In The News provided by Koinonia House

Better than 400 people in Madison County turned out for the National Day of Prayer on May 3, and they ranged in age from those just starting out their school careers to some who could likely teach us all a thing or two about faith. More than 30 churches in all gave testament to importance of the day in Madison County with attendance at one of the major events. That feeling of unity provided a blessing that was surely felt by young and old around the area. "As organized as it was, there was a lot of spontaneity and fellowship that is difficult to describe," Joe Williams, committee chair for the National Day of Prayer event at Bedias Baptist Church, said. "I look forward to it next year, and pray that the Spirit we left it with will continue on until next year." The theme for the National Day of Prayer this year was "One Nation Under God," and Madison County represents just one of thousands of communities across America where the faithful gathered May 3 to seek God on behalf of their families, towns, counties, states and nation.

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

The following was signed by 21 French economists ahead of last Sunday's presidential elections, in which Francois Gerard Georges Hollande beat incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy. The authors attest that they belong to no political party, and the views expressed here are their own and do not necessarily reflect the views of their institutions. "Francois Hollande and his Socialist friends are a particularly mendacious and destructive sort of demagogue: They are purporting to help us by increasing our minimum wages rather than liberating our energies; they will punish the rich rather than encourage all of us to engage in productive efforts; they say they will spend more to stimulate 'growth' - effectively, to buy more consumers - instead of letting us choose the best uses for our own resources. Socialism has never succeeded in its extreme form, communism. As the past several years in Europe have shown, it does not work in its milder form of social democracy either. If European history teaches us anything, it is that prosperity is closely correlated to economic freedom..." [To read the rest, see Title link.]

Read More in: The Rise of a European Superstate

Hillary Clinton's intervention ultimately resulted in an arrangement to allow blind Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng to study at New York University but not to seek asylum, which the Chinese considered an affront. Under terms that have not been disclosed, Mr. Chen is expected to leave the US Embassy in Beijing in days. The outcome, said several officials who recounted the story, reflected a maturing relationship now able to weather a fraught diplomatic entanglement. The officials would discuss diplomatic talks only on the condition of anonymity.

Read More in: The Rise of the Far East

A new study conducted on behalf of the Chilean Maternal Mortality Research Initiative (CMMRI) reaffirms that legalized abortion does not reduce the rate of maternal mortality. To the contrary, since Chile enacted a law protecting unborn children in 1989, the maternal mortality rate has dropped significantly. The study included analysis covering 50 years of maternal mortality data (1957-2007) from Chile's National Institute of Statistics. The analysis found that the most important factor in reducing maternal mortality is the educational level of women. "Educating women enhances women's ability to access existing health care resources, including skilled attendants for childbirth, and directly leads to a reduction in her risk of dying during pregnancy and childbirth," according to Dr Elard Koch, epidemiologist and leading author of the study.

Magnet-making bacteria may be building biological computers of the future, researchers have said. A team from the UK's University of Leeds and Japan's Tokyo University of Agriculture and Technology have used microbes that eat iron. As they ingest the iron, the microbes create tiny magnets inside themselves, similar to those in PC hard drives. The research may lead to the creation of much faster hard drives, the team of scientists say. The study appears in the journal Small. As technology progresses and computer components get smaller and smaller, it becomes harder to produce electronics on a nano-scale. So researchers are now turning to nature - and getting microbes involved.

Read More in: Biotech & Global Pestilence

Seattle Mayor Mike McGinn says he's making an emergency declaration allowing police to confiscate items that can be used as weapons following violent May Day protests that left storefronts and car windows shattered. Police said officers made at least three arrests after hundreds of people marched through downtown Tuesday afternoon. A 23-year-old man was arrested for vandalism and a 19-year-old man with a knife was also arrested. Protestors dressed in black clothing smashed windows of retail stores and banks, and spray-painted parked cars, reported Q13 FOX News. NikeTown, American Apparel, HSBC, and Wells Fargo were among the businesses protesters vandalized.

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

Chinese human rights activist Chen Guangcheng was reportedly pressured to leave the US Embassy in China where he had been seeking refuge and accept a deal struck by the United States and the Chinese government. Chen became a target of Chinese government after repeatedly exposing the forced abortions and forced sterilizations taking place under the One Child Policy. The Chinese government had threatened to kill Chen's wife and family members if Chen did not vacate the embassy and accept the deal. The case of Chen Guangcheng has sparked international outcry. However, there are some groups in the United States that remain conspicuously silent on the issue. Groups like Planned Parenthood, NARAL Pro-Choice America and NOW, which purport to support women's rights have remained silent on Chen and his activism on behalf of the women of China faced with the forced abortions of their children.

Read More in: The Rise of the Far East

The father of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Benzion Netanyahu, died Monday morning in his Jerusalem home at the age of 102. Benzion Netanyahu was an Israeli historian and professor emeritus at Cornell University and was a Revisionist leader in the Zionist Movement in the United States. He will most likely be remembered for his great influence on the worldview of his son, Benjamin. He believed that the extermination of Jews had not ended and long warned against the threat of Islamic extremism. Please pray for the peace of the Netanyahu family and for the peace of Jerusalem.

Read More in: The Struggle for Jerusalem

China successfully launched two satellites into space for its Beidou global navigation and positioning network, Xinhua news agency reported on Monday. The Beidou-2 satellites were lifted into space by a Long March-3B carrier rocket and have entered the scheduled orbit. It is the first time China has launched two navigation satellites, the 12th and 13th of its indigenous global navigation and positioning network, with one rocket.

Read More in: The Rise of the Far East

After Chuck Colson passed away on Saturday, obituaries naturally remembered him first and foremost as the lawyer and Watergate conspirator who went to jail for obstructing justice. They also noted that, while in prison, he found Christ and dedicated himself to prison ministries. Colson took literally Christ's command to visit and comfort those in prison, a ministry that middle-class congregations had previously ignored. He got prisons to set aside wings or buildings for inmates who wanted to live in a structured, faith-based environment. He got congregations to see it as part of their mission to partner with prisons and individual inmates, leading prison programming aimed at turning men's lives around. Most of all, he got law-abiding citizens on the outside to encounter inmates, face to face, not as nameless, faceless threats but as their brothers to be redeemed. And, in doing so, Colson changed the terms of debate.

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

What look like little more than chickenpox pockmarks on Young's face are the physical reminders of the way his life began. It was the story that spread across the country: A newborn baby, umbilical cord still attached, left to die in a Martin County orange grove, near an anthill. But his story took an unexpected turn. Found covered in ant bites by a passerby, raised by a Riviera Beach foster family desperate to raise a child, Nick Young - named only Sam when he was rushed to Martin Memorial Medical Center - will walk across the stage as a graduate of Florida A&M on Saturday. Born at 6 pounds, 5 ounces, Baby Sam was six weeks old when he came to live with Carl and Dorothy Young. Dorothy Young looked at the baby with the eyes of a mother. When he was 2, the family adopted him. When it was time to choose a name, the Youngs, practicing Christians, decided on a biblical name. They chose Nicholas Emmanuel, which means "God is with us."

Former Palestinian intelligence official Muhammad Abu Shahala has reportedly been sentenced to death by the Palestinian Authority for selling a Hebron home to Jews. In response, Jewish officials from the community in Hebron are calling for international officials now to get involved—in order to save Abu Shahala's life. "According to various news agencies, Mr. Muhammad Abu Shahala, a former intelligence agent for the Palestinian Authority, has been sentenced to death, following a hurried trial. His crime: selling property to Jews in Hebron," said David Wilder and Noam Arnon, of the Jewish community in Hebron. Finally, the Hebron Jews urge action. "We appeal to all international leaders to demand the annulment of the death warrant and pending execution of Muhammad Abu Shahala, to be followed by his immediate release from imprisonment, for he has committed no crime."

Read More in: The Struggle for Jerusalem

A ministerial team that had been appointed by the government on Sunday announced on Monday that three communities in Judea and Samaria will be legalized. The three communities are Sansana, Rechelim and Bruchin. All three communities were built in the 1990s based on decisions of previous governments. The announcement means the communities will receive a legal status which hadn't been given to them until now. Some were cautious about the announcement, though. "There is a fear that today's message regarding the legalization came to prepare the ground to destroy Migron, the Ulpana neighborhood in Beit El and Givat Assaf. Netanyahu must know that no one among those who are faithful to the Land of Israel will buy more of these tricks," said MK Aryeh Eldad (National Union)

Read More in: The Struggle for Jerusalem

As many as 100,000 women in Britain have undergone female genital mutilations with medics in the UK offering to carry out the illegal procedure on girls as young as 10, it has been reported. Investigators from The Sunday Times said they secretly filmed a doctor, dentist and alternative medicine practitioner who were allegedly willing to perform circumcisions or arrange for the operation to be carried out. The doctor and dentist deny any wrongdoing. The practice, which involves the surgical removal of external genitalia and in some cases the stitching of the vaginal opening, is illegal in Britain and carries up to a 14 year prison sentence.

While lavish celebrations were being held to mark the centenary of North Korean founder Kim Il-sung's birth, a great number of people across the country are literally starving to death. More than 20,000 North Koreans in South Hwanghae province have died of starvation since former leader Kim Jong-il's death in December last year, according to the Japanese daily Tokyo Shimbun. The paper added that the North's new leader Kim Jung-un has recently instructed authorities to distribute rice from military rations to the hunger-stricken residents.

Read More in: The Rise of the Far East

A terror attack was thwarted Saturday following the arrest of two Palestinian teens by Border Guard and police officers, near the Tapuach Junction in the West Bank. The two, both 17, took a taxi to the junction and upon arrival began walking towards the checkpoint.Their behavior aroused the suspicion of Border Guard and police officers stationed at the checkpoint, who called on them to stop for a routine search. The teens attempted to flee and the officers initiated suspect-arrest protocol, eventually apprehending them. A search of their belongings discovered five pipe bombs, a gun and munitions. The defense establishment said that terror groups are pursuing various ways to execute attacks against Israeli targets, despite the relative calm following the last round of escalation vis-à-vis the Gaza terror groups.

Read More in: The Struggle for Jerusalem

Over 50 Chinese cities are sinking into the ground because of the continuous subsidence of the soil. The excessive consumption of ground water is to blame. As its result, under many Chinese cities, including Beijing, the world's largest underground funnels have formed. But there are other environmental problems in the country. In China lakes are evaporating, rivers are drying out, 75 percent of forests have been logged. Because of the destruction of the topsoil the land turns into desert sand that invades cities and even neighboring countries. The country is paying for the unprecedented pace of economic development and a passion for unbridled consumption...

Read More in: The Rise of the Far East

Parents at a Massachusetts elementary school were furious after educators first removed the word 'God' from the popular Lee Greenwood song, "God Bless the U.S.A." and then pulled the song all together from an upcoming concert. Children at Stall Brook Elementary School in Bellingham were told to sing, "We love the U.S.A." instead of "God Bless the U.S.A.", though the song's writer, Lee Greenwood, had not given his permission for the words of his song to be changed. After parents started complaining, school officials removed the song from the school assembly concert altogether. The superintendent of Bellingham Public Schools finally released a statement last Wednesday stating that students would be allowed to sing or not sing "God Bless the USA" during an upcoming assembly at Stall Brook Elementary School. "Political correctness is certainly a consideration in the public sector," Superintendent Edward Fleury wrote in a statement posted on the district's website. "Students will be allowed to sing or not sing the words 'God Bless the USA' as they sing in celebration of their acquired knowledge," he said. "No other words will be substituted."

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

Today, cinema is the most attractive show business for the haters of Israel; Hollywood celebrities, such as the Trotskyite Vanessa Redgrave and Viggo Mortensen, have boarded the anti-Israel bandwagon. It's an Israelophobic star system that joined the most perverse sabotage of human rights. Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis, a winner of the UNESCO International Music Prize, is a renowned Jew-hater who declared on Greek television that he was "anti-Israel and anti-Semitic." Meanwhile, "Manifest Destiny" by composer Keith Burstein and librettist Dic Edward is another musical opera that romanticizes Palestinian suicide bombers.

Read More in: The Struggle for Jerusalem

Children as young as 13 claim they have instantly healed hundreds of people using the miracle powers of Jesus on Queensland streets. The Pentecostal group Culture Shifters in Queensland says it has healed people suffering from cancer and multiple sclerosis and is developing a large youth following. Children from the group have been approaching people at random on the street, prompting alarm from parents and warnings from doctors for the sick to seek medical attention. "Anyone who has a medical condition should always seek advice from their doctor,'' Australian Medical Association Queensland president Dr Richard Kidd said.

A 12-ton Navy jet loaded with tons of fuel crashes in a spectacular fireball into a big apartment complex, scattering plane parts and wiping out some 40 units, yet no lives were lost. The mayor of Virginia Beach could only call it a "Good Friday miracle." The two pilots and five people on the ground were hurt, but all were out of the hospital by Saturday.

Under fire from a United Nations Human Rights panel, a top Iranian official claims a Christian pastor insulted Islam but denies he faces execution. Iranian human rights envoy Mohammad Javad Larijani denied that Nadarkhani faces the death penalty, though the sentence was spelled out in a ruling handed down by Iran's highest court last fall. Larijani also offered a new set of charges against Nadarkhani, including preaching to youth without their parents' permission, converting his home into a church and offending Islam. In recent months, there has been an increasing international outcry for Iran to release Nadarkhani. At the council session, representatives of the European Union expressed concern over numerous human rights violations and the pastor's case in particular. Representatives from Norway and Germany also have urged Iran to review Nadarkhani's case.

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

The biggest reason that our government has turned into a nanny state is because so many American adults act like spoiled, petulant children. This is not about being a conservative as opposed to a liberal; it's about being an adult as opposed to a child. 1)Keep the government -- and everyone else -- out of your bedroom. Pay for your own contraceptives. 2)It's your job to take care of your kids. It's your job to feed them, clothe them, watch over them, and teach them right from wrong. Of course, it's not easy. It has never been easy, but somehow everybody from cavemen to medieval peasants to Vikings managed to pull it off. If they can do it, you can do it. 3) The government may put basic safety regulations in place, but at the end of the day, you're responsible for your own life and limb...

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

Eurozone finance ministers gave their final approval to a second bailout for Greece on Monday and turned their fire on Spain, demanding it aim for a tougher deficit target this year in order to get back on target in 2013. Greece, the source of the currency bloc's debt crisis, swapped its privately held bonds at the weekend for new, longer maturity paper with less than half the nominal value, a move that cut its debts by more than 100 billion euros. The exchange paved the way for eurozone ministers to give the final political go-ahead to a 130 billion euro package that aims to finance Athens until 2014.

Read More in: The Rise of a European Superstate

The visiting deputy secretary of Russia's Security Council has called for the expansion of strategic relations with the Islamic Republic. Yevgeny Lukyanov made the remarks during a meeting with the secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council (SNSC), Saeed Jalili, in Tehran on Tuesday. The Russian official criticized the West for adopting unilateral approaches toward international issues and said that Russia has a positive attitude toward Iran's scientific and technological advancements. The SNSC secretary said the two countries' bilateral relationship, which is based on common interests, is of high importance.

Read More in: The Magog Invasion

Christians, just like every other member of our species are human, too. And that means that some of us might even be quirky. That combo is often funny. Poking good-natured fun at being slightly offended that the pastor has a nicer car than you do, the humiliation that comes when your kids act up in church, and the hair gel meter for your worship leader is funny because it's real life. While Christians need to be able to laugh at themselves, this sitcom won't be the conduit. "GCB" has a lot of problems, the largest being that it's just not that funny. As usual, when Hollywood goes this route, it inevitably misses clever and, instead, comes across as condescending and mean. Hollywood's writers, producers, and actors do not take the time to get to know us well enough before they portray us and, therefore, parody Christians based on preconceived notions.

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

Just before the James Ossuary trial, Biblical Archaeology Review editor Hershel Shanks delivered a public lecture at the Bible Lands Museum in Jerusalem explaining why the Israel Antiquities Authority had failed to make a convincing case that the James Ossuary inscription — reading "James, son of Joseph, brother of Jesus" — is a forgery. Just before the James Ossuary trial began in 2004, Hershel Shanks questioned the accusations and evidence of the Israel Antiquities Authority, prioritizing argumentation for authenticity over the religious implications of archaeological material suggesting Jesus' brother. The James Ossuary trial verdict will be released March 14th.

According to AllAfrica.com, a sucide bombing in Ghana last week killed three church members and injured 40 more. Had a motorcyclist not gotten in the way, however, the entire church full of people would have been destroyed. Koinonia House received a copy of the following letter from eyewitness Chris Morris, who declared the protection of God in the situation, saying, "The absolutely amazing thing is the force of the bomb went backwards, away from the church, killing 3 people, but sparing the nearly 1,000 people inside. Had any of that gone the other way, the whole structure would have collapsed on everyone. Picture the Samson/Philistine scenario and you have an idea of what this church looks like. The devastation was so awful that later when people saw it, the refrain on everyone's lips was, 'ONLY God could have done this..only GOD could have blown the blast backwards...only God could hold up an invisible hand and shield the people from death.'" Praise the Lord for His protection on the churches in Ghana.

Read More in: Global Religion

Dallas Theological Seminary professor Daniel B. Wallace has said that newly discovered fragments from the Gospel of Mark could be the oldest New Testament artifacts ever found and date from the first century A.D., or during the time of eyewitnesses of Jesus' resurrection. Wallace explained that the fragment was dated by one of the world's leading paleographers. The oldest manuscript that had Mark in it was Papyrus 45 (P45), from the early third century (c. AD 200–250). This new fragment would predate P45 by 100 to 150 years, almost certainly placing it in the first century and making it the oldest of its kind.

A senior German defense figure said in a report this week that Iran may be significantly further ahead in its nuclear weapons program than public intelligence assessments have so far suggested. Hans Ruhle, who directed the planning department of the German Defense Ministry from 1982 to 1988, argued that Iran may have been involved in the detonation of an experimental uranium nuclear bomb in North Korea in 2010. The article, which appeared on the website of the German daily Die Welt, said that many intelligence agencies believe that at least one of the two nuclear tests that occurred in North Korea in 2010 was an Iranian atomic weapon.

Read More in: Weapons Proliferation

The movement to change Russia's political system will continue, say many Russians, but Putin's election Sunday to a six-year presidential term has many activists wondering whether they are entering dangerous times. It was Putin who originally disposed of the direct election of governors, and it is he who has overseen the banning of most opposition candidates from state-controlled media. Tens of thousands of demonstrators protesting alleged voting irregularities Monday were met by security forces who arrested more than 200 people. "We anticipated this. We knew ... we would see a constriction of our liberties," said opposition leader Sergei Udaltsov, who was among those arrested. "We have yet to see whether this will become a tendency. If we see a tightening of the screws, this will be very dangerous."

Read More in: The Magog Invasion

At 59, Didier Raoult is the most productive and influential microbiologist in France, leading a team of 200 scientists and students at the University of Aix-Marseille. He has discovered or co-discovered dozens of new bacteria, and in 2003, he stunned colleagues with a virus of record size, dubbed Mimivirus, the first member of a family that sheds an intriguing new light on the evolution of viruses and the tree of life. Controversial and outspoken, Raoult last year published a popular science book that flat-out declares that Darwin's theory of evolution is wrong. And he was temporarily banned from publishing in a dozen leading microbiology journals in 2006.

Women who want to have an abortion in Virginia must first have an ultrasound under precedent-setting legislation that narrowly passed the Virginia Senate on Tuesday. Conservative Republicans in the evenly divided chamber, with the help of two pro-life Democrats, dismissed complaints from women's rights groups and national ridicule from late-night comedians to approve the bill on a 21-19 vote.

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

A common response to Intelligent Design arguments is to say, "An Intelligent Designer wouldn't have done it this way." As a science, Intelligent Design doesn't address theological questions about whether the design is "desirable," "undesirable," "perfect," or "imperfect." Undesirable design is still design. Here's a quick illustration of what I mean: I'm writing this on a PC using Windows; this PC has crashed probably a dozen times in the past two weeks. Right now, I hate my PC. I consider it poorly designed, full of imperfections, and very undesirable. Does that mean it wasn't designed by intelligent agents? No. "Undesirable design" and "intelligent design" are two different things. "Undesirable," "poor," or "imperfect" design do not refute intelligent design...

A central Kansas man says he caught his 8-year-old grandson as he was about to be sucked out of a window when a tornado touched down in Harveyville Tuesday night. The boy was walking up the stairs when the windows shattered and he became airborne, heading for a living room window. His grandfather lost hold of his dog sitting in his lap, but his free hands allowed him to catch his grandson before he flew out the window. The dog that was sucked through the window was found about an hour later. He was uninjured.

Russian and Ukrainian special services have arrested a group of suspects accused of attempting to assassinate Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, Russia's state television said Monday. The Channel One said that the suspects were plotting to kill Putin in Moscow immediately after the March 4 presidential election, in which he is all but certain to reclaim the presidency. The Ukrainian Security Service said the suspects were arrested following an accidental explosion that happened while they were trying to manufacture explosives at a rented apartment.

Read More in: The Magog Invasion

The bodies of dozens of men were found dumped on wasteland on the outskirts of the stricken city of Homs on Monday in what appeared to be one of the worst instances of mass killing since the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began last March. The Local Coordination Committees, an opposition group, said that the bodies of 64 men were taken to the National Hospital in Homs and that an unknown number of women and children who had been with them are missing. Activists said they thought that the men had been trying to flee the violence with their families when they were stopped and gunned down by security forces. The deaths were among 124 reported across Syria on Monday as the government’s efforts to crush the nearly year-long uprising showed no sign of letting up.

A Colorado high school student says he quit the school choir after an Islamic song containing the lyric "there is no truth except Allah" made it into the repertoire. James Harper, a senior at Grand Junction High School in Grand Junction, put his objection to singing "Zikr," a song written by Indian composer A.R. Rahman, in an email to Mesa County School District 51 officials. When the school stood by choir director Marcia Wieland's selection, Harper said, he quit. "I don't want to come across as a bigot or a racist, but I really don't feel it is appropriate for students in a public high school to be singing an Islamic worship song," Harper told KREX-TV. "This is worshipping another God, and even worshipping another prophet ... I think there would be a lot of outrage if we made a Muslim choir say Jesus Christ is the only truth."

Read More in: The Rise of Islam

Western countries seeking to pressure Tehran are aiming new, stiff sanctions at Iran's top export—oil—but imports of food and other staples have borne the brunt of the measures so far, with an immediate financial impact on Iranian consumers. As a result, Iranians say they are stockpiling daily needs such as rice and cooking oil, while paying sharply higher prices. The U.S. measures don't directly hit oil sales. Instead, they target any entities doing business with Iranian banks, shipping companies and, soon, Iran's Central Bank, through which all of the country's oil sales are processed. The sanctions could deny companies access to the U.S. financial system.

Read More in: The Rise of Islam

Iran's move to cut off oil shipments to Britain and France is expected to have little or no effect on supplies, but had an immediate effect on world prices Monday, as oil prices jumped to a nine-month high above $105 a barrel. Markets in the United States were closed Monday for the Presidents Day holiday. Iran's oil ministry said Sunday it stopped crude shipments to British and French companies in an apparent pre-emptive blow against the European Union after the bloc imposed sanctions on Iran's crucial fuel exports. They include a freeze of the country's central bank assets and an oil embargo set to begin in July.

The Palestinian Authority will not accept less than 98 percent of Judea and Samaria and will most likely insist on getting part of Jerusalem, according to an Israel diplomatic source who spoke with reporters Sunday. The unnamed source said these were part of the core positions the Palestinian leadership communicated to Israeli negotiators during the recent talks in Amman, Jordan, through a "document of principles." The document appears to indicate that the Palestinians reject the concept that Israel would retain certain Jewish settlement blocs under a future agreement, a concept that enjoys broad support in Israel.

Read More in: The Struggle for Jerusalem

Scientists want to create designer babies with the DNA of three parents to prevent children inheriting life-threatening diseases. IVF specialists argue they could eradicate mitochondrial mutations — which can cause multi-organ failure and fatal heart, liver and muscle conditions — by removing defective genes and replacing them with healthy DNA from a donor. "We want to remove the mother's bad mitochondria and replace it with healthy mitochondria through IVF," Professor Peter Illingworth, of assisted conception services program IVF Australia, told The (Sydney) Sunday Telegraph. In Australia scientists are banned from using the DNA of more than two people in any research, but the federal government is reviewing the Research Involving Human Embryos Act after a report was tabled in parliament last year.

Read More in: Biotech & Global Pestilence

China's presumptive next leader, Xi Jinping, met with U.S. congressional leaders Wednesday, the third day of a high profile visit that could influence relations between the two world powers for years to come. For his part, Xi said the main purpose of his visit was to work to strengthen U.S.-Chinese relations and build a "cooperative partnership based on mutual respect and mutual interests." He also said he hoped to engage with a broad section of the American people. But beneath the carefully choreographed presentation of the high-profile meetings lies a range of contentious issues on which Xi has little incentive to give ground, including trade, human rights and China's growing military presence.

Read More in: The Rise of the Far East

A British excavation has struck archaeological gold with a discovery that may solve the mystery of where the Queen of Sheba of biblical legend derived her treasures. Almost 3,000 years ago, the ruler of Sheba, which spanned modern-day Ethiopia and Yemen, arrived in Jerusalem with vast quantities of gold to give to King Solomon. Now an enormous ancient goldmine, together with the ruins of a temple and the site of a battlefield, have been discovered in her former territory. Tests by a gold prospector show that the goldmine is extensive, with a proper shaft and tunnel big enough to walk along.

Many people today are familiar with miracle stories in the Bible, but it is not just people in the first century who have believed in miracles. Various polls peg U.S. belief in miracles at roughly 80 percent. One survey suggested that 73 percent of U.S. physicians believe in miracles, and 55 percent claim to have personally witnessed treatment results they consider miraculous. Even more striking than the number of people who believe in miracles is the number who claim to have witnessed or experienced them. For example, a 2006 Pew Forum survey studied charismatic and Pentecostal Christians in 10 countries. From these 10 countries alone, the number of charismatic Christians who claim to have witnessed or experienced divine healing comes out to roughly 200 million people. The same survey showed that more than one-third of Christians in these same countries who do not claim to be charismatic or Pentecostal report witnessing or experiencing divine healing. And the reports in these countries appear to be merely the tip of the iceberg...

Scientists hunting the Higgs boson, the sub-atomic particle believed to have played a vital role in the creation of the universe, decided on Monday to turn up the power in their Large Hadron Collider to try to prove its existence this year. The CERN research centre near Geneva wants to prove or disprove the existence of an invisible 'Higgs' field permeating the universe quickly, before the giant LHC machine is shut down for a long-term upgrade in late 2012. "This means more Higgs, more quickly," said CERN spokesman James Gillies. The existence of the particle was postulated by British physicist Peter Higgs in 1964 but has never been proved.

An Israeli cable television company has removed an ad from its YouTube channel making light of a possible attack on Iran's nuclear facilities by Israel. The ad, for the cable provider Hot, imagines characters from an Israeli sitcom bungling a covert operation and destroying the Iranian nuclear facility near the city of Isfahan by pressing the wrong button on a Mossad agent's Samsung Galaxy tablet computer. After the facility goes up in smoke, the culpable Israeli character dismisses it with a shrug as just "another mysterious explosion in Iran," a clear reference to a string of deadly attacks on Iranian scientists and installations that have been attributed to Israel. One outraged Iranian official demanded an apology from South Korea and even suggested that a ban on Samsung products might be in order. The company quickly issued a statement stressing that the ad had been produced in Israel "without Samsung's knowledge or participation."

Read More in: Weapons Proliferation

As the world's biggest energy consumer, China's roaring appetite for stable oil and gas supplies is driving its Gulf push — a relationship made clearer last month when Premier Wen Jiabao traveled to Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar. In Saudi Arabia, Wen specifically called for the two countries to "deepen their energy partnership" and increase trade in oil and gas. State oil giant Saudi Aramco and Chinese refiner Sinopec just finalized plans to jointly build a refinery in the Red Sea city of Yanbu capable of handling 400,000 barrels of oil a day. The two companies and Exxon Mobil Corp. are already partners in a refinery in eastern China. Nearby Iran was not on Wen's January itinerary even though China remains Iran's trop crude oil buyer and its powerful state energy companies have rights to exploit untapped Iranian oil reserves.

Read More in: The Rise of the Far East

A woman thought to be the world's last known surviving service member of World War I has died aged 110. Florence Green, from Norfolk, England served as a mess steward in Britain's Royal Air Force. She died in her sleep on Saturday night at Briar House care home, King's Lynn, Norfolk. Mrs Green had been due to celebrate her 111th birthday on 19 February. She outlived the last two surviving combat veterans of WWI — Claude Choules, a Royal Navy sailor and the last WWI combatant, and Frank Buckles, the last American veteran, both of whom died last year at the age of 110.

A federal appeals court ruled against California's voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage Tuesday. In a split decision, a three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found the state's Proposition 8 "works a meaningful harm to gays and lesbians" by denying their right to civil marriage in violation of the 14th Amendment. Supporters of Proposition 8, which passed with 52 percent of the vote in 2008, said they were willing to take the issue all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. A stay halting same-sex marriages remains in place as the appeals continue.

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

Members of Egypt's first freely elected Parliament in more than six decades were interrogating the interior minister over the recent killing of protesters on Tuesday when Mamdouh Ismail, a lawmaker from the ultraconservative Salafi Asala Party, decided to turn to more pressing matters. "God is great," he began to intone, interrupting the televised proceedings with a call to prayer. Saad el-Katatni, the speaker of the Parliament and a leader in the Muslim Brotherhood, tried to interrupt the very persistent Mr. Ismail. "After you're done with the call for prayers, I'll talk to you because you breached the order of the session," he said. "You're not more of a Muslim than we are," Mr. Katatni added, once the call for prayers was over. "You don't need the media show."

Read More in: The Rise of Islam

A manufacturing mix-up by Pfizer Inc. is leaving women at risk of unwanted pregnancies. The world's largest drug maker, led to some packets being distributed with the pills out of order. That means a patient could have unknowingly skipped a dose and raised her risk of an accidental pregnancy. Pfizer has recalled about 1 million packets of Lo/Ovral-28 and its generic equivalent, but the company estimates that only about 30 packets were flawed. The pills were made and shipped last year. Each packet contains 28 days' worth of the prescription, with 21 pills containing the active ingredient that prevents pregnancy and seven placebo pills. The pills are normally color-coded to note the difference.

Horrified eyewitnesses described how Egyptian police officers stood by as violent clashes between rival fans at a soccer match in northeastern Egypt left scores dead. When the referee blew the final whistle, thousands of Al-Masry home team fans stormed the pitch despite their team's hard-fought 3-1 victory. Amr Khamis, an Ahly supporter told CNN at the train station in Cairo after returning from the match, "Officers refused to open the gates of the stadium so we could not escape and had to face thousands of Al-Masry hooligans attacking with rocks, knives, swords and anything else you can imagine." Egypt has recently experienced a breakdown in security, with several armed robberies, kidnappings and random killings taking place across the country in the past week alone.

Record-low temperatures in parts of Eastern Europe pushed the death toll from Arctic conditions to at least 89 people on Wednesday. In Ukraine, 43 people have died in the past five days. Overnight temperatures sank as low as -27F and hundreds of heated tents have been put up to shelter the homeless. European weather alert network Meteoalarm warned of "extremely dangerous" conditions in several parts of eastern Europe, including Serbia, where a fourth person was found dead overnight in the southwestern Suvobor mountains. Thermometers in parts of Bulgaria plunged to record lows freezing ATM cash machines in Sofia, the daily newspaper Trud reported. Eight people in Bulgaria and 14 in neighboring Romania have now died in the cold snap. Meanwhile in Slovenia, winds of up to 180 kph (112 mph) blew off roofs and prompted authorities to close some schools, authorities said.

Read More in: The Rise of a European Superstate

The breast cancer awareness organization Susan Komen for the Cure is defending its decision to revoke funding for the Planned Parenthood. The key in the Komen decision is the grant criteria it uses to make grants. Planned Parenthood does not perform mammograms at any of its centers across the United States, and Komen says it is implementing "more stringent eligibility standards to safeguard donor dollars." Its new guidelines also prevent it from funding any group under congressional investigation, but the breast screening issue reportedly has the effect of ending Planned Parenthood's funding even if the current Congressional probe finds Planned Parenthood free of any wrongdoing.

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Alaska Airlines is ending decades of giving passengers prayer cards with their meals, saying Wednesday the decision was made out of respect for all passengers. Airline spokeswoman Bobbie Egan said the airline heard from customers who preferred not to mix religion with transportation. "Some customers were comforted by the cards and some didn't feel religion was appropriate on the plane and preferred not to receive one," she said. The cards offer a short excerpt of a psalm from the Old Testament printed on a beautiful photograph. One current example includes this excerpt printed over a beach scene: "Give thanks to the Lord for He is good. His love endures forever."

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Authorities arrested more than 100 members and associates of the Mexican Mafia street gang in southern California as part of investigation into a wide range of offenses such as racketeering, kidnapping, attempted murder and drug trafficking, federal officials said. The arrests were made primarily in San Diego County and were the culmination of three major investigations on gang activity in the area, U.S. Attorney Laura Duffy said Wednesday.

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At a time of heightened tension between the West and Iran with the US more determined than ever to prevent the Islamic state from becoming nuclear-armed Iranians are uncertain about the future they face. Local residents in Tehran's northern district are divided over the comments of US president Barack Obama, who, in a State of the Union address, warned Iran the United States would keep up pressure on its disputed nuclear program with "no options off the table" but said the door remained open to talks for a peaceful resolution. Obama said on Tuesday (January 24) Tehran was isolated and facing "crippling" sanctions that he said would continue so long as the Islamic Republic keeps its back turned to the international community.

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The full text of President Obama's 2012 State Of The Union speech can be found at the above link. We will give perspective on the speech in next week's eNews.

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The Palestinian Authority will not restart direct peace negotiations with Israel unless Jerusalem recognizes the borders of a Palestinian state, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said Wednesday according to the Palestinian News and Information Agency (WAFA). The most outstanding issue preventing the resumption of high-level direct negotiations is the continued expansion of Israeli settlements, especially in "occupied" Jerusalem, Abbas said according to the report. Israeli officials took a more positive tone, saying Tuesday they were confident the Palestinians would continue the talks being held in Jordan beyond the January 26 Quartet deadline, which Israel contests.

Read More in: The Struggle for Jerusalem

Wikipedia has enacted a 24 hour blackout as a public protest of the Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) and PROTECT IP Act (PIPA), with Sue Gardner of the Wikimedia Foundation saying, "My hope is that when Wikipedia shuts down on January 18, people will understand that we're doing it for our readers. We support everyone's right to freedom of thought and freedom of expression... We believe that new proposed laws like SOPA and PIPA, and other similar laws under discussion inside and outside the United States — don’t advance the interests of the general public." For those hunting for online information, there are alternatives to Wikipedia (to use during the blackout, of course): Encyclopedia.com — This online (free) encyclopedia is a compilation of over 100 trusted encyclopedias and dictionaries. Scholarpedia — Although the layout and feel of this online encyclopedia is similar to Wikipedia, only verified expert authors are allowed to post and each article is peer reviewed. Encyclopedia Smithsonian — This online encyclopedia, which is run by the Smithsonian Institution, includes articles, images, audio, and video. Open Site — Open Site is an Internet encyclopedia that is edited by volunteers and then peer reviewed by senior contributors.

One hundred years ago, John Elfreth Watkins Jr. predicted that there would be 500 million people in America and its possessions by the year 2011. Watkins thought that everybody would live in the suburbs instead of the city by then. Travel to the city would take just a few minutes and cost a penny, but because of the plethora of gymnasiums, most adults would be able to walk 10 miles with no trouble. University education would be free, English would be simplified, and the letters C, Q, and X would be made obsolete. Best yet, food and store goods would be delivered by pneumatic tubes. Where is Watkins' 2011 America? Where are our pneumatic tubes?

Israel has serious concerns about what will happen to "huge stockpiles" of chemical and biological weapons in Syria when the Assad regime collapses, a senior military official said on Tuesday. Major-General Amir Eshel, head of the Israeli military's planning division, said the working assumption was the regime of President Bashar Assad would eventually fall. "That's a major concern because I don't know who is going to own those the day after. Up till now, what has been transferred to Hezbollah? What will be transferred to Hezbollah? What will be divided between those factions inside Syria? What is that going to create?" asked Eshel.

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The Ethiopian government is forcing tens of thousands of people off their land so it can be leased to foreign investors, Human Rights Watch (HRW) said in a report released Tuesday. The Ethiopian government under its "villagization" program is forcibly relocating approximately 70,000 indigenous people from the western Gambella region to new villages that lack adequate food, farmland, health care, and educational facilities," HRW said. "The first round of forced relocations occurred at the worst possible time of year - the beginning of the harvest. Government failure to provide food assistance for relocated people has caused endemic hunger and cases of starvation," it said.

The justices today left intact a federal appeals ruling that said a North Carolina county board was violating the constitutional separation of church and state by opening most of its sessions with a Christian prayer. The high court also refused to review a separate decision that barred prayers at meetings of a Delaware school board. In the North Carolina case, the Forsyth County Board of Commissioners used private religious leaders to deliver its prayers, each year inviting members of various faiths to sign up on a first-come, first-served basis to deliver an invocation. The result tended to be prayers that were predominantly Christian. From May 29, 2007, to Dec. 15, 2008, almost 80 percent of the prayers referred to Jesus.

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A study by a team of researchers at Johns Hopkins and elsewhere shows that lymph gland cancer cells called B cells can use glutamine in the absence of glucose for cell replication and survival, particularly under low-oxygen conditions, which are common in tumors. When the investigators used a glutaminase (a glutamine enzyme) inhibitor, cancerous growth of B cells was stopped in petri dishes.

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The Texas sonogram law, requiring women seeking abortions to have an ultrasound in order to view the fetus and hear its heartbeat, doesn't violate constitutional protections and can go into effect, a federal appeals court ruled Tuesday. The three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals lifted a ban on the law that had been imposed in August by U.S. District Court Judge Sam Sparks. Other issues and a formal ruling on the case are still pending before Sparks. "We are thrilled by the ruling," said Joe Pojman, executive director of Texas Alliance for Life, adding the law protects women. "This is about raising the standard of care regarding informed consent about abortions to the same level any patient would expect from any other medical or surgical procedure," he said.

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

The Center for Science & Culture at Discovery Institute announces two intensive 9- day seminars for college students during the summer of 2012. The CSC seminar will prepare students to make research contributions advancing the growing science of intelligent design (ID) and will explore cutting-edge ID work in fields such as molecular biology, biochemistry, embryology, developmental biology, paleontology, computational biology, ID-theoretic mathematics, cosmology, physics, and the history and philosophy of science. The seminar will include presentations on the application of intelligent design to laboratory research as well as frank treatment of the academic realities that ID researchers confront in graduate school and beyond, and strategies for dealing with them.

A 1,500-year-old seal with the image of the seven-branched Temple Menorah has been discovered near the city of Acre. The ceramic stamp, which dates from the Byzantine period in the 6th century CE, was found during ongoing Israel Antiquities Authority excavations at Horbat Uza, east of Acre. "The stamp is important because it proves that a Jewish community existed in the settlement of Uza in the Christian-Byzantine period. The presence of a Jewish settlement so close to Acre - a region that was definitely Christian at this time - constitutes an innovation in archaeological research," said Dr. Danny Syon, one of the directors of the excavation, on behalf of the Israel Antiquities Authority.

Read More in: The Struggle for Jerusalem

Christianity is growing almost as fast as humanity itself, but its 2.2 billion adherents cannot count on safety in numbers. According to a report published by the Pew Forum in December, the Christian share of the population of sub-Saharan Africa has soared over the past century, from 9 percent to 63 percent. Meanwhile, the think-tank says, the Christian proportion of Europeans and people in the Americas has dropped, respectively, from 95 to 76 percent and from 96 to 86 percent. But moving from the jaded north to the dynamic south does not portend an easy future. In Nigeria scores of Christians have died in Islamist bomb attacks, targeting Christmas prayers. Dozens of churches in Indonesia have been attacked or shut. In Egypt and Syria, where secular despots gave Christianity a shield of sorts, political upheaval and Muslim zeal threaten ancient Christian groups. In India Hindu nationalists want to penalise Christians who make converts...

Read More in: Global Religion

The Obama administration on Tuesday brushed aside Iran's warning to keep U.S. aircraft carriers out of the Gulf, dismissing its threats as a consequence of hard-hitting American sanctions on the Iranian economy. Provoking a hostile start to what could prove a pivotal year for Iran, the country's army chief said American vessels were unwelcome in the Gulf, the strategic waterway that carries to market much of the oil pumped in the Middle East. The Islamic republic also has warned of blocking one of the world's key tanker lanes, the Strait of Hormuz, in response to new, stronger U.S. economic penalties on Iran over its disputed nuclear enrichment program.

Read More in: The Rise of Islam

Doctor-prescribed death is illegal under Hawaii law despite what a pro-death group has argued, according to a newly authored legal opinion issued by Hawaii Attorney General David Louie to Sen. Josh Green, M.D. Green requested the opinion after learning from media reports and an Alliance Defense Fund allied attorney that the group Compassion and Choices was publicly arguing that state law allows for physician-assisted suicide. According to Green, the attorney general's legal opinion states that state law "does not authorize physicians to assist terminally ill patients with dying" and "a physician who provided assistance with death could be charged under Hawaii's manslaughter statute."

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Zimbabwe police have stopped Anglican clergy from holding an annual retreat, saying the religious group did not abide by security laws. The Anglican Church said authorities broke up a prayer gathering of about 80 clergy on Tuesday at a private school about 75 kilometers east of the capital. According to Bishop Chad Gandiya of the Diocese of Harare, authorities claimed the group had not obtained police clearance to hold the retreat. The bishop called the move a "calculated harassment" by police officers loyal to a renegade bishop who is close to President Robert Mugabe.

Credit card details belonging to thousands of Israelis were posted online Monday by a Saudi hacker. The hacker, known as 0xOmar, hacked into ONE, a popular Israeli sports website, where he posted the details of thousands of Israelis on the homepage. In addition to the Israelis' credit card numbers, addresses, names, telephone numbers and identity card numbers were also revealed. This is a reminder to the Knesset that in a technological era when every protective system also constitutes a potential for penetration, a biometric database is also an invitation to hackers to break in.

Read More in: Global Government

In 1987, the concept of sustainable development hit the international stage through the publication of the Brundtland Report. The report linked environmentalism with leftist economics and social justice. By 1992, the Brundtland version of sustainable development was incorporated into United Nations' bylaws and formalized into an initiative known as Agenda 21. Beginning with President Clinton, both Republican and Democratic administrations have continued to force smart growth and Agenda 21 programs on the American people on every level of government. Agenda 21 policies and sustainable development cannot work in a free market system, so central control is a must.

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A South Camden congregation will call for divine intervention in the fight against violence and poverty on New Year's Day. In what he is calling a "drive-by prayer" session, the Rev. John Parker is eliciting his Antioch Baptist Church congregation to cruise through Camden next Sunday praying for God to heal a violence-plagued city that elected officials have been unable to cure. Parker said it is time for the churches in Camden to call for a divine intervention rather than rely on the plans of others to fix the city where 50 people have been killed this year and nearly 40 percent of the approximate 77,000 residents live in poverty.

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

Oil fell for the first time in seven days on reduced concern that Iran will block the Strait of Hormuz and as the dollar climbed against the euro. Crude oil for February delivery decreased 84 cents, or 0.8 percent, to $100.50 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Earlier, prices touched $100.48 a barrel. Futures have climbed 10 percent this year, extending last year’s advance of 15 percent.

Tensions ran high in Beit Shemesh Tuesday night as people gathered to protest against the rise of ultra- Orthodox extremism. Estimates put the number of demonstrators in the thousands. Protesters from Beit Shemesh and beyond, religious and secular, kids with parents and even the Israeli Hells Angels arrived to speak out against a growing frequency in attacks against a local religious-Zionist girls' elementary school and the broader trend of haredi exclusion of women from the public domain.

Christians living in Nigeria's violence-prone northern towns were fleeing for the south Tuesday, amid fears of further attacks from the radical Islamist group Boko Haram, which means "Western education is sinful". At least 40 people were killed in Christmas Day bombings of several churches, in attacks claimed by Islamist group Boko Haram. "These people are mostly southerners who are afraid of more attacks, even though Christmas is over. Those who traveled (during the holidays) are not coming back en masse to these towns," said Maiduguri motor park tout Mohammed Bolori.

Read More in: The Rise of Islam

All but four nurses in same-day surgery unit at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey signed on to a lawsuit filed October 31 after being notified in writing that the hospital's new policy would require same-day surgery unit nurses to assist in abortions. Matt Bowman of the Alliance Defense Fund described the settlement as a "victory", saying, "[T]he hospital finally agreed to obey the law and not force our clients to do any work on abortion cases in violation of their beliefs. The hospital agreed not to penalize our clients in any way because they choose to not help abortions, according to their legal rights."

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

The U.S. government paid scientists to figure out how the deadly bird flu virus might mutate to become a bigger threat to people, and two labs succeeded in creating new strains that spread easier. On Tuesday, federal officials took the unprecedented step of asking those scientists not to publicize all the details of how they did it. The worry: That this research with lots of potential to help the public might also be hijacked by would-be bioterrorists. The labs found that it appears easier than scientists had thought for the so-called H5N1 bird flu to evolve in a way that lets it spread easily among at least some mammals.

Read More in: Biotech & Global Pestilence

State governments across the country have cut more than 80,000 jobs since the beginning of the recession, reflecting steep drops in tax revenue. Data collected by AP reporters in all 50 states show the number of government employees has declined along with per-capita general fund spending. The national average of state employees per 1,000 people has dropped from 8.1 to 7.6, thanks to layoffs and hiring freezes since the 2007-08 budget year. Even as the total number of state employees has plummeted, the ratio of public employees per 1,000 residents varies widely by state, the AP reporting found. Alaska had the most with 34.9, while Illinois had the fewest with 4.1 after cutting more than 4,000 workers from the state payroll since 2007. The AP figures _exclude_ K-12 teachers and employees in higher education systems.

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

The Dutch government is considering plans to use mobile medical teams that would administer euthanasia to people in their homes. The units, dubbed 'grim reapers on wheels' by critics, will be called in to kill patients when their own GPs refuse to administer lethal drugs. The mobile teams of doctors and nurses would be sent out from a clinic following a referral from the patient's doctor.

As many as 5,000 attended a rally in a small Texas community to show their support for a Nativity scene under attack by a Wisconsin-based atheist group, according to a minister who organized the event. "We are humbled at the turnout of the crowd," said Nathan Lorick, the pastor of the First Baptist Church in Malakoff. "This message is resonating in the hearts of people all over the country." The Freedom From Religion Foundation had sent a letter to Henderson County, Texas explaining that a local resident had complained and they wanted the Nativity removed from the courthouse lawn.

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

Intellectual, writer, and provocateur Christopher Hitchens died December 15 of pneumonia, a complication of his esophageal cancer. His famous book, God Is Not Great, proved more hostile than logical, but perhaps his most admirable quality was his impatience with nonsense and his willingness to be independent. He defended the Iraq War against his left wing friends and the cogency of the pro-life cause against the fury of left wing feminists. He also defended moral absolutes, despite the difficulty of accounting for them in an atheistic and materialistic framework.

After Marion Barber and the Bears — well, mainly Marion Barber — opened the door for an improbable victory by the Broncos in Denver Sunday, Tebow thanked his Lord and Savior Jesus Christ and his teammates, in that order. Always in that order. The Tebow effect. Tebow has been a polarizing figure since his college days. It's not as if Tebow just talks the talk. Since he was a teenager, he's used his fame to help raise money for the orphanage his family runs and for other charitable causes. Love him or hate him, let's be honest — the NFL is a lot more fun with Tebow out there every week, throwing wobbly passes, Tebowing after touchdowns, and making God part of the game-day discussion.

The wife of a disgraced doctor on Tuesday admitted to performing an illegal late-term abortion at her husband's clinic, a now-shuttered facility that authorities described as a filthy "house of horrors" where newborns were routinely murdered. Pearl Gosnell, 50, of Philadelphia, pleaded guilty to performing an abortion after 24 weeks of pregnancy, two counts of conspiracy and participating in a corrupt organization, according to court documents. Authorities said Gosnell's husband, Kermit Gosnell, ran the Women's Medical Society, an abortion clinic in west Philadelphia where babies born alive were killed.

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Mysterious stone carvings recently uncovered in an excavation underneath Jerusalem have archaeologists stumped. Israeli diggers who uncovered a complex of rooms carved into the bedrock in the oldest section of the city recently found the markings: Three "V" shapes cut next to each other into the limestone floor of one of the rooms, about 2 inches deep and 20 inches long. The rooms were unearthed as part of the excavation of fortifications around the ancient city's only natural water source, the Gihon spring. It is possible, the dig's archaeologists say, that when the markings were made at least 2,800 years ago the shapes might have accommodated some kind of wooden structure that stood inside them. They might have had a ritual function or one that was entirely mundane.

Cuba and Venezuela have become the most strident defenders of Iran’s nuclear ambitions and the three countries have formed a strategic partnership to evade U.N. and U.S economic sanctions. Iran is an increasingly important politico-economic player in Latin America. Its influence transcends geography, language, culture and religion. At the heart of this growing Iranian influence is a peculiar trilateral political configuration with Cuba and Venezuela. In the case of Iran, Cuba and Venezuela, the unifying point seems to be virulent hostility toward the United States, liberal democracy and market economies. Increasingly, the Tehran, Havana, Caracas bloc speaks with a unified anti-American voice in a concerted effort to undermine U.S. influence by any means at its disposal.

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Archaeologists with the Israel Antiquities Authority now say diggers have found coins underneath the massive foundation stones of the compound's Western Wall that were stamped by a Roman proconsul 20 years after Herod's death. "The find changes the way we see the construction, and shows it lasted for longer than we originally thought," said the dig's co-director, Eli Shukron. The four bronze coins were stamped around A.D. 17 by the Roman official Valerius Gratus. The coins were found inside a ritual bath that predated construction of the renovated Temple Mount complex and which was filled in to support the new walls.

Read More in: The Struggle for Jerusalem

The Supreme Court has rejected an evangelical church's plea to overturn New York City's ban on renting public schools for religious worship services. That means the city now has a green light to begin evicting congregations who pay rent to use public school buildings for church services. The Supreme Court's decision not to hear the case leaves in place a federal appeals court ruling that upheld the city's policy. The court case involved the Bronx Household of Faith – a church that paid weekly rent to hold worship services at a public school since 2002. The church, along with five dozen other congregations, was allowed to continue worshipping at public schools pending the outcome of the lawsuit. Churches will have to vacate public schools on Feb. 12, 2012.

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

With the fate of the 17-nation single currency at stake at a summit this week, 20 years almost to the day since the Maastricht summit at which European leaders agreed to merge their monies, the same battles are still being fought out. The outcome of Friday's 27-nation European Union summit may determine the course of the world's largest trading bloc. One road leads to a core group of euro zone states forging ahead with closer integration; another to a continuation of the current, multispeed Europe limping along at the pace of the slowest in the convoy; and a third toward a potential breakup of the currency and disintegration of the Union.

Read More in: The Rise of a European Superstate

Caleb Teodorescu, who is nearly 3, is making a full recovery after nearly drowning in his backyard pool. It was the day after Thanksgiving when firefighters were called out to the home in Glendale, AZ. A neighbor started CPR but Caleb was unresponsive. For 28 minutes he did not have a heartbeat. "When the emergency crew showed up, no vital signs, his heart wasn't beating and for all intents and purposes he had died," said Dr. Corey Philpot with Banner Thunderbird Medical Center. Still Caleb's mom and dad believed that the boy would live. "All of us had a voice inside of us that said 'It's going to be all right, it's going to be all right, don't despair, it's going to be all right,'" said Caleb's mother. Four days later he started showing signs of improvement - fingers and toes twitching, pulling at his breathing tube. Caleb was released from the hospital Sunday. "They did everything that they could humanly do, but the rest was God," Caleb's father said.

Wine flowed freely from ancient Greece during its golden age, but new work suggests nuts and various herbs were also in demand. With the help of DNA analysis, scientists are getting a present-day look at centuries- old trade in the Mediterranean. Such studies may help debunk some long-held assumptions, namely that the bulk of Greek commerce revolved around wine. With such information, scientists could reconstruct a more accurate picture of the crops being grown and the products changing hands when the world's first complex economies were getting under way, possibly gaining clues to the agriculture, technologies, art and geopolitics that played into daily life.

On Dec. 7, 1941 the United States suffered the worst intelligence failure in its history - before or since - when Japanese planes destroyed much of the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor. Seventy years after Pearl Harbor, the U.S. finds itself in much the same situation that it was in prior to World War II. There is a great effort to cut military spending, bring troops home from abroad, and scale back our international exposure. The country's critical financial situation is one reason. Yet a nuclear-obsessed Iran, an emerging China and Russia, along with smaller rogue actors are enough of a threat to justify a vigilant and even aggressive guard.

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A federal judge on Monday issued a preliminary injunction that stops the state from issuing license plates with an pro-life message. The suit was filed by the ACLU of North Carolina, which argued that the state's "Choose Life" plates were a violation of the First Amendment as there was no plate with a message for pro-choice drivers. U.S. District Judge James Fox issued the injunction, and held that the driver of the vehicle is the one buying the plate and spreading the message. The case came down on whether the specialty plates were considered private speech - protected by the First Amendment - or government speech, which the legislature can control.

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

North Korea has supplied Syria and Iran with a special kind of steel used to upgrading missiles and building centrifuges for uranium enrichment, the German newspaper Die Welt reported over the weekend. The material, called maraging steel, appears on the monitoring list of the Nuclear Suppliers Group and the Missile Technology Control Regime, and its export is prohibited to countries under sanctions such as Iran.

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Hard-line Iranian students stormed British diplomatic sites in Tehran on Tuesday, bringing down the Union Jack flag, burning an embassy vehicle and throwing documents from windows in scenes reminiscent of the seizing of the U.S. Embassy compound in 1979. The mob surged past riot police into the British Embassy complex - which they pelted with petrol bombs and stones - two days after Iran's parliament approved a bill that reduces diplomatic relations with Britain following London's support of recently upgraded Western sanctions on Tehran over its disputed nuclear program.

Read More in: The Rise of Islam

A psychiatric evaluation has shown that Anders Behring Breivik, the Norwegian man who killed 77 people in two attacks on July 22 this year, was insane when he committed the crimes, Norway's state prosecutor Svein Holden said Tuesday. The evaluation, carried out by criminal psychiatrists Torgeir Husby and Synne Sorheim, concluded that Breivik is unfit to face a court ruling or be sentenced to prison, Holden said. The 236 page report concludes that Breivik was "psychotic" when carrying out the attacks and states Breivik developed paranoid schizophrenia over a long period of time. The psychiatrists conducted 13 interviews with Breivik, lasting 36 hours in total. They describe him as a person who lives entirely in a universe marked by delusions.

Sixty-three-year-old Lieb Potok recalls being threatened by two hate-spewing men as he walked home in Midwood, Brooklyn, last Monday. "Two guys, they followed me two blocks the other day saying 'dirty Jew' and cursing about Israel, things like that," he said. "There is a feeling we are truly not safe." In Borough Park, Brooklyn, on Friday, just as three cars were torched in Potok's neighborhood, someone used a key to etch a swastika into the lobby door of an apartment building on 17th Ave. Residents were stunned. "I'm very upset," said one 58-year-old man. "Why are they doing this? What's going to come afterward. This is just the beginning.'

Mariano Rajoy's Partido Popular has won a thumping victory in Spain: nearly eleven million votes to the Socialists' seven million, 186 seats to their 110. Spain has entrusted her future wholly to the conservatives. Only three per cent of EU nationals now live under Left-led governments. Yet spending continues to rise (except on defence), bureaucracies continue to grow, powers continue to shift from national capitals to Brussels. Which brings us up against a hard truth. As long as most laws come from Brussels, and as long as economic policy comes from Frankfurt, it doesn't seem to matter much how Europe votes. We'll see.

Read More in: The Rise of a European Superstate

Two months after scientists reported that they had clocked subatomic particles known as neutrinos going faster than the speed of light, to the astonishment and vocal disbelief of most of the world's physicists, the same group of scientists, known as Opera, said on Friday that it had performed a second experiment that confirmed its first results and eliminated one possible explanation for how the experiment could have gone wrong. The group admitted that many questions remain. "This is not the end of the story," said Antonio Ereditato of the University of Bern in Switzerland, explaining that physicists would not accept the result that neutrinos could go faster than light until other experiments had come up with the same conclusion.

Abortion practitioner Neal Adam Poch has quit doing abortions at a Fort Worth, Texas Planned Parenthood abortion clinic and local pro-life advocates say a new pro-life law the state legislature approved is the reason why. Jeff Williams, the coordinator for 40 Days for Life in the large northern Texas city says Poch quit his post as a Planned Parenthood abortion practitioner on Saturday. He credits the new law requiring abortion practitioners to give women considering an abortion the opportunity to see the ultrasound they perform beforehand with prompting Poch to stop doing abortions. Poch doesn't want the extra work load.

Read More in: The Decline of the U.S.

The search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) has gone on for more than 50 years. In 1960 Frank Drake, a Cornell University astronomer, cobbled together the Drake Equation, supposedly quantifying the likelihood that intelligent life started up on its own. Nothing has yet been found and the search is getting harder to fund. What scientists are looking for, of course, is extra-terrestrial life, not rocks orbiting stars. The late novelist Michael Crichton gave an entertaining lecture at Caltech in 2003 saying that the search for extraterrestrial intelligence is a religion. And in a way it is. Carl Sagan, one of its leading promoters, "believed in superior beings in space, creatures so intelligent, so powerful, as to resemble gods." He affirmed that a new civilization is formed just in our galaxy every 10 years. "There are a million technical civilizations in the [Milky Way] galaxy," he believed. That's religion.

Geron, the first company ever permitted to test human embryonic stem cells on people, announced Monday it is halting the studies to focus on developing two cancer drugs. Researchers have long held out hope that embryonic stem cells would be the key to treating a variety of ailments because they can turn into any type of tissue in the body and be reproduced in vast quantities in laboratories. But studies to develop treatments from them have been subject to delays in part because of ethical concerns surrounding the cells, which are harvested from discarded 3-to-5-day-old embryos. Monday's decision throws into question the future of the most-advanced study so far and puts a cloud over the commercial viability of stem cell treatments.

Read More in: Biotech & Global Pestilence