“For
I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery,
lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part
is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come
in.”
(Romans 11:25)
Until The Fulness Of The
Gentiles
Dear Friends,
Who Are God's Chosen People
Do Israel and the Jews continue to remain God's chosen people or have they been replaced by the Christian church?
“Supersessionism, also called replacement theology or fulfillment theology, is a Christian doctrine which has parallels in Islam.
In Christianity, supersessionism is a theological view on the current status of the church in relation to the Jewish people and Judaism. It holds that the Christian Church has succeeded the Israelites as the definitive people of God or that the New Covenant has replaced or superseded the Mosaic covenant.
Supersessionism has formed a core tenet of the Church for the majority of its existence. Subsequent to and because of the Holocaust, some mainstream Christian theologians and denominations have rejected supersessionism.” Wikipedia
Let us examine some verses from both the Old and New Testaments.
“When they therefore were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel? And he said unto them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power. “ Acts 1:6-7
The key word to look at here is restore. Jesus' disciples were asking Jesus if the Kingdom of Israel
was to be restored at this time, sounding like something they were fulling expecting to happen. Jesus answered in such a way as would indicate it would be restored but it was not for them to know when.
The Temple and Jerusalem were actually utterly destroyed in 70 AD by Titus and the Roman legions.
This must have been very dis-heartening for those looking forward to the restoration of the kingdom.
In fact, Israel, had not been a united kingdom since approximately 930 BC
“The United Monarchy (Hebrew: הממלכה המאוחד ) is the name given to the Israelite kingdom of Israel and Judah, during the reigns of Saul, David and Solomon, as depicted in the Hebrew Bible. This is traditionally dated between 1050 BCE and 930 BCE. On the succession of Solomon's son, Rehoboam, around 930 BCE, the biblical account reports that the country split into two kingdoms: the Kingdom of Israel (including the cities of Shechem and Samaria) in the north and the Kingdom of Judah (containing Jerusalem) in the south.” Wikipedia
The Kingdom of Israel was destroyed in 722 BC by the Assyrian empire and the Kingdom of Judah along with Jerusalem was destroyed in 586 BC by Nebuchadnezzar. As already mentioned the Temple and Jerusalem were destroyed in 70 AD. There was no entity called Israel from that time until May 14, 1948, when the United Nations declared a homeland for the Jews in what was then Palestine. A key verse many point to as the fulfillment of the Kingdom of Israel is:
“Who has heard such a thing? and who has seen after this manner? Has the earth travailed in one day? or has even a nation been born at once, that Sion has travailed, and brought forth her children?” Isaiah 66:8
Then we have verses such as the following:
“I will establish my covenant between thee and thy seed after thee, to their generations, for an everlasting covenant, to be thy God, and the God of thy seed after thee. And I will give to thee and to thy seed after thee the land wherein thou sojournest, even all the land of Chanaan for an everlasting possession, and I will be to them a God.” Genesis 17:7-8
The word everlasting appears in both verses.
There are many similar verses to the one above, to many to list here.
Does this mean Israel and the Jews continue to be God's chosen people?
Well, we also have these scriptures.
“Jesus saith unto them, Did ye never read in the scriptures, The stone which the builders rejected, the same is become the head of the corner: this is the Lord’s doing, and it is marvellous in our eyes? Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof.” Matthew 21:42-43
This would seem to be completely at odds with what God promised Abraham in Genesis 17. Can we reconcile this seeming conundrum?
Let's look at some interesting things Paul said concerning Israel and the Jews in Romans 9 and 11.
“But Israel, which followed after the law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness. Wherefore? Because [they sought it] not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumblingstone; As it is written, Behold, I lay in Sion a stumblingstone and rock of offence: and whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed.
God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew.
I say then, Have they stumbled that they should fall? God forbid: but [rather] through their fall salvation [is come] unto the Gentiles, for to provoke them to jealousy.
Now if the fall of them [be] the riches of the world, and the diminishing of them the riches of the Gentiles; how much more their fulness?
And they also, if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be graffed in: for God is able to graff them in again.
For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in.
And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob:
For this [is] my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins.
As concerning the gospel, [they are] enemies for your sakes: but as touching the election, [they are] beloved for the fathers’ sakes.
For the gifts and calling of God [are] without repentance.
For as ye in times past have not believed God, yet have now obtained mercy through their unbelief: Even so have these also now not believed, that through your mercy they also may obtain mercy.”
Romans 9:31-33, 11:2, 11-12, 23, 26-31
There is a key word and a key phrase which are very important to note in the above scriptures, “graffed” and “until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in.”
Jesus made a similar statement is Luke 21 concerning the Gentiles.
“Jerusalem shall be trodden down of the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles be fulfilled.” Luke 21:24
Paul and Barnabas also said something interesting in Acts, chapter 13, concerning the Jews and the Gentiles.
“Then Paul and Barnabas waxed bold, and said, It was necessary that the word of God should first have been spoken to you: but seeing ye put it from you, and judge yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles.” Acts 13:46
What are the times of the Gentiles? Many believe them to be the present Church age until the return of Jesus. Remember it said “until the time of the Gentiles will be fulfilled,” ended.
Paul seems to say that Israel will once again be restored to prominence in God's Kingdom when the times of the Gentiles are completed, not before then.
With so much compromise in much of the Christian “Church” these days, has Christendom ceased to be “a light on a hill” to lead people to the truth in God?
(Matthew 5:14-16)
“I tell you that he will avenge them speedily. Nevertheless when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth?” Luke 18:8
“Let no man deceive you by any means: for [that day shall not come,] except there come a falling away first.” 2 Thessalonians 2:3
During the thousand year reign of Christ, the Millennium, it would certainly appear God is once again using Israel and the Jews as well as the saved Christians as His people.
It may also be well to remember what Zachariah thirteen states:
“And it shall come to pass, that in all the land, saith the Lord, two parts thereof shall be cut off and perish; but the third shall be left therein. And I will bring the third part through the fire, and I will try them as silver is tried, and I will prove them as gold is proved: they shall call upon my name, and I will hear them, and say, This is my people: and they shall say, The Lord is my God.” Zachariah 13:8-9
It would appear before they can be used by God again a great purging takes place.
“For in the last days the mountain of the Lord shall be glorious, and the house of God shall be on the top of the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall come to it. And many nations shall go and say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will tell us his way, and we will walk in it: for out of Sion shall go forth the law, and the word of the Lord out of Jerusalem.” Isiah 2:2-3
“And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem. And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and compassion: and they shall look upon me, because they have mocked me, and they shall make lamentation for him, as for a beloved friend, and they shall grieve intensely, as for a firstborn son.” Zechariah 12:9-10
“And it shall come to pass, that whosoever shall be left of all the nations that came against Jerusalem, shall even come up every year to worship the king, the Lord Almighty, and to keep the feast of tabernacles. And it shall come to pass, that whosoever of all the families of the earth shall not come up to Jerusalem to worship the king, the Lord Almighty, even these shall be added to the others.” Zechariah 14:16-17
“In that day I will raise up the tabernacle of David that is fallen, and will rebuild the ruins of it, and will set up the parts thereof that have been broken down, and will build it up as in the ancient days:” Amos 9:11
Could it be possible the Jews will be ministering in the Temple and Jerusalem while the Christians are helping to rule over the nations during the thousand year reign of Christ?
So, are Israel God's chosen people, or is the Christian Church God's chosen people? What do you think? Could both be within specific time frames?
Perhaps rather then using the terms supersessionism or replacement theology it would be more correct to call it what Jesus and Paul called it, “The times of the Gentiles”.
Until next week...
***
BREAKINGISRAELNEWS
BIN Exclusive: Campaign to Construct Messianic Golden Royal Crown
By Adam Eliyahu Berkowitz
December 7, 2018
“You have proffered him blessings of good things, have set upon his head a crown of fine gold.” Psalms 21:3 (The Israel Bible™)
Messianic Golden Royal Crown. (Breaking Israel News)
Rabbi Yosef Berger, the rabbi of King David’s Tomb on Mount Zion, has initiated a special project to create a golden crown to be presented to the messiah-king upon his arrival in Jerusalem.
Rabbi Berger, a direct descendant of King David, explained that the founding of the State of Israel and the Six-Day War were overt miracles and that we are today living in the beginning of the messianic era. Creating such a crown, he said, and uniting the 70 nations of the world around the project, will hasten the arrival of the king.
“For 2,000 years, Israel has waited for the moshiach (messiah),” Rabbi Berger said. “As a symbol of our belief that this period of waiting has ended, we should prepare a crown, since the first act of the moshiach will be to restore the Davidic Dynasty, which will be visibly unlike any other kingship that has ever existed.”
Berger has a strong personal interest in the project. He is the son of Rabbi Shalom Berger, the spiritual leader of thousands of members of the Mishkoltz sect of Hasidic Jewry. Rabbi Yosef Berger can trace his family lineage, from father to son, directly back to King David.
To illustrate the special nature of the Davidic Dynasty, Rabbi Berger cited the Prophet Zechariah.
“And Hashem shall be king over all the earth; in that day there shall be one Hashem with one name.” Zechariah 14:9
“The rule instituted by the moshiach will unite all 70 nations, bringing them in joy to Mount Zion to serve Hashem (God, literally ‘the name’),” Rabbi Berger said.
The rabbi emphasized that a king of Israel would ensure that the exile would end, the ingathering of the exiles would be complete, the Temple would be rebuilt and the Temple service reinstated.
“We are commanded to anticipate this, to pray for it, at all times until we merit seeing it with our own eyes,” Rabbi Berger said. “It is written in the Midrash (homiletic teachings) that the generation that anticipates and yearns for God’s kingdom is redeemed immediately. But this anticipation, like every mitzvah (Torah commandment), is made stronger when accompanied by a physical action.”
Rabbi Berger told a story to illustrate the point concerning a specific tzaddik (righteous man) that many people visited to request blessings. One time, two couples approached him, both requesting to be blessed with a child. The tzaddik complied. The next year, the couples returned. The blessing given to one couple had materialized but the other couple remained childless. When they asked why their blessing had gone unanswered, the tzaddik gave a simple answer.
“After I blessed them, they went out and bought a carriage for the baby,” he said.
Rabbi Berger explained the lesson illustrated in the story.
“True belief leads to action,” he said.”And action strengthens the heart to believe even more. It is the strength of the belief that makes the blessings come true.”
The rabbi noted that amazing efforts have been made to prepare for the Third Temple and all of the utensils stand ready, but no preparations have been made for the messiah who will build the Temple.
“Creating a crown for the king is unprecedented,” Rabbi Berger said. “When all 70 nations unite in an act of love expressly intended for the king in Jerusalem, this will surely be answered by Hashem.”
Rabbi Berger described rabbis throughout the generations who would go to great lengths to express their anticipation of the messiah in a material fashion: designating a room for the messiah with special furniture or setting aside a special suit of clothing in which to greet the him. These rooms and clothes would remain untouched, waiting for their appointed purpose.
“In this generation, when it is clear that the messiah is imminent, merely waiting to reveal himself, we need to prepare our hearts by performing acts that strengthen our belief,” Rabbi Berger said. “By preparing an actual crown, we are taking the first step toward bringing the inner vision of a king into reality. The beauty of a true king has not been seen in the world since the exile began and the prophets assured us that it would return.”
***
BREAKINGISRAELNEWS
Conference Paves Way for Jewish-Christian Cooperation on Temple Mount (Emphasis added.)
By Adam Eliyahu Berkowitz
December 5, 2018
“In the days to come, The Mount of Hashem’s House Shall stand firm above the mountains And tower above the hills; And all the nations Shall gaze on it with joy.” Isaiah 2:2 (The Israel Bible™)
Ascending the Temple Mount (Credit: Adam Eliyahu Berkowitz/Breaking Israel News)
The first Temple Jerusalem Convention took place at the Menachem Begin Heritage Center on Wednesday, aimed toward educating Christians about the relevance of the Jewish Temples to their belief. The focus is not only on the Biblical Temples but also on the future Third Temple written about in prophecies.
In his opening address, John Enarson, the Christian Relations Director of Cry for Zion and co-organizer of the conference explained the ground rules for the conference.
“The conference will be a meeting place of Jews and Christians with different perspectives. This should be done with mutual respect, acknowledging differences, and finding common ground on important issues without signing up for any political or religious position. We ask that all participants show grace toward each other.”
Doron Keidar, one of the organizers and the executive director of Cry for Zion, has high hopes for the event.
“This is like the first Zionist conference which brought people together to talk about their hopes and dreams for a Jewish state,” Keidar told Breaking Israel News. “That led to the establishment of the modern state of Israel. We are bringing people together to talk about the Temple Mount. It is pretty clear what can come from this.”
Rabbi Tuly Weisz, head of Israel365, addressed the crowd, emphasizing that it was powerfully appropriate for such a gathering to be held during the Jewish holiday of Hanukkah.
“Many Jewish holidays are about ‘they tried to kill us, we survived, let’s eat,’” Weisz jokingly told the crowd. “But Hanukkah is different. The Greeks did not want to kill us. The focal point of the holiday is about the non-Jews preventing the Jews from connecting to the Torah and about the Greeks defiling the temple. It is entirely appropriate to join in with Christians who have come to Israel to honor the Temple, the Torah, and the Jewish people.”
“If you were the Gentiles back then, there would never have been a need for Hanukkah,” Rabbi Weisz concluded.
The conference focused on a theory that is gaining popularity which claims that the Jewish Temples did not stand on the Temple Mount. According to the theory, both Temples were located further south in an area now recognized by archaeologists as the City of King David. This theory was most recently put forth in a series of books written by Bob Cornuke, a former police investigator with no training in archaeology. Cornuke has also proposed that the Ark of the Covenant was taken out of Solomon’s Temple and has been hidden away in a church in Ethiopia for hundreds of years.
Several of the speakers addressed this theory. Harry Moskoff, the author of the A.R.K. report, discussed the archaeological proof of the Temples’ location as well as the lack of proof for the theory’s claims.
Enarson believes the theory hides an insidious theological agenda.
“Rejecting the Temple Mount is the last stand of Replacement Theology,” Enarson explained to Breaking Israel News in an interview in April. “Replacement Theology, a belief that Christianity replaced Judaism in the covenant between Abraham and God, was a core tenet of Christianity. Subsequent to, and because of, the Holocaust, some mainstream Christian theologians and denominations have rejected Replacement Theology.”
***
THE TIMES OF ISRAEL (Emphasis added)
Rare interfaith Temple Mount confab highlights a ‘Christian awakening’
Participants come for the ‘conspiracy theories’ about where Temple was located, stay for the activism in unusual show of evangelical Christian support for Jewish right-wing cause
By MARISSA NEWMAN
December 5, 2018
Tourists look at the view of the Dome of the Rock and the Temple Mount from the lookout of the Mount of Olives overlooking the Old city of Jerusalem, on November 28, 2018. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)
Some 150 evangelical Christians and Jews gathered in Jerusalem on Wednesday in a highly unusual interfaith conference on right-wing Temple Mount activism that aimed to dispel what its organizers described as an insidious, viral “hoax” taking hold in the Christian world — that the two historical Jewish temples had never been located on the iconic, holy, politically explosive compound.
The location and timing of Wednesday’s Temple Mount Jerusalem Convention were symbolic. Under tight security, participants gathered at the Menachem Begin Center in the capital, where four years ago Temple Mount activist Yehudah Glick (now a Knesset member) was shot multiple times by a Palestinian terrorist in an assassination attempt over his advocacy for Jewish prayer at the holy site.
And its hosting on the Temple-centric Jewish holiday of Hanukkah — commemorating the Jewish revolt against the Seleucid empire by the Maccabees and restoration of the ransacked Temple and miracle of its oil-burning for eight days — was not lost on the speakers.
Nor did the convention’s organizers attempt to disguise its primary and controversial political aims: to drum up international Christian support for Jewish control of the flashpoint holy site, which remains under Jordanian custodianship since the 1967 Six Day War, and where Jews may visit, but not pray. Though many of the lecturers called for the rebuilding of a third temple, the organization insisted it had no such aspirations.
“Listen, it was evangelicals who helped usher in the move of the embassy to Jerusalem with President Donald Trump. Imagine if Christian evangelicals understood the importance of the Temple Mount and pushed for Jewish sovereignty of the Temple Mount,” said Doron Keider, the executive director of the Cry for Zion organization behind the conference.
The Temple Mount — site of the Biblical Jewish temples, and which houses the Al-Aqsa Mosque and Dome of the Rock shrine — has often been the epicenter of tensions between Israel and the Palestinians as the holiest site in Judaism and third-holiest site in Islam. Multiple flare-ups in car-rammings, stabbings and shootings in recent years were attributed by the Palestinian terrorists and attackers to a perceived attempt by Israel to change the status quo at the site. The Israeli government has firmly and repeatedly denied it will change the 50-year-old arrangements.
“There are many Christians who believe the Bible, that there will be a future temple. How that comes about is all in God’s hands. We are not some sort of extremist organization wanting to destroy any buildings or anything like that,” said John Enarson, the organization’s Christian relations director and student at the Scandinavian School of Theology.
“I know there’s a certain group among the media that are going to be watching, and they’re bound to call us racist, sexist, bigoted, homophones, bible-thumpers, irresponsible troublemakers, zealots and extremists, but the seal of God is truth, and the era of empty name-calling to shout down the opposition, opinions you don’t like, that era is over,” Enarson said earlier, in his opening remarks.
“The Temple Mount is now a mainstream concern, in Israel and around the world.”
In recent years, there has been an uptick in visits by Jewish worshipers to the holy site, and, according to the conference organizers, a flurry of interest by Christians, primarily evangelicals, since 2013, though they could not offer precise figures on visits to the site by Christian supporters.
But for many, the draw is not any sort of political activism, but rather various “conspiracy theories,” Keidar admitted.
‘The Temple Mount is now a mainstream concern, in Israel and around the world’
“There’s an awakening of interest in the Christian world, but unfortunately it’s more in the direction of conspiracy theory, you know, the Indiana Jones ‘I’m going to find the treasure and I’m going to be the one who does it,'” Keidar told reporters on Wednesday.
“Our main focus is educating about the Temple Mount, but unfortunately we learned that since we’re engaging with a Christian audience that’s their main thing in the back of their minds, the first thing when you talk about it, [so] we have to address it.”
A third temple in… Silwan?
The crux of a “hoax” addressed during the conference is a long discredited theory by Ernest L Martin — recently revived in books, articles and viral YouTube videos with millions of combined views — that claims the Jewish temples never stood on the Temple Mount, but rather in the nearby City of David in the East Jerusalem Silwan neighborhood, despite an abundance of archaeological and textual evidence to the contrary.
For proponents of the theory, it provides a “solution” to the apparently irreconcilable claims to the compound by Muslims and Jews.
“I think for Bible-believing Christians, it’s interesting to them that maybe it would not conflict with Muslim holy sites, but I think that’s obviously immature,” said Enarson, a Sweden-born evangelical Christian.
He also suggested the allure of the theory could stem from deep-rooted Christian supersessionist views of Judaism.
“There’s been thousands of years, almost 2,000 years, of Christian anti-Semitism, of replacement theology that subconsciously, I think, with many Christians it lends it easier to have this idea of ‘oh, the Jewish people missed it. They’re wrong again. And now we found something out that they don’t know.’ So you have articles appear, like ‘Wailing at the wrong wall’ and things like that,” he said.
“I don’t think a lot of Christian people consciously think that, but that’s something in the back of the history of the relationship between Christians and Jews. And we really want to change that.”
‘Jesus loved the Temple Mount’
Will pro-Israel evangelical Christians offer a tailwind to right-wing activism over the holy site? Though Wednesday’s event appeared unprecedented in terms of evangelical interest in the issue, the Cry for Zion organization has limited reach on social media (with only several thousand likes), and the Israeli government has firmly rejected any notion of changing the status quo.
And despite what conference organizers describe as an “awakening” that has seen more Christians visit the compound since 2013 (Why is that? “I really don’t know,” said Enarson), there is still a theological “schism” over the issue.
“A lot of Christians, who love Israel, are rejecting replacement theology and that includes the Temple Mount being passé and old, and being relevant and holy and sacred today,” insisted Enarson.
A packet distributed at the conference attempted to smooth over the theological rifts and questions raised by support for a Jewish Temple Mount movement, with articles such as “What about the temple of antichrist?” and “The apostles loved the Temple Mount.”
Backing animal sacrifices that were traditionally the centerpiece of Jewish ritual at the holy site, an article by Enarson acknowledges, is “touchy.”
“We are all often blind to our own worldview and Christians may be just as disturbed by the Hebrew Bible’s view of sacrificing sheep, as Jews may be disturbed by the Christian thought of the ‘human sacrifice’ of Jesus. It’s high time to take a fresh look at this topic!”
In another article, titled “Jesus loved the Temple Mount,” he writes: “Whatever Christian tradition of interpretation one subscribes to, one thing is clear: Jesus loved the Temple Mount — Mt. Zion — where the holy House of God stood. His disciples even said that zeal for God’s temple consumed him, and, like the weeping prophet Jeremiah, Jesus wept when he foresaw its destruction.”
Outside the conference hall, where books and t-shirts were on sale, and a model temple was set up, a table with a poster citing Psalms 69:8 pandered to Jewish and Christian buyers equally: “For the zeal for your house consumes me.”
(For more thoughts on the Third Temple click here.)***
(Below is a link to a 54 minute video Chaim Richman gave while lecturing in the US. In it he addresses the issue of the Temple location. He calls the belief that the Temple location is not on the Temple Mount the "mother" of all fake news. His discussion on this subject begins at the 17:30 mark.
He goes on to say, "The future of the world is totally dependent on the clarification of this place, the place where God will make His presence known".
Chaim Richman is the head of the Temple Institute in Jerusalem, the foremost organization in the promotion of the Third Temple.)
(See our video The Coming Temple that disputes the location of the first and second Temples.
“For there is nothing covered, that shall not be revealed; and hid, that shall not be known.” Matthew 10:26)
***
PRESSTV
US Christian evangelical groups donated some $65 million to Israeli settlements: Report
December 9, 2018
A general view shows Israel's controversial separation barrier between the occupied West Bank village of al-Zaayem and Israel's largest settlement of Maale Adumim (background) on September 27, 2018. (Photo by AFP)
Evangelical Christian groups have reportedly raised tens of millions of dollars over the past decade to fund settlement projects in the occupied West Bank as the Israeli regime presses ahead with its land expropriation policies in the occupied territories irrespective of great international outcry.
According to a report published by the English-language Haaretz daily newspaper, it is estimated the total amount of money collected in the past 10 years to be somewhere between $50 million and $65 million.
The report added that Hayovel (The Jubilee), an American non-profit organization that claims to bring Christian volunteers from all over the world to serve Jewish farmers in occupied lands, has brought more than 1,700 volunteers to Har Brakha settlement near Nablus alone.
The paper further revealed that the Israeli Ministry of Strategic Affairs has offered Hayovel $16,000 a year for the production of materials promoting Israel and settlements abroad.
American-born founder of the Heart of Israel (also known as the Binyamin Fund), Aaron Katsof– who lives in the West Bank settlement of Shiloh – said his association collects hundreds of thousands of dollars annually for projects in the settlements.
Katsof noted that even though evangelicals do not account for the bulk of the money he raises, they do account for the vast majority of his donors.
“You have to realize that while the average Jew gives $1,500, the average Christian gives $50,” he said. “But their share is growing very, very fast.”
Less than a month before US President Donald Trump took office, the United Nations Security Council adopted Resolution 2334, calling on Israel to “immediately and completely cease all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territories, including East Jerusalem” al-Quds.
About 600,000 Israelis live in over 230 illegal settlements built since the 1967 Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and East Jerusalem al-Quds.
Palestinians want the West Bank as part of a future independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem al-Quds as its capital.
The last round of Israeli-Palestinian talks collapsed in 2014. Among the major sticking points in those negotiations was Israel’s continued settlement expansion on Palestinian territories.
Trump backtracked on Washington’s support for a “two-state solution” earlier this year, saying he would support any solution favored by both sides.
“Looking at two-state or one-state, I like the one that both parties like. I’m very happy with the one both parties like. I can live with either one,” the US president said during a joint press conference with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington on February 15.
Click to View PDF online
JEWSNEWS
The Pope calls on the Jews in Israel to hand over a large part of their country to Muslims, so ‘Palestine’ can be created
December 6, 2018
Pope Francis meets PA chairman at Vatican, briefs him on “Israeli violations against Palestinians”.
Pope Francis on Monday called for the implementation of a “two-state solution” to solve the Israel-Palestinian Arab conflict.
His comments came during a meeting with Palestinian Authority (PA) chairman Mahmoud Abbas at the Vatican.
The PA’s official news agency Wafa said that Abbas briefed the Pope on the latest developments in “Palestine” and the implications of the US decision recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and moving its embassy to the city.
He also briefed him on alleged “Israeli violations against the Palestinian people, their land and holy places, particularly in Jerusalem.”
A statement issued by the Vatican said the two discussed “the path of reconciliation among the Palestinian people, as well as the efforts to reactivate the peace process between Israelis and Palestinians, and to reach a two-state solution, hoping for a renewed commitment on the part of the international community to meet the legitimate aspirations of both peoples.”
“Particular attention was reserved for the status of Jerusalem, underlining the importance of recognizing and preserving its identity and the universal value of the holy City for the three Abrahamic religions,” the statement said, according to Wafa.
The Vatican recognized “Palestine” as a state in 2013. Last year, the PA opened an “embassy” in the Vatican. This occurred after an accord between the Holy See and the PA on the establishment of an “embassy” took effect.
During a 2015 meeting with Abbas, the Pope referred to Abbas as “an angel of peace”, causing outrage on social media.
The Vatican later explained that the reference was mistranslated, and in fact was meant as encouragement for Abbas to pursue peace with Israel.
***
AL JAZEERA NEWS
Palestinians battle home evictions in East Jerusalem's Silwan
The settlers' takeover of Batan al-Hawa is 'the most extensive expulsion process' in recent years in East Jerusalem.
Mersiha Gadzo
December 7, 2018
Batan al-Hawa, Occupied East Jerusalem - Over the years, Israeli settlers have repeatedly offered Zuheir Rajabi and his neighbours millions of dollars for their modest homes stacked on the hillside of Silwan's Batan al-Hawa, a neighbourhood in occupied East Jerusalem.
The homes are in what is known as the Historic Basin of the Old City and in proximity to the holy Al-Aqsa Mosque, making them prized possessions.
A Jewish settler once offered Rajabi a blank cheque for his house, asking him to write any figure he chose, from 3m to 30m shekels ($800,000 to $8m).
But for Rajabi and 700 other neighbourhood residents - who are now facing eviction - no amount of money could make them part with their homes.
"They thought that in 30 days the people would give up their houses," Rajabi said, standing on the roof patio of the neighbourhood’s community centre, overlooking the valley.
"The people here are very simple. They have only one thing, which is honour. We don’t mind living in poverty or in bad conditions, but we just can't handle losing our honour," said Rajabi, who is also the spokesperson for the Batan al-Hawa Committee.
A large number of Batan al-Hawa residents have been there for over 70 years, many after being expelled from their ancestral homes as Israel proper was being established.
Residents now face another expulsion with a Jewish settler organisation, Ateret Cohanim, trying to wage what Ir Amim, an Israeli NGO, calls the single-largest takeover of a Palestinian neighbourhood in East Jerusalem since Israel occupied it in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war.
The Judaisation of East Jerusalem
Ateret Cohanim, which aims to Judaise East Jerusalem, claims the homes in Batan al-Hawa were built on land owned by the Jewish Benvenisti Trust in the 19th century, which it used to settle Yemeni Jews in the area.
In 2002, Israel's Justice Ministry issued a title deed for the land, about 5.5 dunams (1.4 acres), to the Benvenisti Trust without notifying the residents. By then, Ateret Cohanim had established control of the Trust.
The deed was used as a basis for eviction notices to residents, such as the one received by the Rajabi family in 2015 demanding that the seven families living in the house leave.
In June this year, over a hundred Palestinian residents fighting evictions filed a petition, arguing that the Benvenisti Trust owned just the buildings and not the land on which they stood.
Since the original buildings had since been destroyed and rebuilt, the Trust could not claim the land, the residents argued.
That same month, the Israeli government admitted that the Ministry of Justice had failed to investigate the Trust before issuing the title deed.
Yet, the Israeli High Court of Justice last month rejected the residents' appeal to overturn the 2002 decision, effectively allowing Ateret Cohanim to pursue the takeover of Batan al-Hawa.
Israeli human rights organisation B'Tselem said that the court's ruling had paved the way for the cleansing of Palestinians from Silwan.
"The judgment proves, yet again, that the Israeli High Court gives its seal of approval to almost any infringement of Palestinians' rights by the Israeli authorities."
The 'octopus' in East Jerusalem
So far, Ateret Cohanim has evicted 17 families and now owns six buildings in the area.
According to the UN Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, 45 percent of all Palestinian families facing eviction in East Jerusalem live in Batan al-Hawa.
B'Tselem called it "the most extensive expulsion process" in recent years in the city.
Rajabi said his father bought their plot of land in 1966 after they were expelled from the Old City's Jewish Quarters without any compensation.
"I was born here, I grew up here, I got married here, I have lived here all my life," he said.
Disappointed over the court's ruling, he said Israeli society is heading to the "extreme right".
Rajabi compares Ateret Cohanim to an octopus whose tentacles have gripped the Old City and Silwan.
"Ateret Cohanim is a powerful organisation, not just politically. It has money too," Rajabi said.
According to Israeli daily Haaretz, the organisation uses a number of tactics to coerce Palestinians into selling their properties, including sexual entrapment and blackmail of various types - such as threatening to publicise a sale agreed in secret so the seller, fearing for their life, would then be forced to lower their price significantly to avoid their community's ire.
Ir Amim says the Israeli government has been directly involved in facilitating illegal private settlement in the Old City and surrounding Palestinian neighbourhoods.
"The government acted through the General Custodian and the Registrar of Trusts (both under the Ministry of Justice) to facilitate settlers' seizure of Batan al-Hawa, as well as increasing its security budget by 119 percent from 2009-2016 to ensure the protection of radical Jews settling in the hearts of Palestinian neighbourhoods in East Jerusalem," the NGO said.
Consolidating Jewish control
According to a report by Ir Amim, the political objective of groups such as Ateret Cohanim is to consolidate Jewish control in East Jerusalem and thwart the two-state solution.
Yacoub al-Rajabi, a member of the Batan al-Hawa Committee, said that settlers have been trying to buy their house since 2003.
A year and a half ago, Ateret Cohanim offered him $2m to sell his home and drop the court case, but to no avail.
"If they evict us from our homes, we will build tents next to our homes. We will not go anywhere. We refuse to go anywhere. We refuse to be transferred [for the third time]," Yacoub said.
He described their neighbourhood as a prison where residents feel trapped and are regularly harassed by settlers, police, army and Israeli governmental institutions who pressure them to leave.
Whenever there is a Jewish holiday, he says the residents cannot leave their homes and the children can't go to school under military order.
"We do not have anything but our steadfastness. [We will] try to defend ourselves and our rights … We have the ownership of this land and it is ours by law," he said.
Rajabi's office is located in the community centre built for children - the only place in the neighbourhood where the kids can play safely. In one corner of his office, a screen displays CCTV footage from the cameras installed outside.
Across the street, a dozen more cameras surround his home. He had them set up to document attacks by settlers or Israeli authorities after his father died from inhaling tear gas fired by the police.
Rajabi says his cameras have been extremely useful in disputing false claims by the settlers and the Israeli authorities.
The fate of their homes is now with the magistrate's court in Jerusalem, which has to decide whether the Benvenisti Trust owns just the buildings or the land too.
But Yacoub said there is little hope that justice can be delivered from Israeli courts.
"Even during the hearing the judge herself mentioned that there are some legal dilemmas in the court's verdict," Yacoub said adding that residents will try all possible means to stay, even taking the case to the International Criminal Court.
"This [court decision] will never break us. We will keep fighting for our rights, we will keep fighting for our ownership over our land and houses," he said.
***
Associated Press
Israel, Palestinians jockey over Jerusalem in Trump era
TIA GOLDENBERG and MOHAMMED DARAGHMEH
December 1, 2018
JERUSALEM (AP) — President Donald Trump's recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital has set off an increasingly visible battle in the city's eastern sector — with an emboldened Israel seeking to cement its control over the contested area and Palestinians pushing back to maintain their limited foothold.
In recent weeks, Israel has arrested dozens of Palestinian activists for alleged illegal political activity. It demolished Palestinian shops for failing to have permits, a court has cleared the way for settlers to move in to an Arab neighborhood and the city's outgoing mayor is trying to close the east Jerusalem operations of the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees.
The Palestinian Authority in the West Bank, in turn, has boosted efforts to protect its claim on Jerusalem, attempting to block east Jerusalem Palestinians from selling properties to Jews — a major taboo that it is largely powerless to prevent.
"The change in the U.S. position on Jerusalem under Trump's administration has unleashed the Israeli hands to increase and escalate its measures that aim to change the features of the city from a Palestinian city to an Israeli one," said Walid Salem, a Palestinian analyst in Jerusalem. "The Palestinian Authority feels the heat and is stepping up measures to resist this Israeli policy."
The conflicting claims to east Jerusalem lie at the heart of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Israel captured the area, home to the city's most sensitive religious sites, in the 1967 Middle East war and annexed it, claiming the entire city as its capital. But the annexation is not internationally recognized, and the Palestinians seek east Jerusalem as the capital of a future state.
A year ago, Trump upended decades of American policy and recognized Jerusalem as Israel's capital.
"We finally acknowledge the obvious: that Jerusalem is Israel's capital," Trump said at the time.
Several months later, he moved the U.S. Embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, thrilling Israel and enraging the Palestinians.
Speaking at the embassy dedication ceremony in May, Netanyahu said: "We are in Jerusalem and we are here to stay."
Although Trump has said his decision would not determine the city's final borders, it has been seen by both Israel and the Palestinians as taking sides.
Israel's hawkish government has been energized by the backing of its American ally in its quest to keep Jerusalem what it considers to be its eternal, undivided capital.
The Palestinians have for years accused Israel of taking steps to fortify its hold on the city, primarily by encircling Arab neighborhoods in east Jerusalem with Jewish settlements. These settlements, considered by Israel to be neighborhoods of its capital, are now home to over 200,000 Israelis.
Criticism from previous U.S. administrations has often held Israel back in the past. With the reins removed, Israel has carried out a flurry of moves, often jostling with Palestinians along the way.
"Around 300, 000 Palestinian live in east Jerusalem," said Adnan Husseini, the Palestinian minister of Jerusalem affairs. "They have always resisted the Israeli occupation measures in the city and they always will."
In an unusual step, Israel arrested the top Palestinian official in Jerusalem this week along with over 30 Palestinian Jerusalemites, accusing them of the rarely enforced offense of serving in the Palestinian security forces in violation of previous agreements with Israel. Most were released on bail, but the governor, Adnan Ghaith, remains in custody.
The arrests appear to have been prompted by the detention of a Palestinian resident of east Jerusalem who allegedly sold property to Jews — a punishable offense under Palestinian law.
That detention was a bold move by the Palestinians because, also according to previous accords, they cannot arrest Jerusalem residents.
The Palestinians have also zeroed in on the Bedouin hamlet of Khan al-Ahmar. Israel says the West Bank encampment, just outside of Jerusalem, was illegally built and is trying to uproot the village. A planned demolition was postponed following heavy European pressure, but it could still happen at any time.
Critics say the demolition is meant to make way for Israeli settlement homes, a step the Palestinians fear could cut off the West Bank from their hoped-for capital in east Jerusalem.
While Khan al-Ahmar residents avoided eviction for now, others haven't. After a lengthy legal battle, Israel's Supreme Court this month rejected an appeal by residents of the Silwan neighborhood in east Jerusalem who claimed their land was illegally granted to a pro-settler group. The decision could lead to the evictions of hundreds of longtime Palestinian residents.
"A huge mechanism of displacement has been set in motion, allowing settlers and the government to work hand in hand," said Yudith Oppenheimer, executive director of Ir Amim, an Israeli advocacy group that promotes coexistence in the city.
Israeli police demolished 18 stores in east Jerusalem last week in what it called a "large-scale" operation against illegal structures that it said was prompted by Palestinian residents' complaints.
Meanwhile, in a move coordinated with the national government, Jerusalem's municipality plans to evict the U.N. agency responsible for Palestinian refugees and shift its services — schools, sanitation and others — over to Israeli authorities.
Jerusalem's outgoing mayor, Nir Barkat, said a decision by the Trump administration to cut $300 million in funding to UNRWA prompted the move.
The Israeli steps in east Jerusalem come ahead of the promised release of Trump's long-awaited peace plan. The Palestinians have already said they will oppose it, accusing Trump of being unfairly biased in favor of Israel.
Yitzhak Reiter, a senior fellow at the Jerusalem Institute for Policy Research, said Israel may be trying to skew the American plan toward its vision for the city.
"It seems that this plan will not completely satisfy Israel, let alone the Palestinians," Reiter said. "The Israeli government is making an attempt to create facts on the ground that will manifest its ideal plans and policies."
___
Daraghmeh reported from Ramallah, West Bank. Associated Press writer Isabel DeBre contributed reporting.
***
MailOnline
Jihadis are plotting a devastating CHEMICAL WEAPONS attack in Britain and could launch a chlorine bomb on London Underground, security chiefs warn
Terror chiefs warned that a chemical weapons attack is 'more likely than not'
The assessment follows 'chatter' between IS senior figures was intercepted
Islamic State has been inspired by the poisoning of Sergei and Yulia Skripal
By MARK NICOL DEFENCE EDITOR FOR THE MAIL ON SUNDAY
PUBLISHED: 22:02, 8 December 2018 | UPDATED: 08:32, 9 December 2018
Terror chiefs believe a devastating chemical weapons attack in Britain is now ‘more likely than not’, The Mail on Sunday can reveal.
The chilling assessment follows the interception of ‘chatter’ between senior figures in Islamic State (IS). The terror group has been inspired by the poisoning of former KGB agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, by Russian agents in March.
Before the novichok attack in Salisbury, the Government’s Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre (JTAC) put the risk of a chemical weapons strike by jihadis at 25 per cent.
Security sources say that has now surged to more than 50 per cent. There are particular fears over the potential for a chlorine bomb to be detonated on the London Underground. The threat is considered so severe that terror chiefs secretly met with emergency services bosses a fortnight ago to ‘war game’ their response to such an atrocity.
Teams, including officers from the Met Police’s Emergency Preparedness Operational Command Unit (CO3) and officials from the London Mayor’s office, were faced with a scenario of simultaneous attacks at Oxford Street and Waterloo Underground stations by terrorists carrying chlorine bombs hidden in rucksacks.
When such devices are triggered, the relatively harmless liquid chlorine becomes a deadly vapour that mixes with fluid in the lungs and eyes of victims to form corrosive hydrochloric acid. The gas would be particularly dangerous in confined and densely packed Underground stations, especially for children and the elderly.
The recent simulation involved commuters being killed as the chlorine gas swept through trains and along platforms. Many more ‘died’ as terrified passengers fought to escape. It was concluded that up to 100 lives could be lost in such an attack, with hundreds more injured.
A security source involved in the exercise said: ‘The chlorine vapour would be very localised and would last a few minutes before it evaporated. While fatal, the stampede to get out of the Tube station would cost far more lives than the chemical. That’s why it is important to educate people about the threat of these weapons. The more they know, the less inclined they’ll be to panic.’
Last night, Hamish de Bretton-Gordon, an expert on chemical weapons, said IS bomb-makers in Syria had already developed the necessary skills to make such devices and could pass such expertise to extremists in Britain.
He said: ‘These tactics have been morbidly successful for IS in the Syria war zone, while the nerve-agent attack in Salisbury has shown that just a tiny amount of a chemical can have a huge impact.’
Responding to The Mail on Sunday’s exclusive report, Security Minister Ben Wallace said last night: ‘I have consistently warned that a chemical attack in the UK is getting more likely. We have well-tested plans to respond to an attack and minimise the impact, should an incident occur.’
***
MailOnline
Babylonian language is brought back to life in a short film nearly 2,000 years after the language DIED OUT with the ancient culture
'The Poor Man of Nippur' is a 20-minute film from the University of Cambridge
The language of the film is exclusively Babylonian as it was recreated by experts
It tells the story of a man who avenged the killing of his goat by a city official
Babylonian was spoken in Mesopotamia but went extinct around the time of Christ and has not been spoken since
By JOE PINKSTONE FOR MAILONLINE
PUBLISHED: 11:01, 28 November 2018 | UPDATED: 16:42, 28 November 2018
Babylonian language has been extinct for around 2,000 years but a University of Cambridge professor has revived the deceased dialect and made a short film in the language (pictured)
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LIFESITENews
The image of Santa and baby Jesus that was censored by Facebook. Jennifer Beahm Crawford / Facebook
December 5, 2018
Facebook censors image of Santa kneeling before baby Jesus, calls it ‘violent content’
Update Dec. 6, 2018: Facebook is no longer censoring the image of Santa Claus kneeling before the Baby Jesus after LifeSiteNews' report on the matter went viral. Read our new report: Facebook unblocks image of Santa kneeling before Baby Jesus after LifeSite report goes viral
December 5, 2018 (LifeSiteNews) – Facebook has covered over a posting of a picture of Santa Claus kneeling before the Baby Jesus, warning viewers that the photo "may show violent or graphic content.”
A second warning beneath the obscured image of Santa on bended knee, reverentially adoring the Christ Child states, “This photo was automatically covered so you can decide if you want to see it.”
Users can click on a button to uncover the photo.
Facebook explains on its site what it means by “Violence and graphic content:”
"We also know that people have different sensitivities with regard to graphic and violent content. For that reason, we add a warning label to especially graphic or violent content so that it is not available to people under the age of eighteen and so that people are aware of the graphic or violent nature before they click to see it," the social media giant states.
“We err on the side of allowing content, even when some find it objectionable,” declares Facebook’s community standards, saying it does so in order to maintain a “safe environment” for its “Facebook community.”
It remains unclear why the image of Baby Jesus and Santa was deemed by Facebook to be "violent and graphic content."
On December 25, Christians around the world celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ that happened 2,018 years ago. Christians believe that Jesus is the Son of God who came into the world to save mankind from sin and to open the way to heaven. Christians consider God becoming man the greatest historical event to have ever taken place.
The image in question — of the Savior of the World as an infant and a popularized version of a saint — was originally posted on December 1, 2015, with this accompanying poem explaining the touching illustration:
My dear precious Jesus, I did not mean to take your place,
I only bring toys and things and you bring love and grace.
People give me lists of wishes and hope that they came true;
But you hear prayers of the heart and promise your will to do.
Children try to be good and not to cry when I am coming to town;
But you love them unconditionally and that love will abound.
I leave only a bag of toys and temporary joy for a season;
But you leave a heart of love, full of purpose and reasons.
I have a lot of believers and what one might call fame;
But I never healed the blind or tried to help the lame.
I have rosy cheeks and a voice full of laughter;
But no nail—scarred hands or a promise of the hereafter.
You may find several of me in town or at a mall;
But there is only one omnipotent you, to answer a sinner’s call.
And so, my dear precious Jesus, I kneel here to pray;
To worship and adore you on this, your holy birthday.
Facebook has a long history of censoring faith-based organizations and individuals. The social media giant has been forced to apologize for numerous instances of improperly flagging conservative or Christian content as “hateful” or otherwise inappropriate. It has also come under fire for letting left-wing organizations like PolitiFact and the Southern Poverty Law Center influence its “fact-checking” and “hate speech” policies.
Facebook has censored a Christian theology professor after he criticized a video selling LGBT “pride” to children. It has suspended the account of Elizabeth Johnson, a Christian who goes by the name of Activist Mommy, after she called gender confusion a mental illness. The social media giant has also blocked ads for the movie Gosnell: The Trial of America's Biggest Serial Killer, labeling the film about the serial killer abortionist ‘political speech.’
The social networking giant has also banned many LifeSiteNews’ pro-life ads, deeming them too “political” because they showed pictures of pregnant mothers, ultrasounds, preborn babies, and the tiny feet of an infant child held in her mother’s hands.
***
THE ORGANIC PREPPER (Excerpted from longer article. Ed)
Narnia Author Warned About Genetically Edited Babies 74 Years Ago
By Meadow Clark
C.S. Lewis, beloved author of The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe had an important warning about genetically edited babies…and he said it 74 years ago – in 1944.
C.S. Lewis warned us about genetically edited babies in 1944.
But in C.S. Lewis’ book The Abolition of Man, the topic is about keeping values in a modern society. It’s a highly debated book and is considered #7 of National Review’s top 100 non-fiction books of the 20th century.
Thanks to writer Anne Holmquist, who compiled the following C.S. Lewis quotes in her article: “A 1944 Warning About Genetically Edited Babies.”
She quotes The Abolition of Man, emphasis hers:
Each generation exercises power over its successors: and each, in so far as it modifies the environment bequeathed to it and rebels against tradition, resists and limits the power of its predecessors. This modifies the picture which is sometimes painted of a progressive emancipation from tradition and a progressive control of natural processes resulting in a continual increase of human power. In reality, of course, if any one age really attains, by eugenics and scientific education, the power to make its descendants what it pleases, all men who live after it are the patients of that power. They are weaker, not stronger: for though we may have put wonderful machines in their hands we have pre-ordained how they are to use them.
Lewis goes on to explain that a world that tosses aside values is just as bad for its predecessors as it is for its successors.
Then, he shows a 74-year-old concern for “designer babies.”
The final stage is come when Man by eugenics, by pre-natal conditioning, and by an education and propaganda based on a perfect applied psychology, has obtained control over himself. Human nature will be the last part of Nature to surrender to Man. The battle will then be won. We shall have ‘taken the thread of life out of the hand of Clotho’ and be henceforth free to make our species whatever we wish it to be. The battle will indeed be won.
So, will humanity be able to thoughtfully wield this newfound power? Lewis writes,
I am very doubtful whether history shows us one example of a man who, having stepped outside traditional morality and attained power, has used that power benevolently. I am inclined to think that the Conditioners will hate the conditioned.
***
BREITBART
Duterte Tells Philippines: ‘Kill Bishops,’ ‘90% of Priests Are Gay’
By Francil Martel
December 7, 2018
Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte used the occasion of an award ceremony for “Child-friendly Municipalities and Cities” on Wednesday to call on his population to “kill bishops” for being “good for nothing.” On Friday, at a labor event, Duterte disparaged priests as being “90 percent gay.”
Duterte regularly attacks the Catholic Church and its local clergy in routine presidential speaking engagements. He has repeatedly claimed to have been the victim of sexual assault at the hands of a priest as a child and gifted supporters copies of books detailing child sexual assault by Catholic clergy.
Duterte’s antagonism towards the Church has marred his popularity among constituents. The Philippines is home to one of the world’s largest Catholic populations and over 90 percent of the country identifies as Christian in some form. His remarks, however, immediately preceded the arrest of yet another priest in the country accused of dozens of instances of sexual assault and rape of children.
On Wednesday, Duterte remarked in Manila’s Malacanang Palace that “all [bishops] do is criticize” and encouraged their killing. According to the Philippine outlet Rappler, Duterte first stated that he did believe in God, regardless of his attitude towards the Church. He then added in Filipino, “but these bishops, kill them, those fools are good for nothing.”
At another event on Friday, this time dedicated to the 85th anniversary of the Philippines’ Department of Labor and Employment, Duterte called the Catholic Church “the most hypocritical institution.”
“You see, the pope said, ‘If you cannot be celibate, get out.’ Most of them, 90 percent of the priests (are gay),” Duterte said.
Presidential spokesperson Salvador Panelo assured reporters on Thursday that Duterte’s call to kill was “only hyperbole.”
“We should be getting used to this president. He makes certain statements for dramatic effect,” Panelo said, condemning Philippine bishops for triggering Duterte’s remarks.
“The president, just like any ordinary human being, is upset when the good things that he does for this country and not even appreciated by people who are supposed to support it, like the Church,” Panelo said.
The explanation did not appear to satisfy the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP). CBCP-Episcopal Commission on Missions (ECM) chairman Sorsogon Bishop Arturo Bastes told the Philippine Star that Duterte was a “megalomaniac” and “murderous madman,” urging the country not to “take his statements lightly from this time on.”
Fr. Jerome Secillano of the CBCP issued a statement urging bishops to use “prudence” with their words to protect their safety.
“What we need here is to exercise prudence in our words and actions. If we engage him in a word war, it might not end,” he advised.
On his remarks regarding gay priests, Bishop Broderick Pabillo told the Philippine Starthat it was an “irresponsible accusation.”
“The sins of others do not make his own sins right,” he said.
Bishop Virgilio David, a frequent target of Duterte’s attacks, posted a reply to Wednesday’s tirade on Facebook consisting mostly of Biblical passages. He added, “We have already faced quite a lot of persecutions in the past two thousand years of Church history. We always respond the way Jesus would.”
Last month, Duterte accused David personally of being a drug abuser, without providing any evidence, and threatened to “decapitate” him.
“I’m telling you, David. I am puzzled as to why you always go out at night. I suspect, son of a whore, you are into illegal drugs,” Duterte said at an event observing the launch of a water supply project.
Duterte spent much of the summer making similar comments. In August, he told the nation’s bishops, “I will kick your ass,” a month after he promised to stop attacking God in his speeches, a vow prompted by dwindling approval numbers. His promise lasted less than a day.
Asked to explain his animosity towards the Church, Duterte has accused a local priest in his childhood of having sexually assaulted him. “It was a case of fondling—you know what—he did during confession, that’s how we lost our innocence early,” Duterte said in a 2015 interview. The priest in question, Father Mark Falvey, was an American who served the Church in the Philippines before returning home and dying in the 1970s. The Society of Jesus (or Jesuit order), of which Falvey was a member, subsequently confirmed that Falvey stood accused not only of molesting a young Duterte, but several American children whose identity has remained secret.
Child sex abuse has become an ongoing scandal for the Vatican, particularly in developing countries. On Wednesday, prior to Dutere’s call to “kill bishops,” American priest Kenneth Bernard Hendricks was arrested in the country for allegedly forcing between seven and 50 boys in the past three decades to bathe with him and molesting them. He had lived in the Philippines for 37 years. An Ohio court had issued an arrest warrant for him.
***
INDEPENDENT
Satanism and The Rolling Stones: 50 Years of ‘Sympathy for the Devil’
When Mick Jagger sang ‘Just call me Lucifer’, pop music changed forever, but the tragedy of Altamont lay ahead
By Simon Hardeman
December 5, 2018
The Rolling Stones walk through London’s Green Park ( Getty )
Fifty years ago this week Mick Jagger became the Devil. Everyone had known the Rolling Stones were misogynistic, drug-taking, all-round bad boys but as he sang, “Please allow me to introduce myself / I’m a man of wealth and taste…” the genie – or, rather the demon – bolted from the bottle. The results would be devastating. For pop, it laid a new path for some of the biggest bands ever, but for the Rolling Stones it led to a vicious murder at an infamous concert exactly a year from the song’s release, and an abiding reputation for evil.
The song was “Sympathy for the Devil”, the opening number on the Beggars Banquet album, both released on 6 December 1968. The Stones’ previous LP had been Their Satanic Majesties Request. Its occult pretensions pretty much began and ended with the title, but it was a sign of something coming. Stones guitarist Keith Richards’ lover Anita Pallenberg, with whom Jagger had a steamy on-set relationship during shooting of the film Performance earlier in the year, was said to wear anti-vampire garlic round her neck and keep voodoo-style bones in a drawer; American filmmaker and occultist Kenneth Anger wanted Jagger to play Lucifer in a film he was making; and, as the peace-and-love era drew to a close, the dark side had become increasingly attractive to pop musicians. Occult legend Aleister Crowley had appeared on the cover of The Beatles’ Sgt Pepper, and there was even a diabolic track in the charts on the day of the song’s release – Gun’s “Race with the Devil”.
But what seems to have been the key inspiration for songwriter Jagger (it is his only solo masterpiece, according to his biographer Philip Norman) was when his girlfriend, Marianne Faithfull, gave him The Master and Margarita, Mikhail Bulgakov’s long-suppressed and recently translated Russian novel in which the Devil appears in Moscow and creates murder and mayhem. “Sympathy” has many lines that mirror Bulgakov’s book – including the way the debonair Devil presents himself, and passages about Jesus’s crucifixion.
Jagger had written “Sympathy” as “sort of like a Bob Dylan song”, he told Rolling Stone’s Jann Wenner in 1995. But during recording, guitarist Keith Richards suggested its trademark samba beat. Jagger said this had “a tremendous hypnotic power… because it is a primitive African, South American, Afro-whatever-you-call-that rhythm. So to white people, it has a very sinister thing about it.”
And over this insistent, primal rhythm he personified Satan in an extraordinarily uncompromising, gloating way – “I was ’round when Jesus Christ / Had his moment of doubt and pain / Made damn sure Pilate / Washed his hands and sealed his fate… / I stuck around St Petersburg / When I saw it was a time for a change / Killed the Tsar and his ministers / Anastasia screamed in vain”. And, in case anyone doubted where he was coming from, he sang “Just call me Lucifer”. The original title of the song had been “The Devil Is My Name”.
Musicians and artists had played with devilry before but for pop this was something else. Jagger WAS the Devil! Richards told Rolling Stone: “Before, we were just innocent kids out for a good time.” But after “Sympathy for the Devil”, he said, “they’re saying, ‘They’re evil, they’re evil’… There are black magicians who think we are acting as unknown agents of Lucifer and others who think we are Lucifer.”
Jagger was taken aback by the effect. “It was only one song. It wasn’t like it was a whole album, with lots of occult signs on the back,” he said, 20 years later. He was amazed how “people seemed to embrace the image so readily, and it has carried all the way over into heavy metal bands...”
He had opened Pandora’s Box, according to musician and occultist Kieran Leonard. “It kicked down the door for diabolism in the mainstream,” says Leonard, whose forthcoming book investigates the esoteric and creativity, and whose music with his own band, St Leonard’s Horses, is inspired by this passion. He admits a fascination with the darker side was “in the air” then, but says “Sympathy for the Devil” was the key moment, “the pin-prick in the time map”.
And then, a year to the day later, came the moment that confirmed the Stones’ new reputation. It was what one reporter called “rock’n’roll’s all-time worst day”. At their chaotic free concert at the Altamont Speedway in California an African American teenager with a gun was knifed to death by Hells Angels to whom the Stones had contracted security. Popular belief, fuelled by bad reporting, was that the murder happened as the band were playing “Sympathy for the Devil”. Though trouble seemed to start during that song, it was actually a few numbers later that Meredith Hunter was stabbed. Nevertheless, accused of “diabolical egotism” by Rolling Stone magazine, and stunned by the general outcry, the Stones didn’t play the number live again for several years.
They might have been warned off, but others were not. Black Sabbath formed in 1969, aiming to create the musical equivalent of horror films. Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page was inspired by Aleister Crowley, opened an occult bookshop, and a line of Crowley’s was written into the vinyl of Led Zeppelin III. David Bowie incorporated occult inspiration into his music all the way from “Quicksand” on Hunky Dory to his final album. The list of hard rock and heavy metal bands who have dabbled in and drawn on the occult is a long one, from Black Widow’s chilling early-Seventies “Come to the Sabbat” to Iron Maiden’s “The Number of the Beast” to Marilyn Manson to the welter of contemporary metal bands with names such as Evil Empowered, Make them Suffer, Black Rites in the Black Nights, Black Wedding, The Devil Inside, Pop Evil and Black Soul.
As rock’n’roll frontman Jim Jones of the Jim Jones Revue says, Satan is now “an easy go-to, a one-stop shop for distancing yourself from everything ‘good white Christian’” though, for him, occultism and Satanism represent esoteric knowledge –“always the smart choice, whatever the consequences”.
There are three fascinating films about “Sympathy for the Devil”. Jean-Luc Godard’s otherwise borderline-unwatchable film of the same name documents the recording session, the first time audiences had been able to see a major band creating a track in the studio in such a way. The Altamont gig is the jaw-dropping centrepiece to the Maysles brothers’ movie Gimme Shelter. And just five days after “Sympathy” was released, Jagger was captured performing the song for the film The Rolling Stones Rock and Roll Circus. It’s still shocking today, when the “devil’s horns” hand gesture is commonplace in the mildest of music, to see him pull off his shirt at the end and reveal the horned head on his chest.
Or maybe the Devil had been underneath all along.
***
PREPARE FOR CHANGE
MILEY CYRUS SAYS WORSHIP SATAN IF YOU WANT TO BE RICH & FAMOUS LIKE ME
By Edward Morgan
December 9, 2018
Miley Cyrus left her followers shocked and confused after advising her young fans to “worship Satan” if they want to become “rich & famous” like their heroes.The former Hannah Montana star left a group of fans bewildered after passing on the “pearls of wisdom” when asked for tips on how to gain success in the entertainment industry.
Following filming the NBC TV talent show, The Voice, on which Cyrus is one of the judges, a flock of young admirers had gathered outside the backstage exit, hoping to catch a glimpse of their idol.As the Wrecking Ball singer made her way out of the exit with her security team, one of her star-struck fans asked her: “Hey Miley, do you have any advice for any of your fans that might want to follow in your footsteps and become a star?”
To which she responded: “Yeah: If you wanna be famous, and rich, it’s easy…”But don’t ask me, you need to ask Satan.”You can have it all.”As a nervous laugh spread through the crowd, Cyrus stopped her bodyguards, seemingly annoyed by the response, and turned back to the crowd saying: “You think I’m joking?”
You asked me how to make it as a pop star and I just told you everything you need to do.”If you want everything that I have, then all you have to do is ask Satan for it and you can have it.”You need to stop asking Santa for Christmas presents and praying to Jesus because none of them exist.”Satan is our Lord, and when you let him into your heart and worship him instead of your make-believe God, then you can have it all.”
Cyrus then stormed off with her entourage and jumped into the back of a Range Rover before speeding away.The group of her supporters was left shocked by her comments, with some visibly upset.
The mother of one of the young fans said she was “disgusted” by the singer’s rant, saying: “My Daughter’s only 6 and has been really looking forward to Christmas.”Now she’s asking me why I lied to her about Santa.”We’re a good Christian family but now I’m getting asked how we can please Satan, and I don’t know what to tell her.”This isn’t the first time Miley Cyrus has dealt a devastating blow to her fans since joining the panel of The Voice.Just last week, she told one of the contestants that she “doesn’t like” pop music, and only makes that type of music because it’s what “they” tell her to sing.When the audience gasped in amazement at the admission, she scrambled to pull it back by adding: “And I don’t even like my own pop music most of the time, but you take a song that’s on the radio, that I can’t even relate to, and…make it about you.” Just recently, hip-hop star Jay-Z also opened up about his devotion to Lucifer, by telling fans that “God created Lucifer to be the bearer of truth and light,” before declaring that “only idiots believe in Jesus.”
This statement indicates that followers, known as Thelemites, should seek out their true path in life, and follow their “True Will.”Jay-Z’s Satanic preaching is just the latest in a long line of public glimpses into the dark side that the rapper has shared.He recreated his image as a dark lord, after starting his career as an aspirational rapper, flashing Illuminati hand gestures and promoting Satanic symbolism as he rose to the top of the music industry.Jay-Z has since attempted to tone down his dark image since establishing himself in the global consciousness as a Devil-worshipping entertainer.
Source: https://killuminatinews.blogspot.com
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LIFE SITE News
Poland and Hungary block ‘LGBTIQ rights’ from being enshrined in EU legislation
Dorthy Cummings McLean
December 12, 2018
BRUSSELS, December 12, 2018
Last week representatives from Poland and Hungary annoyed other European Union (EU) member states by vetoing the inclusion of the “LGBTIQ” acronym in a joint statement by employment and social affairs ministers meant to promote “gender equity in the digital era.”
LGBTIQ is a reference to people who derive their identity from lesbianism, homosexuality, bisexuality, transgenderism, intersexuality, or an experimental “questioning” approach to sexuality.
The European employment and social affairs ministers collectively form the EU Employment, Social Policy, Health and Consumer Affairs Council (EPSCO), which meets four times a year. Its most recent meeting was held in Brussels on December 6. Brussels is the capital of the European Union.
The official EPSCO Council Conclusions now refer only to “gender equality, youth and digitalization.” To appease the other member states, who were reportedly furious with Poland’s and Hungary’s veto, Austria added a reference to “LGBTIQ” to the document in its current capacity as holder of the Presidency of the European Council. However, this addition is classified as only “presidential conclusions,” which do not have the legal significance of formal Council conclusions.
One of the ministers complained vociferously about the actions of the Hungarian and Polish members.
According to Politico, Wouter Koolmees, the Dutch minister for social affairs and employment, called “LGBTIQ” rights “core values” of the European Union.
“LGBTIQ inclusion and equality are core values of our European Union,” he said. “This is where I draw the line. We will never compromise our principles. This is not up for discussion and should have never been an issue for any member state. So I am happy that the reference is back in the text. Although I do regret we were not able to adopt them as Council conclusions.”
Gaystar News reported that in response to Poland’s and Hungary’s refusal to sanction the pro-homosexual language, the Maltese government drew up another pro-LGBT document. This common paper called on the European Commission to “adopt a strong, EU-wide [LGBT] strategy.” Signed by 19 EU countries, it is not legally binding.
Poland and Hungary are considered the gadflies of the European Union for not going along with the EU’s far-left, globalist agenda. Both Poland and Hungary have consistently fought against a redefinition of marriage and the family, LGBT indoctrination of children, and the forced resettlement of migrants within their borders.
Hungarian Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó made waves when he boldly stated that his country wants to “preserve Europe as a Christian Europe” and that they would like Hungary to remain a “Christian nation.” Poland has been rebuked by the EU for considering legislation that would criminalize the abortion of unborn children with disabilities.
***
The Telegraph
DeepMind's AlphaZero now showing human-like intuition in historical 'turning point' for AI
Sarah Knapton
December 6, 2018
Demis Hassabis the co-founder and CEO of DeepMind - DeepMind
DeepMind’s artificial intelligence programme AlphaZero is now showing signs of human-like intuition and creativity, in what developers have hailed as ‘turning point’ in history.
The computer system amazed the world last year when it mastered the game of chess from scratch within just four hours, despite not being programmed how to win.
But now, after a year of testing and analysis by chess grandmasters, the machine has developed a new style of play unlike anything ever seen before, suggesting the programme is now improvising like a human.
Unlike the world’s best chess machine - Stockfish - which calculates millions of possible outcomes as it plays, AlphaZero learns from its past successes and failures, making its moves based on, a ‘nebulous sense that it is all going to work out in the long run,’ according to experts at DeepMind.
When AlphaZero was pitted against Stockfish in 1,000 games, it lost just six, winning convincingly 155 times, and drawing the remaining bouts.
Yet it was the way that it played that has amazed developers. While chess computers predominately like to hold on to their pieces, AlphaZero readily sacrificed its soldiers for a better position in the skirmish.
Speaking to The Telegraph, Prof David Silver, who leads the reinforcement learning research group at DeepMind said: “It’s got a very subtle sense of intuition which helps it balance out all the different factors.
“It’s got a neural network with millions of different tunable parameters, each learning its own rules of what is good in chess, and when you put them all together you have something that expresses, in quite a brain-like way, our human ability to glance at a position and say ‘ah ha this is the right thing to do'.
“My personal belief is that we’ve seen something of turning point where we’re starting to understand that many abilities, like intuition and creativity, that we previously thought were in the domain only of the human mind, are actually accessible to machine intelligence as well. And I think that’s a really exciting moment in history.”
AlphaZero started as a ‘tabula rasa’ or blank slate system, programmed with only the basic rules of chess and learned to win by playing millions of games against itself in a process of trial and error known as reinforcement learning.
It is the same way the human brain learns, adjusting tactics based on a previous win or loss, which allows it to search just 60 thousand positions per second, compared to the roughly 60 million of Stockfish.
Within just a few hours the programme had independently discovered and played common human openings and strategies before moving on to develop its own ideas, such as quickly swarming around the opponent’s king and placing far less value on individual pieces.
The new style of play has been analysed Chess Grandmaster Matthew Sadler and Women’s International Master Natasha Regan, who say it unlike any traditional chess engine.
”It’s like discovering the secret notebooks of some great player from the past,” said Sadler.
Regan added: “It was fascinating to see how AlphaZero's analysis differed from that of top chess engines and even top Grandmaster play. AlphaZero could be a powerful teaching tool for the whole community."
Garry Kasparov, former World Chess Champion, who famously lost to chess machine Deep Blue in 1997, said: “Instead of processing human instructions and knowledge at tremendous speed, as all previous chess machines, AlphaZero generates its own knowledge.
“It plays with a very dynamic style, much like my own.The implications go far beyond my beloved chessboard."
The new analysis was published yesterday in the journal Science, and the DeepMind team are now hoping to use their system to help solve real world problems, such as why proteins become misfolded in diseases such as Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s.
The new results suggest that it could come up with new solutions that humans might miss or take far longer to discover.
DeepMind CEO and co-founder Demis Hassabis said: “The reason that tabula rasa was important is because we want this to be as general as possible. The more general it is across the games the more likely it will be able to transfer to real world problems. Like protein folding.
“Protein folding has always been our number one target. I’ve had that in mind for a long time, because its a huge problem in biology and it will unlock a lot of other things like drug discovery.
"In chess AlphaZero works not because it’s looking further ahead but because it understands the position better. It’s generalising from past experience. It’s almost like intuition in the same way a human grandmaster would think about it, it's evaluation of the current situation is better. And if you’re evaluation is better then you don’t have to do as much calculation.”
Prof Silver added: “Historically there has been this amazing mismatch between the things that humans can do and the things that computers can do.
“With the advent of powerful machine learning techniques we’ve seen that the scales have started to tip and now we have computer algorithms that are able to do these very human-like activities really well.”
WASHINGTON Examiner
Start prepping! Electric grid ‘prime target’ of terrorists, ‘profound threat,’ says council
by Paul Bedard
December 10, 2018 10:23 AM
In a new report that warns that the electric grid is the “prime target” of terrorists, Americans are being urged prepare for the up to six months without electricity, transportation, fuel, money, and healthcare.
“People no longer keep enough essentials within their homes, reducing their ability to sustain themselves during an extended, prolonged outage. We need to improve individual preparedness,” said a just-published report to President Trump.
“There needs to be more individual accountability for preparedness,” adds the report, “Surviving a Catastrophic Power Outage,” from the President’s National Infrastructure Advisory Counciland published by the Department of Homeland Security.
It looked at the potential of a power outage of up to six months and recommended Americans have enough supplies on hand for a minimum 14 days, a standard for some prepper organizations.
“Build a Culture of Preparedness includes objectives to incentivize investments that reduce risk, including pre-disaster mitigation; closing the insurance gap; helping people prepare for disasters; and better learn from past disasters, improve continuously, and innovate,” said a key recommendation.
(Screenshot via National Infrastructure Advisory Council)
The report, a draft to be voted on this week by the council, is the second in one month to warn of a “profound threat” to the electric grid from terrorism and naturally occurring events like a solar storm or flare. A prior governmental report also called for presidential action to protect the grid. That report warned of a threat to world order in an attack.
Together, they draw emergency attention to the threat and impact a national blackout would have.
“This profound risk requires a new national focus. Significant public and private action is needed to prepare for and recover from a catastrophic outage that could leave the large parts of the nation without power for weeks or months, and cause service failures in other sectors — including water and wastewater, communications, transportation, healthcare, and financial services — that are critical to public health and safety and our national and economic security,” said the advisory council.
The report is an urgent call to action to organize a uniform reaction to a grid attack, harden it from attack, warn of the threats, and push regular Americans into preparing for the worst.
It also calls for federal spending instead of a reliance on rate hikes by individual utilities to fix their systems and said that $1 spent to protect the grid will save $6 in the case of recovery.
“The power grid is a prime target for attack by nation states, and it is not fair for ratepayers to bear the full burden for this national security function,” said the report, which looked at the potential of a “catastrophic” half-year blackout that could impact 75 million.
The attack could also come with no notice and last half a year. "Long-duration, lasting several weeks to months (at least 2 months, but more likely 6 months or more) due to physical destruction to equipment, such as transformers or transmission lines; or the severity of the event resulting in limited work force to repair damage, or inability to create or transport replacement parts," the report said. “This profound threat requires a new national focus. The NIAC found that our existing plans, response resources, and coordination strategies would be outmatched by an event of this severity. Significant action is needed to prepare for a catastrophic power outage that could last for weeks or months."
According to DHS, the council "provides the president of the United States, through the Secretary of Homeland Security, with advice on the security and resilience of critical infrastructure sectors and their functional systems, physical assets, and cyber networks."
While the prior study was prepared by federal agencies and the military, the new report was prepared by industry and governmental leaders. Both raised similar concerns.
Much of the report’s recommendations focus on the need for a central clearinghouse or authority to guide the nation in a blackout. But it also reveals how unprepared people and governments are despite the prepper movement in the nation. Some of those warnings from the report are below:
Given the growing frequency and severity of disasters and other risks, there needs to be an increase in individual accountability, enterprise, and community investment in resilient infrastructure.
There is a misconception that events occur infrequently.
There needs to be more individual accountability for preparedness.
Resilience at the state and local level will be critical to enable people to shelter in place and facilitate faster recovery. Any event that requires a mass evacuation will use up critical resources, clog transportation pathways, and reduce the workforce necessary for infrastructure recovery.
Electricity, fuel, clean drinking water, wastewater services, food/refrigeration, emergency medical services, communications capabilities, and some access to financial services have been identified as critical lifeline services that would be needed to sustain local communities and prevent mass migration.
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Zero Hedge
New Satellite Imagery Shows Hundreds Of Russian Battle Tanks Amassing On Ukraine Border
By Tyler Durden
December 11, 2018
Ukraine's president has recently warned Russian tanks are amassing along the border between the two countries amid increasing tensions. The comments came late last month after three Ukrainian naval boats were seized in the Kerch Strait by Russia.
President Petro Poroshenko has allegedly shown images of what he claims to be hundreds of tanks preparing for an invasion.
He told Sky News:
"This is the tank base just 18km from our border, this was happening in September, October, and now."
"This is 18km from my border, this is the same warehouse where they have their ammunition, the same where they have multi-rocket launch systems, we should be prepared to protect my country."
Satellite imagery from Google Earth taken sometime in November from the Defense Blog has verified Poroshenko claims. Photos show hundreds of Russian main battle tanks at a new military installation in the Kamensk-Shakhtinsky region.
The Russian base is about 18 kilometers (11.1 miles) away from the rebel-held territory in eastern Ukraine. Images show hundreds of main battle tanks, with thousands of military trucks, support systems, artillery pieces, tankers, and troop transport vehicles.
Russia has been quietly building up its forces near the border with Ukraine since late summer and now has a military force greater than 2014, the year Moscow annexed Crimea, Viktor Muzhenko, the commander of Ukrainian armed forces, told Reuters in an interview last week.
“In front of us is an aggressor who has no legal, moral or any other limits,” he said. “It is very difficult to predict when it will occur to him to begin active combat actions against Ukraine.”
“This (the Kerch Strait incident) was an act of aggression from regular forces, the border service (of the Russian Federation) in relation to the Ukrainian armed forces,” Muzhenko added.
Eric Zuesse via The Strategic Culture Foundation, made a great point in October that Washington is now treating Ukraine as if it were a NATO member, donating warships and military equipment to the country for use against Russia. This is the latest indication that America's military-industrial complex is shifting to Ukraine as the epicenter to start World War III, and from which the nuclear war is to be sparked against Russia.
There is a reason why Russia is amassing hundreds of main battle tanks on the Ukranian border, that is because the next geopolitical flare-up is right around the corner, likely to occur during the next global recession.
Zero Hedge
"It's A Horrible Mess": Disgusted Traders Refuse To Trade The British Pound Any More
By Tyler Durden
December 11, 2018
After yesterday's "peak" Brexit chaos, which slammed cable to a 21 month low... currency traders have finally had enough, and are making their disgust public.
While the pound may recover some of its losses in the long run, Ensemble Capital is one fund that will watch from the sidelines, and refuses to trade the currency due to ongoing uncertainty over Brexit, said Damien Loh, chief investment officer at the Singapore-based hedge fund.
"I’m staying out of it - it’s basically like trying to pick a roller coaster as your commuter," says Loh, who oversees an artificial intelligence-driven hedge fund he jointly set up with former JPMorgan Chase & Co. FX option trader, Atsuo Ogaki.
"It’s so headline driven and everyone feels they’re entitled to give their opinion. So do I really want to be open to the vagaries of someone’s trading opinion right now? Not really.”
Others, such as AMP Capital, were even more explicit in their disgust over what has become a headline-driven, algorithmic love/hate fest:
"It’s a mess - in a world of turmoil Brexit has become a bit of comic relief, it’s like a British comedy,” Shane Oliver, head of investment strategy at the $138BN Sydney-based asset fund, told Bloomberg.
"It’s more than two years now since the Brexit vote and most of that time leaders have taken to arguing among themselves."
"I’ll say stay away for now. It’s just too hard to trade the pound. You can’t really trade it on technicals because it’s driven by political announcements that flip and flop."
"What you’d want to see is more certainty about which way this will go. The dust needs to settle before you can make decisions based on fundamentals for the pound."
Alas for Shane, if he is indeed waiting for "certainty" before he resumes trading, he will be waiting a long, long time.
We give the last word to Bill Blain who summarized the mess best: "yesterdays no vote decision, and the likelihood Europe is not going to give us any change to the current agreement, and Derivative Contracts to be settled in 90 days time will need somewhere to settle… and its clear we’re in a horrible mess."
Bloomberg
Macron’s Defeat in Paris Sounds Alarm for Europe
The political vultures are circling around the French president and there’s much at stake for the world order.
By Gregory Viscusi
December 8, 2018
Teargas is launched during 'Yellow Vest' demonstrations in Paris on Dec. 1.
Photographer: Veronique de Viguerie/Getty Images
Less than a month ago, French President Emmanuel Macron staked his claim as the flag-bearer for globalism. In a speech to 60 world leaders at the Arc de Triomphe, he eulogized the United Nations and declared nationalism the “betrayal” of patriotism.
Last Saturday, tear gas and cobblestones flew in the same part of Paris as protesters trashed the iconic monument and demanded Macron’s embattled government withdraw a proposed fuel-tax increase. For the first time in his presidency, he backed down. It was a humbling moment for opponents of the populist revolts that spawned Donald Trump.
Europe has seen many a critical juncture in recent years, from the Greek debt crisis to the anti-immigrant backlash against refugees and Britain’s Brexit vote. Rarely, though, have so many political vultures been circling around one leader with so much at stake for the world order.
Poland is flirting with the far right and nationalist parties cajoled by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban are plotting a rebellion at European Parliamentary elections in May. Meanwhile, Italy has collided with the European Union by taking a defiant stand on its budget spending.
With the EU’s erstwhile firefighter, Angela Merkel, planning to step down as German chancellor, the baton was supposed to pass to Macron to uphold liberal democracy. But Merkel’s power on the world stage was underpinned by a political fortress at home, and the French leader looks anything but solid.
“You can’t make speeches about defending the international order when your popularity is at 20 percent and there are protesters in the street,” said Nicholas Dungan, a Paris-based senior fellow at the Atlantic Council. “It’s very difficult to get your credibility back.”
It’s a stark contrast to the weekend of Nov. 11 as leaders marked a century since the end of World War I. Macron championed the need for global cooperation while Trump cut an isolated figure. Europe’s divisions were laid bare that day as Polish government officials marched through Warsawwith far-right groups to mark the country’s Independence Day. Macron, though, stood firm as Europe’s statesman.
The images televised around the world last weekend were of burning cars in the French capital. The retreat by the 40-year-old French leader was mocked by Trump. Macron admitted, via his prime minister, that he’s not been able to connect with the French people. “No tax merits putting our nation’s unity in danger,” Edouard Philippe said in a televised address.
The trouble for opponents of Trump-style nativism and protectionism is that there’s no one else to take up his mantle, Dungan said.
After Macron was elected in May 2017, he sought to work with Merkel and a friendly government in Rome to deepen European integration. He reached out to Trump to convince the American president to stick to international agreements.
Trump ignored him and withdrew from the Iran nuclear accord and the Paris climate agreement. Trump tweeted that Macron’s climb down over a carbon tax that would raise fuel prices was proof that he’d been right all along.
Prevailing Wind
Merkel, meanwhile, was wounded in German elections in September 2017. She was formally replaced on Friday as the head of her party by Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer, albeit an ally whose presence boosts the likelihood Merkel will see out her final term. Italy elected a Euroskeptic government in March.
“His ambitions for a strong Europe had already taken a hit from events in Germany and elsewhere,” said Philippe Moreau Defarges, an adviser at the Paris-based French Institute for International Affairs. “But he emerges seriously weakened from the recent events. He’s just not appeared up to the level, and France's image has taken a terrible blow.”
At home, his popularity has been sinking, hurt by the failure of his early unpopular changes to labor and tax law to revive the French economy. Macron’s policies are seen to favor the wealthy, and poll after poll have shown the French electorate thinks the former banker is aloof and arrogant. His approval rating is at 28 percent, according to an average of seven polling institutes.
Then came the “Yellow Vests.” The grassroots protest movement was sparked by opposition to his environmental policy of hiking taxes on diesel and gasoline to fund incentives to buy cleaner cars and home housing systems. But it’s evolved into widespread anger about the rising cost of living and declining services in rural and small-town France.
The protesters’ demands have expanded accordingly. Some want to restore the wealth tax, increasing pensions, raising the minimum wage, cutting the salaries of politicians, and even to Macron resigning and replacing the National Assembly with a “people’s council.” Polls show three-quarters of the French support their demands, even if they also disapprove of the violence that’s accompanied many of the protests.
It’s also been felt in the bond market. The yield on French securities compared with Germany, a barometer for political risk, rose to the highest level since Macron was elected.
He doesn’t face national elections again until 2022, and he’s always said he doesn’t care about popularity polls. French opposition parties will file a joint no-confidence motion against the government on Monday. It’s unlikely to make much difference.
But European elections and a series of municipal and regional votes over the next two years could shape up as referendums on his policies, according to Antonio Barroso, an analyst at Teneo Intelligence, which looks at political risk.
“Whether Macron will have enough political space to implement more economic reforms will probably be determined by the European Parliament elections, which will likely be interpreted as a ‘midterm vote’ on the presidency,” Barroso said.
Isolated
Even after Macron climbed down on the fuel taxes, the Yellow Vests have said they won’t dismantle their roadblocks and blockades. While they don’t have the formal organization of populist groups Italy’s Five Star Movement, the momentum is with them. Copycat protests have spread to Belgium and the Netherlands.
Most of its members will vote for either Marine Le Pen’s anti-immigrant National Rally or Jean-Luc Melenchon’s far-left France Unbowed, said Marc Lazar, a professor at Sciences Po in Paris. Both party leaders were defeated by Macron last year and eye another shot at power. The worry for the EU is that neither of them are defenders of the bloc’s integrity.
Any breakthroughs by those parties in May’s European elections will make it difficult for Macron to push on with his agenda -- for France and beyond. “Macron emerges from this extremely weakened and isolated,” said Lazar. “Both at home and in Europe.”
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The Guardian
Bolsonaro abolishes human rights ministry in favour of family values
Rightwing president names evangelical pastor to head ministry lumping together women, family, rights and indigenous people
Don Phillips
December 7, 2018
Damares Alves has been appointed by Jair Bolsonaro as the new minister of women, family and human rights, and indigenous people. Photograph: Sergio Lima/AFP/Getty Images
Brazil’s far-right president-elect, Jair Bolsonaro, will abolish the country’s human rights ministry and has named a conservative evangelical pastor to run a newly created ministry which will oversee women, family and human rights – and also the country’s 900,000 indigenous people.
The plan, announced on Thursday, has prompted outcry from feminist groups, indigenous activists and LGBT campaigners, who fear it indicates that human rights will be downgraded under the incoming government.
The new minister, Damares Alves, is a lawyer, evangelical preacher and congressional aide, who co-founded a group that rescues indigenous children from situations of danger and evangelises in indigenous communities.
She opposes abortion – illegal in Brazil in most cases – believes that women were born to be mothers, and said she plans to work for the “invisible” people in society, such as Gypsies and women who cut sugar cane and tap rubber.
In 2016, she told an evangelical congregation: “It is time for the church to tell the nation that we have come … It is time for the church to govern.”
Boslonaro’s chief of staff, Onyx Lorenzoni, said on Thursday that the new ministry would also house Funai, Brazil’s indigenous agency.
The new president wants to permit commercial mining and farming on indigenous reserves, which make up around 13% of Brazilian territory and include some of the Amazon’s best protected areas. Last week he compared indigenous people to zoo animals.
“Why in Brazil do we have to keep them as inmates in reserves, as if they were animals in a zoo?” he told reporters.
Funai’s future has come under intense speculation after Lorenzoni said it could become part of the Ministry of Agriculture. On Thursday, indigenous leaders visited Bolsonaro’s transition team to demand the agency stayed where it is.
“It is regrettable that the governments disregards this,” said Cleber Buzatto, executive secretary of the Indigenous Missionary council, a group linked to Brazil’s conference of bishops.
He said Alves’s appointment could “bring substantially serious risks to the cultural aspects of indigenous people”.
Alves, who has an adopted indigenous daughter, is one of the founders of Atini – Voz Pela Vida (Voice For Life), a group combating the infanticide of disabled and unwanted children, a practice in some remote indigenous communities. The group’s Facebook page also shows its members preaching in indigenous villages.
It is linked to the missionary group Youth With A Mission, whose mission is to “preach the gospel to every creature in the world”.
Speaking anonymously, a Funai official said staff have been left “bewildered”.
“They chose the worst possible [person]. We are in a state of shock,” the official said.
Under the leftwing president Dilma Rousseff, Brazil had a ministry of women, racial equality and human rights, which her successor Michel Temer downgraded into a secretariat for women’s policies, first under the justice ministry, then moved in June this year to the human rights ministry.
Feminists expressed concern over Alves history of criticising abortion and feminism.
“We want a Brazil without abortion,” she told reporters on Thursday. Last March, she attacked feminism in an interview. “It’s as if there was a war between men and women in Brazil. This does not exist,” she told the Expresso Nacional YouTube channel in March. “Women are born to be mothers,” she told O Globo newspaper.
Carolina Oms, editorial director of magazine AzMina, said Bolsonaro’s decision to lump women and family and human rights into one ministry showed how little regard he had for the issues concerned.
“This government is not concerned in reducing the inequalities of women, of homosexuals or minorities in Brazil,” she said.
Bolsonaro has repeatedly expressed homophobic views over the years. But Alves defended gay marriage – which is legal in Brazil – on Thursday.
Toni Reis, director-president of the National Alliance for LGBTI group (Alianca Nacional LGBTI), said he would work to find common ground with her.
“We have many divergences with her and some similarities,” he said. “It will be very hard to make advances but we will not accept going backwards.”
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MailOnline
South Africa 'sets date for white farmers land grab' months after announcing 'test case' to see if 'expropriation without compensation' is legal
National Assembly voted in favour of the set up of a committee to amend law
The amendment to section 25 of the Constitution will be presented next year
If adopted South Africa could reclaim farmers' homes leaving them with nothing
President Cyril Ramaphosa's suggested (above) expropriation laws are feared by farmers
White South Africans could be forced to give up their own homes from next year as the nation's government steamrolls through plans for land expropriation over claims 'Africa's original sin' must be reversed.
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p>Land is a huge issue in South Africa where racial inequality remains entrenched more than two decades after the end of apartheid when millions of the black majority were dispossessed of their land by a white minority.
The National Assembly agreed to the establishment of a committee that will draft an amendment to section 25 of the Constitution – a law which will allow the government to take homes from the people – and refuse to pay them compensation.
As many in the nation see the move as retribution for the 'original sin' when decades ago black people were driven off their land, it is believed white farmers will be driven from their homes immediately.
Governing party The African National Congress (ANC) wants to amend the law so the government can take back land and distribute it.
However, critics say it is likely it will be handed off to their friends rather than dished out to those in need.
Last week the nations politicians fast tracked the set up of a committee which will write the legal change and present it next year.
The motion was adopted with 183 MPs voting yes, 77 voting no and no abstentions in fiery scenes as South Africans battle over land reform.
In the same week, South Africa's High Court rejected a legal challenge brought by a group representing white farmers against President Cyril Ramaphosa's plans for land expropriation without compensation.Currently section 25 of the Constitution 'just and equitable' payment which reflects 'an equitable balance between the public interest and the interests of those affected' must be offered for land – but changes would abolish the need to compensate.
Economic Freedom Fighters politician Hlengiwe Mkhaliphi said those arguing against legalising land grabs are 'beneficiaries of racism'.
'Your time is up, white people,' She added.
The EFF will later put forward an amendment stating all land in private hands must be appropriated.
Democratic Alliance chief whip John Steenhuisen said the amendment is being pushed through without proper procedure.
'What it (the passing of the motion) also says, very clearly, to the people of South Africa is that regardless of their submissions, this bill is a fait accompli (already decided),' Steenhuisen said.
'This is madness. The message it sends to the people of South Africa is 'we don't care what you say'.'
MP Sibusiso Mncwabe supported the adoption of the motion: 'Let's continue giving this Christmas gift (expropriation without compensation) to our people.'
The Joint Constitutional Review Committee's report recommended that section 25 of the Constitution be amended 'so as to address the historic wrongs caused by the arbitrary dispossession of land'.
The report also recommended that the Constitutional Amendment Bill be tabled, processed and passed before the end of the Fifth Parliament, which will rise before next year's election, presumably in March or April.
However, experts said it is not likely to happen if proper processes are followed.
The motion gives the committee a deadline of March 31, 2019, to complete its work.
ANC chief whip Jackson Mthembu says the nationalisation of land presents a risk that could see those in power giving land away to their friends and cronies.
In some places the wheels are already in motion.
A city outside Johannesburg is preparing what the mayor calls a 'test case' over plans to take hundreds of acres of land from private owners, without paying for it in order to build low-cost housing.
Last month, Ekurhuleni's city council voted in favour of forging ahead with 'expropriation without compensation' - a legal tool that the ruling African National Congress says is necessary to provide land for disadvantaged black citizens.
Ramaphosa handed over the title deeds of 4,586 hectares of land to Chief Inkosi Mandla Mkwanazi of the KwaMkwanazi community in Empangeni, near Durban.
The KwaMkwanazi community was forcibly removed from their land more than 100 years ago following the enactment of the 1913 Land Act.
Like other South African cities, Ekurhuleni faces a dire housing crunch, with some 600,000 of its nearly 4 million people living in 'informal settlements' and a shortage of land to build homes.
Executive mayor of Ekurhuleni, Mzwandile Masina, who heads the local ANC-led coalition, echoed the president, saying landowners in South Africa don't need to be 'scared'.
He added: 'Our policy is not to take the land by force. Our policy is to make sure the land is shared amongst those that need it.'
Ekurhuleni plans to expropriate about 865 acres (350 hectares) of land in the city limits, both private and government-owned, that has been vacant for decades and develop it to relieve pressure in vast tracts of ramshackle dwellings. The mayor did not identify the landowners.
***
State of the Nation
IT’S ALL OVER! With AG Nomination Trump Proves Swamp Will NOT Be Drained
Posted on December 8, 2018 by State of the Nation
AG Barr Covered Up BCCI Scandal, Bush Drug-Running Operations; Justified Unlawful Attack on Panama and Kidnapping of Panamanian Gen. Manuel Noriega
We’re not sure that Trump could have nominated a worse candidate for Attorney General.
Not only was William Barr a close collaborator with President George HW Bush, he did so much dirty work for the POTUS that it boggles the mind.
In light of the recent Bush funeral, the irony could not be any greater with this selection for the nation’s top lawman.
Either President Trump has completely given up on draining the swamp. Or, he has jumped head first into the swamp with no hope of “locking her up” or prosecuting any other swamp monster during the rest of his term.
This single official act begins a new chapter of the Trump presidency; one that sobers up each and every voter who supported Trumps primary mission of draining the swamp.
It ain’t gonna happen folks. It can’t happen with an AG Barr. That’s why it’s all over as far as D.C. corruption cleanup and criminal lock-ups are concerned.
***
Exposed: the Nazi roots of the European Union
December 13, 2018
by Jon Rappoport
This is an
intelligence briefing. Here I present the bare bones of what has been
happening before our eyes…if we would see it.
Once upon a time,
there was an industrial combine in Nazi Germany called IG Farben. It
was the largest chemical/pharmaceutical octopus in the world. It
owned companies, and it had favorable business agreements with
companies from England to Central America to Japan.
The author
of The Devil’s Chemists, Josiah DuBois, traveled to Guatemala,
on a fact-finding mission, in the early days of World War 2, and
returned with the comment that, as far as he could tell, Guatemala
was “a wholly owned subsidiary of Farben.”
The pharmaceutical
empire was and is one of the major forces behind the European Union
(EU). It is no accident that these drug corporations wield such
power. They aren’t only involved in controlling the medical cartel;
they are political planners.
This is how and why Big Pharma fits
so closely with what is loosely referred to as the New World Order.
The aim of enrolling every human in a cradle-to-grave system of
disease diagnosis and toxic drug treatment has a larger purpose: to
debilitate, to weaken populations.
This is a political goal. It
facilitates control.
IG Farben’s main component companies, at
the outbreak of World War 2, were Bayer, BASF, and Hoechst. They were
chemical and drug companies. Farben put Hitler over the top in
Germany as head of State, and the war was designed to lead to a
united Europe that would be dominated by the Farben nexus.
The
loss of the war didn’t derail that plan. It was shifted into an
economic blueprint, which became, eventually, the European Union.
The
European Commission’s first president was Walter Hallstein, the
Nazi lawyer who, during the war, had been in charge of post-war legal
planning for the new Europe.
As the Rath Foundation reports: In
1939, on the brink of the war, Hallstein had stated, “The creation
of the New Law [of the Nazis] is ONLY the task of the law-makers!”
In
1957, with his reputation sanitized, Hallstein spoke the words in
this manner: “The European Commission has full and unlimited power
for all decisions related to the architecture of this European
community.”
Post-war, IG Farben was broken up into separate
companies, but those companies (Bayer, Hoechst, and BASF) came
roaring back, attaining new profit highs.
I refer you to the
explosive book, The Nazi Roots of the Brussels EU, by Paul Anthony
Taylor, Aleksandra Niedzwiecki, Dr. Matthias Rath, and August
Kowalczyk. You can also read it at relay-of-life.org. It is a dagger
in the heart of the EU.
At the Rath Foundation, you can also read
Joseph Borkin’s classic, “The Crime and Punishment of IG
Farben.”
In 1992, I was deeply engaged in researching the
specific devastating effects of medical drugs. Eventually, I
concluded that, at the highest levels of power, these drugs weren’t
destructive by accident. They were intended to cause harm. This was
covert chemical warfare against the population of the planet. The
Rockefeller-Standard Oil-Farben connection was a primary piece of the
puzzle.
It was, of course, Rockefeller (and Carnegie) power that
had forced the birth of pharmaceutical medicine in America, with the
publication of the 1910 Flexner Report. The Report was used to
excoriate and marginalize Chiropractic, Homeopathy, Naturopathy, and
other forms of traditional natural practice, in favor of what would
become the modern juggernaut of drug-based treatment.
In an
article about the FDA, “Medical Murder in the Matrix,” I point
out the fact that this federal agency has permitted at least 100,000
deaths of Americans, per year, from the direct effects of drugs it,
the FDA, has certified as safe. (See, for example, JAMA, July 26,
2000, ‘Is US Health Really the Best in the World,’ Dr. Barbara
Starfield.)
The FDA knows these death figures. “Unintended”
and “accidental” can no longer be applied to this ongoing
holocaust.
The pharmaceutical industry itself also knows those
death figures.
To understand the dimensions and history of the
ongoing chemical warfare against the population, in the form of
medical drugs (and of course pesticides), one must factor in the
original octopus, IG Farben.
World War 2 never ended. It simply
shifted its strategies.
In any fascist system, the bulk of the
people working inside the system, including scientists, refuse to
believe the evidence of what is happening before their own eyes. They
insist they are doing good. They believe they are on the right side.
They see greater top-down control as necessary and correct. They
adduce “reasonable” explanations for inflicted harm and
death.
World War 2 is still underway. The battleground has been
changed, and the means are far cleverer.
Sun Tzu wrote: “Hence
to fight and conquer in all your battles is not supreme excellence;
supreme excellence consists in breaking the enemy’s resistance
without fighting… The best victory is when the opponent surrenders
of its own accord before there are any actual hostilities…It is
best to win without fighting.”
This is what has been happening:
invisible warfare.
(There was an underground book published decades ago called “Death By Injection” which
chronicled the takeover of the US medical system by the Rockefeller family. We have not been able to locate a copy for years. Ed)
***
Until
next week...keep on believing.
Almondtree Productions
“He
that dwells in the help of the Highest, shall sojourn under the
shelter of the God of heaven. He shall say to the Lord, Thou art my
helper and my refuge: my God; I will hope in him. For he shall
deliver thee from the snare of the hunters, from every troublesome
matter.
He shall overshadow thee with his shoulders, and thou
shalt trust under his wings: his truth shall cover thee with a
shield. Thou shalt not be afraid of terror by night; nor of the arrow
flying by day; nor of the evil thing that walks in darkness; nor of
calamity, and the evil spirit at noon-day.
A thousand shall fall
at thy side, and ten thousand at thy right hand; but it shall not
come nigh thee. Only with thine eyes shalt thou observe and see the
reward of sinners.
For thou, O Lord, art my hope: thou, my soul,
hast made the Most High thy refuge. No evils shall come upon thee,
and no scourge shall draw night to thy dwelling. For he shall give
his angels charge concerning thee, to keep thee in all thy ways. They
shall bear thee up on their hands, lest at any time thou dash thy
foot against a stone.
Thou shalt tread on the asp and basilisk:
and thou shalt trample on the lion and dragon.
For he has hoped
in me, and I will deliver him: I will protect him, because he has
known my name. He shall call upon me, and I will hearken to him: I am
with him in affliction; and I will deliver him, and glorify him. I
will satisfy him with length of days, and shew him my salvation.”