‘Ring of Fire’ annular solar eclipse to grace the skies soon after the solstice

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An annular solar eclipse will take place on Sunday, June 21, 2020. This is one of the most breathtaking celestial events when the Moon partially obscures the Sun, allowing a “ring of fire” on its edges. The eclipse will start several hours after the solstice.

The annular solar eclipse occurs when the Moon is farthest away from the Earth in its orbit, thus, appearing smaller in our skies, relative to the Sun.

The difference in apparent size is what sets annular eclipses apart from full eclipses– when the nearer position of the Moon (with its average radius of  800 km or 1 000 miles) makes it look the same size as our star (with a radius of around 696 000 km or 432 000 miles).

A stunning example of this was taken by photographer Colin Legg and astronomy student Geoff Sims in Western Australia in May 2013. The ring of fire is seen being distorted by the Earth’s atmosphere.

A complete ring of fire will be visible from central Africa through Asia, while many other areas, from southern Europe to the northern portions of Australia, will see a partial annular eclipse.

The instant of greatest eclipse takes place at 06:40 UTC, with the Sun in the constellation Taurus. This is 6.2 days after the Moon reaches apogee.

The synodic month in which the eclipse takes place has a Brown Lunation Number of 1206, NASA’s Fred Espenak aka Mr. Eclipse noted. The eclipse belongs to Saros 137 and is number 36 of 70 eclipses in the series. All eclipses in this series occur at the Moon’s ascending node. The Moon moves southward with respect to the node with each succeeding eclipse in the series and gamma decreases.

At the peak of the eclipse, the Moon will obscure 99.4 percent of the Sun as the pair puts a spectacular display across the skies of northern India.

https://watchers.news

NATO Launches New Massive Exercise on Russia’s Doorstep

Tru-News – June 11, 2020

NATO is sending yet another provocative message to Russian President Vladimir Putin, sending an armada of warships, more than two dozen aircraft, and 3,000 personnel from 19 countries into the Baltic Sea for “drills.”

The 10-day BaltOps exercise will include participants from the U.S., UK, France, Germany, and the former Soviet satellite states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania. The annual drill, a relic of the Cold War dating back to the early-1970s, will be commanded remotely from NATO’s new Joint Operations Center in Lisbon, Portugal.

During the first phase of BaltOps, the various military units will learn how to work together. In the second phase, they will test their ability to “respond to threats” in coordination with one another. Typically, it also includes ground operations, but that phase has been eliminated due to risk of spreading COVID-19.

The exercises take place against the backdrop of President Donald Trump’s decision to remove 9,500 American soldiers from Germany. That move prompted a backlash from British politicians who say it will “play into Russia’s hands.”

It also comes as NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has suggested a pivot in the alliance’s mission. During a speech this week, he said the organization must focus on the threat posed by China “to our values and way of life.” He added that there needs to be a “more global approach” to dealing with Beijing:

“The rise of China is fundamentally shifting the global balance of power, heating up the race for economic and technological supremacy, multiplying the threats to open societies and individual freedoms and increasing the competition over our values and our way of life.

“We cannot ignore the consequences of the rise of China. China will soon have the biggest economy in the world, and they already have the second largest defense budget. They are investing heavily in new modern capabilities.”

https://www.trunews.com

US national debt hits $26 TRILLION, soaring by $1 trillion just in one month

RT – June 11, 2020

The latest data from the Treasury Department shows that the US gross national debt has exceeded $26 trillion for the first time, as the nation grapples with economic relief from the Covid-19 pandemic.

National debt is up from $23.5 trillion in March, with an increase of $1 trillion since May 5. According to CBS News, citing data from the Treasury, public debt has grown by $6 trillion since President Donald Trump took office in 2017.

“The Treasury Department notes that the growth in public debt was caused by the allocation of funds for the COVID-19 pandemic counteraction program and the pandemic-related tax deferral,” CBS reported.

The US government has allocated trillions of dollars in coronavirus relief since the start of the pandemic. The so-called CARES Act (Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security) was adopted in March and earmarked $2 trillion, while the $3 trillion HEROES Act (Health and Economic Recovery Omnibus Emergency Solutions) was passed by the House of Representatives in May.

According to the Treasury’s monthly report, the federal government budget deficit for the first eight months of the current fiscal year (which started on 1 October 2019) has reached $1.88 trillion – already higher than any full fiscal year deficit in US history.The 2020 eight-month deficit more than doubled the $738.6 billion deficit for the same period in the 2019 fiscal year.

https://www.rt.com

Some nations said gearing up to recognize Palestine if annexation goes ahead

TOI staff – June 10,2020

Palestinian and European officials have indicated some countries could retaliate for unilateral Israeli annexation of sections of the West Bank by recognizing a Palestinian state and sanctioning Israel, Hebrew media outlets reported Wednesday.

Quoting unnamed Palestinian officials, Kan TV news reported that several European countries, among them Ireland, have said they will recognize a Palestinian state if Israel extends sovereignty over areas designated for it under US President Donald Trump’s peace plan.

The report said the Palestinian Authority was also querying the positions of France, Spain, Luxembourg, Portugal and Belgium. A committee in the latter’s lower house of parliament passed a resolution Wednesday calling on the government to recognize a Palestinian state. That resolution is slated to be debated in the full chamber in the next 15 days.

Meanwhile, during meetings with Israeli leaders Wednesday, German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas was said to issue similar warnings.

According to reports in Haaretz and Walla news, Maas warned that while Germany was unlikely to take punitive measures against Israel if it moves forward with annexation, other countries could impose sanctions or recognize a Palestinian state.

Maas, who held separate meetings during a quick visit to Israel with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi and Defense Minister Benny Gantz, told them some countries in the European Union were pushing to sanction Israel if annexation moves forward, the reports said.

https://www.timesofisrael.com

World on the brink of worst food crisis in 50 years, UN warns

– June 10, 2020

Food systems are failing and the pandemic is mitigating the situation, said UN secretary-general, Antonio Guterres, on June 9, 2020.

“Unless immediate action is taken, it is increasingly clear that there is an impending global food emergency that could have long term impacts on hundreds of millions of children and adults.”

Although harvests of crops are holding up and export bans and protectionism have been largely avoided so far, the worst of the pandemic’s impacts and the recession that will follow is yet to be felt.

This year, about 49 million more may fall into extreme poverty due to the coronavirus as the number of people who are severely food insecure will rapidly expand.

“Even in countries with abundant food, we see risks of disruptions in the food supply chain,” Guterres pointed out. “We need to act now to avoid the worst impacts of our efforts to control the pandemic.”

The secretary-general plotted a three-point plan to restore the world’s ailing food systems and avoid further harm.

First, countries must focus aid on the worst-affected regions to ward off immediate disaster and for governments to prioritize food supply chains.

“That means designating food and nutrition services as essential while implementing appropriate protections for food workers. It means preserving critical humanitarian food, livelihood, and nutrition assistance to vulnerable groups.”

“And it means positioning food in food-crisis countries to reinforce and scale up social protection systems,” he added.

https://watchers.news

Congo Now Faces 2nd Ebola Outbreak in Northern Province

Newsmax – June 2, 2020

Health officials have confirmed a second Ebola outbreak in Congo, the head of the World Health Organization said Monday, adding yet another health crisis for a country already battling COVID-19 and the world’s largest measles outbreak.

Congo also has yet to declare an official end to Ebola in its troubled east, where at least 2,243 people have died since an epidemic began there in August 2018.

Now Congolese health authorities have identified six cases in the north near Mbandaka in Equateur province, including four fatalities, WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus tweeted Monday.

“The country is also in final phase of battling Ebola in eastern DRC, COVID19 & the world’s largest measles outbreak,” he tweeted.

This marks the second time Ebola has hit Equateur province in as many years: A 2018 outbreak there killed 33 people before the disease was brought under control in a matter of months.

The last known patient in Congo’s eastern outbreak was released in mid-May but the country now must go about another month without any new cases before an official end to the outbreak can be declared.

https://www.newsmax.com

‘God is Dead’: Leftist Rioters Vandalize Churches and Synagogues

Daniel Greenfield – June 4, 2020

The assault on St. John’s Episcopal Church by radicals and racists was the ugliest moment of the D.C. riots. Not only was the famous 204-year-old church, which every president since Madison has attended, sprayed with graffiti, but some of the thugs even tried to burn it down by starting a fire in its basement.

The attack and President Trump’s subsequent visit to the ‘Church of Presidents’ captured the attention of a nation. But what happened to St. John’s was not an aberration. The Black Lives Matter and Antifa riots have been associated with attacks on churches and synagogues across the United States.

The victims of New York City’s leftist riots included St. Patrick’s Cathedral as the venerable 142-year-old building was defaced with obscenities and the three letters BLM for Black Lives Matter, along with “George Floyd” and “No Justice, No Peace”.

In Richmond, Virginia, Beth Ahabah, a 225-year-old Reform Jewish congregation, had the windows in its grand 116-year-old building smashed by rioters. The building is now covered over with plywood. St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, a 175-year-old building, also in Richmond, was defaced with graffiti. Finally, rioters in Richmond broke the windows of the West Broad Church of Christ, an African-American congregation. They left intact the one pane of glass reading, “Welcome”.

Some of the nationwide vandalism of churches and synagogues featured generic Black Lives Matter slogans, but some had hateful messages that were specifically targeted to the houses of worship.

The Cathedral Basilica of the Immaculate Conception in Denver, a 108-year-old building, was at the center of some of the local riots, including the hit-and-run of three Denver police officers, and suffered permanent damage. The walls were also vandalized with graffiti reading, “Pedofiles” and “God is dead”.

https://www.frontpagemag.com

Federal Judge Overrules Idaho Law that Birth Certificates Conform to Biological Sex

Penny Starr – June 5, 2020

Lawmakers in Idaho last year passed the Idaho Vital Statistics Act, which does not allow people to change the sex identification on their birth certificate just because they “identify” as something other than their biological sex.

Those who want to change their gender on their birth certificate because they are “transgender” or have some other “sexual orientation” had already been able to do so because of a 2018 ruling by federal Magistrate Judge Candy Dale, who said it was unconstitutional to deny such changes.

The Idaho State Journal reported on the judge’s latest decision:

Shortly after the bill took effect Lambda Legal, which represented the plaintiffs in the 2018 F.V. v. Barron case, filed a motion asking Dale to clarify whether her 2018 injunction still applies. She ruled on Monday that it does and that the passage of House Bill 509 doesn’t change that.

“The Court clarifies that the plain language and objective of the Order and Judgment entered in this case permanently enjoin (the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare) from infringing on the constitutional rights of transgender individuals by automatically rejecting applications to change the sex listed on their birth certificates to match their gender identity,” Dale wrote. “The Injunction requires IDHW to institute a meaningful and constitutionally-sound process for accepting, reviewing, and considering applications from transgender individuals to amend the gender listed on their birth certificates.”

The judge did not rule on the constitutionality of House Bill 509 or grant Lambda Legal’s effort to block enforcement of the law.

“While serious and formidable questions exist over the constitutionality of HB 509, whether HB 509 can pass constitutional muster is not yet before the Court and not decided here,” Dale wrote. “Likewise, whether enforcement of HB 509 violates the Injunction is not ripe.”

https://www.breitbart.com

New Cold War Tensions Building Between U.S., China

TruNews – June 3, 2020

It’s difficult to know how much longer the “good friendship” between presidents Donald Trump and Xi Jinping can endure the growing tensions between the U.S. and China, especially after the latest development.

Today, the Chinese Communist Party’s mouthpiece Global Times published an editorial that blasted the U.S., and President Trump in particular, for the violent riots that have erupted across the country:

“As more and more netizens question ‘whether this is how U.S. President Donald Trump makes America great again,’ observers see a weak, irresponsible, and incompetent leadership navigating the country into a completely opposition direction, with all-out efforts to deflect public attention from its own failure. The protests exposed long-standing issues in the U.S., including racial inequality, discrimination, and a polarized society, which have been amplified under the Trump administration.”

The article goes on to claim American politicians have been blaming China for “inflaming the social unrests (sic).” To date, no U.S. politician has made that claim.

Global Times editor-in-chief Hu Xijin personally took things even further Tuesday when he wrote in a separate article:

“When riot breaks out in the U.S., they want to use all means necessary, and cannot stand the loss of order for even one more day. What they are facing are merely unorganized protesters. If this was organized subversion, what would they do? Will they drop an atomic bomb?”

https://www.trunews.com

Israel intel: Iran will have fissile material for a nuke this year, a nuclear-capable missile in two years

ANNA AHRONHEIM, TOVAH LAZAROFF  – February 13, 2019

Iran is capable of producing a nuclear weapon within two years, if it steps up work on its nuclear program and violates the 2015 deal with the West, according to a recent Israeli intelligence assessment.

The assessment was released as the controversial US-led summit against Iran opened in Warsaw, where Israel is expected to pressure the European Union against trying to prop up the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action following the American withdrawal last May.

In the Polish capital, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke openly about the possibility of war with Iran, and the possibility of a new alliance of Arab states with Israel, in the event of such hostilities.

“I am going to a meeting with 60 foreign ministers and envoys of countries from around the world against Iran,” Netanyahu said next to an outdoor skating rink in a short video clip his staff filmed for his Facebook page.

“What is important about this meeting – and this meeting is not in secret, because there are many of those – is that this is an open meeting with representatives of leading Arab countries, that are sitting down together with Israel in order to advance the common interest of war with Iran,” he said.

https://www.jpost.com