McCain Campaign Blasts Obama Trip as Overseas ‘Rally’
http://elections.foxnews.com/2008/07/17/mccain-campaign-blasts-obama-trip-as-overseas-rally/
When Barack Obama embarks on his upcoming trip to Iraq and Afghanistan he will do so as part of a congressional delegation. But top aides for John McCain are casting his voyage as little more than the Obama world tour.
Campaign aides, though seemingly at odds with McCain’s personal view of the journey, described his trip to the Middle East and Europe as an unprecedented global rally that will have zero bearing on Obama’s policies as a U.S. official.
“This is nothing more than a campaign stop and a photo op for Barack Obama to highlight his candidacy for president,” McCain spokesman Tucker Bounds told FOXNews.com, arguing that Obama established his trip as political by declaring his foreign policy views before even leaving the country. Another aide called the trip a “rally overseas.”
“Everything about this trip indicates … it is about promoting his candidacy, and it has nothing to do with the security of the American people,” Bounds said.
The Illinois senator scheduled the trip following criticisms from McCain and his campaign that he had yet to travel to the war zones as a presidential candidate.
Obama’s trip is expected to be divided into two parts. He will travel to Iraq for the first time since January 2006 and to Afghanistan for the first time ever as part of an official delegation, paid for by taxpayers. He also will travel to other stops in Europe and the Middle East as a presidential candidate, paid for by campaign dollars.
Obama says he plans to meet with troops and commanders on the ground as part of a fact-finding mission that could influence his policies with regard to the War on Terror.
Obama spokesman Hari Sevugan said Thursday that the McCain campaign should “stop worrying” about Obama’s travel plans and start correcting the damage from the “Bush-McCain” foreign policy.
“It’s clear that the McCain campaign is getting nervous about being on the wrong side of the Iraq debate. First John McCain wanted Barack Obama to travel with him to Iraq and the campaign used the occasion to raise campaign cash. Now, his campaign is calling Senator Obama’s trip a ‘campaign rally overseas,’” he said in a written statement.
The McCain campaign used some of its strongest language to date Thursday to criticize Obama’s visit.
“Let’s drop the pretense that this is a fact-finding trip and call it what it is — the first-of-its-kind campaign rally overseas,” McCain spokeswoman Jill Hazelbaker told FOX News earlier.
McCain declined to label the trip an outright campaign stop when asked about his aide’s comment Thursday, instead saying he’d “let other people judge.”
“The fact is I am glad he is going to Iraq. I am glad he is going to Afghanistan. It’s long, long overdue if you want to lead this nation and secure our national security,” McCain told reporters.
He later said Iraq and Afghanistan “will not be a place for political rallies or politicization,” but that his European stops could lead to such a scene.
But the presence of election-year American politics may be inescapable. It was that presence that apparently set off concern among German officials, who are reportedly uneasy about a possible Obama speech in front of the Brandenburg Gate, close to where the wall dividing Berlin once stood.
Robert Lichter, president of the Center for Media and Public Affairs, said Obama will need to avoid engaging in political bickering overseas — but that he cannot and should not hide the obvious fact that he is more than a U.S. senator traveling abroad.
“It’s impossible to separate those roles. I’m not even sure that it’s wise to do so. Everything he does now is as a presidential candidate. Everything he does will be interpreted in terms of what kind of president he will be,” Lichter said.
McCain attempted to leave presidential politics behind on recent trips out of the country, to Canada and then to Latin America. But while in Canada, he still took thinly veiled shots at Obama for his positions on free trade, and in Latin America criticized Obama as a flip-flopper — both on the plane to Colombia and in an interview with FOX News in Mexico.
Lichter said that regardless of the potential pitfalls, Obama has an opportunity to comport himself as a statesman — and a potential president.
“He will benefit from (his) popularity abroad, because the media images will show adoring crowds and other world figures saying nice things about him, and it will put him on the level of being a president,” he said. “Part of becoming a viable presidential candidate is convincing people to imagine you as president.”
That image will inevitably be fed by the entourage of media stars who are expected to be in tow once he reaches the Middle East. All three network anchors are reportedly accompanying Obama. The exact timetable of the trip hasn’t been disclosed publicly.
But Republicans are continuing to cast him as just another politician.
The McCain campaign unveiled an eight-minute video Thursday called “The Obama Iraq Documentary: Whatever the Politics Demand.”
The video contrasts past and present statements Obama has made about troop withdrawal, the troop surge and other Iraq debates.
“You’re never wrong if you pretend you gave the right answer all along,” the video says.
The McCain campaign also argues that by laying out his foreign policy platform before he travels to Iraq, Obama is proving that he will ignore the advice of military commanders and that his Iraq strategy is “politically motivated.”
Obama has in recent days downplayed the role of Iraq in the War on Terror, stressing the need to track down terrorists in Afghanistan and prevent nuclear material from falling into the hands of nations like Iran.
He is standing by his plan to remove U.S. troops from Iraq within 16 months of taking office, despite saying recently that he may “refine” his policies after going to Iraq.
“This war distracts us from every threat that we face and so many opportunities we could seize,” Obama said Tuesday.
The Democratic National Committee responded to the latest video on Obama and Iraq by releasing its own videos accusing McCain of echoing President Bush’s policies in the Middle East.
The McCain campaign is trying to “distract attention from John McCain’s real record on Iraq–a record of being inconsistent and being wrong, just like President Bush,” the DNC said in a statement.
Fact Check: Obama's Position on Afghanistan
http://www.newsmax.com/politics/obama_afghanistan_fact_check/2008/07/17/113867.html
WASHINGTON -- Just what is the best way to explain Barack Obama's stand on Afghanistan _ has he shown great leadership or is he a Johnny come lately? Potential Obama running mate Sen. Joe Biden has used both descriptions.
Republicans were quick to point out the discrepancy in Biden's stance Thursday in a case that shows the risk of having a former rival rise to your defense in a political spat.
Biden's criticism came last year when he was running against the freshman Illinois senator for the Democratic presidential nomination, while the praise came this week in response to GOP attacks.
THE SPIN:
As Obama prepares for his first visit to Afghanistan, Republicans are criticizing him for failing to hold a single hearing on NATO's mission in the country as chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee's Subcommittee on European Affairs.
"He's going to go to the American people and say, `I want to be commander in chief,'" Republican presidential candidate John McCain told reporters Thursday, "and yet he has been the chairman of the subcommittee that oversights NATO and he has never had a hearing nor has he ever visited Afghanistan."
South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint, the top Republican on the panel, sent Obama a letter this week urging him to have a hearing on Afghanistan after his visit. DeMint got a response by letter from Biden, who explained the full committee that he chairs has held three hearings on the issue in the past two years.
"Sen. Obama has displayed great leadership on this issue," Biden wrote, pointing out that Obama chaired the confirmation hearing for the ambassador to NATO and nearly a year ago called for the deployment of at least two additional combat brigades to Afghanistan.
But when Obama made the call for those extra brigades last summer in the midst of the primary campaign, Biden had a different take. The Delaware Democrat issued a statement saying Obama had a "Johnny come-lately position" on Afghanistan and was late to the debate.
"Thank you, Sen. Biden, for proving the point that Barack Obama has no credibility on Afghanistan," said RNC spokesman Alex Conant in a statement Thursday.
THE FACTS:
In a February debate, Obama acknowledged he hadn't had any oversight hearings because he only became chairman as he launched his presidential bid. He's not been around Capitol Hill much since then _ nor has McCain.
The subcommittee's jurisdiction includes "all matters, policies and problems concerning the continent of Europe, including the European member states of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization."
Obama may have missed a chance to build his foreign policy credentials by making use of his leadership position. Biden could tell him about that _ he was the leading Democrat on the Europe subcommittee for nearly 20 years and used the position to become one of the Senate's leading foreign policy experts.
But some observers of the committee have said major issues like a war in Afghanistan are typically examined by the full committee _ as Biden argued was more appropriate in his letter to DeMint.
But the RNC pointed out to reporters Thursday that Obama only attended one of the three full committee hearings on Afghanistan that Biden mentioned in his letter. And in Biden's "Johnny-come-late" statement, he criticized Obama for asking only one question unrelated to Afghanistan at that March 8, 2007 hearing.
But the Democrats aren't the only ones with a mixed-message messenger on the issue. DeMint skipped the one hearing that Obama chaired on the NATO ambassador's nomination, and McCain also has missed multiple Armed Services Committee hearings on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars while campaigning for president.
Bin Laden Planning Hiroshima-Type Destruction?
http://www.newsmax.com/weyrich/Bin_Laden_Plans_Hiroshima/2008/07/17/113694.html
Does Osama bin Laden possess nuclear weapons? Has he smuggled these weapons into the United States? Does he have a plan to detonate these weapons in multiple American cities if Israel attacks Iran’s nuclear facilities? Dr. Hugh Cort, president of the American Foundation for Counter-Terrorism Policy and Research, believes the answer to all of these questions is yes.
Cort has assembled a body of evidence which he claims supports the view that bin Laden has a plan for an “American Hiroshima” which will be implemented in the near future. He has sent this material to various U.S. officials, including Robert S. Mueller III, director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). Cort believes that the government is not doing enough to prevent an attack.
Much of his evidence centers around one Hamid Mir, a Pakistani journalist who has conducted the only interview of bin Laden after 9/11. Bin Laden told Mir that he had acquired 20 suitcase nuclear bombs from the former Soviet Union. Mir told Cort that bin Laden’s men have smuggled these bombs into the United States.
His men supposedly are waiting for bin Laden to give them the signal, then seven to ten American cities will be struck. If true it is little wonder that Iran’s leader confidently predicts that the United States will be bombed back to the Stone Age.
Bin Laden supposedly has fulfilled Islamic law by warning the United States that an attack is coming and offering a truce — convert to Islam and you will not be attacked. Refusal to convert to Islam means that an attack against America is justified. Three weeks prior to 9/11 bin Laden warned that the United States would be attacked in an unprecedented way for its support of Israel.
Already bin Laden has called for all Muslims in the United States to leave. Instead of a mass exodus of Muslims from this country, new mosques are opening every few weeks. Muslim schools also are being established, which suggests that families plan to stay here for the foreseeable future. But Yossef Bodansky, director of the Congressional Task Force on Terrorism from 1988 to 1998, has testified that bin Laden has obtained nuclear weapons.
He told Congress that “Osama has recruited former Soviet Special Forces (SPETSNAZ) soldiers to teach al-Qaida how to maintain and operate the bombs.”
Mir, by the way, has suggested that most of the nuclear weapons have been smuggled across the border from Mexico. Opponents of illegal immigration long have argued that they want the border monitored and closed for national security purposes.
Proponents of illegal immigration have maintained that opposition to it is “racist.” Clearly, opponents of illegal immigration have the better case; although if Mir is correct, the door may have been open too long.
Ronald Kessler, chief Washington correspondent for Newsmax.com, interviewed Mueller, who said that he is very concerned about bin Laden having nuclear weapons in the United States, so concerned that the FBI has surrounded mosques in 10 American cities with nuclear radiation detectors. Cort quotes Steve Coll, president of New America Foundation, as stating that these detectors cannot sense enriched uranium when it is shielded in lead. If Islamists have such bombs, no doubt they are wrapped in lead.
Cort says that Secretary of Homeland Security Michael Chertoff does not have a plan in the event that these bombs are detonated. In such a scenario real deaths will come from radiation. If people know how to avoid radiation prior to an attack, there may be many survivors.
If people can devise a radiation-proof shelter in their own homes to survive a detonation, two days later radiation is one, one-hundredth the strength of the initial blast. If people can spend three days in the shelter and then only make brief trips outside once a day, they can defeat radiation. But what credible source has warned people of the potential threat and how they can meet it?
Is all of this just alarmist talk? Has Cort missed something important which would nullify his answers? I have no idea.
It seems more than reasonable that we proceed as if it is true. If it proves to be a false alarm, what have we lost? But if Cort’s research has merit and we are prepared to handle such a situation, we could minimize its terrible impact.
When I asked some U.S. officials why no one in the government is warning people, I was told “we don’t want to unduly alarm people.” Nonsense.
I have great faith that the American people will do the right thing if properly informed. We did in the mid-1950s when told that the Soviet Union could start a nuclear war. We can do so again, but someone with credibility must tell Americans the truth.
Pelosi Calls Bush a 'Total Failure'
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/411594.aspx
CBNNews.com - WASHINGTON - President Bush has been a "total failure" in everything from the economy to the war to energy policy, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Thursday.
In an interview on CNN, the California Democrat was asked to respond to video of the president criticizing the Democratic-led Congress for heading into the final 26 days of the legislative session without having passed a single government spending bill.
Pelosi shot back in unusually personal terms.
"You know, God bless him, bless his heart, president of the United States, a total failure, losing all credibility with the American people on the economy, on the war, on energy, you name the subject," Pelosi replied. She then tsk-tsked Bush for "challenging Congress when we are trying to sweep up after his mess over and over and over again."
White House spokeswoman Dana Perino defended Bush.
"What the president said is a fact - this is the longest a Congress has gone in 20 years without passing a single spending bill, so it's clear that the speaker is feeling some frustration at their inability to do so."
Pelosi's outburst was a departure. Her usual practice in public has been to call Bush's policies a failure - not his presidency or him, personally. Pelosi's remarks are the latest evidence of the Democrats' throw-caution-to-the-wind approach to Bush in the waning days of a presidency weighed down by an unpopular war and soaring gasoline prices.
Election Day, after all, is just over four months away; Bush's successor takes his seat on Jan. 20.
Pelosi's counterpart in the Senate, Majority Leader Harry Reid, long ago took off the rhetorical gloves. Last month, he ridiculed Republicans who sided with Bush on a Medicare bill.
"Who would be afraid of him?" Reid, D-Nev., said as many senators looked on. "He's got a 29 percent approval rating."
The public's view of Congress is even worse. Its approval rating has hit a new low of just 18 percent, down from 23 percent last month, according to a new AP-Ipsos poll. Bush's approval is at 28 percent, about even with the 29 percent rating last month.
Only 16 percent of those surveyed thought the country was moving in the right direction, a new low as well, although statistically the same as last month's 17 percent.
Last week Reid and other Democrats dropped any pretense of trying to fight the president on battles they were likely to lose - even on the most important part of their jobs, which is passing spending bills that keep the government running.
Of the 12 annual appropriations bills, Congress is likely to pass one or two and send Bush a temporary spending fix for the rest. That would have to suffice until a new president takes office, Reid told reporters.
Privately, Democrats have said that either candidate for president - Democrat Barack Obama or Republican John McCain - would be easier to make laws with than Bush. But Reid made clear which he'd prefer.
"I would hope that before we would leave here this year that we would do a continuing resolution that would get us (through) until after Senator Obama becomes president," he said.
Wall Street and Your Pocketbook
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/411051.aspx
CBNNews.com - WASHINGTON - Oil prices are finally falling, stocks are rising - but so are retail prices. So how do they affect you and your wallet and where do things go from here?
A Pleasant Surprise
Investors are hoping that the big rally was only the start of a big move up in stocks.
The Dow climbed 277 points - the biggest one day jump in more than three months.
It closed with some good news on the financial front: oil prices fell for a second day. And the earnings report from Wells Fargo, America's fifth largest bank, showed a 23 percent decline for the second quarter - much better than anyone expected.
"It turned what could have been an ugly situation completely about face and actually pleasantly surprised investors," Harris Private Banks' Chief Investment Officer Jack Ablin said.
Oil fell more than $10.00 in just two days.
It closed at just below $135 Wednesday ($134.60) ,the biggest 2-day drop in 17 years and a 10 percent decline since setting a record high at $147 last week (i.e. $147.27 on July 11).
Some analysts believe the two-day tumble could mean the beginning of a correction in oil.
The sharply rising price has already led to less demand in the U.S, with some Americans altering their driving habits altogether. And some analysts wonder if demand is dropping off in other parts of the world as well.
"A very weak dollar that's supportive of the oil price, maybe some serious demand destruction that is bearish for the oil price. Those are the two factors that are pushing and pulling," said Ray Carbone, president of Paramount Options.
Airlines Feeling the Squeeze
But oil prices haven't only been hitting the pockets of drivers on the road, they've taken a toll on the airlines as well.
As Delta and American Air reported operating in the red in the second quarter of 2008, industry executives came to Capitol Hill looking for help.
"We are deeply, deeply concerned about the future of this industry, and for that matter the entire U.S. economy, given the impact that high oil prices are having on every walk of life," Air Transportation Association CEO Jim May said.
Americans have already felt the pain from rising energy and food prices. And Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke says inflation can't be allowed to take off.
"It's a top priority of the federal reserve to run a policy that's going to bring inflation to an acceptable level," Bernanke said.
Economists are predicting the Federal Reserve will try to do that by keeping interest rates right where they're at when they meet next month.
Christian Counselor Fired for Denying Advice
http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/411302.aspx
CBNNews.com - The battle for gay rights may have cost one Christian counselor her job.
Marcia Walden used to work as a workplace counselor for the Centers for Disease Control.
She says she was fired after referring a lesbian worker at the CDC to another counselor. The woman wanted relationship advice.
Walden told her she had religious convictions against same-sex relationships, and pointed her to a different counselor who could help.
But the Christian worker was accused of "homophobia," and eventually fired.
Both the CDC and the private company that had been outsourced to provide the counselors would not comment to CBN News because because of pending litigation.
South Dakota Docs Told to Comply With Abortion Law
http://www.newsmax.com/us/south_dakota_abortion/2008/07/17/113911.html
PIERRE, S.D. -- Starting Friday, doctors in South Dakota must tell women seeking abortions that the procedure ends a human life and may cause them psychological harm, the state attorney general said.
Planned Parenthood challenged the 2005 law that requires those statements, but a court order that prevented the state from enforcing the law expires Friday.
"Any entity to whom the law applies should be in compliance tomorrow," Attorney General Larry Long said Thursday.
Planned Parenthood, which operates a women's clinic in Sioux Falls that is South Dakota's only acknowledged abortion provider, will comply with the law, spokeswoman Kathi Di Nicola said.
"We will do what the law says, but clearly the law is extreme and flawed and wrong," Di Nicola said.
U.S. District Judge Karen Schreier of Rapid City prevented the law from taking effect while she decided whether it was constitutional. But the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeal last month overruled her order and sent the case back to her for a trial. A date has not been set.
The 2005 law requires doctors to tell women "that the abortion will terminate the life of a whole, separate, unique, living human being." Women also would have to be told they have a right to continue a pregnancy and that abortion may cause them psychological harm, including thoughts of suicide.
Planned Parenthood argues the law interferes in the doctor-patient relationship, requires doctors to tell women untrue things and violates doctors' free-speech rights.
The state argues the law requires doctors to tell accurate information.
The South Dakota Legislature has passed a number of recent laws intended to reduce or eliminate abortions.
A law that took effect July 1 requires doctors to ask women if they want to see sonograms of their fetuses, but women will not be forced to look at them.
State voters in 2006 rejected a ballot measure to ban all abortions except to save the woman's life. A ballot measure this year would ban abortions with exceptions for rape, incest and a threat to a woman's life and health.
Lawmakers: European Banks Aiding U.S. Tax Cheats
http://www.newsmax.com/us/congress_tax_havens/2008/07/17/113725.html
WASHINGTON — European bankers and some of their U.S. clients faced grilling by senators Thursday about offshore tax abuses that investigators believe are costing American taxpayers about $100 billion a year.
The questioning follows the release of a report by a Senate panel accusing the banks of helping commit massive tax evasion and urging establishment of tougher laws to combat offshore tax havens around the world.
The 109-page report by the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs' investigations subcommittee took aim specifically at Switzerland's UBS AG, among the world's largest wealth managers, and Liechtenstein's LGT group, owned by the principality's royal family.
Representatives from UBS were testifying, along with some of LGT's U.S. clients. LGT declined to send a representative.
"While LGT declined to testify for the subcommittee, it has cooperated by sending a senior official of the bank for a lengthy interview," Michael Robinson, a spokesman for the bank said in a statement. Robinson added that the bank had produced all requested documents and answered all questions permitted under Liechtenstein's laws.
Both LGT and UBS came under withering criticism from the lawmakers.
"Tax havens are engaged in economic warfare against the United States and honest, hardworking American taxpayers," said Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., the chairman of the subcommittee. "Today we will look at two banks that relied on secrecy and deception to hide, not just the tax avoidance schemes of their clients, but the actions they themselves took to facilitate U.S. tax evasion."
A federal judge ruled this month that the Internal Revenue Service could serve legal papers to UBS in an expanding probe of U.S. taxpayers who may have used overseas accounts to hide assets and avoid taxes. UBS has said it is cooperating with Swiss and American investigations and will disclose records involving U.S. clients who might have broken tax laws. It also has banned its Swiss bankers from traveling to the United States.
Investigations linked to LGT have been launched in a number of countries since German authorities obtained in February a CD-ROM of some 1,400 alleged tax cheats with accounts at the bank. Germany has since passed the file to other countries, including the United States.
U.S. taxpayers are required to report all their foreign financial accounts if the total value exceeds $10,000 at any point during the tax year. Failure to report the accounts can result in penalties of up to 50 percent of the amount in the accounts.
The subcommittee report said "UBS Swiss bankers targeted U.S. clients, traveled across the country in search of wealthy individuals and aggressively marketed their services to U.S. taxpayers who might otherwise never have opened Swiss accounts."
It said the bank's practices resulted in billions of dollars of U.S. taxpayer money in undeclared accounts that were not disclosed to the IRS. The report said UBS has estimated that it has 1,000 declared accounts in Switzerland for U.S. clients against 19,000 undeclared, with a combined value of $17.9 billion.
While UBS did not technically violate U.S. reporting requirements under the 2001 "qualified intermediary program," it actively assisted clients in structuring their Swiss accounts to avoid disclosure responsibilities with the IRS and thus aided tax evasion, the report said.
In Liechtenstein, the report said the royal family's LGT Group contributed to a "culture of secrecy and deception" that enabled clients to "evade U.S. taxes, dodge creditors, and ignore court orders."
Bill Gross: Euro Overvalued by 30 Percent
http://moneynews.newsmax.com/streettalk/gross_euro_overvalued/2008/07/17/113727.html
While the dollar has dropped to yet another record low against the euro, the greenback will recover in coming months, according to superstar money manager Bill Gross and other heavyweights.
Rising European interest rates have pushed the euro up nearly 35 percent against the dollar over the past three years, to a high of $1.60.
But a growing number of experts believe the economies of Europe will slump even further than the U.S., forcing the European Central Bank to reverse this month's interest-rate increase.
The euro will slip about 6.5 percent to $1.50 by year-end and then slide further to $1.45 by the middle of next year, according to the median of 37 currency analysts surveyed by Bloomberg News.
Gross, co-CEO of Pacific Investment Management Co. (Pimco), has turned bearish on the euro for the first time since the common European currency was created in 1999. Pimco runs the world's largest bond fund.
"We might have hit a point where the euro doesn't have a lot to stand on," Emanuele Ravano, co-head of European strategy for Pimco, tells Bloomberg.
"The euro is ultimately very overvalued. It could be quite a bit lower at some point over the next couple years."
Indeed, based on purchasing power parity, the euro is 30 percent overvalued against the dollar, according to the bond fund. Purchasing power parity means that $1 would buy the same amount of goods and services in the U.S. as its rate in euros would buy in Europe.
"When a currency gets between 25 and 30 percent overvalued, it tends" to revert to the mean, Ravano says. He says a euro drop to $1.5350 is in order.
The Economist's Big Mac Index, which measures purchasing power parity for the purchase of the McDonald's signature hamburger, points to the euro being 22 percent overvalued against the dollar.
As for economic growth, the 15 countries sharing the euro will produce an expansion of 1.4 percent next year, down from 1.7 percent in 2008, according to the median forecast of a Bloomberg survey.
The median U.S. estimate shows growth accelerating to 1.8 percent in 2009 from 1.5 percent this year.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy already has complained that the euro's strength is hurting European exports and could restrain economic growth. Exports from Germany, the continent's largest economy, plunged 3.2 percent in May, the most in four years.
"We're not far off the capitulation point for the euro," says Mitul Kotecha, head of foreign exchange research in London for the investment-banking unit of Credit Agricole.
He predicts the euro will drop to $1.52 by Sept. 30, and $1.45 by next April.
Falling European interest rates will drive the euro lower, experts say. The median forecast in a Bloomberg survey of economists suggests that the ECB will cut its key rate by 25 basis points to 4 percent by the middle of next year.
European Terrorists a Threat to the U.S.?
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/411681.aspx
CBNNews.com - WASHINGTON - European terrorists are trying to enter the United States with European Union passports, and there is no guarantee officials will catch them every time, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said Thursday.
Chertoff's comments on Capitol Hill comes as the country is entering a potentially vulnerable period with the presidential nominating conventions coming up next month; the presidential election in November; and the transition to a new administration in January - all of which may be attractive targets for terrorists.
In his last scheduled appearance before the House Homeland Security Committee, Chertoff said that the more time and space al-Qaida and its allies have to recruit, train, experiment and plan, the more problems the U.S. and Europe will face down the road.
"The terrorists are deliberately focusing on people who have legitimate Western European passports, who don't appear to have records as terrorists," Chertoff told lawmakers. "I have a good degree of confidence we can catch people coming in. But I have to tell you ... there's no guarantee. And they are working very hard to slip by us."
Chertoff and other intelligence officials have delivered similar warnings before, and he offered no new information about specific threats or an imminent attack.
Chertoff reiterated his concern that terrorists could sneak radiological material into the country on small boats or private aircraft. This material could be used to create an explosive device known as a "dirty bomb."
The Homeland Security Department has a strategy to protect against this small boat vulnerability and is testing radiation detection equipment in Seattle and San Diego ports.
Chertoff said that getting out a regulation to prescreen and enhance security of general aviation aircraft coming to the U.S. from overseas is one of his top priorities.
He also said he expects to approve new radiation detection technology this fall.
Responding to a question from Rep. Al Green, D-Texas, Chertoff dismissed any rumor that he is on a list of potential running mates for Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee. Chertoff quipped that the only list he has for next year is a list of vacations.
Chertoff's term as the country's second Homeland Security Secretary ends when a new administration takes over the White House in January.
Nazi-Hunter Says He's Closing in on 'Dr. Death'
http://www.newsmax.com/international/argentina_nazi_hunt/2008/07/17/113794.html
BUENOS AIRES, Argentina -- The world's top Nazi-hunter says he's made progress in finding 94-year-old "Doctor Death," a former concentration camp physician accused of torturing Jewish prisoners as they died and who may have been living for decades in Argentina or Chile.
Efraim Zuroff, head of the Israeli branch of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, was ending a fact-finding mission in the southern reaches of Americas on Thursday, saying he has received clues that may help him capture former SS doctor Aribert Heim.
Zuroff launched the investigation last week in southern Chilean fishing town of Puerto Montt, where Heim's daughter long lived. Zuroff has said she frequently traveled to the Patagonian town of San Carlos de Bariloche in Argentina, which he visited this week.
"What we expected to do _ and so far we have been successful _ is to put in place the tools that will lead to his capture in the next few weeks _ or at the most, months," Zuroff said in Bariloche.
Heim was indicted in Germany after World War II on charges he murdered hundreds of inmates at the Mauthausen concentration camp in 1941. The Wiesenthal center says he injected the corrosive poison phenol directly into the hearts of many and used "other torturous killing methods."
Zuroff says that Heim's children have made no claim to a bank account with euro1.2 million (US$1.6 million) and other investments in Heim's name. To do that, they would have to produce proof that "Doctor Death" was dead.
A reward of euro315,000 (US$495,000) is being offered jointly by the center and the German and Austrian governments for information leading to his capture. Heim tops the Wiesenthal Center's list of most-wanted Nazi war criminals.
The South American probe is part of the Jewish human rights organization's "Operation: Last Chance" _ an effort to bring aging war criminals to justice before they die. If alive, Heim would be 94.
After World War II, Heim was held for two and a half years by the United States military but was released without being tried.
He disappeared in 1962 after he was tipped off that German authorities were about to indict him, Zuroff said.
"You can't obtain justice from someone who engaged in genocide," said Abraham H. Foxman, the U.S. director of the Anti-Defamation League. But he echoed Zuroff's mantra that no crime should go unpunished.
The search for Heim, Foxman said, is meant "to deliver the message to all who in the future would act in similar manners that they will not be able to have a sleepless night."
Saudi and Spanish kings urge religions to join forces
http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/europe/news/article_1417464.php/Saudi_and_Spanish_kings_urge_religions_to_join_forces__Roundup_
Madrid - The kings of Saudi Arabia and Spain on Wednesday urged world religions to join forces in building a more peaceful and harmonious world.
It was time to turn 'a new page for humanity' in inter-religious understanding, which could help the world recover lost values and emerge from confusion, Saudi King Abdullah said on inaugurating the World Conference on Dialogue, a major inter-faith event sponsored by his country in Madrid.
Islam was a religion of moderation and tolerance, the monarch stressed.
Earlier initiatives may have failed because they sought to merge religions, an attempt doomed to failure, because all religions were convinced of their own beliefs despite God being the same for all, King Abdullah said.
Human tragedies were not caused by religions, but by extremism, the monarch explained.
Spain's King Juan Carlos said inter-faith dialogue could help to solve problems including terrorism, hunger, disease and poverty.
Muslim World League Secretary-General Abdullah al-Turki called on delegates attending the three-day conference to produce concrete projects with follow-up plans.
Other guests at the inauguration included Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, Middle East Quartet envoy Tony Blair and US civil rights figure the Reverend Jesse Jackson.
Around 250 Muslim, Christian and Jewish clergy and other experts on inter-religious dialogue, including 15 women, were attending the meeting instigated by Saudi Arabia in what was seen as a ground-breaking move for the highly conservative Muslim kingdom.
Experts and intellectuals including Lebanese Culture Minister Tariq Mitri and Vatican inter-faith specialist Cardinal Jean-Louis Tauran were to analyze questions such as the civilizational foundations of inter-faith dialogue, ways to promote it, and common human values.
The conference, which also includes representatives of Buddhism, Hinduism and Taoism, is taking place against the backdrop of the Middle East conflict and controversy over caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed, but it was expected to shun political questions.
The sessions are closed to the media, with a final communique expected on Friday.
Organized by the World Muslim League, the conference was partly inspired by King Abdullah's unprecedented meeting with Pope Benedict XVI in the Vatican in November 2007, and by the International Islamic Conference for Dialogue in Mecca last month.
Detractors slammed the Madrid conference as a public relations operation by Saudi Arabia after the attacks of September 11, 2001 in the United States, which were carried out mainly by Saudis inspired by Saudi-born Osama bin Laden.
Critics said it was ironic for a meeting on religious tolerance to be sponsored by Saudi Arabia, where others than Sunni Muslims had few right. There were few Shi'a Muslim participants, and none of the Jewish delegates were listed as Israelis, they added.
Yet others praised the initiative, with the World Jewish Congress describing it as a 'significant and timely development.'
Cardinal Tauran said Saudi Arabia's 'act of great courage' had come surprisingly quickly after King Abdullah's meeting with the pope.
Inter-religious understanding should be promoted with 'prejudice-free' religion studies at universities and by training specialists on inter-faith dialogue, the newsletter of Radio Vatican quoted Tauran as saying.
The organizers were believed to have chosen Spain as the host country, because domestic opposition would have made it difficult to stage the conference in Saudi Arabia.
Al-Turki said Spain had been chosen because of the religious tolerance that characterized it when it was partly under Moorish rule for eight centuries until 1492.
Muslims, Christians and Jews lived in a relative harmony in Moorish Spain, known as al-Andalus. 'The image of al-Andalus made us hold this conference in Spain,' al-Turki told the daily El Mundo.
King Abdullah also praised Spain's support to the Middle East peace process and role in promoting the Euro-Mediterranean partnership.
Zapatero is the sponsor, alongside his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan, of the Alliance of Civilizations project to improve understanding between the West and the Muslim world, which has been adopted by the United Nations.
Global Europe: what next for EU foreign policy?
http://www.epc.eu/en/er.asp?TYP=ER&LV=293&see=y&t=2&PG=ER/EN/detail&l=&AI=837
The EU must face up to the challenges arising from the three key drivers of change which are shaping today’s world: economic changes, demography and climate change, Benita Ferrero-Waldner, European Commissioner for External Relations and European Neighbourhood Policy, told an EPC Breakfast Briefing. By looking outward, rather than resorting to “EU-navel-gazing”, the Union can use its “smart” power to turn these to its advantage and strengthen its role on the international stage.
Benita Ferrero-Waldner, European Commission for External Relations and European Neighbourhood Policy, said the Union was “in a delicate pass” and, with or without the Lisbon Treaty, it needs to be an effective, coherent actor on the world stage.
World events will not wait for “EU navel-gazing” following the Irish rejection of the Lisbon Treaty in its June referendum, so the Union must face up to global challenges arising from the key drivers of change.
Key drivers of change
The first is economic change, said Commissioner Ferrero-Waldner, as there is a growing interconnectedness in the global economy and a shift towards emerging economies, with China and India soon to become the world’s second and sixth largest economies.
The EU has to adapt to this, not by creating “fortress Europe” or “pulling up the draw bridges”, but by seeing the opportunities this offers. So it is building up strategic partnerships with these economies, and has, for example, made concrete progress in negotiations with China and Russia on issues such as market access, energy, human rights, etc.
The second driver is Europe’s changing demography. A rising world population will put pressure on scarce resources, leading to migration, civil unrest or state failure. At the same time, it gives the EU an opportunity to welcome young workers from outside its borders (currently, it attracts only 5% of the world’s qualified migrants).
The EU is a strong defender of free trade and investment, and has argued in the World Trade Organisation Doha negotiations for open markets and economic integration to increase global economic welfare.
The Union is also the world’s biggest aid donor, which, insisted the Commissioner, is not just “diplomatic social work”, but an investment in security.
The “youth bulge” in the EU’s southern neighbours has political and security implications, so the Union is using its European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) and relaunching its Barcelona Process as the “Mediterranean Union” at the July 2008 Summit in Paris to help build open societies and opportunities.
On the issue of migration, the French Presidency is proposing an Immigration Pact to help source- and transit-countries manage migration, while “mobility partnerships” are being set up within the ENP to combat illegal trafficking.
The third driver is climate change, which will act as a “threat multipler”, increasing the risk of famine, drought, forced migration, state failure and conflict. At the same time, it gives the EU the potential to develop carbon trading and alternative energy technology, and encourage more healthy lifestyles.
The EU is a world leader in this field - neither the Kyoto Protocol nor the Bali agreement for future global action would ever have been agreed without EU pressure, insisted the Commissioner. Its call for renewable energy to be increased by 20% by 2020 is “groundbreaking”, and this has been reinforced by the G8 calling for emissions to be halved by 2050.
The EU is actively discussing these issues with both Presidential Candidates in the United States, building up good connections for the future.
The Union looking outward
The Commissioner said the challenges facing the Union today are different from those that led to its formation after the Second World War. At that time, it was a case of looking inwards to rebuild democracy and secure lasting peace and prosperity in Western Europe.
Today, in the age of globalisation, the Union needs to look outward, to be a “Global Europe” and manage globalisation in order to defend the interests of European citizens – providing food and shelter and leaving the planet in a fit state for their children. Europe is both a “soft” and a “smart” power.
Working together, EU Member States can multiply their capability for as EU Founding Father Paul-Henri Spaak put it: “Europe consists of small countries - some of which know it and some of which don’t.” However, the Union is not starting from scratch, but rather building on many years of achievements in EU external policies.
Referring to the setback to the Lisbon Treaty caused by the Irish No vote, Ms Ferrero-Waldner quoted the proverb that: “If you find a path within obstacles, it probably doesn’t lead anywhere”. She said there is a real path for Europe to manage globalisation. The Lisbon Treaty is important for this, but building a global Europe is not just a case of building institutions, but also of having the political will to carry this through.
Blair still hopes for Israel-Palestinian peace deal by year-end target
http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1215330993690&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull
International Mideast envoy Tony Blair said Wednesday he still hopes Israel and the Palestinians can achieve peace this year, clarifying a remark attributed to him in a newspaper interview.
The Palestinian newspaper Al Quds quoted Blair as saying he was pessimistic that Israel and the Palestinians will complete a final peace agreement by year's end, and that questions surrounding Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's political fate have complicated the peace effort.
The two sides set a goal of an agreement by the end of 2008 when they restarted peace talks last November at a US-sponsored peace summit.
A statement released by Blair's office quoted him as saying, "I have always said it is possible to get a deal this year, and that remains my view. Of course the situation is difficult, but I am convinced the parties are still working hard for a deal and are determined to achieve agreement by the end of the year."
French FM: France to propose new Middle East peace process with enhanced EU role
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2008/07/15/europe/EU-France.php
BRUSSELS, Belgium: France wants the European Union to play a greater role in the Middle East peace process, and its foreign minister said Tuesday that having a new administration in Washington might provide a good opportunity for that change.
Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner told a European Parliament committee on Tuesday the new plan will not compete with the current American-backed peace plan but rather put the EU "at the heart of affairs."
"We do not carry sufficient weight in the peace process. The EU can't just bankroll, sign checks. We want more political weight," Kouchner said Tuesday as he laid out his government's priorities while France holds the six-month rotating EU presidency.
The EU and its member nations give Palestinians about €1 billion (US$1.6 billion) in aid every year, about double the contribution of the United States.
"This isn't a roadmap competing with the Americans, it's not designed to compete with anyone," he told lawmakers.
However Kouchner noted the change in U.S. government — President Bush is not allowed to run for a third term — would might be a good time for an overall change in the EU's Mideast role.
France has sought to boost its role in the Mideast peace process under President Nicolas Sarkozy and hosted an international donors conference that raised billions for the Palestinians in December.
Kouchner also repeated EU criticism of Israeli plans to build nearly 900 homes in disputed east Jerusalem.
"We won't accept any more settlements, even the Americans have said it strongly. It's something very difficult to put up with," Kouchner said.
Mideast envoy Tony Blair will brief EU foreign ministers on the peace process at a July 22 meeting. Blair is an envoy for the Mideast Quartet — the U.S., Russia, the European Union and the United Nations — which is trying to push the Palestinians and Israel toward a peace agreement.
Kouchner also called for a change of the EU's attitude toward Russia ahead of a September meeting on a new cooperation deal.
"Our relationship with Russia is extremely important ... We have to change our language, we have to talk differently to Russia even though we don't always like the way Russia talks to us," he said.
Most EU nations are eager to have closer ties with Moscow, notably to secure more stable oil and gas supplies amid rising energy prices.
Thousands Mourn Israeli Soldiers
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/411193.aspx
CBNNews.com - Thousands attended Israeli funerals on Thursday for the two fallen soldiers returned in a prisoner exchange with Hezbollah. Their burials ended the two-year campaign for their homecoming.
Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser's remains were returned by Hezbollah Wednesday in exchange for five live Lebanese prisoners and the remains of some 200 Arab fighters.
"I stand here today sad, crying, but proud; proud of my country that fought with me to bring you back, proud of every citizen who thought of you, Eldad, as his brother," Ofer Regev, brother of slain soldier Eldad, said at his funeral. Regev was 26 when he was taken.
"I'm proud to belong to those who love and not to those who hate. And to the entire nation who paid a high price with clenched teeth, they know that camaraderie has no price," he said.
It was Regev and Goldwasser's capture in 2006 that sparked a monthlong war with Lebanon. Whether they died in captivity or during the raid in which they were seized is unclear.
Earlier in the day, mourners buried Goldwasser, who was 31 at the time of his capture.
His widow, Karnit Goldwasser, told mourners that the funeral took place a day before Goldwasser's birthday.
"One day before your birthday I ask, Toush, maybe time will allow the bleeding wounds to heal?" she said, referring to her fallen spouse by his nickname. "Although I am without you, I will always be with you."
Since their capture, Karnit led a two-year campaign to get her husband and Regev released. The effort turned into a nationwide crusade in Israel, replete with bumper stickers, billboards and frequent radio and TV spots.
Although the two IDF reservists were believed to be dead, there was no proof until Wednesday when their remains were returned by Hezbollah in black coffins.
Meanwhile, in Lebanon, the five terrorists released as part of the prisoner swap prayed at the grave of slain Hezbollah military commander Imad Mughniyeh.
Supporters greeted them with enthusiasm, showering the men with rice as they placed wreaths at the grave. The terrorists vowed to keep fighting Israel.
"We swear by God ... to continue on your same path and not to retreat until we achieve the same stature that God bestowed on you," said Samir Kantar, who had been the longest-held Lebanese prisoner in Israel until his release Wednesday.
Kantar was convicted in 1979 of killing a father and his 4-year-old daughter. The girl's 2-year-old sister was accidentally smothered by her mother, who held her hand over the toddler's mouth to stifle her cries while the two hid in a crawl space. An Israeli policeman was also killed.
Some in Israel are concerned about the lopsided prisoner swap and have raised questions about its nation's policy of bringing back its soldiers, dead or alive, at any cost.
Critics contend that Israel's uneven exchanges with terrorist groups only lead to more kidnappings.
ANALYSIS: Hezbollah’s Short-Term Gains, Uncertain Future
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,384761,00.html
BEIRUT — Hezbollah has been on a roll recently, declaring victory after victory, but its long-term strategy is less certain and its recent gains may prove its ultimate undoing.
Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, in a rare public appearance Wednesday night, stood with the five Lebanese prisoners just released by Israel and declared that “the victory achieved in July 2006 is the main factor that produced today's victory.”
That victory: an exchange of the remains of two Israeli soldiers for five Lebanese prisoners and the remains of 199 Hezbollah and Palestinian fighters.
Hezbollah presented the prisoner swap as a validation of its decision in 2006 to launch a cross-border raid to kidnap Israeli soldiers. That resulting war led to what Hezbollah calls the "divine victory" — that is, that Hezbollah was still standing after a month-long war with Israel, a feat no Arab army had achieved.
But these self-declared victories have come at a price, and the group's ability to survive in the long-term in its current form is now less certain.
Hezbollah’s popularity has declined, as it left much of Lebanon and many of its admirers around the Arab world in distress when it turned its guns on fellow countrymen last May.
Its rationale that it maintained a huge paramilitary force to defend Lebanon from Israel was shattered when Hezbollah used its army to take over parts of West Beirut, a long way from the Israeli border to the south.
But that takeover and Hezbollah’s confrontation with the government of Fouad Siniora by force of arms did in fact lead to talks in Qatar that resulted in a long-sought "unity" government.
On Wednesday, the newly formed Lebanese cabinet met for a class photo, the first complete gathering of ministers since November 2006. The long-awaited cabinet, which sat unfilled for many months, includes 11 pro-Hezbollah ministers — another “victory” that gives the group the power to veto government decisions.
But now Hezbollah faces the task of carrying out the work of the people, in the interest of all Lebanese.
It will have to explain its strategic relationships with Iran and Syria and overcome a deep distrust of its military goals. It will have to change from a resistance group designed to protect the interests of its followers to a conventional political party ready to make compromises in the interest of all Lebanese. It is a change that establishment of the PLO in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank has shown to be difficult, bloody and uncertain.
Hezbollah knows that most Lebanese do not want another war with Israel, and the group must be aware that the bitter experience of 2006 has left Israeli forces in no mood to hold anything back if there is to be a next war.
And Wednesday’s prisoner exchange has left Hezbollah with one less reason to fight Israel, now that Lebanese prisoners have been released from Israeli jails. A move by Israel to pull out of the tiny sliver of land known as the Shebaa farms, encouraged by the U.S. and European powers, would leave Hezbollah with no territory to fight over.
The price may be too high to launch another round of hostilities, and the Lebanese are now looking for jobs, stability, an investment of the petrodollars sloshing around the region — and a reason to remain in the country at all.
The lesson of 15 years of civil war in Lebanon in the 1970s and '80s is that no party is strong enough to win on its own. The lesson of the last 15 years is that without political compromise in this tiny country, civil war remains an option.
Hezbollah now has to show it can become a constructive political force that will not resort to arms to get its way, and show to the Lebanese people that it is not dangerous for the country. As long as it believes it can continue its roll of victories, it may not believe it has to make the difficult changes it needs to make to move into the future.
How Israeli PM wooed, and lost, Christian dollars
http://www.christiantoday.com/article/how.israeli.pm.wooed.and.lost.christian.dollars/20608.htm
An Israeli investigation into fraud and corruption has turned a spotlight on how Ehud Olmert, when mayor of Jerusalem, raised funds from rich American Jews.
Less in view have been fruitful financial ties Olmert enjoyed with evangelical Christians in the United States, a relationship that became strained after the prime minister launched talks with Palestinians that could return parts of Jerusalem to Arab rule.
The police inquiry has focused on allegations that Olmert took cash stuffed in envelopes from Jewish financier Morris Talansky, whom Olmert's lawyers will cross-examine on Thursday.
Investigators do not suggest any wrongdoing in Olmert's dealings with churches and other groups which, according to US and Israeli records reviewed by Reuters, channelled millions to a charitable foundation he headed while Jerusalem mayor.
But the probe of "campaign donations" in cash from Talansky - who served as treasurer of the US arm of that foundation - has drawn attention to how Olmert won and lost Christian support when he opened the door to splitting Jerusalem after campaigning against its division during his 10 years as mayor to 2003.
Olmert raised about $70,000 for the New Jerusalem Foundation at a single Christian fundraiser in Dallas in 2002. But this year, the evangelical leader who helped organise that event voiced "outrage" at Olmert's starting talks about sharing the city with the Palestinians as part of the US-backed Annapolis process. He vowed to "do everything in my power" to prevent it.
Many in the evangelical movement who helped elect President George W Bush believe Bible prophesies foretold the creation of the Israeli state and the Jewish capture of Jerusalem's holy sites as part of a countdown to the end of the world that will include the battle of Armageddon and the Second Coming of Jesus.
Bush himself is a born-again Christian who told Israel's parliament in May the Jews were God's "chosen people". But he has also thrown his weight in his last year in office behind a Palestinian state whose leaders want a capital in Jerusalem.
Before becoming premier in 2006, Olmert raised large sums from Christians who heard him vow to retain Jewish control over all of the city at the heart of both religions - a condition, some believe, for bringing about their biblical vision of world peace, when "they shall beat their swords into ploughshares".
UNITED JERUSALEM
"Olmert...identified the huge potential in Christian support for Israel and he sought to tap into it," said David Parsons of the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem (ICEJ), which promotes cooperation between evangelicals and Israel.
But Olmert angered erstwhile backers when, with Bush, he relaunched talks with the Palestinians at Annapolis in November.
Those talks are at risk if Olmert quits, which he says he will do if indicted. He denies wrongdoing and aides lay blame for his troubles on unspecified opponents of the peace negotiations.
The Jerusalem issue has played into the campaigns to succeed Bush, with Barack Obama and John McCain both courting Jewish and Christian voters - and, in doing so, courting controversy.
When Obama tried to woo Jewish Democrats by saying Jerusalem "must remain undivided", Palestinian leaders protested he was prejudging negotiations. Obama said he had used "poor phrasing".
McCain's drive for support from evangelical Republicans went awry when he had to disown an endorsement from Texan preacher John Hagee - after media reported Hagee's view of the Holocaust as part of God's biblical plan for the Jews to move to Israel.
Some Israelis criticise Olmert for embracing evangelicals, including Hagee, who visited Olmert in Jerusalem in April.
The critics say some Christians' goal in supporting Israel is to provoke the prophesied apocalyptic showdown between good and evil in which Jews must perish or be converted to Jesus.
"Do we still need to point out that Jesus can return only after Armageddon and to this end it is best if Israel continues to be at war?" rival politician Colette Avital wrote last month.
Yet Olmert, who once called the Christian community the most politically powerful in the world, was not the first Israeli politician to tap the evangelicals for money. He was, however, one of the most aggressive after being elected mayor in 1993.
"Olmert gets it," said Yechiel Eckstein, founder of a group that has raised nearly $500 million for Israeli and Jewish causes, mainly from Christians. Eckstein, a rabbi, set up the International Fellowship of Christians and Jews in 1983.
Olmert's bond with evangelicals is rooted in his platform as mayor of keeping Jerusalem united. Palestinians accuse him of spearheading Jewish settlement round the city, dividing Arab East Jerusalem from the West Bank, both occupied by Israel in 1967.
Olmert headed the New Jerusalem Foundation, set up in 2000 to fund charity projects in the city, and records filed with Israel's Justice Ministry show that groups like Eckstein's International Fellowship were among the largest donors.
In Israel, the New Jerusalem Foundation, which is now headed by Olmert's successor as mayor, said in a statement to Reuters that it was not under investigation and described the US branch as a "separate legal entity" that it never oversaw.
Public documents indicate financial links between the two.
MILK COW GOES SOUR
"The United States is one of the best milking cows in the world. You come to the United States and you milk," said Ranan Gissin, an aide to former prime minister Ariel Sharon.
"It's not just the money. It's the political support. We're talking about 70 million people," Gissin said of evangelicals.
Olmert was long a familiar speaker on the US fundraising lunch and dinner circuit. Public records show that, for example, he attended a series of three meetings in churches organised by a group known as the Jerusalem Prayer Team, whose founder Mike Evans's stated mission is "to protect the Jewish people...until Israel is secure and the redeemer comes to Zion".
From 2002 to 2004, church fundraisers organised by the Jerusalem Prayer Team, including the one in Dallas, raised $239,300 for the New Jerusalem Foundation. NJF records say it spent its money on parks, charity meals and other programmes.
But Olmert's relationship with many Christians has soured.
"I think he's changed over the years and power can do that," said one pastor who attended Olmert's fundraisers in the past.
"I don't think it's the same Ehud Olmert that we knew."
Evangelicals did not oppose all talks, Gissin said, but were firmly against "giving away holy real estate like Jerusalem".
A group of Christian leaders, including George Morrison from Colorado, met Olmert in April: "When he was mayor, he found a friend in evangelical Christians and evangelical Christians found someone strong on Jerusalem," Morrison said. But now many Christians were "questioning if he is on the same page".
In a declaration he read to Olmert on behalf of the group, which also included Hagee and Evans, Morrison assured the prime minister that American evangelicals could mobilise to try to stop Bush or his successor pressing Israel into giving up land.
In January, Evans made clear his view of Annapolis: "I was completely outraged when I heard that Ehud Olmert, whom I have known for 26 years, stood next to President Bush and declared that he would work to fulfill the final status solution.
"This means the division of Jerusalem," he wrote on his Web site. "I will do everything in my power to resist that."
Pentagon proposes selling Israel four littoral combat ships
http://www.debka.com/headline.php?hid=5441
The US Defense Security Cooperation Agency has notified Congress of its wish to sell Israel shore-hugging combat ships, spare parts, software and other goods and services worth $1.9 billion. Israel has requested the littoral combat ships to patrol its shores, mainly from Lockheed Martin, General Dynamis and Raytheon. The agency statement said: "It is vital to the U.S. national interest to assist Israel to develop and maintain a strong and ready self-defense capability. This proposed sale is consistent with those objectives."
U.S. to establish presence in Tehran
http://www.christiantoday.com/article/us.to.establish.presence.in.tehran/20618.htm
The United States will announce in the next month that it plans to establish a diplomatic presence in Tehran for the first time in 30 years, a London newspaper said on Thursday.
In a front-page report, the Guardian said Washington would open a U.S. interests section in the Iranian capital, halfway towards opening an embassy.
The unsourced report by the newspaper's Washington correspondent said: "The Guardian has learned that an announcement will be made in the next month to establish a U.S. interests section in Tehran, a halfway house to setting up a full embassy.
"The move will see U.S. diplomats stationed in the country."
Senior U.S. diplomat William Burns said in testimony to Congress last week the United States was looking to opening up an interest section in Tehran but had not made a decision yet.
The Guardian said the development was "a remarkable turnaround in policy by President George Bush who has pursued a hawkish approach to Iran throughout his time in office".
Washington said on Wednesday it was sending Burns to join atomic talks with Iran this weekend to signal to Tehran and others that Washington wanted a diplomatic solution to their nuclear impasse.
Iran says its nuclear work is for peaceful power generation, and not for the development of nuclear weapons as the West suspects, and has rejected conditions it give up uranium enrichment.
On Sunday, President Amhmoud Ahmadinejad suggested Iran would consider any proposal by the United States for a U.S. interests section in the Islamic Republic, should one be forthcoming.
U.S. media have reported that the State Department is considering opening an interests section that could mean U.S. diplomats returning to Tehran but operating under another country's flag.
The United States cut off diplomatic ties with Tehran during the 1979-1981 hostage crisis, in which a group of militant Iranian students held 52 U.S. diplomats hostage at the American embassy for 444 days.
Iran maintains an interests section at the embassy of Pakistan in Washington. Mottaki said it serves the large Iranian community in the United States.
Waiting for Islam's Messiah
http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/411301.aspx
CBNNews.com - QOM, Iran -- Iran's president believes Allah has chosen him to prepare the world for the coming of an Islamic 'savior' called the Mahdi.
But before the Mahdi's return, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad believes there must be global chaos - even if he has to create it himself.
Whether it's his belief that Israel should be wiped off the map, denials of the Holocaust, obsession with going nuclear, or support for radical Islamic terrorist groups, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is a man on a divine mission.
To understand him, and that mission, you have travel to the small dusty village of Jamkaran tucked in a corner of Iran's holy city of Qom.
On a recent Tuesday afternoon, CBN News made that journey heading south out of Iran's capital, Tehran. Some 95 miles, and a couple of wrong turns later, we arrived at the Jamkaran mosque on the outskirts of Qom.
Behind the Jamkaran mosque there is a well. According to many Shiite Muslims, out of this well will emerge one day their version of an Islamic 'savior.'
They call him the Mahdi or the 12th Imam.
Ron Cantrell has written a book about the Mahdi. He explained, "The Mahdi is a personage that is expected to come on the scene, by Islam, as a messiah figure. He is slotted to come in the end of time, according to their writings, very much like how we think of the return of Jesus."
Shiite Muslims believe the Mahdi, a descendent of the Prophet Mohammed, vanished in the middle of the 9th century.
Cantrell told us, "The 12th Imam disappeared, around the age of 9, with a promise that he would return and he would bring Islam to its total fruition as the world's last standing religion."
Enter Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Since becoming the president of Iran in August 2005, Ahmadinejad has emerged as the Mahdi's most influential follower.
Cantrell said, "[Ahmadinejad] has stated that his mandate is to pave the way for the coming of this Islamic 'messiah'."
In almost all his speeches, Ahmadinejad begs Allah to hasten the return of the Mahdi. At a recent military parade attended by CBN News in Tehran, Ahmadinejad said, "Oh, Allah, please facilitate Imam Mahdi's early return and make us one of his supporters."
He said something similar last September just before ending a speech at the United Nations in New York.
Ahmadinejad said, "Oh mighty Lord, I pray to you to hasten the emergence of your last repository [a reference to the Mahdi], the promised one, that perfect and pure human being, the one that will fill this world with justice and peace."
A few days later, back home in Iran, Ahmadinejad told a group of religious leaders that during his UN speech, he felt a 'bright light' around him.
His reactions were captured on video and later posted on a conservative Iranian website.
Ahmadinejad said, "I felt it myself. I felt that the atmosphere suddenly changed, and for those 27 or 28 minutes, all the leaders of the world did not blink. When I say they didn't move an eyelid, I'm not exaggerating. They were looking as if a hand was holding them there, and had just opened their eyes to the message of the Islamic Republic."
Ahmadinejad is reportedly tied to a radical Islamic society in Iran that believes man can hasten the appearance of the Mahdi by creating chaos in the world.
Cantrell explained, "Ahmadinejad has stated that this chaos must take place before the Mahdi can come on the scene."
Some wonder if Ahmadinejad believes these are 'the end times,' and whether his calls for the destruction of Israel and nuclear pursuits are ways to accelerate the divine timetable.
Cantrell further explained, "With him it is a win-win situation. If we attack him, he wins because chaos happens. If we don't attack him, he gets to create the chaos which he has said he is willing to do and he will do."
In Shiite Muslim teaching, the Mahdi's second coming will be marked by apocalyptic times. Wars, famines and floods will ravage the earth and then comes judgment day and a battle between good and evil.
As the sun dips behind the mountains that surround Jamkaran, the faithful, many of whom voted for Ahmadinejad, arrive by the thousands from across Iran to pray for the Mahdi's return.
Ezatallah Alimoradi, a follower of the Mahdi, said, "I feel so refreshed in my spirit when I come here to Jamkaran."
Akram Alsadat Emmami, Follower of Mahdi, said, "This day belongs to the Mahdi and I've come to share my heart with him."
The night begins with a visit to the sacred well. CBN News is given a rare opportunity to visit with people praying there. The opening of the well is covered by a green-like metal box to prevent people from jumping in.
Most of the time here is spent praying and kissing the metal box. Others scribble prayer requests to the Mahdi on pieces of paper that are then dropped into the well.
A man asked the Mahdi to forgive his sins.
A man, Follower of Mahdi said, "If you ask in the right way, your prayers will be answered."
Another person seeks healing for family members.
Emmami explained, "I don't come here just to pray for myself. I also ask the Mahdi to take care of my family and their needs."
Many, like this young boy with a flashlight, believe the Mahdi is actually hiding at the bottom of the well reading those prayer requests.
Abbas Rezaie, Follower of Mahdi, told us, "I was looking into the well with my flashlight hoping to see the Mahdi. But not to tonight."
Shia tradition teaches that if you come to Jamkaran 40 weeks in a row, you will "see" the Mahdi.
A Woman who did not give her name said, "I have not had the privilege to see him yet, but I've had many dreams about him. In one of my dreams I saw a big bright light in the sky and this figure standing over me."
The next few hours are spent praying inside the Jamkaran mosque.
I stood at the entrance to the Jamkaran mosque; and I've been told that as a non-Muslim I am not allowed to go inside the mosque. The truth is every day, tens of thousands of men and women come through this mosque to say their prayers but also to pray that one day soon the Mahdi would return."
Nedal said, "And because we believe that he is going to come back soon we can believe in heaven and hell and we can believe in the life after death."
Ahmadinejad's government reportedly gave $20 million to help renovate the Jamkaran mosque. There are rumors that he's planning to build a railway line connecting Tehran and Jamkaran, to ferry the faithful.
And apparently Ahmadinejad has also drawn up the plans for the road the Mahdi will take when he returns.
Cantrell said, "...that will actually serve as the red carpet rolled out in Iran for the Mahdi to appear."
And if all this wasn't mystical enough, there's also the belief that when the Mahdi comes back, he will be accompanied by Jesus Christ.
Cantrell further explained, "The Mahdi will take Jesus to Mecca, they will circum-ambulate the Kabah together. The Mahdi will teach Jesus to pray; at which time Jesus will then replace the Gospel with the Koran, and then all of us Christians, wherever you are on the face of the earth, will convert to Islam because Islam will be deemed the one lasting pure religion."
As the West drifts closer to a potential showdown over Iran's nuclear program, followers of the Mahdi are getting ready for judgment day.
And many of them are convinced that President Ahmadinjead will fulfill his divine mission to prepare the world for the coming of the Islamic 'savior.'
Iran Briefs Ally Syria on Standoff With West
http://www.newsmax.com/international/syria_iran/2008/07/17/113827.html
DAMASCUS, Syria -- Iran's foreign minister briefed Syria's president Thursday on the international standoff over his country's nuclear program.
The meeting in Damascus signaled Syria's willingness to act on a request by French President Nicolas Sarkozy to try to help resolve the crisis by pushing Iran to cooperate with the international community.
Iran's foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, welcomed a Syrian role in trying to ease the tension, Syria's official SANA news agency reported. Speaking at a news conference, he added that Iran has always kept the Syrians informed of developments in the standoff with the United States and its European allies.
Sarkozy met with Syrian President Bashar Assad at a summit of European nations and other countries bordering the Mediterranean Sea last weekend in Paris. The French president asked Assad to step in and persuade Iran to offer proof that it has no intention of developing nuclear weapons.
Iran's assurances that it only wants nuclear technology for the production of energy have failed to quell suspicions that it is seeking a pathway to an atomic bomb.
Assad promised to relay the request from France to Tehran, but expressed doubts that his intervention would help, despite his country's close ties with Iran.
On Thursday, Assad stressed his view that "dialogue and diplomacy are the only way to settle this issue," SANA reported.
The visiting Iranian foreign minister also met with his Syrian counterpart, Walid al-Moallem, who said at a joint news conference that Iran's peaceful intention "was confirmed to us by our brothers in Iran."
Al-Moallem was also asked by a reporter how his country's indirect peace negotiations with Israel might impact Syria's relations with Iran, whose president has called for Israel to be wiped off the map.
Al-Moallem said the "strategic alliance" between Syria and Iran was strong and would not be shaken by the possibility of a peace treaty with Israel.
Mottaki expressed Iran's support for Syria's aims in the Turkish-mediated peace talks, namely the return of the Golan Heights, a strategic plateau that Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 Mideast war.
"We support the Syrian president's stand in recovering the occupied land," Mottaki said.
Pro-Western Lebanese leader appeals to Iraqi Shiite grand ayatollah for help
http://www.debka.com/headline.php?hid=5442
Our exclusive sources report that Lebanon’s pro-Western Sunni majority leader Saad Hariri resorted to the unheard-of step of a secret visit to the Iraqi town of Najef to seek the help of Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani. He was desperate to check the Hizballah leader, Hassan Nasrallah’s meteoric rise to power in Beirut.
In another development, DEBKAfile’s military sources disclose that Israel’s defense minister Ehud Barak’s visit to Washington, scheduled for this week, was indefinitely postponed. Jerusalem was informed that the Washington-Tehran rapprochement, revealed first by DEBKA-Net-Weekly, is so advanced that no administration official would be available to hear Israel’s concerns regarding Iran, Syria and Hizballah.
A senior administration official told DEBKAfile Thursday, July 17, that this was an unfortunate time for an Israeli minister to come to Washington to discuss these matters.
Israel’s prisoner exchange deal with Hizballah has turned out to have damaged Israel and given Hassan Nasrallah a massive prestige boost in Lebanon and the region. An alarmed Hariri flew to Baghdad on the day the exchange took place with an SOS for prominent Iraqi Shiite clerics to save Lebanon’s Sunni communities from harm at the hands of the Shiite Nasrallah’s Hizballah.
The Lebanese Sunni politician was received on his arrival by Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki. He then traveled in a heavily secured convoy to the Shiite shrine city of Najef to meet Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, the most esteemed doctrinal scholar in the Shiite world, whom not even Iran’s president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or Nasrallah would dare defy.
Our sources disclose that Hariri appealed to the grand ayatollah for a guarantee of protection for the Sunni community’s rights in Lebanon.
This step is unprecedented, especially on the part of a Lebanese politician who until recently was one of the most prominent pro-Western figures in the Middle East. Hariri evidently saw no other way of controlling the damage to Lebanon in the wake of new US-Iranian understandings. He was therefore willing to chance life and limb to make the journey to the Iraqi Shiite domain in search of help against Nasrallah's brutal bid for dominance.
Al-Qaida Draws More Foreign Recruits to Afghan War
http://www.newsmax.com/international/afghanistan_foreign_jihadi_recruits/2008/07/17/113799.html
PESHAWAR, Pakistan -- Afghanistan has been drawing a fresh influx of jihadi fighters from Turkey, Central Asia, Chechnya and the Middle East, one more sign that al-Qaida is regrouping on what is fast becoming the most active front of the war on terror groups.
More foreigners are infiltrating Afghanistan because of a recruitment drive by al-Qaida as well as a burgeoning insurgency that has made movement easier across the border from Pakistan, U.S. officials, militants and experts say. For the past two months, Afghanistan has overtaken Iraq in deaths of U.S. and allied troops, and nine American soldiers were killed at a remote base in Kunar province Sunday in the deadliest attack in years.
Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned during a visit to Kabul this month about an increase in foreign fighters crossing into Afghanistan from Pakistan, where a new government is trying to negotiate with militants.
Two U.S. officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the information, told The Associated Press that the U.S. is closely monitoring the flow of foreign fighters into both Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Jihadist Web sites from Chechnya to Turkey to the Arab world featured recruitment ads as early as 2007 calling on the "Lions of Islam" to fight in Afghanistan, said Brian Glyn Williams, associate professor of Islamic history at the University of Massachusetts. Williams has tracked the movement of jihadis for the U.S. military's Combating Terrorism Center at West Point.
Local Afghans in the border regions are increasingly concerned about the return of the "Araban" or "Ikhwanis," as Arab fighters are known in the Pashtun language, Williams wrote in a CTC paper. He said there were rumors of hardened Arab fighters from Iraq training Afghan Pashtuns in the previously taboo tactic of suicide bombing.
Turkey also appears to have emerged as a source of recruits. Williams estimated as many as 100 Turks had made their way to Pakistan to join the fight in Afghanistan.
"The story of Turkish involvement in transnational jihadism is one of the best kept stories of the war on terror," said Williams, who noted that al-Qaida videos posted on YouTube mention Turks engaging in the insurgency. "The local Afghans whom I talked to claim that the Turks and other foreigners are more prone to suicidal assaults than the local Taliban."
Dozens of Turkish Islamic militants have trained in al-Qaida camps in Afghanistan and taken part in attacks there, said Emin Demirel, an anti-terrorism expert in Turkey. He said images of attacks on mosques or Muslim villages provide propaganda for recruiting young Turkish Muslims.
"Nowadays, they are effectively using the Internet to communicate with fellow militants, and police have difficulty in keeping tabs on several of the jihadist sites," said Demirel, author of several books on Turkish Islamic militant groups. "Turkish courts sometimes locally block access to one particular site, but it is still accessed outside Turkey. Those Web sites eulogize fallen fighters as martyrs in order to recruit among radical Muslim youths."
One example was Cuneyt Ciftci, the German-born son of Turkish immigrants, who took the Arabic nom de guerre of Saad Abu Furqan. In a video obtained last March by the AP, the 28-year-old was shown giving a final hug goodbye to some friends before blowing himself up outside a U.S. military base in eastern Afghanistan.
A Turkish news Web site, Uslanmam, said an Uzbek militant group called Islamic Jihad Union claimed responsibility and eulogized Ciftci as "the brave Turk who has left his luxury life in Germany and came here to go to paradise."
Just a couple of weeks later, newspapers in Pakistan reported that four Turkish nationals with suspected links to al-Qaida had been arrested by authorities on a bus. They were found with explosives, ammunition and jihadi sites on their laptop computers.
A senior official in Turkey's Interior Ministry said it has no information to corroborate claims of an increase in the number of Turks fighting in Afghanistan. The official asked not to be identified because Turkish rules bar civil servants from making statements to the press.
Al-Qaida's recruitment drive stems from a slow and steady resurgence that started in 2002, according to Taliban sources.
"They are awake," said Qari Mohammed Yusuf, who Afghan authorities confirm is a senior Taliban. "They have people going by different names to other countries. They are coming and going easily. In the last year, they have been organizing more day by day."
Al-Qaida has financed the Taliban in both Pakistan and Afghanistan, Yusuf told the AP. In the chaos created by the Taliban groups, al-Qaida has been able to steadily recruit, re-establish its public relations wing, plot new attacks and re-establish areas of operation on both sides of the border.
Some new recruits cross into Afghanistan's northern Balkh province or through Iran into Herat province in western Afghanistan, said Nangyal Khosti, a commander loyal to Jalaluddin Haqqani, a wanted terrorist. Those from Iran have often trained in Iraq and are hardened insurgents. The recruits, Yusuf said, head to Afghanistan's Paktika province, where there are roughly 150 Arab militants.
In Pakistan, al-Qaida recruits are sent to Waziristan and the lawless regions of the northwest along Afghanistan's eastern border, Yusuf said.
Afghan and Western officials say a key route for al-Qaida recruits is from Central Asia into northeastern Kunar and Nuristan provinces, where former U.S. intelligence officials suspect Osama bin Laden is hiding. Both provinces border Pakistan's Bajaur tribal area, where the Taliban hold sway and where the U.S. has targeted al-Qaida's No. 2, Ayman al-Zawahri.
The hulking mountains of Kunar and Nuristan soar thousands of feet and are heavily forested, giving militants good cover. Kunar was the location of the war's two deadliest attacks on U.S. soldiers _ on Sunday, with the killing of the nine Americans, and in June 2005, when militants shot down a helicopter and killed 16 soldiers.
Kunar and Nuristan are also the only areas in South Asia where the Wahhabi or Salafi strain of Islam dominates. Wahhabism is the main sect in Saudi Arabia and is followed by al-Qaida, while Afghanistan's Islamic traditions are more Sufi and mystical in nature.
Naseer Ahmed al-Bahri, who was bin Laden's bodybuard until 2000, told the AP in Yemen last year that al-Qaida has field commanders in countries from Indonesia to Senegal.
While al-Qaida may be sending most of its trainees to Afghanistan and Pakistan, it is probably also creating cells with the mission of attacking Western countries, including the United States, warned Erich Marquardt, senior editor with the Combating Terrorism Center.
"I think we have to accept the fact that al-Qaida has not taken its sights off the far enemy," he said. "Al-Qaida recognizes that it is fighting in multiple theaters and is therefore likely training fighters for different areas of operation."
Coptic Christians Protest for Equal Rights
http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/411335.aspx
CBNNews.com - Coptic Christians protested outside the White House Wednesday, demanding freedom for their fellow believers in Egypt.
The Copts of Egypt are the largest Christian minority in the Middle East.
The government discriminates against them by denying access to higher education and good jobs.
Egyptian authorities look the other way when Copts are persecuted by radical Muslims.
"It's evident to anybody who can... apply logical thinking," one protestor began. "The Egyptian authorities are in partnership with these crimes."
The protesters are calling on U.S. lawmakers to pass a resolution encouraging Egypt to protect Coptic Christians.
China: More Islamic Terror Groups Busted
http://www.newsmax.com/international/china_terrorism/2008/07/16/113234.html
BEIJING -- Chinese authorities issued the latest in a flurry of claimed victories against Islamic terrorist groups Wednesday, as Beijing continues its crackdown on those it accuses of targeting next month's Olympic Games.
Police in the city of Kashgar in the traditionally Muslim Xinjiang region so far this year have demolished a dozen terror cells linked to foreign-based organizations, the official China Daily newspaper reported Wednesday.
The report didn't say how many people had been detained, but said members of the cells were mainly "jobless drifters or ex-convicts."
Last week, authorities said they had detained 82 suspected Islamic terrorists and separatists in the first half of the year across Xinjiang. The suspects were engaged in plots targeting next month's Beijing games, a police official was quoted as saying in state media. The official offered no details or evidence.
It wasn't clear if any of the 82 detained were members of the Kashgar cells, word of which was released only on Wednesday. The report identified the groups involved as the East Turkistan Islamic Movement, or ETIM, reportedly based along China's borders with Afghanistan and Pakistan and linked to al-Qaida; and Hizb ut-Tahrir, which originated in the Middle East in the 1950s, and is banned in several countries.
Radicals among Xinjiang's indigenous Turkic Uighur people have been fighting Chinese rule for decades, although critics say communist authorities fuel resentment in the region with harsh repression and strict rules governing cultural and religious expression.
Experts who study the region say ordinary criminals and nonviolent human rights campaigners are often labeled terrorists, while state media say raids target "illegal religious schools" and "jihad training centers."
Media reports say at least seven terror suspects have been killed this year, while 18 were killed last year in a raid on a training base allegedly run by ETIM.
The reports follow human rights groups' claims that authorities are ratcheting up security and repression ahead of the Aug. 8-24 games in an all-out attempt to shield the event from disruptions that could tarnish China's carefully cultivated image of order and control.
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