastly underestimate the magnitude of the outbreak,” the organization wrote on its website. While no new cases surfaced, the outbreak is expected to continue “for some time” in West African states affected by the virus, the WHO said, adding that the “operational response plan extends over the next several months.”  

THE LANDSCAPE OF A COMET
While the comet's head (in the top half of the image) is scored with parallel linear features, the neck is peppered with boulders resting on a smooth underlying terrain. In comparison, the comet's body (lower half of the image) is jagged and dimpled by crater-like depressions.  

Allen West Declares Obama An Islamist
Former Florida Rep. Allen West declared President Obama an Islamist who is intentionally working against the security of the United States.  

Bibles are back in Navy Lodges, for now
The Navy has decided to put Bibles back in Navy Lodge rooms while leaders review policy on keeping donated Bibles in Navy Lodge guest rooms. The Aug. 14 announcement followed a widespread backlash from religious, conservative and veterans organizations after officials with Navy Exchange Service Command ordered the Bibles removed in June.  

Has Russia invaded? Ukraine enters a critical state
A column of Russian armored personnel carriers (APCs) has reportedly crossed Russia’s border with Ukraine. The APCs had earlier been seen traveling alongside a supposed Russian humanitarian convoy headed towards Ukraine’s conflict-torn east. Evidence of Russian troop movement over the border supports the Ukrainian claim that Russian soldiers have been actively supporting pro-Moscow separatist militants in the region.  

Earthquake jolts southwest of Turkey
An earthquake measuring four on the Richter scale occurred in Bodrum Province in southwestern Turkey, TRT Haber TV channel reported Aug. 15. The earthquake occurred at 07:00 local time Aug. 15, according Kandilli Observatory of the Bogazici University and the Earthquake Research Institute of Turkey.  

Study Reveals Most American Pastors Silent on Current Issues Despite Biblical Beliefs
Most pastors believe that the Bible addresses the current issues of the day, but few speak about them from behind the pulpit, according to a recent study from a prominent research organization.  

Ferguson shooting: US police armed with 93,763 new machine guns
If Ferguson, Missouri, looks like a war zone, that may be because its police force is armed to the teeth with military equipment. In photographs from this week’s protests, officers can be seen toting assault rifles, wearing gas masks and body armour loaded with extra ammunition magazines, and riding around in mine-resistant armoured personnel carriers.  

...11 countries in the world that are actually free from conflict
...It may make for bleak reading, but of the 162 countries covered by the Institute for Economics and Peace’s (IEP’s) latest study, just 11 were not involved in conflict of one kind or another. Worse still, the world as a whole has been getting incrementally less peaceful every year since 2007 – sharply bucking a trend that had seen a global move away from conflict since the end of the Second World War.  

DOCUMENT: Homeland Security Predicts Rise of 'Anti-Government' Violence
A leaked document from the Department of Homeland Security’s Office... predicts increased “anti-government violence over the next year.” ...DHS’s seven-page report...points to ...murders of two Las Vegas law enforcement officers as evidence that there is a “growing trend of anti-government violence compared to the previous four years...” and the “perceived victory at Bunkervile” will “likely prompt more violence.”  

Iraq crisis: Philip Hammond says UK would consider arming Kurds
The UK would "consider favourably" any request for arms from the Kurds in their battle with extremists in Iraq, the foreign secretary has confirmed. Kurdish forces are fighting militant group Islamic State (IS), which has seized large parts of northern Iraq. France and the United States have already supplied them arms.  

France scraps deficit target, as eurozone recovery halts
France has all but abandoned a target to shrink its deficit, as the eurozone endured a turbulent day that raised the prospect of a triple-dip recession. Figures published by Eurostat on Thursday (14 August) indicated that the eurozone economy flatlined between April and June, while the EU-28 saw 0.2 percent growth.  

Does George Soros know something we don’t about the S&P 500?
Among the highlights, Soros Fund Management increased a bear-call bet on the S&P 500 in a huge way. The fund lifted a put position — a bet the market will go lower — on the S&P 500 ETF SPY +0.35% to its biggest size yet, in terms of value and portfolio percentage, making a 605% leap over the previous quarter.  

Rand Paul: We Must Demilitarize the Police
Soldiers and police are supposed to be different. … Police look inward. They’re supposed to protect their fellow citizens from criminals, and to maintain order with a minimum of force. It’s the difference between Audie Murphy and Andy Griffith. But nowadays, police are looking, and acting, more like soldiers than cops, with bad consequences. And those who suffer the consequences are usually innocent civilians.  

Islamic Jihad official: There will be a cease-fire, even without an agreement
The Palestinian delegation indicated Friday that a lasting cease-fire could be imminent. "From our point of view, we're heading toward a cease-fire, even if there isn't an agreement," Islamic Jihad's Ziad al-Nakhaleh said. ...he confirmed that Palestinian groups have agreed to delay negotiations over the airport and seaport, signifying what could be a step towards both sides coming to a compromise.  

Ebola crisis vastly underestimated, says WHO
The scale of the Ebola outbreak appears to be "vastly underestimated", the UN's health agency says, as the death toll from the disease reaches 1,069. The World Health Organization said its staff had seen evidence that the numbers of reported cases and deaths do not reflect the scale of the crisis.  

Iraq crisis: Maliki quits as PM to end deadlock
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki has stepped aside, ending political deadlock in Baghdad as the government struggles against insurgents. He resigned on state TV to make way for Haider al-Abadi, who was asked by Iraq's president to form a government.  

Syrian troops seize contested Damascus suburb
Syrian government troops captured a fiercely contested suburb of the capital Thursday after five months of heavy fighting, flushing rebels from their last hideouts and quickly moving to crush pockets of resistance in the surrounding countryside, activists and state media said.  

Here's Why Russia Has Sent $13 Billion Worth Of Weaponry To India In Recent Years
Russia has sent an extraordinary amount of weaponry to India, which was the world's largest arms importer in 2013. Vladimir Putin's government has been aggressive in its stance towards Europe and the west — while cultivating one of the developing world's emerging powers as the leading recipient of Russian arms.  

Watch: 'CHRISTIANS UNDER ATTACK' On Fox News
Tonight, Franklin Graham will appear with Greta Van Susteren on CHRISTIANS UNDER ATTACK, a special that will air at 7 p.m. Eastern on the Fox News Channel.  

Israel, What are You Doing?
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsJerusalem Watchman
Categories: The Nation Of Israel;Commentary

You pipe electricity to Gaza, drop leaflets over your intended targets to give your enemy time to escape and live to fight another day, put your own soldiers lives at risk rather than endanger the lives of Israel-hating Gazans.

You send medical and humanitarian aid through your crossings into Gaza (while Egypt keeps its Rafah Border Crossing tightly closed as it has for the past seven years – Egypt itself blockading the Strip even as it piously calls on Israel to lift its blockade and ‘siege.’) and you permit Palestinians wounded in Gaza to be brought to Ben Gurion International Airport and from there to be flown to the anti-Semitic, near-enemy state of Turkey for medical treatment.

You refrain from killing the men leading Hamas – those primarily responsible for the rocket rain of terror that has driven millions of your people to seek shelter in their reinforced rooms, and that has caused unknown numbers of Israelis to flee from the vicinity of the Gaza Strip.

For some unfathomable reason, Hamas leaders Ismail Haniyeh and Khaled Mashaal – the men directly responsible for the deaths of dozens of your soldiers – are still breathing, together with their top tier of terrorism directors and propagators; instead of leveling your weapons at their heads and taking them out, you level threats to kill them unless they do this or unless they do that.

You send official delegates to Cairo to hold negotiations with this organization whose goal mirrors that of the Nazis – and who would enthusiastically pursue that goal if only they had the wherewithal to perpetrate against Israel’s Jews what Germany did to Europe’s.

It is as if you are negotiating with Hitler! Do you really think there is any difference whatsoever?

I was led to believe that, when he trained militarily unskilled Jews in Palestine to fight, Charles Orde Wingate taught your first soldiers to combat your enemies for the sake of your existence, for the sake of your nation. His teachings purportedly formed the foundation of your subsequently created Israel Defense Forces – the IDF.

The name sounds nice but it should be the Israel Offensive Forces – you know that winning means taking the initiative…being an offensive force, albeit only insofar as you would take the battle all the way to those who declared war on you.

What you need to do (I don’t have to be an expert or be privy to inside intelligence to say this) is you need to accurately identify your enemy (as Islam’s mujahideen or holy warriors, not Arab nationalists), target this enemy in its Hamas form, and crush it without mercy.

You need to win this – and the only way to win it is to take from Hamas both the ability and the will to continue to fight.

Unless you do this – unless you take hold of the battle with both hands and fully engage your foe, you are sending your young men needlessly to their deaths, adding to the never ending pile of dead soldiers whose sacrifices will have to be repeated all over again by others who will die with the next round and in the next wave.

What are you criteria? What is your outlook? What are you hoping to achieve? Really? Just quiet for quiet?

It sounds good, but for you quiet means your citizens continue with their lives as uninterruptedly as possible, day in day out, month in month out, all the while waiting for the next volley of rockets to fall, or the next wave of terrorism to break upon them.

For Hamas and the larger Arab-Muslim world, quiet means it has the chance to renew its strength, equip and plan for the next round. And this while the Islamic State is expanding its territory and sowing tsunamis of terror through the Middle East, the number of its adherents exploding as it pulls in new members across Arab national borders. Day by day, month by month, the Middle East is becoming increasingly dangerous for Jews and for the Jewish state.

Israel, you are trying to fight Hamas like politicians, staging operations – weighing the cost and the risks and the possible international fall out – the threat of prosecution in international criminal courts, etc. tying your own hands with your own calculations.

What you need to do, for the sake of your nation, for the sake of Israel’s very existence down the road, is order all journalists out of Gaza, order all Gaza’s civilians to head south to Rafah and break through the Egyptian crossing, flooding into the Sinai.

You need to stop taking calls from the White House, the Kremlin, 10 Downing Street, the Palais de l’Élysée the Bundeskanzleramt and the Vatican.

Address your nation, tell the people of Israel you are neither continuing an operation, nor beginning a new one, against Hamas.

Tell them you are declaring war on Hamas to destroy them.

And set to it.

The sooner you do, the sooner you will secure your nation – the Jewish nation – in the homeland you have returned to to stay.

In light of the long and pain-filled history of the Jewish people, your people, this is your duty to them.

Islamic State Flag Flown in New Jersey
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsArutz Sheva
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

The black flag of the Jihadist extremist group Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS) was seen flying this week in front of a home in none other than Garwood, New Jersey.

An uproar broke out after a picture of the flag was posted to Twitter on Tuesday by Marc Leibowitz, a former IDF paratrooper living in New Jersey. Despite doubting whether an actual IS member would openly fly the flag, Leibowitz alerted Homeland Security.

Mark Dunaway, the owner of the flag, claimed to ABC News on Thursday that the flag was not connected to IS, saying he's flown it for the past ten years. However, when Garwood police came to investigate complaints on Tuesday, Dunaway "voluntarily took the flag down," said police.

According to Dunaway the flag, which reads "There is no G-d but Allah, and Mohammed is the messenger of Allah," is an innocent expression of religion. "I'm Muslim, and I fly a flag in front of my home that says I'm a Muslim," he said.

Likewise Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesperson for the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), claimed to the news outlet "this is not the ISIS flag," stating the ISIS flag has an additional phrase at the bottom referencing the "Islamic State."

Despite the protestations, a careful investigation of photographic evidence of IS Jihadists in Iraq and Syria waving their flag shows it is absolutely identical to the one flown by Dunaway, and does not contain an additional phrase at the bottom.

It is worth noting that former FBI Counterterrorism expert John Guandolo in March revealed to Arutz Sheva that CAIR is a "Hamas front." Last month, during the ongoing Operation Protective Edge, a CAIR representative interviewed on Fox News TV refused to call Hamas a terrorist group.

Dunaway, who is "American-born and -raised," has replaced the IS flag with a San Diego Chargers flag, saying "I just want this situation to go away."

New Jersey isn't the only place where IS flags have been cropping up; reports reveal that recently the flags have been spotted in Israeli-Arab cities, including Nazareth and Akko.

Islamic Jihad: Truce Deal With Israel Next Monday
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsArutz Sheva
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Islamic Jihad terrorist

Flash 90

An Islamic Jihad spokesperson on Friday claimed that a truce deal with Israel will be signed as soon the current five-day ceasefire ends next Monday at midnight.

"We expect a complete truce agreement to be signed right as the five-day ceasefire ends. The delegation has made much progress in ending the siege and the offensive on Palestinians," Yousef al-Hasayneh told the Palestinian Arab Ma'an News Agency.

Al-Hasayneh said that the current ceasefire extension was agreed to on Wednesday night to give the Egyptian intermediaries time to remove "technical issues" blocking a final agreement.

The Islamic Jihad terrorist confirmed numerous reports that the proposed truce deal would ease the blockade on Gaza, expand the naval fishing zone, and allow construction materials into the Hamas terror enclave. He also confirmed that discussion on the issue of a sea and airport in Gaza would be postponed for a month after the agreement.

While US President Barack Obama's government has reportedly been pressuring Israel to agree to a truce deal, al-Hasayneh said "we, as the Islamic Jihad, are not interested in American sponsorship because we do not trust the United States, the partner of Israel, who supplies them with arms and money."

In fact, Obama's administration recently blocked a missile shipment to Israel according to a Wall Street Journal report on Wednesday night, and ordered greater scrutiny on future weapons transfers.

According to the Islamic Jihad spokeperson's appraisal of an imminent truce deal, apparently the pressure has worked. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu reportedly met with ministers on Tuesday for "softening talks" to gain support for Israeli concessions.

Al-Hasayneh concluded by emphasizing his terrorist group would "respond to any Israeli attack."

The statements come after Islamic Jihad second-in-command Ziad Nahala said Friday the war with Israel is "behind us," adding "we have no choice but to reach a truce agreement."

"The great destruction caused by the war obligates us to leave this (war) status," said Nahala. The night before, he claimed that Egypt talked Israel out of its security demands to disarm Gaza, end the smuggling into the Hamas enclave and the local weapons production, as well as have the terror tunnels disclosed.

However, another senior Islamic Jihad terrorist, Halad al-Batash, said Thursday night that his organization may embark on a long-term ceasefire even if a long-term truce deal is not reached with Israel.

The statement roughly mirrors that of Economics Minister Naftali Bennett (Jewish Home), who on Friday pushed for a unilateral end of the Gaza operation without an agreement with Hamas, accompanied by several Israeli concessions and an essential return to the status quo.

Islamic Jihad Says the War is Over
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsArutz Sheva
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Islamic Jihad terrorists in Gaza (file)

Reuters

Islamic Jihad second-in-command Ziad Nahala was quoted on Friday in the Palestinian Authority (PA) Al-Hayat Al-Jadida saying that the war with Israel is "behind us," the same day that a Security Cabinet meeting was to be held in Jerusalem.

Nahala said "we have no choice but to reach a truce agreement. That stands at the head of our priorities. I believe that we are approaching an agreement."

"The great destruction caused by the war obligates us to leave this (war) status," said Nahala, adding that while not all of the demands of his terrorist organization and Hamas have been met, they will at the very least get to keep their weapons in the proposed agreement.

"Our achievements from the war are acceptable to the Palestinian people," claimed the Islamic Jihad leader.

On Thursday, Nahala likewise said an agreement is imminent, claiming that Egypt talked Israel out of its security demands to disarm Gaza, end the smuggling into the Hamas enclave and the local weapons production, as well as have the terror tunnels disclosed.

The agreement apparently follows an Egyptian proposal Tuesday, which Nahala said would have those issues, as well as Hamas's demands to have a sea and airport in Gaza, discussed a month after an interim truce agreement is signed.

The Security Cabinet is set to meet at the Prime Minister's Residence in Jerusalem on Friday. Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu on Tuesday reportedly held "softening talks" with party head coalition partners to gather support for Israeli concessions.

However, Hamas's "military wing," the Al-Qassam Brigades, made it clear on Tuesday that if any truce agreement is accepted, it will only be so as to prepare for the next terror war on Israel.

Report: Israel's proposal

Nahala's statement comes as the Palestinian Arab Ma'an News Agency on Friday released what it claimed to be the Israeli proposal presented to the PA, Hamas and Islamic Jihad delegation in Cairo, reports Walla!.

According to the report, Israel stipulated that the opening of border crossings between it and Gaza be dependent upon a detailed agreement with the PA. The move apparently echoes an Egyptian offer to have the PA monitor the Rafah Crossing to Sinai.

Confirming Nahala's announcement Thursday, the report adds that Israel agreed to gradually cancel the "periphery" no-entry zone on the Gaza side of the border, meant to prevent terrorist infiltration, from the onset of the truce.

Israel also offered aid to the PA in rebuilding Gaza according to the report, even though the idea of Israel paying the salaries of Hamas officials in Gaza was not seen in the proposal.

Earlier it had been reported that Israel had agreed to paying those salaries, a proposal which was met with harsh criticism.

The Israeli proposal expressed the Jewish state's opposition to the release of terrorists and the establishment of a sea and airport in Gaza, all of which have been Hamas demands.

Is Las Vegas in Danger of Running Out of Water?
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsExpress
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

AFTER years of drought Lake Mead, the source of fresh water for the holiday hotspot, has hit its lowest level and Sin City is facing its biggest crisis.

The main source of fresh water for Sin City has hit its lowest level[GETTY]

After years of drought Lake Mead, the main source of fresh water for the holiday hotspot, has hit the lowest level ever and Sin City is now facing its biggest crisis.

Athe Venetian hotel gondoliers punt tourists up and down a fake Grand Canal.

There are six-foot waves in the sandy-bottomed pool of the Mandalay Bay, while the pool parties at the water complex of the Hard Rock Hotel with its underwater sound system are a legendary summer feature.

Even more legendary are the fountains: the one at Caesars Palace, which Evel Knievel once tried to leap on a motorbike and ended up in a coma, and the musical ones on the eight-acre lake at the Bellagio that reach 500ft and are a tourist draw in their own right Welcome to Las Vegas, the self-styled but undisputed entertainment capital of the world.

Home to 15 of the world's 25 largest hotels it boasts 125,000 rooms for visitors, every one of them with an obligatory en-suite bathroom.

The city may sit in the Mojave Desert and get just four inches of rain a year but this is a place where everything is done to excess.

The idea of cutting back on anything, least of all water, sounds unthinkable.

But take a trip 25 miles southeast to Lake Mead, the massive reservoir created when the Hoover Dam was built across the Colorado River, and you get a striking visual wake-up call.

All around its 760 miles of rocky shoreline is a clearly defined line that locals call the "bathtub ring".

Above it the rocks are brown and jagged but below they are shiny white. This is where the calcium in the water has stained the rocks - and the widening band of white is a powerful sign of how fast the level is dropping.

The lake, which supplies 90 per cent of the water to the two million residents of Las Vegas and its 43 million annual visitors, has been reduced by drought to the lowest level since it was filled in 1937 and is now at 39 per cent capacity. The surface reached a record high of 1,225ft above sea level in 1983 but is now at about 1,080ft. If the level drops below 1,050ft one of the two intakes that feed water to the city will become useless. Another 50ft and the other one would fail.

With the water level dropping by about a foot a week you can see why Professor Tim Barnett, climate scientist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in California, recently warned: "The situation is as bad as you can imagine. It's going to be screwed - and relatively quickly.

"Unless it can find a way to get more water from somewhere, Las Vegas is out of business."

The dam’s intake towers in 2007 and last month. If the levels drop another 80ft they will fail [GETTY]

Unless it can find a way to get more water from somewhere, Las Vegas is out of business

Professor Tim Barnett, climate scientist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography

Most of the water from the Colorado River, which runs down to a trickle where it used to meet the Gulf of California, actually goes to agriculture.

Seven states share its waters and under an accord struck at a time when Las Vegas was still tiny, Nevada gets just two per cent.

Nowadays the city is expanding at a massive rate and the population has more than quadrupled since 1980. But the reason Lake Mead is so low is that for the past 12 years the south-west of the United States has been suffering one of its periodic droughts.

Recorded in the area for some 1,200 years these are a result of reduced snowmelt from the Colorado Rockies. The current drought is made worse by global warming: higher air temperatures make the lake water evaporate faster.

But meteorologist Mike Tsolinas, who writes about Las Vegas weather at miketsolinas.com, says it's wrong to say Sin City is drying out. "Fortunately the Las Vegas Valley Water District is way ahead of the curve on this," he says.

"At 1,000ft Lake Mead would not be able to provide any water to Las Vegas because our intake valves would be pumping air. However a new project at 875ft is already twothirds done. By the time that happens, should it ever, Las Vegas will still have water.

"So the city will not run dry soon. We have at least enough water for everyone to come play in for another 30 years or so."

Water consumption in the city itself is actually falling, despite the soaring population. It may come as a surprise considering its air of conspicuous excess but Las Vegas has had no choice but to become one of the most eco-conscious places in the US.

One misconception is the Bellagio fountains, which seem like such a ruinous waste of water but aren't fed from Lake Mead.The display is supplied by groundwater from an aquifer that is high in salt content and so would not be drinkable.

Much more significant for conservation is that every drop of water going down a drain in a hotel bathroom or toilet is treated to near drinking-water standard and sent back to Lake Mead.

"We have been way ahead of the curve here in cultivating an ethic of conservation, providing people with the incentives to conserve, and we've been doing that for more than a decade now," says Bronson Mack of the Southern Nevada Water Authority.

"Compared to 2002, which is really when the drought started, our water consumption has dropped by 32 billion gallons yet our population has increased by almost half a million.

"In other words our water consumption has been cut by one third but our population increased by a quarter."

The lake, created by the dam is emptying and the city is at risk [GETTY]

The real conservation effort is aimed at water used outdoors, which can only be used once.

Mack says the conservation argument has largely been won among locals, who get rebates from pulling up turf from their gardens. The bigger challenge is the tens of thousands of migrants arriving from America's chillier corners at the end of every hard winter.

"A lot of them are pensioners sick of shovelling snow and we need to help them understand that they are now living in a desert and will have to adapt," says Mack.

"They won't be able to have grass in their front yard - they will have to have something more water-smart. But that message has been more easily received over the past five years or so, as people have become more aware of the drought and more attuned to the value of water."

The anti-green excess that can't be explained away are the wealthy enclaves arranged around manmade lakes such as the 320-acre Lake Las Vegas, whose residents include Celine Dion and which require regular topping up from Lake Mead.

These communities were planned in the late 1970s and early 1980s before anyone realised the extent of the problem and nowadays local development codes would no longer permit them. Since nobody is prepared to let the existing lakes dry out the most to hope for is the development of new technologies to prevent evaporation.

Otherwise Mack is upbeat. "In Las Vegas we had to change the culture because we were the fastest-growing community in the US for many consecutive years and we needed to take adaptive action," he says.

"We have taken account of our projected population growth in our 50-year water resource plan and so far so good. The community has been outstanding in its response and I am of the firm belief that Las Vegas is not going to dry up and blow away."

Google's Satellites Could Soon See Your Face from Space
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsProphecy New Watch
Categories: Today's Headlines;Commentary

Google will soon have an unprecedented ability to spy on you from space. Theoretically, at least. How?

Two months ago, after much lobbying by the biggest satellite company in North America, DigitalGlobe, the US government relaxed restrictions to allow for commercially available satellite imagery up to 25 cm resolution—twice as detailed as the previous limit of 50 cm.

Now, the first commercial satellite set to capture these high-res images, DigitalGlobe's Worldview-3, will launch this Wednesday. Six months after that, private businesses willing to fork over the money will be able to get their hands on hyper-detailed photos and videos of the globe.

That, of course, includes Google. 

Google—along with Microsoft, NASA, and numerous US federal agencies such as National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, which played a pivotal role in the seizure of Osama Bin Laden—is a regular DigitalGlobe customer. It signed a multiyear imagery contract with the colossus satellite company in February to use satellite imagery for apps like Google Earth, Maps, and Street View.

The extra sharp images from Worldview-3 will greatly increase the maps' level of detail to the point where it can make out 10-inch objects, which means Google will soon be able to see “manholes and mailboxes” from its hired eyes in the sky.

So, when you get that panicked feeling mid-flight that you forgot to turn off your coffee maker before leaving on vacation, Google will have resolution adequate enough for you to see a recent image of your slowly singeing house. You could also hypothetically pull up Google Maps and see a real-time image of your actual plane, rather than a blue dot, soar further and further away from your fiery abode.

The satellite behemoth is now making a push to relax the rules even further, down to 10 cm resolution, about the height of an iPhone 4.

DigitalGlobe currently has five birds in the sky, and one, GeoEye-1, has the ability to capture images at 41 centimeters. The company lobbied hard to loosen restrictions to 25 centimeters so that it could compete with foreign firms that will be blasting their own satellites into orbit soon. According to Reuters, the ability to commercially sell hi-res images this small, it can possibly increase the DigitalGlobe’s revenue by $400 million.

Meanwhile, coincidentally or not, Google acquired its own private satellite company, Skybox Imaging, shortly after the US government relaxed its satellite imagery restrictions in June.

Google’s Skybox intends to launch a constellation of 24 satellites by 2018, which will survey the globe by taking pictures of its entirety three times a day. This too will eventually, undoubtedly, upgrade the picture quality on its map applications. Google’s own birds can capture 90-second video clips and imagery at 30 frames per second. But how much can they actually see? 

At this point, considerably less than the shots the Worldview-3 will be snapping. Skybox’s satellites deliver high-res imagery "better than 1-meter resolution,” said Sara Blask, a company spokesperson. “Which means you can clearly discern features such as the size of car windshields, road markings and car colors.”

Skybox founder Dan Berkenstock echoed this claim in a TED Talk he gave right before the launch of SkySat1: “From our own computer simulations we quickly found that one-meter really was the minimum viable product to be able to see the drivers of our global economy,” he said. “For the first time being able to count the ships and cars and shipping containers and trucks that move around our world on a daily basis while conveniently still not being able to see individuals.”

That last bit is the salient point: Skybox’s satellites cannot capture details as small as license plate numbers or someone’s face—yet. But DigitalGlobe’s might. At 25 centimeters, the images will be detailed enough to classify the make of a car. If the restrictions relax further, the plate number or owner's face could come into clear view.

Naturally, the mere speculation of how this new powerful view will impact privacy is already raising concern. But how the Silicon Valley company actually intends to use its new detailed view of Mother Earth is still a looming question.

Google, for its part, claims it will use satellite image and video capabilities for the greater good. The technology can be extremely helpful in regards to natural disaster relief and it could provide internet access to places where it was previously unavailable.

In all likelihood, Google acquired Skybox not to spy on your mailbox number but to help it achieve something it has not yet been able to do: create a competitive cloud service. Skybox plans to combine its snap-happy satellites’ images with a collection of public data it has already gathered, like historical weather reports and satellite imagery, and create a vast archive, or a “cloud for the Earth” for other companies to run their own software and algorithms on.

But that raises another question: What kind of companies will utilize this “cloud for the Earth?” What could they potentially create with this vast amount of knowledge that, until now, seemed only obtainable and appropriate for super powers or leather-clad spies in action movies? If Google can make out your face from space, will it? And how might it capitalize on that ability?

Despite much of society’s indifference about sharing personal data—proven through social media’s mass archive of photos and information—perhaps it’s time we begin to have an open conversation, on an international level, about these new technological developments that can impact the world and public’s privacy. The sky is no longer the limit.

France Rebels Against Austerity As Europe's Recovery Collapses
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsThe Telegraph
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

France’s finance minister sends tremors through European capitals with a defiant warning that his country would no longer try to meet deficit targets

German GDP contracted 0.2pc, is France once again stuck at zero and Italy is already in a triple-dip recession Photo: Alamy

“What is absolutely necessary is to adjust the pace of deficit reduction to the exceptional situation we are in today. Growth is too weak in Europe and inflation is too low. We must therefore stop reinforcing the causes of this depression,” he told RTL television.

“We must face the figures in front of us with realism. The truth is that, contrary to the forecasts of the International Monetary Fund and the [European] Commission, growth has broken down, both in France and in Europe.”

He halved his French growth forecast to 0.5pc this year and to little more than 1pc next year, too weak to stop unemployment hitting fresh highs. The IMF has already warned that there will be no job growth until 2016.

Germany has so far refused to yield any ground on austerity policies but is increasingly vulnerable. Revised data show that the economy has been far weaker than thought over the past two years, falling into a significant double-dip recession last year. Professor Paul De Grauwe, from the London School of Economics, said: “They are victims of their own folly. Germany needs massive investment in its energy sector and it should be doing it now while it can borrow for almost nothing.”

Mr De Grauwe said EMU elites have misdiagnosed the cause of Europe’s intractable slump, blaming it on lack of reform when it is in reality a “demand crisis” made worse by a debt purge since the financial crisis. “They are doing everything they can to stop recovery taking off, so they should not be surprised if there is, in fact, no take-off,” he said.

“It is balanced-budget fundamentalism and it has become religious. We know from the 1930s that if everybody is trying to pay off debt and the government then deleverages at the same time, the result is a downward spiral. The rigidities in the European economy have absolutely nothing to do with the problem we face today.”

Many German economists said one-off factors explained the “sudden stop” in the second quarter but Berlin’s Institute for Economic Research (DIW) warned that deeper forces may be at work, with a risk of recession as Germany suffers the blowback effects from sanctions against Russia. “The economy may shrink again in the third quarter,” it said.

Sigmar Gabriel, Germany’s vice-chancellor, blamed the slowdown on “geopolitical risks in eastern Europe and the Near East”.

The contraction of world trade over the early summer has undoubtedly played a role since Germany is highly-geared to global exports.

The signs of a policy revolt in France could prove a turning point in Europe. Mr Sapin said his country would miss its deficit target this year but not try to make up the ground because the shortfall was caused by the deflationary conditions in Europe. He pledged to cut the deficit at an “appropriate pace” but would not go further. It is likely to exceed 4pc of GDP.

President Francois Hollande has so far gone along with EMU austerity demands, imposing severe fiscal tightening in his first two years in office, even though the ECB refused to offset the effect with monetary stimulus.

The result has been a permanent slump, with industrial output down 14pc from its peak. Mr Hollande has suffered a collapse in his approval ratings and faces a mutiny by the Left-wing of his own Socialist Party. There is increasing speculation over whether he may be forced to resign before the end of his term in 2017.

However, Mr Hollande is known for pirouettes that come to little. It is too early to tell whether he is willing to form a “Latin alliance” with Italy to force a change in policy, launching what amounts to a rebellion against German policy doctrines. Any such demarche would risk a dangerous rupture with Berlin.

The collapse of economic recovery in Europe leaves the ECB in a delicate position. Mario Draghi, the bank’s president, offered no clues earlier this month on when the ECB might finally resort to QE, insisting that it will wait to gauge the full effects of its negative deposit rate and the result of new loans to banks (TLTROs) in September and December.

This delays any likely QE until next Spring, yet it is far from clear whether the TLTROs will make much difference. They involve exchange of collateral and are merely asset swaps. Banks are in any case shrinking their lending to meet new capital ratios. The IMF said QE is a far more powerful instrument.

“The ECB will do as little as possible in the hope that something will come along to save them, and the euro will weaken,” Gabriel Stein, from Oxford Economics, said. “They are desperate not to do QE.”

First the UK, Now U.S. Turning Backs on Israel
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsProphecy New Watch
Categories: Today's Headlines;Antisemitism

After the abandonment of Israel by the UK, with its promise to limit arms sales to Israel if Hamas restarts its attacks on our civilians, we now learn that the US is already restricting arms sales to Israel, having halted a planned supply of the Hellfire precision missiles that enable Israel to strike at the rocket launchers set up by Hamas in the heart of Gaza’s residential areas.

While we seek to ascertain just how grave the crisis now is between Israel and its most important ally — is the case of the non-delivered Hellfires a procedural delay or the beginning of an embargo? is the relationship between the Obama and Netanyahu administrations ruptured or just very heavily strained? — nobody is going to believe the prime minister the next time he claims, as he did two weeks ago, that US support throughout this campaign has been “terrific.”

It becomes ever harder to understand what the US administration thinks it is doing in the Middle East. Its influence is waning across the region. It appears insufficiently robust — to put it mildly — when dealing with the region’s most dangerous regimes, notably Iran. Its ill-judged lack of enthusiasm for Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi — apparently blamed by Washington for ending an elected Muslim Brotherhood presidency, even though president Mohammed Morsi would likely have ensured no further elections — is pushing Egypt ever closer to Russia. And now ties with the region’s only democracy are fraying.

Some in the administration appear to labor under the delusion that if only Benjamin Netanyahu — described by some US officials in Thursday’s Wall Street Journal as “reckless and untrustworthy” — could be weakened and eased aside, Israelis might elect a leadership more inclined to follow its thinking and consider territorial compromise in the cause of a rejuvenated peace process with the Palestinians. The fact is, of course, that an Israel attempting to de-fang Hamas, concerned at the possibility of rising tensions in the West Bank, aware that Hezbollah in Lebanon is many times more powerful than Hamas is, and watching Iran working to outwit the West on its route to nuclear weapons, is as likely to veer left as Hamas is to voluntarily disarm. Far from being the most obdurate prime minister, Netanyahu is the most moderate that Israel can be expected to choose in the foreseeable future.

It is frankly astounding to the overwhelming majority of Israelis that Israel is being blamed for and pressured to end a war it manifestly sought to avoid — against a terrorist-government sworn to its destruction that repeatedly breaches the ceasefire efforts Israel consistently accepts. That the conflict is widely misrepresented, and that hostile governments are critical, is bad enough for Israel. Far, far graver is that key allies, to one degree or another, are turning upon it.

Hamas has fired more than 3,000 rockets into Israel. It exploited periods of calm in the years since it violently seized control of Gaza to build a network of tunnels under the border into Israel through which it planned major terrorist attacks. It documentedly emplaced its war machine in the heart of Gaza’s residential neighborhoods. It seeks to lift “the siege of Gaza” so that it can build a still more potent offensive capability.

It should be blindingly obvious that Israel and Egypt do not impose the blockade as a collective punishment or caprice. There was no blockade before Hamas seized power in 2007. Israel had unilaterally left Gaza two years earlier, and hoped to be rewarded with tranquility. If Gaza was not run by a terrorist government, there would be no need for a security blockade to prevent arms smuggling.

Rather than criticizing Israel for seeking to protect its civilians from Hamas, and moving now to limit its capacity to do so, the US, UK and the rest of the international community should be emphatically backing Israel in its struggle against the cynical Hamas — for the sake, too, of the civilians of Gaza. They should be insisting that Hamas disarm. And they should be making clear that they share Israel’s and Egypt’s concern that lifting the blockade is not tenable so long as any easing of restrictions would be exploited by Hamas.

They would thus be underlining the message to Gazans that Hamas is not fighting for their freedom, as it claims, but is, through its pursuit of war against Israel, denying them their freedom.

They would also be giving Israel reason to believe that when it finds itself in crisis — in good part, it can be argued, because it undertook a territorial withdrawal widely urged by the international community — the world will stand shoulder-to-shoulder with it. Right now, the sense in Israel is quite the reverse — not support, but abandonment.

From Hamas’s point of view, it must be a source of immense delight to witness the strains, and practical fallout, in the relationship between Washington and Jerusalem. It wins an election in which the US insisted it be allowed to take part, even though it has never renounced terrorism. It murders its way to control of Gaza. It diverts Gaza’s resources to turn the Strip into one great big terrorist bunker. It hits Israel, over and over and over again. It intimidates international journalists to not report on and film its attack methods. And the international community condemns Israel, the UN sets up inquiries into Israeli war crimes, and Israel’s allies limit its arms supplies.

All it needs to do, Hamas can only conclude, is keep firing at Israel’s towns and villages, forcing Israel to respond, confident that this will bring still more criticism down on Israel as well as growing restrictions on Israel’s ability to defend itself. Wow, the Hamas leaders must be thinking, the free world is just so dumb.

Read more at http://www.prophecynewswatch.com/2014/August14/142.html#xHSQ7KFVMhjKrzHG.99

Far - Left Groups Shocked By Public Backlash
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsArutz Sheva
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Thousands march in support of IDF operation to end Gaza rocket attacks

Flash 90

Left-wing newspaper Haaretz decried Friday what it called a "witch hunt" against leftists and civil rights organisations after the director of the national service administration, Sar-Shalom Jerbi, informed far-left NGO B'Tselem it was being blacklisted as an employer.  

"I feel obligated to exercise my power and stop the state assistance provided to an organisation that works against the state and against soldiers who are heroically giving their very lives to protect the safety and well-being of all citizens," Jerbi wrote in a letter.

He accused B'Tselem of disseminating lies and slander, endangering the state and publishing information that encourages Israel's enemies and leads to violent anti-Semitic acts against Jews around the world.  

The NGO, which models itself as a "rights group" but which is regularly involved in provocations against Jews in Judea and Samaria, denounced the move as an attack on Israeli democracy, and asked supporters to sign an online petition to support freedom of expression and democracy.

B'Tselem gained notoriety after it was among a number of radical-left NGOs which contributed to the UN's 2009 Goldstone Report, which accused Israel of "war crimes" after Operation Cast Lead. The report was slammed by Israel and other observers as biased, and the report's author, Richard Goldstone, later retracted his most inflammatory claim, that the IDF had deliberately targeted civilians in Gaza.

B'Tselem has maintained a similar stance throughout the recent military operation, drawing widespread resentment.

Israeli public opinion has overwhelmingly supported Operation Protective Edge, which was launched over a month ago to end indiscriminate rocket fire from Gazan terrorists against Israeli civilians. A poll carried out by The Israel Democracy Institute last month said 95 percent of Israeli Jews believed the offensive was just.  

Only a few fringe groups from the Israeli left have voiced opposition to the operation, including radical Haaretz journalist Gidon Levy, who accused air force pilots of perpetrating "the cruelest (and) most despicable deeds", despite going through great pains to avoid civilian casualties.

Haaretz itself has suffered as a result of Levy's pieces, which have been considered beyond the pale even by the paper's left-wing readership, and hundreds of readers have cancelled their subscriptions. The paper hired Levy bodyguards after people stopped in the street to insult him and government whip Yariv Levin denounced him as a liar, a "mouthpiece of the enemy" who should be put on trial for treason.  

"I have never faced such aggressive reaction, never," Levy told AFP in his cramped office at Haaretz in Tel Aviv, away from the coffee shops where he fears being insulted.

EU Offers to Take Charge of Gaza Border Crossings
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsArutz Sheva
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

European Union flag flutters outside of the European Parliament in Brussels

Reuters

The European Union (EU) on Friday offered to take charge of Gaza's border crossings and work to prevent illegal arms flows, according to The Associated Press (AP).

The EU is prepared "to play a strong role" in managing the crossings while assuring that Israel's security is guaranteed, said the 28-nation bloc's foreign policy chief, Catherine Ashton.

The EU offered to reactivate and extend its monitoring of the Rafiah crossing with Egypt and other border posts, provided there will be a UN Security Council mandate for the mission and a sustainable cease-fire in place, according to AP.

In addition, the EU says Israel must lift its blockade to allow "a fundamental improvement in the living conditions for the Palestinian people in Gaza."

The EU foreign ministers said the bloc is also prepared to prevent arms smuggling and launch a training program for Palestinian Authority police and customs officers to be deployed in Gaza.

"The situation in the Gaza Strip has been unsustainable for many years and a return to the status quo prior to the latest conflict is not an option," they said, according to AP.

The EU has been critical of Israel over its operation in Gaza and has several times called for an immediate ceasefire.

The offer comes amid continued talks between the sides for a long-term ceasefire. The talks are mediated by Egypt which has reportedly offered an 11-point ceasefire plan to the sides.

An Islamic Jihad spokesperson claimed on Friday that a truce deal with Israel will be signed as soon the current five-day ceasefire ends next Monday at midnight.

The statements come after Islamic Jihad second-in-command Ziad Nahala said Friday the war with Israel is "behind us," adding "we have no choice but to reach a truce agreement."

Egypt's 11 - Point Ceasefire Plan Revealed
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsArutz Sheva
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Rocket barrage from Gaza

Reuters

The Egyptian newspaper Al-Shourouq published on Friday afternoon what it said was an 11-point plan proposed by Egypt to Israel and Hamas in order to bring about a long-term ceasefire in Gaza.

According to the report, the 11 points are as follows:

• Israel will stop the attacks in Gaza, from sea, land and air. There will be no ground entries of Israeli troops into Gaza. 
• All the factions in Gaza will stop the attacks on Israel by land, sea and air. The construction of the terror tunnels will be stopped as well.
• Movement of people and goods for the purpose of rebuilding Gaza will be permitted, as well as trade of goods from Judea and Samaria and Gaza, and vice versa, in accordance with the principles to be agreed upon between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA).
• Israeli authorities will coordinate with the Palestinian Authority any matters related to finances and the reconstruction of Gaza.
• Elimination of the buffer zone in northern and eastern Gaza and deployment of the Palestinian Authority’s security forces starting January 1, 2015.
• Freedom of fishing and movement in the territorial waters of Gaza within six miles. The range will be gradually increased to no less than 12 miles, in coordination between the PA and Israel.
• Israeli authorities will assist the Palestinian Authority in rebuilding the damaged infrastructure in Gaza, and will help meet the needs of those who were forced to flee their homes because of the fighting. In addition, Israel will provide urgent medical assistance to the wounded, and bring in food and humanitarian aid to Gaza.
• The Palestinian Authority in coordination with the Israeli authorities and international organizations will provide the basic products needed to rehabilitate Gaza, according to a defined schedule that will allow for the rapid return of displaced persons to their homes as soon as possible.
• Egypt urges the international community to provide urgent humanitarian assistance and raise the funds needed to rebuild Gaza, according to a defined schedule.
• After the ceasefire is stabilized and normal life resumes in Gaza, the two sides will complete the indirect talks in Cairo, within one month from the date of the agreement which has not yet been signed.
• Ways to set up and operate an airport and a seaport in Gaza, in accordance with the Oslo Accords and other previous agreements, will be discussed.

According to Channel 2 News, Israel and the PA have not yet submitted their response to the Egyptian proposal. Diplomatic sources in Jerusalem told the channel that Israel has not yet agreed to any proposal.

"Israel insists that any agreements clearly express Israel’s security needs," they stressed.

Earlier Friday, an Islamic Jihad spokesperson claimed that a truce deal with Israel will be signed as soon the current five-day ceasefire ends next Monday at midnight.

The statements come after Islamic Jihad second-in-command Ziad Nahala said Friday the war with Israel is "behind us," adding "we have no choice but to reach a truce agreement."

However, another senior Islamic Jihad terrorist, Halad al-Batash, said Thursday night that his organization may embark on a long-term ceasefire even if a long-term truce deal is not reached with Israel.

The statement roughly mirrors that of Minister Naftali Bennett (Jewish Home), who on Friday pushed for a unilateral end of the Gaza operation without an agreement with Hamas, accompanied by several Israeli concessions and an essential return to the status quo.

China is Developing Alarming High - Tech Weapons Systems
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsArutz Sheva
Categories: Today's Headlines;Commentary

Over the past month, China has showed how its approach to its own rising superpower status applies to its defense policy. The results aren't exactly reassuring.

Outside of its borders, China has forged a wide-ranging policy of outreach and investment in Africa. China claims the offshore extractive resources, and even the offshore territories, of nearly all of its immediate geographical neighbors in the South China Sea. The country holds substantial American debt, and commands an enormous trade surplus with the world's largest economy — a label that it hopes to seize from a wheezing U.S.

In the military realm, China's ambitions have a tendency to manifest themselves through weapons technologies that skirt the boundaries of international legality. Over the past month, it's been proven to be working on two such capabilities.

This is an asymmetrical tactic: China will never have a military with the global reach or technological and operational superiority of the U.S.'s. But it can at least develop worrying and globally impactful capabilities that most countries wouldn't necessarily want for themselves — unless global norms rapidly deteriorated.

The past month offered two stark reminders of China's asymmetrical approach to its military development. In late July, the U.S. State Department determined that China had conducted a "non-destructive" test of an anti-satellite missile. This wasn't nearly as alarming as China's early 2007 test of the an anti-satellite battery in which it destroyed a satellite already in orbit and created a potentially-destructive orbital debris field.

But even the abstract possibility of space warfare carries extraordinary risks for the world's communications and GPS infrastructure — tools that the developed world's governments and militaries depend upon. By even pursuing anti-satellite capabilities China is suggesting that it might consider orbital assets to be in play in a future conflict.

Such weaponry isn't exactly illegal under the existing international legal regime, but it looks ahead to a mode of warfare that much of the world shudders to contemplate at the moment, including the U.S. In an email to Space News in the wake of last month's test, a U.S. State Department spokesperson called on China "to refrain from destabilizing actions ... such as the continued development and testing of destructive anti-satellite systems."

And two weeks ago, China confirmed the existence of the long-rumored Dongfeng-41A next-generation intercontinental ballistic missile, which can supposedly carry up to ten nuclear warheads a distance of 12,000 kilometers.

Multi-warhead missiles were banned under a 1993 arms reduction treaty between Russia and the U.S. that Russia later annulled. The treaty only applied to those two countries, and even then, it lasted for less than a decade.

But the logic that convinced the world's leading nuclear powers to eschew the very type of missile that China is developing still applies.

In a nuclear exchange, a country with multi-warhead missiles could deliver a potential death-blow to its enemy on a single volley. More importantly, it would have an incentive to do so if it believed its opponents had the same kind of multi-bomb delivery system. "First strike" would become "only strike" under such a state of play: an aggressor would have to defeat its enemy on the first go-round if it wanted to defeat them at all, with little room for error or negotiation.

Again, this is an asymmetric capability. China is developing weaponry that the rest of the world has mostly eschewed, in the hope of deriving an advantage from their rivals' complacency.

This is no reason for panic — China isn't about to go around blowing up satellites or lobbing dozens of nukes. It's an ambitious and sometimes aggressive actor, but by no means an irrational or craven one.

But the past month reveals something important about China's rise to superpower status. China's growing power and influence doesn't just derive from its population, economic clout, or sizable military. It also comes from its willingness to plot its own course, even against prevailing international norms — and its certainty that it's become too large and indispensable to have to pay any price for it.

Big Earthquake Looms for Chile
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsScientific American
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Damage in northern Chile caused by the tsunami associated with the magnitude-8.2 earthquake that struck in April 2014.
Credit: Juan González-Carrasco (Universidad Catolica del Norte, Chile)

The powerful earthquake that rocked Chile in April ruptured the earth in a way that suggests major quakes may still hit the region in the future, researchers say.

On April 1, a magnitude-8.2 earthquake struck about 58 miles (94 kilometers) northwest of Iquique in northern Chile, a major port city and hub for Chile's copper mining industry. It killed six people, damaged or destroyed at least 13,000 homes, caused power failures and triggered a tsunami wave nearly 7 feet (2.1 meters) high. Preliminary estimates suggest total economic losses from the temblor are close to $100 million.

The powerful earthquake originated in a seismic hot spot that has produced some of the world's strongest known tremors. The area is a subduction zone, where one tectonic plate dives beneath another — specifically, the oceanic Nazca Plate is plowing under the Pacific coast of the South American Plate at an average rate of about 2.75 inches (7 centimeters) per year. Major quakes that burst at subduction zones, the most tectonically active places on Earth, are known as megathrust earthquakes. 

Another big one looming?
The last time a great earthquake happened on this section of the boundary between the tectonic plates was in 1877, when a much larger event about magnitude 8.8 ruptured nearly 310 miles (500 km) of a fault. Past studies of the amount of deformation of the Earth's surface revealed that much of that fault is currently fully locked in position, building up stress. This dangerously strained part of the plate boundary is what is known as a seismic gap — a portion of a fault that is overdue for one or more powerful earthquakes.

"We had known about the potential for a large event in this region for some time," said Gavin Hayes, a seismologist at the United States Geological Survey in Golden, Colorado, and lead author of one of two studies examining the 2014 Chile quake appearing in the Aug. 14 issue of the journal Nature.

However, the 2014 quake was smaller than the major earthquake that researchers were anticipating. "I think most people expected that the large event, when it came, would be bigger than it was; that it would probably repeat what we saw in 1877, and so would be magnitude 8.5 or larger," Hayes told Live Science.

After modeling seismic data from the earthquake as well as the amount of deformation of the Earth's surface, Hayes and his colleagues found the 2014 quake did not rupture the entire seismic gap.

"There is still a lot of stored strain in this subduction zone, meaning the hazard still remains," Hayes said.

Earthquake forecast
In a separate study appearing in the Aug. 14 issue of the journal Nature, lead study author Bernd Schurr at the German Research Centre for Geosciences in Potsdam and his colleagues found the 2014 quake broke a 93-mile-long (150 km) portion in the center of the seismic gap. However, only one-third of the seismic gap was broken — two large segments of the seismic gap north and south of this ruptured portion remain, and pose a significant hazard.

Hayes and his colleagues noted that in the three weeks before the great earthquake, more than 80 earthquakes, between magnitudes 4.0 and 6.7, shook the area. These warning signs of the major quake to come occurred in the form of foreshocks that were part of a slow unraveling process. Schurr and his colleagues suggest that smaller earthquakes starting in 2013 weakened the plate boundary, helping set the events of this year in motion.

Although both groups suggest a large earthquake will occur in northern Chile in the future, "the difficult thing is we cannot tell when it will occur, even knowing as we do that parts of this subduction zone have not ruptured for close to 150 years, and have been further 'loaded' by the 2014 events," Hayes said.

The most likely place for this inevitable megathrust earthquake "seems to be the section immediately to the south of the 2014 earthquakes, but other sections are still hazardous, such as the stretch north of the 2014 sequence," Hayes said. "Unfortunately, earthquake prediction is still elusive, and we cannot give a precise date or size of a future event."

Allen West Declares Obama An Islamist
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsThe Daily Caller
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Former Florida Rep. Allen West declared President Obama an Islamist who is intentionally working against the security of the United States.

Alex Bligh: Now is the Time to Renew Ties With the Saudis
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsArutz Sheva
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Professor Alex Bligh, head of the Center for Middle East Studies at the University of Ariel and the former adviser to the Prime Minister on Arab Affairs, told Arutz Sheva that a new opportunity formulating in the Middle East at present. "The whole world is focusing on the obvious issue of the Arab-Israeli conflict, but is ignoring the underlying internal unrest between the Arab countries," he said.

In what is being perceived a  possible olive branch being held out to Israel by the Saudis, Al-Sharq al-Aswat, a London-based international newspaper owned by the Saudi royal family, has stated "There is no longer an Israel-Arab conflict, but an Israel-Turkish-Iranian conflict."

16 U.S. States At High Earthquake Risk
Aug 15th, 2014
Daily NewsLloyd's
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Thu 14 Aug 2014

Updates to the recent US geological survey show that certain areas face a higher threat of earthquakes than previously thought.

Some of the most prominent changes to the USGS earthquake maps include:

The potential for larger and more damaging earthquakes along the East Coast than previously thought. A magnitude 5.8 earthquake that struck Virginia in 2011 offered scientist more insight;

However, in New York City, the maps indicate a slightly lower hazard for tall buildings than previously believed;

The New Madrid Seismic Zone has been identified as having a larger range of potential earthquake magnitudes and locations than previously identified. This is a result of new research, part of which was compiled by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission;

In California, earthquake hazard extends over a wider area than previously thought. Faults were recently discovered for San Jose, Vallejo and San Diego; and

New research on the Cascadia Subduction Zone (a plate boundary that stretches from Vancouver Island in Canada to northern California) resulted in higher estimates of earthquake magnitude, up to 9.3.

The magnitude 6.1 earthquake which hit China’s Yunnan province on 3 August 2014 is a reminder of why some governments are keen to better understand earthquake hazard in order to mitigate the risk.

This is the objective of the US Geological Survey (USGS), which released its latest hazard maps for the US in July 2014.

“USGS earthquake science is vital because you can’t plan for earthquakes if you don’t know what you are planning for,” said Mark Petersen, chief of the USGS National Seismic Hazard Mapping Project, in a statement. “Our nation’s population and exposure to large earthquakes has grown tremendously in recent years. The cost of inaction in planning for future earthquakes and other natural disasters can be very high, as demonstrated by several recent damaging events across the globe.”

Learning from catastrophes

Earthquake science is constantly evolving as new research improves understanding. In recent years there have been significant earthquake events around the world. Such devastating catastrophes offer scientists the ability to better understand how earthquakes behave.

Geoscientists have recently studied the phenomenon of earthquake “clustering” (where one earthquake triggers another further down a fault line) and the impact of secondary perils, such as tsunami and liquefaction. Much of this insight has informed the latest incarnation of USGS hazard maps.

Earthquakes in Alaska, Mexico and New Zealand have offered insight into more complex ruptures and how faults can link together. This insight was applied to California by USGS.

The magnitude Tohoku earthquake and a M8.2 earthquake off the coast of Chile in 2014 ruptured along subduction zones similar to the Pacific Northwest zone.

And the M7.9 Wenchuan earthquake in China in 2008 provided many new records of shaking that are similar to anticipated future earthquakes in the western US.

Learning from these events has been shared throughout the scientific and risk modelling communities. “As our understanding of earthquake risk continues to evolve, it is imperative that our models reflect the best available science,” says Nick Beecroft, Lloyd’s manager of emerging risks and research.

“For complex and dynamic perils such as earthquakes, models provide an invaluable tool, but we also have to apply underwriting expertise to ensure that we achieve the most accurate valuation of risk.

“One of the key challenges is to ensure that lessons are learned from catastrophic events,” he continues. “The 2011 Tohoku earthquake-generated tsunami off Japan led to a reassessment of the methods for tsunami risk assessment, for instance. The critical challenge for insurers in communicating risk assessment based on geoscience is the need to encourage individuals and organisations to prepare for events outside their immediate experience.”

USGS updates

Every six years, the USGS updates its hazard maps to incorporate the latest geoscience research. Catastrophe modelling agency RMS, among others, was involved in the latest USGS maps. The earthquake models the insurance industry uses to manage its exposures and price the risk are likely to change as a result of the USGS updates.

“With the incorporation of new science or data, sometimes the hazard expectations increase and sometimes they decrease,” explains Patricia Grossi, senior director, model product management, RMS. “Incorporating the 2014 USGS map release into the RMS model is expected to increase losses in some cases and decrease losses in some cases. The expectation is that it will have an impact [on the models] but the full range is yet to be determined.”

“Where the USGS is incorporating higher magnitude events for off-fault events to M8.0, this change will likely increase losses on the ‘tail’ of an exceedance probability curve,” she adds. “But it’s also likely to have very little impact on the average annual loss estimates that are used for pricing.”

States at highest risk

The USGS hazard map reveals that 16 states are at a high risk of damaging earthquakes over the next 50 years (these have all historically experienced earthquakes with a magnitude 6 or higher).

The 16 states are Alaska, Arkansas, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Kentucky, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Washington, and Wyoming.

Several areas have been identified as being capable of having the potential for larger and more powerful earthquakes than previously believed, due to more data and updated earthquake models.

For the US as a whole, earthquake hazard is especially high along the west coast, intermountain west and in several active regions of the central and eastern US, such as near New Madrid, Missouri, and new Charleston, South Carolina.

New Madrid was the site of the most powerful earthquakes to hit the eastern US in recorded history. The 1811-1812 series of quakes were felt strongly over a wide area (roughly 130,000 square kilometres) and moderately over an area of nearly three million kilometres.