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God and Jerusalem-Page 2

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To the atheists among us this won’t mean much, but to every single Jewish or Christian man and woman in this country this should mean everything. Israel is the homeland for the Jewish people by God-given right. Obama does not and will never believe in it. Strike one. I also believe that America’s special and historic relationship with Israel has enabled it to become the greatest nation this planet has ever seen. Obama does not and will never believe that either. Strike two. And finally, and most importantly, Obama’s Democratic party took both God and Jerusalem off its platform. As if Obama and the “new” Democratic Party haven’t shown enough of their true colors during the past four years, this reinforced to America who they really are. All they had to do is take God and Jerusalem out. Strike three. And strike three it was this past Wednesday.

I know some of you would argue that at the very last moment Obama forced these two issues up the party’s throat which enabled the Democrats to claim God and Jerusalem are still part of their platform. Unfortunately for all you good Democrats, it is just too little, too late. We all now know and are aware of what you really think and believe. A last minute political maneuver to try and save your fate from the public’s wrath will not succeed. We all witnessed it live this past Wednesday.

For open minded and reasonable Christians and Jews, if strike three isn’t enough to make you reconsider and reevaluate your decision in November, nothing will. If your hatred towards Conservatives is greater than your faith and your common sense, I’m afraid nothing else I can say will change your mind. It’s been four years of the most corrupt administration in American history, the greatest debt we ever faced, extremely high unemployment, unprecedented gas prices, huge government growth and outrageous taxes. This of course is only a partial list of the chaos that has hit this country since Obama took office. If this is not enough to signal that something is incredibly wrong and should drastically change, I’m afraid we have crossed the point of no return.

I just hope that at least God (yes the same God Obama and the Democrats threw out of their lives, their convention and their platform), will not decide to give Obama another four years. I know I wouldn’t.

Israel’s Knesset Speaker: Democratic ‘Jerusalem Mistake’ No Accident

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Photo credit: drmikeevans

The absence of Jerusalem’s status as the capital of Israel in the Democratic Party platform was no oversight, and not the result of a “bureaucratic snafu,” as some Democrats tried to claim in the face of the embarrassing flip-flop on the matter at the party’s convention Wednesday night, Knesset speaker Reuven Rivlin said Thursday. The Democrats intended to leave Jerusalem off the agenda, and only changed their minds due to the sharp criticism from Republicans and supporters of Israel in the U.S., he said.

“And I see no cause for optimism on their decision to change the platform to reflect Jerusalem’s status,” Rivlin said in a radio interview Thursday. “This was no mistake or slip of someone’s mind. I have no doubt that President Obama restored Jerusalem to the platform because of political and electoral pressure, and because of the sharp criticism in Israel and the U.S.,” he said.

The party most definitely suffered a black eye over the brouhaha, media reports in the U.S. said. After sharp criticism earlier in the week over the removal of a section in the platform saying that Jerusalem is Israel’s capital, as well as removal of all references to G-d, party officials moved to reinstate both sections. The proposed change would include a line that said that “Jerusalem is and will remain the capital of Israel,” and that “it should remain an undivided city accessible to people of all faiths.” G-d was also restored t the platform, with the sentence that Obama, on his second term, will conduct “an administration that will give every hard-working American the opportunity to realize his G-d given potential.”

However, when convention chairman Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, the mayor of Los Angeles, called for a voice vote to approve the insertion of the Jerusalem sentence, he was met by a loud chorus of opposition – with witnesses saying that at least half, if not more, of delegates voicing opposition to inserting the clause about Jerusalem. Voice approvals require a [two thirds] majority, and after the first vote, Villaraigosa awkwardly called for a second vote, citing “interference” that prevented him from clearly hearing the results. Only after three votes was the resolution declared approved. In response, witnesses said, the crowd turned on Villaraigosa, jeering him as he left the stage.

Read more from this story HERE.

US to Iran: ‘In Case of Israeli Strike, Please Don’t Fire on Our Bases’

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The United States has no intention of joining in a preemptive Israeli strike on Iran and expects the Islamic Republic to refrain from attacking US targets in the case of such an attack, senior Washington officials told their Iranian counterparts, according to a report in Yedioth Ahronoth on Monday.

In recent days, senior administration officials reportedly sent messages to Iran, through diplomats from two European states, addressing the possibility that Israel would launch a unilateral strike and establishing that the US expects Iran to not draw it into a conflict by firing on American army bases and aircraft carriers in the Persian Gulf.

Monday’s report came amid widespread debate over the level of coordination between Israel and the US on halting Iran’s nuclear program, which — despite assurances by US Ambassador to Israel Dan Shapiro on Sunday that the relationship is as good as ever — appeared to be strained.

While Israel has warned that the Iranians are quickly approaching a potential weapons capability and that the use of force must be seriously considered, the US says sanctions and international diplomacy must be given more time to work.

Highlighting the disagreement between the two countries on the use of force were reports of a scaling-down of joint US-Israel missile defense exercises in October, and public comments by the Chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff Martin Dempsey, who said last Thursday that he did not want to be “complicit” in an Israeli attack on Iran.

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Israel hit Syrian nuke plant in 2007 after Bush refused to do so

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Former prime minister Ehud Olmert ordered the 2007 strike on a Syrian nuclear reactor immediately after former US president George W. Bush informed him that the Americans would not attack the facility, according to a Channel 10 report aired on Sunday evening.

Bush’s deputy national security adviser Elliot Abrams was present when the president called Olmert on September 6, 2007 and made clear that the US would not take action, and that then-secretary of state Condoleezza Rice would fly to Israel to hold a joint press conference with Olmert to alert the international community of the secret reactor. The US had decided to handle the Syrian threat via diplomacy.

Olmert responded to Bush that the secretary’s visit would not be necessary and that Israel would deal with the nuclear facility on its own.

“If you’re not going to act against the reactor then we are,” Abrams quoted Olmert as saying during the teleconference. “You don’t want to know where or when,” the former prime minister reportedly added.

The Israelis were convinced that time was fairly short, and that they had to strike the reactor — built by the Syrians with extensive input from the North Koreans — before it went live, the TV report said.

Read more from this story HERE.

Germany cooperated with Black September after Munich Massacre

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German newspaper Der Spiegel revealed Sunday that German authorities cooperated with Black September, a Palestinian terror group, after it had carried out an attack that killed 11 Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich. Germany, it was reported, did so for fear of additional attacks on its soil.

According to the report, the German government held secret contacts with the planners of the Munich Massacre. Several months after the attack, Germany’s then foreign minister, Walter Scheel, met secretly with several Black September members to “rebuild trust.”

Berlin demanded that the terror group not carry out any more terrorist attacks on German soil. The Palestinians, on their part, demanded Berlin’s support of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO).

According to Der Spiegel, Germany suspended its criminal investigation against the massacre’s perpetrators as the talks progressed. Several weeks later, the deputy foreign minister announced that the investigation had been concluded.

In 1977, French police asked Germany whether it wanted it to extradite Abu Daoud, one of the planners of the attack, but Germany decided not to answer the question.

Read more from this story HERE.

Massive Cyberattack: Act 1 of Israeli Strike on Iran?

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Talk in Israel of a military strike on Iranian nuclear facilities has reached a fever pitch. Last week brought the news of an alleged “war plan” leaked to a blogger. This week, a well-informed military correspondent in Jerusalem reported that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is “determined” to attack Iran before the U.S. election. Two weeks ago, an outgoing government minister told Israelis to prepare for a war that would last 30 days.

David Makovsky of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy has his own contacts in the Israeli leadership. He says there’s more going on here than just war talk. “I think there’s a 50-50 chance before the U.S. election of an Israeli strike,” he says.

The alleged war plan that was recently leaked said an Israeli strike would begin with an unprecedented cyberattack designed to paralyze the Iranian regime and blind it to what was happening on its territory. The Internet, telephones, radio and television transmissions, the electrical grid would all be taken out.

That’s an attention grabber: The world has never seen a cyberattack remotely that dramatic.

John Bumgarner, chief technology officer at the U.S. Cyber Consequences Unit, says the plan does make sense, at least in theory: “Israel has very good cybercapabilities. Some of the best computer scientists in the world come out of the Israeli military and intelligence branch,” he says. “Some of the best cybertools that are currently used in the world come out of Israel.”

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Video: Order to strike Iran issued in Israel today

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This commercial, just released on Israeli TV, features John Cleese of Monty Python fame. Cleese plays a US general and he, along with two other western generals, listen to Israeli pleas to allow them to strike Iran. English with Hebrew subtitles.

Prime Minister Netanyahu “determined to attack Iran before the US elections”

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Photo credit: futureatlas.com

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “is determined to attack Iran before the US elections,” Israel’s Channel 10 News claimed last night, and Israel is now “closer than ever” to a strike designed to thwart Iran’s nuclear drive.

The TV station’s military reporter Alon Ben-David, who earlier this year was given extensive access to the Israel Air Force as it trained for a possible attack, reported that, since upgraded sanctions against Iran have failed to force a suspension of the Iranian nuclear program in the past two months, “from the prime minister’s point of view, the time for action is getting ever closer.”

Asked by the news anchor in the Hebrew-language TV report how close Israel now was to “a decision and perhaps an attack,” Ben-David said: “It appears that we are closer than ever.”

He said it seemed that Netanyahu was not waiting for a much-discussed possible meeting with US President Barack Obama, after the UN General Assembly gathering in New York late next month — indeed, “it’s not clear that there’ll be a meeting.” In any case, said Ben-David, “I doubt Obama could say anything that would convince Netanyahu to delay a possible attack.”

The report added that Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak believe Obama would have no choice but to give backing for an Israeli attack before the US presidential elections in November.

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GOP Congressman swims nude in Sea of Galilee, FBI investigates

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Photo credit: ITIF

U.S. Rep. Kevin Yoder of Kansas apologized to his constituents Sunday night after a published report revealed the freshman lawmaker swam nude in the Sea of Galilee during a private fact-finding trip to the Mideast last August.

Politico reported the incident in a story on its website Sunday. The website said the FBI investigated the trip, which included other lawmakers and their spouses, as well as staff members.

“I feel incredibly remorseful that I have caused embarrassment to my constituents and I have caused folks who believe in me to be disappointed,” Yoder told The Star Sunday night.

“The gravity of the situation and the actions I’ve taken are not lost on me, and I feel certainly regret at what has occurred, and I just want to apologize to my constituents for a momentary lapse in judgment.”

It was not immediately clear what the FBI might have examined in relation to the trip. Yoder and his chief of staff, Travis Smith, said neither the Republican congressman nor any members of his staff had talked to the FBI.

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Israel tests new SMS missile alert system, to be fully functional in September

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Israel this week began testing an SMS system for warning the public of an imminent missile attack as chatter over a possible strike on Iran dominated the Israeli press headlines.

As testing began, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel had chalked up “a significant improvement” in its home front defence capabilities, mentioning its highly-vaunted anti-missile systems such as Iron Dome and Arrow 2.

“There has been a significant improvement in our level of defence capacity on the home front: with Iron Dome, with the Arrow, in terms of protection and shelters, in advanced warning systems and in other areas,” he said at the start of the weekly cabinet meeting.

“But all the threats which are directed towards the Israeli home front are dwarved by another threat — different in both its scope and its essence. And so I repeat: Iran must never be allowed to get nuclear weapons.”

With front page stories in two papers suggesting Tehran had made progress towards the manufacture and assembly of a nuclear warhead, Israel’s Home Front Command began final tests of the SMS warning system which is expected to be operational by September.

Read more from this story HERE.