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The recent fall of Fallujah, Iraq, to an Al-Qaeda-linked group provides an unwelcome reminder of the American resources and lives devoted in 2004 to 2007 to control the city – all that effort expended and nothing to show for it. Similarly, outlays of hundreds of billions of dollars to modernize Afghanistan did not prevent the release of 72 prisoners who have attacked Americans. These two examples point to a larger conclusion: maladies run so deep in the Middle East (minus remarkable Israel) that outside powers cannot remedy them. Here's a fast summary: Water is running out. A dam going up...

Mr. Abbas, Israel wants to sign a peace treaty based on the principle of "two states for two peoples." You have refused to accept this formula. Israel has proven that it will withdraw to new borders, remove Israelis from your state, and give up its claims to Biblical lands. It's time for you to reciprocate. Recognize Israel as the nation-state of the Jewish people, stop the incitement against Israel, and let's bring an end to the conflict once and for all.

[VIDEO AT LINK] After his remark, the President suggested we imagine all the people living for today. It’s funny, people joke about hippie Democrats, and then they go and give you something like this on a silver platter. With a platitude like give peace a chance, one cannot help but think of the recent revelations from Robert Gates’ explosive new memoir. Now that we know how unseriously Obama dealt with Iraq and Afghanistan, hearing him state his philosophy on Iran’s nukes as something so trite and so contrary to everything we know about the Iranian regime takes on a meaning...

What do you expect from your relationship to Jesus Christ? I have come to discover that many do not expect all that much. In effect they hope that faith can kind of help them “muddle through” life and offer them a few consolations that, perhaps things will be better some day, and in heaven. Others see the moral life described in the scriptures more as a duty than a description of the person being transformed by Jesus Christ. And because they see it as a list of duties,  rather than the result of grace, they tend to resent it, consider...

I. The Paradox of this Night - In a way, we are too familiar with the Christmas story, and so many of its strange paradoxes and stunning “absurdities” fail to shock and amaze us. And yet it does not take long to consider that no human being would ever craft this sort of entrance of God into our world. Surely we would envision God’s entrance in Cecil B. DeMille proportions.  (DeMille was producer of “The Ten Commandments” and other classic Hollywood Epics, in case I’m showing my age). Yes, there would be grand sets, a cast of thousands, palaces, trumpets,...

Well, we had 9 degrees this morning, but warming up to 32 degrees later today. Everyone be safe out there on this Sabbath day, and take time to warm your souls and feed your spirits by remembering and worshiping God in Heaven and His Son, Jesus Christ, this day. Drink of the living water. John 4:14 "But whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life."

What could go wrong with that? This is a re-post of an article written last December when Palestinians exercised their universal human right to send missiles and freedom fighters (messengers of peace and love) to hateful Israeli settlements and elsewhere in Palestine. Three Cheers for President Obama and his peace makers, whomever they may happen to be!With recent increases in Palestinian peace efforts and Obama Administration support for peace everlasting in the entire nation of Palestine (wherever and whatever that may turn out to be), this seemed an appropriate time to revisit the situation. Mahmoud Abbas has created a tiger with his...

We are hearing a multitude of broadcasts, blogs, and stories about Mandela. Hosts fill their alloted time with stories of Mandela, and cannot help but slip into comparisons with modern politicians. It is also appropriate to compare him with our 16th President, Abraham Lincoln, who faced some of the very same challenges as Mr. Mandela.

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu apparently believes the greatest threat the country now faces is an escalated European trade war. He's wrong. The greatest threat we are now facing is a national leadership that cannot get its arms around changing strategic realities. Over the weekend, Yediot Aharonot reported that during Secretary of State John Kerry's seven-hour meeting in Rome last week with Netanyahu, Kerry warned that the price for walking away from the talks with the PLO will be European economic strangulation of Israel. According to the newspaper, "[T]he secretary of state told the prime minister that he heard from his...

Have you been searching for the real thing in spirituality and salvation? We hear a lot of talk about it by ministers who are no more saved than the average Joe, sadly. Well, I have begun this FB page to promote the real thing because I have found it myself. I am not talking from theory or rote learning. No! And I want you all to be on that path to real salvation, peace of mind, and being able to fight socialists/ communism and still remain happy! Please give it a like too...if you do like it! Thank you, fabian

One evening several years ago, I was laying upon my bed almost ready for sleep after my quiet and silent prayer that I have been practicing for many years. Then, this presence came hovering over my body, filling it with warmth and a very real feeling of well being and love. It was not a dream and was the most wonderful sensation I have ever had. Far surpassing any drug induced feeling of happiness that I and many were prone to seek in our troubled childhoods. No, this was the rel deal and had a wordless telepathic message: I had...

In his speech to the nation on Syria last week, the president twice emphasized that America is not the “world’s policeman.” According to polls, most Americans agree. Unfortunately, however, relinquishing this role assures catastrophe both for the world and for America. This is easy to demonstrate. Imagine that, because of the great financial and human price, the mayors and city councils of some major American cities decide that they no longer want to police their cities. Individuals simply have to protect themselves. We all know what would happen: The worst human beings would terrorize these cities, and the loss of...

John Kerry burped. Excuse him. That’s how he does foreign policy. Don a burping pad before asking him questions; you never know whether he will spit out war or peace. Last Monday, Secretary of State John Kerry held a press conference. CBS reporter Margaret Brennan asked Kerry how Syrian President Bashar al-Assad could avoid a U.S. air strike on Syria. MARGARET BRENNAN: “…is there anything at this point that his government could do or offer that would stop an attack?” SECRETARY KERRY: “Sure. He could turn over every single bit of his chemical weapons to the international community in the...

Barack Obama ran for president as the last of the red-hot pacifists, so it might have sounded preposterous to predict that after a few security briefings at the White House, President Obama would follow in the same policy footsteps of horrid warmonger George Bush, with his anti-terrorist wars and strategies. So where is the anti-war movement now? "What anti-war movement?" former Congressman Dennis Kucinich asked when called for comment last week. Medea Benjamin of the radical group Code Pink agreed: "The antiwar movement is a shadow of its former self under the Bush years." Cindy Sheehan quipped, "The 'anti-war left'...

Editor's Note: Although President Obama had only been in office for 12 days before the nominations for this year's Nobel Peace prize closed the entire process actually takes a full year... Barack Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize this morning. Over the last decade the only requirement to win the prize was that the nominee had to be critical of George W. Bush (see Al Gore, Mohamed El Baradei and Jimmy Carter). President Obama has broken new ground here. Nominations for potential winners of the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize ended on February 1. The president took office only 12 days...

A dentist wants to clone John Lennon from his rotten tooth All you need is DNA. A Canadian dentist says he's working with "American scientists" to clone John Lennon from a rotten molar the Beatles singer had extracted in the 1960s. According to the press release (warning: it autoplays a weird parody song, "Love Me Tooth") dentist Michael Zuk bought the tooth at auction for $31,000 and now is working with an unspecified lab to see if they can clone him. Says Zuk: I am nervous and excited at the possibility that we will be able to fully sequence John...

Israeli and Palestinian Authority negotiators on Tuesday night concluded a third meeting as part of the renewed peace talks between the sides. The meeting, reportedly held at an undisclosed location in Jerusalem, was described as “serious”. The sides agreed to meet again soon. As usual, Israel was represented at the meeting by Justice Minister Tzipi Livni and Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s envoy Yitzhak Molcho. The PA side was represented by chief negotiator Saeb Erekat and Mohammed Shtayeh. The late evening meeting, which ended shortly before midnight, was the second meeting of the day between the sides. Earlier Tuesday, a senior...

At the behest of the State Department, Israel began releasing Palestinian prisoners this week in a deal to get peace talks going. One of them killed an American. Eli Lake reports. For decades, the United States has urged foreign governments not to free prisoners who have killed Americans. But a man who murdered an American was freed this week by Israel in a prisoner-release deal encouraged by Secretary of State John Kerry. Among those released Tuesday as an inducement to the Palestinian Authority to return to peace negotiations was Al-Haaj Othman Amar Mustafa, a Palestinian convicted in 1991 of killing...

This might come as a surprise to some, but many Israelis do not believe that establishing a Palestinian state is the right thing to do. Actually, we are disappointed to see Israeli representatives going through the motions in order to demonstrate to the world that we are the good guys while putting their faith in the PLO functionaries to mess it up. They are basing their actions on the well-known Israeli saying “the Palestinians never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.” Some Israeli leaders feel that they can only depend on the Palestinians for one thing - their dedication...

Gen. Mark Welsh, the chief of staff of the U.S. Air Force, has completed a secret visit to Israel, where was the guest of the Commander of the Israel Air Force, Maj.-Gen. Amir Eshel. snip The officials discussed a number of topics including mutual security challenges in light of the regional security situation. Welsh and Eshel also discussed plans to further strengthen the cooperation between the U.S. Air Force and the Israel Air Force, according to the IDF. The meeting, which reportedly was kept secret at the request of the United States, comes in advance of a scheduled visit by...