JULY-AUGUST 2004 WORLD NEWS

JULY-AUGUST 2004 WORLD NEWS

August 26, 2004

IDF splits Gaza into three after renewal of Qassam fire

Israel hopes EU will back barrier at U.N.

Iran calls for pressure on Israel to sign nuclear treaty

U.S. Believes Syria Has Centrifuges

Australia Risks Asian Ire with Long-Range Missiles

U.S. Preparing for Global Flu Epidemic

August 25, 2004

• Avian Flu Discovered in Pigs - August 20, 2004
Scientists in China say they have discovered a highly virulent strain of bird flu virus in pigs. The spread to pigs has yet to be confirmed, but there could be serious implications for human health if it is. The World Health Organization said that if the pigs were harbouring both bird and human flu viruses, the two strains could interact to create a strain capable of transferring easily to humans.

• U.S. Black Leaders Back Marriage Amendment - August 23, 2004
A coalition of black leaders said Monday they would gather at Washington's Lincoln Memorial in support of federal efforts to protect traditional marriage.

• Office Chaplains Provide Spirituality at Work - August 23, 2004
Marketplace Chaplains USA is a Dallas-based company that provides more than 1,000 chaplains to businesses nationwide. Major corporations like Coca-Cola and UPS provide spaces for employees to hold prayer or Bible study meetings during their breaks.

• Florida Court Rules Against Religious School Vouchers - August 23, 2004
Florida appeals court ruled yesterday that a voucher program for students in failing schools violated the state's Constitution because it sent public money to religious institutions.

• Washington Bankruptcy Case Yields DOMA-Friendly Ruling - August 22, 2004
In a precedent-setting case, a federal judge in the state of Washington has upheld the federal Defense of Marriage Act, choosing -- for a change -- to exercise judicial restraint and to interpret the law instead of creating it.

August 24, 2004

Israeli Troops Round Up 300 Palestinians in West Bank

PA: No Jewish connection to Israel

Iran boasts Dimona now 'within range'

Israel-EU hold advanced talks on wider Europe plan

U.S. Politics Influence Stand on Israeli Settlements

Mosque ultimatum: Get out or be wiped out

Typhoon Aere lashes Taiwan

Christian stripped of workplace signs

Scientists to create first artificial cornea

August 23, 2004

Executive Summary—Connecting The Dots - www.watch.org

There was a tremendous converging impact this past week of news events that culminated in a powerful massive storm that blasted the West coast of Florida. Charlie amassed damages in the billions of dollars as nearly 800,000 people were left without power and thousands were homeless even a week later. Meteorologists analyzed the storm and predicted its powerful impact, but were they aware of the causes other than the atmospheric conditions?

Leading up to the storm were other storms—of a political nature. A judge in Houston, Texas ruled that a Bible that has been in place for nearly 50 years must be removed from a monument in front of a Texas Court House. Homosexual activists vowed to fight a California Supreme Court ruling nullifying the some 4,000 illegal same sex marriages performed in that state in the wake of the Massachusetts decision to legalize homosexual marriage. New Jersey's governor resigned amid several corruption charges using the excuse that he violated his marriage vows by having an affair with a homosexual man. And the United States continued to apply awesome pressure on the leaders of Israel to dismantle so-called "illegal settlements."

Something the newscasters or the meteorologists were aware of is the mighty hand of God playing a role in Hurricane Charlie. These immoral stories about homosexuality and the removal of God's word from the public square converged with a massive pressure campaign for Israel to give up her covenant land to quite possibly lift God's hand of protection over America, resulting in the devastation of Charlie that killed some 17 people. left thousands homeless and became one of the costliest storms in U.S. history.

At the epicenter of Charlie's damage was the home district of Republican Congressman Porter Goss, newly appointed director of the Central Intelligence Agency.

All these stories have had an enormous impact on the United States and its people. Lets take a rundown of events starting in Texas. A Texas U.S. District Court judge ruled on August 10 that Harris County, Texas had 10 days to remove a Bible from a monument outside its civil courts building. As the deadline grew closer, Harris County was considering appealing the ruling amid protests from anti-Christian factions and demands from Christians who believe the ruling is in violation of their free speech rights.

Meantime, Thursday August 12 was a landmark day for homosexual announcements. The California Supreme Court ruled 5 to 2 that the 4,000 same sex marriages performed under the direction of the San Francisco mayor earlier this year were illegal and, thus, nullified. This infuriated sodomites, who publicly stated a vow of another sort—to fight the Supreme Court's ruling, which seemed rather final. The activists intend to challenge based on the court's neglect to consider whether the referendum that established marriage between a man and a woman in California was Constitutional. That referendum passed two years ago with a 67% majority.

On the East Coast, New Jersey Governor James E. McGreevey, saying he was a "Gay American," resigned amid a disgraceful and sordid shroud of having a homosexual affair behind his wife's back as well as a myriad of other charges of corruption. The sordid tale did little to sway New Jersey citizens against McGreevey as a poll conducted following news of his resignation indicated that his support was strong as ever. Unrepentant, both the Governor and the majority of his state citizens seem to think he should remain in office. Strange politics, but Republicans and some Democrats pressured McGreevey to vacate before his announced date of November 15 so free elections can be held along with other elections on the first Tuesday of November.

The third jewel in this week's triple crown of judgment was the intense pressure applied on Israel from the United States to abandon the settlements on the West Bank and Gaza. The U.S. announced that it was sending a team to Israel to monitor the pace of activity surrounding the so-called illegal settlements. A U.S. team to monitor the status of the unauthorized settlement outposts and settlement construction is to arrive in September, Defense Ministry officials said Monday. U.S. Ambassador Dan Kurtzer met Monday for the first time in three weeks with Israeli Defense Ministry official Baruch Spiegel, Israel's point man with the US on the settlement issue, and discussed the goals of the visit. The meeting was probably pretty intense as in recent weeks; the Bush Administration has made clear its frustration, both publicly and privately, with Israel's failure to fulfill commitments to remove settlement outposts.

This week also found church spy groups battling with Ministers of the Gospel in both liberal and conservative denominations. Spies are being sent in from Washington, D.C. activist groups to report pastors who politically support candidates of either party to the IRS, in an attempt to revoke their church's tax exempt status…another spy-type item in the news comes from an increased interest in governments around the world issuing various forms of required national identification programs…a type and shadow of the end times mark of the beast…and a sure sign that the apocalypse is upon us this week is that John Kerry gave advice to men about how to find the perfect woman and showed his lack of character by saying he was "turned on" by Catherine Zeta-Jones and Marilyn Monroe. Marilyn Monroe? Where does Teresa fit in? That's a wrap this week for Koenig's Eye View from The White House.

Impact Segment—America's Prophetic Decline: Immorality Plus Pressure On Israel Equals Judgment - www.watch.org

The horror scenes of hurricane Charlie smashing into the West coast of Florida late last week were a grim reminder of the force of nature. But many discount the veritable hand of God when it comes to life threatening natural disasters.

Consider that increased pressure on Israel to withdraw from the West Bank and Gaza settlements, the stirring up of the homosexual agenda in the U.S. and a Texas judge removing the Bible from a half-century old display in front of a courthouse may have combined to unleash the wrath of God's judgment manifest in hurricane Charlie leveling the West coast of Florida.

Recent disasters have been costly in both terms of human life and financial impact. They also have been significant because there is a direct relationship between the disasters and the U.S. government trying to pressure Israel into giving up her covenant land. Following are the "Top 10" catastrophic events for insured property losses, according to Insurance Services Office Inc. of Jersey City, New Jersey. The company defines a catastrophe as a single incident or series of related incidents — man-made or natural — that cause insured property losses totaling at least $25 million and affect a significant number of policyholders and insurers. Catastrophes with equivalent amounts of damage are listed with the same rank. The following numbers are inflation adjusted to 2002 dollars.

In parenthesis are the corresponding U.S. Presidential and/or Administration actions that occurred just prior to the catastrophes. Decide for yourself if the hand of God's judgment is involved.

1. Terrorist attack (New York, Virginia, Pennsylvania), September 2001 — $20.7 billion – (President George W. Bush and Crown Prince Abdullah of Saudi Arabia were completing work on President Bush's Middle East plan on September 10, 2001, the plan was to be given to the UN General Assembly by Secretary of State Colin Powell on September 24, 2001.)

2. Hurricane Andrew, August 1992 — $19.9 billion – (The Madrid "land for peace" meeting convenes in Washington D.C.)

3. Northridge, Calif., earthquake, January 1994 — $15.2 billion. – (President Bill Clinton and Syria's Hafez Assad meet in Geneva, Switzerland they call on Israel to leave the Golan Heights and agree to peace talks.)

4. Hurricane Hugo, September 1989 — $6.1 billion – (No direct tie into Israel)

5. Hurricane Georges, September 1998 — $3.3 billion – (PLO's Yassir Arafat meets with Bill Clinton and Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House. Clinton announces that he is sending Secretary of State Madeline Albright to the Middle East to get the Israeli and Palestinian negotiations back on track. )

6. Midwest, South tornadoes, May 2003 — $3.1 billion – (The Quartet's Road Map is delivered to the Israelis and the Palestinians on April 30. Colin Powell meets with Syria's Bashar Assad and states Israel will have to leave the Golan Heights on May 3. President Bush gives the graduation commencement address to the University of South Carolina stating his personal commitment to Israel and Palestine living "side by side" in peace and security on May 6. Colin Powell meets with the Israelis and the Palestinians on May 10 and May 11 to discuss implementing the Road Map.)

7. Tropical Storm Allison, July 2001 — $2.5 billion – (CIA Director George Tenet is in Israel meeting with the Israelis and the Palestinians on a cease fire agreement which was named the Tenet agreement. The plan was never implemented. )

8. Hurricane Opal, October 1995 — $2.5 billion – (The Israeli and Palestinian Interim Agreement is signed in Washington D.C. Secretary of State Warren Christopher, Israel's Shimon Peres and PLO's Yassir Arafat convene the first meeting of the U.S., Israel – Palestinian - Trilateral Committee.)

9. Midwest, South tornadoes, April 2001 — $2.2 billion – (President Bush agrees to become more involved in the Middle East peace efforts after meetings with Egypt's Hosni Mubarek and Jordan's King Abdullah II.)

10. Northeast winter storm, March 1993 — $2.2 billion – (Bill Clinton pressures Israel's Yithzak Rabin to begin Middle East talks at a White House meeting.)

Insider's take: Nine out of ten of these record-setting catastrophes took place the same day or within 24 to 48 hours of an American President applying pressure on Israel to divide her covenant land or increasing their involvement in the peace process. The specifics and details are in my book "Eye to Eye – Facing the Consequences of Dividing Israel."

August 20, 2004

India's 'lost Jews' wait in hope - By Geeta Pandey

A team of senior Israeli rabbis is due to rule soon on whether thousands of Indians who say they are members of one of the lost tribes of Israel can settle there.

Shlomo Amar recently led a delegation of rabbis to the north-eastern Indian states of Manipur and Mizoram where members of the Benei Menashe tribe live and practise Judaism. At the Beith-el Synagogue in the Manipur capital, Imphal, nine men wearing knitted skull caps read silently from the Old Testament.

Four others stand on a wooden platform in the centre of the room as a young man reads from the holy book under the supervision of an elderly priest.

These people claim to be one of the lost tribes of Israel.

Recent discovery

Tongkhohao Aviel Hangshing is the leader of the Benei Menashes in Imphal.

We found that the stories, the customs and practices of the Israeli people were very similar to ours Tongkhohao Aviel Hangshing

"We are Benei Menashe, because we belong to the Menashe tribe," he says. "Menashe is the son of Joseph, who was one of the 12 sons of Jacob. So we are the lost tribe of Israel."

Mr Hangshing says for thousands of years they did not know they were lost.

"We found out only 27 years ago," he says.

"When the Bible was translated into our language, in 1970s, we studied it.

"And we found that the stories, the customs and practices of the Israeli people were very similar to ours. So we thought that we must be one of the lost tribes."

Saturdays are observed by Jews the world over as the Sabbath, the day of rest, and the members of the Benei Menashe community meet for morning prayers at the synagogue in Imphal.

A lamb-skin scroll of the Torah, is unrolled and then rolled up again as each reader finishes his part.

Hope

There are more than 300,000 Benei Menashes in Manipur but most of them follow Christianity.

Only about 5,000 have converted to Judaism, most of them during the 1970s.

Mr Hangshing says although India has treated them quite well, they do not consider it their home.

The recent visit by a delegation of rabbis from Israel has given new hope to the members of this community. Caleb, a 24-year-old college student, wants to go to Israel because he says it is the land of his forefathers.

Amram is studying to be a lawyer. He says Israel is the promised land, for him and the others too.

"In Israel it will be easier for us to practise our religion."

In a chamber partitioned from the main prayer hall, about a dozen women join in the Sabbath prayers.

Lucy Vaiphei is the caretaker of the synagogue.

Her parents and six siblings have emigrated to Israel in the last few years and she is now looking forward to making the move herself.

Michael Freund, director of Amishav - an organisation that helps Jews move to Israel - says he firmly believes that Menashe is one of the lost tribes of Israel.

"We have brought over 800 of them to Israel," he says, "and the remaining people also want to emigrate".

Mr Freund says that last year the new Israeli interior minister, Avraham Poraz, suddenly declared his opposition to bringing the Benei Menashes into Israel.

"But I'm confident that if the chief rabbi issues a ruling saying that the Benei Menashes are indeed descendents of the Jewish people and should be allowed back home, then he will have no choice but to let them in."

So while the rabbis in Israel take a decision on whether or not to grant the right to emigrate to Israel to the Benei Menashes, this community here is waiting with bated breath - and praying.

August 20, 2004

Israel's Peres Urges Election, Pressures Sharon

Iran, Israel Tensions Rising

Iran: We have the right to launch preemptive strikes against Israel

Iran missiles sharpen aim with U.S. technology

Fearing riots, police restrict entry to Temple Mount

Damascus is not interested in talks with Israel

Bird Flu Believed Endemic in Asia, Spreads to Pigs

Bibles banned from citizenship ceremonies

August 19, 2004

Sharon's Settler Withdrawal Plan Suffers Major Setback

Rebuffed by Party, Sharon Presses on with Gaza Plan

Israel hits two Gaza City targets

Oil Sets Record Amid New Violence in Iraq

Official: 40,000 Christians flee Iraq

Typhoon Megi buffets South Korea

Torrential British Rain Set to Cause More Chaos

Five new moons for planet Neptune

Teleportation goes long distance

U.S. General Violated Rules with 'Satan' Speeches

August 16, 2004

Israeli Helicopters Fire Missiles in Gaza

Iran Warns Its Missiles Can Hit Anywhere in Israel

Three religions, one barrier and Jerusalem's ominous future

Mideast peace promoters sharply criticise Bush administration

Olympics Hit by Crisis Over Iran-Israel Contest

Frail Pope Struggles Through Lourdes Mass

Pollutants cause huge rise in brain diseases

Dazed Floridians Cope After 'Hell of a Storm'

Hurricane, Tropical Storm Form in Atlantic

EU orders health ID cards for all tourists

What in the blazes? 'Demon' fires vanish

University cuts off Christian fraternity

Bible study meets in unconventional place - Hooters

Rabbi plans to preach Jesus under the big top

August 13, 2004

WATCHDOG GROUP MONITORS SERMONS

… Pilate said to them, "Shall I crucify your King?" The chief priests answered, "We have no king but Caesar!" - John 19:15

"We recognize no Sovereign but God and no King but Jesus."
- Rev. Jonas Clarke, April 18th, 1775

Hundreds of years ago, Europeans in search of religious freedom fled their homes for the New World. The principle of freedom of religion was so important to America's early leaders that they enshrined it in the United States' founding documents, including the first Amendment to the Constitution in the Bill of Rights. However, in the effort to implement so-called "separation of church and state" the freedoms of many churches and groups of religious people have been attacked, especially when those churches begin dealing with what some people consider "political" activities.

Churches with 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status are free to engage in many kinds of political activities, but are prohibited from certain things like officially endorsing a candidate for office from the pulpit. Recently, pastors in some cities have been accused of "endorsing" certain candidates, because those pastors have pointed out which candidates do and don't support values important to Christians.

In Kansas and Missouri, a battle is heating up in the local government over the issue of homosexual marriage. This is a political issue with deep religious significance to Christians, as it attacks the fundamental unit of the family as established in Genesis 1 and 2. Fearful that a Pastor might endorse a candidate in the close political races, a group calling itself The Mainstream Coalition has dispatched over 100 volunteers to "monitor" sermons at various churches in these states. The churches receiving the most attention are those with a strong public voice against same-gender marriage or abortion.

According to Caroline McKnight of the Mainstream Coalition: "I want to impress upon my board and my people who work with me, we will be monitoring church services and we will be alerting people when we know they have crossed the line and we will be contacting them with a list of guidelines. We will be watching them."

The Christian Seniors Association (CSA), a division of the Traditional Values Coalition, sent a letter to Attorney General John Ashcroft asking the Justice Department to look into these activities, which they consider to be harassment. Pastors in the Kansas and Missouri areas are also concerned. Rev. James Conard, assistant pastor at the First Baptist Church of Shawnee said, "Somebody is trying to act like Big Brother when there's no need for Big Brother. It's obviously an intent to intimidate."

A group called Ad Hoc Pastors for Biblical Values responded with a written statement condemning The Mainstream Coalition. "We are alarmed at such scare tactics," it said. "These are the methods of coercive rulers. There is no place for this type of intimidation by 'secret police' in our land." Rev. Conrad said the Ad Hoc group has about 100 members of local church leadership among its ranks.

The Mainstream Coalition claims to have no political affiliation or agenda, however scanning their web site reveals the following about this group:

* strong support of Roe v. Wade
* strong support of late-term abortions
* strong support of sex education
* strong support of human cloning
* strong support of hate-crime laws
* strong support of gun control
* strong support for teaching of evolution
* strong opposition to prayer in schools
* strong opposition even to the wearing of religious symbols on government property

The activities of The Mainstream Coalition appears to be only a part of a broader campaign to exclude Christian pastors from political dialogue, even if it directly impacts issues of faith. On July 4th, pastor Ronnie Floyd of First Baptist Church in Springdale, AR, preached a sermon which included references to President Bush, Senator Kerry, homosexual marriage, and abortion. A short time after the sermon, Barry Lynn of Americans United for Separation of Church and State filed a complaint with the IRS seeking to remove the church's tax-exempt status. Lynn also recently filed a complaint with the IRS against Jerry Falwell over political statements on his web site.

While no church has yet lost its tax-exempt status for political viewpoints, it is important to note that this harassment is consuming valuable ministry time. It also reveals a prevailing mood of anti-Christian sentiments which could grow to hurt ministries if left unchecked. However, as Christians, we know that the people promoting this attack are not our enemies, and our fight is not against flesh and blood. Our duty to the ballot box is important, but our most important “vote” is cast in the prayer closet.

THE 'HISTORIC PALESTINIAN HOMELAND'

In a time of Gaza withdrawal plans, EU criticisms and a struggling Road Map to Peace, there are a multitude of arguments about who really owns the land of ancient Israel, and who has the right to make their dwellings in it.

In order to climb above all the propaganda for a true perspective of recent history's realities, it may be beneficial to turn to an eyewitness account of the land before all the current media attention. What was Israel like a hundred years ago? Did the Jews really invade a land inhabited by content Palestinian Arabs to set up an oppressive Israeli state?

To better answer these questions, we should go back to sources that predate the current fighting. Just 135 years ago, an American writer documented his travels with a group of other pilgrims to Europe and the Holy Lands. For our reader's convenience, we offer below a number of excerpts from Mark Twain's visit to the lands of the Bible, as memorialized in his book, The Innocents Abroad, published in 1869.

Chapter 46:

It was a very short day's run, but the dragoman does not want to go further, and has invented a plausible lie about the country beyond this being infested by ferocious Arabs, who would make sleeping in their midst a dangerous pastime. Well, they ought to be dangerous…The great sash they wear in many a fold around their waists has two or three absurd old horse pistols in it that are rusty from eternal disuse - weapons that would hang fire just about long enough for your to walk out of range, and then burst and blow the Arab's head off. Exceedingly dangerous these sons of the desert are.

[Regarding the valley where Joshua slaughtered the King of Hazor and where Jael killed Sisera in her tent:]

There is not a solitary village throughout its whole extent - not for thirty miles in either direction. There are two or three small clusters of Bedouin tents, but not a single permanent habitation. One may ride ten miles hereabouts and not see ten human beings. To this region one of the prophecies is applied; "I will bring the land into desolation; and your enemies which dwell therein shall be astonished at it. And I will scatter you among the heathen, and I will draw out sword after you; and your land shall be desolate and your cities waste." No man can stand here by deserted Ain Mellahah and say the prophecy has not been fulfilled.

Chapter 47:

...We traversed some miles of desolate country whose soil is rich enough, but is given over wholly to weeds; a silent, mournful expanse, wherein we saw only three persons - Arabs with nothing on but a long coarse shirt like the "tow-linen" shirts which used to form the only summer garment of little Negro boys on the southern plantations. Shepherds they were, and they charmed their flocks with the traditional shepherd's pipe - a reed instrument that made music as exquisitely infernal as these same Arabs create when they sing...

...Well, there was nothing to do but just submit and forgo the privilege of voyaging on Gennesaret, after coming half around the globe to taste that pleasure. There was a time, when the Saviour taught here, that boats were plenty among the fishermen of the coasts - but boats and fishermen are both gone now… and the commercial marine of Galilee numbers only two small ships, just of a pattern with the little skiffs the disciples knew. One was lost to us for good - the other was miles away and far out of hail. So we mounted the horses and rode grimly on toward Magdala, cantering along the edge of the water for want of the means of passing over it...

...We had left Capernaum behind us. It was only a shapeless ruin. It bore no semblance to a town and had nothing about it to suggest that it had ever been a town. But all desolate and unpeopled as it was, it was illustrious ground...

Chapter 48:

...Magdala is not a beautiful place. It is thoroughly Syrian, and that is to say that it is thoroughly ugly and cramped, squalid, uncomfortable and filthy…

...As we rode into Magdala not a soul was visible. But the ring of the horses' hoofs roused the stupid population, and they all came trooping out - old men and old women, boys and girls, the blind, the crazy, and the crippled, all in ragged, soiled, and scanty raiment, and all abject beggars by nature, instinct, and education...

...We are camped in this place now, just within the city walls of Tiberias… Its people are best examined at a distance. They are particularly uncomely Jews, Arabs, and Negroes. Squalor and poverty are the pride of Tiberias...

Chapter 49:

...But the doom of the Christian power was sealed. Sunset found Saladin lord of Palestine, the Christian chivalry strewn in heaps upon the field… It was hard to realize that this silent plain had once resounded with martial music and trembled to the tramp of armed men. It was hard to people this solitude with rushing columns of cavalry… A desolation is here that not even imagination can grace with the pomp of life and action...

...We never saw a human being on the whole route, much less lawless hordes of Bedouins. Tabor stands solitary and alone, a giant sentinel above the Plain of Esdraelon...

Chapter 52:

...The narrow canyon in which Nablus, or Shechem, is situated is under high cultivation, and the soil is exceedingly black and fertile. It is well watered, and its affluent vegetation gains effect by contrast with the barren hills that tower on either side.

For thousands of years this clan have dwelt in Shechem under strict taboo and having little commerce or fellowship with their fellowmen of any religion or nationality. For generations they have not numbered more than one or two hundred, but they still adhere to their ancient faith and maintain their ancient rites and ceremonies. Talk of family and old descent! … This handful of old first families of Shechem…can name their fathers straight back without a flaw for thousands [of years]…. I found myself gazing at any straggling scion of this strange race with a riveted fascination, just as one would stare at a living mastodon or a megatherium…Carefully preserved among the sacred archives of this curious community is a MS copy of the ancient Jewish law, which is said to be the oldest document on earth...

...The Further we went, the hotter the sun got, and the more rocky and bare, repulsive and dreary the landscape became… There was hardly a tree or a shrub anywhere. Even the olive and the cactus, those fast friends of a worthless soil, and had almost deserted the country. No landscape exists that is more tiresome to the eye that that which bounds the approaches to Jerusalem...

...At last, away in the middle of the day, ancient bits of wall and crumbling arches began to line the way - we toiled up one more hill, and every pilgrim and every sinner swung his hat on high! Jerusalem! Perched on its eternal hills, white and domed and solid, massed together and hooped with high gray walls, the venerable city gleamed in the sun. So small! Why, it was no larger than an American village of four thousand inhabitants… Jerusalem numbers only fourteen thousand people...

Chapter 53:

...The population of Jerusalem is composed of Muslims, Jews, Greeks, Latins, Armenians, Syrians, Copts, Abyssinians, Greek Catholics, and a handful of Protestants. One hundred of the latter sect are all that dwell now in this birthplace of Christianity. The nice shades of nationality comprised in the above list and the languages spoken by them are altogether too numerous to mention. It seems to me that all the races and colors and tongues of the earth must be represented among the fourteen thousand souls that dwell in Jerusalem. Rags, wretchedness, poverty, and dirt, those signs and symbols that indicate the presence of Muslim rule more surely than the crescent flag itself, abound… I would not desire to live here...

Chapter 56:

Of all the lands there are for dismal scenery, I think Palestine must be the prince. The hills are barren, they are dull of color, they are unpicturesque in shape. The valleys are unsightly deserts fringed with a feeble vegetation that has an expression about it of being sorrowful and despondent. The Dead Sea and the Sea of Galilee sleep in the midst of a vast stretch of hill and plain wherein the eye rests upon no pleasant tint, no striking object, no soft picture dreaming in a purple haze or mottled with the shadows of the clouds. Every outline is harsh, every feature is distinct, there is no perspective - distance works no enchantment here. It is a hopeless, dreary, heartbroken land.

Palestine is desolate and unlovely. And why should it be otherwise? Can the curse of the Deity beautify a land?

The so-called historic Palestinian homeland. Did the Jews come into a prosperous nation and divide it, or did they enter a desolate land and bring with them prosperity and trade, cultivation and health? A great deal has changed in Israel since Mark Twain's visit, and all inhabitants would do well to set aside their guns and stones and to enjoy the benefits of living in what is now a bountiful, thriving, democratic nation.

August 11, 2004

• Christian Doctors Call for Support of Adult Stem Cell Study - August 10, 2004
The Christian Medical Association recently sent a letter to Congress speaking out against embryonic stem cell research, and asking the U.S. legislature and the White House to support adult stem cell research, which holds promise for improving and saving human lives without the destruction of human embryos.

• Iraqi Priests Defy Bombers in Half-Empty Churches - August 10, 2004
Blasts at five churches in Iraq killed 11 people during evening prayers last Sunday - inspiring dread among some of Iraq's 800,000 Christians and invigorating the faith of others.

• Federal Lawsuit to Recognize Same-Sex Marriage to Be Filed in Tampa - August 10, 2004
The Equality Campaign announced Tuesday that attorney Ellis Rubin will be filing the first Federal lawsuit on behalf of Rev. Phyllis E. Hunt and her spouse, Vilia Corvision, for the recognition of the couple's Canadian marriage.

• EU Labeling of Israeli Products Described As Anti-Semitic Boycott - August 10, 2004
An agreement between Israel and the European Union that will limit trade to products exported from Israel proper - not exports from the disputed territories - amounts to an anti-Semitic boycott according to the mayor of one of the largest West Bank settlements.

• Olympics' Digital Security Unprecedented - August 10, 2004
If you're going to the Olympics, you'd better be careful what you say and do in public. Software will be watching and listening. Recent leaps in technology have paired highly sophisticated software with street surveillance cameras to create digital security guards with intelligence-gathering skills. Spoken words collected by the cameras with speech-recognition software are transcribed into text that is then searched for patterns.

August 10, 2004

Is The Total Information Awareness System A Product Of Antichrist? - By Thomas Horn

RNU.com – (Raiders News Update) - Many people believe that, before long, a man of superior intelligence, wit, charm, and diplomacy will emerge on the world scene as a savior. He will seemingly possess a transcendent wisdom that enables him to solve problems and offer solutions to many of today's most perplexing issues.

His popularity will be widespread. His fans will include young and old, religious and non-religious, male and female. Talk show hosts will interview his colleagues, news anchors will cover his movements, scholars will applaud his uncanny ability at resolving what has escaped the rest of us, and the poor will bow down at his table.

He will, in every human way, appeal to the best idea of society.

But according to conservative news sites like Raiders News Update, his profound comprehension and irresistible presence will be the result of an invisible network of thousands of years of collective knowledge. He will, like the pharaohs of Egypt, represent the embodiment of a very old and super-intelligent spirit. Just as Jesus was the "seed of the woman" (Gen. 3:15), he will be the "seed of the serpent."

It's been assumed for centuries that a prerequisite for his appearing is an all-seeing world order, an umbrella under which national boundaries dissolve, and ethnic groups, ideologies, religions, and economics from around the world, exist beneath his hungry domination.

At the head of his utopian administration, his single personality will surface. He will appear to be a man of distinguished character, but will ultimately become "a king of fierce countenance" (Dan. 8:23).

With imperious decree he will facilitate a totalitarian world government. Those who refuse his New World Order will be branded as unpatriotic, and imprisoned (or destroyed) until finally he exalts himself "above all that is called God, or that is worshiped, so that he, as God, sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God" (2 Thess. 2:4).

For many years the idea of his Orwellian society, where his all-seeing Antichrist-eye watches over the smallest details of our lives and qualifies our human liberties, was considered anathema. The concept that rugged individualism could somehow be sacrificed for his anesthetized universal harmony was repudiated by America's greatest minds.

But something happened in the 1970's. Following a call by Nelson Rockefeller for the creation of a "New World Order," presidential candidate Jimmy Carter campaigned, saying, "We must replace balance of power politics with world order politics."

Evidently he struck a chord with world leaders.

During the 1980's, then president George Bush repeated Carter's one-world dirge, announcing over national television that "a New World Order" had arrived. Following the initial broadcast, he addressed the Congress where he added: "What is at stake is more than one small country [Kuwait], it is a big idea - a new world order, where diverse nations are drawn together in common cause to achieve the universal aspirations of mankind: peace and security, freedom, and the rule of law. Such is a world worthy of our struggle, and worthy of our children's future!"

The current administration's response to Bush Senior's call for a new world order, in which peace and security, freedom, and the rule of law is aspired, has been to authorize increasingly severe surveillance of - and even elimination of - civil liberties.

The Total Information Awareness System, the controversial Pentagon research program that aims to gather and analyze a vast array of information on Americans, has hired at least eight private companies to work on the effort, while without any official public notice, and without any congressional hearings, the Bush administration continues to push the quick development of the commercial applications that will be overseen by The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), a big-brother amalgam of government and private sector sources ala Orwell's 1984.

"It will extensively mine government and commercial data banks, enabling the FBI, the CIA, and other intelligence agencies to collect information that will allow the government—as noted on Nightline—to essentially reconstruct the movements of citizens. This will be done without warrants from courts, thereby making individual privacy as obsolete as the sauropods of the Mesozoic era."

Meanwhile, biometrics - the incessantly hyped technology that relies on physical characteristics such as fingerprints, facial and iris patterns, to ID individuals - is emerging as the indisputable security standard of the new corporate realm. The next logical step of The Total Information Awareness System will be to monitor travel, banking, and security authorization using biometric chips implanted in the body according to some futurists.

As if that was not enough, the Coast Guard confirmed plans just this week to employ 70 Unmanned Drones to monitor people-movements along U.S. Coastlines. If the robotic eyes-in-the-sky are successful, additional robots for vast surveillance and information-analysis will look for suspicious patterns in everything from personal driving habits to the movies you watch, prescriptions you purchase, telephone calls you make, and arguments you have with your spouse or divorcee.

"It is as if a giant plan is unfolding," one time presidential candidate, Pat Robertson observes. "Everything perfectly on cue."

While I've disagreed with some of Pat's comments recently (Not while I was a guest on his 700 Club show), I can't help but feel this particular comment - "It is as if a giant plan is unfolding" - is inspired.

Is The Total Information Awareness System part of the Antichrist's plan? It, or something like it, will be.

An ancient scheme is unfolding. At the core of the conspiracy a leader of indescribable brutality is about to materialize. His all-seeing, all-controlling quest will make the combined depravities of Antiochus Epiphenes, Hitler, Stalin and Genghis Khan - all of whom were types of the antichrist - look like child's play.

TRAGEDY STRIKES IRAQI CHRISTIANS

Families at the Armenian Our Lady of the Flowers Church in central Baghdad had just gathered for Sunday evening services when the attacks began. A car bomb outside the church exploded, sending thousands of fragments of shattered glass into the congregation. Men, women, and children fled the building and those who were able helped the wounded to safety amidst the smoke and flames.

Twenty minutes later a second explosion occurred at a nearby Assyrian church. A communion service was underway when attackers detonated nearly 200 pounds of explosives and artillery shells. The blast ripped through the church with incredible force, sending glass, debris, and even parked cars flying into the air.

The third and fourth blasts quickly followed at a seminary in the southern neighborhood of al-Dora and a Chaldean church in the eastern district of New Baghdad. Iraqi Police found a fifth bomb near another church in the capitol city, but managed to disarm it before anyone could be hurt.

In the city of Mosul, approximately 200 miles north of Baghdad, two more bombs exploded outside the Mar Polis Church, killing at least one person and wounding over a dozen more. Another bomb went off in a Christian neighborhood in Kirkuk, but police said no one was killed in the attack.

The attacks in Mosul and Baghdad began and ended within a period of thirty minutes. When the smoke cleared at least 10 people were dead and more than 60 others were wounded. Many of the injured suffered severe burns and were brought to area hospitals for treatment. The bombings were the first coordinated attacks specifically targeting Iraqi Christians.

Iraq's national security adviser said the attacks were most likely the work of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who Iraqi and U.S. intelligence officials suspect may be heading up Al-Qaida's forces in Iraq. Government officials were quick to condemn the bombings, hoping to unite the Christian and Muslim communities. Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the country’s most revered Shiite Muslim spiritual leader, also denounced the attacks, saying that terrorists "targeted Iraq’s unity, stability and independence," and that "[Iraqis] should all be working together as a government and a people in order to put an end to the attacks."

Religious minorities in Iraq, including Christians, represent about three per cent of the population, or approximately 700,000 out of a total population of 24 million mainly Shia and Sunni Muslims. Until recently Iraqi Christians have lived in relative peace with their Muslim neighbors. However the escalation of violence over the last few months has lead many to fear for their lives. Please remember to pray for the Christians of Iraq, many of whom have given everything for the cause of Christ.

August 10, 2004

A new era of Christian persecution - www.wnd.com

"If they have persecuted me, they will also persecute you." So Christ told his disciples, and so it has again come to pass.

Not since Stalin's time have Christians been so savagely persecuted. But it is no longer communists who are the great persecutors, but Islamist mobs from Africa to the Balkans to Indonesia.

Last Sunday during evening services, terrorists detonated car bombs outside five Catholic churches in Mosul and Baghdad. A dozen worshipers perished. Scores of women and children were injured.

Now the Christians are fleeing. In Damascus, Rita Zekert, who heads the Caritas Migrant Center, says that where, a year ago, the refugees were Shiite, Sunni, Christian and Kurd in rough proportion to each's share of the population, "nowadays, 95 percent of the people coming to us are Iraqi Christians."

According to the New York Times, these refugees "tell of Christian shopkeepers killed by Islamist gangs for daring to sell alcohol, of family businesses sold to ransom stolen children ... They left Iraq, they say, only because they were too terrorized to stay."

"All Sunday's attacks were against Catholics rather than Eastern Orthodox churches, suggesting that Christians who owed their allegiance to Rome had become targets in the anti-Western campaign, Catholic clerics said," says the Financial Times, adding, "Iraq's 650,000-strong Christian community is depleting fast. Most of the 3 million Christians of Iraqi origin now live abroad, mainly in the U.S. and Western Europe. Tens of thousands have moved to Syria and Jordan, many crammed into tenement blocks, living on charity, banned from work and waiting for visas out of the Arab world."

From Lebanon, scores of thousands of Catholics have fled in recent decades, leaving those behind as a shrinking minority in a Muslim land where they once flourished and, indeed, led.

Last May, in Nigeria's second city, Kano, Muslim youth went on a midnight rampage with cutlasses, clubs and machetes, massacring 600 Christians and leaving their bodies in the streets. Sixteen churches burned to the ground. The senior Muslim cleric in the city ordered all Christians out. Some 30,000 were driven from their homes.

In Kosovo in March, Albanian mobs, enraged over false rumors that Serbs were responsible for the drowning of three Muslim boys, looted and torched 17 monasteries, churches and convents. To protect these same Kosovar Albanians, the United States launched a 78-day bombing campaign on Belgrade and Serbia in 1999.

All the world is today focused on Darfur in the western Sudan. Forgotten are the millions of Christians in the southern Sudan who suffered torture, slavery, mutilations, rapes, starvation, massacres and exile at the hands of Sudanese soldiers after Khartoum declared Islamic law for the nation.

Between 1974, when Indonesia invaded East Timor, and 1999, when East Timor voted for independence, the United Nations has documented at least 120 massacres, with many involving hundreds of dead in this small Catholic country. After independence, Indonesian troops slaughtered over 1,000 East Timorese in rage over their decision to break free of Jakarta.

In Egypt, the 6 million Christian Copts have begun openly to protest persecution by Muslim fanatics and local authorities. If, as President Bush has assured us, "Islam is a religion of peace," what is going on? Why the persecutions? Why the rampages and massacres to force peaceful Christians to flee their homes in Nigeria, Sudan, Kosovo, Iraq, Egypt, Indonesia?

Answer: What is going on in the Islamic world is something akin to what happened in Europe from the Spanish Reconquista in 1492 through the Thirty Years War. As Isabella was determined to expel the Moors and de-Islamicize all of Spain, militant Muslims are today determined to expel all Christians and to de-Christianize the Islamic world.

They intend not only to drive Americans out of Iraq, Saudi Arabia and other Arab lands, but to drive the Christian minorities out – as aliens, traitors and collaborators of the West. Islamic terrorists are engaged in what has been called Fourth Generation warfare, warfare by non-state actors, warfare that will not be defeated with Tomahawk missiles and F-16s. And the militant Islamists conducting this form of warfare against Christian minorities in their midst are only confirmed in the justice of their jihad by America's imperial presence in Iraq and our domination of the Middle East and Arab world.

The Western empires came and conquered the Islamic world in the 19th and early 20th centuries. They then departed or were driven out in wars of national liberation. But the Christian minorities who had lived peacefully there for 20 centuries, and who were left behind when the West went home, are now paying the price of our occupations and of militant Islam's determination to purge and purify the Dar al Islam of all the hated residue of the Christian West.

August 9, 2004

Rain and stormy weather batter UK

Hurricane Alex Floods Homes on North Carolina Island

25 killed in monsoon downpour in western India

Bangladesh: 20 million need food aid

Three Moderate Quakes Shake Turkey

North Korea crops hit by heavy rains

Turkey Earthquake Injures Six People

Disease Spreads Death in Flood-Ravaged South Asia

Alaska Volcano Stirs From 12-Year Slumber

Suicides in Japan Hit Record High in 2003

Drought warning adds to India woe

Ship-sinking monster waves revealed by ESA satellites

Locusts have a field day in starving Africa

Aids reduces African life expectancy to 33

July 30, 2004

2 killed in suicide attack at Israeli embassy in Tashkent

Report: Israeli Troops Kill 4 in Gaza Strip

Jordanian FM calls fence a `grave national security threat'

French Jews heed Sharon's homeland call

Spy: Israel has 200 nukes

US warns Iran over nuke plans

Iran says it is building a stealth missile

July 29, 2004

Under-the-skin ID chips move toward U.S. hospitals - By Michael Kanellos

VeriChip, the company that makes radio frequency identification--RFID--tags for humans, has moved one step closer to getting its technology into hospitals.

The Federal Drug Administration issued a ruling Tuesday that essentially begins a final review process that will determine whether hospitals can use RFID systems from the Palm Beach, Fla.-based company to identify patients and/or permit relevant hospital staff to access medical records, said Angela Fulcher, vice president of marketing and sales at VeriChip.

VeriChip sells 11-millimeter RFID tags that get implanted in the fatty tissue below the right tricep. When near one of Verichip's scanners, the chip wakes up and radios an ID number to the scanner. If the number matches an ID number in a database, a person with the chip under his or her skin can enter a secured room or complete a financial transaction.

"It is used instead of other biometric applications," such as fingerprints, Fulcher said.

The approval process does not center on health risks or implications, Fulcher said. VeriChip can already sell implantable RFID chips in the United States for standard security applications and the financial market. The company's basic technology has also been used in animals for years.

Instead, the FDA may mostly examine privacy issues, Fulcher indicated. In other words, the agency will look at whether the technology will lead to situations where confidential information can get improperly disclosed.

Technically, the FDA on Tuesday issued a letter stating that there were no equivalent products on the market. This allowed VeriChip to then seek a de novo, or additional, review. The application process started in October 2003.

The Italian Ministry of Health kicked off a six-month trial of the chips for hospitals in April.

VeriChip, a division of Applied Digital Solutions, generated headlines worldwide recently with the announcement that the Attorney General of Mexico implanted one of the small company's RFID tags in his arm.

Fulcher said the basic technology has been around for a while. For 15 years, Digital Angel, a sister company under the Applied corporate umbrella, has sold thousands of tags for identifying animals. The U.S. Department of Energy employs Digital Angel's technology to monitor salmon migration. Several implants have been placed in household pets and livestock.

"We believe the tags can last 20 years," Fulcher said.

The idea for employing the tags to identify humans came after the horror of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, Fulcher said. Richard Seelig, vice president of medical applications at Applied, saw on TV how firemen were writing their badge numbers on their arm with pen so they could be identified in the event of a disaster.

He inserted Digital Angel tags in his body and told the CEO that they worked. VeriChip was born. In June, the company hired Next Level and Motorola alum Kevin Wiley as CEO.

About 7,000 VeriChip tags have been sold, and approximately 1,000 have been inserted in humans. The chips only work with VeriChip's scanners. Along with scanners, VeriChip also sells complementary security systems for opening or shutting doors after the identification process.

So far, most of the sales have been outside the United States. Along with its attorney general's implant, Mexico has evaluated the chips as a way to better identify children in the event of a kidnapping. The Baja Beach Club in Spain has used them as electronic wallets to buy drinks. Sales have also taken place in Russia, Switzerland, Venezuela and Colombia.

"The applications that have taken hold at this point have been international so far," Fulcher said.

But FN Manufacturing, a South Carolina gun maker, is evaluating the technology for "smart guns," which contain sensor-activated grips so that only their owners can fire them.

The chips themselves are inserted into humans and animals with a syringe. When emerging from the syringe, the chips get coated with a substance called BioBond, which insulates the chip from the body and allows it to adhere to local tissue. If removed, it becomes inactive.

Privacy has been an issue for the company, but the complaints have actually begun to die down. "The pushback is less and less," Fulcher said.

The chip is an ID tag, Fulcher emphasized. When a person with an embedded chip passes near a scanner, the dormant chip simply wakes up and issues an ID number. The administrator of the security systems and databases determines how the information is used. A person has to stand within a few feet of a scanner for the tag to wake up. Thus, the tags can be used to follow someone's steps only when they are near scanners. The company's hand scanners can ping chips about 12 inches away, although the devices for counting salmon are 10 to 12 feet away from the fish.

Also, VeriChip is working on an implant that will contain a Global Positioning System. Such a device would allow an individual with a scanner to pinpoint someone's position on the globe.

The lab device, however, is relatively large right now, about the size of a pacemaker.

July 28, 2004

• Congress OKs Delay on Biometric Passports - July 24, 2004
Countries whose citizens can enter the United States without a visa will get an extra year to provide "tamperproof" biometric passports under legislation approved by the Senate.

• Hardline Threat to al-Aqsa Mosque - July 27, 2004
Israel's Public Security Minister Tzahi Hanegbi has said hardline Jewish groups may be planning to carry out attacks on the two most sacred Islamic shrines in occupied East Jerusalem the Al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock.

• NIH to Open National 'Stem Cell Bank' - July 27, 2004
The government plans to open a "national bank" to better grow the only embryonic stem cells eligible for government-funded research, holding firm against critics who want Bush administration restrictions on the controversial cells lifted. In addition, the National Institutes of Health plans to spend $18 million over four years to establish three "centers of excellence" to speed research on the currently available cell lines.

• Sudan Group Tells Muslims to Prepare to Fight the West - July 27, 2004
A group calling itself Mohammed's army has called on Muslims to prepare to fight Western forces sent on any mission to western Sudan.

• Explaining the Arab-Israeli Conflict Through Numbers - July 27, 2004
Dennis Prager offers compelling statistical data concerning the Arab-Israeli conflict.

July 26, 2004

Israel's Sharon: No Turning Back on Gaza Pullout

Israel Completes Rerouting of West Bank Barrier

Temple Mount to be open to Jews on Tisha Be'av

Arafat wants Bush, Sharon out

China Militia Hold Exercises Opposite Taiwan

700 Die in South Asia Floods

Christians Fear Persecution in New Iraq

July 23, 2004

Arafat agrees to cede power to PM

Israel and EU fail to heal rift

EU Vows to Play Peace Role Despite Israeli Rebuke

Strike before Iran's nukes get hot

Teacher has kids tasting flavored condoms

July 22, 2004

Chip Implanted in Mexico Judicial Workers - By Will Weissert (Article submitted by Stella Busby -Thanks!)

MEXICO CITY—Security has reached the subcutaneous level for Mexico's attorney general and at least 160 people in his office—they have been implanted with microchips that get them access to secure areas of their headquarters.

It's a pioneering application of a technology that is widely used in animals but not in humans.

Mexico's top federal prosecutors and investigators began receiving chip implants in their arms in November in order to get access to restricted areas inside the attorney general's headquarters, said Antonio Aceves, general director of Solusat, the company that distributes the microchips in Mexico.

Attorney General Rafael Macedo de la Concha and 160 of his employees were implanted at a cost to taxpayers of $150 for each rice grain-sized chip.

More are scheduled to get ''tagged'' in coming months, and key members of the Mexican military, the police and the office of President Vicente Fox might follow suit, Aceves said. Fox's office did not immediately return a call seeking comment.

A spokeswoman for Macedo de la Concha's office said she could not comment on Aceves' statements, citing security concerns. But Macedo himself mentioned the chip program to reporters Monday, saying he had received an implant in his arm. He said the chips were required to enter a new federal anti-crime information center.

''It's only for access, for security,'' he said.

The chips also could provide more certainty about who accessed sensitive data at any given time. In the past, the biggest security problem for Mexican law enforcement has been corruption by officials themselves.

Aceves said his company eventually hopes to provide Mexican officials with implantable devices that can track their physical location at any given time, but that technology is still under development.

The chips that have been implanted are manufactured by VeriChip Corp., a subsidiary of Applied Digital Solutions Inc. of Palm Beach, Fla.

They lie dormant under the skin until read by an electromagnetic scanner, which uses a technology known as radio frequency identification, or RFID, that's now getting hot in the inventory and supply chain businesses.

Scott Silverman, Applied Digital Solutions' chief executive, said each of his company's implantable chips has a special identification number that would foil an impostor.

''The technology is out there to duplicate (a chip),'' he said. ''What can't be stolen is the unique identification number and the information that is tied to that number.''

Erik Michielsen, director of RFID analysis at ABI Research Inc., said that in theory the chips could be as secure as existing RFID-based access control systems such as the contactless employee badges widely used in corporate and government facilities.

However, while those systems often employ encryption, Applied Digital's implantable chips do not as yet. Silverman said his company's system is nevertheless save because its chips can only be read by the company's proprietary scanners.

In addition to the chips sold to the Mexican government, more than 1,000 Mexicans have implanted them for medical reasons, Aceves said. Hospital officials can use a scanning device to download a chip's serial number, which they then use to access a patient's blood type, name and other information on a computer.

The Food and Drug Administration has yet to approve microchips as medical devices in the United States.

Still, Silverman said that his company has sold 7,000 chips to distributors worldwide and that more than 1,000 of those had likely been inserted into customers, mostly for security or identification reasons.

In 2002, a Florida couple and their teenage son had Applied Digital Solutions chips implanted in their arms. The family hoped to someday be able to automatically relay their medical information to emergency room staffers.

The chip originally was developed to track livestock and wildlife and to let pet owners identify runaway animals. The technology was created by Digital Angel Corp., which was acquired by Applied Digital Solutions in 1999.

Because the Applied Digital chips cannot be easily removed—and are housed in glass capsules designed to break and be unusable if taken out—they could be even more popular someday if they eventually can incorporate locator capabilities. Already, global positioning system chips have become common accouterments on jewelry or clothing in Mexico.

In fact, in March, Mexican authorities broke up a ring of used-car salesmen turned kidnappers who were known as ''Los Chips'' because they searched their victims to detect whether they were carrying the chips to help them be located.

July 21, 2004

• 85 Boy Slaves Freed in Sudan - July 16, 2004
The freed slave boys were among the tens of thousands of black women and children who had been enslaved by Sudanese government-sponsored militias during two decades of civil war.

• Protesters Demand Ouster of 'Gay Friendly' Justices - July 16, 2004
A group of Massachusetts citizens staged a protest against the state speaker of the House for scuttling a bill to remove state Supreme Court Chief Justice Margaret Marshall and three other judges who ruled in favor of same-sex marriage.

• YMCA Ousts Member For Witnessing - July 15, 2004
Ironically, an evangelist from Georgia says his local YMCA (Young Men's Christian Association) terminated his family's membership because he shared the gospel with two young men just outside the facility.

• U.S., World Clearly Are Safer - July 16, 2004
National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice overviews the events of the past several years and concludes that the war on terror has removed significant threats and has made America and the world safer.

• Sudan Rebels Quit Talks On Darfur - July 17, 2004
"By refusing to accept our demands the government in Khartoum is saying that it is not prepared to discuss the disarmament of the Janjaweed [militia] who are conducting ethnic cleansing and genocide against the Africans in Sudan."

• Poll Indicates Protestant Majority in U.S. Eroding - July 20, 2004
Between 1993 and 2002, the share of Americans who said they were Protestant dropped from 63 percent to 52 percent. At the same time, the number of people who said they had no religion rose from 9 percent to nearly 14 percent.

• Regime Change in Iran if Bush Wins? - July 19, 2004
The U.S. would not use military force, as in Iraq, but "if Bush is re-elected there will be much more intervention in the internal affairs of Iran," said the official, who stressed the war on terror would "continue to be relentless."

• Satellites Will Track 5,000 of the Worst Criminals in Britain - July 18, 2004
The radical new technology, which has been developed in the US, will enable law enforcement officers to pinpoint the exact location of criminals who have been released early from prison and fitted with electronic tags.

July 20, 2004

Israel hits Gaza military HQ

Palestinian PM agrees to stay on

Israel, Hezbollah Forces Clash; 2 Soldiers Die

100 church leaders arrested

July 16, 2004

Israel braces for 'battle' at UN debate on ICJ anti-barrier ruling

Palestinian Gunmen Kidnap Gaza Police Chief

Muslims warned: Avoid 'Christian' companies

Iran Atomic Shopping Deepens Bomb Fears

Author: Al-Qaida Has Nuclear Weapons Inside U.S.

North Korea makes bombs as disarmament talks continue

Chinese produce new type of sub

Aids reduces African life expectancy to 33

Powerful Storm Hits Hong Kong

Christian academy rejects creationism as 'rubbish'

July 15, 2004

U.N. thrashes Arafat for coming 'collapse'

American, Canadian immigrants land in Israel

Saddam Statues Melted Down, Recast As Memorial To US Soldiers

South Asia floods chaos worsens

Powerful Storms strike U.S. Northeast, Midwest

'Superbug' Kin Infects Athletes, Kids

Hale and hearty: the boy who died for seven hours

Bible Teacher Tells Believers to Prepare for Persecution

July 14, 2004

• European Court Denies Fetus Rights Ruling - July 08, 2004
The European Court of Human Rights said it could not rule on a case filed by a French woman who was forced to have an abortion after a doctor's mistake.

• UN rules against Israeli barrier
The International Court of Justice has ruled that Israel's West Bank barrier is illegal and construction of it should be stopped immediately.

• Senate Agrees to Pro-Life Bush Nominee on Federal District Court - July 06, 2004
Despite intense pressure from abortion advocates, pro-life attorney Leon Holmes was given a spot on a federal district court in Arkansas.

• Schoolchildren to be RFID-Chipped - July 08, 2004
School authorities in the Japanese city of Osaka have decided to start chipping children in one primary school. The chips will be put onto kids' schoolbags, name tags or clothing in order to track the kids' movements.

• Canadian Judge OKs Spanking - July 09, 2004
"The force used by the accused falls within the scope enunciated by the Supreme Court of Canada and was 'a minor corrective force of a transitory and trifling nature,'" Judge Bob Wilkins said.

• U.S. Senate Votes on Marriage Amendment on Wednesday - July 09, 2004
Senate debate over an amendment to the U.S. Constitution, to include the phrase "marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman," began on Friday. Debate is expected to continue until Tuesday with Senators casting their votes Wednesday.

• Swedish Pastor Sentenced to Month in Prison for Preaching Against Homosexuality - July 05, 2004
Ake Green, the pastor of a Swedish Pentecostal church in Kalmar, Sweden, has been sentenced to one month in prison by a Swedish court, for inciting hatred against homosexuals. Green was prosecuted in January for "hate speech against homosexuals" for a sermon he preached last summer citing Biblical references to homosexuality.

GLOBAL PESTILENCE UPDATE

According to the National Institute of Health "infectious diseases remain the leading cause of death worldwide, and the third leading cause of death in the United States." Diseases thought to be obsolete have once again become a global threat, and in recent years new pathogens have emerged, some of which carry antibiotic-resistant genes or mutations enabling them to move across different species. Following are some of the diseases that have been the focus of government health organizations worldwide:

Ebola: Ebola hemorrhagic fever is one of the deadliest and most feared diseases in the world; many victims die within one week of infection. The World Health Organization announced Monday that 19 cases of Ebola have been confirmed in southern Sudan. Five people have already died and 120 others are under observation. Officials do not know to what extent the disease has spread.

Rift Valley Fever: This disease originated in Africa and is spread by mosquitoes. In humans it is more deadly than West Nile virus, but poses the greatest threat to livestock, killing nearly 30 percent of all infected animals. There is currently no vaccine for Rift Valley Fever, and if spread to the United States would be very difficult to contain.

Anthrax: Local Chinese health officials recently announced the death of a man who contracted anthrax from an infected cow. Outbreaks of anthrax are generally rare, but many fear diseases like anthrax and smallpox could be used as weapons in bioterror attacks.

Malaria: Malaria has been successfully treated for many years with an over-the-counter drug called chloroquine, however new strains that are resistant to this drug have appeared and spread throughout Africa, South America, and Southeast Asia. Stronger drug-resistant strains of both Cholera and Tuberculosis have also emerged.

Avian Bird Flu: There are at least 15 different types of avian influenza that routinely infect birds around the world. The current outbreak is highly contagious among birds and rapidly fatal. Unlike many other strains of avian influenza, it can be transmitted to humans, causing severe illness and death. It has been known to mutate rapidly, and has resurfaced as an epidemic in eastern Asia.

SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome): Caused by a new virus that killed nearly 800 people worldwide, symptoms are similar to the bird flu, although easier to contain. The initial outbreak is under control and scientists have been able to use antibodies to treat patients, but there is still the possibility of the disease re-emerging.

AIDS: Caused by the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), AIDS effects more than 40 million people worldwide, 30 million of whom live in the developing world. Scientists and humanitarian organizations are working on developing and distributing less complicated and more affordable treatment options. Meanwhile, only 400,000 of those with HIV in poorer countries receive anti-AIDS drugs. The AIDS epidemic remains as much a political issue as it is a humanitarian one, much to the detriment of those suffering from the disease. AIDS has overshadowed many of the other maladies that plague the third world. Monday, at the Global AIDS Conference in Bangkok, controversy erupted over whether abstaining from sex or using condoms was more effective in preventing AIDS.

Our goal in bringing you this information is not to promote fear or anxiety, yet we live in a world that is plagued with sin and death. In every tribe and nation there are men and women who are condemned to die without ever hearing the Gospel of Jesus Christ. They will not hear unless we tell them. "God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. Be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony of our Lord (2 Timothy 1:7-8a)."

July 13, 2004

Israel Rerouting Barrier Closer to Border

Palestinians to seek emergency U.N. session

Sharon promises US envoys to dismantle illegal outposts

Israel's fence - top agenda for EU talks

EU warns Israel aid depends on political dialogue

Sharon looks to religious parties

Hamas has new missile to fire into Israel

Terror 'navy' raises alarm

Flood havoc mounts in South Asia

Hundreds Flee Flooding in Northeastern U.S.

Cold weather kills eight in Argentina and Chile, thousands of animals in Peru

Sex and Porn Scandal Hits Austrian Catholic Seminary

Parliament of World's Religions opens in Spain

July 9, 2004

World Court Rules Israel's Barrier Illegal

Israeli fighting on two fronts in Gaza

Israel will respect its own High Court, not ICJ

Nuclear Israel: Belling the cat

Hamas leader claims 'hundreds' of suicide bombers waiting to be deployed

Report: Bin Laden Aims to Attack U.S. This Year

July 8, 2004

Israelis Fight Palestinians in North Gaza, Kill 7

Hamas commander killed in Gaza fighting

Israel's West Bank Barrier Faces World Court Ruling

Quartet 'sick and tired' of Arafat

'Hope' for nuclear-free Mid-East

Arab Fears of a Persian Bomb

Hundreds dead in China floods

Costa Rica on alert after volcanic eruption

Mystical cow 'licks' away disease

Pastor gets prison for sermon

July 7, 2004

• Site A Treasure Trove of Artifacts From Ancient Utah - June 25, 2004
An extremely well-preserved archeological site in Utah is open to researchers (and potential looters) after having been protected for decades by the rancher who owned the site. It offers insight into the lives of the Fremont people who lived in central Utah over 1000 years ago.

• Court Says E-mail Providers Can Read Messages - June 30, 2004
In an online eavesdropping case with potentially profound implications for online privacy rights, a federal appeals court ruled it was acceptable for a company that offered e-mail service to surreptitiously track its subscribers' messages.

• Will Mel Gibson's Passion Play Out in County-Seal Fight? - July 05, 2004
The ACLU is fighting to have the tiny cross removed from Los Angeles County's official seal. Catholic actor Mel Gibson and Jewish Rabbi Daniel Lapin may both be fighting to keep the cross on the seal. Lapin said, "As long as Americans respect the cross, Jews and other minorities are safe. In post-Christian Europe, anti-Semitism is rife."

• Democrats Block Independence Day Celebration - July 02, 2004
California state Assemblyman John Campbell comments, "Four years of Cinco De Mayo and not one recognition of the 4th of July..." as celebrations on the Assembly floor.

• Physicists Reveal Flaw in EU Constitution - July 01, 2004
As Britain prepares to make its mind up over the proposed European Constitution, Physics World reveals new research by physicists in Poland that claims the most controversial aspect of the new constitution, the voting rules at the EU Council of Ministers, are fatally flawed and will give some countries unfair clout in the decision-making process.

• Hand Scanners To Keep Tabs on Students at Boca Middle School - July 01, 2004
When teachers take attendance at a new middle school next month, they won't need a notebook or even a piece of paper. They can depend on biometric hand readers to do the job.

• Egypt Demands PA Fire Corrupt Officials - July 07, 2004
"Suleiman made it crystal clear to Arafat that without reforms he would not receive financial aid from the donors, who estimate that hundreds of millions of dollars did not arrive at their destination," an official was quoted as saying.

UFOs Over Teheran

July 2, 2004 - Flying saucer "fever" has gripped Iran after dozens of sightings in the last several weeks, and even Iran State television has aired footage of a sparkling white disk, that it says was filmed over Teheran. All of this is part of the phenomenon of colorful Unidentified Flying Objects, UFOs, in the skies over Iran.

These sightings have prompted an Iranian Air Force Officer in the Revolutionary Guard to call for Iran's Supreme National Security Council to investigate whether or not these visitors from afar have hostile intentions.

Some newspapers and agencies are reporting that people are rushing out into the streets to watch a bright extraterrestrial light dip in and out of the clouds in eight different Iranian towns.

July 6, 2004

Six Palestinians, Israeli Officer Killed in Clashes

Civil War in Israel?

Nuclear watchdog starts visit to Israel

Syrians claim confiscating Israeli goods to Iraq

Iran warns US of global retaliation if attacked

UN: HIV Infections Hit Record High in '03

UN issues locust plague warning

Flash floods hit north-east India

Japan Firm's Chip Tells Mom if Kids Out of School

UFO conference this weekend - Argen Duncan

Is anyone searching for truth or curious about UFOs?

The Ancient of Days UFO and Abduction Conference in Roswell this weekend is planned to offer UFO believers and skeptics a chance to hear presentations on evidence and physical and theological implications of UFO phenomena.

Guy Malone, conference organizer and owner of Alien Resistance Headquarters bookstore and Internet cafe, said the point of the event is to bring together a wide variety of beliefs, backgrounds and areas of speciality in UFOs. Also, the conference has an emphasis on theology, he said.

According to Malone, some of the speakers are Christians presenting theological views of UFOs and some are presenting evidence he considers credible.

"This is for serious research only," he said of the conference.

He said some of the best researchers and theologians are coming. While there's no consensus on whether the phenomena are spiritual, man-made or extraterrestrial, none of the speakers will argue against UFOs and related occurrences, Malone said.

The spiritual theory refers to the hypothesis that angels, especially demons, cause UFOs and related occurrences, rather than implying the happenings aren't real, he said.

Eighty people have prepaid and preregistered to attend the conference, and the public can come to some parts, according to Malone.

Friday, people can walk into talks for free from 1-6 p.m. Speakers are scheduled to repeat those presentations 9 a.m.-1:30 p.m. Monday, he said.

The public can purchase day passes Saturday or Sunday or pay at the door for specific talks, according to Malone. Half-day passes are to be available as well.

While the public can pay to attend the lecture following the meal, the dinner Saturday night is only for those who preregistered. The panel discussion on Monday is closed to the public as well, Malone said.

He also said he plans to sell videos of the presentations.

Representatives from a CBS affiliate in Tampa, Fla., the Sci-Fi channel, paranormal radio stations and magazines are slated to attend, according to Malone.

Also, he said he expects registration money, walk-in fees and video and DVD sales to cover the $12,000 in expenses for putting on the conference. Any extra money will go toward the Alien Resistance Headquarter's work, Malone said.

Alien Resistance HQ offers Biblical perspectives on UFOs and Bible counseling for abductees, according to a written statement.

As a child, the statement says, Malone had contact with beings who taught him doctrines that, when he became a Christian as an adult, he found conflicted with the Bible.

Malone moved to Roswell in 1999 as a missionary concerned about the people who look to UFOs and aliens as a new religion. He believed some, though not all, UFO reports had an evil, demonic element, particularly those involving contact with entities, according to the statement.

Malone said he teaches that belief in UFOs is reconcilable with a biblical world view .

"I think most UFOs are man-made, but a very few are angelic chariots and/or demonic counterfeits," he said. "I think most abductions are angelic in nature, but fallen angels, just like in Genesis 6, and a few of the modern abductions are military experimentation. But from all the available research and published reports, I think the extraterrestrial hypothesis has the least amount of proof going for it, although it is the most popular view."

July 1, 2004

Israeli Helicopter Fires Missile in Gaza

Israel launches raid on Jericho

Eminent rabbi says those who dismantle settlements would be subject to biblical death sentence

Handcuffed in His Former Palace, Saddam Defiant

Expect 'big' missile test soon: Musharraf

Baptists denounced as 'America's Holy Warriors'

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