India floods: Death toll in Uttarakhand 'passes 500'

The death toll from flooding and landslides following heavy monsoon rains in the northern Indian state of Uttarakhand has passed 500.

The state's Chief Minister, Vijay Bahuguna, said 556 bodies had been seen floating or buried in "slush", and that the army was working to recover them.

The charity Action Aid says 5,000 people are missing in the area.

Many of those stranded in the mountainous region are Hindu pilgrims visiting local shrines.

The worst affected area is around the holy town of Kedarnath.

The Indian Army is leading rescue efforts. The authorities say troops have yet to reach some remote mountain areas.

Indian Home Minister Sushilkumar Shinde said more than 33,000 pilgrims had been rescued in the past few days, but at least 50,000 people were still stranded.

Earlier on Friday, 40 bodies were recovered from the river Ganges in the temple town of Haridwar, according to local police official Rajiv Swaroop.

Haridwar is downstream from the region where heavy rains on Sunday night triggered flash floods and landslides.

Flood-related deaths have also been reported in Himachal Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh states and neighbouring Nepal.

The monsoon season generally lasts from June to September, bringing rain which is critical to farming, but this year the rain in the north of India and parts of Nepal has been far heavier than usual.

BBC

CONGRESS WAKES UP TO CATACLYSMIC THREAT

WASHINGTON – As the technologically sophisticated U.S. faces the increasing threat of an electromagnetic pulse attack from a man-made, high altitude nuclear explosion or an “inevitable” massive solar flare, Republicans in the U.S. House are trying to prepare a defense.

They are proposing legislation to protect the vulnerable U.S. electrical grid from an attack so cataclysmic 90 percent of Americans could be affected, including many who would face starvation

The legislation aims to get the federal government to ensure that vital hardware and other devices are installed in the national grid system to protect critical infrastructure such as systems that supply water, food, fuel, communications, transportation, financial transactions and emergency services.

The protection would be employed by hardening the grid to ensure that it can be brought back should it be subjected to such an event.

The alternative, said Rep. Trent Franks, R-Ariz., who will introduce the legislation called the SHIELD Act, could leave the nation without electricity for months and possibly years and affect some 90 percent of the American people, subjecting them to starvation and death.

SHIELD stands for Secure High-voltage Infrastructure for Electricity from Lethal Damage Act.

“This is a problem big enough to be seen but small enough to fix before an EMP happens,” Franks said at a news conference.

He was accompanied by former Republican House Speaker Newt Gingrich, who has been outspoken in recent years on the threat of an EMP attack.

Gingrich believes an EMP event is the greatest national security threat facing the United States today.

Franks explained that the U.S. is not more vulnerable than before but has “become a victim of our technological sophistication and scientific advancement.”

“Why does the U.S. need to be vulnerable to such a threat?” he asked. “EMP is the ultimate cyber security threat.”

In terms of coping with external man-made threats, Franks pointed out that Congress has seen to it that the military’s triad of land, sea and air assets has been hardened against the prospect of an EMP attack. Yet, the military is 99 percent dependent on the national grid, making it difficult for it to respond in the event of such an attack.

He pointed out that at the cost of two B-2 strategic bombers, the U.S. could fix the grid so that it could come back in short order should it be brought down.



“The SHIELD Act is a bill that goes in the right direction,” he said.

The legislation passed the House in the last Congress but never made it through the Senate.

Sources on Franks’ staff said that they are actively looking for a Senate version, possibly to be introduced by Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga.

The SHIELD Act would amend the Federal Power Act to encourage cooperation between industry and government in developing and implementing standards and processes needed to address the shortcomings and vulnerabilities of the grid to a major EMP event.

It does not include provisions to deal with cyber-security threats which legislators decided to leave to a separate bill. However, Franks said that an EMP attack, whether natural or man-made, would be “the ultimate cyber-security threat.”

The legislation also would give the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission authority to develop standards but won’t preclude industry from developing its own.

“This increased authority is necessary to protect the entire grid,” a congressional fact sheet on the SHIELD Act said. “Some industry stakeholders may develop these standards on their own, but unless the entire grid is uniformly resilient to EMP, cascading effects of blackouts resulting from stakeholders that did not protect their entities from EMP will most likely still cause rolling blackouts and massive outages.

“Some industry stakeholders may not view EMP as a credible threat (e.g., Southern stakeholders may not feel threatened by solar storms because of their relative latitudinal protection,” the fact sheet said. “Therefore, we cannot rely on voluntary action by industry stakeholders to protect against this threat.”

The legislation also offers “hardware-based solutions,” available at minimal cost. The hardware will automatically react to an EMP disturbance, removing the “guessing-game” operators currently face.

“If we are going to be serious about avoiding such a catastrophic event” as an EMP, “a priority on this legislation is greater than defense spending,” Gingrich said.

“We can literally see a civilization crash,” he said, referring to the U.S. dependency on the grid’s technology-based infrastructure.

He pointed out that the people of the Netherlands have a particular problem with their dikes. If repair is neglected, he said that more than 40 percent of the country would be underwater. Consequently, he said, there is no question in their minds to maintain the dike system because of this alternative.

The same should apply to the U.S. ensuring protection of the U.S. electrical grid system.

“We could lose 90 percent of the population if an EMP only hit the U.S,” Gingrich asserted.

The U.S. then would have “massive needs of foreign assistance” if no other country were affected.

“That would mean we’d lose our sovereignty,” Gingrich declared.

Peter Vincent Pry, staff director of the original EMP Commission that first revealed the threat of an EMP hit on the nation’s critical infrastructures, pointed out that Russia and China and even North Korea would be the only countries prepared for an EMP event. In effect, they would emerge as the new world leaders.

If the U.S. became disabled from an EMP attack, “is that what we want?”

“The problem,” Franks said, “is fixable.”

Earlier this week, WND reported Maine became the first state in the nation to pass legislation ordering its grid to be hardened against an electromagnetic pulse event.

The law not only requires preparation against a natural or man-made EMP, it encourages other states to take a similar initiative, since the federal government has refused to make the potential for an EMP event a priority.

The Act to Secure the Safety of Electrical Transmission Lines was introduced by Maine Rep. Andrea Boland, D-Sanford.

Read more at http://www.wnd.com/2013/06/congress-wakes-up-to-cataclysmic-threat/#spFJJVSa470PfOZ3.99

Lavrov: Russia will honor its S-300 missile contract with Damascus. Two Russian warships head for Syria

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Thursday, June 20, that Moscow will honor its controversial contract to deliver S-300 air defense missile systems to Syria. He spoke the day after the announcement that two warships carrying 600 Russian marines were heading for Syria "to protect the Russian citizens there” along with air force cover as needed. Lavrov told Russian TV: “We respect all our contracts and are honoring all our contractual obligations.” DEBKAfile: Both Russia and the United States are pumping more arms into Syria for the decisive battle for Aleppo between the HIzballah-backed Syrian army and heavily mobilized rebel forces.

DEBKAfile reported earlier:

Just one day after the G8 Summit ended in the failure of Western leaders to overcome Russian resistance to a resolution mandating President Bashar Assad’s ouster, Moscow announced Wednesday June 19, the dispatch to Syria of two warships carrying 600 Russian marines. They were coming, said the official statement, "to protect the Russian citizens there." Russian Deputy Air Force Commander Maj.-Gen. Gradusov added that an air force umbrella would be provided the Russian expeditionary force if needed.

DEBKAfile's military sources report that the pretext offered by Moscow for sending the force thinly disguised Russian President Vladimir Putin’s intent to flex Russian military muscle in response to the delivery of Western heavy arms to Syrian rebels – which DEBKAfile first revealed Tuesday, June 18.

Putin was giving the West due warning that if they persisted in arming the rebels any further, a Russian troop landing in Syria would take place in the guise of an operation to evacuate endangered Russian nationals.

Some 20,000 Russians live in Syria. In former stages of the conflict, they were given the locations of assembly points should Moscow decide to lift them out of the war-torn country. The evacuation of Russian citizens would in itself dramatically denote the expansion of the Syrian conflict.

The Russian Interfax news agency identified the warships heading for Syrian shores as the Nikolai Filchenkov Large Landing Ship and the Vice Admiral Kulakov, a Udaloy 1 class destroyer, each carrying 300 marines. Aboard the former are also 20 tanks and 15 armored troop carriers or military trucks, while the Kulakov is designed mainly for anti-submarine warfare.
DEBKAfile's military sources also reveal that, although Moscow described the warships are preparing to depart for Syria, they have actually been cruising in the Mediterranean since mid-May. Upon receiving their orders, they could reach Syria in just a few hours.

Maj.-Gen. Gradusov was quoted as saying: "We won't abandon the Russians and will evacuate them from the conflict zone, if necessary."

Asked if the Russian aircraft were intended as air cover for the Russian warships coming to Syria, he declined to answer, saying said only "They will act on orders."

The Moscow communiqué does not say when the Russian forces are scheduled to reach port in Syria or in which part of the country they are to operate. Our military sources say their impending presence in the war zone and the possibility of Western-supplied weapons in Syrian rebel hands causing Russian casualties are enough to contribute three more perilous dimensions to the Syrian conflict:

1. The harming of Russian soldiers would give Moscow an excuse to pile on more military reinforcements in Syria;

2. Russian air power is on its way to Syrian airspace before any decision is taken in the West about imposing a US-led no-fly zone over Syria;

3. The presence of Russian military personnel in Syria would pour more fuel on the already highly incendiary diplomatic and military tensions between Washington and Moscow over this conflict.

DEBKAfile

World Health Organisation calls emergency meeting to respond to SARS-like outbreak

Amid fears of a new pandemic more deadly than Sars, 80 officials and doctors, including two from Britain, gathered in Cairo yesterday to examine ways of tackling Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, dubbed MERS.

The coronavirus is casting a shadow over the annual Muslim pilgrimages to Saudi Arabia, where four new deaths were announced on Monday.

The three-day meeting called by the World Health Organisation will look at developing guidelines for Ramadan. In October, more than two million people are expected to attend the Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca.

"Everyone is very aware of the fact that Ramadan begins next month and that there will be a large, large movement of people in a small crowded spaces," said Gregory Hartl, a spokesman for the WHO. "So the more we know about this virus before that starts the better."

There are also concerns that tourists could bring the virus back to their home countries. It appears to have an incubation period of up to 12 days and a fatality rate of 60 per cent.

The Telegraph

Israel’s FUTURE Rejection of the Second Coming of Moses and Elijah

The very one who was Jehovah’s mighty champion AGAINST the godless oppressive regime of Ahab and Jezebel (1 Kings 17-19). The very one who took on the national apostasy of the 10 tribes in the north (Israel). The very one who took on the 850 prophets of Baal then slew them upon Mount Carmel (1 Kings 18:19-40). The very one who at Mount Sinai heard the still voice of Almighty G-d (1 Kings 19:9-14) who will set the ground work for turning the hearts of the sons back to the fathers and the hearts of the fathers back to the sons (Mal. 4:4-6) is now REJECTED by the present day nation of Israel at this time (Ezek. 38:26, Rev. 11:9). 

Moses and Elijah will be REJECTED by the majority of the Nation of Israel durng their 31/2 year ministry!
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The very deliverer of Egypt’s 400 year oppressive bondage, the one who parted the Red Sea, the Lawgiver of Mount Sinai, the very one Almighty God used to institute the Leviticus priesthood and sacrificial system (Deut 32-40) which pointed to the Person and Work of the Messiah, the one who talked Face to face with Almighty G-d (Deut. 34:10) and the most honored patriarch in Israel’s history (MOSES) will be REJECTED by the majority of present day Israel during this time (Rev. 11:9). How absolutely amazing is that! UNBELIEF is UNBELIEF no matter who Almighty G-d sends. Remember what the Messiah spoke of Abraham telling the godless rich man who died in his transgressions who was in Sheol (Luke 16:19-31)? Abraham stated to the rich man across the fixed gulf - before Sheol Paradise was emptied at the Messiah’s ascension to the Right Hand of Almighty G-d (Psalm 68:18, 110:, Eph. 4:8-10).

“Then he said, I pray thee therefore, father, that thou wouldest send him to my father's house: For I have five brethren; that he may testify unto them, lest they also come into this place of torment. Abraham saith unto him, They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them. And he said, Nay, father Abraham: but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent. And he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead (Luke 16:27-31).”
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No matter WHAT the signs and wonders, no matter WHO the mighty person or no matter the Divine witness of Almighty God, the Holy Spirit and the Light of the World, NONE of these CAN EVER turn an unbelieving and unrepentant heart to the Savior (Jer. 17:9). Time and time again this has been the case throughout Israel’s wretched history (1 Sam 8:7, Isa. 53: 1-3, Lev. 26, Acts 7) and in the 6000 year history of Adam’s fallen race (Rom. 1:18-32). As Israel dwells in the land their hearts are far from Almighty God. They have chosen an existence of self reliance and self dependance but all of this will come to an abrupt end very shortly (Jer. 30:1-7, Dan. 12, Rev. 12).

It will be at the end of MOSES and ELIJAH’S 3 ½ year ministry, that the Anti Christ will be resuscitated and given authority to violently murder these Two MIGHTY Men of world’s history, which "terrorized" a godless world with their RIGHTEOUS WORDS of Divine judgment(i,e. the WORD’S of ALMIGHTY GOD - Heb. 4:12-13)! It is AT THIS TIME (at the death and resuscitation of Almighty God’s Two Witnesses – Rev. 11:7-13) that Almighty God will allow rebellious and unbelieving Israel to be persecuted as NEVER before by Satan and his demonic and human minions (Ezek 39:26, Zech. 13:8-9, Rev. 12)! Because of the national REJECTION of MOSES and ELIJAH (HOW AMAZING IS THAT STATEMENT!!) and their OVER ABUNDANT SUPER NATURAL witness to Israel, they will now be subjected to GREAT TRIBULATION for 3 ½ years (Zech. 13:8-9, Rev. 12, 13). For those who are able to flee and who have taken heed to the warnings of the Messiah's scripture text and the testimony of MOSES and ELIJAH they will be protected and nourished during this time in a place provided by Almighty God (Matt. 24:15-22, Rev. 12:14-17), a place of protection against the satanic rage of Lucifer and his earthly and demonic minions(Rev. 12). 

This horrific period is called the time of “Jacob’s Trouble” and the GREAT tribulation will EXPONENTIALLY EXCEED the anti Semitic genocide and atrocities of Nazi Germany.

It will be in the END of this 3 and 1/2 year period, that the Messiah will come out of Heaven’s glory with His saints and the unbelieving Jews who have been able to survive thus far will see Him coming in the clouds in GREAT GLORY and THEN it will ALL click and they will GREATLY REPENT and MOURN for what they have done and who they have done it to.since Messiah was CUT OFF (Dan. 9:26, Zech. 12:9-14, 13:1-2). It will be at this time that those who remain of the seed of Israel will FINALLY receive their Messiah and He will MIGHTILY deliver them out of the hand of a raging world HELL bent on their total annihilation (Dan. 9:26, Zech. 12:9-14, 13:1-2, 14:2-4, Rev. 12:17, 16:13-16, 19:11-21). Indeed will those who remain of Israel at this time truly say, "Blessed is He who cometh in the Name of the Lord" (Psalm 110, 118, Matt. 23:39)! It will be through the POWERFUL catalyst, testimony and ministry of MOSES and ELIJAH of old which will lay the ground work for the salvation of countless gentiles and the redemption of the nation of Israel (Isa 61:2-4, 62:1-5, 66;7-10, Zech. 12:8-14, Mal. 4, Matt. 25:32-32)!

It will be through the POWERFUL catalyst, testimony and ministry of MOSES and ELIJAH of old which will lay the ground work for the salvation of countless gentiles and the redemption of the nation of Israel.

Oh my beloved what a day to live in!! Israel will yet be a praise unto the Lord of Hosts throughout the world! Oh my beloved Jewish friend, cast a side this world's subjective carnal delights and come OUT of her and turn back to the G-d of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in spirit and truth. May the Word of the Lord transform you for my friend you will NEVER be the same! Rejoice GREATLY, for the Kingdom of Heaven is at TRULY at hand!

DJP I.F.

The Ignorant fisherman blog