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Pray For the Peace of Jerusalem Character Studies From The Bible Paul (Paul's First Letter to The Corinthians) 23  "I have the right to do anything," you say-but not everything is beneficial. "I have the right to do anything"-but not everything is constructive. 24 No one should seek their own good, but the good of others. 25 Eat anything sold in the meat market without raising questions of conscience, 26 for, "The earth is the Lord's, and everything in it." 27 If an unbeliever invites you to a meal and you want to go, eat whatever is put before...

Meretz chairwoman Zehava Galon blasted Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked and the Transparency Law at Monday evening's discussion of the bill in the Knesset. “This is not transparency; it is political persecution,” she charged. “Those who slander Israel are actually Ayelet Shaked and her settler friends. The world hates Israel not because of what the [leftist] organizations make public...

The FBI’s jurisdiction and its digital presence have intersected in an embarrassing and highly damaging manner. Hackers penetrated networks at the Department of Justice and the Department of Homeland Security, gaining access to employee records at the FBI and other agencies. Hundreds of gigabytes worth of data have been stolen, the hackers claim, and they are using the hack as a protest for the #FreePalestine movement.Motherboard first reported on the hack, and corroborated at least some of the claims: A hacker, who wishes to remain anonymous, plans to dump the apparent names, job titles, email addresses and phone numbers...

Greece aims to play the role of an economic force to strengthen ties between the European Union and Iran, Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras said Sunday after he arrived in Tehran for an official visit. "Greece will become an energy, economic and trade bridge between Iran and European Union," Tsipras said, according to a translation by the Mega television channel. He further called Iran "a key player for stability and peace in the Middle East, and a significant economic partner." Tsipras's comments come after Iran's nuclear deal with world powers came into force, allowing the United States and the European...

In the midst of ongoing normalization talks with Israel, Turkey is planning to invest $5 billion in reconstructing the Hamas stronghold of Gaza including a seaport - which Israel has fiercely opposed due to the blatant threat of weapons smuggling. The Turkish Hurriyet Daily News on Friday reported that a team of the Union of Chambers and Commodity Exchanges of Turkey (TOBB) announced the expensive rebuilding plan, which is being prepared by the Center for Multilateral Trade Studies at the Economic Policy Research Foundation of Turkey (TEPAV). The plans to reconstruct the Hamas-held region came after meetings with Palestinian Authority...

A very unusual case of smuggling took place on Thursday, as huge quantities of gold, steroids and smart phones were found in the car of a European Union (EU) representative in Israel, as he drove into the country from Jordan. Dozens of kilograms of gold, hundreds of smartphones and a full package of steroid drugs were discovered by customs inspectors in the car as it tried to pass through the Allenby Border Crossing from Jordan, reports Channel 2. The EU diplomat was detained and later released, and his driver - an Arab resident of the northern Atarot neighborhood of Jerusalem...

After Egypt President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi apologised for not finishing the reconstruction work of Christian properties damaged in the aftermath of Islamist president Mohamed Morsi's ouster in 2013, the engineering unit of the Armed Forces immediately started cooperating with Coptic authorities to wrap up the pending renovations, religious Coptic figures said. While visiting Cairo's St. Mark Cathedral on Christmas Eve, El-Sisi apologised to the country's Christians over the delay in the completion of renovations, which he says will be done by the end of 2016.The churches undergoing renovation were attacked in August 2013 on the day of the dispersals of pro-Morsi...

Democratic presidential contender Bernie Sanders has tapped several critics of Israel to advise him on foreign policy, including one who has compared Israelis to “Nazis” and accused them of waging “a Holocaust.” Sanders, who is Jewish and had family members slaughtered during the Holocaust, recently disclosed that his top foreign policy advisers include J Street, a dovish Middle East advocacy group that backs some of Congress’ most vocal critics of Israel, former assistant Secretary of Defense Larry Korb, and James Zogby, an Israel detractor who heads the Arab American Institute. The inclusion of these advisers in the Sanders’ campaign, which...

The Knesset Ethics Committee ruled on Monday night to suspend three Arab Knesset members following a public uproar over their meeting with the families of terrorists who committed murderous attacks against Israelis. MKs Hanin Zoabi and Basel Ghattas were suspended for a period of four months, while MK Jamal Zahalka was suspended for two months. All three are members of the Joint List's Balad faction. The three Knesset members will be barred from attending the Knesset plenum until the end of the winter session, but will still be able to vote there and in committee meetings. In the meeting last...

This has been the most dramatic week in US/Iranian relations since 1979. Last weekend ten US Navy personnel were caught in Iranian waters, as the Pentagon kept changing its story on how they got there. It could have been a disaster for President Obama's big gamble on diplomacy over conflict with Iran. But after several rounds of telephone diplomacy between Secretary of State John Kerry and his Iranian counterpart Javad Zarif, the Iranian leadership - which we are told by the neocons is too irrational to even talk to - did a most rational thing: weighing the costs and...

An Iranian official on Monday rejected reports that Tehran has ceased funding the Palestinian terror group Hamas, claiming that supporting the fight against Israel remains a "principled policy," the semi-official Tasnim news agency said. Speaking at his weekly press conference in Tehran, Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Hossein Jaberi Ansari rejected media reports that funding for the Gaza-based group ceased in 2009. Ansari said that supporting "Palestinian resistance movements" is part of Iran's foreign policy, according to the state-run Islamic Republic News Agency. He called the Palestinian issue "pivotal and basic" for Muslims, according to the agency. ...

Rafat Alian, the Jerusalem spokesperson of Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah faction, cited UN Director-General Ban Ki-Moon in justifying the attack on the Old City's Damascus Gate in which Hadar Cohen was murdered. [...] Alian said the "occupation" of the "Palestinian nation" demands a "natural response" - in a direct quote from Ban, who two weeks ago caused outrage by sympathizing with Palestinian terror and saying, "it is human nature to react to occupation." Israeli Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon wrote an official letter to Ban, demanding that he take back his statements that grant legitimacy to...

Pray For the Peace of Jerusalem Character Studies From The Bible Paul (Paul's First Letter to The Corinthians) 14 Therefore, my dear friends, flee from idolatry. 15 I speak to sensible people; judge for yourselves what I say. 16 Is not the cup of thanksgiving for which we give thanks a participation in the blood of Christ? And is not the bread that we break a participation in the body of Christ? 17 Because there is one loaf, we, who are many, are one body, for we all share the one loaf. 18 Consider the people of Israel: Do...

UN Director-General Ban Ki-Moon spoke at Park East Synagogue in New York on Saturday, in a speech for International Holocaust Remembrance Day - but he was met with boos in light of his recent virulently anti-Israeli statements. Two weeks ago on Tuesday Ban expressed sympathy for murderous Palestinian terrorism in Israel, saying, "it is human nature to react to occupation." The comment was met with outrage in Israel. In his speech at the synagogue Ban steered completely clear of Israel, instead only speaking about the universal messages from the Holocaust regarding the need to combat racism and violence. But the...

The man who stabbed and lightly wounded an Israeli soldier Sunday morning in the southern coastal city of Ashkelon has been identified as a Sudanese national. The attacker was shot and seriously injured after fleeing the scene of the stabbing; he later died of his wounds at the hospital. Police initially believed the stabbing near the city's central bus station was part of an ongoing wave of Arab terror attacks across Israel. Now, however, the motive for the stabbing is unclear. The Sudanese national, said to be in his 20s, arrived at Ben Gurion Boulevard in Ashkelon shortly before 8:30...

The Iowa Democratic caucus which I've already described as akin to the Marxist Zimbabwe Farmers-workers confabs is over, and it appears -- as Mark Steyn ably notes -- "almost certain" that Hillary Clinton did not win it. If Iowa were one of those banana republics in which the president-for-life has been prevailed upon to hold an election and Jimmy Carter and a bunch of UN observers had flown in to certify it, none of the above would pass muster. But in the Democrat Party it does:[snip] In effect, Hillary and Bernie fought Iowa to a draw. But a miss is...

Holding hands and singing Kumbaya in Gaza. Sure. Maybe you're right to keep the rest of us away from Israel, might confuse us. Dear Mr Fooley (or may I call you Luke?*) Just got back from my Labor Parliamentary Excursion, dividing my time equally between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, as you requested. What a trip! My feet hardly touched the ground! Monday: Arrived at Lod Airport, after circling around to avoid being blasted out of the sky by IS, Hamas, Hezbollah, and a bunch of other peace-loving friends of the Palestinian Arab People's Struggle to Wipe The Perfidious Jew...

Iran wants to recover tens of billions of dollars it is owed by India and other buyers of its oil in euros and is billing new crude sales in euros, too, looking to reduce its dependence on the U.S. dollar following last month's sanctions relief. A source at state-owned National Iranian Oil Co (NIOC) told Reuters that Iran will charge in euros for its recently signed oil contracts with firms including French oil and gas major Total, Spanish refiner Cepsa and Litasco, the trading arm of Russia's Lukoil. "In our invoices we mention a clause that buyers of our oil...

Israelis who posted Facebook statuses in Tel Aviv during the weekend were surprised to find that according to Facebook, they were not in Tel Aviv - but rather in "Al Mas'Udiya." The name refers to a town abandoned by Arab residents during the 1948 War of Independence, when the surrounding Arab nations tried and failed to destroy the nascent modern Jewish state. The location of the village, which has not existed for around 68 years, currently would be between the streets of Ibn Gabirol and Arlozorov in Tel Aviv, right near Hameah Tower. Facebook took things even further by listing...

Pray For the Peace of Jerusalem Character Studies From The Bible Paul (Paul's First Letter to The Corinthians) 10 For I do not want you to be ignorant of the fact, brothers and sisters, that our ancestors were all under the cloud and that they all passed through the sea. 2 They were all baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea. 3 They all ate the same spiritual food 4 and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ. 5 Nevertheless, God was not...