Author: Ron Chambers

Satanists Pitch Abortion as a Satanic ‘Ritual’ to Bypass Laws

Ricky Scaparo – October 1, 2020

(ETH) – The Satanic Temple based in Salem, Massachusetts just announced this week that it has sued an advertising company because it refused to display some billboards promoting a ritual offered by the organization to help people bypass abortion rules in some states.

TST has sued Lamar Advertising in Arkansas state court according to a report from CBN News, accusing the Louisiana-based company of religious discrimination.  The organization claims that Lamar refused to display eight billboards in Arkansas and Indiana promoting what the group is calling its “religious abortion ritual.” The group describes the ritual as a “sacramental act that confirms the right of bodily autonomy.”

The group claims that by performing the ritual, people can claim a religious exemption from mandatory waiting periods, counseling, ultrasounds, and other measures that some states require before an abortion can be performed. According to the report, The group claims that it submitted five designs to Lamar to be displayed near pro-life pregnancy centers.

In one of the images, a bowl of cake batter is shown with the text, “not a cake,” next to an image of a sperm and egg with the text “not a baby.” It’s accompanied by text saying, “Our religious abortion ritual averts many state restrictions.” Lamar reportedly rejected the billboards from the group stating that their content was “misleading and offensive,” according to the suit.

This latest report follows a recent story that was also first distributed by CBN News in August, where TST announced that it was raffling a free abortion to promote the organization’s Satanic abortion ritual while arguing that its members’ religious rights are exempt from any state laws or any regulations that might block access to abortion services during the first trimester.

This is because the organization claims that those who practice the Satanic abortion ritual are automatically exempt from being subjected to waiting periods, mandatory counseling, forced viewing of sonograms, and reading materials as required in many states.

https://endtimeheadlines.org

Violence Erupts Between Armenia And Azerbaijan Over Long-Disputed Region

– September 27, 2020

Fighting broke out between Armenia and Azerbaijan in the disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh on Sunday, causing casualties on both sides and prompting the Armenian government to declare martial law and mobilize its military.

The conflict is the latest eruption of violence in a decades-long dispute over the region, which lies within the borders of Azerbaijan but is controlled by ethnic Armenian forces. Both countries have reported military and civilian deaths as of Sunday afternoon.

Armenian officials said Azerbaijani forces launched a “missile and aerial attack” in the region on Sunday morning, targeting peaceful settlements and shelling civilian infrastructures, while Azerbaijan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said its armed forces were responding to Armenian shelling.

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said in a tweet that the aggression seemed to be pre-planned, and “constitutes large-scale provocation against regional peace & security.”

Azerbaijan’s president, Ilham Aliyev, countered that “the first fire, including artillery fire, was opened by Armenia, and the first victims were Azerbaijani servicemen.”

Officials in both Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh declared martial law and dispatched armed forces as tensions rose on Sunday morning.

The human rights ombudsman of Nagorno-Karabakh said that a woman and child were killed and two civilians were wounded in the Martuni region as a result of Azerbaijani shelling. The region’s deputy defense minister later said that 16 Armenian forces were killed and more than 100 were wounded.

Aliyev, Azerbaijan’s president, said enemy fire had killed and wounded both servicemen and civilians, and that “shedding of their blood will not go unpunished.”

“Armenia is an occupying state, and an end to this occupation must and will be put,” Aliyev added.

https://www.npr.org

Trump says he and first lady tested positive for coronavirus

JILL COLVIN and ZEKE MILLER – October 2, 2020

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said early Friday that he and first lady Melania Trump have tested positive for the coronavirus, a stunning announcement that plunges the country deeper into uncertainty just a month before the presidential election.

Trump, who has spent much of the year downplaying the threat of a virus that has killed more than 205,000 Americans, said he and Mrs. Trump were quarantining. The White House physician said the president is expected to continue carrying out his duties “without disruption” while recovering.

Still, Trump’s diagnosis was sure to have a destabilizing effect in Washington, raising questions about how far the virus had spread through the highest levels of the U.S. government. Hours before Trump announced he had contracted the virus, the White House said a top aide who had traveled with him during the week had tested positive.

“Tonight, @FLOTUS and I tested positive for COVID-19. We will begin our quarantine and recovery process immediately,” Trump tweeted just before 1 a.m. “We will get through this TOGETHER!”

Trump was last seen by reporters returning to the White House on Thursday evening and did not appear visibly ill. Trump is 74 years old, putting him at higher risk of serious complications from a virus that has infected more than 7 million people nationwide.

The president’s physician said in a memo that Trump and the first lady, who is 50, “are both well at this time” and “plan to remain at home within the White House during their convalescence.”

https://apnews.com

EU launches legal action against UK over Brexit bill

DW – October 1, 2020

The European Union launched a legal case against the United Kingdom on Thursday for a “breach of the good faith articles in the Withdrawal Agreement.”

The action is due to the UK’s new Internal Market Bill that undercuts the British government’s earlier legal commitments as part of the agreement, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said.

“We had invited our British friends to remove the problematic parts of their draft Internal Market Bill by the end of September,” von der Leyen said. “The deadline lapsed yesterday.”

London has one month in which to respond to the formal letter of complaint submitted by the Commission. The EU’s executive branch will then assess the answer before considering further action.

If the Commission deems the response to be unsatisfactory it then has the option of suing at the Luxembourg-based European Court of Justice.

Von der Leyen said it was “the first step in an infringement procedure.” A draft “letter of formal notice” has been finalized, meaning legal action is imminent.

The choice of words “leaves some wiggle room to walk this back,” said DW Brussels correspondent Barbara Wesel. “Negotiations about a trade deal are still going on, but they are not going well… and a trade deal cannot come into force if the Internal Market Bill passes.”

Michael Gove, the UK minister handling Brexit divorce issues, said “differences still remain” between Britain and the EU in trade talks, but that some advances had been made after the ninth round of negotiations between the two parties took place this week.

“We made progress in a number of areas and specialized committees will meet in the coming weeks, in order to conclude further work,” Gove told parliament.

https://www.dw.com

Erdogan Tells Turkish Leaders: ‘Jerusalem is Our City’

Emily Jones – October 2, 2020

JERUSALEM, Israel – Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan suggested that Jerusalem belongs to his country during an address to Turkish lawmakers in Ankara on Thursday, The Times of Israel reported.

“In this city that we had to leave in tears during the First World War, it is still possible to come across traces of the Ottoman resistance. So, Jerusalem is our city, a city from us,” he said. “Our first qibla [Islamic direction of prayer] al-Aqsa and the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem are the symbolic mosques of our faith. In addition, this city is home to the holy places of Christianity and Judaism.”

The Ottoman Empire ruled Jerusalem from 1516-1917 until Great Britain took over after World War I. Erdogan is increasingly pushing the constitutionally secular country towards conservative Islam and considers Jerusalem an extension of Turkey.

Shortly after converting Istanbul’s Hagia Sophia church into a mosque in July, Erdogan set his sights on the holy city.

He said in a Facebook post that the “revival of the Hagia Sophia is a sign towards the return of freedom to the al-Aqsa mosque” in Jerusalem.

https://www1.cbn.com

Texas residents warned of tap water tainted with brain-eating microbe

Guardian – September 26, 2020

Texas officials have warned residents of some communities near Houston to stop using tap water because it might be tainted with a deadly brain-eating microbe.

The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality warned the Brazosport Water Authority late on Friday of the potential contamination of its water supply by Naegleria fowleri.

The commission issued an advisory warning people not to use tap water for any reason except to flush toilets in Lake Jackson, Freeport, Angleton, Brazoria, Richwood, Oyster Creek, Clute and Rosenberg.

Those communities are home to about 120,000 people. Also affected are the Dow Chemical works in Freeport, which has 4,200 employees, and the Clemens and Wayne Scott state prison units, which have 2,345 inmates and 655 employees.

The Brazosport Water Authority’s water source is the Brazos river.

Naegleria fowleri is a microscopic amoeba commonly found in warm freshwater and soil, according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It usually infects people when contaminated water enters the body through the nose, from where it travels to the brain and can cause a rare and debilitating disease called primary amebic meningoencephalitis.

The infection is usually fatal and typically occurs when people go swimming or diving in warm freshwater places such as lakes and rivers. In very rare instances, Naegleria infections may also occur when contaminated water from other sources, such as inadequately chlorinated swimming pool water or heated and contaminated tap water, enters the nose.

https://www.theguardian.com

Intense earthquake swarm near Salton Sea, California

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An intense earthquake swarm started near Salton Sea, California on September 30, 2020, with 421 earthquakes detected by 07:00 UTC on October 1.

  • The swarm is centered just southeast of Salton Sea, near Westmorland in Imperial Valley, in an area with a history of intense swarms. The most notable earthquakes in the region include M5.8 in 1981 and M5.4 in 2012.
  • During this earthquake swarm, the probability of larger earthquakes in this region is significantly greater than usual, the USGS said.
  • The swarm is taking place in Brawley Seismic Zone, a network of small faults that connect the San Andreas and Imperial faults.

The USGS registered a total of 440 earthquakes from 10:06 UTC on September 30 to 07:33 UTC on October 1, 2020, with the largest M4.9 at 00:31 UTC on October 1, followed by M4.5, M4.4, M4.2, and two M4.1.

“This earthquake [M4.9] and the associated swarm are located in an area of diffuse seismic activity between the San Andreas fault in the north and the Imperial fault to the south,” USGS seismologists said in a statement.

“This area has also seen swarms in the past – notably the 1981 Westmorland swarm, which included a M5.8 earthquake, and the 2012 Brawley swarm, which included a M5.4 earthquake. Past swarms in this region have remained active for 1 to 20 days, with an average duration of about a week. The current swarm is occurring about 40 kilometers (25 miles) to the south of the swarm that occurred near Bombay Beach in August 2020.”

According to the USGS, there is approximately a 3 in 10 000 chance of a magnitude 7+ earthquake in the vicinity of this swarm in a typical week.

“[This is] one of the largest swarms we have had in the Imperial Valley,” seismologist Dr. Lucy Jones said.

https://watchers.news

Chinese authorities abduct and torture priest to force state conversion

Ricky Scaparo – September 29, 2020

(ETH) – China is so hell-bent on destroying Christianity that the Communist authorities in China have now reportedly abducted and tortured a 46-year-old priest in the southeastern province of Fujian for refusing to join the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association, according to a report from the Christian Post.

Bitter Winter, which is a magazine publication that reports on religious liberty and human rights in China state that Father Liu Maochun from the Diocese of Mindong was ruthlessly tortured.  The details of the report indicated that Officers banged a “gong beside his ear and shone a bright light into his eyes for several consecutive days—a torture method known as ‘exhausting an eagle’ when people are deprived of sleep for a long time,”

Then Liu Maochun, who assists the diocese’s auxiliary bishop Guo Xijin, was then taken away by Chinese police on Sept. 1st while he was visiting patients in a hospital. He was then taken to a detention house in the county-level city of Fu’an. “The government claimed that Fr. Liu Maochun has disobeyed its rule and was ‘ideologically radical,’” the source was quoted as saying.

The Bishop also refused to join the Chinese Patriotic Catholic Association, This comes as the government had earlier pressured one of the deacons in the diocese, threatening to demolish his house and sack his children if he further supported Guo’s refusal to join the Patriotic Church, according to the shocking report. The report also stated that Fr. Maochun may have shared information with foreign media about another priest, Fr. Huang, who too was tortured for not joining the Patriotic Church. China continues cracking down on underground churches and Christian activists and has been for years.

https://endtimeheadlines.org

Iran Building Drone and Missile-Carrying, Electronic Warfare Capable Warship, Commander Reveals

– September 25, 2020

The Islamic Republic staged large-scale drills in the eastern waters of the Strait of Hormuz, the Makran coast, the Gulf of Oman and the northern Indian Ocean this month amid tensions with Washington. This week, drones from the Revolutionary Guard Corps captured detailed video footage of a US carrier strike group as it entered the Persian Gulf.

Iran is building a new class of helicopter-carrying warship capable of operating in the world’s oceans, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy Commander Rear-Admiral Alireza Tangsiri has revealed.

The domestically built 65-metre-long ships are expected to be unveiled in the near future, Tangsiri said, speaking on television on Thursday evening, without providing any more details.

Separately, Rear-Admiral Hossein Khanzadi, commander of Iran’s Navy, said his force would unveil a new dock ship on Navy Day in November, with the 231-metre-long vessel expected to carry up to seven helicopters, as well as drones, missiles and electronic warfare equipment.

The Moudge-class Dena frigate, the Saba minesweeper and a new class of missile boat are also expected to be unveiled on Navy Day, Khanzadi said adding that the Dena is undergoing its sea final trials, and is more advanced than previously delivered ships of the class.

Tangsiri noted that, as well as the new class of corvettes, the IRGC plans to take delivery of new missile-launching boats capable of accelerating to blazing-fast speeds up to 94 knots.

https://sputniknews.com

Bank of England eyes sub-zero rates in face of virus, Brexit

The Canadian Press – September 17, 2020

LONDON — The Bank of England indicated Thursday that it could cut interest rates below zero for the first time in its 326-year history as it tries to shore up a U.K. economic recovery that is facing the dual headwinds of the coronavirus and Brexit.

After unanimously deciding to maintain the bank’s main interest rate at the record low of 0.1%, the nine-member rate-setting Monetary Policy Committee said it had discussed its “policy toolkit, and the effectiveness of negative policy rates in particular.”

In minutes accompanying the decision, the rate-setters said a recent wave of virus infections has “the potential to weigh further on economic activity, albeit probably on a lesser scale than seen earlier in the year.”

Though the committee noted that recent economic data have been a “little stronger than expected” at its last meeting in early August, it said it is unclear what that says about the future “given the risks.”

One clear concern relates to whether Britain, like others in Europe, will reimpose broad restrictions on businesses and public life after the recent flare-up in virus infections across the region. Already social gatherings are being restricted and certain areas of the U.K. are seeing localized lockdowns.

The British economy suffered one of the deepest recessions in the world this year when many sectors were effectively mothballed to help contain the pandemic. Though it recouped some ground in the summer as lockdown restrictions were eased, the economy was still around 12% smaller at the end of July than it was in February, when the pandemic started in Europe.

https://ca.finance.yahoo.com