MFS - The Other News

                      Afternoon Posting.

• Indian Catholics fast for the synod and religious freedom in Saudi Arabia.Fr George Joshua, an Indian priest, leads the activity. He is an important figure in the struggle for the religious freedom of Indian Catholics living in Saudi Arabia. He tells AsiaNews about the suffering and abuses inflicted upon on the million Christians living in the Muslim country, where every religion other than Islam, is banned.More than 700 Indian Christians from the Christ Army for Saudi Arabia (CASA) are fasting and praying for the success of the Synod of the Churches of the Middle East and for religious freedom in Saudi Arabia. Fr George Joshua, an Indian priest who belongs to the Malankara rite, is their leader; he provides spiritual support to Catholic migrant workers from Indian living in Saudi Arabia.In 2006, Fr Joshua spent four days in a Saudi prison for celebrating Mass in a private home and was eventually expelled.“There is no religious freedom in Saudi Arabia and no official pastoral care for the over a million who live in the country, of which nearly 3 lakhs are Indian,” he said. One lakh corresponds to 100,000. “Recently, a French priest was picked up for celebrating Mass to various groups,” Fr Joshua said. “He was released only after many hours of interrogation.The only priest of Indian origin in Saudi Arabia is a certain Fr John, who caters to the needs of English- and Malay-speaking Catholics, Fr Joshua said.Read the full story here.Click here for comments.

• HT:AmericanThinker.Why Americans Need to Support Geert.Freedom is the most precious of all our attainments and the most vulnerable. People have devoted their lives to it and given their lives for it. Our freedom in this country is the outcome of centuries. It is the consequence of a history that knows no equal and has brought us to where we are now.These patriotic words didn't come from one of Ronald Reagan's speeches, or even from the quill of Thomas Jefferson. They were spoken less than a year ago by a Dutch Member of Parliament (MP) named Geert Wilders. He's on trial in the Netherlands for "inciting hatred and discrimination." The above and following quotes are from his pretrial speech last January. In recess since June, the trial resumes this week, and we should all pay close attention.At least one prominent American political figure isn't afraid to publicly disagree. "Sharia is explicitly at odds with core American and Western values," Newt Gingrich has declared. "It is an explicit repudiation of freedom of conscience and religious liberty as well the premise that all citizens are equal under the law." According to Spencer, "Gingrich has become the first national politician to take notice that the threat we face today from Islamic jihadists is not simply terrorism." Let's pray Gingrich doesn't one day find himself hauled before an American court echoing the following words of the Dutch PM : Lady Justice wears a blindfold, but she has splendid hearing. I hope that she hears the following sentences, loud and clear: It is not only a right, but also the duty of free people to speak against every ideology that threatens freedom. Thomas Jefferson, the third President of the United States was right: The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.Read the full story here.Click here for comments.

• Aussie wrestler loses silver after giving finger.Australian Greco-Roman wrestler Hassene Fkiri has been stripped of a Commonwealth Games silver medal for unsportsmanlike behaviour.The 36-year-old refused to shake hands with his Indian opponent, Anil Kumar, and made the obscene gesture at officials after losing the 96-kilogram gold medal bout.The bout ended when Fkiri received a third caution for rule breaches.Fkiri had appeared frustrated during the bout, at one point attempting to slap and headbutt Kumar.Mahabir Parsad, the coach of the gold medallist, said Fkiri's outbust was out of character for an Australian wrestler."All Australians behave very good but he lose his temper, so he did bad," he said."My wrestler was better and he frustrated your wrestler ... and [Fkiri] broke the FILA rules," he said.Read the full Story here.Click here for comments.

• HT:AmnonJonathan.Obama to Get the Shoe on Monday."Obama Effigy toGet the Shoe at Monday's Demo at US Embassy".Jewish protests against the the United States are usually polite affairs while Muslim protests often involve effigy-burning, shoe-stomping and other forms of acting out. However, a protest planned for 7:00 p.m. Monday outside the U.S. embassy in Tel Aviv could be a sign that Jews have begun taking some pages from the Muslim protesters' book. The event's organizers say they have prepared a large effigy of U.S. President Barack Obama, which protesters will hurl shoes at to protest the way Obama is "stepping all over us."The current American government's feeble Middle Eastern policyhas ultimately caused a substantial amount of damage to the State of Israel,"the organizers stated. "The policies, which are based on appeasing the Islamic states, have unsurprisingly increased hostility and tension in the region."The activists accuse the US of "blackmailing" Israel's leaders, "violating agreements" and lacking even "an ounce of regard towards the safety of Israeli citizens.""Ultimately," they say, "we bear no ill feeling towards the American public or the vast majority of the American leadership, and wish to strengthen the connection between both sides. In fact, it is this connection that inspires us to protest the current American policy - before the situation deteriorates and this connection ends."Read the full story here.Click here for comments.

• Iran has a Russian gun pointed at the U.S. from Venezuela.On September 23, 2010, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gave a speech at the United Nations headquarters in New York stating that: “Some segments within the U.S. government orchestrated the [911] attack to reverse the declining American economy and its grips on the Middle East in order also to save the Zionist regime.”It may have been momentarily satisfying that the delegations from the U.S. and 32 other nations walked out on that bellicose and bizarre speech, but that small satisfaction quickly fades when one learns that Iran and Russia are mining uranium, building nuclear facilities, opening weapon factories, and placing elite Iranian military troops -- in Venezuela.In 1823, President James Monroe declared that the American continents were “not to be considered as subject for future colonization” by any other power. The Monroe Doctrine, as it came to be called, has always been a fundamental principle of U.S. foreign policy.Read the full story here.Click here for comments.

• Wilders 'makes Muslims feel unsafe'.Muslims in the Netherlands say that remarks by politician Geert Wilders have poisoned attitudes toward them, according to complaints disclosed at his hate speech trial on Wednesday.Wilders is charged with inciting discrimination and hatred and with insulting a people on religious grounds, punishable with up to a year in jail and a fine.Wilders, who polls suggest is the Netherlands' most popular politician, denies any wrongdoing. He says that his opinions are protected by freedom of speech and endorsed by more than a million people who voted for him in national elections last June.He accused his judges of bias, but lost a motion this week to have them replaced. In an opening statement, he claimed his trial is political and he would remain silent in the Amsterdam court.The case is seen as a test of how far a politician can go in speaking negatively about a religion without unlawfully infringing on religious freedom. He has never called for violence.Read the full story here.Click here for comments.

• U.S. Supreme Court declines appeal of ban on religious music at N.J. schools."Silent Night" and other religious songs will remain off the program at holiday concerts in South Orange-Maplewood schools after the U.S. Supreme Court declined today to take up an appeal of the district’s ban on celebratory religious music.The nation’s highest court ended a case that dates back to 2004, by deciding not to hear the petition brought by Michael Stratechuk, a parent who sued over the policy that bars performance of religious songs.He also said that despite the district’s stated policy, prior to 2004 some holiday concerts did contain Christmas music. In 2003, for example, according to the petition, one holiday concert included "Joy to the World," "O Come all Ye Faithful," "Hark, the Herald Angels Sing" and "Silent Night."Read the full story here.Click here for comments.

• This Supermarket "Health Food" Killed These Baby Rats in Three Weeks.Biologist Arpad Pusztai had more than 300 articles and 12 books to his credit and was the world’s top expert in his field.But when he accidentally discovered that genetically modified (GM) foods are dangerous, he became the biotech industry’s bad-boy poster child, setting an example for other scientists thinking about blowing the whistle.The results of Pusztai’s work were supposed to become the required testing protocols for all of Europe. But when he fed supposedly harmless GM potatoes to rats, things didn’t go as planned.Within just 10 days, the animals developed potentially pre-cancerous cell growth, smaller brains, livers, and testicles, partially atrophied livers, and damaged immune systems. Moreover, the cause was almost certainly side effects from the process of genetic engineering itself. In other words, the GM foods on the market, which are created from the same process, might have similar affects on humans.Read the full story here.Click here for comments.

• HT:IsraeliCool.Fanning the Flames of Hatred.One of the dominant stories of the past few days has been the torching of the Beit Fajar mosque, presumably by those referred to as “settlers.” While there has been no definitive proof they were the culprits, almost everyone – including the Israeli Prime Minister and Defense Minister – is assuming this to be the case. Even some prominent “settler” Rabbis – one of whom I learned under in my younger days – have publicly condemned the attack and given palestinians a box of Korans as a gesture of solidarity.Perhaps Al Jazeera did not have footage from the latest attack, or the damage was less severe than that of the previous attack. Either way, they seem to be engaging in deceptive conduct in order to promote their anti-Israel agenda and incite people against Israel.They are aparantly reusingold footage to escalade tensions.Read the full story here.Click here for comments.

• Analysis: G20 proximity talks needed to avert FX war.Careful calibration of a U.S. dollar devaluation looks to be the only way to avert the sort of currency war flagged by Brazil and others, leaving G20 powers the unenviable task of agreeing some control of the process.Robert Johnson, director of the Soros-funded Institute for New Economic Thinking, said G20 needs agreement on the size and pace of the currency shifts between three main groups -- the United States and major consumers; the big exporters of China, Japan and Germany; and a grouping of emerging exporters."There is competitive devaluation going on," said Johnson, a former director at billionaire George Soros' fund management firm and former economist at the U.S. Senate Banking Committee.Read the full story hereClick here for comments.

• Toxic Sludge Engulfs Hungarian Towns.Hungary declared a state of emergency after toxic mud spilled from a reservoir, dumping deadly chemicals on several towns. View shocking photos of the disaster.Read and see the whole thing here and here.More on the continues contamination here.Click here for comments.

• HT:AmericanThinker.Obama To Get Out of Dodge After the Election.More evidence Obama knows there will be a Democrat bloodbath at the polls: he has changed his schedule and is flying away for 12 whole days, just two days after election, and is going to the other side of the world. Those recriminations are not going to be fun, and its best to be an honored guest in places that feel honored to have a presidential visit."Fear has its use but cowardice has none" - Mahatma Gandhi.
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• HT:NewsRealBlog.Has Anyone Noticed That Islamists Have Threatened Notre Dame Cathedral?Considering that the leftist media immediately jumped into a mad rush to defend the right of Muslims to build a mosque at Ground Zero, one would think that Islamic threats against the Catholic Cathedral at Notre Dame would be making headlines.What threat could the Cathedral of Notre Dame possibly pose to Islamists? Where is the mad rush defending the right of Catholics to worship in peace? Why no outrage from so-called “moderate Muslims“? Why no statement from Catholic leaders on Islamic targeting of Catholics?If Islam were a religion of peace, we should now be hearing outrage not only through media sources but also from so-called moderate Muslims regarding all of the targets listed by Al Qaeda, but particularly in regard to the Islamic threat to the Cathedral at Notre Dame.If Islam is not about blowing up Catholic cathedrals, Muslims are failing miserably in getting that message out to the public. But you see, Islam really is about blowing up Catholic cathedrals and any other “threat” to Muslim domination of the world.Therein lies the problem.Meanwhile this is just another example of the results from "Interfaith Dialog".Read the full story here.Click here for comments.

• HT:MichelleMalkin.Obamacare waivers: Torquemada Sebelius spares McDonald’s, unions.After an embarrassing leak about the dire potential consequences of forcing one of America’s largest companies to abide by onerous Obamacare coverage mandates, HHS Secretary Kathleen “Torquemada” Sebelius decided that McDonald’s, a major teachers union, and several other firms deserved a break today.Old promise: Everyone gets to keep their health insurance.New promise: You can keep your health insurance…if you BEG hard enough for an Obamacare waiver.Will only high-powered, politically connected corporations and Big Labor groups be spared? Where’s the transparency in how these decisions are being made? Read the full story here.Click here for comments.