by Jeffrey Dunetz
Shabbat became my life raft, my refuge from a cruel working environment.
Every week is bad, but this week's Friday's staff meeting was particularly brutal. But, as always, I kept my mouth closed and didn't say a word.
Even though I have been with the company for less than a year, I knew very well that you were not allowed to disagree with the CEO, even in private. If you try to lay out a case for position that does not agree with his, the response is inevitably, "You're wrong," or " If you think that you can convince me of that, you must think I'm stupid."
Today, when I told him why we didn't get a particular piece of business, he berated me in front of my staff.
My new job started out with so much promise. The company has a great product. Before I came, results weren't what they should be. Half the staff was never on board, the rest were completely unmotivated. I was out of work for over a year, but I had won awards running a sales organization for one of their competitors, so they hired me to get the sales team ...   more »

By Ron Brackin
DALLAS, TX (ANS) -- In the Gaza Strip, Sunday, January 28, a 20-year-old man was shot through the heart and killed. He was the AWANA Club driver for Gaza Baptist Church. The next morning, a bullet stuck the home of another church member, barely missing his head.
On Friday, February 2, Fatah police broke into the church. They commandeered the six-story building to use as high ground to cover the main police station next door.
"The situation in Gaza is very dangerous," says Pastor Hanna Massad. "We are not able to leave our homes much. We continue to hear shooting, especially at night. Streets are blocked. People are afraid and confused. It is the worst situation we ever went through, even more dangerous than any Israeli invasion."
Gaza Baptist Church is the only evangelical church in Palestine's volatile Gaza Strip. The believers are surrounded by nearly 2 million Muslims. Gaza is also the stronghold of the Hamas terrorist organization.
Despite the dangers, the church's prayer team continues to travel house to house to strengthen and encourage believers. The congregation continues to minister to hundreds of impoverished Palestinian families in neighboring refugee cities.
That they remain in Gaza ...   more »

An Israeli archeologist said Wednesday that he has pinpointed the exact location of the Second Jewish Temple on the Temple Mount.
The site identified by Hebrew University archeologist Prof. Joseph Patrich, based on the study of a large underground cistern on the Temple Mount and passages from the Mishna, places the Temple and its corresponding courtyards, chambers and gates in a more southeasterly and diagonal frame of reference compared to previous studies.
Patrich based his research, which is about to be published, on a study of a large underground cistern on the Temple Mount that was mapped by British engineer Sir Charles Wilson in 1866 on behalf of the Palestine Exploration Fund, along with passages from the Mishna.
The giant cistern, 4.5 meters wide and 54 meters long, lay near the southeastern corner of the upper platform of the Temple Mount. Examining the location and configuration of the cistern together with descriptions of the daily rite in the Temple and its surroundings found in the Mishna, Patrich said that this cistern is the only one found on the Temple Mount that can tie in with the ancient rabbinic text describing elements involved in the daily purification and sacrificial duties carried ...   more »

Arab Israelis from across country gather at Temple Mount to protest excavation works; 'Works could cause situation in entire region to deteriorate and even intensify the intifada,' protester says
Hundreds of Arabs from across Israel arrive at the Mugrabi Gate near the Temple Mount in Jerusalem Thursday afternoon in protest to excavations taking place near the gate, adjacent to the Western Wall.
The protesters claimed that Sheikh Raad Salah, head of the northern branch of the Islamic movement, also plans on arriving, despite a restraining order received Wednesday that bars him from coming within 150 meters of the Old City for 10 days.  
"We oppose the destruction of Al-Aqsa Mosque," one protester told Ynet. "It hurts Muslim pride, the world, and Israel. The works could cause the situation in the whole region to deteriorate and even intensify the intifada."   
A spokesman for the Islamic movement, Zahi Nujidat, said "we came to protest the excavations. The path to Mugrabi Gate is 800 years old and it's only Muslim, not Jewish."
"The current works are a continuation of previous works whose sole purpose was to draw a line on the ground. We suspect that the goal of the current works ...   more »

MOSCOW. (RIA Novosti political commentator Marianna Belenkaya) - Russian President Vladimir Putin will visit Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Jordan February 11-13, an official trip no Russian leader has ever made before (Boris Yeltsin's attendance at the burial ceremony for Jordan's King Hussein in 1999 does not count).
As a result, the visit is expected to be highly productive.
Russian cooperation with the three countries has been given a powerful boost in the past few years under Putin, but unlike previous visits by their leaders to Russia, it will be the Russian president's first trip there.
Jordanian King Abdullah II has visited Russia six times since 2001. Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, the Emir of Qatar, was in Russia in 2001, and Saudi King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz al-Saud visited Moscow in 2003 when he was the Crown Prince.
In fact, the period between 2001 and 2003 was a time of growing political and economic cooperation between Russia and the three Arab countries.
It was also a time of change in the Middle East, marked by the 9/11 tragedy in the United States, the toppling of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, and the derailing of the Middle East peace process that ...   more »

The Ku Klux Klan has experienced a worrying resurgence in popularity in the United States due to the "hot-button issues including immigration, gay marriage and urban crime" the Anti-Defamation League has said.
The ADL, which monitors the activities of the KKK as well as other racist groups and relays their findings to law enforcement and policymakers, views the recent increase in Klan activity in the US as troublesome, since the Klan has been relatively under the radar in recent years.
"If any one single issue or trend can be credited with reenergizing the Klan, it is the debate over immigration in America," said ADL Civil Rights Director Deborah M. Lauter. "Klan groups have witnessed a surprising and troubling resurgence by exploiting fears of an immigration explosion, and the debate over immigration has in turn helped to fuel an increase in Klan activity, with new groups sprouting in parts of the country that have not seen much activity."
The KKK has exploited Americans's fear of Muslim and Arab immigrants, as well as the growing anti-immigrant feeling in the South stemming from the overwhelming influx of illegal Mexican workers, said ADL Israel office director Arieh O'Sullivan. New hate groups have emerged, and ...   more »

Russian President Vladimir Putin's security adviser will meet Thursday with an envoy of Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the security council said Wednesday.
Security Council secretary Igor Ivanov will meet with Ali Akbar Velayati, Ivanov's spokeswoman Kseniya Roshchina said. Both men are former foreign ministers.
Russia has urged Iran to take steps to prove its claims that it is not seeking nuclear weapons, but is a staunch supporter of Tehran's right to a peaceful nuclear energy program.
Ivanov visited Iran late last month and met with Khamenei as well as others including Iran's top nuclear negotiator, Ali Larijani.
Original Source

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A new "truth-telling" industry is emerging in the US which uses brain scans to determine whether or not people are lying. But experts are already questioning the ethics and validity of such tests.
The trouble began in 2003 when a fire gutted Harvey Nathan’s deli in Charleston, South Carolina. In the aftermath, Nathan fought off police charges of arson, but his insurers’ lingering doubts over his innocence have since tied up a payout that could exceed $200,000.
Which is why, last December (2006), Nathan travelled across the US and paid $1500 to have his brain scanned. “We provide a service for people who need to prove they are telling the truth,” says Joel Huizenga, a biologist turned entrepreneur and CEO of No Lie MRI of Tarzana, California.
In what amounted to the world’s first commercial lie-detection test using function magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), technicians at No Lie mapped blood flow within Nathan’s brain while he answered a battery of questions about the deli fire and compared the results to control tests during which Nathan was asked to lie.
Think of a card
The differences in the way his brain responded to these tasks appear to confirm his innocence. Huizenga says ...   more »

Two men who are members of Gideons International, the Christian organization that is famous for, among other ministries, placing Bibles in motels and giving them to children, have been arrested after trying to hand out Bibles on a public sidewalk in Florida, according to a law firm.
Officials with the Alliance Defense Fund have confirmed they will be representing Anthony Mirto and Ernest Simpson, who were arrested, booked into jail and charged with trespassing.
Jeremy Tedesco, one of the ADF's lawyers on the case, confirmed to WND that the organization's clients were on a public sidewalk when they were handing out Bibles and school officials summoned police.
"The First Amendment protects the right to engage in religious speech on a public sidewalk," ADF Senior Legal Counsel David Cortman said. "Members of the Gideons have been highly respected for decades as peaceful providers of free Bibles to those who want them."
Principal Annette Martinson
The arrest happened Jan. 19, when Mirto and Simpson were on the sidewalk outside of Key Largo School in Key Largo, Fla., and were distributing copies of the Bible to those interested
Monroe County Sheriff Richard Roth
"Neither man entered school grounds," the law firm said. "After ...   more »