An asteroid the size of the Golden Gate Bridge to make “very close encounter” with Earth on first full day of spring

Sophie Lewis – March 12, 2021

An asteroid similar in size to the Golden Gate Bridge will whip past Earth later this month — the largest and fastest asteroid to pass close to our planet this year.

But don’t worry, it won’t get too close.

The asteroid, officially known by NASA as 231937 (2001 FO32), is about 1,300 to 2,230 feet wide, according to observations made by the NEOWISE team, putting it at the smaller end of the scale. It has an orbit period of 810 days.

The asteroid is smaller than the last notable one to make a close approach to Earth, but it will be three times closer, NASA said in a statement Thursday.

2001 FO32 is set to come within 1.25 million miles of Earth at 11:02 a.m. ET on March 21, just one day after the spring equinox. That’s close enough for NASA to classify it as “potentially hazardous” in its database of near-Earth asteroids, a designation given when they come within about 4.65 million miles of Earth, and are larger than 500 feet in diameter.

It will zoom past at almost 77,000 miles per hour, or 21 miles per second — peaking scientists’ interests as one of the fastest space rocks known to fly past Earth. The asteroid is “unusually speedy” due to its highly inclined and elongated orbit around the sun, which takes it closer to the sun than Mercury and twice as far from the sun as Mars.

https://www.cbsnews.com

Iran Built, ‘Sanitised’ Secret Nuclear Site Ahead of IAEA Inspectors’ Arrival, Report Claims

– March 5, 2021

The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), the diplomatic wing of the People’s Mujahedin of Iran (MEK), an Iran-listed domestic terrorist group, claims to have uncovered evidence of illegal activity at a secret Iranian nuclear facility.

In an online conference held Tuesday and picked up on by some US media, the NCRI provided information about an alleged deactivated nuclear site located in the Abadeh region in central Iran.

The analysis, complete with an examination of open-source intelligence, including Google Earth and DigitalGlobe satellite images, claims that the Abadeh site was previously overseen by Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, the Iranian nuclear scientist assassinated in an attack on his convoy outside Tehran late last year, and whom Israeli intelligence has alleged was the head of a secret Iranian nuclear programme.

The NCRI says the facility was built by companies controlled by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, and played a role in ‘Project Marivan’, an element “of the clerical regime’s nuclear weapons programme”.

Iran denies that it has any intention to pursue nuclear weapons, and its supreme leaders have issued fatwas (religious rulings compliance with which is mandatory) banning the development of nuclear arms and other weapons of mass destruction.

The Abadeh site was supposedly been built for use by the Center for Research and Expansion of Technologies on Explosions and Impact (Persian acronym METFAZ), a subunit of the Organisation of Defensive Innovation and Research (SPND), the research entity which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu claimed was tasked with pursuing the development of nukes in his ‘Iran Lied’ speech in April 2018. The Trump administration is thought to have based its decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal, at least in part, on this speech.

According to the NCRI, the Abadeh facility was “sanitised” in July 2019, prior to the arrival of International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors in August of that year.

https://sputniknews.com

Powerful quake hits off New Zealand, prompting evacuations

Nick Perry – March 4, 2021

WELLINGTON, New Zealand — One of the biggest earthquakes to hit the South Pacific in modern history forced thousands of people in New Zealand to evacuate and triggered tsunami warnings across the world Friday, but it did not appear to cause injuries or major damage because it struck in remote ocean.

The magnitude 8.1 quake was the largest in a series of tremors that hit the region over several hours, including two earlier quakes that registered magnitude 7.4 and magnitude 7.3.

The earthquakes triggered warning systems and caused traffic jams and some chaos in New Zealand as people scrambled to get to higher ground, but their remoteness meant they did not appear to pose a widespread threat to lives or infrastructure.

The largest quake struck about 1,000 kilometers (620 miles) off the coast of New Zealand. One of the earlier quakes hit much closer to New Zealand and awoke many people as they felt a long, rumbling shaking.

“Hope everyone is ok out there,” New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern wrote on Facebook during the night.

After the largest quake, civil defense authorities in New Zealand told people in some coastal areas to immediately get to higher ground. They said a damaging tsunami was possible, and waves could reach up to 3 meters (10 feet).

Emergency Management Minister Kiri Allan told reporters that people had followed the advisory.

https://abcnews.go.com

Guinea’s neighbors ‘not ready’ for resurgent Ebola, says WHO, as risk of cross-border transmission ‘very high’ in West Africa

RT – March 5, 2021

The World Health Organization has warned that the deadly Ebola virus is highly likely to spread across West Africa, but said some of Guinea’s neighbors are not prepared for a new Ebola outbreak.

“There are six neighboring countries to Guinea, and we conducted an assessment of readiness. Two of the countries are not ready and one is borderline and there are three countries more or less ready,” WHO Regional Emergency Director Abdou Salam Gueye said on Friday, by video conference from Guinea.

Guinea, which is bordered by Senegal, Guinea-Bissau, Mali, Ivory Coast, Sierra Leone, and Liberia, has registered 18 cases of the virus, and four of those people have died, the WHO’s Guinea representative, Georges Alfred Ki-Zerbo, said.

Gueye noted that none of the neighboring countries were prepared to start inoculating against the virus, adding that, regardless, there aren’t enough jabs available to vaccinate preventively.

“But those neighboring countries agreed on cross-border cooperation and coordination to control the outbreak,” he said.

Ki-Zerbo said that 1,604 people had been given the Ebola vaccine in Guinea, which is experiencing the first major outbreak of the virus since 2013-16 epidemic.

The 2013-16 outbreak in West Africa was larger than all previous outbreaks combined, with 28,646 reported cases and 11,323 registered deaths. Ebola is a highly infectious and deadly disease that causes hemorrhagic fever and internal bleeding. The virus is spread through contact with infected body fluids.

Ebola has also seen a resurgence in the Democratic Republic of Congo, with a number of cases confirmed in early February and two deaths.

https://www.rt.com

Venezuelan Christians forced to eat pages of the Bible, have ‘crosses’ etched into their bodies

Anugrah Kumar – March 2, 2021

At least four Christian men recently suffered serious injuries after they were stabbed, forced to eat pages of the Bible, and had “crosses” etched into their skin by eight hooded men, according to a persecution watchdog organization.

The attack by men suspected to be criminals from a drug gang took place at Restoration House in the city of Libertador on Feb. 16, Open Doors reported Friday. Restoration House is a church-led drug rehabilitation center in Venezuela’s Mérida State.

The charity, which works with persecuted churches in over 60 nations, explained that Christians, who deter people from criminal lifestyles, are often seen as a threat to the illegal activities of drug gangs in Latin America.

“The criminals covered our faces and started to beat and stab us,” a victim was quoted as saying. “They drew ‘X’ on our bodies and forced us to eat the Bible.”

While the four Christians have been discharged from the hospital, one of them remains in poor health due to two broken ribs and injuries to his lungs and head. Two others had casts put on their legs and arms.

“Weeks before the attack, in the middle of a meeting discussing neighborhood issues, two men said they were going to end the Restoration House because they did not agree with this type of program,” Pastor Dugarte, who founded the center with his wife, told Open Doors.

Pastor Dugarte remains strong in his faith, and he will carry on with the ministry in the predominantly Roman Catholic country.

https://www.christianpost.com

Scientists Create Robotic “Life Form” to “End Aging”: Danger feared as it violates Biblical commandment

– March 3, 2021

Scientists announced that they have created a ‘xenobot’; an organic robot made from a frog’s stem cells. The project raises theological concerns about creating new life forms, the exclusive purview of God, and practical concerns about what will happen when this living robot is injected into the human body.

Scientists at  Tufts University’s Allen Discovery Center at the University of Vermont recently announced that they had succeeded in making organic robots made from stem cells scraped from frog embryos, separated into single cells, and incubated. The cells were cut and reshaped into specific “body forms” designed by a supercomputer.

Named xenobots for the African clawed frog (Xenopus laevis) that was the donor of the cells, the newly “created” robots are self-healing and are one millimeter wide, small enough to travel inside human bodies. They are multi-skilled, able to walk and swim, survive for weeks without food, living on lipid and protein deposits, though they can’t reproduce or evolve. The scientists envision injecting the xenobots into a patient where it can pick up a payload, like a medicine, and deliver it to a specific place inside a patient.

In a clear burst of hubris, the researchers declared the xenobots to be “entirely new life-forms…never seen in nature.”  They claim this is the first time science  “design[ed] completely biological machines from the ground up.”

https://www.israel365news.com

COVID-19 Relief Bill Provides Billions to Bail Out Abortion Industry

Dr. Susan Berry – March 4, 2021

As the Senate prepares to debate the COVID-19 Relief bill, Sen. Steve Daines (R-MT) observed the bill provides $400 billion that contains no protections for ensuring it will not be used to fund elective abortion.

Daines tweeted a video of his review of some of the features of the measure, which passed the House Friday, referring to it as the “liberal wish list” of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (CA) and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (NY).

“Here’s one that will get your blood pressure up,” said Daines, who heads the Senate Pro-Life Caucus. “$400 billion that has no protections to ensure we don’t have taxpayer dollars spent for abortions.”

He explained Democrats removed the language of the Hyde Amendment that has prohibited taxpayer funding of abortions in appropriation bills.

“$400 billion that could be used to fund abortions paid for by United States taxpayers,” the senator emphasized.

In a floor speech in the House prior to the vote on the bill, co-chair of the House Pro-Life Caucus, Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ), also called the exclusion of the Hyde Amendment “a radical departure from all previous COVID-19 relief laws,” and one that “mandates taxpayer funding of abortion-on-demand.”

https://www.breitbart.com

Mississippi Passes Bill Banning Transgender Athletes in Girls’ Sports

Jay Greenberg – March 5, 2021

The Mississippi House of Representatives has passed a bill that bans transgender athletes from competing in female sports events.

The state’s House passed the bill 81-28 on Wednesday to ban transgenders from competing on sports teams based on the gender they “identify” with.

Seven representatives voted “present,” while six did not vote, which counts neither for nor against the bill.

The ban would apply to teams at all schools and universities across the state.

The bill now heads to the desk of Republican Gov. Tate Reeves.

Reeves has expressed support for the move and is expected to sign the legislation into Mississippi state law as soon as possible.

The Republican-controlled state Senate passed the bill 34-9 on Feb. 11, with five senators not voting, and four voting “present,” according to Fox News.

Mississippi is now one of more than 20 states where lawmakers have proposed restrictions on athletes playing on sports teams that don’t align with their sex assigned at birth or for gender-reassignment health care for minors.

https://neonnettle.com

Israel Getting Ready to ‘Take Action’ to Stop Iran From Going Nuclear, Defence Minister Says

Sputnik News – February 26, 2021

Joe Biden’s campaign promise to get the US back into the Iran nuclear deal has yet to bear fruit, with Washington demanding that Tehran reduce its enrichment activities first. In the meantime, media reports suggest that Israel – the Middle East’s only alleged nuclear weapons state, is engaged in major construction at its Dimona research facility.

The Israeli military is “currently working to build up” its forces “and is preparing itself for any scenario, including one in which we would need to take operational action to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons,” Defence Minister Benny Gantz said, his remarks cited by the Times of Israel.

Gantz, who also serves as Israel’s alternate prime minister, said the military preparations were being taken in parallel with Tel Aviv’s diplomatic efforts to pressure the Biden administration into modifying the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action Iran nuclear deal, if not scrapping it entirely.

“We all need to make sure that if an agreement is signed with Iran, it will be one that ends its nuclear project, enables long-term effective oversight and inspection, and puts a stop to Iranian entrenchment in Syria, Yemen and Iraq,” the minister said.

Iran maintains that it has no intention of pursuing nuclear weapons, and has warned both the Trump and Biden administrations that it will not accept any effort to modify the terms of the JCPOA in any way. The US has a binary choice – take the deal or leave it, according to Tehran.

https://sputniknews.com

World debt soars to record $281 TRILLION in 2020, set to rise again this year – report

RT – February 21, 2021

The Covid-19 pandemic has added $24 trillion to the global debt mountain over the last year, the Institute of International Finance (IIF) said. Government spending has accounted for about half of the increase.

Corporations added $5.4 trillion to the total, while banks and households accounted for $3.9 trillion and $2.6 trillion respectively.

With global debt now totaling a record $281 trillion, the ratio of debt to global GDP has risen 35 percentage points to over 355 percent, the institute’s study shows. The increase in debt is larger than the rise seen during the global financial crisis, in which 2008 and 2009 saw 10-percent and 15-percent debt-to-GDP jumps respectively.

Borrowing levels are expected to run well above pre-pandemic levels in many countries and sectors again this year, supported by still-low interest rates.

“We expect global government debt to increase by another $10 trillion this year and surpass $92 trillion,” the IIF said, adding that slowing down support could prove even more challenging than it was after the financial crisis.

“Political and social pressure could limit governments’ efforts to reduce deficits and debt, jeopardizing their ability to cope with future crises. This could also constrain policy responses to mitigate the adverse impacts of climate change and natural capital loss,” it added.

According to the report, rises in debt were particularly sharp in Europe, with non-financial sector debt-to-GDP ratios in France, Spain, and Greece increasing by 50 percent.

https://www.rt.com