Many church-affiliated institutions will have to cover free birth control for employees, the Obama administration announced Friday in an election-year move that outraged religious groups, fueling a national debate about the reach of government.

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Iniquity Abounding

“And because iniquity•Strongs 458:anomia, an-om-ee´-ah; from 459; illegality, i.e. violation of law or (genitive case) wickedness: — iniquity, x transgress(-ion of) the law, unrighteousness. shall abound, the love•Strongs 26:agape, ag-ah´-pay; from 25; love, i.e. affection or benevolence; specially (plural) a love-feast: — (feast of) charity(-ably), dear, love. of many shall wax•Strongs 5594: psucho, psoo´-kho; a primary verb; to breathe (voluntarily but gently, thus differing on the one hand from 4154, which denotes properly a forcible respiration; and on the other from the base of 109, which refers properly to an inanimate breeze), i.e. (by implication, of reduction of temperature by evaporation) to chill (figuratively): — wax cold. cold.”
—Matthew 24:12

In a concession, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said nonprofit institutions such as church-affiliated hospitals, colleges and social service agencies will have one additional year to comply with the requirement, issued in regulations under President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul.

“I believe this proposal strikes the appropriate balance between respecting religious freedom and increasing access to important preventive services,” Sebelius said in a statement.

Yet the concession was unlikely to stop a determined effort by opponents to block or overturn the rule. If they fail, some predicted that religious employers would simply drop coverage for their workers, opting instead to pay fines to the federal government under the health care law.

“Never before has the federal government forced individuals and organizations to go out into the marketplace and buy a product that violates their conscience,” said New York Cardinal-designate Timothy Dolan, president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. “This shouldn’t happen in a land where free exercise of religion ranks first in the Bill of Rights.”

Officials said the administration’s ruling was carefully considered, after reviewing more than 200,000 comments from interested parties and the public. The one-year extension, they said, responds to concerns raised by religious employers about making adjustments. Administration officials stressed that individual decisions about whether or not to use birth control, and what kind, remain in the hands of women and their doctors.

Underscoring the sensitivity of the decision, Obama personally spoke with Dolan on Friday to inform him of the announcement, an administration official said.

The Becket Fund for Religious Liberty, a powerhouse law firm based in Washington that tackles religious freedom issues, predicted in a statement that religious groups “will never pay for abortion drugs in violation of their religious beliefs.” Many religious conservatives consider the morning-after birth control pill to be an abortion drug.

Liberals and women’s rights groups praised the decision, saying that women who work for religious employers should not have to accept a lower standard of health coverage.

“The administration stood firm,” said Nancy Keenan, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America. “As a result millions will get access to contraception, and they will not have to ask their bosses for permission.”

Democratic Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, a member of Senate leadership, said, “The president made the right decision by putting access and the reproductive rights of women first.”

Birth control use is virtually universal in the United States, and most health insurance plans cover the pill, usually with copays. Still, about half of all pregnancies are unplanned.

At issue is a provision of the health care law that requires insurance plans to cover preventive care for women free of charge to the employee. Last year, an advisory panel from the respected Institute of Medicine recommended including birth control on the list, partly because it promotes maternal and child health by allowing women to space their pregnancies.

Sebelius agreed, issuing a new federal regulation last summer.

That rule, however, exempted houses of worship and their employees, as well as other institutions whose primary purpose is to promote religious belief. Churches, synagogues, mosques and other places would not be required to cover contraceptives, it specified.

It was a different story for religious-affiliated hospitals, colleges and social service agencies.

Although many of those employers had not traditionally covered birth control, the new regulation required them to do so. Catholic hospitals, which at a critical moment had defied the bishops to back Obama’s health care law in Congress, immediately sought a broader exemption. On Friday they were denied.

Representing some 600 hospitals, the Catholic Health Association expressed disappointment.

“The challenge that these regulations posed for many groups remains unresolved,” said Sister Carol Keehan, president of the group. “This indicates the need for an effective national conversation on the appropriate conscience protections in our pluralistic society, which has always respected the role of religions.”

The administration says between 1 million and 2 million people work for religious-affiliated institutions, though it’s not clear how many would be affected. Some states already require religious employers to cover the pill.

For religious-affiliated employers, the requirement will take effect August 1, 2013, and their workers in most cases will have access to coverage starting January 1, 2014.

Women working for secular enterprises from profit-making companies to government will have access to the new coverage starting January 1, 2013, in most cases.

Workplace health plans will have to cover all forms of contraception approved by the Food and Drug Administration, ranging from the pill to implantable devices to sterilization. Also covered is the morning-after pill, which can prevent pregnancy after unprotected sex and is considered as tantamount to an abortion drug by some religious conservatives.

However, the new regulation does not require coverage of abortions.

Associated Press writer Julie Pace contributed to this report.

According to its latest annual report, the Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) received $487.4 million in tax dollars over a twelve-month period and performed 329,455 abortions.

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Innocent Blood

“Yea, they sacrificed•Strongs 2076:zabach, zaw-bakh´; a primitive root; to slaughter an animal (usually in sacrifice):—kill, offer, (do) sacrifice, slay. their sons and their daughters unto devils, And shed innocent•Strongs 5355:naqiy, naw-kee´; or ayIqÎn naqiyi (Joel 4 : 19; Jonah 1 : 14), naw-kee´; from 5352; innocent:—blameless, clean, clear, exempted, free, guiltless, innocent, quit. blood, even the blood of their sons and of their daughters, whom they sacrificed unto the idols of Canaan: and the land was polluted•Strongs 2610:chaneph, khaw-nafe´; a primitive root; to soil, especially in a moral sense:—corrupt, defile, x greatly, pollute, profane. with blood. Thus were they defiled with their own works, and went a whoring with their own inventions•Strongs 4611:mah-al-awl´; from 5953; an act (good or bad):—doing, endeavour, invention, work..”
—Psalms 106:37-39

In addition, the number of adoption referrals made by the organization continued to decline.

The latest annual report covers the period from July 1, 2009 to June 30, 2010, the PPFA’s fiscal year. The report states that the organization received “government health services grants and reimbursements” totaling $487.4 million.

Previous Planned Parenthood annual reports showed total funding from “government grants and contracts” (which were $363.2 million in 2009), while this year’s report also accounts for payments from Medicaid managed care plans among the payments the group receives from government .

When compared with previous annual reports, the latest one shows an almost steady increase in the number of abortions performed at its clinics: In 2006, Planned Parenthood did 289,750 abortions; in 2007, it did 305,310; in 2009, it did 331,796; and, in 2010, it did 329,445–a small decrease from the previous year.

The annual report for fiscal year 2008-2009 does not include abortion or adoption figures, but a PPFA Fact Sheet posted on its Web site and said to be current as of September 2010, states that 324,008 abortions were performed at Planned Parenthood clinics around the country in 2008.

According to PPFA’s annual report for fiscal year 2007-2008, in 2007 Planned Parenthood’s “adoption referrals to other agencies” totaled 4,912. In Fiscal Year 2010 that number was 841, a decrease of 82.8 percent.

The PPFA Fact Sheet states that adoption is included in 1 percent of services in 2008 (primary care and “other services” are included in that 1 percent), or 2,405 adoption referrals.

The latest annual report claims that abortion services make up 3 percent of “medical services,” but PPFA states it served 3 million people and performed 329,445 abortions – numbers that show 11 percent of customers received an abortion.

The Fiscal Year 2009-2010 annual report also shows that PPFA’s net assets as of June 30, 2010 topped $1 billion, specifically $1,009,600,000.00.

Marjorie Dannenfelser, president of the Susan B. Anthony List, a pro-life organization that lobbies Congress to defund Planned Parenthood, called the organization an “abortion giant.”

“With over a billion in net assets and a business model centered on abortion and government subsidies, it is time for Planned Parenthood to end its reliance on taxpayer dollars,” Dannenfelser said in a statement. “Despite an unprecedented effort by statewide and federal leaders to defund them, a wave of former employees willing to testify against them, and uniform agreement amongst Republican presidential candidates that they should be defunded, Planned Parenthood continues full-steam ahead.”

“They are unwilling to answer to the pro-life American majority that wants out of this business,” Dannenfelser said.

As reported earlier by CNSNews.com, a spokesperson with Planned Parenthood told Bloomberg’s Businessweek last year that 90 percent of government funding the organization gets is from the federal government or from Medicaid.

Roving security teams increasingly visit train stations, subways and other mass transit sites to deter terrorism. Critics say it’s largely political theater.

New World Order

“And through his policy also he shall cause craft to prosper in his hand; and he shall magnify himself in his heart, and by peace shall destroy many: he shall also stand up against the Prince of princes; but he shall be broken without hand.”
—Daniel 8:25

Reporting from Charlotte, N.C.— Rick Vetter was rushing to board the Amtrak train in Charlotte, N.C., on a recent Sunday afternoon when a canine officer suddenly blocked the way.

Three federal air marshals in bulletproof vests and two officers trained to spot suspicious behavior watched closely as Seiko, a German shepherd, nosed Vetter’s trousers for chemical traces of a bomb. Radiation detectors carried by the marshals scanned the 57-year-old lawyer for concealed nuclear materials.

When Seiko indicated a scent, his handler, Julian Swaringen, asked Vetter whether he had pets at home in Garner, N.C. Two mutts, Vetter replied. “You can go ahead,” Swaringen said.

The Transportation Security Administration isn’t just in airports anymore. TSA teams are increasingly conducting searches and screenings at train stations, subways, ferry terminals and other mass transit locations around the country.

“We are not the Airport Security Administration,” said Ray Dineen, the air marshal in charge of the TSA office in Charlotte. “We take that transportation part seriously.”

The TSA’s 25 “viper” teams — for Visible Intermodal Prevention and Response — have run more than 9,300 unannounced checkpoints and other search operations in the last year. Department of Homeland Security officials have asked Congress for funding to add 12 more teams next year.

According to budget documents, the department spent $110 million in fiscal 2011 for “surface transportation security,” including the TSA’s viper program, and is asking for an additional $24 million next year. That compares with more than $5 billion for aviation security.

TSA officials say they have no proof that the roving viper teams have foiled any terrorist plots or thwarted any major threat to public safety. But they argue that the random nature of the searches and the presence of armed officers serve as a deterrent and bolster public confidence.

“We have to keep them [terrorists] on edge,” said Frank Cilluffo, director of the Homeland Security Policy Institute at George Washington University in Washington. “We’re not going to have a permanent presence everywhere.”

U.S. officials note that digital files recovered from Osama bin Laden’s compound in Pakistan after he was killed by U.S. Navy SEALs in May included evidence that the Al Qaeda leader had considered an attack on U.S. railways in February 2010. Over the last decade, deadly bombings have hit subways or trains in Moscow; Mumbai, India; Madrid; and London.

But critics say that without a clear threat, the TSA checkpoints are merely political theater. Privacy advocates worry that the agency is stretching legal limits on the government’s right to search U.S. citizens without probable cause — and with no proof that the scattershot checkpoints help prevent attacks.

“It’s a great way to make the public think you are doing something,” said Fred H. Cate, a professor at the Indiana University Maurer School of Law, who writes on privacy and security. “It’s a little like saying, ‘If we start throwing things up in the air, will they hit terrorists?’ ”

Such criticism is nothing new to the TSA.

The agency came under fresh fire this month when three elderly women with medical devices complained that TSA agents had strip-searched them in separate incidents at John F. Kennedy International Airport. Lenore Zimmerman, 84, said she was ordered to pull down her pants after she refused to pass through a full body scanner because she was afraid the machine would interfere with her heart defibrillator.

TSA officials denied the women were strip-searched, but they announced plans to create a toll-free telephone number for passengers with medical conditions who require assistance in airport screening lines. TSA officials said they also are considering a proposal by Sen. Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) to designate a passengers advocate at every airport.

The TSA’s viper program hasn’t drawn that kind of attention, although it is increasingly active.

In Tennessee in October, a viper team used radiation monitors and explosive-trace detectors to help state police inspect trucks at highway weigh stations throughout the state. Last month in Orlando, Fla., a team set up metal detectors at a Greyhound bus station and tested passengers’ bags for explosive residue.

In the Carolinas this year, TSA teams have checked people at the gangplanks of cruise ships, the entrance to NASCAR races, and at ferry terminals taking tourists to the Outer Banks.

At the Charlotte train station on Dec. 11, Seiko, the bomb-sniffing dog, snuffled down a line of about 100 passengers waiting to board an eastbound train. Many were heading home after watching the Charlotte Panthers NFL team lose to the Atlanta Falcons after holding a 16-point lead.

No one seemed especially perturbed by the TSA team.

“It’s probably overkill,” said Karen Stone, 26, after a behavior-detection officer asked her about the Panthers game and her trip home to Raleigh.

“It’s cool,” said Marcus Baldwin, 21, who was heading home to Mebane, near Burlington, where he waits tables to help pay for computer technology classes. “They’re doing what our tax money is paying them to do.”

“I’m mostly curious,” said Barbara Spencer, 75, who was heading home to Chapel Hill after watching her grandson perform in a Christmas play. She asked the officers whether a terrorist threat had required the extra security. No, they replied.

Vetter, the lawyer, had attended the game with his son, Noah. They jogged for the train after Seiko had finished his sniff, but Vetter had bigger worries on his mind. “The Panthers blew it,” he said.

Two of the Democratic Party’s core institutions are challenging a bipartisan consensus on Israel and Palestine that has dominated American foreign policy for more than a decade.

Anti-Semitism

“And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.”
—Genesis 12:3

The Center for American Progress, the party’s key hub of ideas and strategy, and Media Matters, a central messaging organization, have emerged as vocal critics of their party’s staunchly pro-Israel congressional leadership and have been at odds, at times, with Barack Obama’s White House, which has acted as a reluctant ally to Benjamin Netanyahu’s Israeli government.

The differences are ones of tone – but also of bright lines of principle – and while they have haven’t yet made any visible impact on Democratic policy, they’ve shaken up the Washington foreign policy conversation and broadened the space for discussing a heretical and often critical stance on Israel heretofore confined to the political margins.

The daily battle is waged in Media Matters’ emails, on CAP’s blogs, Middle East Progress and ThinkProgress and most of all on Twitter, where a Media Mattters official, MJ Rosenberg, regularly heaps vitriol on those who disagree as “Iraq war neocon liar” (the Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg) or having “dual loyalties” to the U.S. and Israel (the Washington Post’s Jennifer Rubin). And while the Center for American Progress tends to walk a more careful line, warm words for Israel can be hard to find on its blogs.

Events of recent years such as GOP attacks on Obama as insufficiently loyal to Israel, Israel’s controversial raid on a Turkish ship bound for Gaza and debates over the Iranian nuclear program have deepened the divide between some on the Democratic left and the party’s mainstream foreign policy apparatus.

“Like segregation in the American South, the siege of Gaza (and the entire Israeli occupation, for that matter) is a moral abomination that should be intolerable to anyone claiming progressive values,” wrote Matt Duss, a CAP policy analyst and the director of Middle East Progress, last year, after an Israeli raid on a flotilla challenging the blockade of Gaza turned violent.

The two groups’ push is part of a larger revival of the liberal American Israel lobby, though one that has yet to make a policy impact. Stalwarts of the anti-settlement movement like Peace Now have new, more politically engaged counterparts like J Street and see their views reflected increasingly in the party’s central institutions. They represent – they hope – the Democratic Party’s future, if not its present, and have taken heart from recent criticism of Israel by Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

The shift is vividly reflected in the current debate over how the U.S. should handle the fledgling Iranian nuclear program. With both Obama and congressional Democrats working to increase pressure on what they view as alarming Iranian nuclear efforts, the Center for American Progress and Media Matters have made the case that both Iran’s belligerence and its level nuclear sophistication have been overstated – in some cases attacking hawkish hyperbole or Republican rhetoric, in others going after claims by the administration.

In one recent item, for instance, ThinkProgress National Security reporter Eli Clifton took issue with a Quinnipiac University poll that made reference to Iran’s “nuclear program.” The belief that such a program exists undergirds the Obama administration’s drive for sanctions, and was recently bolstered by a report from the International Atomic Energy Agency, which wrote of “increasing” concerns, though not definitive evidence.

“Such assertions, and the resulting polling statistics, serve to tilt public opinion toward preemptive military action when intelligence reports paint a far more complex picture of Iran’s nuclear program and the extremely risky outcomes of an Israeli and/or U.S. airstrike,” Clifton wrote.

Another recent column on the CAP website, one of several to prompt behind-the-scenes outrage from the powerful pro-Israel group AIPAC, featured Eric Alterman accusing AIPAC of campaigning for war in Iran, which Alterman described as its “big prize.”

Over at Media Matters, Rosenberg, a former AIPAC staffer turned apostate, labels American Israel hawks “Israel-firsters” and recently blasted Rep. Brad Sherman, a California Democrat, for pushing a sanctions on Iranian civilian aviation that would be “the most ugly expression yet of this country’s almost bizarre obsession with punishing Iran, its people along with its government.” (Sherman spokesman Ben Fishel, a former Media Matters staffer, said the organization “would agree with” Sherman if it understood how civilian planes were being used to ferry arms to the Syrian government.)

ThinkProgress also scrambled to call into question an alleged Iranian plot to assassinate Saudi diplomats in the United States, though the charges were leveled by Attorney General Eric Holder, a longtime Democratic Party stalwart. “With analysts and the media still scratching their heads over what to make of a convoluted plot alleged to have been hatched by an Iranian American in collusion with Mexican drug cartels,” Clifton wrote, “[conservative think tanks] – along with their friends in Congress — are quickly declaring the end of diplomatic strategies to curb Iran’s nuclear program and regional ambitions.”

The villain: AIPAC. “It would appear that AIPAC is now using the same escalating measures against Iran that were used before the invasion of Iraq,” Clifton wrote in August.

Clifton’s post and others like it, two sources said, drew a furious reaction from the pro-Israel group, whose executives called CAP chairman John Podesta and other senior officials at the organization to complain.

“There’s two explanations here – either the inmates are running the asylum or the Center for American Progress has made a decision to be anti-Israel,” said Josh Block, a former spokesman for AIPAC who is now a fellow at the center-left Progressive Policy Institute. “Either they can allow people to say borderline anti-Semitic stuff” – a reference to what he described as conspiracy theorizing in the Alterman column – “and to say things that are antithetical to the fundamental values of the Democratic party, or they can fire them and stop it.” (Alterman called the charge “ludicrous” and “character assassination,” noted that he is a columnist for Jewish publications, and described himself as a “proud, pro-Zionist Jew.”)

An AIPAC spokesman, Ari Goldberg, declined to comment on CAP’s views. But the suggestion that AIPAC is leading an Iraq-style drive for war with Iran also angered leading Jewish Democrats, many of whom are close to AIPAC.

“There’s a great difference between the widespread concern for Iran within the Democratic and Jewish communities versus the far right. Some extreme right-wingers may be beating the drums for war, but the vast mainstream — certainly including AIPAC — is most definitely not,” said David Harris, the CEO of the National Jewish Democratic Council, when asked about the AIPAC’s statements. He noted that even liberal, pro-Israel groups like Peace Now and J Street shy away from putting AIPAC at the heart of a pro-war cabal.

CAP officials have told angry allies that the bloggers don’t speak for the organization, and senior fellow Brian Katulis – whose work is more standard Clinton-Democrat fare – stressed that in an email.

“I think there are different voices on the Think Progress blog and some individual analysts – and some of that work, especially the blog, is I think aimed at reporting on and reflecting one aspect of the diversity of the views among the broad progressive community,” he said. “But what one blogger or analyst may write isn’t necessarily indicative of what our policy recommendations are for the administration or Congress when I’m doing meetings with our friends in government.”

The director of CAP’s national security program, Ken Gude, also drew a distinction between the blog, which is CAP’s loudest megaphone, and its less confrontational policy work.

“There’s a distinction here that we have between the policy work that we do and the blogging work that we do,” he said. Middle East Progress “is clearly a progressive blog and it does respond to arguments that are made most forcefully by conservatives and it responds in that way.”

Gude also said the Center’s experts view the allegations of an Iranian assassination plot as credible, despite initial doubts, and said he wasn’t sure whether that perspective had been reflected on its blogs, or why not.

In interviews, several ThinkProgress officials described the Center’s goals differently. Two of them suggested that criticizing the Israeli government and raising doubts about allegations against Iran serve a useful political purpose: They open political space on Obama’s left, and give the president room to maneuver.

Gude denied that motive.

“There is no decision on the part of the Center for American Progress to push any line that would be to the left of [the Administration],” he said.

AIPAC and its allies have not been satisfied by those explanations. “To suggest that the organization is not responsible for people who are ‘just bloggers’ is ludicrous and insulting to people’s intelligence,” Block said. But CAP has refused to give ground, and while CAP’s top officials didn’t respond directly to POLITICO, Gude said he was unaware of Jewish Democrats’ concerns.

The seams sometimes show in the organization, however. Podesta, who recently stepped down from his longtime position as CAP’s president, “always wanted to stay out of Israel stuff from the beginning, because it’s a no-win issue for them,” a liberal Israel policy thinker and CAP ally said. “They’re obviously a progressive place, but if you want to attract a mainstream Clinton, New Democrat milieu, you can’t really do real progressive Israel stuff.”

But the fact remains that the Center’s most audible voices on the Middle East aren’t the former Clinton staffers who populate much of the organization, and they come from different foreign policy traditions. Duss, a confrontational presence on Twitter but typically a more careful blogger, was an intern for Anthony Cordesman of the Center for Strategic and International Studies, for instance. It’s the stream from which many Washington figures who would prefer the U.S. push Israel harder drink.

“This is where James Baker and George H.W. Bush were, this is where Brent Scowcroft is, this is where Tom Pickering and Colin Powell are – this is not crazy stuff, we’re talking about mainstream, bipartisan positions,” said Jeremy Ben Ami, the executive director of J Street, which has sought in recent years to build an American “pro-Israel, pro-peace” lobby.

Duss’s deputies hail from farther to the left: Clifton and his colleague Ali Gharib came to CAP from Inter Press Service; their work is still published, by agreement with the Center for American Progress, on the blog of the Inter Press Service’s Jim Lobe, a stalwart of a range of foreign policy views on the left of the Democratic foreign policy spectrum.

Duss dismissed his staffs’ intellectual roots – “they’re just two very good reporters” – or the implication that they were saying anything radical.

“That recognition – there are two narratives here, there are actually two sides to this – it’s a sad statement on the debate in DC that just saying that gets you qualified as anti-Israel,” he said.

But that more liberal stream of foreign policy thinking, in exile in the Clinton years, was vindicated for some Democrats when its leading voices opposed President Bush’s war in Iraq – a position the rest of the party came to late if at all. And CAP’s new views are, Duss said, in part generational.

“I’m really interested in the way in which America’s experience in the Middle East in the last decade has informed this younger generation of analysts and journalists and veterans,” he said.

Duss says he’s mischaracterized by his critics as anti-Israel. He is quick to note that he sympathizes with Israel, in part from his personal roots in American evangelical Christianity and that if American criticism of Israel should be harsher, it should also be done with the recognition that Israel is a democracy that should be held to high standards. Iran, meanwhile, is “abusing their own people, they support terrorism, and they say all sorts of horrible things about the U.S. and Israel,” he said.

But if CAP is at times cautious or muddled about its goals, Media Matters, by contrast, backs Rosenberg’s line, and makes no apologies for his sharp criticism of Democrats.

“Conservative misinformation on specific issues knows no partisan bounds,” said Media Matters executive vice president Ari Rabin-Havt. “There’s a difference between ideology and political party.”

And Rosenberg told POLITICO that his cadre of writers is looking less to sway votes on Capitol Hill today than to shift the Democratic Party’s conversation and its younger generation.

“We’re playing the long game here,” said Rosenberg.

The participants in the endless, bitter Israel policy arguments all demand a variety of labels: pro-Israel, pro-Palestinian, pro-American. Everyone argues that his case is win-win. But the new tone in Washington is also one that straightforwardly pro-Palestinian voices see as a welcome change, if one that has yet to be accompanied by a shift in American policy.

“What is actually happening is that the discourse that lot of people in the Palestine solidarity community and activists have been engaging in is starting to break down the walls of the Washington bubble,” said Ali Abunimah, a longtime activist and the co-founder of the site Electronic Intifada. “But political intimidation from Israel’s supporters is still a much more powerful force than any change in thinking at the CAP.”

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this article attributed to Jim Lobe a quote from an article that appeared under his byline on the website Antiwar.com. Lobe and the site’s editor, Eric Garris, said the article was incorrectly attributed to him, and was in fact written by someone else. Also, the earlier version said that Matthew Duss considers himself a foreign policy “realist.” He does not, he said.

BARTELLA, Iraq—The plight of Iraqi Christians since the fall of Saddam Hussein has been agonizingly personal for Aram Butrus Matti.

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Ishmael•FYI: Ishmael is the son of Abraham through Hagar, the maid of Abraham’s wife Sarah.
Ishmael is the Biblical father of the Arab nations.
•From these nations came Mohammad, who in approximately 632 a.d founded the Religion of Islam.
•The Religion is divided into two main groups, The Sunni’s and The Shiite’s. These two are engaged in a battle to gain control of the religion.
•The Shiite branch claims its right to control because Ali, its founder, was the nephew of Mohammad.
•While the Sunni branch claims its right to control because its founders were the generals in-charge when Mohammad died.
•It is reported that the Muslim Brotherhood is a Sunni based organization.
•The battle continues to this very day.
•The verse below is speaking directly concerning Ishmael and the nations that would come from this direct descendent of Abraham.

“And he will be a wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man’s hand against him; and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.”
—Genesis 16:12

Hated for His Name’s Sake

“Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name’s sake.”
—Matthew 24:9

Hanging on the wall in his parents’ home here in northern Iraq are photographs of his cousin Yonan, his cousin’s spouse and their three-month-old son, who were among some 50 worshippers killed by suicide bombers in a Baghdad church in October 2010.

There also is a photo of his older brother, Noel, a pharmacist. Six years ago, Aram and Noel were kidnapped together in the nearby city of Mosul. Noel, then 44, was murdered. Aram was released only after his parents paid a ransom.

Shortly thereafter, Mr. Matti, now 27, fled Mosul with the rest of his family to their ancestral village. Bartella is now ringed with trenches, earthen berms and checkpoints manned by local security forces to ward off attacks.

Mr. Matti is eager to leave Iraq for good.

With the Arab Spring now bringing political turbulence to many other countries in the region, Christians throughout the Middle East are worried that what happened in Iraq may be a harbinger of misfortune to come in their own communities. While many remain supporters of the uprisings, others fear that the toppling of their autocratic rulers could uncork sectarian violence against Christians and other minority groups in their own nations.

The sectarian violence that followed the U.S. invasion of Iraq and fall of Hussein in 2003 has been brutal for all Iraqis, including Muslim Shiites and Sunnis. But for the nation’s fragile Christian communities, it has been catastrophic.

At least 54 Iraqi churches have been bombed and at least 905 Christians killed in various acts of violence since the U.S. invasion toppled Hussein in 2003, according to Archbishop Louis Sako of the Chaldean Catholic Church in the northern provinces of Kirkuk and Sulimaniya. Hundreds of thousands of Iraqi Christians have fled. A report on Iraq released Tuesday by Minority Rights Group International said that about 500,000 Christians remain in Iraq, down from an estimated 800,000 to 1.4 million in 2003.

“It’s a hemorrhage,” Archbishop Sako says. “Iraq could be emptied of Christians.”

Iraq’s Christians aren’t the only ones under pressure. In Egypt, long-simmering tensions between Muslims and Coptic Christians have flared into violence. Christians, who account for about 10% of Egypt’s about 80 million people, worry that the powerful Muslim Brotherhood and ultraconservative Islamic groups will erode some of the protections Christians had carved out under a succession of military-dominated governments.

In Syria, where Christians make up more than 5% of the population, minority groups of all sorts worry about the stability of the country’s ethnic and sectarian patchwork. If President Bashar Assad is overthrown, they say, those communities could turn on each other.

Lebanon suffered through 15 years of sectarian fighting in a civil war that ended in 1990. Although some Lebanese Christian leaders say they are hopeful about the Arab Spring’s promise of democracy, many also worry about the potential fallout for Christians.

“I am for the [Arab] Spring if it’s indeed a spring and not a prelude to a winter” of civil war and minority oppression, said Patriarch Bechara al-Rai, leader of the Lebanese Maronite Catholic Church, after a recent memorial service at Our Lady of Salvation, the Baghdad church where Mr. Matti’s relatives were killed.

The church now is barricaded behind blast walls and razor wire and secured by armed Iraqi government forces. Inside, a photo collage of the blast victims sits on the altar, and the black robes of two priests killed in the attack hang overhead. Dried blood is visible on the shrapnel-pocked ceiling.

In the city of Kirkuk, a car bomb exploded outside Holy Family church in August, wounding 15 and damaging the building. In April, a Christian man was kidnapped and later found dead after his family paid a $50,000 ransom, according to police officials.

Christian leaders such as Archbishop Sako say Iraqi Christians are caught in the middle as more powerful groups—the majority Shiite Muslims; the Sunni Muslims that dominate in Mosul and further south; and the Kurds in the north, who are predominantly Muslim—jockey for power in post-Hussein Iraq.

“In Iraq, the war has unleashed evil forces within the country…and has made all Iraqis victims,” said a report issued in conjunction with a synod of Middle Eastern bishops convened in Vatican City in October 2010. “However, since Christians represent the smallest and weakest part of Iraqi society, they are the principal victims of violence.”

Some Christian leaders in the region say Christians are better off under authoritarian but secular regimes such as Mr. Assad’s in Syria. “I fear that extremist groups will put in place a worse rule,” says Patriarch al-Rai of the Lebanese Maronite Catholic Church.

In Egypt, many Coptic Christians took part in the demonstrations that led to the February collapse of President Hosni Mubarak’s regime and the subsequent rise of the Muslim Brotherhood. Since then, dozens of Coptic Christians have died in violent clashes with Islamic extremists and the Egyptian ruling military, most recently on Oct. 9.

Naguib Sawiris, a billionaire businessman and one of Egypt’s highest profile Copts, founded a secular political party this year to counter what he describes as the threat of a “new dictatorship” by Islamist parties. Partial results released Sunday from last week’s parliamentary elections show Islamists garnering almost 60% of votes.

Cherbel Eid, head of the student league of the Lebanese Forces, a militant Christian political party supporting the Syrian uprising, rejects the argument that Christians in the Middle East are better off under authoritarian rulers. “It’s wrong for us [Christians] to preach servitude while others come forward to demand freedom day and night,” he said during a visit to northern Iraq last month.

In Syria, the Assyrian Democratic Organization, a political movement that supports Assyrian Christians and other minorities, was among the 10 founders of the Syrian National Council, an opposition umbrella group created in October in Istanbul.

Its counterpart in Iraq, the Assyrian Democratic Movement, battled Hussein’s regime for years. Now, as many Iraqi Christians flee the country, the movement is trying to persuade the Christian community to stay and fight for a part in the political process.

Kirkuk, an oil-rich city 180 miles north of Baghdad, had an estimated 30,000 Christians in the 1970s, according to Archbishop Sako. Now it has fewer than 10,000, he says, and the number is plummeting fast. Only the elderly and those with little chance of immigrating are left, he says.

Arabs, Kurds and Turkomen—diverse ethnic groups that are all Muslim—are engaged in a struggle, at times bloody, for control of the province. The wrangling also involves the Arab-dominated central government in Baghdad and the semiautonomous Kurdistan regional government, which claims Kirkuk and other disputed territories. Scattered through the conflict zone are the last sizable clusters of Christians in Iraq.

On a mound overlooking the sprawling Bab Gurgur oil field on the outskirts of Kirkuk, the Kurds are building thousands of new homes on land they claim once was theirs, before it was taken by Hussein’s regime. They are urging Christians to leave central Kirkuk, where Christians have been attacked, and move to the area, known as Three Springs, which they say will be safer.

Kurdish authorities are giving about 100 land plots to Christian families. The Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, one of the two main Iraqi Kurdish factions, is giving $10,000 to each family that receives land. The Kurdistan regional government has committed to build a new church to replace the prefabricated home that now serves as a chapel, according to Mufeed Haddad, mayor of the Christian settlement.

According to some residents of Kirkuk, all of this is being done with the understanding that Christians who move to the area will side with the Kurds in any future referendum to decide the fate of Kirkuk. In recent interviews, many Christians said they will because they feel safer with Kurds than Arabs.

Fifty Christian families have moved to Three Springs, although most of their children, they said, had immigrated abroad already.

Charlotte Benyamin, a 52-year-old widow with no children, plans to sell her home in Baghdad and move to Three Springs. Almost all Christian families in her Baghdad neighborhood, known as Sector 52, have left. She says she does not feel safe there on her own.

Ms. Benyamin says she’ll build a new house next door to her sister, Svetlana, who moved to Three Springs ahead of her. Her sister has two sons. One lives in Sweden. The other moved to Syria earlier this year to await possible asylum in a European country.

Svetlana Benyamin, who cares for an ailing husband in Three Springs, says that as a Christian, she felt safer before the fall of Hussein. “A thousand mercies on Saddam, at least we had security,” she says.

The Assyrian Democratic Movement is now trying to encourage Christians who went abroad to return to another part of Iraq known as the Nineveh Plain, sandwiched between the Kurdish region and Arab-dominated Mosul. The ADM wants to turn the area into a separate province answerable to Baghdad, which they hope would give it a measure of independence. ADM officials have lobbied central-government and Kurdistan regional authorities.

Bassem Belo, a senior ADM official and the mayor of the Nineveh Plain town of Tal Keif, says a province would translate into budget money from Baghdad, thousands of government jobs and investments from wealthy Iraqi Christians in the diaspora—all inducements for young Christians to stay.

Mr. Belo accuses the Kurdish leadership of undercutting the project by maintaining a heavy security presence in the Nineveh Plain, and of laying the groundwork for eventual annexation by the Kurdistan region.

Karim Sinjari, interior minister of the Kurdistan region, denies that and says it is entirely up to residents to decide if they want their own province or to join the region. He says Kurdish forces have been sent to the area to protect the population from insurgents and extremists, and that Christians would be better off joining the Kurdistan region. “Here they will be more protected, more free” to practice their religion, he says.

At the moment, fear of attacks has turned Christian-dominated enclaves in the Nineveh Plain, including Bartella, into fortresses. On some roads, Kurdish forces and Iraqi army soldiers man checkpoints in an uneasy arrangement until recently overseen by the U.S. military.

Many Christian families from Baghdad and Mosul had sought sanctuary in Bartella after the fall of Hussein. Now, these Christians are growing uneasy about several things: an influx of Kurds, the uncertain political future of the area and its bleak economic prospects.

Even within the relative safety of the Kurdistan region, Christians are threatened by Islamists emboldened by the Arab Spring. More than 30 people were wounded Friday when a mob instigated by a fiery mosque preacher set fire to liquor stores and hotels owned by Christians and other minorities in the northern city of Zakho.

Mr. Matti, who lost his brother to murder, recently got married to another Christian. He and his wife want to leave Iraq, preferably for Europe or the U.S., but his exit options are dwindling. He previously spent a year in Lebanon, but had to return to Iraq after his asylum bid was rejected.

Neighboring Syria, until recently, was a favored transit destination for Iraqi asylum seekers, including Christians. But relatives of the Mattis in the Syrian capital, Damascus, now are worried about their own future, should President Assad’s regime collapse.

“They are afraid,” said Mr. Matti. “They do not want a repeat of Iraq.”

Israelis are nervously watching Egypt’s revolution reignite with protests in Tahrir Square raising fears a decades-old military dictatorship may soon be replaced by Islamist radicals who will pose a new security threat.

Israel in the Last Days — Egypt

“It shall be the basest of the kingdoms; neither shall it exalt itself any more above the nations: for I will diminish them, that they shall no more rule over the nations. And it shall be no more the confidence of the house of Israel, which bringeth their iniquity to remembrance, when they shall look after them: but they shall know that I am the Lord GOD.”
—Ezekiel 29:15-16

“A Song of degrees of David.
If it had not been the LORD•Strongs #: Yhwh; a variation of 3068 (used after 136, and pronounced as 430, in order to prevent the repetition of the same sound, since elsewhere 3068 is pronounced as 136):—God. who was on our side, now may Israel say;
If it had not been the LORD•Strongs #: Yhwh; a variation of 3068 (used after 136, and pronounced as 430, in order to prevent the repetition of the same sound, since elsewhere 3068 is pronounced as 136):—God. who was on our side, when men rose up against us:
Then they had swallowed us up quick, when their wrath was kindled against us:
Then the waters had overwhelmed us, the stream had gone over our soul:
Then the proud waters had gone over our soul.
Blessed be the LORD•Strongs #: Yhwh; a variation of 3068 (used after 136, and pronounced as 430, in order to prevent the repetition of the same sound, since elsewhere 3068 is pronounced as 136):—God., who hath not given us as a prey to their teeth.
Our soul is escaped as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers: the snare is broken, and we are escaped.
Our help is in the name of the LORD•Strongs #: Yhwh; a variation of 3068 (used after 136, and pronounced as 430, in order to prevent the repetition of the same sound, since elsewhere 3068 is pronounced as 136):—God., who made heaven and earth.”
—Psalm 124:1-8

When Israel’s inner security Cabinet met for eight hours Tuesday to discuss annual intelligence assessments compiled by Shin Bet, the Mossad, Military Intelligence and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, its discussions apparently were dominated by concerns about Egypt, Syria and Iran.

Wednesday morning’s edition of Yediot Aharonot, Israel’s top-selling newspaper, carried the front-page headline: “Between Cairo and Tehran,” in reference to the Middle East’s rising Islamist tide.

The newspaper Maariv also reported that Israel’s army chief, Benny Gantz, “presented the security Cabinet with a scenario involving the cancellation of the peace treaty” between Egypt and Israel.

Also on Wednesday, Israel’s Minister for Civil Defence, Matan Vilnai, told Israel’s Army Radio that security experts expect a “grave erosion” of Israel’s 32year-old peace treaty with Egypt if the Muslim Brotherhood makes major gains in Egypt’s upcoming elections.

“The picture is quite clear,” he said. “We’ve been saying it for months. What we call the Muslim Brotherhood will ultimately be the majority in all the [Egyptian] institutions and once the regime stabilizes, as we expect it to do, we expect that there will be a grave erosion of this agreement. We have to prepare for such a situation.”

The peace treaty with Egypt has been a cornerstone of Israel’s security doctrine for three decades, guaranteeing relative quiet along its southern border and allowing Israel’s military to focus on threats elsewhere.

Israeli and Egyptian militaries learned to co-operate with each other and shared an interest in guarding the border and limiting the influence of Hamas in Gaza.

But relations have already deteriorated sharply since the ousting of former dictator Hosni Mubarak in February. Arab terrorists have launched cross-border attacks into Israel from the Sinai and repeatedly blown up an Egyptian pipeline that carries natural gas to Israel and Jordan. In September, a Cairo mob stormed and destroyed Israel’s Egyptian embassy.

The situation may only deteriorate further as Egypt experiences its first real taste of political competition in more than 40 years with the scheduled start of parliamentary elections on Monday.

“The political context in Egypt, when it comes to peace with Israel, might be changing,” said David Makovsky of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. “Islamist parties – led by the Muslin Brotherhood but not exclusively – could be a dominant political bloc.”

Israel could become a target of convenience for competing politicians and a military that wants to cling to power while limiting confrontations with the Egyptian public.

“There is political capital to be made in saying, ‘We’re going to take a tougher position toward Israel,’” Mr. Makovsky said.

“In light of the Jan. 25 Revolution, Israel no longer has the luxury or the security, of dealing with a handful of Egyptian leaders,” writes Mirette Mabrouk of the Brookings Institute. “While the move toward democracy in Egypt is likely to be a slow and painful grind, Israel is still going to have to deal with a government more accountable to its people. And considering that any new government is going to struggle with the prodigious social and economic burdens left by the former regime, a populist foreign policy may be considered an easy crowd-pleaser.”

Israel has already braced for change by doubling up its military deployments along the Sinai and accelerating construction of a $400-million, five-metre-tall security fence along 240 kilometres of the Egyptian border.

Any cooling of relations with Cairo could have major repercussions for Israel, since Egypt is more than just an Arab neighbour, but plays a dominant role in the rest of the Arab world.

“It looks like it is going to be a long Arab Winter,” said Moshe Arens, a former Israeli defence and foreign minister.

“The Islamists are going to inherit the mantle of the dictators. A wave of Islamic rule, with all it entails, is sweeping across the Arab world. It will replace secular dictatorships with Islamic ones. We should have expected nothing else.”

UNREST IN EGYPT

? Rocks, tear gas, firebombs and gunfire made darkened streets in central Cairo a battle zone on Wednesday as hard-core protesters demanding an immediate end to army rule fought riot police around government buildings close to Tahrir Square.

? Forty people have been killed is six days of violence, and clashes continued despite army concessions to hold a presidential election next year, six months sooner than planned, have a new interim government and a commitment to allow a free vote for parliament.

? “They were with Mubarak from the start. I came when I saw our sons being killed.” – Fatihia Abdul Ezz, a 60-yearold woman, speaking about Field Marshal Mohamed Hussein Tantawi and the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces.

China has issued a veiled warning to the US to keep out of Beijing’s disputes with several of its neighbours over the South China Sea.

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Perplexity

“…upon the earth distress•Strongs 4928: sunoche, soon-okh-ay´; from 4912; restraint, i.e. (figuratively) anxiety: — anguish, distress. of nations, with perplexity•Strongs 640: aporia, ap-or-ee´-a; from the same as 639; a (state of) quandary:—perplexity.
•Strongs 639: aporeo, ap-or-eh´-o; from a compound of 1 (as a negative particle) and the base of 4198; to have no way out, i.e. be at a loss (mentally):— (stand in) doubt, be perplexed….”
—Luke 21:25

Kings of the East

“And the sixth angel poured out his vial upon the great river Euphrates; and the water thereof was dried up, that the way of the kings of the east might be prepared.”
—Revelation 16:12

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“The disputes over the South China Sea between the relevant countries in the region have existed for many years. They should be settled through friendly consultation and negotiation between the sovereign states directly concerned,” Wen Jiabao, premier, told Asean leaders in Bali on the sidelines of a regional summit on Friday. “Outside forces should not get involved under any excuse.”

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New York City police were investigating a possible hate crime in a Jewish neighborhood in Brooklyn where cars were set on fire and anti-Semitic symbols spray painted on benches.

Anti-Semitism

“Hear the word of the LORD, O ye nations, and declare it in the isles afar off, and say, He that scattered Israel will gather him, and keep him, as a shepherd doth his flock. For the LORD hath redeemed Jacob, and ransomed him from the hand of him that was stronger than he.”
—Jeremiah 31:10-11

“Fear thou not, O Jacob my servant, saith the LORD: for I am with thee; for I will make a full end of all the nations whither I have driven thee: but I will not make a full end of thee, but correct thee in measure; yet will I not leave thee wholly unpunished.”
—Jeremiah 46:28

Police responded to 911 calls reporting cars ablaze early Friday morning. When they arrived, they found three cars, including a BMW and a Lexus, on fire, according Sgt. Carlos Nieves.

Another vehicle, a red van, had “KKK” spray painted on it, representing the racist group Ku Klux Klan. Police also found eight benches with Nazi swastikas spray painted on them.

“The NYPD’s Hate Crimes Task Force is actively investigating the twisted person or people who attacked cars, benches, and a sidewalk on a block of Ocean Parkway,” New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said in statement released Friday.

The attack happened a day after the 73rd anniversary of Kristallnacht, or the Night of Broken Glass, when rioters, encouraged by Nazis, vandalized the Jewish community of Germany, burning and destroying hundreds of synagogues, looting thousands of homes and businesses and killing 91 Jewish people, according to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

Bloomberg said the timing of this attack may or may not be a coincidence.

“Either way, this kind of hateful act has no place in the freest city in the freest country in the world,” he said.

There is no one in custody and police have no suspects.

(Editing by Greg McCune)

The Guardian quotes report claiming Israel extending Jericho III missile’s range, developing ICBM capabilities, expanding nuclear-tipped cruise missile enabled submarine fleet

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Israel in the Last Days

“And he shall set up an ensign •Strongs 5251: nace; from 5264; a flag; also a sail; by implication, a flagstaff; generally a signal; figuratively, a token:—banner, pole, sail, (en-)sign, standard.
•Strongs 5264: naw-sas´; a primitive root; to gleam from afar, i.e. to be conspicuous as a signal; or rather perhaps a denominative from 5251 (and identical with 5263, through the idea of a flag as fluttering in the wind); to raise a beacon:—lift up as an ensign. for the nations, and shall assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth.”
—Isaiah 11:12

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Moving Towards Ezekiel 38-39

“Son of man, set thy face against Gog, the land of Magog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against him, And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal: And I will turn thee back, and put hooks into thy jaws, and I will bring thee forth, and all thine army, horses and horsemen, all of them clothed with all sorts of armour, even a great company with bucklers and shields, all of them handling swords: Persia, Ethiopia, and Libya with them; all of them with shield and helmet:”
—Ezekiel 38:2-5

Editors note about the words and Gog•FYI: Many Bible teachers believe that Gog is the leader of the Russia alliance in the latter days., Magog•FYI: Many Bible teachers believe that Magog, the descendant of Japheth, is identified as the Russian coalition in the latter days. and Persia•FYI: Persia in concert with Adolf Hitler, changed its name to Iran (Aryan Land) in May of 1935.

Israel is extending its Jericho III missile’s range, developing intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) capabilities and expanding its nuclear-tipped cruise missile enabled submarine fleet, The Guardian, quoting an independent committee report, said Monday.

According to the British newspaper, the report was prepared for the Trident Commission, an independent cross-party initiative set up by the British American Security Information Council (BASIC).

“In the case of Israel, the size of its nuclear-tipped cruise missile enabled submarine fleet is being increased and the country seems to be on course, on the back of its satellite launch rocket program, for future development of an inter-continental ballistic missile,” the report said.

Israel currently has three submarines and two more being manufactured in Germany.

Earlier this year, the Der Spiegel reported that Germany had granted Israel’s request to provide it with a six Dolphin submarines said to be capable of carrying nuclear weapons.

Dolphin submarines are manufactured in the city of Kiel in Germany. Experts estimate they are have the longest cruising range of all submarines. Some reports claim they are also able to carry and launch nuclear weapons.

Berlin had granted the request after several years during which Israel has been pushing for the deal.

Meanwhile, the world’s nuclear powers are planning on spending hundreds of billions of dollars modernizing and upgrading their nuclear warheads, The Guardian said. Despite budgetary issues and international rhetoric calling for nuclear weapons disarmament, the report points to “era of nuclear weapons.”

According to the report, the United States will spend some $700 billion on its nuclear weapons industry in the upcoming decade, while Russia is expected to spend &70 billion on cruise missile systems alone.

Other countries, including Israel, India, China and Pakistan, are also expected to spend significant amounts of money on their strategic weaponry systems.

The Basic report claimed that for countries such as Israel, Russia, Pakistan and France, having nuclear weapons is not just about deterrence. For Russia and Pakistan nuclear weapons are also designated for attacks, claimed the report.

A short while ago, a terrorist squad that fired a Qassam rocket at Israel from the southern Gaza Strip was targeted shortly after by an IAF aircraft. A hit was confirmed.

Israel in the Last Days

“A Song of degrees of David.
If it had not been the LORD•Strongs #: Yhwh; a variation of 3068 (used after 136, and pronounced as 430, in order to prevent the repetition of the same sound, since elsewhere 3068 is pronounced as 136):—God. who was on our side, now may Israel say;
If it had not been the LORD•Strongs #: Yhwh; a variation of 3068 (used after 136, and pronounced as 430, in order to prevent the repetition of the same sound, since elsewhere 3068 is pronounced as 136):—God. who was on our side, when men rose up against us:
Then they had swallowed us up quick, when their wrath was kindled against us:
Then the waters had overwhelmed us, the stream had gone over our soul:
Then the proud waters had gone over our soul.
Blessed be the LORD•Strongs #: Yhwh; a variation of 3068 (used after 136, and pronounced as 430, in order to prevent the repetition of the same sound, since elsewhere 3068 is pronounced as 136):—God., who hath not given us as a prey to their teeth.
Our soul is escaped as a bird out of the snare of the fowlers: the snare is broken, and we are escaped.
Our help is in the name of the LORD•Strongs #: Yhwh; a variation of 3068 (used after 136, and pronounced as 430, in order to prevent the repetition of the same sound, since elsewhere 3068 is pronounced as 136):—God., who made heaven and earth.”
—Psalm 124:1-8

“And I will bring again the captivity•Strongs 7622: shbuwth, sheb-ooth´; or shbiyth, sheb-eeth´; from 7617; exile, concretely, prisoners; figuratively, a former state of prosperity:—captive(-ity).
•Strongs 7617: shabah, shaw-baw´; a primitive root; to transport into captivity:—(bring away, carry, carry away, lead, lead away, take) captive(-s), drive (take) away. of my people of Israel, and they shall build the waste cities, and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and drink the wine thereof; they shall also make gardens, and eat the fruit of them. And I will plant them upon their land, and they shall no more be pulled up•Strongs 5428: nathash, naw-thash´; a primitive root; to tear away:—destroy, forsake, pluck (out, up, by the roots), pull up, root out (up), x utterly. out of their land which I have given them, saith the LORD thy God.”
—Amos 9:14-15

The IDF will not tolerate any attempt to harm Israeli civilians and IDF soldiers, and will continue to operate with strength and determination against anyone who uses terror against the State of Israel. The Hamas terror organization is solely responsible for any terrorist activity emanating from the Gaza Strip.