By Stan Goodenough   June 15, 2007
Concerning the chaos in Gaza -- where the so-called Palestinians are killing one another in spades in a bloody bid to determine whether the Islamist Hamas or the secular Fatah will hold sway over that terrorist mini-state -- a friend of mine said this morning"
"God is fighting for Israel."
I believe, absolutely, that this is true.
What do I mean? Just this: Gaza's spiral into internecine violence is sending an unmistakable message to Israel and to the international community.
The scenes of running battles as Arab fights Arab are pouring a torrent of water onto whatever flames of hope still flicker in the deluded reaches of this world that land-for-peace has more than a snowflake's hope in hell of achieving any kind of success.
As Hamas men drag Fatah men out onto the sand dunes and, in front of their wives and children, shoot them executioner-style in the head, the word is going out from Gaza.
On television screens around the world, from CNN to Fox to the BBC to Sky News, as well as on thousands of other news services, the message is being broadcast loud and clear on Israel's behalf (because, ...   more »

BY OREN YANIV
Posted Monday, June 18th 2007, 4:00 AM
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert yesterday vowed to step up peace talks with moderate Palestinian leaders even as he denounced the radical Hamas takeover of the Gaza Strip.
Sounding an upbeat note, Olmert told Jewish leaders in the city that the violent split between Hamas and the more pragmatic Fatah movement could amount to a historic "opportunity for the future."
"With terrorists you fight, with the others you make peace," Olmert told 150 members of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations.
"There is a real chance for a different kind of life for them and ourselves," he added.
Olmert said Israelis were horrified - but not surprised - by the orgy of violence that Hamas unleashed last week against its Fatah rivals in Gaza.
"At the end, it was inevitable," he said. "Hamas will not be part of any peaceful solution."
Olmert earlier met with UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and plans to meet with President Bush tomorrow to discuss the crisis in the Palestinian territories.
The Israeli leader predicted the brutal power struggle would push Fatah and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas into constructive talks with the ...   more »

By Avi Issacharoff, Haaretz Correspondent, and News Agencies
  Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas told U.S. President George W. Bush in a phone call Monday that now is the time to resume Middle East peace talks, Abbas' spokesman said.
"Abbas told Mr. Bush that this is the time to resume the political negotiations and to revive the hope of the Palestinian people,' said Nabil Abu Rudeineh, who sat with Abbas during the phone call.In the 15-minute phone conversation, Abbas told Bush about the steps he has taken, including swearing in an emergency Cabinet and outlawing Hamas' militia forces. 
Bush pledged in return help and support to Abbas. The U.S. is expected to lift its embargo on aid to the PA, imposed in the wake of Hamas' victory in the Palestinian parliamentary elections last year.
The president noted that he plans to meet Tuesday with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, and that he would share their thoughts on how to proceed, said White House press secretary Tony Snow.
"What's important is, you have to have a partner who is commited to peace, and we believe that President Abbas is," Snow said. "And therefore we are commited to working with this new emergency ...   more »

Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Sunday evening he would release frozen tax revenue to the Palestinian Authority and remove some West Bank blockades.
His words came on the eve of his visit to Washington, where the US Administration was expected to ask him to take significant steps to bolster Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, in order to show the Palestinians what they have to gain under the "moderates," as opposed to what they have to lose under the extremists.
"We will cooperate with this government," Olmert said in a Manhattan address to the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations. "We will defreeze monies that we kept under our control because we didn't want these monies to be taken by Hamas to be used as part of a terrorist action. And we will do what we can to upgrade the quality of life [in the West Bank]."
Original Source

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Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said Monday that Israel would resume payments of Palestinian tax revenues if the new Fatah-led West Bank government commits to peace and supports Israel's right to exist.
"We are willing to work with those who support the goal of the two-state solution" of Israel and the Palestinians living side by side in peace, Livni said on arrival at a meeting with EU foreign ministers. "With this kind of government," she added, "Israel will work and, of course, release" hundreds of millions in tax revenue Israel has held back from the Palestinian Authority government while it included Hamas.
Earlier Monday, the European Union said it would resume direct aid to the new Palestinian Authority government of Prime Minister Salam Fayad.
Reacting to a dramatic new situation in the Middle East, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana said the 27-nation bloc would resume direct aid that was frozen more than a year ago after Hamas came to power.
Fatah to Israel: Help us get Hamas out of W. Bank
Solana said the EU planned to deliver aid for Palestinians in the Gaza Strip through the United Nations or an existing temporary program that bypasses the Hamas leadership there. ...   more »

The grisly scenes of death accompanying the Hamas coup in Gaza are a reminder of the dark vision that radical Islamists backed by Iran and Syria have in store for the Palestinians and Muslims throughout the Middle East. And they also should serve as a warning of what the region will look like when these Islamists perceive the United States and the West to be too weak to project power and defend their interests. Today, Hamas, which gets financial support, weapons and military training from Iran, and marching orders from Secretary-General Khaled Meshal in Damascus, has complete control of Gaza, having eliminated all vestiges of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' Fatah organization.
    What does a jihadist "democracy" look like? In Gaza City, a correspondent for this newspaper watched Thursday as Hamas gunmen pulled a Fatah commander out of a building and shot him in the street before bystanders spat on the body. Witnesses described Fatah security operatives being dragged out of what had been a redoubt of Abbas loyalists: the Palestinian Preventive Security Service headquarters. The Fatah men were led out in their underwear or shirtless, and executed as their wives and children watched. Elsewhere, Hamas death squads roamed ...   more »

The U.S. State Department and the Israeli government appeasers are wringing their hands today because Hamas has consolidated its power in the Gaza Strip, executing members of the opposition and, effectively, declared all-out war on the state of Israel.
It didn't have to be this way.
It turned out this way because, under international pressure, Israel caved, capitulated and appeased these Islamo-fascist terrorist monsters, presumably thinking an act of goodwill would win the favor of a population that has been bred on hatred of Jews, Christians and the West.
It was a stupid, counter-productive decision to evacuate Jews from Gaza and turn it over to the Palestinian Authority. It showed weakness. It encouraged more terrorism, more murder, more unprovoked attacks.
It was predictable. I saw it coming. I repeatedly warned of the consequences of the action.
The only question left on the table is whether Israel and the U.S. will learn from this debacle. Will people who advocated the ethnic cleansing of Gaza see the seriousness of the miscalculation?
Weapons and financial aid provided to the Palestinian Authority by the U.S. and Israel will now be used against Israelis – and likely against the U.S. in the form of international ...   more »

Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that the control of the world economic system by a few developed countries is outdated; it is necessary to establish a new world economic order to reflect the growing role of rapidly developing emerging nations.
He made the remarks on Sunday at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum wherein participated 9,000 delegates from sixty-five countries and regions.
Putin said 60% of the world's GDP was produced by nations not within the Group of Seven leading nations-the United States, France, Germany, Britain, Japan, Italy and Canada.
"Stable economic development demands the creation of a new architecture of international economic relations based on trust and mutually beneficial integration," Putin asserted. He noted that in the new world economic system, developing countries and newly emerged economic entities should have more of a say.
Putin also questioned the current financial system. He stressed that while the economies of most developing countries develop steadily, the world financial system only connects with certain currencies at only a few financial centers. This cannot meet the demand of long term global economic development. "There is only one possible response to this challenge: the creation of several international reserve currencies and more financial ...   more »

By Janet I. Tu
The Rev. Ann Holmes Redding attends the Sunday morning service at St. Clement's of Rome Episcopal Church in Seattle. Redding has been an Episcopal priest for 20 years and a Muslim for 15 months.
The Rev. Ann Holmes Redding, right, gets a hug from Ayesha Anderson at the end of a service recently with members of the Al-Islam Center in Seattle. Redding is a Christian who is also a practicing Muslim, and she worships with members of both faiths.
Redding talks with 4-year-old Celia Connor before the start of the service at St. Clement's of Rome Episcopal Church in Seattle. On Sundays, Redding often prays at St. Clement's. On Fridays, she prays with the Al-Islam Center.
Shortly after noon on Fridays, the Rev. Ann Holmes Redding ties on a black headscarf, preparing to pray with her Muslim group on First Hill.
On Sunday mornings, Redding puts on the white collar of an Episcopal priest.
She does both, she says, because she's Christian and Muslim.
Redding, who until recently was director of faith formation at St. Mark's Episcopal Cathedral, has been a priest for more than 20 years. Now she's ready to tell people that, for the ...   more »