After protests led Benedict XVI to postpone a visit to a Roman university, Cardinal Ruini invited all Romans to gather in St. Peter's Square to show their affection for the Pope. "In this circumstance which so painfully struck our entire city," he added, "the Church of Rome expresses its filial and total closeness to its bishop, the Pope, and expresses love, trust, admiration and gratitude to Benedict XVI, who is in the heart of the Roman people."
As the Holy See and Israel continue to hammer out the details of the 1993 Fundamental Agreement signed by both parties, Israel has made a gesture of conciliation. Israel will now make it easier for religious personnel, such as priests and religious, to work and travel in the nation, reported a statement from the Israeli embassy to the Holy See
The German government is considering sending as many as 240 extra troops to Afghanistan as part of a rapid-reaction combat force, drawing criticism from opposition lawmakers that the move oversteps the original mission mandate. Additional combat troops will increase Germany's participation in the "illegal war in Afghanistan. ... The German military is sinking deeper into the quagmire."
On Monday, we reported in our Daily Morning News Briefing that France is proposing a Euro Area summit, and that Germany is "open" to it. On Tuesday, Angela Merkel held a news conference, in which she effectively says that such a summit is both unnecessary and divisive. So what happened? Did they change their mind? It is interesting how 9 years of joint euro area experience have failed to make any inroads into national debates in the countries. Germany and France remain as far apart as ever.
(Also: Merkel rejects summit idea)
New EU presidency holder Slovenia criticised on Wednesday a plan by President Sarkozy to create a Mediterranean Union linking states from both sides of the sea. "We do not however need a duplication of institutions, or institutions that would compete with the EU, institutions that would cover part of the EU and part of the neighbourhood." Chancellor Merkel has also expressed strong misgivings about Sarkozy's proposal, saying it had the potential to divide the EU.
Three days from now, citizens of Serbia will head to the polls and cast their ballots for their preferred candidate among the seven. More so than in previous years, Serbian election results will make a real difference, both in that country's future and that of the West. Nine years since a fabricated massacre started NATO on the road to aggression, it is possible that the Empire's Kosovo gambit has finally failed.
(Also: Serbia will not recognize Kosovo)
(Also: China worries about Kosovo)
A stone seal bearing the name of one of the families who acted as servants in the First Temple and then returned to Jerusalem after being exiled to Babylonia has been uncovered in an archeological excavation in Jerusalem's City of David, a prominent Israeli archeologist said. The 2,500-year-old black stone seal, which has the name "Temech" engraved on it, was found earlier this week amid stratified debris in the excavation under way just outside the Old City walls near the Dung Gate.
According to the Book of Nehemiah, the Temech family were servants of the First Temple and were sent into exile to Babylon following its destruction by the Babylonians in 586 BCE. The family was among those who later returned to Jerusalem.
Prime Minister Olmert's wobbly coalition government was in growing danger of collapse yesterday after a hard-line right-wing party quit to protest peace talks with the Palestinians. The hawkish Avigdor Lieberman, who had been serving as both deputy prime minister and minister of strategic affairs, said he could no longer stay in a government that was willing to make a land-for-peace deal. Lieberman's announcement came just 2 days after final status talks began in earnest.
Israel arrested a suspected Syrian militant operating on Israeli soil accused of preparing attacks against the Jewish state, WND has learned. The militant was arrested July 29, weeks before Israel's Sept. 6 air raid on a remote site in Syria that has been described by independent analysts and some US politicians as a potential Syrian nuclear reactor.
Pakistani troops have abandoned a fort in a remote tribal area, a day after another was overrun by pro-Taleban militants, officials and witnesses say. They say that paramilitary personnel at Sipla Toi military post in South Waziristan left their positions fearing an attack by the militants. But an army spokesman told the BBC he had received no such reports.
A Chinese attack submarine and destroyer confronted the US carrier Kitty Hawk and its battle group in the Taiwan Strait, sparking a tense 28-hour standoff that brought both sides to a battle-ready position. The American ships were heading to Japan following China's sudden cancellation of a scheduled Thanksgiving port call in Hong Kong when they encountered the Chinese vessels, according to the Navy Times, which cited a report in a Chinese-language newspaper in Taiwan.
A worried Israel makes me worried...
Israel said today that Russian deliveries of nuclear fuel to Iran might help Tehran develop nuclear weapons. Israel's foreign minister said during a visit to Russia that the fuel might help Iran develop its nuclear weapons programme. "Now Russia has started delivering nuclear fuel to Bushehr, (Iran's) uranium enrichment may serve military goals. Those taking decisions on Iran are being watched by everyone in our region, including Israel and moderate Arab regimes. We expect the world will not allow the appearance of a nuclear Iran."
Germany's foreign minister is expected to push the 5 permanent members of the UN Security Council to take a tougher stand on Iran when the countries meet in Berlin next Tuesday. Germany is watching the situation in Iran closely, particularly after a man with dual Iranian-German citizenship was arrested in Berlin on suspicion of smuggling nuclear material to Iran.
The Bush administration won't back down on pursuing new sanctions against Iran over its nuclear program despite questions about their usefulness raised by government auditors, US officials said Wednesday. A senior Iranian official said Tehran is confident of a prompt solution to the dispute but warned that failure would play into the hands of those who favor unilateral action and war and criticized Bush for speaking "constantly about war."
(Also: China regrets pressure on Iran)
Not towing the neocon line...
Defense Secretary Robert Gates has dismissed previous allegations of Islamic Republic posing a military threat to the US. In an interview with National Public Radio, Gates said Iran certainly does not pose a direct military threat to the US in the final year of the Bush administration.
It's sad to say, but the history of humanity is largely the history of its wars, and the armed conflicts of western civilization more often than not involved clashes of religious ideologies. The framers of the US Constitution insisted on separation of church and state for a number of reasons. Premier among them was to prevent a self-proclaimed unitary executive from exploiting misplaced religious fervor to wage unnecessary and ill-advised wars.
President Sarkozy's increasingly frequent and positive references to God and faith have drawn fire from critics who accuse him of violating France's separation of church and state. "This is an ideological stand that makes religion into an instrument to promote French products civilian nuclear plants for Muslim countries. Mixing religion and foreign policy is illogical and wrong."
In the final analysis, the inability of the 2 major big business parties to quickly decide the nomination fight is an expression of the divisions within the ruling elite. These are driven, not so much by the debacle in Iraq, where there is still wide agreement in the political establishment on maintaining the US occupation indefinitely, but by the eruption of a series of crises in the financial markets.
There is not yet any consensus on what policy should be pursued in the face of recession, widespread foreclosures, and the danger of social upheaval. The principal policy measure now being pursued—lower US interest rates—threatens to make the crisis even worse if it triggers a movement by foreign investors out of dollar-denominated assets and into assets linked to the euro or the yen. Money and media manipulation will continue to be the major factors in determining both nominations, not genuine popular sentiments.
Gold may smash the $1,000 barrier as soon as this summer should the dollar continue its slide and the woes of the US economy deepen, Goldman Sachs said. The investment bank lifted its forecast for the yellow metal today on expectations of a recession in the US, which the bank expects to take hold in the 2nd and 3rd quarters of this year, could send the dollar to a record low of $1.51 against the euro.
President Chavez warned that the world's biggest oil consumers face shrinking supplies. "The US, for example, unfortunately has very little time left, very little reserves of its own oil. Other big consumer countries already have very small reserves. The US consumes 20 million barrels of oil per day. You see the imbalance?"
Merrill Lynch & Co. reported a record loss after writing down at least $15 billion of failed investments, ousting its chief executive officer and losing almost half of its market value in 2007. Merrill, the largest US brokerage, fell 2.3% in New York trading as the loss was almost three times bigger than analysts estimated.
Even here, far from the housing crisis' epicenter, high earners with good credit may be heading for trouble as their adjustable rate mortgages (ARMs) adjust beyond their means, local real estate agents and others say. In a normal housing market they'd be able to sell, but now they are stuck. "The next wave of problems will come from prime borrowers who bought too much house or borrowed too much against it."
Real estate agents warn that some high-income borrowers have already been forced to sell or leave their homes and more will follow. "For those who utilized home equity loans for five to ten years to finance their lifestyle, the chickens are coming home to roost."
The ongoing and deepening global financial crisis, nominally triggered in July 2007 by an event involving a small German bank holding securitized assets backed by US sub-prime real estate mortgages, can best be understood as an essential part of an historical process dating back to the end of WW2—the rise and decline of the American Century.
Ever on the lookout for tomorrow's customers, Western corporations have set their sights on industrializing economies and developing nations. It's a huge opportunity, but low cost isn't the only important criterion for a vast new group of consumers. Innovations are also important for this growing market.
Syria informed Russia that it wished to conduct international banking transactions in euros and offered to sign intergovernmental agreements to that effect. Syria explained the decision by the possible freezing of its accounts in US dollars, because of US economic sanctions.
Experiments to create Britain's first embryos that merge human and animal material will begin within months after a Government watchdog today approved two research teams to carry out the controversial work. Scientists at King's College London and the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne will now inject human DNA into empty eggs from cows, to create embryos known as cytoplasmic hybrids that are 99.9% human in genetic terms.
Tonight, moving eastward as it always does in orbit around Earth, the moon will pass very near the Pleiades.
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