1. Pope meets Sudanese-American woman who escaped death for apostasy charges in Sudan
Article by Phyllis Chesler here
2. Hamas arsenal suggests ‘apocalyptic’ scenario: Israeli official
The senior official, who cannot be identified under the ground rules of the briefing, said the Israeli military had considerable prior knowledge of Hamas weaponry and tunnels, but was still “surprised” by the extent of both when the current ground operation began last Thursday.
3. Fatah: Abbas presents fighting Israel as religious “war for Allah”
This week, Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas ended a speech about the current conflict between Israel and Hamas in Gaza with a quote from the Quran justifying war. His Fatah party interpreted Abbas’ statement to mean that fighting against Israel is justified on religious Islamic grounds:
“[PA] President [Mahmoud Abbas] concluded his brief speech with the first verse of the Quran that permits Muslims to wage war for Allah.”
[Facebook, “Fatah – The Main Page”, July 22, 2014]
4. US Pulls Peace Corps Volunteers From Kenya
The Peace Corps said Thursday it is closely monitoring the security environment and will determine when the volunteers can return.
The decision comes shortly after the State Department reduced the number of people who work in the U.S. Embassy in Kenya, which increased the number of armed guards on site earlier this year.
Kenya has seen a spate of bombing and gunfire attacks, often carried out by Somali militants.
(It’s ABC so they can’t say ‘muslims’ or ‘Islamic’ I guess)
5. Nigeria and neighbours form new force to fight Boko Haram
Nigeria and three other states have pledged to speed up the creation of a 2,800-strong regional force to tackle militant Islamist group Boko Haram.
Defence ministers of Nigeria, Cameroon, Chad and Niger said they would each contribute 700 troops to the force.
Niger’s Defence Minister Karidio Mahamadou said they were determined to “eradicate this curse”.
Boko Haram’s insurgency is focused on Nigeria, but it has carried out some cross-border raids.
6. Rockets fired at Eilat after mortar wounds Israeli
7. Purged by ISIS, Iraq’s Christians appeal to world for help
Iraqi Christians are begging for help from the civilized world after Mosul, the northern city where they have lived and worshiped for 2,000 years, was purged of non-Muslims by ISIS, the jihadist terror group that claims to have established its own nation in the region.
Assyrian Christians, including Chaldean and Syriac Catholics, Syriac Orthodox and followers of the Assyrian Church of the East have roots in present day Iraq, Turkey, Syria and Iran that stretch back to the time of Jesus Christ. While they have long been a minority and have faced persecution in the past, they had never been driven completely from their homes as has happened in Mosul under ISIS. When the terror group ordered all to convert to Islam, pay a religious tax or face execution, many chose another option: flight.
8. Boro fans banned for life after Koran was used as confetti at away match
(The charge should have been littering. To do what the authorities did is to give in to Islamic thuggery and implement the sharia. Someone needs to tear up a bible and a complete works of Shakespeare and see what happens. Which will be nothing)
Boro have banned three fans for life for their part in a Koran ripping incident at an away match.
Six supporters were originally given temporary bans from The Riverside after the 2-2 draw at Birmingham City in December. […]
Julie Phillips, 50, and Gemma Parkin, 18, from Middlesbrough, were found guilty of committing a religiously aggravated public order offence by magistrates in May.
Thank you Wrath of Khan, M, GoV, Buck and various FB groups and contacts. Thank you all. More to come.
Washington Post reporter Jason Rezaian ‘held in Iran’ (BBC, July 24, 2014)
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-28476214
“An American reporter for the Washington Post and his wife appear to have been detained in Tehran, the newspaper said. Jason Rezaian, a 38-year-old dual Iran-US citizen, and his Iranian wife Yeganeh Salehi, were taken into custody on Tuesday evening, the paper said.
Two freelance photographers, also US citizens, were being held too, it said.
Western news organisations, including the BBC, have great difficulty operating in Iran, with journalists facing detention and surveillance.
“We are deeply troubled by this news and are concerned for the welfare of Jason, Yeganeh and two others said to have been detained with them,” Washington Post foreign editor Douglas Jehl said in a statement.
Mr Rezaian has been the Post’s Iran correspondent since 2012. Ms Salehi works as a correspondent for the National, an English-language newspaper based in the United Arab Emirates.
Authorities in Iran frequently detain or harass journalists working for western news organisations, and Americans with dual citizenship are typical targets…”
1/ ‘See what an effort was required to free just one woman and her family. Imagine what would be required to free all infidels and other prisoners of conscience trapped in today’s Islamic world.’
Of course it would require immeasurably less effort if infidel Media, University and Government were actually on the infidels’ side.
#2 With the entire world forcing Israel to tolerate the terror attacks for so long it was a given that Hamas would gain the weaponry to start acting like a national government in its attacks. They have become a major threat to Israel and by extension to the entire civilized world, and the entire civilized world seems to be intent on suicide.
A comment from an Israeli blog (English version) went something like this:
Since 2006 every soldier coming back from the front, EACH TIME — and they ALL say it — Is that they were surprised by the intensity and advances in the fire power of Hamas. Hamas training is as good as Israel’s. (Probably better, half the secret services of the world are training them.) Hamas or whichever Arabs are around the non-Arab colonized entity in the Middle East will murder the non-Arabs forever.
The whole of the world has decided that Arab colonialists are the only group who are allowed to be called indigenous to the Middle East.
———
I’ve read & heard the same thing for years.
Don’t forget the last time Israel fought Hezbollah, Hezbollah stood and knocked with them and only withdrew when they ran out of ammo. Things aren’t looking good for Israel right now.
#4 While I agree that they should be pulled back home I have to say that Obama will do anything to reduce the US influence around the world.
#7 In WWII the world ignored all of the evidence of the Holocaust and with a few exceptions refused to allow Jewish refugees in, now the so called civilized world is doing the same thing with the holocaust against the Christians in the Middle East.