Michael Coren on the Dalai Lama participating in a co-excistence of religions conference with Tariq Ramadan.

MFS - The Other News

                        Morning Posting.

• Updated !Earthquakes in the last 24 hours in the world seismic activity in Solomon Islands 5.1  ! More info here.

• Japan : For the most accurate info on the nuclear disaster go to : Paul Langley's Nuclear History Blog.Here.

• London riots Live reporting  Here.

• London riots.(TheBigPicture).Two nights of rioting in London's Tottenham neighborhood erupted following protests over the shooting death by police of a local man, Mark Duggan. Police were arresting him when the shooting occurred. Over 170 people were arrested over the two nights of rioting, and fires gutted several stores, buildings, and cars. The disorder spread to other neighborhoods as well, with shops being looted in the chaos. Collected here are images from the rioting and the aftermath. -- Lane Turner (26 photos )See the full extent here.

• Report: US to tell Assad he must go.(Ynet).State Department sources say Washington's efforts to reason with Assad over; White House expected to present new hard-line policy on Syria. The Obama administration is preparing to explicitly demand the departure of Syrian President Bashar Assad and hit his regime with tough new sanctions, US officials said on Tuesday, signaling that American efforts to engage the Syrian government are finally over.The White House is expected to lay out the tougher line by the end of this week, possibly on Thursday, according to officials who said the move will be a direct response to Assad's decision to step up the ruthlessness of the crackdown against pro-reform demonstrators by sending tanks into opposition hotbeds. President Barack Obama and other top US officials had previously said that Assad has "lost legitimacy" as a leader and that he either had to spearhead a transition to democracy or get out of the way. They had not specifically demanded that he step down. The new formulation will make it clear that Assad can no longer be a credible reformist and should leave power, the officials said. At the same time, the Treasury Department is expected to expand sanctions against Assad and his inner circle. Although the officials would only speak anonymously, the State Department on Tuesday telegraphed the planned shift in policy, saying the administration's two-year attempt to work with Assad, pull Syria out of Iran's orbit and transform it into a regional partner for peace and stability is over. "You can't have any kind of partnership with a regime that does this kind of thing to innocents," spokeswoman Victoria Nuland told reporters."In the case of Syria, the message from 2009 was: If you are prepared to open Syria politically, if you are prepared to be a reformer, if you are prepared to work with us on Middle East peace and other issues we share, we can have a new and different kind of partnership," she said. "And that is not the path that Assad chose."Hmmmm......Yeah.... Hillary: "Assad is a reformer".Read the full story here.

• Democratic Sens. Murray, Baucus, Kerry Named To Debt Super Committee.(ThinkProgress).Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) has reportedly tapped Sens. Patty Murray (D-WA), John Kerry (D-MA), and Max Baucus (D-MT) to join the super committee created by the deal that raised the federal debt ceiling. The super committee is charged with crafting a deficit reduction package by Thanksgiving; seven of the 12 members have to approve the plan to send it to the full Congress.Hmmmm......Seem i was right a couple of days ago saying Kerry would be part of the "Super Congress",now what?Dispose of  the hobbits and terrorists?Read the full story here.

• Republican Congressman: Obama Impeachment “Needs To Happen”.(PoliTex) — A brief exchange between US Rep. Michael Burgess, R-Lewisville and a local Tea Party member is drawing attention this morning as Burgess advocated pursuing impeachment proceedings against President Obama.As we first reported last night, the impeachment talk came up while Burgess was speaking to the NE Tarrant Tea Party Monday night. Burgess spent much of the evening defending his decision to vote for a debt ceiling deal earlier this month that many Tea Party conservatives hated.When one attendee suggested that the House push for impeachment proceedings against Obama to distract the president and keep him from getting things done, Burgess was immediately receptive. He said Obama backed away from using the 14th amendment to raise the debt ceiling without Congressional approval because of concerns about getting impeached. He added that there’s also some people who believe Obama violated the War Powers Act when he pursued military action in Libya.“It needs to happen, and I agree with you it would tie things up,” Burgess said. “No question about that.”I asked Burgess about the exchange afterward.“We need to tie things up,” he repeated. “The gentleman was right. The longer we just allow damage to continue unchecked, the worse things are going to be for us…People will talk about it.”Read the full story here.

• Markets to Obama: shut up!(WashingtonTimes).With the stock market facing a historic meltdown, Americans could at least expect the president to be on time for a speech intended to inspire confidence. But those tuning in Monday at 1 p.m. eastern expecting to hear Mr. Obama address the rolling national financial crisis instead saw a live feed of casually dressed techies joking around in front of the presidential podium. After twenty five minutes of waiting for Mr. Obama to show up, the markets resumed tanking. The Dow Jones Industrial Average slid four points a minute before Mr. Obama arrived. It gained a few points back at first, but ten minutes into his remarks the Dow broke through the 11,000 point floor. In the 20 minutes after he finished speaking the Dow slid 200 points. The market closed having lost 634 points. It was a vote of no confidence.  Mr. Obama saying that the U.S. political system was “dysfunctional.” Who would invest in a corporation whose chief executive describes the company’s management in such terms? Never fear, Mr. Obama said Americans have always risen to the challenge with entrepreneurship, innovation and hard work. Given Mr. Obama’s insistence on increasing the number of costly government regulation, his blame-the-rich approach to economics, and burdensome, job-killing health care plan, no president has done more damage to this spirit of enterprise. Mr. Obama said that “this is the United States of America… We always have been and always will be a Triple-A country.” If only we had a Triple-A leader.Hmmmm......Hear,Hear!Read the full story here.

• Syria defies world reproach,tells medling Turkey to mind it's own business, orders new raids.(Ynet).Syrian President Bashar Assad told Turkey's foreign minister on Tuesday that Damascus will "not relent in pursuing terrorist groups", Syrian state news agency said. Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu met with Assad on Tuesday morning, and urged him to end the prolonged crackdown on pro-democracy protesters, which have so far claimed over 1,600 lives.A Syrian source said Tuesday that a mission comprising of Brazilian, Indian and South African delegates will be arriving in Syria on Wednesday, in yet another attempt to convince Damascus to negotiation with the protesters and end the violence.The visit by Davutoglu was meant to signal Ankara's growing discomfort vis-à-vis Damascus' brutality. The Turkish FM reportedly warned the Syrian president that he could risk "Saddam-like" isolation if he does not halt his crackdown on Syrian protesters.The Arab world has already signaled Assad that its patience is wearing thin: The Arab League issued an official censure of his actions, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Bahrain have recalled their envoys to Damascus, and the Grand Imam Ahmed el-Tayeb of the Cairo-based Al-Azhar Sunni institution has stated that the bloodshed in Syria "has goon too far."Unfazed, the Syrian army launched raids on restive areas Tuesday, defying the growing international reproach over the regime's brutality.Activists said tanks stormed villages outside the besieged city of Hama and two towns in Idlib province, which borders Turkey. There was heavy machine-gun fire and reports of at least three deaths in the eastern city of Deir el-Zour, which also has been a flashpoint in recent days.  The reports were confirmed by the LCC and the London-based Syrian Observatory for Human Right. In an editorial published Tuesday, the Al Baath newspaper of Syria's ruling Baath party said the regime was hopeful that Turkey and the Gulf Arab nations will "quickly correct their stands."On Monday, Assad replaced his defense minister with the army chief of staff, saying Gen. Ali Habib was being removed from his post because of health problems. Hmmmm.....Gen Ali Habib who got killed the same night.As i said before how far is Turkey willing to go concerning Iran?Read the full story here.

• AIG Sues Bank Of America For $10 Billion Over 'Massive Mortgage Fraud'.(BlacklistedNews). It's getting ugly. BofA will need at least $100 billion to avoid bankruptcy. Ken Lewis' retirement SIV (BAC stock) is trading sharply lower (currently down 17%) dragging down all financials.(Reuters) - The insurer American International Group Inc (AIG:nyse) is suing Bank of America Corp (BAC:nyse) to recover more than $10 billion of losses from a "massive fraud" on mortgage debt, deepening the morass of litigation faced by the largest U.S. bank.AIG, still largely owned by taxpayers after $182.3 billion of government bailouts, is the latest of a growing number of investors filing lawsuits seeking to hold banks responsible for losses on troubled mortgages that contributed to the financial crisis.The AIG complaint, being filed in the New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan, accuses Bank of America and its Countrywide and Merrill Lynch units of misrepresenting the quality of mortgages placed in securities and sold to investors.Reuters obtained a copy of the complaint. AIG is preparing similar lawsuits against other large banks.Read the full story here.

• Herman Cain Slam Obama: ‘That’s Not Leadership!’(TheOtherMcCain).DENISON, IowaRepublican presidential candidate Herman Cain today denounced as “pathetic” the response of President Obama and other Democrats to the recent downgrade of U.S. credit.“Today, the president, Senator [John] Kerry and other Democrats now want to blame somebody for the credit downgrade – other than themselves,” Cain told a standing-room only crowd at Crunk’s Café here. “They control the Senate. They control the White House. Obama’s Treasury secretary [Tim Geithner] is in charge of the Treasury. Now they are trying to blame the Tea Party movement for the downgrade. How pathetic is that? That’s not leadership, folks – that’s not leadership.“Hmmmmm.......Aaaaah Blasphemy.Read and see the full story here.

• Obama Killed Osama, And Then Ignored His Own Advice.(BigPeace).By Dave Reaboi.John Nolte at Big Hollywood picked up something interesting from a Maureen Dowd column. The Obama administration, it seems, has granted an unusual amount of access to the team behind The Hurt Locker (writer Mark Boal and director Kathryn Bigelow) for an upcoming campaign-season film about the mission to kill Osama bin Laden.As Nolte point out, the timing of the film’s release has not been missed at the White House. Look for Hollywood to be a willing participant in this elaborate Obama re-election commercial, which is intended to remind voters of an increasingly desperate president’s only shining hour.In addition to the desperate obvious ‘October surprise’ quality of this stunt, the cynicism revealed by the White House’s active facilitation of this film is breathtaking. It tells us something important about the Obama White House, and its readiness to abandon its most dearly-held beliefs and even its worldview on the alter of political expediency.On nearly every issue, the president and others from his administration (not to mention the media) lecture us on the need to be sensitive to the feelings and self-image of the Muslim world. This time, however, the White House believes a bounce in the final weeks before the conclusion of a tough re-election campaign is more important than (as the president himself put it, “spiking the football” by antagonistically) reminding the world who was responsible for Bin Laden’s death.Regardless of the merits or failings of the Obama administration’s concern for the feelings of the Muslim world, cooperating with the filmmakers displays an inconsistency that should not go by unremarked upon. Sometimes this hypersensitivity, when translated into policy, is laughably unserious– like the re-tooling of NASA to “reach out to the Muslim world.” After killing Bin Laden, Obama himself insisted America keep its celebrations subdued and decline to “spike the football,” even going so far as to protect the dignity of the arch-terrorist’s corpse so as not to antagonize the ‘Arab street.’More insidious, however, is the compromises the Obama administration is willing to make on issues of free expression when criticism of Islam comes into play. A lone man in Florida threatening to burn a koran was enough to to imperil American national security half a world away, both Obama and his chief general said. Obama’s State Department, too, is increasingly embracing the Shariah-adherent definitions of free speech promoted by the Organization of the Islamic Conference– which plans to enforce blasphemy of Islam. Of course, American free speech is circumscribed by the threat actual violence from a Muslim world even its biggest apologists implicitly concede is highly combustible.If the delicate emotions of the Muslim world– manifested in the degree to which they’re ready to cause violence and mayhem worldwide– are enough to circumscribe the First Amendment of the Constitution, shouldn’t it also discourage a movie about killing a famous Muslim? But alas, not hurting the feelings of Muslims by showing ‘Crusader’ soldiers killing a Mujahid in cold blood (on Pakistan’s Islamic soil) is trumped by the importance of Obama’s reelection.Last month, a Zogby poll revealed that the antipathy of much of the Muslim world to Barack Obama can be traced to the killing of Bin Laden. As Alana Goodman summarized the report at Commentary, “In all six countries surveyed – Egypt, Morocco, Lebanon, Jordan, the UAE and Saudi Arabia – the majority of respondents said killing bin Laden made them “less favorable toward the U.S.’”What could possibly “spike the football” any more than a flashy action film, blasted into the homes and theaters of that very same Muslim world, still smarting from Obama’s triumphant dispatch of the world’s most wanted terrorist?All this fuss and trauma to the Muslim world can be averted with a little tweaking, by making Bin Laden into a villain designated as acceptable in Hollywood, a Serbian terrorist or a anti-government Tea Party type.Hmmmm......And so Obama joins the ranks of leaders gloryfying themselves , the Cult of personality leaders like Fidel Castro, Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini, Hirohito, Mao Zedong, Kemal Atatürk, Nicolae Ceauşescu, Mátyás Rákosi, Saparmurat Niyazov, Ho Chi Minh, Muammar Gaddafi, Kim Il-Sung, Kim Jong-Il, François Duvalier and Juan Perón to name a few.Read the full story here.

• Video - Krauthammer: Obama Blames Tea Party, God ... "Everybody Except Him".(RealClearpolitics).Charles Krauthammer: "I was sort of stunned by his appearance today. I said: ‘Why did he go out there?’ He went out there with the Dow at minus 400. And after he spoke, it went down to minus 600. He looked weak, plaintive and small. "I mean weak and plaintive because he comes out there and he blames, of course the Tea Party, Europe, Japan and the Middle East, probably God because he’s the author of earthquakes. Everybody except him."Read and see the full story here.

• "Fast and Furious" Goes All the Way to the White House.(HumanEvents).By A.W.R. Hawkins.By now, “Gunwalker” and “Fast and Furious” have both entered the national lexicon. And although the amount of information known about the operations varies from person to person, the majority of Americans know they have something to do with the selling of guns to “straw purchasers” in the U.S., who were supposed to smuggle the guns into Mexico and put them in the hands of cartel members, who were then to be arrested.What most people seem not to know is who exactly was behind the Gunwalker and Fast and Furious operations. Was it the ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives)? Yes. Was it also Attorney General Eric Holder? Well, there’s no doubt he was instrumental in Gunwalker, and it’s now known that his chief of staff was briefed on Fast and Furious. So how about President Obama? What did he know? According to information that has surfaced during ongoing investigations by Rep. Darrell Issa (R.-Calif.) and Sen. Charles Grassley (R.-Iowa), it’s certain that knowledge of Fast and Furious went all the way to the White House.Of course, Obama says he knew nothing about either Gunwalker or Fast and Furious, although the President set aside $10 million for the operations in February 2009 via the stimulus package, and talked about “gun tracing” and “gun enforcement policies during a joint press conference in Mexico City with Mexico President Felipe Calderon in April 2009” (which was the same month in which Holder gave a speech in Cuernavaca, Mexico, where he bragged of the implementation of Gunwalker).But although neither Obama or Holder have claimed they had knowledge of the operations until quite recently, both are now actively doing their best to “[stonewall] the oversight committee investigation” that is trying to get to the bottom of this mess. Of Obama in particular, Issa has said, “President Obama has been keen to talk about who didn’t know about the program and who didn’t authorize it. These answers will not suffice. The American people have a right to know, once and for all, who did authorize it and who knew about it.”It doesn’t take long to connect the dots on this one. We have a president who funded these programs, who talked to Mexican President Calderon two months later about tracing guns, and whose National Security Director for North America received communications from ATF Special Agent Newell regarding the operations. The Justice Department is littered with people who knew about the program, and nearly every federal law-enforcement agency besides the Secret Service was involved.The President gets away with laughing off the fact that “shovel-ready jobs” weren’t as shovel-ready as he thought they were. But there’s no way he should be allowed to laugh this one off.Hmmmm......Gunwalker"These boots will keep on walking".Read the full story here.

• Is Medicare Sustainable?(Cato).By David Boaz.A letter in the Washington Post from Dale Everett of Ashburn, Va., makes a point about the sustainability of our entitlements programs:

At 80, I am a “poster boy” for what is wrong with Medicare and Social Security. I worked full time from 1950 until 1993, when I retired. I paid the maximum amount annually required by law. My payment from Social Security in 1993 was $1,170 per month, and it now exceeds $1,500. I paid $47,377 into the fund and have so far received more than $288,000 from it.

As for Medicare I paid $14,350 into the fund from 1966 to 1993. I have been very healthy but had cancer several years ago and a craniotomy five years ago. The costs of those exceeded $1 million. Even minor surgery would far exceed what I paid to the fund.

Please tell me how such a system can be sustained. Both programs need to be overhauled now. No one should believe that he has paid for and earned the right to such payments.Read the full story here.

• Soros Rumored To Be Investor Who Made $10 Billion On Trade U.S. Credit Rating Would Be Downgraded.(DailyMail) — A mystery investor or hedge fund reportedly made a bet of almost $1billion at odds of 10/1 last month that the U.S. would lose its AAA credit rating.Now questions are being asked of whether the trader had inside information before placing the $850million bet in the futures market.There are mounting rumours that investor George Soros, 80, famously known as ‘the man who broke the Bank of England’, could be involved.He made more than $1billion on currency speculation when the British pound left the Exchange Rate Mechanism on Black Wednesday in 1992.The latest bet was made on July 21 on trades of 5,370 ten-year Treasury futures and 3,100 Treasury bond futures, reported ETF Daily News.Now the investor’s gamble seems to have paid off after Standard and Poor’s issued a credit rating downgrade from AAA to AA+ last Friday.Whoever it is stands to earn a 1,000 per cent return on their money, with the expectation that interest rates will be going up after the downgrade.Hmmm........Nope it's not the Teaparty terrorist hobbits.Read the full story here.

• Issa Subpoenas NLRB for Boeing Documents, Internal Communications.(Heritage).Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA), the Chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, issued a subpoena to the National Labor Relations Board on Sunday requesting documents that he said the board had failed to provide of its own accord.The documents involve the NLRB’s controversial suit against Boeing, which seeks to block the airline giant from relocating a production facility from Washington State to South Carolina. The NLRB claims the move – to a right-to-work state – constitutes retaliation against the International Association of Machinists union. Boeing insists that it is purely a business decision.The subpoena orders the NLRB to provide all documents and internal communications relating to Boeing or the IAM from January 1, 2009 to present by noon on Friday. Issa claims that the committee requested those materials in May, but had not received them from NLRB.“NLRB’s action in the case against Boeing has the potential to create a job-killing precedent just as U.S. manufacturers are working toward economic recovery,” Issa said in a statement on Monday. “That a Washington, D.C.-based bureaucracy could dictate the work location and parameters for a world-leading company is unprecedented in a global economy and hobbles a leading American job creator at a time of economic vulnerability.”The Labor Department did not return a request for comment by press time.Read the full story here.

• The Mullahs will pick up the pieces.(Nervana).It is almost impossible to predict how Syria might emerge after Assad. Many hope for a stable, democratic state. Though, instability, civil war and an Islamic state are also real possibilities. Regardless of the outcome, the collapse of the Assad regime in Syria will have an enormous impact on the wider Middle East particularly on Iran.The heat of the Syrian volcano will be felt in Tehran far more than in Beirut, Amman and Istanbul. The Mullahs who stood by Assad for decades already faces daunting challenges today, and those challenges will multiply and grow in the near future and on several fronts.

The Domestic Front:

Perhaps the worst nightmare for the Mullahs is the implications on the domestic front. The psychological impact of the fall of Assad may inspire many in Iran to reignite a second green revolution. This is a red line for the Mullahs that must be avoided at all costs, and they would not hesitate to ruthlessly crush any rebellion. The Green movement is also watching the Arab spring, and they may learn a thing or two from their neighbors, the huge decline in the economy recently can also help their cause. However, it is essential to remember that the power base of the Mullahs and their revolutionary guards is probably still strong with no indication of any erosion, yet!

The Syrian Front:

With the potential loss of the massive Iranian investments in Syria, the economic impact of the fall of Assad could be enormous. However, the political impact would be devastating. By losing Syria, Iran would lose its strategic depth and gateway to the Arab world. How the Mullahs will respond to this serious blow? That remains to be seen.Judging by their past responses, the Mullahs would probably resort to a quick policy of damage limitation and exploitation of any instability. The details will depend on events on the ground in Syria. Chaos, civil war, even a military quo is the Iranians’ best outcomes, as it this would give them more scope to maneuver in exploiting the situation to their advantage and allow them rebuild their links with the newly emerging power groups within Syria and to continue smuggling weapons to Hezbollah. Ironically, a stable, democratic Syria would be Iran’s worst nightmare and a Sunni Islamic regime would not be good either.

The Lebanese Front:

 By throwing in its lot with Assad, the Iranian proxy group Hezbollah stands to lose a lot following the departure of its ally. Whilst it is certainly true that Hezbollah’s center of gravity is within Lebanon, and it is independent of Assad’s regime, however, the destruction of their main bridge with Tehran will have massive implications for Hezbollah’s policies over years to come. In fact, it is no exaggeration to suggest that Hezbollah views the collapse of the Baath regime in Syria as an existential threat.

How Nasrallah will respond? Can he succeed in maintaining his power?No one can predict the future but at least we can discuss his options, Nasrallah will have a potentially three options.Read the full story here.

• NATO Envoy: Military Planning Against Iran and Syria is Underway.(SHTF).Last month we reported that the Pentagon has issued a warning order to ‘Prepare for War’.According to Dmitry Rogozin, Russia’s envoy to NATO, it’s not just Israel and the Pentagon that are getting ready to expand the middle east theater:Rogozin said in an interview with Russia’s Izvestia daily newspaper published on Friday that the NATO was pursuing a long-reaching goal of preparing an attack on Iran, adding that the alliance intends to change governments whose views do not coincide with those of the West.“The noose around Iran is tightening. Military planning against Iran is underway. And we are certainly concerned about an escalation of a large-scale war in this huge region,” Rogozin added.The Russian envoy further pointed out that Syria and later Yemen could be NATO’s last steps on the way to launch an attack on Iran.This comes as there are speculations that Israel is preparing for an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities to divert attention from Palestinian efforts to join the United Nations.Source: Press TV (August 6, 2011)

If Russia is to be believed (and be assured that Mr. Rogozin would not be giving interviews without prior consent from Mr. Putin and President Medvedev) the missile defense shield being built by the EU is designed not to defend against missiles from Iran, but to prepare for an attack: Washington has said its nuclear missile defense plans were designed to prevent any possible missile strikes from Iran or North Korea.“The missile defense system is not purely a defensive system,” envoy Dmitry Rogozin said. “There are serious and authoritative experts in Russia and in other countries who fear that the creation of a European missile defense system, officially assigned the task of blocking a threat from Iran, may in fact be a pretext for preparing an attack on Iran.”Source: Ria Novosti (July 28, 2011)

Iran is in play, but first Syria and Yemen may need to be addressed. Rogozin claims that this, too, is becoming reality: NATO is planning a military campaign against Syria to help overthrow the regime of President Bashar al-Assad with a long-reaching goal of preparing a beachhead for an attack on Iran, Russia’s envoy to NATO Dmitry Rogozin said.The UN Security Council condemned on Wednesday ongoing violence in Syria and urged the country’s authorities to stop using force against peaceful protesters, while saying the current situation in the country has not yet called for NATO interference.”[This statement] means that the planning [of the military campaign] is well underway. It could be a logical conclusion of those military and propaganda operations, which have been carried out by certain Western countries against North Africa,” Rogozin said in an interview with the Izvestia newspaper published on Friday.Source: Ria Novosti (August 5, 2011)We can ignore this as pure speculation and conjecture, or we can consider that this is how World Wars have started in the past. The chess pieces moved around on the board for over a decade before World War I became reality. The same was true for World War II.What we may be witnessing now is the prelude to a third war that will encompass most of the world. If Iran is attacked it is difficult to predict how the Chinese and the Russians will respond, but considering their position on Libya, they won’t be happy about it. Couple that with trillions in their reserves that will be hyperinflated away and the battle for critical resources like oil, water and food, and we have a recipe for disaster.Hmmmmm......It seems like September will be an extremely hot month.Read the full story here.

• German Interior Minister:'German Identity Is Shaped by Christianity'.(Spiegel).In a SPIEGEL interview, German Interior Minister Hans-Peter Friedrich discusses the motives of Norwegian killer Anders Breivik, calls for an end to anonymity on the Internet and explains why Islam is not part of German identity.

SPIEGEL: On your first day in office as German interior minister, you famously said that the idea that Islam is part of Germany is something "that cannot be proved by history." Would you say this again, after Oslo?

Friedrich: Oh, come on, those two things have nothing to do with each other! I was talking about the issue of Germany's identity. This identity is shaped by Christianity and the Enlightenment, not by Islam. I don't have to qualify that.Read the full interview here.

• IAF Deploys Drones Over Northern Gas Fields.(ArutzSheva).Following Iran's backing of the Hizbullah terror organization's claims to gas fields Israel is developing off its northern coast.Israel has deployed drones to keep watch on gas fields off its northern coast, fearing attack by the Hizbullah terror organization from neighboring Lebanon, AFP reported on Tuesday.The fields lie in a part of the Mediterranean claimed by Israel for gas exploration and production, but Lebanon says the fields lie within its territorial waters."The decision to deploy drones was made in order to maintain a 24-hour presence over the site," the paper said, adding that the air force was equipped with the locally made Heron drone, which has special electro-optics designed for maritime work.According to reports the IAF started aerial surveillance after a warning last month from Hizbullah, which in 2006 fought a deadly war with the Jewish state in which it used anti-ship missiles."The Israeli enemy cannot drill a single meter in these waters to search for gas and oil if the zone is disputed... No company can carry out prospecting work in waters whose sovereignty is contested," the Shiite group said.The Hizbullah threat came after Israel's cabinet approved a map of the country's proposed maritime borders with Lebanon and submitted it to the United Nations, which has been asked to mediate in the dispute.The map conflicts with one submitted by Lebanon to the UN last year, which gives Israel less territory. The two countries are technically at war and will not negotiate face to face.The two biggest known offshore fields, Tamar and Leviathan, lie respectively about 80 kilometers (50 miles) and 130 kilometers (81 miles) off Israel's northern city of Haifa.Tamar is believed to hold at least 8.4 trillion cubic feet of gas (238 billion cubic meters), while Leviathan is believed to have reserves of 16 trillion cubic feet (450 billion cubic meters).In June an Israeli company announced the discovery of two new natural gas fields, Sarah and Mira, around 70 kilometers (45 miles) off the city of Hadera further south.Hmmmm.....As i said September will be very hot.Read the full story here.

• King Abdullah's strong statement denouncing Syria's use of brutal force has won the hearts of Saudis and expatriates alike.(ArabNews).Top officials in Saudi Arabia including Shoura members, heads of Islamic organizations and academics lent their support Monday to the call made by the king to stop the bloodshed in Syria and initiate necessary reforms to ensure peace in the strife-torn country."Syrian President Bashar Assad has lost the legitimacy to rule," said Hamza Khoshain, a member of the Shoura Council, in Riyadh on Monday. "King Abdullah has sent a clear message to the Syrian regime by recalling the Saudi ambassador for consultations and by asking Damascus to rectify the situation as soon as possible."He lent his strong support to the Kingdom's call for Syria to shun violence and said the situation was being aggravated in Syria because of some outside elements, which are playing nasty roles to destabilize the country.""What is happening in Syria is not acceptable for Saudi Arabia," King Abdullah said in a written statement released Monday. "Syria should think wisely before it's too late ... and enact reforms that are not merely promises but actual reforms."Saleh Al-Wohaibi, secretary-general of the World Assembly of Muslim Youth (WAMY), said "the WAMY was deeply concerned over the torture and the killings of innocent people in Syria." He said the Syrian regime had failed to ensure peace, security and good governance."In fact, King Abdullah's advice to Syria comes within the framework of the Kingdom's foreign policy, which is based on the Islamic brotherhood, services to mankind, and care for neighbors," said Abdullah Al-Mosarraf, chief of the Al-Riyadh Schools, a chain of schools supervised by Riyadh Gov. Prince Salman."King Abdullah cares not only for Saudi Arabia, but for all Muslims across the globe and all mankind on this planet."Speaking of a possible boycott of the Syrian regime and its oil and gas exports, Ehab A. Al-Harbi, an Arab businessman, warned that such measures could be taken if the international community including the GCC and the Arab League agrees."Syria produces some 380,000 barrels of oil a day, much of which is exported to Europe, including Germany," he said.Al-Ghamdi expected more Arab countries to follow suit and stand against the oppressive actions of the Syrian government.Hamdan Al-Harbi, a journalist working for Okaz Arabic daily, said the king's statement would embarrass Arab regimes that have so far kept silent about events unfolding in Syria. "The king's statement came after an escalation of violence in Syria, especially during the holy month of Ramadan," he said.Abdul Qader Kilani, a Syrian journalist working in the Kingdom, wondered how long the Arabs would stay silent. He hoped that King Abdullah's strong statement would contribute to mobilizing support for the Syrians.Yasser Adlabi, another Syrian working in the Kingdom, said his compatriots would not forget the king's strong and bold statement supporting them. "He was the first Arab leader to call for protecting the rights of Syrian people. I am happy to learn that such a statement came from Saudi Arabia, whom the Syrian people hold in high esteem," he added.Hmmmm.....A very hot September is approaching.Read the full story here.

• Report shows rise in restrictions on religion.(Ynet). Nearly third of world's population lives in countries where it is becoming more difficult to freely practice religion, private US research group says. Jews, who make up less than 1% of world's population, see restrictions or harassment in 75 countries. Nearly a third of the world's population lives in countries where it is becoming more difficult to freely practice religion, a private US research group reported on Tuesday. The Pew Research Center's Forum on Religion and Public Life said government restrictions and public hostility involving religion grew in some of the most populous countries from mid-2006 to mid-2009. "During the three-year period covered by the study, the extent of violence and abuse related to religion increased in more places than it decreased," according to the report "Rising Restrictions on Religion." Only about 1% of the world lives in countries that saw more religious tolerance during those years, it said. The Pew Center review of 198 countries found those deemed restrictive or hostile in the previous report were growing even more so, while the opposite was found for those with more religious tolerance. A substantial rise in public hostility toward religious groups was seen in China, Nigeria, Thailand, Vietnam and Britain, while government restrictions rose substantially in Egypt and France.The countries most restrictive or hostile toward certain religions included India, Pakistan, Indonesia, Egypt, Iran, China, Myanmar, Russia, Turkey, Vietnam, Nigeria and Bangladesh – although most of these did not show much change in the three years. People were killed, physically abused, detained, imprisoned, displaced from their homes, or had their property destroyed for religious reasons by governments in 101 countries in the year ending mid-2009, compared to 91 a year earlier, the report said. Such violence rose in more countries than it declined over the three years. Mob violence involving religion occurred in 52 countries as of mid-2009, compared to 38 a year earlier. Religious hatred or bias led to violence by private citizens groups in 142 countries, nearly three-quarters of the 198 included in the study, and about the same as of mid-2008. "Religion-related terrorist groups were active in 74 countries," and violence was seen in half of these, in the year through mid-2009, the Pew Center said. Christians and Muslims, the world's two largest religious groups, were harassed in the most countries. Other religions also saw harassment, but Jews, who make up less than 1% of the world's population, saw restrictions or harassment in 75 countries. In five European countries – Britain, Denmark, Russia, Sweden and Bulgaria – religious tension focused on the rapidly growing Muslim population, but there was some rising anti-Semitism and antagonism toward minorities such as Jehovah's Witnesses.Read the full story here.

• Underwear bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab's Defense Gets Aggressive.(InvestigativeProject).Accused underwear bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab wants his terrorism trial moved out of Michigan and wants a federal judge to keep statements he gave to FBI agents kept away from jurors.In a series of motions filed Friday, an attorney assisting the Nigerian national with his defense hinted at misconduct by FBI officials. According to one motion, they interviewed Abdulmutallab in a hospital room over the objection of medical staff, who said he was under the influence of a painkiller called fentanyl. In addition, wrote attorney Anthony Chambers, agents failed to read Abdulmutallab his Miranda rights.In a separate motion, Chambers acknowledged Abdulmutallab "made incriminating statements" during plea negotiations with federal officials, after they promised nothing from those talks would be used against him at trial. It's not clear whether prosecutors plan to use any such statements when the trial begins in October. The motion seeks to ensure that cannot happen."Allowing the government to use these statements at trial will violate the government's agreement with Defendant," Chambers wrote.The motion to move the trial cites the intense publicity surrounding the attempted bombing of a Northwest Airlines flight from Amsterdam to Detroit on Christmas Day 2009. Abdulmutallab was detained by fellow passengers after a bomb sewn into his underwear started smoking but failed to detonate.He suffered burns as a result, requiring hospitalization and pain medication.In yet another motion, Chambers asked for access to grand jury records, which rarely are released, because he claims federal agents made "inconsistent statements" in different reports and witnesses may have "embellished facts and contradicted their own reports" during grand jury testimony.The motion did not offer examples.Read the full story here.

• ACORN’s Campaign Against Money Mart May Lead to Violence and Blackmail.(CanadaFreePress).By Matthew Vadum .Pressure. Protests. Picketing. This is how it begins.The Canadian branch of the U.S.-based organized crime syndicate ACORN is gearing up to extort Money Mart, a check cashing and payday loan company.In greater Vancouver, British Columbia, ACORN has been leading a shakedown campaign against the supposedly exorbitant fees Money Mart charges to transfer money to dangerous, corrupt, politically unstable, kleptocratic Third World hellholes like Somalia and Kenya where people get murdered for a single dollar.It’s standard operating procedure at the radical activist group ACORN.If Money Mart doesn’t cough up protection money, ACORN will intensify its actions against the company. (In the U.S., ACORN used to employ President Obama as a community organizer.)ACORN’s corruption and brutal, in-your-face tactics prompted investigators for the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee in the U.S. Congress to accuse ACORN of carrying out “a nationwide strategy of tax fraud, racketeering, money-laundering and manipulating the American electorate.” Their report accuses ACORN of evading taxes, sloppy accounting, defrauding donors, defrauding the U.S. government, filing false statements, obstructing justice, and plundering employee pension funds.John Hewitt, CEO of Liberty Tax Service, felt ACORN’s wrath when it staged a violent protest against his company in 2005. More than 100 angry ACORN members showed up at Liberty’s Virginia Beach headquarters.ACORN accused the company of charging excessive interest rates on the refund anticipation loans it offers to income tax filers. “All of sudden, four bus loads of homeless people pull up in front of our headquarters here in Virginia Beach,” Hewitt said.“They came pouring into the building like a Mongolian horde. There was screaming and fighting. One employee was bitten and another was scratched. They both had to go to the emergency room.” The demonstrators were arrested and the company filed a legal complaint but withdrew it later because it would have been too expensive to pursue, Hewitt explained.The company agreed to pay an ACORN affiliate $50,000 a year. “To me, it’s just to stop them from harassing us,” said Hewitt. “Even though I felt dirty by paying them money, I said, you know, it’s a business decision.”Liberty Tax Service is just one of ACORN’s many victims in the United States.ACORN now has offices in Toronto, Ottawa, Hamilton, and Vancouver.Canada: you’ve been warned. Read the full story here.

• Turkish athlete claims she was hit for wearing shorts on public bus.(HuriyetDaily).Volleyball player Nurcan İbrahimoğlu, 19, claimed she was hit on an Istanbul public bus in July for wearing shorts, daily Vatan reported Tuesday.İbrahimoğlu took a bus from the Bahçeköy neighborhood to the Levent district on July 28, just a few days before the holy month of Ramadan was set to start on Aug. 1.She said she sat on a seat wearing basketball shorts and stretched her legs out toward the aisle.A male passenger reportedly hit İbrahimoğlu's feet while walking past her and sat next to her despite other available seating. İbrahimoğlu asked the man to apologize for hitting her feet. The man in turn yelled at İbrahimoğlu, saying, "You cannot sit on this bus, stretching out your naked legs, you are corrupting the morals of the people," and called her "insolent."İbrahimoğlu responded by saying he was the one being insolent, which prompted the man to punch her in the face, splitting her lip. Passengers on the bus calmed the situation but stopped İbrahimoğlu from calling the police to prevent any "trouble," Doğan news agency, or DHA, reported.The assailant then asked the passengers if anyone saw him hitting her, to which nobody replied.İbrahimoğlu claimed she went to Ayazağa Police station the next day to file a complaint, but no one paid attention to her. She later went to the forensics department at the Şişli courthouse to get a battering report, but she was not given one on grounds that "she had no broken bones or stab wound."Hmmmm.....When if ever will Turkey act against the violence towards women in their country?Read the full story here.

• New Tibetan leader sworn in as prime minister.(TodaysZaman).A Harvard-trained legal scholar was sworn in on Monday as new head of the Tibetan government-in-exile, taking over from the Dalai Lama as leader of his people’s fight for freedom.The Dalai Lama, 76, announced in March he would be giving up his political role as leader of the Tibetan exile movement, though he would remain the spiritual leader for Tibetan Buddhists. Lobsang Sangay, who was elected in April by tens of thousands of Tibetans in exile, was surrounded by hundreds of Buddhist monks and nuns as well as the Dalai Lama as he took the oath of office in the northern Indian city of Dharmsala, where the exile administration is based. Sangay has vowed to follow the Dalai Lama’s approach of seeking increased autonomy for Tibet within China. China refuses to recognize Sangay’s authority. “We will continue the Middle Way policy. We are also willing to negotiate with the Chinese government anytime, anywhere,” Sangay told a huge crowd that gathered for the ceremony at the Tsuglakhang temple. Sangay said he would work to fulfill the vision of the Dalai Lama to create a truly secular democratic society. “Tibetan leadership is far from fizzling out. ... We are here to stay,” Sangay said.Scores of Tibetans playing traditional musical instruments and hundreds of children, men and women cheered as the Dalai Lama accompanied the new leader to the temple for the brief ceremony. Later, the crowds applauded as the Dalai Lama hugged and blessed the new leader after the ceremony. Sangay’s election as the Kalon Tripa, or prime minister, marks many firsts. He was born in the eastern Indian town of Darjeeling and has never visited Tibet. He is also the first secular leader to take over the political leadership of the Tibetan community. The Dalai Lama, the 14th in a line of men said to be the living incarnation of Chenrezig, a Buddhist god of compassion, says he needed to resign as political leader because he feared chaos would erupt after his eventual death, when the Chinese government and Buddhist monks are certain to argue over the identity of his successor. “Now, that danger is no longer there,” he said in an earlier interview with The Associated Press.Read the full story here.

• Iraqi Hizbullah Threatens Missile Attack On Kuwait.(Memri).Iraqi Hizbullah [an Iran-supported terrorist group] has, according to the Kuwaiti daily al-Rai al-Aam, threatened to fire three surface-to-surface missiles at Kuwait – at Abdallah Port, at "the heart of Kuwait," and at the Kuwaiti parliament.It said that the missiles will be fired if Kuwait continue with the construction of the controversial Mubarak Port close to the Iraqi border.Read the full story here.

MFS - The Other News

                       Morning Posting.

• Japan : For the most accurate info on the nuclear disaster go to : Paul Langley's Nuclear History Blog.Here.

• What Happens When Iran Kills American Soldiers?(EliotAbrams).There must be very few times in American history when a foreign government is accused of killing American troops, and absolutely nothing is done about it.Every school kid used to learn lines like “Perdicaris Alive or Raisuli Dead,” or “Millions for defense but not one cent for tribute.” The War of 1812 was fought in large part due to the “impressment” of American sailors by the British, a similar example of denial of freedom that fell far short of actually killing American sailors.So what are we to make of the following statements by America’s senior military officer, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Adm. Michael Mullen? Reuters reports that at a luncheon with journalists, Mullen said this:

“Iran is very directly supporting extremist Shia groups which are killing our troops. And there’s no reason … for me to believe that they’re going to stop that as our numbers come down….There’s no question they want to influence, and particularly in the south,” Mullen said. “They are shipping high-tech weapons in there … which are killing our people and … the forensics prove that.”

Mullen made these comments in the context of discussing the American troop presence in Iraq, and went on to say that any agreement to keep U.S. troops in Iraq beyond the end of the year “has to be done in conjunction with control of Iran in that regard.” So Iran’s killing of American troops is a problem because it complicates leaving some forces in Iraq?What is one to make of it when our senior commander does not seem outraged by this Iranian conduct and does not demand that we put a stop to it? Our forces are not killing Iranians, but Iran has been killing Americans–in Iraq and Afghanistan, but also through involvement in terrorist attacks such as the Khobar Towers bombing in 1996–for decades, and it has paid no price. This is the probable explanation why continuing American promises, or threats if you like, that “it is unacceptable for Iran to acquire nuclear weapons” don’t appear to rattle Tehran. What credibility can we possibly have when they know we know that Iran has been killing American soldiers year after year without any significant American response.It isn’t just Iran, either: the Assad regime in Syria became the transit point for every jihadi wanting to travel to Iraq to kill Americans (and large numbers of Iraqis). From all around the globe they came–Pakistan, Libya, Saudi Arabia, you name it–to Damascus International Airport, thence to be shepherded into Iraq with the full cooperation and coordination of the Government of Syria. The American military response: none. This was especially galling, for whatever dangers may have existed in threatening Iran and then having to carry through on those threats if Iran did not cease acting to kill American soldiers, they were absent in the case of a weak country like Syria. A few object lessons would have persuaded the Assad regime to desist from its actions.Soon we will have a new Secretary of Defense and a new Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, and one can only hope that we will also have a new policy: that neither Iran nor any other government can kill Americans with impunity. The least we owe servicemen and women who risk their lives for our country is the certainty that when we know a foreign government is trying to kill them, we will act to stop it. If we adopted such a policy, we would never again have to hear a Chairman of the Joint Chiefs reveal such a set of facts and suggest as an American response……well, nothing.Read the full story here.

• An Open Letter to @SpeakerBoehner and Sen. McConnell: You Blow This and You Are Political Toast.(DougRoss).You cave on the debt ceiling without meaningful spending cuts -- not Social Security, not Medicare, not some far-off, mystical trillion dollars a decade in the future -- but cuts now in the massive discretionary spending programs that exploded under the 111th Congress, well, then you are both political toast.President Obama has publicly vilified you, has equated you with terrorists ("holding a gun to the American people's head") and has now gone 800 days without a budget. He spent this money. He knew it would blow past the debt ceiling. This is his fault And now he demands something "balanced"?This is the real deal, since you or your staffers haven't figured it out yet: Obama is prepared to slash Social Security, Medicare, Defense--in fact, anything except the bloated public sector unions.As always with Obama, it's about the unions. There can be no negotiation with the ideologues who have blown trillions in borrowed money to no avail.The bloated government bureaucracies are the Democrat Party and vice versa. One can't exist without the other. If you -- Senator McConnell -- and you -- Speaker Boehner -- blow your advantage, you can stick the old political forks in you. You're done.Your starting position -- non-negotiable -- should be the Cut, Cap, Balance Pledge.Period.No secret, back-room deals. No bullcrap "trillion-dollar spending deals for 2020 with non-tax revenue increases".This is Obama and the 111th Congress' fault. They didn't pass a budget. They spent like drunken liberals. And, as we speak, they are destroying the full faith and credit of the United States Treasury.If you are too wedded to your status on the Beltway cocktail and press circuit -- rather than as representatives of a pissed-off electorate -- there will be hell to pay.P.S., How's "Speaker West" sound to you?Read the full story here.

• Operation Fast and Furious: We The People Are Furious So Let’s Get Eric Holder Out Of Office Fast.(BigPeace).Political stooge Eric Holder’s latest poke in our collective eyes comes from his role in Operation Fast and Furious.Representative Darrell Issa and Senator Charles Grassley have accused Holder of blocking their investigation of the scandalous operation that resulted in the deaths of two US agents and many Mexican civilians.Please see Michael Walsh’s piece.Fast and Furious was designed as an ATF sting and involved the “transfer” of thousands of weapons from gun shops in Arizona to Mexican drug cartels in an effort to track those guns back across the border. Predictably those weapons were used by the Mexican drug lords in scores of killings.As Walsh points out, many lawful gun owners believe this ill conceived plan was hatched and implemented by Holder’s ATF to “prove” the Obama Administration’s contention that 90% of the guns Mexican Cartels use originate in the United States. This “proof” would provide the administration with the political cover it would need to further control guns by executive order.If this scenario involving Holder providing political cover sounds familiar, it should. Once again Holder is a willing stooge to his political masters.Holder provided Bill Clinton with the political cover he needed to offer clemency in 1999 to 16 unrepentant FALN and Macheteros terrorists. When Pardon Attorney, Roger Adams refused to reverse his predecessor Margaret Love’s recommendation against the clemency offers in 1998, Holder concocted an “options report” for Adams to deliver to Holder in which Adams would not be required to provide any recommendation for or against clemency.The existence of that new report allowed Clinton the wiggle room to justify his clemency to terrorists who had not even requested clemency, who did not show remorse but whose supporters met with Holder and his team at least 9 times. Holder and his team ignored the families of those killed while pandering to the terrorists and their supporters.Like he did in 1999 by pushing the release of those terrorists, Holder is once again playing Russian roulette with the American People; this time by furnishing guns to gangsters in a reckless attempt to provide political cover to his superior(s).Like he did in 1999, Holder now refuses to answer questions regarding his or his boss’s involvement in the scandal and is even holding up a congressional investigation.Aside from Fast and Furious, since becoming AG, Holder’s other recent travesties of justice are well documented and include his:

1. failure to prosecute the New Black Panthers for voter intimidation

2. desire to prosecute members of the intelligence community over terror interrogations

3. goals of closing the Guantanamo Bay terrorist detention center and trying foreign terrorists in civilian courts

Holder’s previous misdeeds are so numerous and insidious that they are difficult to identify and summarize. Investigative Reporter Ron Kolb, for the America’s Survival conference last week, provided the best brief I have ever seen on Mr. Holder. Look, Holder must go. I don’t know how much more evidence we need; how many more misdeeds Holder has to perpetrate, how many more Americans have to be put at risk, how many more Fast and Furious scandals we have to endure.The American people are Furious so Holder has to go Fast.Read the full story here.

• Obama, the Taliban, and the Muslim Brotherhood Vs. America, Israel, and Freedom .(Marezilla).Obama has publicly stated that Americans "do not consider ourselves a Christian nation" and that the United States is "one of the largest muslim countries in the world". Of course he is wrong, the US is not a muslim country, but do these statements reflect wishful thinking on his part, or do they reveal his intentions to islamicize America as described in THIS article by Victor Mordechai in Israel Today? Is Obama's deliberate undermining of American and Israeli interests his "Final Solution", as described in THIS article by James Lewis?Read the full story here.

• Obama's Plan to Islamicize America.(IsraelToday).At a meeting of the David Allen Lewis “Eschatology Club” a year ago in Springfield, Missouri, where I was the featured speaker, I was told by the organizers that in the previous monthly meeting, Pastor Don Jones made a disturbing statement about President Barack Obama’s plan to Islamicize America.Jones went to one of his orphanages in Haiti after the massive earthquake there and met with a senior UN official, who said Obama had told him that the US would be a Muslim country by 2016, or by the end of his second term in office.While that may seem far-fetched, it is not beyond the realm of possibility. First, Obama’s biological father was a Muslim— which makes the President a Muslim. His stepfather was an Indonesian Muslim who raised Obama as a Muslim in a mosque and madrassa (Islamic religious school) in Indonesia until age 11. His halfbrothers in Kenya are Muslims.My wife Rachel, who is a radio and TV monitor in the Arabic language for Israel Radio in Jerusalem, has picked up many broadcasts indicating that the Arabs see Obama as a Muslim. In one broadcast prior to the 2008 elections, the Saudis claimed that “we will have a Muslim in the White House.” Another Saudi broadcast said: “Obama’s job is to terminate the Shiite threat [Iran] and the Jewish threat [Israel]. And if he cannot do this, he should pack his bags and go home.”America has always been a Judeo- Christian nation, but demographically at least, this is no longer true. While there are more than 250 million Christians in the US, the 6 million Jews are now outnumbered by Muslims who total about 20 million (9 million Iranians who fled after the fall of the Shah, 7 million Arabs and at least 3 million black Muslims, with the remainder being from Somalia and the former Yugoslavia).Numerically, the Jews are now no. 3 or 4 along with the Hindus in the US, whose population is about the same as the Jews. According to Obama’s Inauguration Day speech, America is a “Christian, Muslim, Jewish, Hindu” country. Numerically, he is right. So much for Judeo-Christian America.In the June edition of Israel Today, I wrote about the worsening conditions of the Christians in Egypt, Syria, Lebanon and Iraq. International investment in Egypt has all but dried up since the Revolution. What international (Christian) corporation will invest in a country which is killing and ethnically cleansing its Christians? So the Egyptian economy appears doomed to collapse, which would create fertile ground for a takeover by the radical Muslim Brotherhood.This would leave 70 million Muslims in Egypt in dire poverty.The same applies to other countries in the Middle East that could be taken over by Islamic militants. In the case of Syria, the ruling Muslim Alawite sect will probably share the same fate as the Christians. This could lead to a flood of Arab Muslims to greener pastures in the West.The Bible says Egypt will be a desolation and Egyptians will flee to other countries because the nation will be uninhabitable for 40 years (Ezekiel 29). If the official Syrian newspaper Tishrin is correct in saying that 600,000 Palestinian refugees and Syrians will march on the Golan Heights to reclaim their land, then a war with Syria is inevitable, which means that Syria will be a desolation as well (Isaiah 17).The result could be tens of millions of Muslims fleeing to the US and Europe. President Obama would welcome these “brethren” on humanitarian grounds, and in effect, America would become a Muslim country.Hmmmm......Read the full story here.

• Cleveland airport suddenly very,very popular.Unruly passenger caused a flight from Chicago to Germany to be diverted to Cleveland.(JawaReport).CLEVELAND - An unruly passenger caused a flight from Chicago to Germany to be diverted to Cleveland, an airport spokesperson said.The United Airlines 777 jet landed at Cleveland Hopkins International Airport at about 5:30 p.m. Friday.Jackie Mayo, spokesperson for the airport, said a passenger on Flight 944 headed to Frankfurt was acting “suspicious and unruly,” and would not comply with the flight crew's request to settle down. As a result, the flight was diverted to Cleveland to have the passenger removed.When the plane landed, Mayo said K9 dogs searched the plane as a safety measure.Next thing you know this happens: Several Flights Diverted to Cleveland Hopkins with Emergency on board.Cleveland Hopkins International Airport (CLE) It has suddenly gotten busier with diversions. Joining our earlier noted 767-300 is another United 767-300 from London Heathrow and a 777-200 headed to Frankfurt just landed. The 767-300s in United (new blue, pre CO) are now parked at the FIS at the end on Concourse A and the 777-200 is on pad 1 (in new United/Continental livery). CLE had another unexpected visitor this afternoon. United flight 965, a Boeing 767-300 flying from Moscow to Washington Dulles landed with a medical emergency onboard. CLE medical staff are attending to the passenger. The aircraft is expected to be refueled and dispatched to IAD.Hmmmmm.......Read the full story here.

• Calling Dr. Jihad.Last call before departure for Dr. Jihad.(Aina).Splendid news: Our homeland-security officials have sent fresh warnings to foreign governments that "human bombs" may try to board planes with surgically implanted explosives. The ticking terrorists are reportedly getting help from murder-minded Arab Muslim physicians trained in the West. Infidels beware: Dr. Jihad's version of the health-care oath omits the "no" in "Do no harm."The death docs may be using their expertise to play "Hide the IED" in body cavities that bomb-detection equipment cannot penetrate. At least one Saudi operative has been nabbed with explosives in his bum, and British intel picked up on Arab-website chatter last year about possible breast-bomb inserts. Officials are now said to be on the lookout for physicians' notes requesting that passengers be allowed to carry syringes -- which could carry detonation chemicals.Lest you shrug off reports of these literal booby-traps as empty fear-mongering, listen up:"It's more than aspirational," one U.S. official told the Wall Street Journal. "They're trying to make this happen."There should be no shock at the role of purported healers in these and other hellish plots to destroy masses of innocent lives in the name of Allah. Anyone who still clings to the bleeding-heart belief that poverty breeds terrorism -- including, alas, our commander-in-chief -- is willfully blind to history and present reality.Medical charities have long served as front groups for jihad. Palestinian jihadists used ambulances owned and operated by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) -- subsidized with billions in American tax dollars -- to ferry explosives and gunmen from attacks. Hezbollah terrorists used ambulances as props in Lebanon to stage anti-Israel propaganda and elicit sympathy from Western media.And radical Islam's bloody perversion of the medical profession traces back to the Egypt-based Muslim Brotherhood, the global terror operation that wooed wealthy young docs and other intellectual elites with cushy union benefits.

● Ayman al-Zawahiri, a surgeon from a family of doctors, was raised in the Muslim Brotherhood, was helmed the murderous Islamic Jihad, and masterminded myriad al-Qaeda plots before succeeding Osama bin Laden this summer.

● Former Hamas leader Abdel Rantissi, bent on wiping out the children of Israel, was a pediatrician.

● Convicted al-Qaeda scientist Aafia Siddiqui studied microbiology at MIT and did graduate work in neurology at Brandeis.

● Rafiq Abdus Sabir was a Columbia University grad who served as an emergency-room physician in Boca Raton, Fla., before his terrorism conviction in 2007 for agreeing to provide medical aid and treatment to wounded al-Qaeda fighters so they could return to Iraq to kill American soldiers.

● Rafil Dhafir, an Iraqi-born oncologist, practiced in New York before being convicted in 2004 on 59 criminal counts related to violating Iraqi sanctions and committing large-scale medical-charity fraud.

● A den of well-heeled jihadi doctors from around the world was implicated in the 2007 London/Glasgow bombings. At least one of the convicted terror MDs worked for Britain's National Health Service.

● Mahmoud al-Zahar, another bloodthirsty Hamas biggie and medical doctor, described his specialty to a New York Times reporter in 2006 this way: "'Thyroids: I'm very good at cutting throats,' Dr. Zahar said, drawing his forefinger across his neck as a rare smile spread across his face."

Evil zealots who'll use children as human shields won't hesitate to employ revered caregivers as human explosive-enablers. They've warned us for years. Days after the 2007 terror-doc conspiracy unraveled in London, a Church of England clergyman, Andrew White, recounted to National Public Radio a warning he received from a Sunni fanatic in Amman, Jordan: "I listened to him for 40 minutes, and he went on about how they were going to destroy Britons and Americans and how they were going to be doing more in the U.K. and U.S., and he finished by saying 'those who cure you will kill you.'"How many more Dr. Jihads are operating in the open, exploiting our borders and tolerance, wielding medical licenses to kill?Hmmmm........"Don't worry it won't hurt, you'll feel nothing"?Read the full story here.

• Three Ways to Tell If a Muslim Charity Supports Jihad.(Aina).The Chicago-based Zakat Foundation of America, a 501©3 non-profit, was founded in 2001, and presents itself in a benevolent light: Zakat Foundation of America (ZF) is an international charity organization that helps generous and caring people reach out to those in need. Our goal is to address immediate needs and ensure the self-reliance of the poorest people around the world with Zakat and Sadaqa [acts of worship] dollars of privileged Muslims and the support of other generous donors.Does the Zakat Foundation of America merely help, in an innocent charitable way, "the poorest people" or is it a front for jihad? Part of the answer comes in the identity of the Muslim thinkers the foundation promotes. Chief among them is Yusuf al-Qardawi, spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood who in 2009 declared his hope that before his death, even if he was wheelchair-bound, he would be able to "shoot Allah’s enemies, the Jews, and they will throw a bomb at me, and thus, I will seal my life with martyrdom."Another answer comes in the organizations with which the charity is associated. A number of organizations in the United States have already been identified as Muslim Brotherhood front groups by the FBI. The Zakat Foundation of America works with at least two of the 29 groups the bureau has specified as falling into this category--the Islamic Center of North America (ISNA) endorsed the Zakat Foundation as an organization with "a strong history of immediate and effective responses to national and international disasters" and featured in several of the Zakat Foundation promotional videos. The other Muslim Brotherhood-affiliated group the Zakat Foundation collaborates with is the Muslim Students Association (MSA), having designed printed material guiding MSA activists on "How to start a successful halaqa group in your Masjid," "How to Help Neighbors in Need," and "Starting a Food Pantry."Finally, there is the question of how the Zakat Foundation distributes its funds. The Caipirinha Foundation, the charitable organization created by anti-Israel documentarian Iara Lee and her billionaire husband George Gund III, utilized Zakat as a fiscal sponsor for a grant to the Foundation for Human Rights and Freedom and Humanitarian Relief (IHH). The IHH is part of the "Union of Good," an umbrella coalition of Hamas-affiliated organizations led by Qaradawi. The Foundation supports the IHH's efforts to disrupt Israel's self-defense, describing last year's controversial flotilla as a "heroic effort."Given these intimate connections to radical figures and Muslim Brotherhood fronts, it's safe to characterize the Zakat Foundation of America as another component in the jihad.Hmmmmm.......Obama: “I am committed to working with American Muslims to ensure that they can fulfill zakat”. Read the full story here.

• Obama Officials Misled Congress Regarding Scope of Illegal Immigration Deportation Dismissals According to Documents.(JudicialWatch).Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, announced today that it has obtained documents from the Obama Department of Homeland Security (DHS) showing that DHS officials misled Congress and the public about the scope of an immigration enforcement policy change that gave wide latitude to local immigration officials to dismiss illegal alien deportation cases. According to the documents, obtained pursuant to a Judicial Watch Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit, immigration officials sought the dismissal of charges against a wide range of illegal alien criminals, including those convicted of violent crimes, despite claims by the Obama administration to the contrary.The documents concern the response by Houston immigration officials to a June 30, 2010, memo from John Morton, Director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), to all ICE employees instructing local immigration officials to use their discretion in “prioritizing” illegal immigration deportation cases. This new policy resulted in the dismissal of hundreds of immigration cases and an overall 40% increase in deportation dismissals with the City of Houston taking a particularly aggressive approach to the policy’s implementation.In response to calls by members of the Senate Judiciary Committee for more information regarding this new deportation policy, DHS spokesman Matt Chandler said, “The idea that DHS is engaged in ‘selective enforcement’ couldn’t be further from the truth.” However, the documents uncovered by Judicial Watch show that Houston immigration officials moved quickly to implement a broad interpretation of Morton’s memo, earning praise from ICE agency headquarters.Moreover, despite the claims of immigration officials, ICE attorneys sought to block deportation proceeding for illegal aliens with violent crime offenses. A spreadsheet obtained by Judicial Watch lists the specific violent crimes that immigration officials were prepared to overlook. They include: sexual assault, solicitation of murder, aggravated assault, assaulting a police officer, and kidnapping, as well as numerous drug charges.On June 17, 2011, John Morton sent another memo to all field officers, special agents and to the chief counsel further defining the term “prosecutorial discretion.” “In basic terms, prosecutorial discretion is the authority of an agency charged with enforcing a law to decide to what degree to enforce the law against a particular individual,” Morton writes. Critics point out that this is precisely the type of “selective enforcement” the DHS has denied fostering with its new deportation policy.“These documents show that the Obama administration is implementing ‘stealth amnesty,’ which is an end-run around the rule of law and Congress.” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “The Obama administration doesn’t seem to care about its constitutional responsibility to ‘take care that the laws be faithfully executed’ by pushing the selective enforcement of immigration laws. And they are thumbing their noses at Congress and the American people by stonewalling information requests and lying to cover up their stealth amnesty scheme. Congress should initiate a full investigation to get to the truth of the matter. The lawlessness must stop.”Hmmmm.......Thugocracy in motion?Read the full story here.

• Obama Stiffs the Dalai Lama Again.(CommentaryMagazine).Yesterday, House Speaker John Boehner and Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi greeted the Dalai Lama on Capitol Hill. The reception was entirely appropriate. The Dalai Lama is an important symbol not only of the struggle for political freedom against tyranny but also of the value of non-violent protest. But the Dalai Lama won’t be making a stop at the White House during his current 10-day stay in Washington. President Obama is apparently determined to do nothing to anger China and is refusing to give the Dalai Lama another meeting.It is true Obama has already met with the Tibetan leader in exile once. But unlike the reception the Dalai Lama got during the presidency of George W. Bush, the visit with Obama was low-key, and only one photo of the two men together was permitted. From its earlier days in office, this administration has demonstrated little interest in human rights issues. But its penchant for “realist” policies have done nothing to advance American interests.As Elliot Abrams wrote earlier this week on his blog for the Council on Foreign Relations, Obama is making a big mistake. The Chinese only respect strength and the administration’s determination to appease Beijing will pay no dividends for U.S. policy. The Chinese haven’t helped much on Iran or any other outstanding issue but that hasn’t stopped Obama from behaving in a cowardly manner when it comes to any issue that might discomfit the Communist leadership of the world’s largest tyranny. By taking a pass on another meeting with a truly inspirational world figure, all the president has done is to show once again how small a man he really is.Read the full story here.

• "Birth of a Nation"!Behold the Republic of South Sudan.(GlobeAndMail).Church bells rang at midnight to mark the birth of the world’s newest nation – the Republic of South Sudan. Despite the excitement of the independence celebrations and a mood of joyful expectation in its new capital – the Nile River city of Juba – the emerging country faces grim realities: It is one of the most underdeveloped countries on the planet and has only a 15-per-cent literacy rate. Most citizens live on $1 a day. Education and health facilities are sorely underdeveloped, and fears of renewed conflict abound.Despite independence day festivities, there are fears the conflict could be reignited because troops from the north and south are facing off in the contested oil-rich border region of Abyei. South Sudan produces about 375,000 barrels of oil each day, and although negotiators are still working on the specific formula of how the two Sudans will share the oil, the south stands to make billions from its reserves. In the contested region of Abyei, South Sudan’s oil, for now, still has to flow through the north’s pipelines. One observer noted that the problems South Sudan faces are “bigger and harder than what any other country in Africa faced” when most nations on the continent gained independence from the colonial powers in the 1960s.

Flag

It’s the former emblem of the Sudan People’s Liberation Army – black, red and green horizontal stripes, with a gold star in a blue triangle.

President

Salva Kiir Mayardit, 60, a former army officer, who often wears cowboy hats. He is the head of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, the political wing of the rebel army that fought with the north before a peace accord was signed in 2005.

Religion

Mostly Christian (Anglican, Catholic), but many practise traditional African beliefs.

Population

An estimated 8.5 million citizens. At least 80 per cent are illiterate – rising to 92 per cent for women – the majority of civil servants did not finish secondary school and there are estimated to be fewer than 500 trained doctors. More than three million people, nearly 40 per cent of the population, need food aid to survive.

Geography

A landlocked 580,000 square kilometres, roughly equal to France or Texas. Formed from the 10 southern-most states of Sudan, South Sudan is a land of expansive grassland, swamps and tropical rain forest straddling both banks of the White Nile. In contrast, Sudan in the north is mostly desert. Infrastructure is still lacking – with only about 50 kilometres of paved roads. Water remains a luxury in most communities.

Borders

Ethiopia, Kenya, Uganda, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Central African Republic, Sudan.

Exports

Oil. However, South Sudan has the potential to be among the largest food producers in Africa. The country also has hardwood timber, gold, chromium, iron ore and a host of other minerals.

Currency

Not yet decided. Currently the Sudanese pound.Hmmmm.....Time before the next conflict with the Islamic North......Countdown running.Read the full story here.

• Islam's Scourge Returns, his name is: Zakaria Botros.(Aina).Father Zakaria Botros, also known as Islam’s “Public Enemy #1,” is back.Scourge of Islam; lover of Muslims. From around 2005-2010, this 76 year-old Coptic priest was Islam’s bane. Appearing weekly on Arabic satellite, where he was viewed by an estimated 60 million people worldwide, mostly Muslims, he meticulously exposed any number of theological problems with Islam--all from Islam’s own books--while simultaneously evangelizing from his own book, the Bible.His mission “is to attack Islam, not to attack Muslims but to save them because they are deceived. As I love Muslims, I hate Islam.”And he has been effective: Mass conversions to Christianity, open and clandestine, have resulted. Indeed, years back al-Jazeera aired a segment complaining about Fr. Zakaria’s “unprecedented evangelical raid” on the Muslim world; similarly, one Sheikh Ahmad al-Qatani lamented that as many as six million Muslims annually “apostatize” to Christianity. Unsurprisingly, Fr. Zakaria’s exploits caused al-Qaeda to proclaim him “one of the most wanted infidels in the world,” putting a $60 million bounty on his head; undeterred, the priest kept going, his viewers and converts multiplying by the week. Then, in May 2010, after a particularly graphic episode on Muhammad, his shows inexplicably stopped airing. His enemies exulted. Muslim leaders, preachers, and sheikhs appeared on TV, gleefully announcing that Allah had silenced the great enemy of Islam.Yet, over a year after his many foes--external and internal, Muslim and non-Muslim--have managed to stifle him, Fr. Zakaria is back on satellite, now with his own station Fady TV (Redeemer TV), “a channel for those searching for the truth.” Though other Islam-critics and evangelists have appeared on Arabic satellite since, many with a good following, it is clear that people have not forgotten the priest, the original trailblazer of open and honest talk on Islam--the original scourge of Islam.Watching the first episode of his new show, “Knowledge of the Truth,” was like witnessing a reunion between a lost flock and its spiritual shepherd. Viewer after viewer--Christians and Muslims, much more of the latter--called in to express how much they had sorely missed the evangelist, and how happy they were to see him again, some in tears, others in joyous laughter.And while their words were full of sincere and enthusiastic praise--many insisted that he is a living saint, others a modern day St. Paul--it was only when an elderly-sounding woman asserted that everyone must support Fr. Zakaria, not for his sake, but for the sake of his work liberating Muslims from bondage, that the normally stoic Zakaria broke down in tears.Why is Fr. Zakaria so loved--and hated? For starters, as a native Arabic-speaker, he takes his message straight to the heart of the Islamic world; as a man of God, he takes his message straight to the heart of Muslims--something the Western approach cannot achieve.You see, while Western critics are limited to making secular arguments against specific aspects of Islam--for instance, that it is illiberal, intolerant, sexist--he makes spiritual arguments against the very foundations of the religion.This is not to say that Western polemics are not beneficial; they are, in that they awaken Western peoples to the nature of Islam. However, arguing or even proving that Islam falls short of Western/secular standards has little impact on Muslims--except perhaps to make them more tenacious of their faith (the inevitable result of comparing apples and oranges).But an attack on the veracity of the religion itself--an attack articulated through a spiritual as opposed to a secular paradigm--must be confronted by Muslims.In short, Fr. Zakaria’s success rests in the fact that he fights fire with fire; that he speaks the same language Muslims do--not just literally, Arabic, but more importantly, figuratively, the language of religion and faith, the language of God. He cannot simply be ignored.For example, during this, his first episode, he discussed Sheikh Huwaini‘s recent assertions that Islam advocates plundering, enslaving, buying, and selling infidels. Many have written about this anecdote either to show that Islam is intrinsically violent, or that “radical Islamism” is spreading, or that Islamic teachings are incompatible with the West.But Fr. Zakaria takes it a step further--takes it right to the heart of the matter. After asserting that “God created mankind in his image,” he sincerely addressed his Muslim viewers: “Would God truly want you to kill your neighbor, to enslave him? Would the Almighty truly want believers to buy and sell other human beings like animals? Think people! Use your minds, listen to your hearts--for your souls are at stake!”The same reason the secular mindset may find this approach too simplistic or “unsophisticated” is the same reason it is far from comprehending Islam.Still in its early stages of development and financially challenged, Fady TV has yet to reach the Middle East, where the real battle for souls is waged, though the priest is hopeful. The station is set to air entire programs dedicated to examining various topics in depth, including the Koran, the Hadith, Muhammad, and Allah.As I previously did, I plan on following and summarizing Fr. Zakaria’s programs. For more information on this singular priest, read his exclusive 2009 FPM interview, wherein he discussed his life story, including the torments he experienced for preaching to Muslims in Egypt. Also, to get a feel for his very “non-dhimmi” approach, watch his famous “Ten Demands of Islam.”Read the full story here.

• Erdogan 'Israel must apologize and pay 'Diya' a.k.a. blood money to normalize ties'.(Ynet).No apology, no normalization – After delaying the publication of a UN report that probed the events of the Gaza flotilla last May, Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Recep Erdogan said on Friday it was "unthinkable" to normalize ties with Israel unless the Jewish state apologized for the killing of nine pro-Palestinian Turkish activists aboard the Gaza-bound Turkish ship.Erdogan also said in the text of a speech to parliament seen by Reuters that lifting an Israeli blockade on the Palestinian territory of Gaza and paying compensation to the victims of the raid were also conditions for the normalization of relations.The Palmer committee was appointed by UN General-Secretary Ban Ki-moon to investigate the events that led to the death of nine activists onboard the Mavi Marmara.Last week, it was reported that Israel's representative to the UN inquiry committee Yosef Ciechanover, his Turkish counterpart and other officials were shuttling between Jerusalem and Ankara in an attempt to soften the report's conclusions and improve relations between the countries.Hmmmm.....Why in Gods name would Israel even try to soften the Palmer report?Read the full story here.

• Why Muslim Demands for Headscarves Are Exaggerated.(Aina).Islamic attire for women--the burqa and hijab--are back in the news, though with a twist, as they cause problems and lawsuits in America, where they are legal. In France, however, they have been banned, and Muslim women are happily complying.There is an instructive reason for this.In France, where Islamic dress is altogether banned, a new report suggests that Muslim women are happily complying--indeed, more Muslim women are traveling to France than before the ban:

Wealthy Gulf tourists are expected to continue to flock to France this summer in spite of a law that prohibits Muslim women from wearing the burqa, travel agencies said. Travel industry experts had initially feared a decline in Arab tourists after the April ban on full veils but now report no decline in peak-season bookings to France. Hotels.com, the parent company of the online travel website expedia.com, has seen a 219 percent increase in the number of searches for France from its Arabic Middle East site from April 1 to date. Searches for Belgium, which in 2010 passed a bill banning any clothing that would obscure the identity of the wearer, have increased 300 percent the website said.Lest you think these Gulf women are any less pious than their American counterparts, there is a simple reason for why they are complying:

Islam’s doctrine of taysir allows for hiyla, or the relaxation of Islamic law whenever Muslims find it inconvenient to uphold aspects of Sharia law, like when they are under infidel/Western authority. In fact, some of Islam’s top leaders, Sheikh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, for example, are great advocates of taysir, “especially for those Muslim minorities living in Europe and America.”Taysir is like a broader concept of taqiyya, which permits Muslims to lie when circumstances call for it, while taysir only permits Muslims to drop aspects of Sharia law when circumstances call for it.But there is another distinction. The Gulf women traveling to France are tourists who are not nearly as acquainted with the West as their American counterparts. They naturally assume the West is like the Islamic world--actually tenacious about its customs and laws, hardly to be pushed around by minority groups. (This is precisely why Muslims in the West shamelessly push for the Ground Zero mosque — Muslims in the Middle East can’t believe it and think it’s a Zionist conspiracy.)Muslims living in the West, on the other hand, know how easily the West can be pushed into submission, so why settle for the Muslim option of taysir when they can score a victory for Islam--and make some money while at it?Read the full story here.

• Iran's killing spree stifles Arab spring.(Ynet).As the Arab spring flourishes throughout the Middle East, Iran, one of the region's most prominent targets on Amnesty International's watch list seems to be an "island of calm". The reason, according to Iranian human rights groups, international watchdogs and country experts is that Tehran is pursuing a campaign of public intimidation and covert killing to subdue political opposition and quell turbulence caused by the region's revolts while claiming that it is cracking down on drug trafficking and other criminal activity. According to Amnesty International, Iran has admitted executing 190 people between January and the end of June this year; an additional 130 reported executions have gone unacknowledged. These figures put Iran on course for a record year for capital punishment. In 2010, 252 people were executed, according to official figures, with 300 more also believed to have been killed.In a report on Iran's "judicial killing spree" Britain's Guardian newspaper presents testimonies from various human rights organizations that claim to have a truer picture of the human rights situation in Iran. Iran Human Rights, an independent monitoring organization alleged that 25 people were hanged in one day, July 3, in Ghezel Hesar prison in Karaj, west of Tehran. The hangings, supposedly all drug-related, were not reported by official media. The same report said another seven people were hanged the same day in Evin prison in Tehran. It alluded to further uncorroborated mass executions in prisons in Khorasan province in 2010.The number of public hangings is also on the increase. Since the start of 2011, up to 13 men have been executed in public, eight of them since 16 April, an Amnesty report this year stated.Iran meanwhile reportedly defied international law to become one of the only countries to execute two juvenile offenders on 20 April. Overall, Iran's execution "average" is running at almost two people per day in 2011, making the regime the world's number two executioner after China.Decrying Iran's execution "binge", Mark Wallace, a former US ambassador and president of the United Against Nuclear Iran action group, said Tehran must be forced to stop. In an article for the Los Angeles Times he said "the international community needs to call for an end to this kind of barbarism and highlight more broadly the deteriorating human rights situation"."It is no coincidence that Iran's increased staging of public executions came at the same time protest movements were gaining steam through the Middle East. What better way to keep Iranians from having 'dangerous ideas' like those of their neighbors? "And it should come as little surprise that Iran is now aiding other governments in the region, notably Syria, in their efforts to suppress domestic uprisings." This latter claim was recently corroborated by the US treasury department.Shirin Ebadi, the Iranian Nobel peace prizewinner, joined human rights organizations in February this year in appealing to Iran to impose a moratorium on executions – but after a brief pause following a spate of adverse international publicity; the pace of judicial killings has accelerated again. "The Iranian authorities have shown that they are no longer content to repress those contesting the re-election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad by arresting and convicting them – they have shown they will now resort to execution. Hmmmmm.......Obama doesn't want to be seen meddling in iran's politics.Read the full story here.