Note: You may notice the new Subject Name Moriel Be Alert

That is just to help us continue to serve you in this world of SPAM.

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false."
--- William Casey, Director CIA (Quote from internal staff meeting notes 1981)

According to my favorite ex-NASA Source this quote is true, but only our LORD and William Casey know for sure.

What I do know is that the media seems to do a pretty good job on it's own spreading disinfo, and the government would probably only do what it does best in trying to help them along and that is mess it up.

BE/\LERT!

Picture Gallery: 1) Ahmadinejad's Aug 22nd reply? 2) Madonna's Lost Adventures 3) Signs in the heavens: Superfast Neutron Star traveling faster than 1500 km/s

4) Israel's Star Wars 5) As in the days of Noah: Man to revive extinct beasts from frozen cells

Mark 4:22
"For nothing is hidden, except to be revealed; nor has anything been secret, but that it would come to light.

'Fauxtography': The media scandal continues
WORLDNETDAILY - By Michelle Malkin -  August 15, 2006 - It's the story that the journalistic elite would rather just go away. In the aftermath of Reuters' admission that one of its photographers, Adnan Hajj, had manipulated two war images from Lebanon after bloggers smoked out his crude Photoshop alterations, and all 920 of his Reuters photos were pulled, evidence of far more troubling photo staging and media deception in the Middle East continues to pour in.

Charles Johnson of Little Green Footballs calls it "fauxtography."

One of Hajj's photos was an iconic image of a dusty dead child with a clean blue pacifier clipped to his shirt, paraded by a corpse handler at the site of an Israeli airstrike in Qana, Lebanon. Mainstream journalists have sneered at bloggers' suspicions, first raised at EU Referendum, that some of the gruesome photos from that scene may have been staged. Washington Post photographer Michael Robinson-Chavez, who was at Qana, huffed: "Everyone was dead, many of them children. Nothing was set up." But last week, a German television station aired damning video footage from the scene showing a lead propaganda director (dubbed the "Green Helmet Guy") positioning a young boy's corpse, yanking it from an ambulance, placing it on two different stretchers for the cameras and pushing bystanders out of the way for clearer shots.

This Lebanese version of horror film director Wes Craven was identified by the Associated Press in a softball profile as "Salam Daher," who told the reporter, "I am just a civil defense worker. I have done this job all my life." To clear-eyed readers, that's an inculpatory statement, not an exculpatory one. How many more "jobs" has Daher overseen? And how many more media stage managers like Daher are out there?

Not all photographers overseas have their heads in the sand. Last week, Middle East-based photographer Bryan Denton, whose work has appeared in the New York Times, revealed on the professional photography website Light Stalkers that he had observed routine staging of photos and even corpse-digging by Lebanese stringers:

"[I] have been witness to the daily practice of directed shots, one case where a group of wire photogs were choreographing the unearthing of bodies, directing emergency workers here and there, asking them to position bodies just so, even remove bodies that have already been put in graves so that they can photograph them in people[']s arms."

Denton noted that he had witnessed the photo choreography at numerous protests and evacuations, as well as at an Israeli airstrike location in Chiyeh, Lebanon. Denton followed up with a second post reporting that respected photographer friends of his in Lebanon informed him that "this was not an isolated incident" and that "this has been something [I]'ve noticed happening here, more than any other place [I]'ve worked previously."

Which is probably why bloggers have noticed so many copious examples of phony-looking scenes from countless pristine stuffed animals lying in the foreground of destroyed buildings, to artfully placed Qurans amid scenes of destruction, to a snow-white wedding dress on a mannequin standing in the middle of a street surrounded by piles of rubble, to intact cars photographed on Lebanese roadsides and dubiously labeled as being struck by Israeli missiles.

Miscaptioning (which always makes Israel look worse, never Hezbollah, go figure) adds another dimension of fauxto deception. One Associated Press image of an anguished father carrying his dead 5-year-old daughter into a Gaza City hospital last week blamed the death on an Israeli airstrike. Charles Johnson found a correction of the caption revealing that the girl had been killed in a swingset accident. I found a Reuters photo of an 18-month-old girl with two broken legs that was pulled by the wire service in late July after being included among a photo set of hospital patients injured in an Israeli air raid. In truth, the girl had been admitted for a "routine hospitalization."

Then there was the New York Times' misrepresentation of a half-naked young man sprawled Pieta-like, appearing dead, amid Tyre rubble. The original Times website photo caption? "The mayor of Tyre said that in the worst-hit areas, bodies were still buried under the rubble ..." Turned out the "dead" man was a "rescue worker" who was supposedly "injured" (with his baseball cap tucked neatly in his arm as he closed his eyes and flung his head back) and had been photographed in several other scenes running around the bombing site.

Isolated incidents? In a rare moment of candor, CNN's Anderson Cooper revealed the routine mechanics of Hezbollywood propaganda tours last week: "I was in Beirut, and they took me on this sort of guided tour of the Hezbollah-controlled territories in southern Lebanon that were heavily bombed ... they clearly want the story of civilian casualties out. That is their what they're heavily pushing, to the point where on this tour I was on, they were just making stuff up. They had six ambulances lined up in a row and said, OK, you know, they brought reporters there, they said you can talk to the ambulance drivers. And then one by one, they told the ambulances to turn on their sirens and to zoom off, and people taking that picture would be reporting, I guess, the idea that these ambulances were zooming off to treat civilian casualties, when in fact, these ambulances were literally going back and forth down the street just for people to take pictures of them."

"Just making stuff up." Remember that.

Meanwhile, the media ostriches carry on. Joe Elbert, Washington Post assistant managing editor for photography, told ombudsman Deborah Howell smugly: "We don't use tools to change reality." Newsflash: You are the tools being used.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=51548

CNN Int'l snubs Israeli civiliansz
Highly unbalanced report mostly ignores plight of Israeli civilians, portrays Israelis as soldiers and politicians in suits, while coverage from Lebanon features in-depth interviews with Lebanese civilians and images of children and ruins; no mention of large number of Israelis displaced from their homes in north

YEDIOTH AHRONOTH (YnetNews) - By Yaakov Lappin - August 15, 2006 - The anatomy of bias: A CNN International in-depth report from Israel and Lebanon unveiled the full extent of bias at work behind the global news network's coverage of the Israel Hizbullah war.
Scant attention is paid to Israeli civilians, while a long report featuring images and interviews of Lebanese civilians followed. The report's startling lack of representation of the suffering experienced by so many Israeli civilians stood in stark contrast to the interviews and video footage taken of Lebanese children and scenes of wreckage shown from across Lebanon.

The report began with an account of Haifa by a CNN female correspondent. During the report, there is a single, brief image of Israeli civilians, sitting at a café in Haifa. The picture remains on the screen for a number of seconds, before the journalist is seen being interviewed by the CNN anchor.
"Well some Arab Israelis were very upset when rockets struck their homes and three people died, and all of them were Arab Israelis, and they were complaining that they have hadn't been built bunkers like Israeli Jews in this city," said the journalist, answering a question about relations between Jews and Arabs in Haifa. She later said the answer depended on "who you asked."
The report did not mention any Israeli casualties, and no interviews with Israeli civilians were conducted.
Other than a momentary statistic appearing on the screen, there is no mention of the large number of Israelis who have become displaced from their homes in the north, and the journey home which awaits them to homes possible destroyed by Hizbullah rockets although on the Lebanese side of the border, the report takes a long look at the return of Lebanese refugees to their homes in southern Lebanon.
There were no interviews from Israeli hospitals, and no mention made of the million Israelis who had been living in bomb shelters for almost a month. Also glaringly absent were images of destroyed homes and buildings across northern Israel.
A report then followed by CNN's Paul Hancocks, focusing exclusively on Israeli domestic politics. "The military battle for Israel's prime minister is over for the time being. The political battle has just begun. Critics claimed Olmert has gone to war hastily and ill prepared," said Hancocks, before film of Olmert's Knesset speech was shown. The report showed internal Knesset wrangling and the ejection of two Knesset members.
By the time CNN's correspondents had completed their coverage from Israel, it became clear that CNN had little interest in placing individual faces and names to the suffering on the Israeli side, let alone mentioning the extent and scope of the war damage.
Second half very different
The second half of the report, by CNN's Ben Wiederman, was dramatically different.
The report was saturated with images of Lebanese children playing in ruins, blood stains, destroyed buildings, and personal accounts of Lebanese families attempting to head back to south Lebanon.
It was introduced by CNN's anchor, who said: "Nasrallah also acknowledged the deaths and the destruction of the Lebanese homes, but he said Hizbullah would be ready to help rebuild."
"It was a morning like so many other recent mornings in Tyre. And then there was silence. The ceasefire went into effect at 8 AM local time. And with the prospect of calm, it didn't take long for many of Lebanon's refugees, estimated at more than a million, to pack their belongings, and head south towards home," Wiederman said.
" Beirut's Sinara park has become a temporary refuge. But Monday morning some decided it was to go back. To what, they weren't sure," he added.
Beginning one of a number of interviews with Lebanese civilians, the report continued: "'We're returning to our village but we're not sure if we'll be able to get there,' said this man from a village outside Tyre."
Suggesting that Israel would target Lebanese civilians heading back to Lebanon, Wiederman said: "Last week Israel warned that it would target any car south of the Litani river. The warning remains in effect. But few seem to heed it. Rather they chose to savor the thought that Hizbullah has emerged from this war in their opinion victorious."
"The 33 day conflict has left the Lebanese economy in ruins. Thousands of homes have been destroyed by Israeli land air and sea bombardment, and over a thousand Lebanese, mostly civilians, have been killed during the fighting," Wiederman continued, as images of Lebanese children and wrecked debris flashed across the screen.
Wiederman's report was then followed by an item on the struggle aid workers to get into southern Lebanon.
During earlier coverage on Sunday, CNN chose the word "resistance" to describe Hizbullah's actions in Lebanon a term used by Hizbullah - as well as Hamas - to describe their own attacks - implicitly presuming that armed jihad organizations are 'resisting' and defending against aggression, rather than initiating it.
A succession of images followed, showing a Lebanese woman alone among ruins, followed immediately by a photograph of smiling Israeli soldiers with guns raised in the air. No context or explanations of when and where the photos were taken are provided.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3291328,00.html

Psalms 33:17
A horse is a false hope for victory;
Nor does it deliver anyone by its great strength.

Proverbs 21:31
The horse is prepared for the day of battle,
But victory belongs to the LORD.

Isaiah 31:1
Woe to those who go down to Egypt for help
And rely on horses,
And trust in chariots because they are many
And in horsemen because they are very strong,
But they do not look to the Holy One of Israel, nor seek the LORD !

Hezbollah defeated 'gay' Israeli soldiers
WORLDNETDAILY - By Aaron Klein - August 16, 2006 - JERUSALEM Israel 's military campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon was a "failure" and demonstrated to Palestinian groups the Jewish state is weak and can ultimately be defeated, a senior terror leader here told WorldNetDaily in an interview.

The leader, Abu Oudai, chief rocket coordinator for the Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades in the West Bank, said Hezbollah's "tremendous victory" has emboldened his group and other Palestinian terror organizations to immediately coordinate violence against Israel and to focus their "resistance" on rocket attacks.

"I think the most important achievement this war in Lebanon demonstrated is that Israel with all its power, its air force, its tanks, its navy and its unlimited budget can be defeated," said Abu Oudai.

"If we do [what Hezbollah accomplished], this Israeli army full of gay soldiers and full of corruption and with old-fashioned war methods can be defeated also in Palestine."

"See the hundreds of Israeli tanks that the Mujahedeen had destroyed; the aircraft that were shot down; the Israelis most of them soldiers that Hezbollah killed. But above all the promise Hezbollah kept that no matter what the Israeli army will do and no matter how deep it will get inside Lebanon, Hezbollah will keep shooting the Israeli sites in the north of Israel (with rockets)."....

Olmert's claims of victory 'delusional'

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's government this week accepted a United Nations cease-fire resolution that effectively ended the Jewish state's month-long confrontation against Hezbollah during which the terror group fired nearly 4,000 rockets into Israel.

Some analysts question whether the cease-fire will hold. Thousands of Israeli troops will maintain positions in Lebanon until an international force together with the Lebanese Army deploys in the southern sections of the country.

In an address to the Knesset Monday, Olmert said the cease-fire was a substantial achievement for Israel.

"There is no longer a state within a state, an entity that exploits Lebanon's weakness," he said.

Olmert said Israel's military campaign in Lebanon had "changed the strategic balance in the region" to Hezbollah's disadvantage.

He claimed Hezbollah's vast arsenal of weapons had been largely destroyed and the terror group's self-confidence was undermined. His comments aroused audible scoffs from other Knesset members.

But Abu Oudai said his group feels there is "no question" Israel lost the war. He called Olmert's statements of victory "delusional."

"Nobody will deny that Hezbollah won. It won not only because it fought for more than 30 days on the ground against the soldiers whom we thought were the best in the world, not only because the Israeli raids did not prevent it from shooting its missiles, but because after 30 days of battles the truth is that the last confrontations took place very close to the Israeli borders.

"The military plans of Hezbollah on the ground, the ability to adapt the plans to the Israeli plans and tricks, the fact that even after Israeli sieges from the air, from the sea and on earth Hezbollah succeeded to re-supply its fighters with weapons, it succeeded to keep in contact with them on all levels of the command and that its bunker system was a fatal and deadly trap for the Israelis.

"Hezbollah won because it shows that the Arab and Muslim world and its resistance had finally imposed a new equation destructive Arab missiles versus destructive Israeli air raids; Arab refugees in Lebanon lead to Israeli refugees inside Israel. It is a totally new equation that marks a new era in the Middle East. It marks the beginning of the Arab and Muslims renaissance."

Abu Oudai said there was "no chance" an international or Lebanese force would stop Hezbollah from maintaining arms or from regrouping in south Lebanon.

"Only dumb, stupid and blind people can think that any international or local force can prevent the organization from keeping its military posts in the south and from receiving arms supplies from all around the world," said Abu Oudai.

"I must admit that some of the United Nations International Force In Lebanon members had a very friendly and cooperative attitude toward Hezbollah. And can you imagine Hezbollah being defeated by thousands of soldiers who will be deployed with no political interest and with no enthusiasm on the ground?"....

Abu Oudai said while Hezbollah took a "major hit" and lost many fighters the past month, the group's infrastructure in Lebanon was not minimized. He said Hezbollah still has the ability to fire hundreds of rockets per day into Israel.

The terror leader's estimates of Hezbollah's capabilities coincide with those of many senior military intelligence officials here, who say Hezbollah strongholds in the central regions of south Lebanon remain intact.

The officials told WND because the Israeli Defense Forces were not authorized to conduct a large-scale ground assault to the Latani River about 18 miles into Lebanon until two days before this week's cease-fire was imposed, major nearby cities such as Tyre were not cleaned out of Hezbollah fighters. Tyre and surrounding areas were routinely used by Hezbollah to fire rockets into northern Israeli cities.

Military officials tell WorldNetDaily that from the start of Israel's campaign in Lebanon last month, the IDF petitioned for the deployment of up to 40,000 ground troops to advance immediately to the Latani River taking up the swath of territory from which most Hezbollah rockets are fired and from there work their way back to the Israeli border while surrounding and then cleaning out Hezbollah strongholds under heavy aerial cover.

But Olmert at first only approved aerial assaults. After Hezbollah retaliated by firing large numbers of rockets into Israel, the Olmert government approved a smaller ground offensive of up to 8,000 soldiers who according to military officials were not directed to advance to the Latani. The IDF was charged with cleaning out Hezbollah's bases within about three miles of the Israeli border.

IDF leaders told WND they suffered in "very specific" ways on the battlefield because of a lack of sufficient ground troops. They cited instances in which they claimed there were not enough soldiers to surround key villages, such as Bint JBail in southern Lebanon, allowing Hezbollah fighters to infiltrate cities after the IDF began combat inside the areas.

After nearly four weeks of fighting, Olmert's cabinet last week approved the larger assault the IDF had petitioned for, authorizing about 40,000 troops to enter Lebanon and advance to the Latani River. The IDF estimated it would need about three days to reach central Lebanon and another four to six weeks to successfully wipe out the Hezbollah infrastructure in the areas leading back to the Israeli border. But Monday morning three days after the Israeli army was given a green light to advance a cease-fire was imposed and the Jewish state suspended operations.

"Hezbollah's infrastructure in areas nearing the Latani was not destroyed," said a military official.

The official pointed to this Sunday's volley by Hezbollah one day before the cease-fire was imposed of over 240 rockets into Israel, the largest number the group has fired so far. One Israeli civilian was killed in the attacks; 26 others were injured.

"The message sent is that Hezbollah absolutely maintains the capability of firing hundreds of rockets per day into Israel. Wasn't one of the military campaign's main goals to eliminate the rocket threat?" commented the military official.

' Israel ripe for attack'

Abu Oudai said Israel's actions in Lebanon sent his group a message that Israel is weak and is ripe for attack. He said his group's rocket infrastructure, of which he is in charge, is the key to Israeli defeat.

"We learned what we already started to discover after Israel's Gaza withdrawal was implemented that if there is faith and real commitment to Jihad we can beat and defeat the Israeli army.

"There is no doubt that one of our immediate conclusions is that we should appropriate very soon strategic tools such as missiles and more important things to built a military system that can enable us to survive the Israeli war machine. This takes time, but Gaza was the first proof, Lebanon now is one more, better proof that the Israeli army can do little if we can hold more than a few weeks in front of its war machine and lead attacks.

"If we succeed to have improved rockets and we are doing our best to have them and to shoot them even if the army will invade us, it would be the beginning of the end of the occupation."

'Hezbollah is our model'

Abu Oudai also said Palestinian "resistance" groups should model themselves after Hezbollah and attempt to conduct guerilla warfare against Israel's army and not just "martyrdom operations" against Israeli civilians.

"We are working hard to carry out all kinds of attacks, but this is time to work silently and to prepare the war like Hezbollah did in the last six years. The war imposed high standards of military actions especially from Hezbollah. This should be our leading model for the future.

"If we do so, this Israeli army full of gay soldiers and full of corruption and with old-fashioned war methods can be defeated also in Palestine. The best is if it is a war in more than one front, and I believe it is not an impossible scenario." ....

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=51553

"Star Wars" agency helps Israel on rocket threat
REUTERS - By Jim Wolf - August 15, 2006 - HUNTSVILLE, Alabama - The Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency has begun working with Israel to help find ways to counter enemy rockets, a much shorter-range threat than the "Star Wars" mission to block ballistic missiles for which is it known, the head of the agency said on Tuesday....

The U.S. Missile Defense Agency grew out of the so-called "Star Wars" Strategic Defense Initiative launched by then-President Ronald Reagan in 1983. It is building a multibillion-dollar shield designed to thwart all classes and ranges of incoming ballistic missiles.

The United States has a long history of high-tech joint projects with Israel, including co-development of the Arrow, the system Israel has deployed to defend against short- and medium-range missiles.

Until now, the Missile Defense Agency -- noted for its work on layered defense against intercontinental missiles -- has not been known to be involved in addressing the rocket threat to Israel from Lebanon's Hizbollah fighters.

Israel 's defense ministry recently asked the Pentagon for information about a next-generation chemical-laser system for intercepting short-range Katushya and Kassam rockets, Globes Online, an online publication, reported on Sunday.

The system at issue, called Skyguard, is built by Northrop Grumman Corp. and based on a tactical high-energy laser the company co-developed with the Israeli army in the 1990s. Northrop, based in Los Angeles, had no immediate comment.

Company officials told reporters July 12 they were awaiting a show of interest from Israel to kick off an export-license request for the updated system.

Israel is interested because of the threat from Hizbollah rockets to strategic sites including oil refineries and chemical factories in and around the northern city of Haifa, Globes Online said. ...

http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=technologyNews&storyID=2006-08-15T192136Z_01_N15405759_RTRUKOC_0_US-ARMS-MIDEAST-USA.xml&pageNumber=1&imageid=&cap=&sz=13&WTModLoc=NewsArt-C1-ArticlePage1

The prince of the kingdom of Persia

Zechariah 12:2-3
"Behold, I am going to make Jerusalem a cup that causes reeling to all the peoples around; and when the siege is against Jerusalem, it will also be against Judah. "It will come about in that day that I will make Jerusalem a heavy stone for all the peoples; all who lift it will be severely injured. And all the nations of the earth will be gathered against it.

Israel humbled by arms from Iran
LONDON DAILY TELEGRAPH - By Adrian Blomfield in Ghandouriyeh - August 15, 2006 - Abandoned Hizbollah positions in Lebanon yesterday revealed conclusive evidence that Syria - and almost certainly Iran - provided the anti-tank missiles that have blunted the power of Israel's once invincible armour.

After one of the fiercest confrontations of the war, Israeli forces took the small town of Ghandouriyeh, east of the southern city of Tyre, on Sunday evening, hours before a ceasefire brokered by the United Nations took effect.

At least 24 Israeli soldiers were killed in the advance on the strategic hilltop town as Hizbollah fighters were pushed back to its outskirts, abandoning many weapons.

The discovery helped to explain the slow progress made by Israeli ground forces in nearly five weeks of a war which Hizbollah last night claimed as "a historic victory." Israeli political and military leaders are facing mounting criticism over the conduct of the offensive, which was intended to smash the Iranian-backed Shia militia.

Outside one of the town's two mosques a van was found filled with green casings about 6ft long. The serial numbers identified them as AT-5 Spandrel anti-tank missiles. The wire-guided weapon was developed in Russia but Iran began making a copy in 2000.

Beyond no-man's land, in the east of the village, was evidence of Syrian-supplied hardware. In a garden next to a junction used as an outpost by Hizbollah lay eight Kornet anti-tank rockets, described by Brig Mickey Edelstein, the commander of the Nahal troops who took Ghandouriyeh, as "some of the best in the world".

Written underneath a contract number on each casing were the words: "Customer: Ministry of Defence of Syria. Supplier: KBP, Tula, Russia."

Brig Edelstein said: "If they tell you that Syria knew nothing about this, just look. This is the evidence. Proof, not just talk."

The discovery of the origin of the weapons proved to the Israelis that their enemy was not a ragged and lightly armed militia but a semi-professional army equipped by Syria and Iran to take on Israel. The weapons require serious training to operate and could be beyond the capabilities of some supposedly regular armies in the Middle East. The Kornet was unveiled by Russia in 1994. It is laser-guided, has a range of three miles and carries a double warhead capable of penetrating the reactive armour on Israeli Merkava tanks. Russia started supplying them to Syria in 1998.

Israeli forces were taken by surprise by the sophistication of the anti-tank weapons they faced. They are believed to have accounted for many of the 116 deaths the army suffered. Dozens of tanks were hit and an unknown number destroyed.

The missiles were also used against infantry, in one case bringing down a house and killing nine soldiers. They played an important part in Hizbollah's tactics of using a network of concealed positions to set up ambushes for the Israelis as they inched in. Last night, Hassan Nasrallah, the Hizbollah leader, said his men had achieved "a strategic, historic victory" over "a confused, cowardly and defea-ted" enemy. He said the militia would not disarm, as Israel and the UN Security Council were demanding. It would be "immoral, incorrect and inappropriate," he said. "It is the wrong timing on a pyschological and moral level."

As the militia leader was claiming victory, Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister, defended his handling of the crisis and said that the massive air, ground and sea attack had changed the face of the Middle East. But he admitted that the military and political leadership was guilty of "shortcomings", not least in underestimating the threat from anti-tank weapons.

Critics say that he placed too much faith in the ability of the air force to break the back of Hizbollah and delayed launching a major ground offensive until it was too late.

Benjamin Netanyahu, the Likud Party leader and a rival, said: "There were many failures - failures on identifying the threat, failures in preparing to meet the threat, failures in the management of the war, failures in the management of the home front."

Last night, President George W. Bush blamed Iran and Syria for fomenting the conflict between Israel and Hizbollah. "We can only imagine how much more dangerous this conflict would be if Iran had the nuclear weapon it seeks," he said.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2006/08/15/wmid15.xml

Iran , Syria Praise Hezbollah, Mock U.S.
ASSOCIATED PRESS - By ALI AKBAR DAREINI - August 15, 2006 - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Tuesday that Hezbollah has "hoisted the banner of victory" over Israel and toppled U.S.-led plans for the Middle East. Hezbollah's main backers _ Iran and Syria _ struck nearly identical tones a day after a cease-fire took effect in Lebanon: heaping praise on the guerrillas as perceived victors for the Islamic world and claiming that Western influence in the region was dealt a serious blow.

"God's promises have come true," Ahmadinejad told a huge crowd in Arbadil in northwestern Iran. "On one side, it's corrupt powers of the criminal U.S. and Britain and the Zionists ... with modern bombs and planes. And on the other side is a group of pious youth relying on God."

In Damascus, Syrian President Syrian President Bashar Assad said Washington's plans for the Middle East were turned into "an illusion" by Hezbollah's resistance to the Israeli military during the 34-day conflict.

Israel "was defeated" and Hezbollah "hoisted the banner of victory," Ahmadinejad told the crowd, including many people waving yellow Hezbollah banners and Iranian flags.

Ahmadinejad drew cheers when he said Hezbollah foiled what he called the plans of Washington and its allies "to create the so-called new Middle East."

"The people of the region are also after the new Middle East, but a Middle East that is free from U.S. and British domination," he said. ...

In his address, Ahmadinejad also said his government would stick by its plans to reply on Aug. 22 to a package of Western economic and technology incentives offered in exchange for a suspension of Iranian uranium enrichment.

The U.N. Security Council has told Iran it must halt enrichment by Aug. 31 or face possible sanctions.

Western nations, led by the United States, claim Iran is using its nuclear program as a cover for developing atomic weapons in violation of its commitments under the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty.

Iran denies the allegations, saying its program has the peaceful goal of generating electricity with nuclear reactors.

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/08/15/D8JGVFKO0.html

Iranian Warns Israel to Fear Missiles
ASSOCIATED PRESS - By ALI AKBAR DAREINI - August 15, 2006 - TEHRAN, Iran --

An Iranian hard-line cleric warned Israel on Tuesday that Iran's long-range missiles will land in Tel Aviv if the Jewish state attacks Iran, state-run television reported.

Ahmad Khatami, a mid-ranking cleric, said Israel should bear in mind its monthlong war with Lebanon's Hezbollah guerrillas before considering any threats against Iran.

Boasting that Hezbollah's 40-mile range missiles "turned Israel into a country of ghosts," Khatami declared that Israel would face dire consequences if it "makes an iota of aggression against Iran."

"They must fear the day ( Iran's) 2,000-kilometer (1,250-mile) range missiles land in the heart of Tel Aviv," he said.  

Khatami is a Friday prayer leader in Tehran and a member of the Assembly of Experts, a clerical panel that has the power to choose or dismiss Iran's top leader, but he is not considered a government official.

Tehran perceives international criticism of its nuclear program as carrying a potential threat of military action. The U.N. Security Council has given Iran until the end of August to halt its uranium enrichment activities, or face potential sanctions.

Israel has remained in the background as the United States and several Western allies have stepped up claims that Iran seeks to develop nuclear arms - an allegation Iran denies. But Israel has made no secret that it takes a dim view of Tehran's nuclear aspirations. ...

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/I/IRAN_ISRAEL?SITE=7219&SECTION=HOME& TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2006-08-15-07-41-38

Iran : Victory celebrations, threats to Israel
Thousands of citizens take to streets chanting, ' Lebanon won, Israel destroyed'; dozens of ambulances hold procession in show of empathy with casualties of war. Senior religious figure in Iran warns: 'If Israel and US attack us, we will shoot missiles at Tel Aviv'

YEDIOTH AHRONOTH (YnetNews) - By Dudy Cohen - August 15, 2006 - ... In parades toward the mosques calling "Allah is great, Khamenei is the leader," " Lebanon won with Hizbullah's help," Lebanon is victorious, Israel is destroyed," and "Hizbullah finally won." The daily internet newspaper Rooz Online, run by exiled Iranians, added that the marchers waived flags of Hizbullah and handed out miniature flags to children.

Basij, the volunteer army of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, declared a holiday following the ceasefire declaration. According to reports, most of the signs across Tehran were dedicated to blessing Hizbullah's victory, and were covered in pictures of Hizbullah's leader, Hasan Nasrallah.

Alongside the celebrations, senior religious figure Ahmad Khatamei announced Tuesday that "if the United States or Israel attack Iran, Iran will shoot rockets at Tel Aviv." ...

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3291469,00.html

Iran launches cartoon exhibition on Holocaust
DRUDGE REPORT NEWS FLASH - August 14, 2006 - An exhibition of more than 200 cartoons about the Holocaust opened Monday as Iran's response to last year's Muslim outrage over a caricature of the Prophet Muhammad in a Danish newspaper.

The display, showing 204 entries from Iran and abroad, was strongly influenced by the views of Iran's hard-line president, Mahoud Ahmadinejad, who drew widespread condemnation last year for calling the Holocaust a "myth" and saying Israel should be destroyed.

One cartoon by Indonesian Tony Thomdean shows the Statue of Liberty holding a book on the Holocaust in its left hand and giving a Nazi-style salute with the other.

Masoud Shojai, director of the host Caricature House, said a jury looked through 1,200 entries received after the contest was announced in February by the co-sponsor, the Iranian newspaper Hamshahri.

http://www.drudgereportarchives.com/data/2006/08/14/20060814_154116_flash2.htm

Media Savvy

Iranian president lambasts US on new blog
REUTERS - August 13, 2006 - TEHRAN - Iran's president has launched a Web log, using his first entry to recount his poor upbringing and ask visitors to the site if they think the United States and Israel want to start a new world war.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whose speeches are riddled with anti-U.S. rhetoric, also described how he was angered by American meddling in Iran even when he was at elementary school....

"During the era that ... living in a city was perfection, I was born in a poor family in a remote village," he wrote in a blog dated Friday, after opening with Islamic greetings. 
His origins as the son of "a hard-bitten toiler blacksmith" may have been humble, but he says he excelled at school where he said he came 132nd out of 400,000 in exams to enter university....

"Do you think that the U.S. and Israeli intention and goal by attacking Lebanon is pulling the trigger for another world war?" the president asks visitors to the site, offering them the choice to vote 'yes' or 'no'.

Ahmadinejad describes how in the first grade at school -- for those aged about seven -- he read newspapers with the help of adults about how the then shah of Iran gave Americans living in Iran immunity from prosecution under Iranian laws.

"I realized that Mohammad Reza (Shah) attempted to add another page to the vicious case history which was the humiliation and indignity of the Iranian people versus Americans," he said.

He describes listening ardently to the speeches of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the shah's vociferous critic and later leader of the 1979 Islamic revolution that overthrew the monarchy.

He also discusses Iran's bloody 1980-1988 war with Iraq, in which Ahmadinejad fought as a Revolutionary Guard. ...

http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=topNews&storyid=2006-08-13T162106Z_01_BLA353117_RTRUKOC_0_US-IRAN-PRESIDENT-BLOG.xml&src=rss&rpc=22

Hizbullah 'victory' boosts extremists
THE JERUSALEM POST - By KHALED ABU TOAMEH - August 15, 2006 - RAMALLAH: At least 50 newborn babies in the West Bank and Gaza Strip have been named after Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah over the past month, sources in the Palestinian Authority Health Ministry told The Jerusalem Post on Sunday. ...

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1154525865707&pagename=JPost%2FJP Article%2FShowFull

Matthew 24:7a 

"For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom,…

FBI Says No Connection To Terrorism
WNEM TV-5 MID MICHIGAN - August 14, 2006 - -- The Associated Press out of Caro is now reporting that the FBI says there is no threat to the Mackinac Bridge and that there is no information that directly links the men to terrorism.

Special Agent in Charge Daniel D. Roberts says that the FBI has been working with local authorities from Caro and the State Police. In a press release issued August 14th he stated that local investigation continues even though the FBI has deamed there is no threat to the Mackinac Bridge and no direct connection to terrorism 

It was revealed over the weekend that the goal of an alleged terror plot, uncovered in Mid-Michigan, was apparently to hit the Mackinac Bridge. The plot was revealed in an announcement by the Tuscola County Prosecutor.

This new information comes two days after the three men from Texas were charged by Tuscola County Prosecutor Mark Reene for allegedly targeting the five mile long suspension bridge connecting Michigan's two peninsulas.

There has been no response from the Tuscola County Prosecutor's Office to the information released by the Associated Press. There has also been no word on whether the charges will remain against the three men. The FBI says it will persue all leads and continue to work together with its local partners.

The bridge security had already been increased for several months due to elevated terror alert levels. Cameras on the bridge are monitored so that any suspicious packages or activity will be responded to by authorities.

One theory is that the men weren't targeting solely the bridge itself but the people on it. The Annual Labor Day Bridge Walk has drawn over 60,000 people in the past few years. In 2000 there was an estimated 65,000 people who participated in the Annual Bridge Walk.

The two east lanes of the bridge are used by walkers until 9:30am. To keep I-75 moving the two west lanes will be used for vehicles traveling north and south across the bridge. The National Guard is present in case of an emergency.

The suspects are 21 year old Adham Abdelhamid Othman, 18 year old Maruan Awad Muhareb, and 23 year old Louai Abdelhamied Othman; all are apparently from Texas. The three are all related Adham and Louai are brothers and Maruan Awad Muhareb is their cousin.

All have been charged with one count each of collecting and providing material support for terrorism; and one count of surveillance of a vulnerable target, that target allegedly being the Mackinac Bridge.

State police in Gaylord are reporting that the men bought a large quantity of TracFones from the Wal-Mart in Gaylord on Thursday August 10th around 11:00pm. That number is reported to be 90 cell phones.  The store manager allegedly told police the next day, but it was too late because the men were already on their way to Caro.

Receipts in the van show the men had purchased cell phones in Wisconsin. It is a possibility that the route they took into Michigan from Wisconsin took them across the Upper Peninsula and led them across the Mackinac Bridge. We are currently working with the bridge authority to find out if three men had traveled across the bridge at some point around August 10th.

The van driven by the men contained about one-thousand TracFones. These cell phones are often used by drug dealers because they are cheap and virtually untraceable. They have also been used to detonate IED's or improvised explosive devices.

There are usually three types of IED's, package, vehicle borne, and the suicide bomb. Because these devices are "homemade" they can very in shape and form. They all share the same components: an initiation system, explosive, detonator, a power supply for the detonator, and a container.

It is speculation that the phones where to act as both the initiation system and detonator. Tim Nausler with the Michigan State Police bomb squad says this has all the tell tale signs of using cell phones to detonate bombs.

He says you need two phones to detonate a bomb one to be with the explosive and the other to make the call to that phone. In some instances he says you can detonate with one phone using the alarm clock function. The cell phones contain three of the five ingredients needed to build an IED.

The charges against these men are 20 year felonies. We have also learned the men will face no federal charges. Each of the men was arraigned on August 12th with bond set at $750,000 cash per suspect.

The men purchased the cell phones in Caro around 1:00am which would have given them just enough time to drive directly from the Wal-Mart in Gaylord to the store in Caro. The three men purchased cell phones from the Wal-Mart store on M-81 near the corner of M-24 in Caro early morning August 11th.

Wal-Mart places a limit on the number of cell phones that can be purchased at once, that number is three. The three men allegedly bought 80 by purchasing them three at time so that an alert wouldn't be triggered by the cash register. They also paid cash.

An alert clerk grew suspicious and called Tuscola County central dispatch. The Caro Police Department sent a unit and stopped the rented van on M-81 just east of Caro. The suspects were headed towards Bad Axe on M-81 where there is another Super Wal-Mart.

One man was driving while the other two were in the back opening the phone packages with box cutters throwing the phones in one box, batteries in another and the packaging and phone charger in another container. The suspects had 1000 other cell phones in the van.

The phones were Nokia TracFones selling for $20 at Wal-Mart. For your twenty dollars you receive a phone charger and 40 minutes of airtime. The phones do not have to be registered with a name. Also discovered was a laptop with store addresses and store logos.

The TracFones are a nationwide prepaid wireless phone service and are even offered with international long distance. These phones according to www.tracfone.com don't even have coverage in the Thumb area where they were purchased.

The men have been "cooperative, upfront, not hiding" anything according to police. They also told officers they get stopped frequently and say they buy the phones for $20 and sell them elsewhere for $38. They sell them without the packaging or charger.

The investigation continues at both the state and federal level.

http://www.wnem.com/Global/story.asp?S=5277855&nav=menu97_2

U.S. braces for waves of sky terror suspects
WORLDNETDAILY - August 15, 2006 - The Department of Homeland Security is bracing for waves of terror suspects numbering in the tens of thousands boarding planes bound for the U.S. from foreign airports like Heathrow over at least the next 10 years, according to internal agency documents reviewed by WorldNetDaily.

And more shockingly, DHS admits it won't be able to intercept them all. Thousands each year will get past no-fly-list screening checks even under proposed new rules to improve procedures to vet high-risk passengers. ...

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=51539

Muslims face extra checks in new travel crackdown
THE TIMES of LONDON - By Ben Webster, Transport Correspondent - August 15, 2006 - THE Government is discussing with airport operators plans to introduce a screening system that allows security staff to focus on those passengers who pose the greatest risk.

The passenger-profiling technique involves selecting people who are behaving suspiciously, have an unusual travel pattern or, most controversially, have a certain ethnic or religious background.

The system would be much more sophisticated than simply picking out young men of Asian appearance. But it would cause outrage in the Muslim community because its members would be far more likely to be selected for extra checks.

Officials at the Department for Transport (DfT) have discussed the practicalities of introducing such a system with airport operators, including BAA. They believe that it would be more effective at identifying potential terrorists than the existing random searches.

They also say that it would greatly reduce queues at secur-ity gates, which caused lengthy delays at London airports yesterday for the fifth day running. Heathrow and Gatwick were worst affected, cancelling 69 and 27 flights respectively. BAA gave warning yesterday that the disruption would continue for the rest of the week....

The DfT has been considering passenger profiling for a year but, until last week, the disadvantages were thought to outweigh the advantages. A senior aviation industry source said: The DfT is ultra-sensitive about this and wont say anything publicly because of political concerns about being accused of racial stereotyping.

Three days before last weeks arrests, the highest-ranking Muslim police officer in Britain gave warning that profiling techniques based on physical appearance were already causing anger and mistrust among young Muslims. Tarique Ghaffur, an assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, said: We must think long and hard about the causal factors of anger and resentment. ...

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2313135,00.html

New Terror Plot Arrest
SKY NEWS - August 15, 2006 - Police investigating the alleged UK airport terror plot have arrested a further person in the Thames Valley area.

Scotland Yard said police had now carried out a total of 46 searches at residential and business premises.

They were still searching 22 of these premises.

A total of 20 vehicles have also been searched, although Scotland Yard refused to discuss what officers had recovered.

The further arrest comes as detectives continue to question 23 other suspects.

They allegedly planned to explode liquid-based explosive devices smuggled in hand luggage while in mid-flight. ...

http://news.sky.com/skynews/article/0,,30100-13537588,00.html

Immigrants Swell Numbers Near New York
NEW YORK TIMES - By SAM ROBERTS - August 15, 2006 - Immigrants have continued to surge into metropolitan New York since 2000, according to census figures released today, and that increase, combined with high birth rates, has elevated the foreign-born and their children in New York City itself to fully 60 percent of the population. The rate of change was even more pronounced in the 24 suburban counties around the city, where a record 20 percent of the residents are now born abroad.

The figures, while showing that the citys gains from immigration were not nearly as marked as they were in the 1990s, are nonetheless striking in their detail and magnitude.

In the city, the number of people who identified themselves as Mexicans, here legally or not, soared 36 percent in five years, and not merely as a consequence of improved counting. More than half the residents of Queens and the Bronx do not speak English at home. Nearly one in three black residents in New York City was born abroad.

The trends are reported in the American Community Survey, a new annual version of the federal Census Bureaus long-form questionnaire designed to capture the nations demographic profile in a more timely moving picture, rather than a once-a-decade snapshot.

That moving picture is changing most in the counties just outside New York City. In New Rochelle, where the number of Mexicans rose to nearly 12,000 from under 7,000 in five years, the share of foreign-born residents swelled to 32 percent of the population, up from 27 percent. In Danbury, Conn., a developing magnet for Asian immigrants, the proportion of Asians doubled, to 11 percent of all residents in the states seventh-largest city.

Among children younger than 15, white residents who are not Hispanic have become a minority in the metropolitan area, an indication that within just a few years the New York region will become the first large metropolitan area outside the South or West where non-Hispanic whites are a minority.

Some of the developments in the city over the first half of the decade amounted to modest but significant reversals. In Manhattan and, more recently, Brooklyn, the number of whites actually increased, and the number of blacks in the city, primarily native-born, declined, probably for the first time since the Civil War. ...

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/08/15/nyregion/15minority.html?_r=1&ei=5090& oref=slogin

Psalms 139:13-16
For You formed my inward parts;
You wove me in my mother's womb.
I will give thanks to You, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
Wonderful are Your works,
And my soul knows it very well.
My frame was not hidden from You,
When I was made in secret,
And skillfully wrought in the depths of the earth;
Your eyes have seen my unformed substance;
And in Your book were all written
The days that were ordained for me,
When as yet there was not one of them.

'Aborted' baby born alive, authorities say
WORLDNETDAILY - August 16, 2006 - An investigation into the remains of a baby found at a Hialeah, Fla., abortion clinic in July has determined that the child was born alive, but authorities say it may come down to an interpretation of federal law whether charges will be filed.

The case developed at the end of July when the remains were found in a biohazard bag at "A Gynecologists Diagnostic Center" after an anonymous 911 call reported to police that a child had been born alive, then killed.

Infants' remains at an abortion clinic are not a violation of the law -- unless that child was born alive, in which case the federal Born-Alive Infants Protection Act of 2000 takes effect.

The Miami-Dade County medical examiner and police in Hialeah have been investigating, and now local investigators in the South Florida city have confirmed the child was born alive.

Hialeah Deputy Police Chief Mark Overton recently told WorldNetDaily columnist Jill Stanek that the medical examiner ruled the baby was born alive, but state attorneys were trying to determine if the child was viable, or able to live outside the womb.

At the time the body was found, a lawyer for the owner of the abortion business issued a statement that no crime was committed, and an 18-year-old had had an abortion without complications.

"My clients run an abortion clinic. It's a legal business," Regina DeMoraes-Millan told television station WFOR-TV in Miami-Fort Lauderdale at the time. "Right now police are just investigating a 9-1-1 call."

Police were called to the Hialeah clinic on July 20 after a report that a person identified by Overton as clinic owner Belkis Gonzalez took the infant and placed it in the biohazard bag. But police were unable to investigate because the clinic was closed when they arrived.

After getting the mother's name, police obtained a search warrant, but on July 22 found nothing in their search, Stanek's sources reported.

Then on July 29, after another anonymous tip, officers returned and found the decomposing body in the bag.

Since then, the investigation has gone on, but now Overton has confirmed to Stanek that he's ready to move it to the next level, if a homicide count isn't coming.

"I will make a request to have the case reviewed by a higher authority and go to the media, regardless of the outcome," he told her.

At the time the body was found, a spokeswoman for Florida Right to Life told WND that babies' bodies in an abortion clinic are just "business as usual" for the industry.

Spokeswoman Linda Bell said there are very few protections for the mother, and essentially none for the unborn children, as a "result of legalized abortion in our nation."

Hialeah investigator Det. Tony Rodriquez expressed immediate concern about the situation, too.

"In 24 years in law enforcement, I have never seen a case like this," he had told reporters.

Witnesses told police the woman went in for an abortion, and returned the next day but an abortionist wasn't immediately available. While she was in a room, she gave birth to the child, witnesses told police.

The witnesses said the clinic worker then came in and put the baby in the bag.

Bell said her organization and others concerned about life repeatedly have tried to get basic health clinic rules applied to abortion businesses, without success to date.

"Unfortunately, that's the mentality of this country, that the abortion business is not subject (to rules)," she told WND. "This is the result of that."

One of the witnesses in the case is the mother of the child, police have said.

A report by the Miami Herald said state records show the clinic is one of a group owned and run by the same people. The records show the owner is Gonzalez, of Miramar, who also was listed as the owner of the Miramar clinic that was closed in 2005 after several workers were accused of practicing medicine without a license.

The state Department of Health concluded that one worker, Roberto A. Osborne, failed to treat a woman after giving her an abortion in 2000 and he pleaded guilty in 2005 to performing medicine without a license, a third-degree felony.

Bell also noted the Miramar clinic at one point promoted a cleaning woman to medical assistant so she could assist with abortions. Bell said the woman later pleaded guilty to nursing without a license.

Read Jill Stanek's column today, Homicide in Hialeah or illegal dumping?

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=51549

Luke 21:25-26
"There will be signs in sun and moon and stars, and on the earth dismay among nations, in perplexity at the roaring of the sea and the waves, men fainting from fear and the expectation of the things which are coming upon the world; for the powers of the heavens will be shaken.

Neutron star clocked at mind-boggling velocity
NEWSCIENTIST.com News Service - By David Shiga - August 15, 2006 - A neutron star has been clocked travelling at more than 1500 kilometres per second. It joins the ranks of other fast moving neutron stars, deepening the puzzle over how these dense stellar corpses are accelerated to such astonishing velocities.

Neutron stars are the city-sized spheres that remain after stars are destroyed in supernova explosions. They are incredibly dense a teaspoonful of neutron star material would weigh a billion tonnes.

Many neutron stars are now known to travel at speeds of hundreds of kilometres per second, with one shown in 2005 to be moving at 1100 km/s ( see Fastest pulsar set to escape the Milky Way). Some others have been estimated as travelling faster than 1500 km/s but with less certain measurements: their speeds were measured in an indirect way, based on observations of their effect on the gaseous medium that they move through.

Astronomers have had a hard time figuring out how neutron stars get accelerated to such blistering speeds. Their theoretical models can produce speeds of a few hundred kilometres per second, but these suggest that neutron stars should rarely, if ever, reach more than 1000 kilometres per second.

The neutron star now found to be zipping along at 1500 km/s is providing an even bigger challenge for the models. Its speed was measured by Frank Winkler of Middlebury College in Vermont and Robert Petre of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Centre in Greenbelt, Maryland, both in the US.

Dramatic recoil

Using NASA's orbiting Chandra X-ray Observatory, they took snapshots five years apart of the neutron star RX J0822-4300 in the Puppis A supernova remnant. They found it to be moving 44 millionths of a degree per year. Given the estimated distance of 6500 light years to the supernova remnant, this translates into about 1500 kilometres per second.

The neutron star and some nearby clumps of gas leftover from the explosion are moving in opposite directions. The motion of the gas was measured in earlier studies. "You've got the outer layers of the star going in one direction and the neutron star going in the other direction and that's the first time anyone has seen this so dramatically," Petre told New Scientist.

Such opposite motions are predicted by one popular model of how neutron stars get kicked to high speed, which says that the gas in the explosion gets spewed out preferentially in one direction, causing the neutron star to recoil the opposite way.

Subject to error

"Its a great measurement," says Shami Chatterjee of Cornell University in New York, US, who led the previous study of the 1100-km/s neutron star. "It shows that high velocity neutron stars may be even more common than we think." He adds that the uncertainty in the distance to Puppis A means the neutron star's velocity is subject to error.

The more such neutron stars are found, the harder it will be for current models to explain, says Chris Fryer of the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico, US. Such high speeds sometimes occur in the simulations, but only rarely, he says: "Every time you find a neutron star thats really fast you're pushing all the models to the limits."

Astronomers C Y Hui and Werner Becker of the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Garching, Germany, have made similar measurements of RX J0822-4300, but put its velocity at about 1100 km/s. Petre argues that his team's calculation of over 1500 km/s is more precise, however, because it is based on more measurements.

http://www.newscientistspace.com/article.ns?id=dn9730&feedId=online-news_rss20

Global warming behind disastrous typhoon season in China
AGENCE FRANCE PRESSE - August 13, 2006 - Global warming is contributing to an unusually harsh typhoon season in China that started around a month early and has left thousands dead or missing, government officials and experts say.

"The natural disasters caused by typhoons in our country have been many this year," the head of the China Meteorological Administration, Qin Dahe, said in recent comments on his organization's website.

"Against the backdrop of global warming, more and more strong and unusual climatic and atmospheric events are taking place.

"The strength of typhoons are increasing, the destructiveness of typhoons that have made landfall is greater and the scope in which they are travelling is farther than normal."

The vice minister of the Ministry of Water Resources, E Jingping, also spoke last week about the unusual ferocity, frequency and early arrival of typhoons in China this year.

E said the typhoon season in China normally starts around July 27, but this year the first typhoon hit the southern province of Guangdong on May 18.

"This is the earliest typhoon to hit Guangdong since 1949," he said in a speech.

"The typhoons have come earlier this year, they are strong, the area that they hit is wide and the length of time they last is long."

Natural disasters in China this year have killed 1,699 people and left another 415 missing, the nation's Red Cross Society said last week.

More than 1,300 of those died in weather-related incidents from May to the end of July, the government reported earlier.

Those reports came before the arrival on Thursday last week of Saomai, the eighth typhoon of the season and the strongest to hit China in 50 years.

Saomai killed at least 134 people and left another 164 missing, according to official figures, while local residents have told AFP they fear the death toll could be far higher.

The president of the Washington-based Earth Policy Institute, Lester Brown, told AFP that the weather in China over the past few months is reflective of the worldwide extent of the problem of global warming.

"The emerging consensus in the scientific community is that higher temperatures bring more frequent and more destructive storms," Brown said.

"Our seasons seem to be beginning earlier and ending later."

According to NASAs Goddard Institute for Space Studies, the earths average temperature has risen by 0.8 degrees Celsius (1.4 degrees Fahrenheit) since 1970, he said.

But this is only the beginning of what the UN's International Panel on Climate Change believes will be a rise in temperature for this century of 1.4 degrees to 5.8 degrees Celsius.

"Just imagine what typhoons and hurricanes might be like in the future," Brown said....

Meanwhile, as some areas of China are hit by more typhoons and the resulting floods, other parts of the country are suffering from intense drought, which experts say is another by-product of global warming.

In a landmark report in the mid-1990s, the UN panel predicted that global warming would leave southern China drenched with more rains, while north and western China would suffer worsening droughts.

In Sichuan province, directly to the west of where much of the devastation from the typhoons has occurred, nearly seven million people are currently in urgent need of drinking water due to a severe drought, state press said Friday.

In the southwestern municipality of Chongqing next to Sichuan, the drought is threatening the water supply for 17 million people, according to another state press report on the weekend.

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/08/13/060814034617.4q4pjlvn.html

Male sex sending HIV out of control in Asia: group
REUTERS - By Natalie Armstrong - August 15, 2006 - TORONTO - AIDS is "spiraling out of control" in Asia among men who have sex with other men, activists warned on Tuesday -- and the epidemic is likely to spread because many of these men also marry or have sex with women.

And because the issue of homosexual sex is taboo in many Asian cultures, these men are difficult to identify and reach through public health campaigns, the American Foundation for AIDS Research, or AmFAR, and a group called TREAT Asia said in a joint report.

"Unless we address male to male sex and HIV risks and vulnerability, it is going to have a major impact on the general population because a lot of the people we work with are also married," said Shivandanda Khan of Naz Foundation International, a non-governmental organization that works with men who have sex with men (MSM) in India.

"In our culture it is also compulsory to get married. They have no choice," Khan told a news conference.

Many men who have sex with men are often married, the report said. For instance, 80 percent of men who admit to having sex with other men in China say they hare married or plan to get married.

And many of the men have dangerously false beliefs about sexual health, the report said. Up to half of the men in some areas have never used a condom, the report said. ...

http://today.reuters.com/news/articlenews.aspx?type=worldNews&storyid=2006-08-15T234253Z_01_N15204683_RTRUKOC_0_US-AIDS-MEN.xml&src=rss&rpc=22

White House: Lesser Bird Flu May Be Here
ASSOCIATED PRESS - By LAURAN NEERGAARD - August 14, 2006 - Scientists have discovered possible bird flu in two wild swans on the shore of Lake Erie _ but it does not appear to be the much-feared Asian strain that has ravaged poultry and killed at least 138 people elsewhere in the world.

It will take up to two weeks to confirm whether the seemingly healthy wild mute swans in Michigan really harbored the H5N1 virus or not.

On Monday, the Agriculture Department declared that initial testing had ruled out the so-called highly pathogenic version of H5N1 _ but that they could have a relatively harmless, low-grade H5N1 strain instead.

That's the suspicion, making Monday's announcement almost a practice run for the day the more worrisome Asian strain actually arrives.

"This is not the highly pathogenic avian influenza virus that has spread through much of other parts of the world," said Ron DeHaven, administrator of USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, adding, "We do not believe this virus represents a risk to human health." ...

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/08/14/D8JGD1S01.html

As in the days of Noah

Mammoths may roam again after 27,000 years
THE TIMES of LONDON - By Mark Henderson, Science Editor - August 15, 2006 - BODIES of extinct Ice Age mammals, such as woolly mammoths, that have been frozen in permafrost for thousands of years may contain viable sperm that could be used to bring them back from the dead, scientists said yesterday.

Research has indicated that mammalian sperm can survive being frozen for much longer than was previously thought, suggesting that it could potentially be recovered from species that have died out.

Several well-preserved mammoth carcasses have been found in the permafrost of Siberia, and scientists estimate that there could be millions more.

Last year a Canadian team demonstrated that it was possible to extract DNA from the specimens, and announced the sequencing of about 1 per cent of the genome of a mammoth that died about 27,000 years ago.

With access to the mammoths genetic code, and with frozen sperm recovered from testes, it may be possible to resurrect an animal that is very similar to a mammoth.

The mammoth is a close genetic cousin of the modern Asian elephant, and scientists think that the two may be capable of interbreeding.

The frozen mammoth sperm could be injected into elephant eggs, producing offspring that would be 50 per cent mammoth.

The suggestion that it may be possible to recreate an animal that is at least part-mammoth has emerged from a study of mice by Japanese, British and American scientists....

A team led by Narumi Ogonuki of the Institute of Physical and Chemical Research Bioresource Centre in Tsukuba, central Japan, has demonstrated that sperm better survives freezing if testes, or whole mouse bodies, are frozen.

Even sperm taken from mouse bodies that had been frozen 15 years ago was capable of fertilising mouse eggs and producing pups, the researchers found....

Restoration of extinct species could be possible if male individuals are found in permafrost, Dr Ogonuki said.

If sperm of extinct mammalian species, for example the woolly mammoth, can be retrieved from animal bodies that were kept frozen for millions of years in permanent frost, live animals might be restored by injecting them into oocytes [eggs] from females of closely related species.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2-2312860,00.html

Ezekiel 8:15
He said to me, "Do you see this, son of man? Yet you will see still greater abominations than these."

Colossians 2:8
See to it that no one takes you captive through philosophy and empty deception, according to the tradition of men, according to the elementary principles of the world, rather than according to Christ.

Cash machines urged for churches  
BBC NEWS - August 8, 2006 - A senior clergyman wants cash machines to be installed in churches - because it will help serve the community.
The Archdeacon of Lincoln, the Venerable Arthur Hawes, said people in rural areas sometimes have to travel more than 10 miles to withdraw cash.
He said his idea was inspired by medieval times when churches were used for a range of activities.
But the proposal would need to be approved by the Church of England's own planning authority.
Mr Hawes said: "Already in some churches they have post offices.
"In Lincolnshire, there are lots of churches with rooms built on to them with kitchen facilities and toilet facilities, where people can meet because often it is the only public building left in a village," he said.
The archdeacon said the idea had not faced opposition from parishioners.
He added: "I know we live in a credit card age but we still need cash for some things.
"These people have to travel all that distance, which costs them money, so why not put a cash machine somewhere handy like in a church."
Centre of community
A spokesperson from the Church of England said permission would need to be sought from a church's local diocese before a cash machine was allowed to be installed.
He added: "Increasingly, we are seeing churches coming forward with a range of ideas, which reinforce their position at the centre of their com