Looking for His glorious appearing! Titus 2:13

Six Weeks After Being Declared Dead, Canadian Jihadi Farah Mohamed Shirdon Resurfaces With Threats
Sep 29th, 2014
Daily NewsProphecy New Watch
Categories: Today's Headlines;War

Six weeks after he was declared dead, a Canadian in the Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham resurfaced on video Thursday, vowing the terrorist group was preparing to bomb New York and fly its flag over the White House.

Interviewed from Iraq by the U.S. website Vice.com, Farah Mohamed Shirdon, a former Calgary movie theatre employee, appeared erratic and became increasingly enraged as he dished out threats and claimed God was on his side.

“God willing, we will make some attacks in New York soon, a lot of brothers are mobilizing there right now in the West, thanks to Allah,” he said. Smiling, he added they were “mobilizing for a brilliant attack, my friend.”

ISIS was conducting beheadings because “you attack one of us, we will attack one of you,” he said, adding, “We will stop when we behead the kuffar [disbelievers] and when we turn his children into our slaves.”

But as if to undermine his boasts, he said he was under attack “day and night” and would have to go, apparently because of yet another assault. Calling himself Abu Usamah, Mr. Shirdon was eulogized online by fellow terrorists in August but later returned to Twitter to say he had been injured but was alive.

He is one of several Somali-Canadians thought to have joined ISIS, prompting the Canadian Somali Congress’s Western branch to appeal for government help. A Hamilton, Ont. man presumed dead in ISIS was also a Somali-Canadian.

“No one recruited me. Actually no one spoke a single word to me. All I did, I opened the newspaper, I read the Koran. Very easy,” he said. Five days before he left, Canadian authorities interviewed him, he claimed. “All their intelligence workers are imbeciles,” he said, although he then named the FBI before correcting that it was the Canadian Security Intelligence Service.

The nephew of the former Prime Minister of Somalia, Mr. Shirdon has made grandiose threats before. After arriving in Iraq, he appeared in an ISIS video in which he burned his passport and threatened Canada and the U.S.

The departure of dozens of Canadian extremists to Syria and Iraq has prompted a crackdown by Ottawa, which has begun cancelling their passports, laying criminal charges and tracking them in case they attempt to return to Canada.

The government added ISIS to its list of outlawed terrorist organizations on Wednesday. The move makes it simpler to investigate, prosecute and deport those who have joined the group or who are otherwise supporting it.

Sandy Hook Commission Blames Homeschooling
Sep 29th, 2014
Daily NewsProphecy New Watch
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Adam Lanza, 20, has been described as being “dark and disturbed” before his death. He coldly murdered his own mother in their expensive home near Newtown, Connecticut. Then he took her legally registered guns to the nearby Sandy Hook Elementary School and shot and killed 20 children and six adults. Then he took a handgun and shot himself.

Reports say he suffered from Asperger’s syndrome, “or a personality disorder.” And he “had a tortured mind.”

The New York Daily News said he exhibited “strange behavior” and his “antics irked several residents.”

Now a state commission of 16 educators, local and state officials and behavioral experts assembled by Gov. Dannel Malloy after the tragedy has a game plan to prevent future occurrences.

Monitor homeschoolers.

According to a report in EAG News, a chief recommendation coming out of the state panel that was “charged” with “making recommendations to reduce the risk of future tragedies” has concluded that more oversight of homeschoolers will accomplish that goal.

The report’s “chief recommendation” is “tighter scrutiny of homeschoolers … to prevent an incident such as the December 2012 slaughter of 20 first-graders and six adults at Sandy Elementary School in Newtown,” EAG said.

The New Haven Register said while the final report isn’t expected for a few weeks yet, the “draft proposals call for individual educational plans for students with “significant emotional or behavioral problems.”

“The group is backing extending those requirements to troubled youths, whose parents have chosen to homeschool,” the report said.

The Sandy Hook Advisory Commission was created by Malloy 18 months ago following the Newtown tragedy. He said the education, mental health, law enforcement and other experts were supposed to recommend changes that would help prevent future outbreaks of violence.

This week members reviewed their “likely” recommendations in a meeting in Hartford.

Susan Schmeiser, a mental health law professor at the University of Connecticut, said, “Continuation of homeschooling should be contingent upon approval of [individualized education plans] and adequate progress as documented’ in progress reports.”

The basis for the decision to pin a target on homeschoolers is the fact that Lanza was withdrawn from public schools apparently during his 10th grade, and his mother, Nancy, 52, reportedly homeschooled him, for a time.

That’s from Marsha Lanza, Adam’s aunt and Nancy’s former sister-in-law.

She said, “She mentioned she wound up homeschooling him because she battled with the school district.”

However, details of his homeschooling were not available.

Homeschool experts from the Home School Legal Defense Association, the world’s premiere group advocating for home education, could not be reached immediately.

But in a report on an earlier Connecticut plan that was related – a proposal to require all homeschooled children ages 12, 14 and 17 to “undergo a behavioral health assessment, the group said that was no more than an “unwarranted invasion of family privacy.”

The group noted the state’s plan included “a review of physical and mental health, intelligence, school performance, employment, level of function in different domains including family situation, and behavior in the community.”

“The bill states that the results of the assessments are to be disclosed only to the child’s parent or guardian, but that the health-care provider must submit a form to the state Board of Education verifying that the child has received the assessment.”

Kyle Olson, writing at EAG, noted commissioner Harold Schwartz said, “I think we have thought this issue out at some length and we believe it is very germane and that the actual facts leading up to this incident support the notion of the risk in not addressing social and emotional learning needs of children who may have significant needs in that area who are homeschooled.”

Olson noted that while there are references to “problems” and “behavioral disabilities” there is no word on who would be making such judgments.

“The purpose of this recommendation is to make sure that kids get what kids need. If they have needs that aren’t being addressed, just because the parent has chosen to remove them from the school setting … their needs are still going to be met,” Kathleen Flaherty, of Statewide Legal Services, said in a report by the CTnewsjunkie.

Olson noted that the commission’s logic doesn’t follow, since public school students repeatedly have caused significant violence.

He cited Red Lake Senior student Jeffrey Weise, who in 2005 killed five students, a teacher, a security guard, and them himself. Or Columbine students Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, who killed 13 and wounded 21 before killing themselves in Colorado in 1999. Or Californian Charles Andrew Williams, who killed two in 2001.

“The examples go on and they all point back to a failed government bureaucracy that apparently didn’t adequately address the ‘behavioral and emotional disabilities’ of the students in its care,” he wrote.

Some homeschool experts also pointed out that Lanza likely was “homeschooled” for maybe a year and a half, making him more a product of the public school system he spent the first 10 years of his education in.

Russia Threatens to Retaliate Against U.S. Military
Sep 29th, 2014
Daily NewsWND
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Russian Air Force Sukhoi Su-34

TEL AVIV – Russia has delivered a behind-the-scenes threat to retaliate if airstrikes carried out by the U.S. or its allies target the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, Middle Eastern security officials told WND.

The security officials said Russia complained Sunday in quiet talks with United Nations representatives that the Obama administration’s current aerial campaign against Islamic State fighters in Syria is a violation of international agreements regarding control of Syrian airspace.

The officials said Russia warned it could potentially retaliate if U.S. or Arab airstrikes go beyond targeting Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, and instead bomb any Syrian regime targets.

The officials told WND they do not have any information about the seriousness of the Russian threat or whether Moscow meant it would retaliate directly or aid Assad’s air force in a military response.

The officials said Russian diplomats asserted terms regarding Syrian airspace were agreed upon last September as part of a sweeping deal to disarm Syria’s arsenal of chemical weapons by the middle of 2014.

At the time, the international community feared Assad could target chemical weapons inspectors acting in Syria. That fear in part lead to a deal in which Moscow says it was provided with significant responsibility over the skies of Syria, purportedly to insure against Assad’s air force acting against the international disarmament effort.

The officials further said that both the Russia and Iranian militaries are on heightened alert amid the ongoing situation in Syria.

On Saturday, U.S.-led coalition warplanes for the first time reportedly struck ISIS targets in Syria near the Turkish border as well as positions in the country’s east, according to activists and a Kurdish officials speaking to the Associated Press.

Nawaf Khalil, a spokesman for Syria’s Kurdish Democratic Union Party, or PYD, told the AP the strikes targeted Islamic State positions near the Syrian Kurdish town of Kobani.

U.S.-coalition strikes also reportedly targeted a local ISIS headquarters in the northern Syrian town of Tel Abyad along the Turkish border, setting an oil refinery ablaze.

“Our building was shaking and we saw fire, some 60 meters (65 yards) high, coming from the refinery,” local businessman Mehmet Ozer told Time Magazine.

Time reported the strikes were also confirmed by the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and were reported by Turkey’s Dogan news agency. 

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu Speaks At UNGA
Sep 29th, 2014
Daily NewsArutz Sheva
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Pat Robertson Blasts Ken Ham
Sep 29th, 2014
Christian News
Categories: Creation - Evolution

In providing his feedback on Tuesday’s debate between Ken Ham of Answers in Genesis and Bill Nye ‘the Science Guy,’ televangelist Pat Robertson went off on a two-minute monologue on Wednesday about why he holds to the opinion that Christians need to get over their young earth beliefs.

Speaking on his daily broadcast of the 700 Club, Robertson focused on the calculations and analysis of Bishop James Ussher, the Church of Ireland Archbishop and scholar who once dated the world as being 6,000 years old.

“Let’s face it,” he said. “There was a bishop in the Middle Ages there—1800’s or something—who added up the dates listed in Genesis and he came up with [a calculation that] the world had been around for 6,000 years. There ain’t no way that’s possible.”

“Anybody that’s in the oil business knows that he’s drilling down two miles, three miles, four miles underground. You’re cutting through all these layers laid down by the dinosaurs,” Robertson asserted. “And we have skeletons of dinosaurs that go back about about 65 million years.”

The televangelist then began to amp up his remarks by scoffing at those who believe in a young earth, calling for reformation among Christians.

“[T]o say that it all came about 6,000 years ago is just nonsense, and I think it’s time we come off of that stuff and say this isn’t possible,” he declared.

“So, there was a Big Bang. So? That doesn’t mean it came spontaneously. Nobody knows what caused the Big Bang, but I say God did it,” Robertson continued. “God’s in charge of all this. God’s in control. He is the author of all life, but we’ve got to be realistic that the dating of Biship Ussher just doesn’t comport with anything that is found in science.”

The 83-year-old show host again asserted that rock layers and dinosaur fossils provide proof for an old earth.

“You can’t just totally deny the geological formations that are out there—the rock formations and all the things all over the world, especially the bones,” he contended. “And we have found a Tyrannosaurus Rex out there in Oregon or some place—I mean, a full skeleton—and that layer was laid down about 65 million years ago.”

“So, let’s be real, and let’s not make a joke of ourselves,” he continued. “I don’t believe in so-called evolution as it is currently presented as non-theistic. I believe that God started it all and He’s in charge of it. But the fact that you have the progressive evolution under His control, that doesn’t hurt my faith at all. But this thing [with young earth teachings], we just can’t be playing this.”

But when Ken Ham learned of Robertson’s comments, he posted his own thoughts on Facebook, stating that he found it sad that Robertson was leading his viewers to believe man’s lies over God’s word.

“Pat Robertson is so misinformed and deceived,” he wrote. “Sad that so many will believe him (who is neither a scientist, nor a Bible scholar) rather than open their Bibles and see that evolution and millions of years are totally incompatible with the first 11 chapters of Genesis and rather than think for themselves and check out creationist web sites like Answers in Genesis.”

“He condemns Bishop Ussher (a brilliant Bible scholar and incredible student of history and ancient writings), but couldn’t even get the time of Ussher’s life correct,” Ham noted. “[It was] not the 1800’s, but 1581-1656.”

Ham said that he wished many Christians in the nation, like Robertson, would awaken to the truth about Creation and turn away from the deception.

“Oh, that God would convict and open the eyes of Christian leaders and Christian college and seminary professors, so many of whom are as uninformed and deceived as Pat Robertson,” he concluded. “God have mercy.”

Netanyahu At UN: 'ISIS is Hamas, Hamas is ISIS'
Sep 29th, 2014
Daily NewsArutz Sheva
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu addressed the United Nations General Assembly in New York on Monday, in a bid to refute the smear campaign launched by Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas claiming Israel is guilty of "genocide." 

"Distinguished delegates, I come here from Jerusalem to speak on behalf of my people, the people of Israel," Netanyahu began. "I have come here to speak about the dangers we face [. . ] against the brazen lies about my country and about the people who defend it." 

The Prime Minister emphasized that Israel's fight against Hamas is a microcosm of the fight against global jihad. 

"Ladies and gentlemen, the people of Israel pray for peace, but those hopes are in danger - because militant Islam is on the rise," he stated. "No one is spared - Christians, Jews, and Muslims."

"Their ultimate goal is to dominate the world." 

"That threat may seem exaggerated to some, because it starts out small - like a cancer," he continued. "But cancer grows, covering a wider and wider area. To protect the security of the world, we must remove the scab, before it's too late." 

Hamas = ISIS

Netanyahu then noted the hypocrisy of public opinion. 

"Last week, many people in the world applauded US President Barack Obama for joining the fight against ISIS," he stated. "The same countries complained against Israel for fighting Hamas."  

"They don't understand that ISIS and Hamas are the branches of the same poisonous tree," he continued. "Hamas shares the same militant ambitions of global Islamists."

Netanyahu compared ISIS and Hamas's charters, and noted that Hamas cheered when thousands died in the US during the September 11, 2001 attacks. 

"Hamas is ISIS, and ISIS is Hamas," he declared. "And what they share is what all Islamism shares: [. . .] they all have the same ideology, they all seek to establish a global militant Islam - where there is no freedom." 

"To them, anyone can be considered an infidel, including fellow Muslims." 

Netanyahu then compared Hamas, ISIS, and Nazis. 

"The Nazis believed in a master race; Islamists believe in a master faith," Netanyahu said. "The question before us is whether militant Islam will have the power to realize their unbridled ambition." 

Hamas, ISIS, and Iran: same same, new name

Netanyahu then addressed the Iran issue, noting that the Islamic Revolution was based on the decree that the whole world will cry, 'There is no God but Allah in the entire world.' 

Today, the Revolutionary Guards aim to establish an "Islamic World Government," he notes.

As for the opinion that Iran's views on this are only fueled by "extremists," Netanyahu dismissed it as "changing both the ideology and the content" of Iranian governance. He quoted lines from a book by Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, whereby Rouhani says he has "problems with the West."

"Don't be fooled by Iran's manipulative 'charm offensive,'" Netanyahu urged. "It's for one reason only: to remove sanctions, and to lift obstacles to the path of power." 

"This would essentially cement Iran's place as a threshold nuclear power," he continued, saying it would "pose the gravest threat to us all." 

"It's one thing to confront militant Islamists on the back of a pickup truck armed with rifles," he said. "It's another to confront militant Islamists with weapons of mass destruction." 

Netanyahu then compared the situation with ISIS to the situation with Syrian chemical weapons, whereby he noted that Syria was disarmed - but ISIS and Iran are not.

"Would you let ISIS build a water reactor? Would you let ISIS have access to nuclear weapons?" he asked. "Of course you wouldn't, and you should not let the Islamic State of Iran either." 

If so, he says, "the Ayatollah will show their true face and unleash their fanaticism to the entire world." 

"Iran's military capabilities must be fully dismantled," he declared, to general applause. 

"Make no mistake: ISIS must be defeated. But to defeat ISIS and leave Iran as a threshold nuclear power would be to win the battle and lose the war." 

"Ladies and gentleman, the fight against militant Islam is indivisible," he continued. "That's why Israel's fight against Hamas is not our fight: it's your fight. Our fight against Hamas today could be your fight tomorrow." 

'Would you let terrorists fire rockets at your cities?' 

Netanyahu then addressed Operation Protective Edge. 

"You wouldn't let terrorists fire rockets at your cities with impunity," he said. "Nor would you let them dig terror tunnels or kidnap your citizens." 

"Yet Israel faced another challenge: a propaganda war." 

"Hamas cynically used schools - UN schools! - and hospitals, and mosques to house civilians, as Israel surgically struck to eliminate terrorists." 

"We were not [targeting civilians]," Netanyahu fired. "We regret every civilian casualty." 

Netanyahu noted that the IDF took many measures to warn Palestinian civilians ahead of every strike. 

"No other army in history has gone to greater lengths to prevent civilian casualties in the population of their enemies," he noted, to applause. "They upheld the highest moral values of any army in the world." 

"Israel's army deserves the admiration of decent people everywhere," he added, to applause. 

Redefining 'war crime' and 'human rights council' 

Netanyahu also noted Hamas's executions of Fatah members and dissidents, as well as the terror group's deliberate use of children as human shields, using a France 24 photo as proof. 

"This is a war crime," he said. "I say to Abbas: there are the war crimes committed by Hamas, under your leadership, under the unity government you head, and these are the war crimes you should have called to investigate last week." 

"The profound moral difference between Israel and Hamas couldn't have been clearer," he said. "Israel was using missiles to protect its children, Hamas was using children to protect its missiles." 

"The UNHRC has betrayed its noble principles to protect its enemies," he continued, noting it is "turning the concept of war upside down." 

"The UNHRC is sending a clear message to terrorists everywhere: use civilians as a human shield. Use them again, and again, and again. You know why? Because sadly, it works."

"Thus, the UNHRC has become a Terrorists' Human Rights Council," Netanyahu declared, noting that it "may have already had consequences." 

Netanyahu slammed the UNHRC for dedicating over half of its resolutions against Israel, "where issues are openly debated in our boisterous parliament." 

"The UNHRC is an oxymoron, but I'll use it just the same," he said. "Its policies are an extension of the oldest prejudice in the world. It's a function of diseased minds: it's called anti-Semitism, which is spreading in polite society, which is being legitimized as a form of criticism against Israel."

"Genocide? In what moral universe does a country attempt over and over again to get its enemies out of harm's way? To build field hospitals? To ship tons and tons of aid?"

"The same moral universe where the man who wrote a dissertation denying the Holocaust can stand on the podium and claim Israel commits genocide." 

Israel: standing tall

"Today, Israel will defend itself against her enemies," Netanyahu continued. "Israel will try its enemies on the courts of public opinion. Israel will stand proud and unbowed." Applause followed. 

"Together, Israel and the world face many of the same dangers," he noted, including "militant Islam and a nuclear Iran." 

"Our job is to form a partnership over these issues," he said.

"I believe the partnership between us can also facilitate peace between Israel and the Palestinians," he added, noting that the "active involvement of Arab countries - those who are willing to provide political, material, and other support - could bring a compromise." 

"The people of Israel are not the occupiers in the land of Israel," Netanyahu said, citing "history, archaeology, and common sense." 

"I want peace because I believe it will bring a better future for my people," he said, calling for one which brings "rock-solid security arrangements on the ground." 

"As the Prime Minister of Israel, I am entrusted with the awesome of responsibility of protecting the Jewish people and the Jewish state," he said. "I will never waver on that responsibility." 

Partnership for peace in the Middle East

"In Israel, we have a record of making the impossible, possible," Netanyahu said. "We have made the desert flourish. We have led the world in technological innovation." 

But in order for Israel to "reach its full potential," he said, "the template for peace must change." 

"There is a new Middle East. It has many dangers, but also many opportunities. We are working to work together with our global partners to face those dangers and seize those new opportunities." 

"All of this may fly in the face of conventional wisdom, but it is the truth," he said. "And the truth most be spoken - especially here, at the United Nations." 

War of words

Speaking just before takeoff on his way to New York, Netanyahu reiterated his pledge to "refute the lies" against Israel at the UN General Assembly, particularly in the speech by Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas, who accused Israel of “genocide” and “war crimes”.

"In my speech to the General Assembly, I will refute the lies that are being told about us and I will tell the truth about our state and the heroic soldiers of the IDF, the most moral army in the world," Netanyahu said on the tarmac at Ben Gurion airport near Tel Aviv before boarding the plane.

Netanyahu's response will reportedly be "razor sharp," according to close confidantes of the Prime Minister, who added that it will be "worth the wait." 

On Friday, Abbas made a pathos-laden speech to the UNGA, vowing to prosecute Israel for "war crimes" in International Criminal Court (ICC). 

"There is an occupation that must end now," he claimed. "There is a people that must be freed immediately. The hour of independence of the state of Palestine has arrived."

He did not set a deadline for fast-tracking to what he claimed would be "Palestinian statehood," after aides suggested they were eyeing 2017 as a possible date.

Describing Israel's defensive operation in Gaza as a "genocidal crime," Abbas pledged: "We will not forget and we will not forgive, and we will not allow war criminals to escape punishment."

Abbas’s speech garnered strong reactions from the U.S. - which called the tirade "offensive" - and from Israeli MKs across the political spectrum.

Let the Headlines Speak
Sep 29th, 2014
Daily NewsFrom the internet
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Rick Perry: White House must address beheading
Rick Perry said on Monday that the Obama administration will have to address the beheading of an Oklahoma woman in what the Texas governor noted closely resembles an act of terrorism.  

Russia threatens to retaliate against U.S. military
The security officials said Russia complained Sunday in quiet talks with United Nations representatives that the Obama administration’s current aerial campaign against Islamic State fighters in Syria is a violation of international agreements regarding control of Syrian airspace. The officials said Russia warned it could potentially retaliate if U.S. or Arab airstrikes go beyond targeting Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, and instead bomb any Syrian regime targets.  

Death Threats Against Christian Leaders Emerge From Gay Rights Activists
The HRC has targeted Scott Lively—an American author, attorney, social activist, independent candidate for governor of Massachusetts in the 2014 election, and president of Abiding Truth Ministries—for murder.  

World won’t listen to Netanyahu's UN speech
Sick and tired of hearing about Hamas terror and IDF's successful operations, Western world is preparing to impose a solution on Israel and Palestinians.  

Obama Sits Down With 60 Minutes, Blames Everyone But Self For Burning World
Last night President Obama sat down for an interview on 60 Minutes where he discussed everything from ISIS to the economy.  

An ISIS Nest Grows in Boston
Boston’s WCVB.com reported Monday that “the federal government is targeting Boston and two other American cities to shut down what they are calling the U.S.-Jihad pipeline to ISIS in an attempt to stop Americans from joining the terrorist organization.” ...And so now Boston is reaping what it has sown for so many years.  

The highest court backs ban on ‘gay propaganda to minors’
The Constitutional Court of Russia has acknowledged the ban of homosexual propaganda among the under age as lawful and dismissed a complaint by well-known LGBT activists.  

Mount St. Helens shows signs of reawakening
Geologists expect future dome-building eruptions at the volcano. "It looks like Mount St. Helens is getting ready to erupt again and it can happen in the order of years to decades," Moran said. Those eruptions will likely be similar to the one that started a decade ago and no massive eruption like the one in 1980 is expected. "Part of that is that there isn't as nearby big a cork," Moran said.  

An anomaly in satellites' flybys baffles scientists
"There is something very strange going on with spacecraft motions. We have no convincing explanation for either the Pioneer anomaly or the flyby anomaly," says Jet Propulsion Laboratory astronomer John Anderson, who is now working as a retiree. The anomaly is experienced only when the observed trajectory of the spacecraft can't be fit to a single hyperbolic arc.  

Large earthquake swarm rattles Long Valley caldera, California U.S.
A large earthquake swarm is currently underway in Long Valley caldera, Mammoth Lake region of California U.S., east of the Sierra Nevada mountains. The swarm started on Thursday, September 25, 2014, and it is one of the largest earthquake swarms in this region in the past decade or so. By Monday, September 29, USGS recorded more than 1 100 small scale earthquakes with magnitudes ranging from 0.1 to 3.5 on the Richter scale.  

Prayer Rally to Save Samaria Town from Destruction
A prayer rally will be held on Tuesday in Givat Assaf, located near Beit El in Samaria, in a call to save the small community from destruction by the government. A letter organizing the rally was sent to residents, and warned of impending demolition despite the declarations by the government that it would work to recognize the community officially -  

Ya'alon Criticizes Religious Givati Commander for Invoking G-d
Winter was embroiled in a media storm after in a call-up message sent to members of the brigade he wrote that they were going out against "the terrorist 'Gazaite' enemy that curses, reviles and insults the G-d of the campaigns of Israel."  

INCREASING CHANCE OF FLARES:
There are now four sunspot groups on the solar disk with unstable magnetic fields, which means an eruption today is likely. NOAA forecasters have raised the daily odds of an M-class solar flare to 75% and an X-flare to 15%.  

Obama says underestimated Islamic State; Qaeda says West will be attacked
The head of Syria's al Qaeda branch said militants will attack the West in retaliation for U.S.-led air strikes in Syria and Iraq, and President Barack Obama acknowledged U.S. intelligence had underestimated the rise of Islamic State fighters.  

Dollar is 'currency of choice', Hong Kong unrest hits stocks
The dollar hit its highest in almost two years against the euro, with German inflation data expected to keep pressure on the ECB to ease monetary policy. Unrest in Hong Kong hurt Asian-exposed European shares. The dollar was broadly stronger, reaching a four-year high against a basket of currencies, a six-year peak against the yen and a 13-month high against the New Zealand dollar. Reserve Bank of New Zealand data showed the central bank intervened last month to speed its currency's descent.  

Beheading Suspect Attended Same Mosque as 9/11 Terrorist
MOORE, Oklahoma -- Alton Nolen, the man who beheaded one woman and severely injured another at Vaughan Foods in Moore, Oklahoma, was apparently a radicalized Muslim. Nolen attended the same mosque as Zacarias Moussaoui, a man convicted in federal court of conspiring to kill U.S. citizens as part of the September 11 attacks.  

Explaining Surprise Eruption of Japan Volcano Where Dozens are Presumed Dead
The weekend tragedy on Japan's Mount Ontake, where more than 30 hikers are presumed dead after an eruption of toxic fumes and ash, is a deadly reminder that volcanoes—especially certain kinds—can be unpredictable.  

Small earthquake reported near Lincoln
HELENA -- A small earthquake was reported near Lincoln in Lewis & Clark County on Saturday night. The U.S. Geological Survey says the quake registered a magnitude of 3.6 and happened at 10:42 p.m. on Saturday.  

4.4-magnitude quake shakes area between Monterey, Fresno
The quake struck an area of east San Benito County located about 30 miles south of Los Banos and 30 miles east-northeast of Soledad in Monterey County at 1:45 p.m., the USGS is reporting. The temblor had a depth of 4.8 miles.  

How the airstrikes on Syria could make Isil stronger
When the United States...made good on their threat to bomb Syria this week... ...The bombs also struck the bases and hideouts of Jabhat al-Nusra, an extremist group with affiliations to al-Qaeda, which has been proscribed as a terrorist organisation by the US. If we are going to bomb one jihadist group in Syria, we might as well bomb them all - or so the thinking in the White House may have gone.  

Russia at U.N. accuses U.S., allies of bossing world around
Russia used its annual appearance at the U.N. General Assembly on Saturday to accuse the United States and its Western allies of bossing the world around, complaining they were attempting to dictate to everyone "what is good and evil." The speech...was the latest example of the deteriorating relations between Moscow and Western powers, which have imposed sanctions on Russia over the conflict in neighboring Ukraine.  

Islamic State crisis: Obama says US underestimated threat
President Barack Obama has acknowledged that US agencies underestimated the threat posed by the Islamist insurgency in Syria. In a frank TV interview, he said that al-Qaeda had been beaten in Iraq by US forces working with Sunni tribes. But they took advantage of the power vacuum in neighbouring Syria to emerge as Isis, later called Islamic State.  

Peru earthquake kills eight in Andes village
At least eight people have died in an earthquake in southern Peru, officials announced on Sunday. The 4.9-magnitude quake hit the Cusco region in the early hours of Sunday. Worst affected was the remote Andean village of Misca, where 45 homes collapsed killing four children and four adults, emergency workers said.  

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu lands in New York ahead of UN speech
Prime minister to address UN Monday evening, vows to 'refute the slander and lies' purported by Iranian President Rouhani and Palestinian President Abbas.  

Bomb near Yemen hospital kills seven
Seven people died Sunday after a vehicle exploded near a hospital in Yemen's northeastern province of Mareb.  

Abbas Threatens Israel with 'Political War'
Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas is threatening a "political war" on Israel. Fatah leader Nabil Shaath told the PA-based Ma'an news agency on Sunday that this “political war” will begin if there is a negative response to Abbas’s steps at the United Nations.  

Ashraf Ghani to be sworn in as new Afghan president
Afghan President-elect Ashraf Ghani is set to be inaugurated in a ceremony at the presidential palace in Kabul. It comes after six months of deadlock amid a bitter dispute over electoral fraud and a recount of votes.  

Riot Police Withdrawn from Hong Kong Protest Sites
The Hong Kong government said on Monday it has withdrawn riot police from city streets after pro-democracy protests began to calm down. In a statement, a Hong Kong government spokesman also called on protesters to leave protest areas as peacefully as possible.  

Baghdad steps up propaganda fightback with jihadist TV satire
As Iraqi forces struggle to pin back the Islamic State group on the ground, Baghdad is taking its war against the jihadists to the airwaves with a television comedy series.  

Al-Qaida leader warns of revenge for airstrikes
The leader of al-Qaida's Syria affiliate vowed Sunday that his group would "use all possible means" to fight back against airstrikes by the U.S.-led coalition and warned that the conflict would reach Western countries joining the alliance.  

ISIS Urges Jihadists to Attack Canadians: You will not Feel Secure in Your Bedrooms
Sep 29th, 2014
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The spokesman for the Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham called for attacks on Canadians on Sunday in an apparent attempt to deter members of the military alliance that has formed to challenge the terrorist group.

In a 42-minute audio speech, Abu Muhammad Al-Adnani urged ISIS supporters to kill Canadians, Americans, Australians, French and other Europeans, regardless of whether they were civilians or members of the military.

“Rely upon Allah, and kill him in any manner or way however it may be. Do not ask for anyone’s advice and do not seek anyone’s verdict. Kill the disbeliever whether he is civilian or military, for they have the same ruling,” he said.

“Both of them are disbelievers. Both of them are considered to be waging war. Both of their blood and wealth is legal for you to destroy, for blood does not become illegal or legal to spill by the clothes being worn.”

Canada is part of a U.S.-led alliance that has begun mobilizing to defeat ISIS, which has been committing widespread atrocities against Syrians and Iraqis in an attempt to impose its barbaric version of Islamic law in the region.

Reacting to the ISIS speech Monday, the Prime Minister’s Office said it would not be “cowed by threats while innocent children, women, men and religious minorities live in fear of these terrorists.

Fired Oklahoma City Nursing Home Worker Threatened Beheading, Police Say
Sep 29th, 2014
Daily NewsNews OK
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

Jacob Mugambi Muriithi  

Jacob Mugambi Muriithi, 30, is being held in the Oklahoma County jail on a terrorism complaint. His bail is set at $1 million.

“We take these threats very seriously,” Oklahoma County District Attorney David Prater said.

The arrest came on the same day police in Moore revealed fired Vaughan Foods worker Alton Alexander Nolen beheaded a co-worker after he was fired Thursday. Nolen is a Muslim convert.

Muriithi was identified as a native of Kenya who is living in Oklahoma City. He worked at Bellevue Nursing Home in northwest Oklahoma City, police reported.

The co-worker reported Muriithi threatened her while they were both working at the nursing home Sept. 19, a police detective wrote in an arrest warrant affidavit.

The woman was not identified.

She said Muriithi identified himself as a Muslim and said he “represented ISIS and that ISIS kills Christians,” the detective told a judge in the affidavit. The two had not worked together before.

ISIS is a reference to Islamic State militants responsible for highly publicized beheadings in the Middle East.

Death Threats Against Christian Leaders Emerge from Gay Rights Activists
Sep 29th, 2014
Daily NewsProphecy New Watch
Categories: Today's Headlines;Commentary

I wasn't surprised when fellow culture warriors, like our very own Michael Brown, conservative blogger Matt Barber, Concerned Women for America's Janice Shaw Crouse and others landed on the Human Rights Campaign's (HRC) hate list.

The world's largest gay-activist organization last week issued a report called "The Export of Hate" that called out a network of American, conservative Christian leaders "who are working tirelessly to undercut LGBT people around the world at every turn."

People I work with day in and day out are on that list—and not a single one of them is a hate monger. Rather, they are painted as villains for being brave enough to lift up their voices for truth in a spiritual and cultural war for God's will as it relates to marriage, family—and souls. But some of the very souls these men and women of God are contending for are launching literal death threats against them.

The HRC has targeted Scott Lively—an American author, attorney, social activist, independent candidate for governor of Massachusetts in the 2014 election, and president of Abiding Truth Ministries—for murder. Lively is target No. 1 on the HRC's hate list. Lively says he has received two death threats since the report was published. That death-laced message also listed Barber and Liberty Law School Dean Mat Staver, among others.

"Not every 'gay' activist is physically violent, thankfully. Most limit their 'human rights advocacy' to harassment, intimidation and slander," Lively wrote on his blog. "But make no mistake, if they thought they could get away with killing every person on the HRC and SPLC hit lists, they would do it. They smolder with malicious hatred against anyone who stands in their way."

HRC contends that there's "nothing but shame and hatred" in Lively's work and accuses him of putting "LGBT Russian citizens in harm's way, who now face discrimination, jail or death. He also successfully advocated for a law in Uganda that sends LGBT people to prison for life."

Lively rightly points out that even in the most heated arguments he has distinguished the humanity of individuals in the LGBT movement from the inhumanity of their political goals.

"I care for all people who struggle with homosexual sin and want them all to be delivered from their bondage," Lively wrote on Barbwire. "I love them enough to tell them the truth, even though they hate me for it... None of my comments, taken in context, encourage hatred or violence against homosexuals."

I know what it's like to get death threats. It's unsettling, even if you have no real reason to believe the threat is viable. Some gay activists have misunderstood truth for hate. Although I agree there are some who speak hateful words in the name of Jesus, the men and women of God on the front lines of the culture wars are not among them. They are sharing truth that will set people free—and the devil hates that.

"The truth be told, it is the HRC that is engaging in destructive activism by spreading misinformation and inciting fear, and it is the HRC that must be exposed," says Brown, author of Can You Be Gay and Christian. "Thankfully, they got one thing right in the report, stating that our 'voices are being heard' and our 'impact is being felt.' By God's grace, as we continue to speak the truth in love, the real bigots will be revealed."

Controversial Fingerprinting Machines Rolled Out in Some Venezuelan Stores
Sep 29th, 2014
Daily NewsProphecy New Watch
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

The Venezuelan government has started to fingerprint shoppers at some state-run supermarkets, in a plan to combat food scarcity which has been derided by some consumers weary of shortages.

Shoppers have struggled for more than a year to find basic goods including powdered milk and cooking oil, as well as certain medicines and diapers. Currency controls implemented over a decade ago under the late President Hugo Chavez mean importers do not have the U.S. dollars required for imports.

Long queues are a ubiquitous sight in shops, while Venezuelans often have to visit several stores to find what they are looking for or settle for substitutes, and friends share tips about where scarce products can be found.

Amid growing frustration, the government said last month it would install a biometric system to weed out smugglers and hoarders, whom President Nicolas Maduro blames for the shortages.

The plan designed to prevent shoppers from stocking up on cheap price-fixed goods has been gradually implemented in some state-run supermarkets which chiefly cater to the government's supporters among poor voters.

"This guarantees price-fixed products will remain on shelves," said Food Minister Yvan Bello during a visit to a huge Bicentenario supermarket in Caracas on Thursday afternoon to drum up support for the initiative.

Around 785,000 people have been registered in six state-run food store chains across the country, the Information Ministry said in a statement.

"The results are excellent," Bello said as he inspected the fingerprinting machines set up in the Bicentenario store's 62 cash registers.

Critics counter fingerprinting shoppers will not attack the root of the problem, while others are alarmed by what they deem an invasion of privacy.

The government said on Thursday that it had arrested 794 suspected smugglers since early August as part of a campaign to stop food and other subsidized products being sold across Venezuela's borders, mainly in neighboring Colombia.

Brazil's Evangelicals Gain Clout, Close to Electing First President
Sep 29th, 2014
Daily NewsReuters
Categories: Today's Headlines;Contemporary Issues

 

A replica of the Temple of Solomon, built by the Brazilian evangelical 'Universal Church of the Kingdom of God' in Sao Paulo July 29, 2014.

Marina Silva, an environmentalist running neck and neck in polls with incumbent President Dilma Rousseff, is a Pentecostal Christian who often invokes God on the campaign trail and has said she sometimes consults the Bible for inspiration when making important political decisions.

Some 65 percent of Brazil's 200 million people are Roman Catholics but evangelicals are rapidly gaining followers and power.

They grew from 5 percent of the population in 1970 to more than 22 percent in 2010 and the trend has continued. Evangelical groups have made particular inroads among urban working Brazilians who benefited from economic prosperity over the last two decades and are now demanding a greater say in politics.

Recent polls show evangelical voters would support Silva over Rousseff by a margin of about 54 percent to 38 percent if the two face each other in a runoff on Oct. 26, as most expect.

In a tight race, that could swing the result.

The evangelicals' rise has drawn comparisons to the "religious right" that began to influence U.S. politics in the 1980s.

There are important differences - most Brazilians are politically well to the left of Americans, perhaps inevitably in a country with one of the world's biggest gaps between rich and poor. Silva and Rousseff both call themselves socialists and push for robust welfare programs.

Infighting within evangelical groups has also limited their ability to create a unified bloc.

Yet similarities with the "religious right" abound. Brazil's evangelical faithful have turned their opposition to gay marriage and abortion, which are both illegal here, into key national political issues.

Funded by the tithes their followers are asked to pay, the more successful evangelical churches are increasingly turning their newfound wealth into political influence.

They have bought up radio and television stations across Brazil and financed campaigns to elect evangelical candidates, including many pastors, to seats in Congress.

The evangelical caucus in Congress showed its muscle in May by forcing Rousseff to revoke authorization for public health service abortions in exceptional cases of pregnancies caused by rape and of fetuses with brain defects.

For the first time in a Brazilian election, there are two evangelical candidates running for president. Silva has eclipsed the second hopeful, Pastor Everaldo, although he has made his mark in debates by accusing Rousseff's government of trampling on family values and seeking to legalize abortion.

Under evangelical pressure, Silva has changed her party's position on gay rights. And Rousseff, a Catholic who has rarely used faith in her political career, is now presenting herself as a good Christian. "Happy is the nation whose God is the Lord," she quoted from Psalms at one campaign stop.

"The evangelical vote will be decisive in this election," said Rodrigo Delmasso, a pastor of a Brasilia-based Pentecostal church, who is running for a seat in the city's legislature.

"As the community grows it's natural that our share of political representation grows too," the 34-year-old pastor said during a campaign stop where he handed out bumper stickers and posters to metro workers.

Delmasso said he voted for Rousseff in 2010, but he now backs Silva, trusting she will sweep out corruption after 12 years of rule by the leftist Workers' Party.

MORALITY

Many evangelicals believe their churches are uniquely equipped to cleanse politics - and society at large.

In a shabby shopping center in the center of Brazil's capital, two theaters that used to show porn films are now churches. In one that doubled as a strip club, pastors preach about salvation from a stage where strippers once performed.

Pentecostalism, the fastest growing branch of evangelical Christianity, was introduced to Latin America by U.S. missionaries a century ago.

These days, virtually every town and neighborhood in Brazil seems to have a Pentecostal chapel where vibrant song and prayer blare over loudspeakers onto the street outside. Many converts say the uplifting services and emphasis on material prosperity are more appealing than what they found in the Catholic Church.

The exodus is happening across Latin America and is especially strong in Brazil.

The Catholic Church retains political influence of its own - gathering all the major presidential candidates for a debate in Aparecida, the shrine of Brazil's patron saint, earlier this month, for example.

But while it bans its priests from engaging in politics, evangelical preachers are free to launch their own political careers from the pulpit or televangelist studios.

Recently, at the doors of a church in Brasilia, youths in shirts and ties handed out campaign flyers to people attending the service. A vote for the evangelical congressional candidate was "the same as voting for the Church," one of the youths said.

One major goal of evangelicals is to keep expanding their caucus in Congress, which has grown from 17 in 1985 to 76 today - about 15 percent of the Chamber of Deputies.

They have in many ways followed the path taken by the U.S. Christian right, which didn't really get involved in national politics until the early 1980s when one of its own - Pat Robertson - ran for president, said Andrew Chesnut, an expert on Brazil's Pentecostal boom.

"Up until then, American evangelicals saw the political arena as the devil's arena where even forthright Christians could be contaminated," said Chesnut, a professor of religious studies at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond.

"The view was that if they had critical mass they could elect their own people and that would inoculate them from the contagion of the political arena. That was the same in Brazil."

CONVERSION

Silva's rise could further boost political engagement among Brazilian evangelicals. Many, like Silva, are Afro-Brazilian women who come from a poor background.

Silva came to the faith somewhat late in life. She was born to illiterate rubber-tappers in the Amazon rainforest and wanted to become a Catholic nun as an adolescent, before turning to environmental activism and a career in politics.

Her conversion to Pentecostalism came in 1997 after her doctor said only a "miracle" would heal her fragile health, wrecked by malaria, hepatitis and lead poisoning when she was a child on the rubber plantation.Silva has tried to strike a careful balance between pride in her faith and not alienating more secular-minded Brazilians. She said in an interview this month that "the Bible is without a shadow of a doubt a source of inspiration," but immediately added that all of her decisions are "taken on a rational basis."

One campaign jingle celebrates "the faith of every believer and the reason of every atheist."

Last month, her Brazilian Socialist Party issued an official platform supporting gay marriage and making homophobia a crime but Silva quickly reversed the stance after Brazil's best-known televangelist, Silas Malafaia, threatened to withdraw his support for her.

It was a costly embarrassment for Silva, losing her support among young and urban middle-class voters and fueling broader concerns that she flip-flops on major issues.

Rousseff tried to capitalize, announcing after Silva's gaffe that she would push through legislation granting evangelical churches the same tax benefits as the Catholic Church.

Analysts say many evangelical voters are still up for grabs. Brazil's poor depend on social programs introduced by the ruling Workers' Party, and could vote for Rousseff regardless of what their pastor may say.

Rousseff has the backing of Brazil's second-largest evangelical church, the Universal Church of the Kingdom of God. Silva belongs to Assemblies of God, which has more members but is less well-organized.

Rousseff even attended the opening last month of a 10,000-seat, 11-story Solomon's Temple built in Sao Paulo by the Universal Church's leader, Bishop Edir Macedo. A media magnate, Macedo has a fortune estimated by Forbes magazine at $1.24 billion.

Macedo's PRB party backs Rousseff and even has a seat in her cabinet. But he exerts more influence with his ownership of the second largest television network, Rede Record.

Bishop Robson Rodovalho, a physicist who founded a Pentecostal church in 1992 that now has more than 1 million followers and a TV channel, said he expects that Silva still has room to grow her support in coming weeks.

"Much of the Church will converge on her candidacy," he told Reuters before going on stage to preach to the sound of rock music in a darkened church hall lit with discotheque lights.

"Brazil is a real democracy. It's only a matter of time before we have an evangelical president. That's a fact."

A 'Unique' Year of Religion and State in Israel
Sep 29th, 2014
Daily NewsArutz Sheva
Categories: Today's Headlines;The Nation Of Israel

Arutz Sheva spoke with Rabbi David Stav, a prominent religious-Zionist rabbi and head of the Tzohar rabbinic institute, ahead of the Jewish New Year (Rosh Hashanah), about how the Jewish state has developed in the past year.

According to the rabbi, last year was a "unique" one in terms of religion and state thanks in part to a bill that his Tzohar organization passed in the Knesst, which "enables a couple to get registered (for marriage) wherever they want to."

The bill "contributes to competition between local rabbinates" and attracts more Jews to religious weddings, according to Rabbi Stav.

Some notable rabbis disagreed, explaining that rabbis far from the couple's hometown might not be able to thoroughly check information to confirm their eligibility to wed according to Jewish law. 

Rabbi Stav added that his organization is working on another bill to make a similar change for the process of Jewish conversion, letting each rabbi establish a rabbinic court for conversion in the city. He noted that this goal has yet to be accomplished.

That bill also has been questioned, with Chief Ashkenazi Rabbi David Lau warning earlier in the month that he had been told by rabbis in the UK that world rabbis will not be able to accept Israeli converts if the bill is passed, due to concerns that the Chief Rabbinate will not be able to confirm the uniform validity of conversions.

A thirst for Jewish identity

Aside from the various bills, Rabbi Stav spoke about the changes in Israel wrought in the course of the last year, in which Operation Protective Edge revealed an almost unprecedented level of unity among the Jewish people.

"We saw how deep is the thirst for Jewish identity, how deep is the connection between the general Israeli society to G-d, to religious rituals," said the rabbi.

However, he noted that "on the other hand more and more Israelis unfortunately feel themselves to be far away from Judaism." According to the rabbi, the answer is to "expose them to Judaism that doesn't impose on them anything but suggests to them something they are not aware of."

Alongside a shocking rise in global anti-Semitism, Rabbi Stav said Jews in the diaspora increasingly have been seen as caring less about Israel, at least publicly, and feeling that they could survive without the Jewish state.

"But that's not the truth," remarked the rabbi, arguing the physical and spiritual future of these Jews' children depends on Israel.

'Our Mission Against Isis is Personal': Tornado Crews Say
Sep 29th, 2014
Daily NewsMail Online
Categories: Today's Headlines;War

'Our mission against ISIS is personal': Tornado crews say they want justice for beheaded former RAF engineer David Haines as jets make three raids on jihadis... but still don't drop any bombs

Tornado crews flying over Iraq say their mission is 'personal' as they seek 'some sort of justice' for murdered RAF engineer David Haines.

The 44-year-old British aid worker, who served with the force for 12 years, was beheaded by ISIS militants in a shocking propaganda video after being taken hostage in Syria.

Now servicemen and women based in RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus - who have so far not unleashed firepower on any suitable targets in nothern Iraq - say they want to stop other captives suffering the same fate as their former colleague. 

British hostages Alan Henning and John Cantlie are still being held under threat of execution by the same fighters. 

David Haines, 44, a former RAF engineer, pictured, was murdered by ISIS militants in a horrific video after being taken hostage in Syria

An RAF source told The Telegraph: 'Any human being would be horrified by what Isil is doing to British hostages and that applies as much to the RAF as to anyone.

'Add to that, one of their victims was a former RAF serviceman, and it definitely feels a bit personal for all of us here. 

'It's not about revenge but perhaps some sort of justice – and certainly the hope that we can stop more people suffering the way David and other captives have.' 

Their comments came as RAF jets flew armed sorties for a second day over Iraq yesterday – but again failed to locate any suitable targets for their weapons.

Defence chiefs insisted that the flights by Tornado GR4 fighter-bombers were invaluable for gathering intelligence on the Islamist jihadists who have swept across large swathes of Iraq and Syria, carrying out massacres.

But the failure to unleash any firepower has fuelled concern that Britain is failing to pull its weight in the international coalition against Islamic State.

On a mission: The RAF jets seek out their terror targets - which they failed to find and bomb, again

Military commanders warned that Britain should brace itself to be dragged into a ground war in Iraq to crush IS, which is also known as Isis and Isil. Former top brass also warned that the air campaign would be futile unless the UK could target the terrorists in Syria.

While the Ministry of Defence confirmed that the RAF's third mission had – like on Saturday – failed to locate any targets, US-led coalition aircraft targeted four makeshift oil refineries under IS control in Syria, as well as a command centre.

The mobile refineries generate up to £1.2million a day for the militants.

On Friday, David Cameron won Parliament's backing for air attacks against fanatics in Iraq but, crucially, he stopped short of seeking permission to allow UK jets to bomb targets in Syria, where IS has its stronghold.

By contrast, the US and Arab nations – including Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Jordan – have sent their jets to bombard IS positions around the city of Raqqa, in northern Syria, where it is believed British hostages Alan Henning and John Cantlie are being held under threat of execution.

Lord Richards, who retired as head of the Armed Forces last year, was among a number of senior military figures who warned that the extremists could not be defeated by air attacks alone. He said Western governments had blundered by ruling out the deployment of ground troops and suggested a military campaign on the scale of the attacks that toppled Saddam Hussein in 2003 was needed to crush IS.

Then, a force of 380,000 troops – including 45,000 British service personnel – invaded Iraq.

Lord Richards said: 'How the hell can you win the war when most of your enemy can end up in a country you can't get involved in?'  

He said Iraqi and Kurdish forces should be trained and armed to fight a ground war against the militants. But if they fail, the West should be prepared to send in troops.

'Ultimately, you need a land army to achieve the objectives we've set – all air will do is destroy elements of IS,' said Lord Richards. 'The only way to defeat IS is to take back land they are occupying, which means a conventional military operation.'

Major General Julian Thompson, a former commander in the Royal Marines who recaptured the Falklands, agreed that an air campaign by itself would not be enough.

Armed: A Tornado at RAF Akrotiri is loaded with a laser-guided bomb

'I think we should have forward air controllers to ensure that targeting is done properly.'

Lord Dannatt, a former Chief of the General Staff, said: 'Attacking Isil from the air solely above Iraq is dealing with half a problem, not all of it. The US has correctly concluded that carrying the fight against Isil into Syrian airspace is right – we may yet come to the same conclusion.'

Defence Secretary Michael Fallon warned that the RAF's mission – codenamed Operation Shader – could last years. 'This is not a weekend campaign,' he said. 'This is going to take a long time.'

Britain has deployed six two-seater Tornados, a refuelling aircraft and a spy plane from RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus. Airmen spoke yesterday of their mission against IS feeling 'personal' following the beheading of former RAF serviceman David Haines. 

One ground crew member, who declined to be named amid security concerns, said: 'Any human being would be horrified by what IS is doing to British hostages. Add to that one of their victims was a former RAF serviceman and it definitely feels a bit personal for all of us here. It's not about revenge, but perhaps some sort of justice.'