News items that look towards Ezekiel 38 & 39

[Shammu]

Bahrain accuses Iran of nuclear weapons lie
November 2, 2007
Giles Whittell in Manama

A polished silver Spitfire on the desk of Crown Prince Salman bin Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa recalls two centuries of close and cordial ties between Britain and Bahrain.

But even its most powerful friends cannot guarantee the security of this strategic island caught in the Gulf between worsening Iranian threats and “deadly serious” talk of a US military strike.

It is not a position from which to mince words. In an interview with The Times the Crown Prince has become the first Arab leader to jettison the language of diplomacy and directly accuse Tehran of seeking nuclear weapons.

“While they don’t have the bomb yet, they are developing it, or the capability for it,” he said – the first time one of Iran’s Gulf neighbours effectively has accused it of lying about its nuclear programme.

The Crown Prince also gave a blunt warning that “the whole region” would be drawn into any military conflict and called on India, as well as Russia, to help find a diplomatic solution. “There needs to be far more done on the diplomatic front,” he said. “There’s still time to talk.”

If there is a front line in the looming confrontation between Iran and the Arab world, Bahrain is on it.

The US Fifth Fleet is based here, its main carrier battle group tasked with securing the Strait of Hormuz. The King Fahd causeway to Khobar makes Bahrain a gateway to the richest oil reserves on Earth in eastern Saudi Arabia.

The Iranian coast is ten minutes away by fighter or medium-range missile. And this week a senior Iranian general said that suicide bombers were ready to strike at targets throughout the Gulf “if necessary”. Such rhetoric will focus minds in Qatar, Riyadh and the United Arab Emirates. But its effect is especially chilling in Bahrain as the only Sunni-led country with a Shia majority that is not at war or on the brink of war.

“We are a country like Iraq and Lebanon, and we are the only one that is functioning properly,” said Sheikh Khalid al-Khalifa, the Foreign Minister.

Bahrain’s Shias – and the carnage in Iraq to the north – make the kingdom a vital experiment in sectarian coexistence. So far the Shias have repaid the Royal Family’s efforts at political reform with consistent professions of loyalty. That could change overnight in the event of an attack on Iran.

Already, large-scale demonstrations are not unusual. When the Golden Mosque in Samarra was bombed by al-Qaeda in Iraq last year, and again when Israel invaded Lebanon, “Bahrain turned yellow with Hezbollah flags”, according to one Western diplomat.

Since then a reform process that started with the release of all political prisoners in 2000 has largely stalled and leading Shia figures have complained about “systematic discrimination” by the Sunni Establishment. A scandal over alleged plans to end the Shia majority by granting fast-track citizenship to tens of thousands of foreign-born Sunnis has proved so inflammatory that an otherwise relatively free press has been banned from covering it.

The Crown Prince rejected claims of discrimination but acknowledged that the broader sectarian issue had become “so politically charged that nobody is really willing to have a rational discussion about it”.

Iran has not helped. In a newspaper editorial this summer, a close associate of President Ahmadinejad rekindled an old claim on Bahrain as Iran’s 14th province, with echoes of Saddam Hussein’s designs on Kuwait in the late 1980s that were picked up from London to Washington. The claim “touched on the legitimacy of our country”, the Foreign Minister said.

There is no suggestion – yet – of an Iranian invasion of Bahrain. But even as the kingdom throws up skyscrapers to compete with Dubai and Abu Dhabi for regional financial dominance, its security forces are on high alert for evidence of Iranian-backed “sleeper cells” that could bring them all tumbling down.

Between Bahrain’s two tallest office towers three giant wind turbines are suspended in a brave vote of confidence in a future of eco-friendly peace and prosperity. Without a diplomatic end to the Iran crisis, that confidence may soon look misplaced. But the alternatives – a military strike on Iran and a regional nuclear arms race – are too bleak to contemplate.

Bahrain accuses Iran of nuclear weapons lie

[Shammu]

'Iran trying to acquire nuclear weapons'
JPost.com Staff , THE JERUSALEM POST    Nov. 2, 2007

Bahrain's Crown Prince, Sheik Salman bin Isa al-Khalifa, said Friday that Iran is striving to acquire nuclear weaponry, Israel Radio reported.

Al Khalifa said that at the very least, Iran is attempting to gain the ability to produce nuclear weaponry.

The statement would make Bahrain the first Arab nation in the Persian Gulf to claim that Iran is attempting to deceive world leaders in relation to its nuclear aspirations.

Al Khalifa warned that the crisis could worsen and draw the region into military conflict. For this reason, he said, it must be resolved by diplomatic means.

Meanwhile, German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier on Thursday tried dispelling fears that Germany is reluctant to back new sanctions against Iran because of its strong commercial ties with Teheran. Steinmeier made it clear that Germany is in sync with other Western powers.

Speaking at a news conference in Tel Aviv after talks with Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, Steinmeier stressed that Germany would not stand in the way of tougher sanctions.

"Germany's position does not differ from that of the United States or some other European countries. If Iran refuses to provide answers, we should think about the possibility of European sanctions," he said.

Asked if Germany would support further sanctions, he said, "Yes, if what we are trying now is not successful, then we must not only think about sanctions, but also decide on them."

'Iran trying to acquire nuclear weapons'

[Shammu]

'Iran trying to acquire nuclear weapons'

Iran will not get any nukes, before God's appointed time.

[Def]

Now you got that right
!Love in Jesus Def(';')

[Shammu]

Pakistan under martial law

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (CNN) -- Faced with increasing violence and unrest, Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf declared a state of emergency Saturday, government sources told CNN.

 Musharraf issued an order proclaiming the emergency and suspending the nation's constitution, according to a statement read on state television, and declaring martial law.

Musharraf is scheduled to address the nation at 1800 GMT (2 p.m. ET) Saturday.

The Supreme Court declared the state of emergency illegal, claiming Musharraf had no power to suspend the constitution, Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammed Chaudhry told CNN.

A senior Pakistani official told CNN that the emergency declaration will be "short-lived," and will be followed by an interim government. Martial law is a way to restore law and order, he said.

Shortly afterward, Chaudhry was expelled as chief justice, his office told CNN. Troops came to Chaudhry's office to tell him.

The government appointed Justice Abdul Hameed Dogar as the new chief justice, according to state television.

It was the second time Chaudhry was removed from his post. His ousting by Musharraf in May prompted massive protests, and he was later reinstated.

 In Islamabad, troops entered the Supreme Court and were surrounding the judges' homes, according to CNN's Syed Mohsin Naqvi.

Supreme Court sources said some judges who were not in Islamabad were not at their homes, and it was not known whether they had been arrested.

Aitzaz Ahsan, a leading Pakistani attorney and president of the Supreme Court Bar Association, was arrested at his home. A former interior minister, Ahsan represented Chaudhry the first time he was forced to leave his post.

Meanwhile, former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, who left Pakistan last week to visit her family in Dubai, arrived in Karachi on Saturday, according to her husband, Asif Ali Zardari. She returned to Pakistan last month, despite death threats, after several years in exile.

On October 18, upon her return, at least 130 people were killed when a suicide attacker tried to assassinate her. Bhutto was lightly wounded, but escaped largely unharmed.

Bhutto has pledged to help her party succeed in January's parliamentary elections. She hopes to gain a third term as prime minister, possibly under a power-sharing deal with Musharraf.

"The people of Pakistan will not accept it," Bhutto spokesman Farhatullah Babar said of the emergency declaration. "We condemn this move."

The declaration prompted a few hundred people to take to the streets in protest, but police and paramilitary groups blocked Islamabad's main roads and dispersed the crowds.

Earlier, private networks had reported the declaration was imminent as top officials huddled at Musharraf's residence in Rawalpindi. Shortly after that report, most media channels went off the air in an apparent blackout, although some flickered off and on.

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who is in Turkey for a conference with Iraq and neighboring nations, told CNN's Zain Verjee that anything that diverts Pakistan from the path to free and fair elections is "highly regrettable."

The United States, Rice said, doesn't support any extra-constitutional measures taken by Musharraf, and urged restraint so violence can be avoided. Nothing should jeopardize the transition to democracy, she said.

"President Musharraf has stated repeatedly that he will step down as chief of army staff before retaking the presidential oath of office and has promised to hold elections by January 15th," said State Department spokesman Sean McCormack. "We expect him to uphold these commitments and urge him to do so immediately."

In Britain, Foreign Secretary David Miliband said in a statement, "We recognize the threat to peace and security faced by the country, but its future rests on harnessing the power of democracy and the rule of law to achieve the goals of stability, development and countering terrorism. I am gravely concerned by the measures adopted today, which will take Pakistan further from these goals."

The declaration could delay approaching parliamentary elections, according to CNN's Nic Robertson. It also could provide Musharraf with a reason to continue serving as the nation's military chief.

The nation's political atmosphere has been tense for months, with Pakistani leaders in August considering a state of emergency because of the growing security threats in the country's lawless tribal regions. But Musharraf, influenced in part by Rice, held off on the move.

Since that time, Musharraf has faced a flurry of criticism from the opposition, who demanded he abandon his military position before becoming eligible to seek a third presidential term. Musharraf garnered a vast majority of votes in presidential elections last month; however, those results have not been certified by the nation's high court.

For weeks, the country has been coasting in a state of political limbo while the Supreme Court works to tackle legal challenges filed by the opposition that call into question Musharraf's eligibility to hold office. Some have speculated that a declaration of emergency is tied to rumors the court is planning to rule against Musharraf.

Musharraf, who led the 1999 coup as Pakistan's army chief, has seen his power erode since the failed effort to oust Chaudhry. His administration is also struggling to contain a surge in Islamic militancy.

Pakistan under martial law

[Shammu]

Well lets see, Iran is trying to get nuclear weapons. Iran is ruled by Islamic Fascists. Pakistan has the nuclear weapons. Pakistan has a cadre of Islamic Fascists who have been trying to get power away from Musharraf, who has been a moderating influence. Plus, Pakistan and India have been on the edge of war frequently. None of this is good.

Pakistan better be careful because, India will be watching........ closely.

[Shammu]

Darkness is falling in Vladimir Putin's Russia

By Con Coughlin
Last Updated: 3:07am GMT 03/11/2007

Soaring oil prices have made the country a power again - but its ruler's grip on politics, the media and economy has sinister implications for democracy.

Standing in the shadow of the Lubyanka, the notorious former KGB headquarters in central Moscow, a small group of elderly women are gathered around a large slab of granite that commemorates one of the darkest episodes in Russia's history.

The slab was taken from one of the Solovetsky punishment camps near Archangel on the White Sea, which formed what the Russian writer Alexander Solzhenitsyn described as the Gulag Archipelago, where the victims of Stalin's terror were sent to their deaths in their tens of thousands.

It has been placed outside the Lubyanka as a memorial to the millions of victims of state persecution and repression during the Soviet era. A neighbouring monument to Feliks Dzerzhinsky, the Bolshevik founder of the KGB, was unceremoniously torn down by an angry crowd of Muscovites shortly after the collapse of the Soviet Union in the 1990s: all that now remains is a well-cut grass mound.

Wearing faded headscarves and threadbare coats to protect themselves from the bitter cold, the frail old ladies - some of them in their nineties - quietly intone their prayers for the dead, before placing small, neatly bound clusters of flowers around the granite slab.

"I'm still trying to find out what really happened to my grandfather," says Lyudmila, an 82-year-old grandmother who has travelled 500 miles to Moscow to mark Russia's official Memorial Day for Political Prisoners.

"They wanted him to work for the KGB, but when he refused they sent him off to the Gulags. He died of starvation, but apart from that we know very little."

Russian experts estimate that seven million people perished in the Gulags, and ordinary families are still struggling to come to terms with the horrors they suffered under the Soviet era.

Even Russian president Vladimir Putin, a former senior KGB officer, appears to understand the necessity of acknowledging the appalling repression of the Soviet era. Later in the day he would make his first visit to a memorial and church built at a site on the outskirts of Moscow where thousands of people were executed by firing squad.

This year is the 70th anniversary of Stalin's Great Terror. It is also an election year in Moscow, and ever-eager to consolidate his popularity (Putin has an 80 per cent approval rating), the Russian leader paid a fulsome tribute to the millions of victims.

"As a rule these were people with their own opinions," said Putin. "These were people who were not afraid to speak their mind. They were the most capable people. They were the pride of the nation. And, of course, over many years we still remember this tragedy. We need to do a great deal to ensure that this is never forgotten."

The implication, of course, was that nothing like this could happen in Putin's Russia, a truly democratic state where the rule of law is supreme.

Well, tell that to Mikhail Khordokovsky, the former oil tycoon who only six years ago had a personal fortune worth an estimated $10 billion (£4.8 billion). But then he made the cardinal error of publicly criticising Putin's decidedly autocratic style of government.

He now spends his days breaking rocks at a remote Siberian penal colony, where he is halfway through an eight-year jail term on what many of his supporters believe are politically motivated fraud charges.

The notion that Russia under Putin could return to the worst excesses of Comrade Stalin is, of course, far-fetched.

For a start, the Communist ideology that inspired the Bolsheviks to launch their class war against the governing and professional classes lies buried under the rubble of the Iron Curtain, so much so that the Communists will hardly feature in next month's parliamentary elections, which will in turn set the tone for next year's presidential election.

These days, Russian politics is all about the exercise of raw power and the accumulation of vast wealth. For some, like the closely-knit group of former KGB officers around Putin - the siloviki - it is possible to acquire both.

Putin is claimed by some to have a personal fortune in offshore bank accounts in Liechtenstein and Luxembourg, while establishing an authoritarian regime that has established a stranglehold over all the key levers of power.

"To talk about democracy in Russia today is utterly ridiculous," explains Stanislav Belkovsky, a leading Kremlinologist whose new book, Putin's Business, provides a detailed breakdown of the Russian president's private wealth.

"Putin is one of the wealthiest men in Europe because his business partners are running a network of companies while he runs Russia. So many people want to get their hands on the country's wealth that they are prepared to do anything not to upset Putin. It's a very effective control mechanism."

The recent turnaround in the country's economic fortunes is almost entirely to do with spiralling oil prices, which have recently risen above $90 a barrel over fears that America is shaping up for a military confrontation with Iran, a conflict Russia is anxious to avoid. But if Moscow is unhappy with the Bush administration's warlike disposition, it is nevertheless happy to reap the riches brought by the rocketing price of oil.

It might seem hard to believe now, but when Putin came to power eight years ago, Russia was an economic basket case. Boris Yeltsin's chaotic presidency had left the country virtually bankrupt.

The debt default of 1998 had resulted in millions of Russians losing their jobs and savings, and pensioners, servicemen, teachers and scientists all went unpaid. This was a period when it was not uncommon to find that the bellhop at one of Moscow's new, Western-financed hotels had a PhD in nuclear physics.

Today, Russia has the world's third-largest currency reserves, standing at £200 billion, mainly as a result of Putin's brutal repossession of the country's main energy companies from the oligarchs who had bought them cheaply during the 1990s and made themselves vast personal fortunes.

That wealth is channelled into propping up Putin's regime, and while beyond Moscow there are still large swathes of the country where poverty is rife and the population survives on a subsistence diet, in the capital it is clear that life for Putin's supporters has never been better.

Moscow must rate as the world capital for conspicuous consumption. It is said there are more Bentleys per capita than anywhere else in the world, and boutique stores selling leading luxury brands, from Cartier to Chanel, struggle to meet the demand generated by the city's new super-rich.

Nor has the new oil wealth only been concentrated in the hands of the chosen few. There has been a tenfold increase in the national budget in the past seven years, and there is a palpable sense of prosperity and self-confidence running through the rapidly emerging professional classes.

But even if the economic feel-good factor is starting to trickle down from Putin's elite to other sectors of society, the Russian people have paid a heavy price for their new-found prosperity, both in terms of the erosion of their political rights and the effective suspension of the rule of law.

The parliamentary elections will take place on December 2, but the result is a foregone conclusion. Putin's United Russia party will win 80 per cent of the vote and form the a government for the next four years. It will then be for them to decide whether Putin should change the constitution to allow him to stand for a third term in next spring's presidential elections.

"It's a bit like going to a football match, and when you arrive at the stadium the score has already been decided without the teams even having to take to the pitch," explains Grigory Yavlinsky, the leader of Yabloko (Apple), one of the few truly independent political parties still participating in the election campaign.

cont'd next post

[Shammu]

"Putin has the system so closely controlled that he is able to arrange the result of a so-called democratic election weeks before that election has even taken place."

Yavlinsky knows all about Putin's political skills, having stood against him in the last presidential election four years ago. Yavlinsky's small grass-roots organisation was no match for Putin's KGB organisational skills. The president's supporters ensured that Yavlinsky's party won less than five per cent of the national vote, which meant that it could not even be represented in the Duma.

"It was very strange how we would win thousands of votes in the provinces, but when they came to be counted in Moscow they had somehow been reduced to just a few hundred," says Yavlinsky. "No wonder no one stands a chance of defeating Putin in the coming elections."

Electoral fraud is allegedly just one of many ways the United Russia party keeps its stranglehold over the state. On election day there are an estimated 98,000 polling booths, and even though some are monitored by independent observers, it is impossible to keep a check on all the different votes, which are eventually sent to Moscow, where the electoral commission, supervised by political appointees, announces the result.

Another effective control mechanism is that the Kremlin dictates access to state funding for political parties, and also how much airtime they have on state-controlled television and coverage in the main state-controlled newspapers.

In order to get funds and media exposure, a party must give the Kremlin a firm assurance that it will not discuss controversial issues, such as state corruption, or the way the ruling elite uses the courts to intimidate its opponents. Once that assurance is forthcoming, the party will receive money for its campaign and its candidates will be allowed to appear on television.

But even then opposition parties are only allowed on television for the month-long election campaign. For the rest of the time, the Kremlin keeps a tight rein on who gets on television, with producers being given regularly updated lists of who can appear.

The result is that on most nights, the main news topic is a eulogistic account of Putin's latest activities, whether that be posing semi-naked on a fishing expedition or travelling to Teheran to lecture the Americans on the futility of launching military action against Iran. With coverage like this, it is hardly surprising that Putin's approval rating rarely dips below the 80 per cent mark.

As a former KGB officer under the Soviet system, Putin understands the value of propaganda in indoctrinating the populace, and the stranglehold he has over the media is equal to the control he exercises over the economy. Economic prosperity and rigorous media control are a potent mix when it comes to keeping a firm grip on power, and Putin has demonstrated an aptitude for maintaining both.

There is, though, a dark underbelly to this resurgent Russian bear which, despite the formidable powers at its disposal, remains highly sensitive to criticism, whether from home or abroad.

The BBC's Russian FM service recently disappeared from the airwaves after it ran a series of interviews with disaffected Russians who dared to voice their criticism's of Putin's Russia. And far worse fates have befallen those, such as the journalist Anna Politkovskaya, who have managed to evade the stranglehold the government has on media outlets to publish highly critical articles on the regime's conduct.

It is just over a year since Politkovskaya was found dead at the bottom of a Moscow lift shaft with three bullets pumped into her skull. The official investigation into her death - carried out by yet another Putin associate - has produced an interesting insight into how the regime's critics are silenced.

Politkovskaya was as much a critic of Putin's authoritarianism as she was of Moscow's disastrous involvement in Chechnya. Shortly before her death, she wrote of his regime: "The shroud of darkness from which we spent several Soviet decades trying to free ourselves is enveloping us again."

But it was her trenchant criticism of the conduct of Moscow's military campaign in Chechnya that provoked most controversy, and it now seems likely that a group of Chechen warlords loyal to the Kremlin contracted a gang of Moscow street criminals to murder her.

The poisoning of Alexander Litvinenko in London last year was seen by many as another example of Moscow's heavy-handed response to high-profile critics. But the state repression is more reminiscent of the paranoia that characterised the Brezhnev era in the 1970s, when refuseniks were carted off to lunatic asylums, rather than the widespread killing during Stalin's Great Terror.

Indeed, there have recently been reports that some prominent critics of the regime have also found themselves being committed to the state's psychiatric care, although, to date, these have been rare instances and there is no evidence to suggest the practice is widespread.

What is not in any doubt, however, is that Putin is the undisputed master of all he surveys in Russia. The big question now is whether he can summon the courage to give up all the power he has so carefully accumulated over the past eight years.

Under the current constitution, Putin is obliged to leave office next spring after two full presidential terms. It has been suggested that he might be prepared to take the more junior position of prime minister in the Russian parliament, so long as he can manoeuvre one his key allies into the presidency.

Alternatively, he could get himself appointed to the energy giant Gazprom, and add to the considerable fortune he has accumulated as president.

But for these scenarios to work, Putin would ultimately have to answer to the new Russian president - and Putin has not been good at taking orders since he worked at the KGB.

Which is why most Russians believe that, once United Russia has secured its predicted two thirds parliamentary majority, it will move quickly to amend the constitution to allow their president to serve a third term. So far as Putin is concerned, when it comes to being President of Russia, you can't get enough of a good thing.

Darkness is falling in Vladimir Putin's Russia

[Shammu]

Putin says Russia threatened by "Unipolar World"
Sun Nov 4, 2007 3:19pm EST

By Chris Baldwin

MOSCOW (Reuters) - On a holiday created to unite his country, Russian President Vladimir Putin issued a veiled warning that foreigners were seeking to split up the vast country and plunder its resource wealth.

"Some people are constantly insisting on the necessity to divide up our country and are trying to spread this theory," Putin told military cadets during a speech in Moscow on Sunday, Russian news agencies reported.

"There are those who would like to build a unipolar world, who would themselves like to rule all of humanity," Putin said, a phrase he has used over the past seven years of his administration to mean the United States.

Putin, who has a black belt in Judo, the Japanese martial art that stresses calm, emotionless and powerful shifts of an opponent's weight and balance against himself, also said Russia was well respected by admirers as a stabilizing world factor.

"Some minor countries, under pressure from larger ones, are having a hard time figuring out how to defend their own interests. And Russia has played and will continue to play a positive, stabilizing role in the world," he said.

NATIONAL UNITY

Sunday was National Unity Day, an Autumn holiday created by Putin's administration three years ago to replace October Revolution Day, formerly the most patriotic celebration in the Soviet Union, when tanks, missiles and troops filled Red Square.

Unity Day, according to Putin's own explanation of the holiday, is meant to show the power of the Russian people as a unified whole, rising up to meet the challenges of economic development and national defense.

A Levada Centre poll of adult Russians showed only a quarter of adults could correctly identify why they have Monday off from work.

A further 48 per cent had no idea whatsoever, while the remaining poll participants confused the holiday with the National Day of Reconciliation or Halloween.

To end this national confusion, this year's National Unity Day celebrations were heavily advertised on government television channels, and thousands of people across the country staged rallies, meetings and marches to show their patriotism.

"Some think we have too much resource wealth and should divide it," Putin told the cadets.

"They themselves have no wish to share their own riches, and we should take that into account."

Putin says Russia threatened by "Unipolar World"

[Shammu]

Hezbollah stages maneuvers

By SAM F. GHATTAS, Associated Press Writer Mon Nov 5, 6:40 AM ET

BEIRUT, Lebanon - Thousands of Hezbollah guerrillas staged secret military maneuvers without weapons or uniforms near Israel's border in southern Lebanon, a pro-Hezbollah Lebanese newspaper reported Monday. The Lebanese government downplayed the report as probably just a simulation.

Al-Akhbar, a pro-Hezbollah newspaper, said Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah personally supervised the maneuvers, which it reported were carried out in the last three days and were the biggest ever staged on Israel's border by the Shiite Muslim militant group.

Monday's report marked the first time Hezbollah, with its highly secretive military wing, revealed such exercises through a newspaper. The maneuvers, if confirmed, could pose a major challenge to a U.N.-brokered cease-fire that ended last year's war with the Jewish state.

Hezbollah officials declined to comment. However, a Hezbollah legislator, Hassan Fadlallah, said it was only "natural" that the group be fully ready to confront any possible Israeli attack.

"Clearly, we will not let Israel carry out aggression against Lebanon and we sit still," he told Lebanese Broadcasting Corp. television, referring to the increased Israeli military flights over southern Lebanon in recent days.

Prime Minister Fuad Saniora, speaking to AP Television News at government headquarters, said authorities checked with military and police units as well as U.N. peacekeepers and "they confirmed nothing on the ground really happened."

"It was, let's say, a simulation probably, in an operation room, on the desk, probably they did such a thing," he said. "This has been confirmed by all the sources."

He noted there was no statement issued by Hezbollah confirming the reported maneuvers.

The alleged maneuvers came a few days after Israel held major military exercises in the north of the country near the Lebanese border. The Israeli action was interpreted by some Lebanese media as preparation by the Jewish state for a possible new war with Hezbollah.

Hezbollah's actions could be an attempt to counter the Israeli exercises.

Al-Akhbar said the Hezbollah maneuvers were carried out south of the Litani River in southern Lebanon and aimed at "deterring the enemy from carrying out any adventure in Lebanon." The zone has been controlled by a U.N. peacekeeping force and the Lebanese army since last year's war.

"A state of Israeli alertness is countered by extraordinary movement by the resistance (Hezbollah)," read a front-page headline Monday in As-Safir, another newspaper close to Hezbollah. It quoted witnesses in southern Lebanon as saying they observed "unusual movement" by Hezbollah for the first time since last year's war, but gave no further details.

There was no immediate comment from officials of the U.N. peacekeeping force, which has 13,500 soldiers who patrol a buffer zone near the border with Israel with the help of 15,000 Lebanese troops.

But As-Safir quoted Maj. Gen. Claudio Graziano, the commander of the U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon as warning Lebanese leaders he met in Beirut last week that the tension in the south and a deepening political crisis in the country might prompt European countries "to withdraw from UNIFIL within less than four months."

Italy, France, Spain and Germany form the bulk of the reinforced U.N. force that deployed in southern Lebanon after last year's war.

Commenting on the reported Hezbollah maneuvers, a Lebanese security official, speaking on customary condition of anonymity in line with government regulations, said Lebanese forces in south Lebanon "did not register any armed presence south of the Litani."

The official said troops are under orders to prevent any armed presence in accordance with a U.N. Security Council resolution that ended last year's fighting, but pointed out "that civilians have the right to freely move in their villages" and if they do not carry weapons, they are not breaking the law.

Al-Akhbar said Hezbollah's maneuvers were carried out all along the border with Israel "in extreme secrecy without any show of arms."

The newspaper quoted Nasrallah as telling the participants that the maneuvers were intended "for foe and friend to make them understand that the resistance (Hezbollah) is fully ready to confront any kinds of Israeli threats."

Nasrallah said last week his guerrilla group has grown stronger since last summer's war as Israel has weakened. He said his guerrillas did not want war but "will not allow anyone to attack our villages, people and country."

The Lebanese army command has in the last few days issued statements noting increased Israeli overflights in southern Lebanon in violation of the cease-fire resolution.

Since the fighting with Israel ended, Nasrallah has boasted that his guerrillas have replenished their rocket arsenal and were ready to fight Israel if attacked. The Hezbollah leader has said his group possesses more than 33,000 rockets.

Last week, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon issued a new report that said Israel claims that Hezbollah has rearmed with new long-range rockets capable of hitting Tel Aviv. Ban's report said Israel claims Hezbollah has tripled its shore-to-sea C-802 missiles and has established an air defense unit armed with ground-to-air missiles.

Hezbollah stages maneuvers

[nChrist]

Brothers and Sisters,

Israel has been punished greatly and suffered much because of their rejection of CHRIST about 2,000 years ago. However, their worst punishment and suffering is yet to come at GOD'S Appointed Time. This does not mean that GOD has stopped loving HIS chosen people. GOD will restore Israel at HIS Appointed time.

As Christians, we MUST stand and pray for Israel! Those who help and support Israel will be blessed. Those who harm or come against Israel will be damned. This is a very confusing subject for many people, including many Christians. The Bible tells us that GOD will punish Israel, so maybe we should help GOD. NO! - this is wrong! This is GOD'S business - not ours. Our business is to know that Israel belongs to GOD - the people and the land. We belong to GOD also - only because of HIS Matchless Love, Grace, and GIFT to us. As Christians, we should know that GOD has already rescued us from the curse of sin and death. We have a different set of promises than Israel, and we should all give thanks that JESUS CHRIST has already suffered the punishment we deserved in HIS Own Body on the CROSS. Israel also belongs to GOD, and GOD has promised that HE will rescue and restore Israel at HIS Appointed time. We MUST know the difference between ISRAEL and the CHURCH WHICH IS THE BODY OF CHRIST when we study GOD'S WORD or we will be terribly confused. However, both are possessions of GOD.

As Christians, our thoughts about Israel should be very simple. We should love and support them in any way that we can. That would include dying in the attempt to help Israel if we feel called to do so. Everything should simply be a matter of prayer, and we should never harbor any thoughts of harm or hate against Israel. We don't have to understand all of the details. The Promises of GOD are more than enough.

BEIRUT, Lebanon - Thousands of Hezbollah guerrillas staged secret military maneuvers without weapons or uniforms near Israel's border in southern Lebanon, a pro-Hezbollah Lebanese newspaper reported Monday. The Lebanese government downplayed the report as probably just a simulation.

Al-Akhbar, a pro-Hezbollah newspaper, said Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah personally supervised the maneuvers, which it reported were carried out in the last three days and were the biggest ever staged on Israel's border by the Shiite Muslim militant group.

Brothers and Sisters, this will be real one day, and it will be in greater and greater numbers. Eventually, the forces coming against Israel will be overwhelming, and those remaining will fear total annihilation from the face of the earth. They will cry out finally to their great KING and MESSIAH, and HE will hear them. The KING OF KINGS has not forgotten them, and HE HIMSELF will come to RESCUE them. HE is and always has been their Anointed KING and MESSIAH! HE set Israel aside and turned HIS FACE away from Israel because of disobedience and rejection. BUT, HIS Eternal Promises to Israel were NOT canceled. GOD will keep HIS Promises to Israel most perfectly at HIS Appointed Time.

Brothers and Sisters, Isaiah is also a beautiful Bible Study for this day and age. In fact, there are many beautiful portions of the Bible that tell us what is about to happen and why. Christians - remember that our hopes and Promises are not of this world.

Love In Christ,
Tom

Isaiah 59:20-21 NASB
"A Redeemer will come to Zion, And to those who turn from transgression in Jacob," declares the LORD. "As for Me, this is My covenant with them," says the LORD: "My Spirit which is upon you, and My words which I have put in your mouth shall not depart from your mouth, nor from the mouth of your offspring, nor from the mouth of your offspring's offspring," says the LORD, "from now and forever."

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Turkey seeks right to build monument in J'lem's Old City
By Nadav Shragai, Haaretz Correspondent
tags: Turkey, Israel, Temple Mount

Turkey would like to build a monument to those who died fighting for the Ottoman Empire at the foot of the Temple Mount's eastern wall, not far from the Golden Gate.

The proposal, which the Prime Minister's Office supports, was recently submitted to the Jerusalem Municipality for approval. The Waqf, or Islamic religious trust, which controls the Temple Mount, has already given Turkey land for the monument, which would be about three meters high and fly a Turkish flag.

While the municipality has not yet discussed the proposal, rightist councilmen have already expressed opposition. Councilman Yair Gabbay (National Religious Party) has asked the city's legal adviser to nix the project on the grounds that according to the city's master plan, all construction is forbidden within 70 meters of the Temple Mount. The plot the Waqf has allocated to Turkey is a mere five meters from the mount.

Sources in the Jerusalem Municipality said that the proposal would be examined according to the usual legal criteria, but the stance of the Prime Minister's Office and the diplomatic sensitivities entailed would be taken into consideration.

Turkey controlled this area until 1917, when it was ousted by the British during World War I. Today, it has good relations with Israel, but during the war, it deported many Jews because a Jewish group known as Nili had been providing intelligence to the British.

The last time a similar issue arose was immediately after the 1967 Six-Day War, when the Waqf and Arab residents of East Jerusalem sought permission to erect several monuments to soldiers of the Jordanian Legion who were killed in the battles for Jerusalem. Those proposals aroused fierce public debate, but eventually a compromise was reached, under which one central monument for all the battles was erected.

Turkey seeks right to build monument in J'lem's Old City

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November 6, 2007. Issue 3779. Page 2.
Putin Warns Russia Has Enemies
By Anna Smolchenko
Staff Writer

President Vladimir Putin said Sunday that there were people in the world who wanted to split up Russia and, in a thinly veiled reference to the United States, were attempting "to rule over mankind."

Speaking to pro-Kremlin youth groups on People's Unity Day, Putin said Russia would continue to play an active role in world affairs and defend smaller nations but that some forces outside the country sought to plunder its wealth.

"There are people who have just lost it," Putin told members of the Nashi and Young Guard groups, as well as military cadets, apologizing for using the slang phrase. "Some say we have too many natural riches, that they have to be split up."

"They, themselves, have no wish to share their own, by the way," Putin added.

The reference to natural riches echoed comments Putin made in his annual call-in show in mid-October, when he labeled such notions "political erotica."

In one of the questions posed to Putin, an engineer from Siberia attributed the comment to former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright.

On Sunday, Putin reiterated criticism of the United States, which he has regularly accused of trying to build a unipolar world.

"That has yet to happen in the planet's history and I don't think it ever will," Putin said in remarks posted on the Kremlin web site.
   

He said, conversely, that the majority of the world thought positively of Russia and that "some even do so with hope, as they see Russia as a defender of their interests."

Putin's comments came after youth groups laid wreathes at the monument on Red Square to Prince Dmitry Pozharsky and Kuzma Minin, who helped defeat Polish and Lithuanian forces in Moscow in 1612. People's Unity Day was instituted as a national holiday to mark the event in 2005, replacing the Nov. 7 holiday commemorating the Bolshevik Revolution.

The youth groups and cadets then attended a Kremlin reception. At the reception, Putin praised a new fund he established in June to promote Russian language and culture abroad and Russians involved in doing such work.

"It is comforting that they have new opportunities to expand and reinforce ties with Russia.

Putin also awarded the Pushkin Medal for promoting Russian culture abroad to a number of foreign academics. Past recipients of the award include Thomas Graham, a former senior official in the administration of U.S. President George W. Bush.

Putin Warns Russia Has Enemies

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Russian Nationalists March in Moscow

By MANSUR MIROVALEV – 1 day ago

MOSCOW (AP) — A white supremacist from Texas lifted his black cowboy hat into the air as he stepped forward to address thousands of Russian nationalists at a rally Sunday in Moscow.

"I'm taking my hat off as a sign of respect for your strong identity in ethnicity, nation and race," said Preston Wiginton, 43, exposing his close-cropped head to a freezing drizzle.

"Glory to Russia," he said in broken Russian, as the crowd of mostly young Russian men raised their right hands in a Nazi salute and chanted "white power!" in English.

About 5,000 nationalists turned out for the Russian March, held for the third year on National Unity Day, a holiday the Kremlin created in 2005 to replace the traditional Nov. 7 celebration of the 1917 Bolshevik rise to power.

The Kremlin has tried to give the holiday historical significance by tying it to the 1612 expulsion of Polish and Cossack troops who briefly seized Moscow at a time of political disarray.

But extreme nationalists have seized on the holiday, reflecting a rise in xenophobia. More than 50 people have been killed and 400 injured in ethnically motivated attacks this year, according to the Sova rights center.

Rights activists say the extreme nationalist sentiments are a natural outgrowth of the Kremlin's attempts to rebuild a strong Russian state.

President Vladimir Putin, who celebrated Sunday's holiday by laying flowers at the monument to Moscow's 17th century liberators, told the military cadets and pro-Kremlin youth group members who accompanied him that there are people in the world seeking to split Russia and divide up its natural resource wealth.

"Some believe that we are too lucky to possess so much natural wealth, which they say must be divided," Putin said, speaking near the monument on Red Square. "These people have lost their mind," he added with a smile.

Pro-Kremlin youth groups and the liberal Yabloko party also held rallies Sunday, in part to counter the nationalist march.

"This holiday is a gift for the most reactionary and dangerous group — the nationalists," Yabloko deputy chairman Sergei Mitrokhin told a crowd of about 1,500.

Thousands of pro-Kremlin youth activists marched through central Moscow and gathered near Red Square to sew together a "blanket of peace," symbolizing harmony among Russia's numerous ethnic groups.

The nationalists, who were kept away from the city center, marched along an embankment of the Moscow River to a small square, waving banners that read "Russians, stand up," "Russian order or war," and "Tolerance is AIDS."

What united the marchers was their opposition to nonwhite migrants from the Caucasus and Central Asia.

"Russia will be white," said Alexander Belov, leader of the Movement Against Illegal Migration. His last name, based on the Russian word for "white," is a nom de guerre.

"Our ultimate goal is our race and nation. Nation above all," he said, rephrasing the Nazi slogan "Germany above all."

A top immigration official down played the significance of the Russian Marches.

"This is just an outbreak of national identity feelings, which is noticeable worldwide, and it has affected Russia too," said Vyacheslav Postavnin, deputy director of the Federal Migration Service, the Interfax news agency reported.

In the first Russian March in 2005, thousands marched through central Moscow, some shouting "Heil Hitler." The march horrified many Muscovites, and the following year it was blocked by police.

"The first Russian March was unexpected good luck, the second one was about overcoming the resistance of the authorities, and the third one is already a new Russian tradition," said Konstantin Krylov of the nationalist Russian Social Movement.

City authorities approved Sunday's march but ordered it held on the river embankment away from the city center. Hundreds of police lined the route.

Nationalist marches also were held in other Russian cities.

In St. Petersburg, about 500 people rallied at Revolution Square in front of the Winter Palace. Police detained 12 men who attempted to break into a Chinese restaurant, the Regnum news agency reported.

Russian Nationalists March in Moscow

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Iran Proposes International Security Force to Take Over in Iraq

Voices of Iraq. Posted November 5, 2007.

An Iranian proposal for troops from Iran, Syria and other Arab states to replace U.S. forces in Iraq was swiftly rejected and ridiculed yesterday at a high-level gathering of Iraq's neighbors and world powers, the U.S. newspaper The Washington Times said in a report on Sunday.

"As top diplomats from two dozen countries and international organizations took turns to discuss how to improve Iraq's security, Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki suggested that a coalition from neighboring Arab states take over from U.S. forces, conference participants said."

"The Iranian delegation distinguished itself again today with the most extraordinary proposal," said David Satterfield, the State Department's top coordinator on Iraq, who accompanied U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice at the Istanbul meeting.

Ryan C. Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, who also attended the session, said "Mr. Mottaki specifically identified Iran and Syria as potential troop contributors." Crocker called the Iranian idea a "fantasy" that should not be "dignified" with a response.

Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal offered the most forceful rejection of Mottaki's proposal, saying it would do nothing to stabilize Iraq, diplomats said. They noted that no one voiced support for the idea, and it was not clear whether it had at least Syria's backing.

Rice met with Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem, but they spent most of their time discussing the upcoming presidential election in Lebanon, Satterfield said. He added that Rice warned Damascus to refrain from interfering in the vote.

Crocker said he expects to hold more talks on Iraq's security with Iranian diplomats in Baghdad in the near future, following two unproductive rounds earlier this year.

On the sidelines of yesterday's conference, Rice also acted as a mediator between Iraq and Turkey in search of a way to prevent attacks by the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, against Turkey.

During a three-way meeting, Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, a Kurd, promised "a number of visible measures implemented on the ground to show our seriousness" about hunting down and arresting PKK leaders.

He did not rule out joint military action with Turkey against the PKK.

Satterfield said the United States wants the Iraqi authorities and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in northern Iraq to "block" the movement of goods, supplies and people, as well as to disrupt logistics benefiting the PKK.

"They should apprehend PKK figures, deny any facilities and close all offices," he said.

In northern Iraq, a Kurdish official was quoted by wire reports as saying that the KRG had shut down the offices of the Kurdistan Democratic Solution Party, which sympathizes with the PKK.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki met in Istanbul with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who is scheduled to visit President Bush at the White House on Monday.

"The prime minister renewed the willingness of the Iraqi government to take steps to isolate the terrorist PKK, prevent any help reaching its members, chase and arrest them, and put them in front of the Iraqi judiciary because of their terrorist activities," Maliki's office said.

The Turkish parliament voted last week to authorize Turkish troops to cross the border into northern Iraq to root out an estimated 3,000 PKK guerrillas. Nearly 40,000 Turks have been killed since the PKK took up its armed struggle for Kurdish self-rule in southeast Turkey in 1984.

Iran Proposes International Security Force to Take Over in Iraq