THE POPE BLESSED A GIANT ICE BERG CUBE FOR CLIMATE CHANGE.AND HAMAS PEACE PLAN OR GET BOMBED.

THE POPE BLESSED A GIANT ICE BERG CUBE FOR CLIMATE CHANGE.AND HAMAS PEACE PLAN OR GET BOMBED.

And here are the bounderies of the land that Israel will inherit either through war or peace or God in the future. God says its Israels land and only Israels land. They will have every inch God promised them of this land in the future.
Egypt east of the Nile River, Saudi Arabia, Israel, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, The southern part of Turkey and the Western Half of Iraq west of the Euphrates. Gen 13:14-15, Psm 105:9,11, Gen 15:18, Exe 23:31, Num 34:1-12, Josh 1:4.ALL THIS LAND ISRAEL WILL DEFINATELY OWN IN THE FUTURE, ITS ISRAELS NOT ISHMAELS LAND.12 TRIBES INHERIT LAND IN THE FUTURE.

Joel 3:2-King James Version (YOU DIVIDE JERUSALEM IN HALF - YOUR POKING GOD IN THE EYE - GOD SAYS AN EYE FOR AN EYE AND A TOOTH FOR A TOOTH- YOU WANNA DIVIDE JERUSALEM IN HALF -  HALF OF EARTHS POPULATION 4 BILLION DIE ON EARTH.
2 I will also gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat, and will plead with them there for my people and for my heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and parted my land.

HALF OF EARTHS POPULATION DIE DURING THE 7 YR TRIBULATION.(THESE VERSES ARE JUDGEMENT SCRIPTURES NOT RAPTURE SCRIPTURES)

LUKE 17:34-37 (8 TOTAL BILLION - 4 BILLION DEAD IN TRIB = 4 BILLION TO JESUS KINGDOM) (HALF DIE DURING THE 7 YR TRIBULATION PERIOD JUST LIKE THE BIBLE SAYS)(GOD DOES NOT LIE)(AND NOTICE MOST DIE IN WAR AND DISEASES-NOT COMETS-ASTEROIDS-QUAKES OR TSUNAMIS)
34 I tell you, in that night there shall be two men in one bed; the one shall be taken,(IN WW3 JUDGEMENT) and the other shall be left.(half earths population 4 billion die in the 7 yr trib)
35 Two women shall be grinding together; the one shall be taken,(IN WW3 JUDGEMENT) and the other left.
36 Two men shall be in the field; the one shall be taken,(IN WW3 JUDGEMENT) and the other left.
37 And they answered and said unto him, Where, Lord? And he said unto them, Wheresoever the body is, thither will the eagles be gathered together.(Christians have new bodies,this is the people against Jerusalem during the 7 yr treaty)(Christians bodies are not being eaten by the birds).THESE ARE JUDGEMENT SCRIPTURES-NOT RAPTURE SCRIPTURES.BECAUSE NOT HALF OF PEOPLE ON EARTH ARE CHRISTIANS.AND THE CONTEXT IN LUKE 17 IS THE 7 YEAR TRIBULATION OR 7 YR TREATY PERIOD.WHICH IS JUDGEMENT ON THE EARTH.NOT 50% RAPTURED TO HEAVEN.

MATTHEW 24:37-42 (THESE ARE JUDGEMENT SCRIPTURES-SURE NOT RAPTURE SCRIPTURES)
37 But as the days of Noe were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.
38 For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark,
39 And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.
40 Then shall two be in the field; the one shall be taken,(IN WW3 JUDGEMENT) and the other left.
41 Two women shall be grinding at the mill; the one shall be taken,(IN WW3 JUDGEMENT) and the other left.
42 Watch therefore:(FOR THE LAST DAYS SIGNS HAPPENING) for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come.

THE ISRAEL HATING KILLER, PEDOPHILE ISLAMIC DEATH CULT BURN IN HELL FIRE FOREVER HAMAS REPLYS TO TRUMPS GAZA PLAN.

Hamas replies to Trump-Full text: Hamas’s response to Trump plan for ending Gaza war, returning hostages-Terror group says it agrees to release all Israeli hostages, living and dead, ‘according to the exchange formula’ in Trump proposal, ‘provided the field conditions are met’ and enter talks on details of the deal-4 October 2025, 10:14 am

The following is the text of Hamas’s October 3, 2025, response to US President Donald Trump’s September 29, 2025, “comprehensive plan to end the Gaza conflict”:In the Name of Allah, the Most Gracious, the Most Merciful-In an effort to halt the aggression and war of extermination being waged against our steadfast people in the Gaza Strip, and based on national responsibility and concern for the fundamentals, rights, and supreme interests of our people, the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) has held in-depth consultations within its leadership institutions, extensive consultations with Palestinian forces and factions, and consultations with mediators and friends to reach a responsible position in dealing with US President Donald Trump’s plan.After a thorough study, the movement made its decision and submitted the following response to the mediating brothers:The Islamic Resistance Movement, Hamas, appreciates the Arab, Islamic, and international efforts, as well as the efforts of US President Donald Trump, calling for an end to the war on the Gaza Strip, an exchange of prisoners, the immediate entry of aid, the rejection of the occupation of the Gaza Strip, and the displacement of our Palestinian people from it.In this context, and in order to achieve a cessation of hostilities and a complete withdrawal from the Gaza Strip, the movement announces its agreement to release all Israeli prisoners, both living and dead, according to the exchange formula contained in President Trump’s proposal, provided the field conditions for the exchange are met. In this context, the movement affirms its readiness to immediately enter into negotiations through the mediators to discuss the details of this agreement.The movement also renews its agreement to hand over the administration of the Gaza Strip to a Palestinian body of independents (technocrats), based on Palestinian national consensus and Arab and Islamic support.The other issues mentioned in President Trump’s proposal regarding the future of the Gaza Strip and the inherent rights of the Palestinian people are linked to a comprehensive national position and based on relevant international laws and resolutions. They are to be discussed within a comprehensive Palestinian national framework. Hamas will be part of it and will contribute to it with full responsibility.

Hamas denies it has begun gathering hostages' bodies-Hamas faces ‘complete obliteration’ if it clings to power in Gaza, warns Trump-President said to tell Netanyahu, ‘You’re always so f*cking negative. This is a win. Take it’; negotiators head to Egypt; PM tells bereaved families deal will not progress until all hostages freed-By Lazar Berman,Nurit Yohanan-and Jacob Magid-5 October 2025, 9:09 pm

Hamas faces annihilation if it tries to cling to power in Gaza, US President Donald Trump warned on Sunday, as Israel and the Gaza terror group sent delegations to Egypt ahead of talks on Trump’s plan to return the hostages and end the war.Trump’s warning to Hamas came as reports emerged that the US president held an acrimonious call with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in which he reportedly became annoyed at the Israeli leader, telling him to stop being “so fucking negative.” Israeli sources downplayed the disagreement.Asked by CNN on Sunday what would happen if the terror group will not relinquish power, Trump responded by text, “Complete obliteration!”The terror group has said repeatedly it does not want to remain the sole ruler of Gaza, but it has not consented to its total disarmament and has demanded some role in a future Palestinian state.Speaking to reporters later in the day at the White House, Trump expressed optimism that the deal was going to move ahead, despite serious gaps between Israel and Hamas on core elements of his plan.“We don’t need flexibility, because everyone has pretty much agreed to it,” said Trump. “But there’ll always be some changes,” he added.“You get the hostages back almost immediately. Negotiations are going on right now, will probably take a couple of days,” he continued.Guarded optimism over an agreement also came from the relatives of hostages held in Gaza, and Muslim countries that are in contact with Hamas.But the negotiations face obstacles: Hamas said it is prepared to release the hostages it is holding, but is expected to make additional demands regarding the Israeli military’s withdrawal from the Strip, and the terror group’s leadership is reportedly split over the deal. Netanyahu is likewise working to quell opposition to the agreement within his own government.After successfully pushing for some changes, Netanyahu accepted the plan during his visit to Washington last week, but has been more circumspect than the president.He also “wasn’t happy with the Hamas response” to Trump’s plan on Friday, an Israeli source told The Times of Israel.Axios reported earlier on Sunday that Trump told Netanyahu during a tense Friday call after Hamas responded to the plan, “I don’t know why you’re always so fucking negative. This is a win. Take it.”The Israeli source told The Times of Israel that there was indeed a disagreement, but that it was not acrimonious. “That’s all. He didn’t think it was a yes. There was a push [from Trump] to accept it and move forward.”Hamas was surprised by the extent to which Trump embraced the group’s response to his proposal for ending the war, an Arab diplomat told The Times of Israel.However, the group’s abroad leadership was also “annoyed” by Trump’s latest threat over the weekend to blow up the deal if Hamas did not move quickly to release the hostages, with the Arab diplomat maintaining that Hamas has already demonstrated goodwill by expressing willingness to release all remaining hostages, without securing a more significant withdrawal of Israeli troops beforehand.Hamas is also seeking clarity regarding the terms of Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza in the Cairo talks, the Arab diplomat said.While the White House published a map demarcating the three phases of Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza, the Arab mediators understand the image to be illustrative and are looking to get more clarity regarding the redeployment of Israeli troops in order to bring Hamas on board, the diplomat said.PM: Hostages first, or nothing else happensNetanyahu held a meeting with his negotiating team on Sunday afternoon, before they flew to Cairo to participate in talks on Monday.Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, will lead the team, Netanyahu said late Sunday, despite earlier reports that Dermer would only join based on progress in the talks.According to the Kan public broadcaster, US envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s close adviser and son-in-law, Jared Kushner, will not be joining the talks right away.Government hostage pointman Gal Hirsch will be attending. On Sunday morning, he met the head of the International Committee of the Red Cross delegation in Israel Julien Lerisson for a “preparatory meeting.”The Red Cross has transferred hostages out of Gaza during previous rounds of hostage releases and will likely be called upon to do so again if the current US proposal is implemented.Meeting with members of the right-wing Gvura Forum on Sunday, which represents families of soldiers killed in action in Gaza, Netanyahu said no other element of Trump’s plan will move ahead until every single hostage is released.“Until the first clause — the release of all the hostages, living and dead — until the last of the hostages, all of them, are transferred to Israeli territory, we will not move on to any other clause,” Netanyahu pledged, according to Hebrew language media.If Hamas does not release the hostages “by the end of the time set by President Trump,” he said, Israel will go back on the offensive in Gaza “with the full backing of all the countries involved.”“Trump’s pressure is increasing,” he told the group in the 40-minute meeting in Jerusalem. “Trump will not hesitate to wait longer than he has allotted. This time, he is determined.”There was no official comment from his office on the reported remarks.Rubio: Hamas has agreed-US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Sunday that Hamas has “agreed to the president’s hostage release framework.”Speaking to NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Rubio said, “I’m not telling you here that these are people I trust 100% nor should we. But they have said basically that they agree to his proposal and the framework for releasing the hostages. That’s an enormous achievement. They’ve also agreed, in principle, in generality, to enter into this idea about what’s going to happen afterwards, the Palestinian technocrats, etcetera.”“We will know very quickly whether Hamas is serious or not by how these technical talks go in terms of the logistics” of a potential hostage release, said Rubio.Rubio said the US expects the hostage release to take place “as soon as possible.”“But priority number one, the one that we think we can achieve something very quickly on hopefully, is the release of all of the hostages in exchange for Israel moving back to that yellow line, which is basically where they stood at the middle part of last month, or of August,” Rubio explained. “And that’s the one we’re focused on.”On Sunday, Defense Minister Israel Katz echoed predictions that the hostages could be home in a matter of days, two years after they were taken captive in the October 7, 2023, attack that began the war.“We may soon be informed of the return home of all our hostages, the living and the fallen alike, in accordance with the initiative of US President Donald Trump, at the end of which Hamas will be disarmed and the Gaza Strip will be demilitarized,” Katz said at a memorial ceremony for the Yom Kippur War. “We now expect the implementation of the first phase in the near future and the immediate release of all the hostages.”A senior Hamas official on Sunday said the Palestinian terror group is motivated to reach an agreement to end the war and exchange the hostages it is holding for Palestinian security prisoners in Israeli custody.“Hamas is very keen to reach an agreement to end the war and immediately begin the prisoner exchange process in accordance with the field conditions,” said the Hamas official, who was speaking anonymously, as he was not authorized to speak on the matter.He added, referring to Israel, “The occupation must not obstruct the implementation of President Trump’s plan. If the occupation has genuine intentions to reach an agreement, Hamas is ready.”On Sunday, the foreign ministers of Qatar, Jordan, the UAE, Indonesia, Pakistan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt put out a joint statement praising Hamas’s “readiness” to meet key demands in the Trump proposal, expressing their support for an eventual full IDF withdrawal from Gaza and the return of the Palestinian Authority to the territory.The diplomats welcomed “the steps taken by Hamas regarding US President Donald Trump’s proposal to end the war in Gaza, release all hostages, alive or deceased, and the immediate launch of negotiations on implementation mechanisms.”Whether a deal will be had quickly, however, remains to be seen. Conflicting reports have emerged this week over whether Hamas will agree to the plan’s clauses, which would entail the group releasing all 48 hostages, disarming, and ceding control of Gaza.According to Trump’s plan, Israel is expected to release 250 Palestinian prisoners with life sentences and more than 1,700 detainees from the Gaza Strip who were arrested after October 7, 2023.A Hamas source told the Saudi channel Al-Arabiya that Hamas operatives in Gaza have begun collecting the bodies of the dead hostages across the Strip, and that the organization demands that Israel halt its aerial strikes so that they are able to complete the task. Hamas later denied that it had begun gathering bodies.The report also said that Hamas has received American guarantees requiring Israel not to resume the war and to withdraw IDF forces from the strip.The sources also claimed that Hamas has agreed to hand over its weapons to a Palestinian–Egyptian body under international supervision — a claim that Hamas sources later denied.The report was not confirmed by any other source.

Hostage families pray, sing together at Hostages Square-As negotiators head to Cairo, Trump urges ‘first phase’ of Gaza deal this week-The president urges all sides to ‘MOVE FAST’ toward an agreement, as Hamas reportedly prepares to make additional demands and Netanyahu said trying to placate his right-wing allies-By Jacob Magid,Nurit Yohanan,Jessica Steinberg and Nava Freiberg-Today, 2:59 am-OCT 5,25

A delegation of Hamas officials led by the terror group’s leader Khalil al-Hayya arrived in Egypt on Sunday night to begin negotiations on Washington’s plan to end the war in the Gaza Strip and free the remaining hostages, as US President Donald Trump implored all parties to move fast toward an agreement.Israel’s delegation, led by Strategic Affairs Minister Ron Dermer, also departed for Cairo on Sunday night, even as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was still attempting to keep his right-wing coalition allies on board with Trump’s ambitious 20-point plan and prevent them from jumping ship and bringing down his coalition.Disapproval within Netanyahu’s coalition is not the only obstacle to reaching an agreement: Hamas has said it is prepared to release the hostages it is holding, but is expected to make additional demands regarding the Israeli military’s withdrawal from the Strip and the release of Palestinian security prisoners in exchange for the hostages.According to Trump’s plan, Israel is expected to release 250 Palestinian prisoners with life sentences and more than 1,700 detainees from the Gaza Strip who were arrested after October 7, 2023.The sides have not agreed on which prisoners will be released, although Channel 12 news reported on Sunday evening that Hamas was demanding the release of several of the most notorious Palestinian prisoners held by Israel.Hamas “won’t give up” on securing the release of these terrorists, Channel 12 quoted a Hamas source as saying, “even at the cost of dooming the deal.”The terror group, on Sunday night, confirmed that it had arrived in Cairo “to begin negotiations on mechanisms for a ceasefire, withdrawal of occupation forces, and prisoner exchange.”Despite the non-insignificant bumps that can be expected on the road to an agreement, Trump struck an upbeat tone on Sunday night, saying that there had been “very positive discussions” between Hamas and Arab and Muslim interlocutors over the weekend aimed at securing the release of the hostages, ending the war in Gaza and achieving “PEACE in the Middle East.”“These talks have been very successful, and proceeding rapidly,” Trump wrote on Truth Social, adding that “technical teams” will meet again on Monday in Egypt to “work through and clarify the final details.”“I am told that the first phase should be completed this week, and I am asking everyone to MOVE FAST,” Trump said, although it was not immediately clear what he meant by “first phase” and whether he was suggesting that hostages will begin being released this week.“I will continue to monitor this Centuries old ‘conflict,'” the president said, and reiterated his warning to Hamas to act speedily in an all-cap addendum at the end of his post: “TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE OR, MASSIVE BLOODSHED WILL FOLLOW — SOMETHING THAT NOBODY WANTS TO SEE!”He later told reporters outside the White House that the effort to secure the agreement “looks like it’s working,” but cautioned that the US would “wait for a little while, [and] see how it all turns out.”“I think it’s going to go very quickly. We’ll let you know soon,” the president added.Among the requirements laid out in Trump’s plan for the Gaza Strip is a demand for Hamas to disarm. As to how this will play out, however, “must be addressed within a Palestinian framework,” Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty said on Sunday.Speaking to the Saudi Asharq al-Awsat newspaper, he expressed hope that the Palestinian Authority’s security apparatus would assume the task of controlling Gaza after an unspecified transitional period, framing the possibility as a political horizon toward the establishment of a Palestinian state.He said Cairo was also seeking to define the limits of authority for the international force expected to enter the Strip under the plan, and noted that, eventually, the same force would also need to enter the West Bank to link the two areas — Gaza and the West Bank — and to support the Palestinian Authority’s security mechanisms.The Palestinian Authority’s future involvement in the governance of the Gaza Strip and the potential path to Palestinian statehood are the two key issues that Netanyahu’s far-right allies have taken issue with.Far-right lawmakers stand down — for now-But on Sunday evening, Channel 12 reported that Otzma Yehudit leader Itamar Ben Gvir and Religious Zionism chair Bezalel Smotrich had given the premier leeway to facilitate at least the implementation of the first phase of Washington’s plan, and would not bring down his government over the matter, or at least, not yet.The two demanded assurances from Netanyahu that Israel would be able to continue to fight Hamas if the terror group does not disarm in the second phase of the agreement, the outlet reported, citing sources familiar with the matter.The first stage of the proposal, as it currently stands, will enable the release of all 48 remaining hostages, the living and the dead, and will require the IDF to redeploy to positions that allow it to continue to oversee Gaza. In the second phase, Hamas will be required to disarm and Gaza will be demilitarized.In their meeting with the premier yesterday, National Security Minister Ben Gvir and Finance Minister Smotrich focused on the second phase of the deal, Channel 12 reported, and sought “explicit guarantees” from Netanyahu that Israel would be able to resume fighting if Hamas refused to disarm.Netanyahu reportedly gave the ministers the impression that if Hamas does not disarm, Israel will be able to act — though such a guarantee does not appear anywhere in the US proposal’s current 20 points.Despite this, anonymous sources said that the two men left the meeting feeling that Netanyahu had not provided sufficient assurances on the issue. Still, they decided that for the time being, they would give him more time to carry out the agreement, but warned that they would not tolerate Hamas restoring its capabilities in Gaza.Ben Gvir had said the day before that his faction would leave the government if Hamas “continues to exist” after the hostages are returned.On top of the pressure at home from his far-right allies, mounting reports have suggested that Netanyahu is also facing pressure abroad, from none other than Trump himself.Reports of tensions between the two men began to emerge after Trump welcomed Hamas’s response to his proposal on Friday night, in a move that was said to have caught Netanyahu off guard, as he had been preparing to declare the terror group’s response to be a rejection of Trump’s offer.The disagreement over whether Hamas had accepted or rejected Trump’s plan led the US president to rebuke his Israeli counterpart, telling him in a tense phone call on Friday to not be “so fucking negative,” the Axios news outlet reported Sunday.According to a US official, Netanyahu had told Trump the ambivalent Hamas response, which welcomed parts of the proposal while hinting at disagreements over other sections, was “nothing to celebrate.”Adding fuel to the fire, Trump shared a New York Times article on Truth Social on Sunday, which detailed how fury over Israel’s botched strike against Hamas leaders in Doha last month led him to pressure Netanyahu to end the war.Trump did not offer any commentary when sharing the story on Truth Social, but the decision to do so further bolstered the narrative about how the US president has lost patience with Netanyahu.The Prime Minister’s Office has sought to downplay the notion, insisting that the two are on the same page regarding Trump’s Gaza plan.Anxiety and hope in Israel and in Gaza-With top negotiators gathering in Cairo and Trump predicting a swift procession to the deal’s implementation, the mood on the ground in both Israel and Gaza was tense, yet still hopeful.In Israel, relatives of the hostages gathered with former hostages and bereaved relatives at Tel Aviv’s Hostages Square to pray and sing together and express their hope for an end to the two-year-long nightmare they have experienced.Julie Kuperstein, the mother of hostage Bar Kuperstein, said she “can’t get excited yet,” while Sigi Cohen, the mother of former hostage Eliya Cohen said she felt in her heart that the stage at Hostages Square would no longer be needed by next week.Sasha Trufanov, who was released from captivity in February 2025, spoke to the crowd about the power of the High Holidays — Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur — and was joined by fellow freed hostage Agam Berger, who performed the liturgical prayer “Ana b’Koach,” on her violin.Elhanan Danino, the father of Ori Danino, who was killed by his captors in the tunnels of Gaza in August 2024, spoke about Yom Kippur in general, and the liturgy that reflects the great losses and trauma suffered by Israel on October 7, 2023.“Enough, God Almighty, have mercy on your nation who are calling to you,” said Danino.He noted that while those marking the Yom Kippur fast went home to full refrigerators to sate themselves after the 24-hour fast, the hostages have been fasting for more than 15,000 hours.“They don’t know what date it is. They don’t know the hour. Every day is Yom Kippur for them,” said Danino. “If we can’t bring them home with ammunition, let’s use our prayers so that the living will sit in the sukkah with their families and the others will be brought to a proper burial.”In Gaza, too, Trump’s plan has stirred hope for peace, but there was no let-up of Israeli attacks on Sunday, as planes and tanks pounded areas across the enclave, killing at least 19 people, local health authorities said.Four of those killed were seeking aid in the south of the strip and five were killed in an airstrike in Gaza City in the early afternoon, they said.The figures could not be verified.Still, Muin Abu Rajab, 40, a resident of the city’s Al-Rimal neighborhood, told AFP that there had been “a noticeable decrease in the number of air strikes” since the previous day, when the IDF was instructed to move to defensive operations only.“The tanks and military vehicles have slightly pulled back, but I believe this is a tactical move, not a withdrawal,” he said.Ahmed Assad, a displaced Palestinian man in central Gaza, said he had been hopeful when news broke of Trump’s plan but said nothing had changed on the ground.“We do not see any change to the situation, on the contrary, we don’t know what action to take, what shall we do? Shall we remain in the streets? Shall we leave?” he asked.Times of Israel staff and agencies contributed to this report.

Hamas said to demand release of terror chiefs, Oct. 7 terrorists in deal for hostages-Source says terror group to fight for release of life-termers ‘even at the cost of dooming the deal,’ wants deeper initial IDF withdrawal and is working to ensure PA role in ‘day-after’ Gaza-By ToI Staff Today, 1:35 am-OCT 5,25

Hamas is set to demand the release of some of the most notorious Palestinian terrorists, whom Israel has refused to set free, in talks set to start in Egypt on Monday to finalize the return of all Israeli hostages in the first phase of US President Donald Trump’s plan to end the war in Gaza.Citing Hamas sources, Channel 12 reported that among the terrorists Hamas is demanding are Marwan Barghouti, the Fatah Tanzim chief serving five life sentences for his part in planning three terror attacks that killed five Israelis during the Second Intifada, and Ahmad Sa’adat, leader of the Marxist-Leninist Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), who was sentenced in 2008 to 30 years behind bars for masterminding the 2001 assassination of Israeli tourism minister Rehavam Ze’evi.Hamas was also demanding the release of Ibrahim Hamed, serving 45 life terms for orchestrating the killings of numerous Israelis as Hamas’s West Bank commander during the Second Intifada, Abbas al-Sayed, who orchestrated the 2002 bombing at the Park Hotel in Netanya in which 39 Israelis were killed, and Hamas’s Hassan Salameh, who is serving 48 life terms for plotting multiple suicide bombings.Channel 12 cited a Hamas source saying the terror group “won’t give up” on securing the release of these and other life-term terrorists, even at the cost of dooming the deal.”There are currently 303 security prisoners serving life sentences in Israel.In a separate, unsourced report, the network said Hamas is also demanding that Israel release terrorists from Hamas’s elite Nukhba force, who took part in the terror group’s October 7, 2023, invasion and massacre — a demand Israel has consistently rejected.Speaking to Channel 12, Agriculture Minister Avi Dichter — a cabinet minister and former Shin Bet chief — appeared to indicate that Israel would be willing to release the convicted terrorists, but raised doubts about freeing those involved in the October 7 invasion.Dichter noted that in the past Israel had freed some of the most notorious terrorists, including Hamas’s founder, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, who was twice released in deals. In 1985, Israel traded him and 1,150 other security prisoners for three captured IDF soldiers. He was later rearrested. In 1997, he was released as part of a deal in exchange for two Mossad officers captured in Jordan while trying to kill Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal.“I twice brought him to jail and once to the end of his life,” said Dichter, who was Shin Bet chief when Yassin was assassinated in an IAF helicopter strike in 2004.Dichter said that while there was precedent for releasing convicted terrorists, those who participated in the October 7 massacre had not yet been tried for their crimes.“It’s a different story,” he said.According to the Hamas sources cited by Channel 12, the terror group also wants guarantees that there will ultimately be a full IDF withdrawal from Gaza, with a timetable; and that the IDF’s initial withdrawal be larger than the one shown in a map issued by Trump on Sunday. Hamas was said to be demanding a withdrawal to the lines where the IDF was deployed in January during the last ceasefire.Palestinian sources close to the negotiations were cited by the Kan public broadcaster saying that Hamas’s top priority was the depth and timeline of the IDF withdrawal, while long-term issues such as the demilitarization of the Gaza Strip were on the back burner for the terror group.Channel 12 further reported that the Hamas negotiating team under Khalil al-Hayya will hold simultaneous talks with a Palestinian Authority team, as it seeks to ensure that the initial mechanism for “day-after” Gaza includes the PA.The report noted a statement by PA President Mahmoud Abbas on Saturday promising PA reforms, including the formulation of a temporary constitution within three months and elections within a year. According to Channel 12, Abbas would permit Hamas to contest those elections only if it accepts Israel’s right to exist.Under Trump’s plan, the PA — which Israel accuses of incitement to terrorism in its schools and through payments to terrorists — would take control of Gaza only after it “has completed its reform program.” Until then, the plan stipulates that the Strip will be governed by an international transitional “Board of Peace” led by Trump.The US president announced his plan on Monday in a joint press conference with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who endorsed the proposal. Trump accepted Hamas’s response on Friday, which said the terror group agreed to the hostage-prisoner exchange formula set out in the plan and was willing to immediately hash out the details with mediators.The formula would see Hamas release the remaining 48 hostages within 72 hours, in exchange for 250 life-term Palestinian prisoners; 1,700 Gazans detained since the October 7 massacre, which sparked the Gaza war; and the remains of 15 slain Gazans in exchange for each deceased hostage, of whom there are at least 26, according to the IDF.Hamas’s response said the release of the hostages would be subject to “field conditions,” and has indicated that returning the buried, slain hostages within 72 hours could be difficult due to IDF presence.

'We are not Jews with trembling knees'Anger, defiance in the UK as October 7 anniversary colored by Manchester attack-After a terror attack at the Heaton Park Synagogue on Yom Kippur left two dead and four seriously injured, memorial events blame government inaction as they remember the fallen-By Zev Stub-5 October 2025, 11:38 pm

British Jews gathered on Sunday to mark two years since the October 7, 2023, Hamas massacres in southern Israel with anger, sadness, and defiance in ceremonies that were heightened by the shock of the deadly terror attack on a synagogue over the Yom Kippur holiday.Participants lamented that the wave of antisemitism unleashed after the Hamas attack and subsequent war in Gaza had been left unchecked in the UK, where rabid anti-Israel and antisemitic protests have become regular events.In Manchester, where a knifeman assaulted congregants on Thursday at the Heaton Park Synagogue in an attack that left two dead and four seriously injured, thousands gathered under the banner, “We are not Jews with trembling knees.”In London, Keith Black, chairman of the Jewish Leadership Council, told a crowd of some 3,000 gathered at Trafalgar Square that “antisemitism in this country is out of control.”“Our streets have been filled with protesters screaming Jew hatred, our students have faced relentless waves of abuse on campus,” Black said.“A new concept called ‘ambient antisemitism’ has entered our vocabulary, a prevailing undercurrent across society, across a society that has turned against Israel, in consequence, against us as Jews,” he added.Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis led prayers for the release of the remaining hostages and in memory of those killed in the attack. Candles were lit in memory of the different communities that were attacked on October 7, and the names of British citizens killed in the attack were read.The rally came a day after nearly 500 people were arrested Saturday at a pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel protest, also held in London’s Trafalgar Square. In the aftermath of that event, the British government granted local police forces the power to restrict repeat protests in the same place, recognizing the cumulative impact of protests on a local community.In a video message, British-Israeli Emily Damari, who was kidnapped by Hamas terrorists on October 7 and held hostage in Gaza for 471 days, urged the crowd “to use your voice” to secure the hostages’ release, adding: “We can never give up on them.”Another survivor, Shaun Lemel, who had been at the Nova Festival, recalled the day “everything changed” within minutes when things went from “an epic music festival to the most horrific battlefield.”“At 6:18 a.m., I was dancing and having the time of my life. At 6:29 a.m., the music stopped,” Lemel said.The images from that day are seared in our collective memories, said Phil Rosenberg, president of the Board of Deputies.Defiance in Manchester-Meanwhile, in Manchester, more than a thousand people attended the ceremony outside the Manchester Cathedral on a chilly, rainy day, as bolstered security forces guarded a crowd still fearful after two members of their community were murdered days earlier.After a six-minute rampage Thursday morning outside the synagogue, police shot dead the terrorist, a British man of Syrian descent who counterterrorism police said may have been inspired by extremist Islamist ideology. The attacker was on bail over an alleged rape, but had not been charged.“Adrian and Melvin’s bravery will never be forgotten,” banners proclaimed, referring to the two victims of the attack, Adrian Daulby and Melvin Cravitz.Rabbi Amir Elituv led prayers and a moment of silence for the victims of both the October 7 and the Heaton Park attack before blowing the shofar.Marc Levy, chief executive of the Jewish Representative Council of Greater Manchester, offered condolences to the families of the murdered and injured, and thanked the security forces that helped prevent the attack from being even worse.“Being Jewish in the UK over the last two years has been a very lonely place. We have been screaming about the abuse we were suffering in all sections of society, and we were largely ignored,” Levy said. “There are no words that will comfort their families, but I hope the fact that we are all here united will resonate and provide some comfort to them.”Raphi Bloom, a prominent community member who attends Heaton Park Synagogue, blamed Prime Minister Keir Starmer for emboldening Hamas by recognizing Palestinian statehood last month.“For two years, our community has faced unprecedented Jew hatred,” including assault, vandalism, and marches that made city centers effectively off-limits for Jews, Bloom said.Never has Jewish life in the UK been as uncertain, and it is not an exaggeration to say that our government’s demonization of Israel and inaction and failure in tackling [antisemitism] has played a significant part in allowing this Jew hatred to flourish and to make many British Jews question in our country,” he said.“When you fail to act on constant calls to globalize the intifada, the results are that the intifada came to our Manchester Jewish community with horrific consequences,” Bloom concluded.Elsewhere in Manchester, the leader of the UK’s Conservative Party, Kemi Badenoch, said that pro-Palestinian marches in the country had become “carnivals of hatred directed at the Jewish homeland.”The terror attack on Yom Kippur “was not just an attack on British Jews, it was an attack on all of us,” she told the annual Conservative Party conference.Badenoch suggested that in the spirit of the Day of Atonement, Britain should consider where it went wrong, and that one mistake was tolerating rhetoric at anti-Israel demonstrations that are most plausibly understood as calls for violence against Jews.“You hear it in the asinine slogans; you hear it in ‘from the river to the sea,’ as if the homes and the lives of millions of Jewish people should be erased,” she said.“You hear it in ‘globalize the intifada,’ which means nothing at all if it doesn’t mean targeting Jewish people for violence,” she continued to applause.“We have tolerated this in our country for too long, and we have tolerated the radical Islamist ideology that seeks to threaten not only Jews, but all of us, of all faiths and none, who want to live in peace.”“We must now draw a line and say that in Britain you can think what you like, and within the bounds of the law you can say what you like, but you have no right to turn our streets into the theaters of intimidation, and we will not let you do so anymore!” she asserted.Trouble brewing for British Jews-The feelings expressed at the rally outside the Manchester Cathedral were highlighted by a study published ahead of the second anniversary of the October 7 massacre by the UK-based Institute for Jewish Policy Research (JPR) which, found that 82 percent of British Jews now consider antisemitism a “significant” problem and nearly half described it as “very big,” compared to just 11% a decade earlier.The survey of 4,800 adult British Jews conducted in June and July 2025 found that nearly one-third of Jews experienced at least one antisemitic incident in 2024, and 35% rated their safety between 0–4 on a 10-point scale. Trust in UK institutions, political parties and media is poor, and 45% said they experience “ambient antisemitism” — hostile media coverage, online comments, and microaggressions — “frequently” or “regularly.”Increases were noted in levels of Zionist and Jewish identity, but younger Jews are increasingly critical of Israel, and disagreements about Israel’s military actions in Gaza have exacerbated communal tensions, the report found.Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.

'I'll be honest, I didn't think we would find anything'Archaeologists unearth 1,500-year-old synagogue below abandoned Syrian village in Golan-A team from the University of Haifa and Kinneret College identifies an ancient wall facing Jerusalem and 150 synagogue items, including a stone engraved with a menorah-By Rossella Tercatin-5 October 2025, 9:58 pm

A team of Israeli archaeologists has unearthed the remains of a synagogue in the Golan Heights, roughly dating to 1,500 years ago, the Israel Nature and Parks Authority and the University of Haifa said on Sunday.The Yehudiya Nature Reserve, known for its streams, canyons, and waterfalls, is named after the Syrian village of Yehudiya, which was inhabited until Israel captured the area from Syria in 1967. The town likely preserved the name of an ancient settlement that might have had a Jewish population.For decades, Israeli researchers had surveyed the village, which contains several stones and architectural elements from the synagogue incorporated into its houses. However, the synagogue’s exact location remained a mystery.“The abandoned Syrian village is built on top of ancient remains,” said Dr. Mechael Osband from the Zinman Institute of Archaeology at the University of Haifa and the Department of Land of Israel Studies at the Kinneret Academic College. “You’d walk into a house and see a pillar in the middle used as a support for the roof, or a Doric capital underneath an archway.”Overall, some 150 items from the synagogue have been documented across the ruins of the village, including a stone engraved with a menorah.Four years ago, Osband and his partner, Prof. Haim Ben-David, also from Kinneret College, began a systematic survey of the site. They mapped out the remains of the synagogue and the exact locations where they had been found.“After we mapped out the remains, we told ourselves that we would do two probes and see if we could figure out where the synagogue was,” Osband told The Times of Israel over a phone interview. “I’ll be honest, I didn’t think we would find anything.”Osband explained that the finds in secondary use were scattered across the village, and no researcher had managed to pinpoint the actual building.The archaeologists first excavated below a house that had been suggested as a possible location for the synagogue already 30 years ago, but did not uncover anything.“Then we checked another place, where three columns had been discovered that were not in secondary use,” explained Osband. “It was December 2024, and we opened a 3×3 meter survey area. There, we unearthed the base of a column and a stone floor.”In July, Osband and Ben-David returned to Yehudiya for a larger excavation, accompanied by students and volunteers.“We found the southern wall of the building with three entrance ways, and different architectural elements, so it was clear that we found the spot,” Osband said. “We are really just beginning the excavation. We have not even uncovered the northern wall yet. I look forward to seeing what else is there.”The researchers estimate that the building was approximately 13 meters wide and at least 17 meters long. It was constructed in a basilica style, featuring a rectangular structure with two rows of columns and benches along the walls, a common layout in ancient synagogues in Israel.Among the remains uncovered was a “tabula ansata,” or a large rectangular stone tablet with dovetail handles.“In Roman and Greek architecture, they usually carry some writing, but here there is nothing,” Osband said.The archaeologist noted that the study of the artifact is ongoing, and it is possible that, with the aid of new technologies that can highlight faded inscriptions invisible to the naked eye, some writing might still be identified.The team also found several stone benches.“The benches were not in their original place, but in secondary use, or in other words, someone went into the building and reused it for a different purpose at a later time,” Osband said.According to Osband, the dating of the synagogue remains preliminary, as it is based on stylistic considerations of the architectural elements, which do not allow for precision.“Stylistically, [the building] is very similar to other synagogues in the area which date mainly from the late 3rd century to the 7th, 8th centuries [CE],” the archaeologist explained.“As is the case in many synagogue buildings, there were probably different stages, possibly beginning in the late Roman period, and continuing through the Byzantine period, and maybe a bit later,” he added. “We don’t know yet.”So far, archaeologists have uncovered the remains of approximately 130 ancient synagogues in the Land of Israel, with about 30 of them located in the Golan.Osband explained that two factors likely contributed to the abundance of finds in the region.“It’s an area where there was continuous Jewish presence from the Hasmonean period [2nd century BCE] up until the late Byzantine, early Islamic periods [6th-8th centuries CE],” he said. “In addition, the Golan has not been as intensely settled over time as other areas such as the Galilee, so [ancient remains] are preserved better.”The team plans to return to excavating next summer, hoping to uncover more of the building and answer additional questions about those who once prayed there.“Every synagogue has its own story,” Osband noted.He explained that ancient synagogues in Israel were built in a variety of styles, especially in the Golan Heights. Therefore, it will be essential for archaeologists to gain a deeper understanding of the specific features of the structure in the Yehudiya Reserve.“When was it built? In what ways is it similar [to other synagogues]? Is it unique? And what does it say about the community that built it?” he said. “Those are research questions we hope to address as we uncover more.”

Ukraine says Russia intensifying railway strikes to cut off civilians near front.

Kyiv, Ukraine, Oct 4 (AFP) Oct 04, 2025-The head of Ukraine's railways said Saturday that Russia was intensifying a campaign of air strikes on the network in an attempt to isolate frontline communities ahead of winter.Ukrainian Railways CEO Oleksandr Pertsovsky also warned that Russian drone strikes were becoming more precise, complicating Kyiv's ability to fend off incoming attacks.Russia launched drones at two passenger trains in Ukraine's northeastern Sumy region on Saturday, killing one person and wounding dozens, according to Ukrainian officials."We clearly see the intensification of enemy attacks on the railway infrastructure," Pertsovsky told reporters, including AFP."There is no military purpose whatsoever," he said."The only purpose is to sow panic among people... that the connection will be destroyed and people will be left alone," he added.Speaking via video call while on a train to Shostka, the station that was hit, he said there had been "40 major attacks" on railway infrastructure since August, "pretty much every other day".Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called Saturday's attack, which occurred around 50 kilometres (30 miles) from the Russian border, "savage".He posted a video showing a mangled train carriage engulfed in flames with twisted metal and busted windows."The Russians could not have been unaware that they were striking civilians," he said.Russia's army has repeatedly targeted Ukraine's railways since invading in February 2022.Pertsovsky said there had not been a single week of the war without this occurring.In April 2022, more than 60 people waiting to evacuate the frontline city of Kramatorsk were killed when a Russian missile crashed into the busy station there.Pertsovsky expressed particular concern about Russian weapons becoming more precise, saying that without effective air defence, "it's unfortunately very easy to imagine that a similar attack could bring way, way worse results"."They have very precise Shaheds (Iranian-designed drones) that are targeting individual locomotives; they are able also to target energy infrastructure very effectively, making many of the tools that were used for protection ineffective at the moment," he said.Russia has also stepped up its attacks on Ukraine's energy infrastructure as the weather chills.Moscow earlier this week launched its largest-ever strike on Ukraine's gas infrastructure, while strikes on Saturday cut off power to some 50,000 households in the northern Chernigiv region.

Iran says cooperation with UN nuclear watchdog 'no longer relevant'

Tehran, Oct 5 (AFP) Oct 05, 2025-Iran's top diplomat said Sunday that cooperation with the United Nations nuclear watchdog was no longer relevant following the reimposition of international sanctions on the Islamic republic."The Cairo agreement is no longer relevant for our cooperation with the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency)," Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said, referring to a September deal with the UN agency.The deal had set up a framework to resume cooperation and allow the watchdog to inspect Iranian sites, after Tehran suspended cooperation following Israeli and US strikes on its key nuclear sites in June.But the agreement lost its significance to Iran as Britain, France, and Germany -- signatories to Iran's 2015 nuclear deal -- triggered the return of the UN sanctions over Tehran's non-compliance.Tehran had threatened to halt cooperation with the agency if they sought to reimpose the sanctions."The three European countries thought they had a leverage in their hands, threatening to implement a snapback," Araghchi said during a meeting with foreign diplomats in Tehran."Now they have used this lever and seen the results... the three European countries have definitely diminished their role and almost eliminated the justification for negotiations with them."He added that the European trio "will have a much smaller role than in the past" in any upcoming diplomacy over Iran's nuclear dossier.Iran accused the IAEA of failing to condemn attacks conducted by its arch-enemies on its nuclear installations, despite it being a signatory of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).Western countries, spearheaded by the United States and joined by Israel, accuse Iran of pursuing nuclear weapons and define uranium enrichment as a red line.Iran categorically rejects the accusations, insisting its nuclear programme is solely for civilian purposes and that it has a right to enrichment under the NPT.Some Iranian MPs have floated the idea of leaving the NPT, while President Masoud Pezeshkian has said Iran will remain committed to its obligations under the treaty.Araghchi said Tehran's "decision regarding cooperation with the agency will be announced", without elaborating, while adding there was still room for diplomacy.Iran had engaged in talks with the United States starting in April to reach a new deal over its nuclear program.However, the June attacks on Iranian nuclear, military and residential sites by Israel brought the talks to a halt.Tehran accused the United States of undermining diplomacy and urged guarantees and recognition of its rights before any possible resumption of negotiations.

Gaza civil defence says heavy strikes despite Trump appeal.

Jerusalem, Oct 4 (AFP) Oct 04, 2025-Gaza's civil defence agency said Saturday that Israel carried out dozens of air strikes and artillery shelling on Gaza City despite US President Donald Trump's appeal to end bombardments after Hamas accepted a ceasefire deal."It was a very violent night, during which the (Israeli army) carried out dozens of air strikes and artillery shelling on Gaza City and other areas in the Strip, despite President Trump's call to halt the bombing," civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP.Bassal, whose agency is a rescue force which operates under Hamas authority, added that 20 homes were destroyed in the overnight bombardments.Gaza City's Baptist Hospital said in a statement that it received casualties from a strike on a home in the city's Tuffah neighbourhood, including four dead and several wounded.Gaza's Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis said two children were killed and eight people wounded in a drone strike on a tent in camp for displaced Gazans.The peace plan for Gaza, presented by Trump this week and backed by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, calls for a ceasefire, the release of hostages within 72 hours, Hamas's disarmament and a gradual Israeli withdrawal from Gaza.Hamas said on Friday it was ready to release hostages held in Gaza under the Trump plan but wanted negotiations on the details and a say in the future of the Palestinian territory.

octors Without Borders ‘outraged’ after 15th staffer killed in Gaza-Military looking into incident, says target of strike was Hamas operative; four said killed while seeking aid in southern Gaza, at least 8 killed in Gaza City strike-By Emanuel Fabian-and Agencies Today, 5:07 am-OCT 5,25

The medical charity Doctors Without Borders (MSF) voiced sorrow and outrage following the death of a colleague in Gaza on Sunday, as Israeli strikes continued to pound into the enclave, even as negotiators prepared to discuss US President Donald Trump’s plan to end the war in the Palestinian enclave.Abed El Hameed Qaradaya, 43, succumbed to shrapnel injuries sustained on Thursday, amid an attack that killed MSF colleague Omar Hayek and injured several others, the organization said.MSF said the attack was carried out by Israeli forces. It said its staff were waiting for a bus to the charity’s field hospital at the time, and were all wearing MSF vests.In response to a query by the Times of Israel, the IDF said the strike on October 2 targeted a Hamas operative in central Gaza.“Reports were received of a local Palestinian employee of an international organization who was killed, along with several local employees who were injured,” the military said, adding that “the details of the incident are under investigation.”The IDF said that it took steps to mitigate civilian harm in the strike, while stressing that Hamas “embeds itself in the civilian population and exploits it as a human shield for terror purposes.”El Hameed is the 15th MSF staff member killed in the nearly two-year-long conflict, and the third in less than 20 days.“His loss is immense and has a tragic impact on his loved ones, MSF and the health system in Gaza,” the Geneva-based NGO said in a statement.“For 18 years, Abed El Hameed was a cornerstone of MSF’s physiotherapy department in Gaza. He was a unique and invaluable specialist in both physiotherapy and occupational therapy.”MSF said he innovated and adapted tools, and was the driving force behind opening a 3D physiotherapy department.“We are profoundly grieved and outraged by the loss of our colleagues — a stark reminder of the pattern of complete disregard for civilian lives and human dignity,” it said.In June 2024, after another MSF staffer, Fadi al-Wadiya, was killed in an IDF strike, the military said he was an Islamic Jihad operative involved in developing the terror group’s missiles. MSF denied the accusation, then the IDF published a photograph of Wadiya in a PIJ uniform.Also on Sunday, the IDF published footage showing weapons that it said were left behind by Hamas operatives in a kindergarten and a school in Gaza City.“Last week, IDF troops identified Hamas terrorists fleeing a kindergarten in al-Shati, Gaza City. The troops later found an explosive device and an AK-47 rifle inside the kindergarten,” the military said on its English-language X account.In a separate post, the IDF’s international media spokesman, Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani, posted a picture of uniforms, military equipment, and a Hamas flag in a classroom, saying: “These weapons were discovered in a school in Gaza a few days ago, a place meant for learning, not terror.”Both educational facilities likely have not been active during the war.The IDF has repeatedly accused Hamas of using civilian sites — including schools, mosques, and hospitals — for terror, and has published extensive footage showing how the terror group dug tunnels and set up weapon depots in such facilities.The IDF has also made use of schools in Gaza as temporary encampments for troops during the war.Planes and tanks pounded areas across the Gaza Strip on Sunday, despite the IDF having moved to purely defensive operations a day earlier.The military was ordered to halt offensive operations in Gaza City on Saturday amid Trump’s push to bring about an end to the war in the enclave, and so shifted to defensive operations only, acting against those it deemed to pose a threat to troops.In total, local health authorities said at least 19 people were killed across the Strip on Sunday.Four of those killed were shot dead near an aid distribution site in the southern city of Rafah, according to Nasser Hospital. Israel’s military said it was not involved.At least eight others were killed in multiple strikes in Gaza City, according to Shifa hospital, which received the casualties. A security official who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to the media said the strikes were against Hamas militants who were a threat to troops.The toll could not be independently verified.The Hamas-run Gaza health ministry says more than 67,000 people in the Strip have been killed or are presumed dead in the fighting so far, though the toll cannot be verified and does not differentiate between civilians and fighters. Israel says it has killed over 22,000 combatants in battle as of August and another 1,600 terrorists inside Israel during the October 7 onslaught.Israel’s toll in the ground offensive against Hamas in Gaza and in military operations along the border with the Strip stands at 471. The toll includes two police officers and three Defense Ministry civilian contractors.

'What we are facing today is a spiritual catastrophe'Two years in, some are asking if the war in Gaza is changing Judaism-Rabbis and pundits say the war’s death toll and humanitarian crisis — alongside simultaneous settler violence in the West Bank — are causing engaged Jews to question their faith-By Andrew Silow-Carroll Today, 3:41 am-OCT 5,25

JTA — In the two years since the Hamas-led attacks of October 7, 2023, the Jewish discourse over the war in Gaza has been agonizing and polarizing. Jews have argued over the Israeli government’s military aims, over what it means to “bring the hostages home,” over the left’s betrayal of its Jewish allies and over the influence of Israel’s far-right ministers.Since the summer, however, a number of Jewish religious and thought leaders are debating another assertion: that the war in Gaza is not just a military, ethical or diplomatic challenge, but a crisis of faith. They are warning that the death toll and humanitarian crisis in Gaza and the settler violence in the West Bank are shaking the beliefs and practices of engaged Jews.“What we are facing today is a spiritual catastrophe, and what is at stake is not just the future of the state of Israel, but the very soul of the Jewish people,” Rabbi Sharon Brous, leader of the independent IKAR congregation in Los Angeles, said in a Rosh Hashanah sermon.Most, but not all, of these spiritual critiques are coming from liberal Zionist thinkers and rabbis from the non-Orthodox denominations, not to mention pundits opposed to or disillusioned with Zionism. Critics of their stances, meanwhile, say the real spiritual hazard is that Jews abandon Israel and the hostages during a just war that Israel didn’t ask for.But the latest discourse suggests that among many Jews in the mainstream, the second anniversary of the attacks is raising difficult questions about Israel, Judaism and Jewish identity.In an interview in August, the journalist Peter Beinart asked Rabbi Ismar Schorsch how he would respond to a fellow Jew who might be dismayed over Israel’s actions in Gaza and the West Bank.“What would you say to someone,” Beinart continued, “whose very belief in God and whose belief in Judaism had been brought into question by what Israel is doing in Gaza and the West Bank?”Schorsch, 89, the chancellor emeritus of the Jewish Theological Seminary, accepted the premise of Beinart’s question, replying:“I think that in some ways, Judaism is at [a] critical moment. Are we going to be able to defend Judaism, which has the burden of the chillul Hashem [desecration of God’s name], taking place in the West Bank and in Gaza? Will we be able to live [with] that Judaism, and if we don’t speak out now, it may be too late. This may be our final moment. In raising the ethical constraints that need to be imposed on the Israeli government, we are defending Judaism, and Judaism is going to have to survive this catastrophe. And how will we be able to live with ourselves if we were silent?”The response was surprising, perhaps, coming from a historian who, from 1986 until his retirement in 2006, as head of Conservative Judaism’s flagship, was not known for either fiery rhetoric or public criticism of Israel. In some rabbis’ forums, there was dismay that Schorsch had aired his views in conversation with Beinart, an observant Jew whose very public drift from Zionism has been the subject of debate and much ridicule.But Schorsch had aired similar misgivings about the spiritual toll of the war over the summer, in an essay for the fast day of Tisha B’Av. “The unremitting violence against helpless Palestinians in Gaza and their wholly innocent coreligionists on the West Bank will saddle Jews with a repulsive religion riddled with hypocrisy and contradictions,” Schorsch warned. “The messianism driving the current government of Israel is sadly out of kilter with traditional Judaism — and an utter moral abomination.”In her sermon, Brous describes Hamas as a “formidable foe who has repeatedly expressed its intent to repeat the massacres of the 7th of October again and again and again.” And yet she excoriates Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for “the perpetuation of a war now nakedly advanced to keep in power a craven prime minister,” and government ministers who “openly share their feverish anticipation of a full resettlement of Gaza at all costs.”Beyond what could be read as a partisan political sermon from a well-known liberal Zionist, Brous also speaks of the spiritual costs of what she calls “manifest disregard for Palestinian lives.”“To be clear, core to our Jewish faith is the notion that every human being is created in God’s own image, which means that the death of any innocent is a moral catastrophe. A moral catastrophe,” she said. “And yet the devastation continues to rain down on Gaza. And I must wonder, have those leaders completely divorced themselves from Jewish history, from our Jewish tradition?”Brous quotes the Israeli historian Yuval Noah Harari, who in August called the war “a spiritual catastrophe for Judaism itself.”“What is happening right now in Israel could basically, I think, destroy 2,000 years of Jewish thinking and culture,” Harari said on “The Unholy” podcast. Driving his grim prediction for Judaism’s future, he said, were “an ethnic cleansing campaign in Gaza and the West Bank,” the “disintegration of Israeli democracy,” and the creation of a new Israel which is based on “an ideology of Jewish supremacy and the worship of what were completely anti-Jewish values for the last two millennia.”It’s not just liberal Zionists like Brous and Schorsch and critics of Zionism like Beinart — whose latest book is titled, “Being Jewish After the Destruction of Gaza: A Reckoning” — who are talking about the war’s impact on Judaism.In August, 80 mostly Modern Orthodox rabbis, representing a staunchly Zionist cohort, signed a letter calling for “moral clarity” in response to the hunger crisis in Gaza. The letter expressed their critique in terms of Jewish texts calling for “justice and compassion.”“They are the foundations of our ethical obligation — to demand policies that uphold human dignity, to provide humanitarian aid wherever possible, and to speak out when our government’s actions contradict the Torah’s moral imperatives, no matter how painful this may be to accept,” according to the letter.The letter’s author, Rabbi Yosef Blau, told JTA that he wrote the letter in part to defend Judaism and its Orthodox practitioners from the consequences of policies that he called antithetical to tradition. Blau, a former spiritual adviser at Yeshiva University, said the letter was intended in part for the secular Israeli Jew who might say, “I don’t see a Judaism that stands for moral values that I can identify with.”For some critics — and Blau and his colleagues had plenty, within Orthodoxy and beyond — public moralizing about the war is dangerous because it gives rhetorical ammunition to Israel’s enemies. They also accuse those who call the war a spiritual crisis of cherry-picking Judaism: In addition to its calls for justice and compassion, they say, Jewish tradition justifies war in the name of self-defense and in securing the Land of Israel against its enemies.They also point to some polling and anecdotal evidence showing that the trauma and stress of war inspired many Jews to intensify their engagement with Judaism.“Their sermons are not courageous; they are capitulating,” the author and rabbi Shmuley Boteach wrote in an angry response to the rabbis’ letter. “Their statements are not moral; they are derelictions of duty.”Jews on college campuses and those attending synagogues, Boteach continued, “need spiritual leaders who roar with pride. Rabbis who declare that Israel is our shield, our heart, our destiny. Rabbis who teach that Israel’s war is not only just but holy — a fight for the survival of the Jewish people against the forces of annihilation.”Jonathan S. Tobin, editor-in-chief of JNS.org, similarly urged rabbis and pundits to resist the impulse to “virtue-signal their ambivalence about a war against a truly evil opponent,” and instead “join in solidarity with Israel’s efforts to extinguish Hamas.”“Inevitably, many of the resulting reflections often have more to do with political opinions than dispassionate moral judgments,” wrote Tobin. “And that can be particularly egregious when applied to the efforts of those who serve its cause in the middle of an armed conflict with the genocidal Islamist forces that head the Palestinian national movement.”Tobin was responding to a column by Yossi Klein Halevi, a senior fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute. An American-born Israeli who leans center-right, Klein Halevi had written in advance of the High Holidays that Israel and its supporters should undergo a process of “moral self-critique” in keeping with the holidays’ themes of introspection and repentance — within limits.“Even when fighting an existential war against enemies without moral restraint, there are limits to what is morally permitted to the Jewish state,” wrote Halevi in The Times of Israel. “And given the nature of our enemy and the threats against us, there are limits to the self-recrimination Jews should assume.”Nevertheless, he writes, “something has gone very wrong in Gaza,” citing the humanitarian crisis, the high civilian death toll, the messianic intentions of Netanyahu’s cabinet, and, beyond the war itself, the settler rampages on the West Bank. Writes Halevi:“This season of self-reckoning that begins with the Hebrew month of Elul and culminates on Yom Kippur is intended not only for individual Jews but also — in fact primarily — for the Jewish collective. Undergoing this process as a people doesn’t weaken us. It provides spiritual protection.“Just as we need a language for defending ourselves against the lies and distortions, we need a parallel language in which we struggle with the moral dilemmas raised by this war. Those of us who love Israel must not forfeit the moral conversation to Jews who have despaired of Israel or who openly side with our enemies.”An observant Jew and journalist who has covered both sides of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Halevi is comfortable using the language of Jewish tradition in discussing politics and policy.Pulpit rabbis are typically more hesitant. Unlike retired university administrators like Blau and Schorsch, they face congregants who may, and do, revolt over a sermon they don’t agree with. In her sermon at New York’s Central Synagogue on the first day of Rosh Hashanah, Rabbi Angela Buchdahl told her congregants, “I have never been so afraid to talk about Israel.”Buchdahl, one of the country’s best-known pulpit rabbis, went on to discuss the spiritual hazards of the war, but was careful to describe defects among both Israel’s critics and its defenders. She framed her talk around the Torah portion read on the first day of Rosh Hashanah, which is about the conflict between Abraham’s wife, Sarah, and her handmaid Hagar. Judaism’s ancestors chose to have the story read on Rosh Hashanah when, she said, “our tradition asks us to take a cheshbon hanefesh, an accounting of our souls.”The story is about empathy, which has been lacking on both sides, said Buchdahl. Israel’s critics refuse to acknowledge the vulnerability Israelis feel after October 7 and “take the worst accusations against Israel at face value,” while the defenders have become callous toward the children in Gaza, “who are suffering, exiled, and desperate.”“This war has tested our empathy. All of us,” she said. “I see the ways that my fear has disabled my empathy response. I still struggle to find the emotional bandwidth to read the tragic stories coming out of Gaza while my extended family is still held captive, while calls to ‘blacklist Zionists’ or to ‘globalize the intifada’ still ring around the world, and even this city. But who do we become when we harden our hearts?”Jay Michaelson, a rabbi and contributing columnist at the Forward, suggests the discussion over how the war might change Judaism is the latest expression of an age-old tension between universalism and particularism. Liberal Jews, he writes, tend to favor the universal aspects of tradition that cultivate “compassion for everyone, not only Jews or even primarily Jews.” Israel’s right-wing government, and the observant Jews who support it, represent a “hyper-particularist” strain for whom “Judaism is about the love of other Jews, first and foremost.”Michaelson rejects this particularism in favor of a Jewish path “committed to human rights, justice, love and universalism.” In some ways, he writes, he practices “a different religion, a different way of life, from at least half the religious Jews in the world,” and appears reconciled to that division.Schorsch, meanwhile, thinks the moral stakes demand rebuke. He directs his remarks at fellow clergy, calling it their responsibility to denounce the “excesses” being carried out by Israel and being condoned by right-wing rabbis.In his interview with Beinart, Schorsch sympathized with rabbis who do not feel comfortable using their pulpits to question Israel, but said they should do it anyway in the spirit of the self-correcting tradition of the Jewish prophets — and for the sake of Judaism itself.“The prophets were the critical spokesmen that limited the authority of the monarchy, and the voice of the prophets is silent today,” he said. “There is nothing more destructive of religion than hypocrisy and for us to defend what is happening on the West Bank and in Gaza religiously is simply hypocritical, and I think will be a burden for the future history of Judaism.”The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of JTA or its parent company, 70 Faces Media.

THAT LITTLE SNOT RAG, FLEE BAG, ISRAEL HATER, CLIMATE NUTJOB OF SCAMS GRETA THUNBERG GOT DEPORTED FROM ISRAEL FOR THE 2ND TIME.

Greta Thunberg set to be deported from Israel Monday on flight to Athens-Some 70 flotilla activists expected to leave for Greece, where they will be able to catch flights to their home countries; Activist bites prison staff member, delaying deportation-By AFP and Charlie Summers-Today, 3:39 am-OCT 5,25

Swedish activist Greta Thunberg will be among more than 70 people of different nationalities to leave Israel on Monday after they were seized aboard an intercepted Gaza aid flotilla.Most, if not all, those being released from Israeli detention will be flown to Greece, where they will be able to get flights to their home countries, their respective governments said on Sunday.Those flying out of Israel on Monday include 28 French citizens, 27 Greeks, 15 Italians, and nine Swedes.Twenty-one Spaniards separately returned to Spain on Sunday from Israel.The release still leaves several foreigners in Israeli custody, including 28 Spanish nationals.All had been on board the 42-vessel Global Sumud Flotilla carrying activists and politicians, who had been aiming to get past an Israeli blockade to deliver aid to Gaza, where the United Nations says famine has taken hold — a charge that Israel rejects.Israel started intercepting the ships in international waters on Wednesday, detaining the more than 470 people who had been aboard the boats.The Italian and Greek foreign ministries said their released nationals would on Monday fly from Israel to Athens. Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said on X that the 15 Italians would have assistance for a subsequent transfer to Italy.France’s foreign ministry said the 28 French citizens would be flown to Greece. They accounted for most of the 30 French nationals Israel seized aboard the flotilla.The Swedish foreign ministry did not say where the Swedes would fly to, but Swedish media said they, too, could be put on the flight to Greece.The plane carrying the deported activists to Greece will take off from southern Israel’s Ramon Airport and land in Athens.In total, 170 flotilla activists have been deported so far. Those who remain are being held in Ketziot prison, in what their legal representation has described as substandard conditions.On Sunday evening, a Spanish activist caused a stir in the prison by biting a medical staff member, prison staff said.They said she bit the staff member while being escorted from a routine medical examination, as part of preparations for her deportation, which was initially scheduled for tomorrow morning, but has since been pushed back.The medical staff member was treated in the prison for minor injuries, and police were called to the scene to handle the activist.The incident was reported to have delayed the activist’s deportation, as she was taken for questioning and is due to appear before a court on Monday.Legal aid organization Adalah has reported that the detained activists are being mistreated by the Israeli Prison Service, with some telling the Israeli Arab organization’s lawyers that they were denied food and water, and others reporting that they were manhandled by Israeli law enforcement.Thunberg told the Swedish Embassy on Saturday that she was suffering from dehydration, having received “insufficient amounts of both water and food.”The embassy relayed that Greta had said she “had developed rashes, which she suspects were caused by bedbugs. She spoke of harsh treatment and said she had been sitting for long periods on hard surfaces.”While Israel’s Foreign Ministry dismissed the accusations of mistreatment as “brazen lies,” far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, who oversees the Israel prison system, appeared to take pleasure in the reports, saying he was proud the activists were being treated like terrorists.“All the detainees’ legal rights are fully upheld,” wrote the Foreign Ministry on X.In contrast, Ben Gvir said that he visited Ketziot and “was proud that we are treating the ‘flotilla activists’ as terror supporters, whoever supports terrorism is a terrorist, and deserves the conditions of terrorists.”The Sumud flotilla, which set sail in late August, marked the latest attempt by activists to challenge Israel’s years-long naval blockade of Gaza.Similar attempts were intercepted in June and July, amid spiking international anger at Israel over the humanitarian crisis in the Strip. Israeli officials have denounced the Sumud and other missions as pro-Hamas media stunts.In an August report that Israel has rejected, the UN declared a famine in parts of northern Gaza. Israel, which blocked the entry of aid into Gaza for nearly three months until May, has accused Hamas of systematically looting aid entering the Strip since the war there was sparked when the Palestinian terror group invaded Israel on October 7, 2023.Meanwhile, a new nine-boat flotilla organized by the Freedom Flotilla Coalition is also expected to approach Gaza soon and be intercepted by the Israeli Navy. The mission, said to include about 100 activists on one of the boats, set sail from Italy about a week ago and was approaching the coast of Egypt’s Alexandria, its live-tracker showed Saturday.

STORMS HURRICANES-TORNADOES

OZONE DEPLETION JUDGEMENT ON THE EARTH DUE TO SIN

ISAIAH 30:26-27
26 Moreover the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold,(7X OR 7-DEGREES HOTTER) as the light of seven days, in the day that the LORD bindeth up the breach of his people,(ISRAEL) and healeth the stroke of their wound.
27 Behold, the name of the LORD cometh from far, burning with his anger, and the burden thereof is heavy: his lips are full of indignation, and his tongue as a devouring fire:

MATTHEW 24:21-22,29
21 For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.
22 And except those days should be shortened,(DAY LIGHT HOURS SHORTENED) there should no flesh be saved: but for the elect’s sake (ISRAELS SAKE) those days shall be shortened (Daylight hours shortened)(THE ASTEROID HITS EARTH HERE)
29 Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken:

REVELATION 16:7-9
7 And I heard another out of the altar say, Even so, Lord God Almighty, true and righteous are thy judgments.
8 And the fourth angel poured out his vial upon the sun; and power was given unto him to scorch men with fire.
9 And men were scorched with great heat, and blasphemed the name of God, which hath power over these plagues: and they repented not to give him glory.

EZEKIEL 32:6-9
6  I will also water with thy blood the land wherein thou swimmest, even to the mountains; and the rivers shall be full of thee.
7  And when I shall put thee out, I will cover the heaven, and make the stars thereof dark; I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon shall not give her light.
8  All the bright lights of heaven will I make dark over thee, and set darkness upon thy land, saith the Lord GOD.
9  I will also vex the hearts of many people, when I shall bring thy destruction among the nations, into the countries which thou hast not known.

REVELATION 16:3-7
3 And the second angel poured out his vial upon the sea; and it became as the blood of a dead man: and every living soul died in the sea.(enviromentalists won't like this result)
4 And the third angel poured out his vial upon the rivers and fountains of waters; and they became blood.
5 And I heard the angel of the waters say, Thou art righteous, O Lord, which art, and wast, and shalt be, because thou hast judged thus.
6 For they(False World Church and Dictator and baby murderers by abortion) have shed the blood of saints and prophets, and thou hast given them blood to drink; for they are worthy.

ISAIAH 30:26-27
26 Moreover the light of the moon shall be as the light of the sun, and the light of the sun shall be sevenfold,(7X OR 7-DEGREES HOTTER) as the light of seven days, in the day that the LORD bindeth up the breach of his people,(ISRAEL) and healeth the stroke of their wound.
27 Behold, the name of the LORD cometh from far, burning with his anger, and the burden thereof is heavy: his lips are full of indignation, and his tongue as a devouring fire:

MARK 13:8
8 For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom:(ETHNIC GROUP AGAINST ETHNIC GROUP) and there shall be earthquakes in divers places, and there shall be famines and troubles: these are the beginnings of sorrows.

LUKE 21:11
11 And great earthquakes shall be in divers places,(DIFFERNT PLACES AT THE SAME TIME) and famines, and pestilences; and fearful sights and great signs shall there be from heaven.

2 Peter 3:6-7 Amplified Bible (AMP) (HOT SUN, NUKES ETC)
6 By these waters also the world of that time was deluged and destroyed. 
7 By the same word the present heavens and earth are reserved for fire, being kept for the day of judgment and destruction of the ungodly.

LUKE 21:25-26
25 And there shall be signs in the sun,(HEATING UP-SOLAR ECLIPSES) and in the moon,(MAN ON THE MOON-LUNAR ECLIPSES) and in the stars;(ASTEROIDS-PROPHECY SIGNS) and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity;(MASS CONFUSION) the sea and the waves roaring;(FIERCE WINDS)
26 Men’s hearts failing them for fear,(TORNADOES,HURRICANES,STORMS) and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth:(DESTRUCTION) for the powers of heaven shall be shaken.(FROM QUAKES,NUKES ETC)

Typhoon Matmo disrupts holiday travel, forces closures in China.

Beijing, Oct 4 (AFP) Oct 04, 2025-Chinese authorities will cancel flights and close businesses on Saturday as Typhoon Matmo hurtles towards the country's southern Hainan and Guangdong provinces during the busy National Day travel period.According to China's National Meteorological Centre (NMC), Matmo is expected to make landfall on Sunday morning, the middle of an eight-day public holiday when many domestic tourists flock to tropical Hainan Island.All flights at Meilan International Airport in Haikou, Hainan's provincial capital, are scheduled to be cancelled from 11 pm (1500 GMT) on Saturday, state media outlet Xinhua said.The airport was originally expected to handle more than 632,000 passengers between October 1 to 8 for the combined National Day and Mid-Autumn Festival holiday, according to Hainan Airport Group, which operates the airport.Haikou also plans to suspend schools, public transport and construction from Saturday afternoon, while businesses will also be ordered closed.Both Hainan and Guangdong provinces have upgraded their emergency typhoon response, with authorities warning that heavy rains and strong winds could trigger flash floods and landslides.They have also cancelled many rail services and ordered fishing boats back to port.Downpours are also expected in Yunnan province and the Guangxi region, both also in China's south.Matmo is likely to bring winds of up to 45 metres per second, or 160 kilometres per hour (100 miles per hour), before its intensity gradually weakens after landfall, the NMC said Saturday.

Thousands evacuated as Typhoon Matmo lashes southern China.

Beijing, Oct 5 (AFP) Oct 05, 2025-Hundreds of thousands of people were evacuated from their homes as Typhoon Matmo lashed China's southern coast on Sunday, state media reported.The powerful storm made landfall around 2:50 pm (0650 GMT) in Guangdong province, according to state broadcaster CCTV.The National Meteorological Centre recorded winds of more than 150 kilometres per hour (93 mph).As the storm approached, authorities evacuated 197,000 people from their homes on Hainan Island and 150,000 from Guangdong province, according to the official Xinhua news agency.Public transportation, construction sites and businesses were also shuttered in coastal cities including Haikou, Wenchang, Zhanjiang and Maoming.The city of Beihai in the south of Guangxi region also announced Sunday it would suspend work, classes and transportation.The storm had already caused sea levels to rise in a port in Maoming on Sunday morning, leading to a "serious" risk of flooding, according to CCTV.The intensity of the typhoon is expected to gradually decrease after making landfall, the meteorological centre said.But torrential rain and strong winds were expected until Monday in Hainan and parts of Guangdong and Guangxi.China is the world's largest emitter of greenhouse gases, which scientists say are accelerating climate change and making extreme weather events more frequent and intense.It is also a world leader in renewable energy and aims to be carbon neutral by 2060.

FINALLY THE EUROPEAN UNION IS TALKING ABOUT HAVING THEIR OWN ARMY.AND IT MUST HAPPEN.
REVELATION 19:16-21
16 And he hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written, King Of Kings, And Lord Of Lords.(JESUS RETURNG TO EARTH LITERALLY ON A WHITE HORSE WITH THE RAPTURED CHRISTIANS 7 YEARS EARLIER)
17 And I saw an angel standing in the sun; and he cried with a loud voice, saying to all the fowls that fly in the midst of heaven, Come and gather yourselves together unto the supper of the great God;
18 That ye may eat the flesh of kings, and the flesh of captains, and the flesh of mighty men, and the flesh of horses, and of them that sit on them, and the flesh of all men, both free and bond, both small and great.(2ND TIME GOD-JESUS TELLS THE 500 MILLION MIGRATING BIRDS TO GET READY TO EAT HUMAN FLESH.THE FIRST TIME WAS WHEN GOD TOLD THE 500 MILLION MIGRATING BIRDS-TO EAT RUSSIA,GERMAN,ARAB, MUSLIM BODIES FOR 7 MONTHS IN EZEK 38 @ 39.
19 And I saw the beast,(E.U WORLD LEADER) and the kings of the earth, and their armies,(HERE IT SAYS THE E.U WILL HAVE ITS OWN ARMY) gathered together to make war against him that sat on the horse, (JESUS) and against his army.(RAPTURED CHRISTIANS)
20 And the beast (E.U WORLD LEADER) was taken, and with him the false prophet (POPE FRANCIS) that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone.
21 And the remnant were slain with the sword of him that sat upon the horse, which sword proceeded out of his mouth: and all the fowls were filled with their flesh.

Zephaniah 2:1-15
1 Gather together, yes, gather,O shameless nation,
2 before the decree takes effect[a] -before the day passes away like chaff—before there comes upon you the burning anger of the Lord, before there comes upon you the day of the anger of the Lord.
3 Seek the Lord, all you humble of the land, who do his just commands;[b] seek righteousness; seek humility; perhaps you may be hidden on the day of the anger of the Lord.
4 For Gaza shall be deserted, and Ashkelon shall become a desolation; Ashdod's people shall be driven out at noon, and Ekron shall be uprooted.
5 Woe to you inhabitants of the seacoast, you nation of the Cherethites! The word of the Lord is against you, O Canaan, land of the Philistines; and I will destroy you until no inhabitant is left.
6 And you, O seacoast, shall be pastures, with meadows[c] for shepherds and folds for flocks.
7 The seacoast shall become the possession of the remnant of the house of Judah, on which they shall graze, and in the houses of Ashkelon they shall lie down at evening. For the Lord their God will be mindful of them and restore their fortunes.
8 “I have heard the taunts of Moab (JORDAN) and the revilings of the Ammonites, how they have taunted my people and made boasts against their territory.
9 Therefore, as I live,” declares the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, Moab shall become like Sodom, and the Ammonites like Gomorrah, a land possessed by nettles and salt pits, and a waste forever.The remnant of my people shall plunder them, and the survivors of my nation shall possess them.”
10 This shall be their lot in return for their pride, because they taunted and boasted against the people of the Lord of hosts.
11 The Lord will be awesome against them; for he will famish all the gods of the earth, and to him shall bow down, each in its place, all the lands of the nations.
12 You also, O Cushites, shall be slain by my sword.
13 And he will stretch out his hand against the north and destroy Assyria,(SYRIA) and he will make Nineveh a desolation, a dry waste like the desert.
14 Herds shall lie down in her midst, all kinds of beasts;[d] even the owl and the hedgehog[e]  shall lodge in her capitals; a voice shall hoot in the window; devastation will be on the threshold; for her cedar work will be laid bare.
15 This is the exultant city that lived securely, that said in her heart, “I am, and there is no one else.” What a desolation she has become, a lair for wild beasts! Everyone who passes by her hisses and shakes his fist.Sa'ar: No free meals; talks possible if more hostages freed Israel halts aid into Gaza, citing Hamas refusal to extend first phase of truce
Footnotes-a -Zephaniah 2:2 Hebrew gives birth, b-Zephaniah 2:3 Or who carry out his judgment, c-Zephaniah 2:6 Or caves, d-Zephaniah 2:14 Hebrew beasts of every nation, e-Zephaniah 2:14 The identity of the animals rendered owl and hedgehog is uncertain

DANIEL 2:37-45
37 Thou, O king, art a king of kings: for the God of heaven hath given thee a kingdom, power, and strength, and glory.
38 And wheresoever the children of men dwell, the beasts of the field and the fowls of the heaven hath he given into thine hand, and hath made thee ruler over them all. Thou art this head of gold.
39 And after thee shall arise another kingdom inferior to thee, and another third kingdom of brass, which shall bear rule over all the earth.
40 And the fourth kingdom shall be strong as iron: forasmuch as iron breaketh in pieces and subdueth all things: and as iron that breaketh all these, shall it break in pieces and bruise.
41 And whereas thou sawest the feet and toes, part of potters' clay, and part of iron, the kingdom shall be divided; but there shall be in it of the strength of the iron, forasmuch as thou sawest the iron mixed with miry clay.
42 And as the toes of the feet were part of iron, and part of clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong, and partly broken.
43 And whereas thou sawest iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.
44 And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever.
45 Forasmuch as thou sawest that the stone was cut out of the mountain without hands, and that it brake in pieces the iron, the brass, the clay, the silver, and the gold; the great God hath made known to the king what shall come to pass hereafter: and the dream is certain, and the interpretation thereof sure.

DANIEL 7:17-26
17 These great beasts, which are four, are four kings, which shall arise out of the earth.
18 But the saints of the most High shall take the kingdom, and possess the kingdom for ever, even for ever and ever.
19 Then I would know the truth of the fourth beast, which was diverse from all the others, exceeding dreadful, whose teeth were of iron, and his nails of brass; which devoured, brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with his feet;
20 And of the ten horns that were in his head, and of the other which came up, and before whom three fell; even of that horn that had eyes, and a mouth that spake very great things, whose look was more stout than his fellows.
21 I beheld, and the same horn made war with the saints, and prevailed against them;
22 Until the Ancient of days came, and judgment was given to the saints of the most High; and the time came that the saints possessed the kingdom.
23 Thus he said, The fourth beast shall be the fourth kingdom upon earth, which shall be diverse from all kingdoms, and shall devour the whole earth, and shall tread it down, and break it in pieces.
24 And the ten horns out of this kingdom are ten kings that shall arise: and another shall rise after them; and he shall be diverse from the first, and he shall subdue three kings.
25 And he shall speak great words against the most High, and shall wear out the saints of the most High, and think to change times and laws: and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time.
26 But the judgment shall sit, and they shall take away his dominion, to consume and to destroy it unto the end.

THE WORLD IN 10 WORLD TRADE BLOCS LEAD BY THE EUROPEAN UNION THE WORLD LEADER, NOT AMERICA.I PREDICT.

THE EUROPEAN UNION AND REVIVED ROMAN WORLD GOVERNMENT
DANIEL 2:31-33,36-43, DAN 7:3-8,17

First From Daniel Chapter 2

1 EGYPT
2 ASSYRIA
3 BABYLON (HEAD OF GOLD) DAN 2:31-32,36-38, DAN 1:1
4 MEDO-PERSIANS (CHEST & ARMS OF SILVER) DAN 2:32,39, DAN 9:1
5 GREECE (WAIST & HIPS OF BRONZE) DAN 2:32,39, DAN 11:2
6 ROME (2 LEGS OF IRON) DAN 2:33,40, ROM 1:6
7 REVIVED ROME (EU) (FEET IRON & CLAY) DAN 2:33,41-43,10 TOES

Now From Daniel Chapter 7

1 EGYPT
2 ASSYRIA
3 BABYLON (LION WITH EAGLES WINGS) DAN 7:4, DAN 1:1
4 MEDO-PERSIANS (BEAR ON HIND LEGS) DAN 7:5, DAN 9:1
5 GREECE (LEOPARD 4 WINGS, 4 HEADS) DAN 7:6, DAN 11:2
6 ROME (HUGE IRON TEETH) DAN 7:7 (10 HORNS), ROM 1:6
7 REVIVED ROME (EU) DAN 7:8,19-20,23-25 10 HORNS, 10 KINGS
REV 17:9,12, 10 HORNS, 10 KINGS, 7 HILLS ROME. REV 13:1 BEAST WITH 7 HEADS. THE E.U LEADER OF WORLD GOVERNMENT DAN 2:40-45, 7:7-8,23-25,27, 8:23, REV 13:3,7,8,12,14,16

REVELATION 17:10-12
10 And there are seven kings (7TH WORLD EMPIRE IN HISTORY) five are fallen, (EGYPT, ASSYRIA, BABYLON,:MEDO-PERSIAN,GREECE and one is,(IN POWER IN JOHNS DAY-ROME) and the other is not yet come; and when he cometh,(FUTURE-REVIVED ROMAN EMPIRE-EUROPEAN UNION TODAY) he must continue a short space.(7 YEARS OF WORLD DOMINATION-BUT 3 1/2 YEARS OF NEW WORLD ORDER OR ONE WORLD GOVERNMENT)
12 And the ten horns (10 WORLD TRADE BLOCS OR REGIONS) which thou sawest are ten kings, which have received no kingdom as yet; but receive power as kings one hour with the beast.

REVELATION 17:12-13
12 And the ten horns (10 WORLD TRADE BLOCS-NATIONS) which thou sawest are ten kings, which have received no kingdom as yet; but receive power as kings one hour with the beast.
13 These have one mind,(WORLD SOCIALISM) and shall give their power and strength unto the beast.

We shall have World Government, whether or not we like it. The only question is whether World Government will be achieved by conquest or consent.James Paul Warburg appearing before the Senate on 7th February 1950

Like a famous WWII Belgian General,Paul Henry Spock said in 1957:We need no commission, we have already too many. What we need is a man who is great enough to be able to keep all the people in subjection to himself and to lift us out of the economic bog into which we threaten to sink. Send us such a man. Be he a god or a devil, we will accept him.And today, sadly, the world is indeed ready for such a man. 

DICK MORRIS-This truly creates a global economic system. From now on, don’t look to Washington for the rule making, look to Brussels.

THE CLUB OF ROME FOUNDER AURELIO PECCEI WANTS THE WORLD IN 10 REGIONAL TRADING BLOCKS.

REVELATION 16:1-2
1 And I heard a great voice out of the temple saying to the seven angels, Go your ways, and pour out the vials of the wrath of God upon the earth.
2 And the first went, and poured out his vial upon the earth; and there fell a noisome and grievous sore upon the men which had the mark of the beast, and upon them which worshipped his image.

REVELATION 13:16-18
16 And he(FALSE POPE) causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, (SLAVE) to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:(CHIP IMPLANT)
17 And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.
18 Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.(6-6-6) A NUMBER SYSTEM

I KNOW THIS MARK WILL BE A MICROCHIP IMPLANT UNDER THE SKIN. LETS LOOK UP WHAT THE WORD MARK SAYS IN REVELATION 13:16-18, 14:9,11, 15:2, 16:2, 19:20, 20:4-ALL THESE VERSES FROM THE BOOK OF REVELATION SPEAK OF THIS DICTATORS MARK. NOW LETS SEE WHAT IT MEANS FROM STRONGS EXAUSTIVE CONCORDANCE OF THE BIBLE. UNDER MARK PAGE 684.MARK UNDER MARK. THE OLD TESTAMENT IS UNDER HEBREW AND THE NEW TESTAMENT IS UNDER GREEK. SO WHEN WE LOOK UNDER REVELATION 13:16-17 WE SEE IT IS UNDER GREEK, SO WE GO TO GREEK IN THE BACK SECTION AND GO TO 5480 TO SEE WHAT IT SAYS THIS MARK WOULD BE. SO LETS GET TO IT.MARK IN STRONGS GREEK 5480 XAPAYUA CHARAGMA, KHAR-AG-MAH: FROM THE SAME AS 5482: A SCRATCH OR ETCHING, I.E STAMP (AS A BADGE OF SERVITUDE), OR SCULPTURED FIGURE-(STATUE):-GRAVEN, MARK FROM 5482 XAPAE CHARAX, KHAR-AX; FROM XAPAOOW CHARASSO (TO SHARPEN TO A POINT; AKIN TO 1125 THROUGH THE IDEA OF SCRATCHING); A STAKE, I.E (BYIMPL.) A PALISADE OR RAMPART (MILITARY MOUND FOR CIRCUMVALLATION IN A SIEGE): - TRENCH FROM 1125 YPAPOE GRAPHO, GRAF-0; A PRIM. VERB; TO "GRAVE", ESPEC. TO WRITE; FIG. TO DESCRIBE:-DESCRIBE, WRITE (-ING, -TEN).G5516-GO TO G4742-666 - STRONGS NT 4742: στίγμα - στίγμα, στιγματος, τό (from στίζω to prick; (cf. Latinstimulus, etc.; German stechen, English stick, sting, etc.; Curtius, § 226)), a mark pricked in or branded upon the body. According to ancient oriental usage, slaves and soldiers bore the name or stamp of their master or commander branded or pricked (cut) into their bodies to indicate what master or general they belonged to, and there were even some devotees who stamped themselves in this way with the token of their gods (cf. Deyling, Observations, iii., p. 423ff); hence, τά στίγματα τοῦ (κυρίου so Rec.) Ἰησοῦ, the marks of (the Lord) Jesus, which Paul in Galatians 6:17 says he bears branded on his body, are the traces left there by the perils, hardships, imprisonments, scourgings, endured by him for the cause of Christ, and which mark him as Christ's faithful and approved votary, servant, soldier (see Lightfoots Commentary on Galatians, the passage cited). (Herodotus 7, 233; Aristotle, Aelian, Plutarch, Lcian, others.) 

THE INVENTOR OF THE MICROCHIP IMPLANT-CARL SANDERS MICROCHIP ENGINEER LEADER
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rgH9D6n4ZWo

THE MICROCHIP IMPLANT IN YOUR RIGHT HAND OR FOREHEAD.

LEVETICUS 19.28
Ye shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon you: I am the LORD.

HERES WHAT THE WORLD WOULD LOOK LIKE (SINCE THERE WILL BE WORLD GOVERNMENT IN THE FUTURE)-UPDATED VERSION (10 WORLD TRADE BLOCS)

01 CANADA, U.S.A, MEXICO
02 EUROPEAN UNION,WESTERN EUROPE
03 JAPAN
04 AUSTRALIA,NEW ZEALAND, S AFRICA, ISRAEL AND PACIFIC ISLANDS
05 EASTERN EUROPE
06 SOUTHERN, CENTRAL AND LATIN AMERICAS
07 NORTH AFRICA, AND MIDEAST (MOSLEMS)
08 CENTRAL AFRICA
09 SOUTH AND SOUTHEAST ASIA
10 CENTRAL ASIA

THE CLUB OF ROME WANTS A WORLD CHARISMATIC DICTATOR (EITHER RELIGIOUS, POLITICAL OR SCIENTIFICAL) TO HEAD THIS WORLD GOVERNMENT. REV 13:3,7-8, DAN 7:23-24

WORLD POWERS IN THE END TIME

NORTH - RUSSIA EZEK 38:1-2, 39:1-2
SOUTH - EGYPT DAN 11:42
EAST - CHINA DAN 11:44,REV 16:12
WEST - EUROPEAN UNION DAN 7:23-24 (NOT THE U.S.A)
http://israel7777777.blogspot.ca/2012/03/10-world-trade-blocs-one-world.html
http://israndjer.blogspot.ca/2006/09/how-eu-takes-world-control.html 
http://israndjer.blogspot.ca/2012/05/one-world-religion-crislam.html 

FINALLY THE EUROPEAN UNION IS TALKING ABOUT HAVING THEIR OWN ARMY.AND IT MUST HAPPEN.
REVELATION 19:16-21
16 And he hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written, King Of Kings, And Lord Of Lords.(JESUS RETURNG TO EARTH LITERALLY ON A WHITE HORSE WITH THE RAPTURED CHRISTIANS 7 YEARS EARLIER)
17 And I saw an angel standing in the sun; and he cried with a loud voice, saying to all the fowls that fly in the midst of heaven, Come and gather yourselves together unto the supper of the great God;
18 That ye may eat the flesh of kings, and the flesh of captains, and the flesh of mighty men, and the flesh of horses, and of them that sit on them, and the flesh of all men, both free and bond, both small and great.(2ND TIME GOD-JESUS TELLS THE 500 MILLION MIGRATING BIRDS TO GET READY TO EAT HUMAN FLESH.THE FIRST TIME WAS WHEN GOD TOLD THE 500 MILLION MIGRATING BIRDS-TO EAT RUSSIA,GERMAN,ARAB, MUSLIM BODIES FOR 7 MONTHS IN EZEK 38 @ 39.
19 And I saw the beast,(E.U WORLD LEADER) and the kings of the earth, and their armies,(HERE IT SAYS THE E.U WILL HAVE ITS OWN ARMY) gathered together to make war against him that sat on the horse, (JESUS) and against his army.(RAPTURED CHRISTIANS)
20 And the beast (E.U WORLD LEADER) was taken, and with him the false prophet (POPE FRANCIS) that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone.
21 And the remnant were slain with the sword of him that sat upon the horse, which sword proceeded out of his mouth: and all the fowls were filled with their flesh.

COUNCIL FOR EUROPE ON DEFENCE
https://defence-industry-space.ec.europa.eu/document/download/6d6f889c-e58d-4caa-8f3b-8b93154fe206_en?filename=SAFE%20Regulation.pdf

ECB picks Feedzai, G+D among preferred tech providers for digital euro-Oct 3, 2025, 3:51 pm EDT    | Chris Burt

Feedzai and Giesecke + Devrient are among five “first-ranked” technology providers selected by the European Central Bank (ECB) to build five components of its system for managing the digital euro.Suppliers were named in two ranks, with the first option getting service requests and the second “approached only if required,” the ECB says.The ECB chose Feedzai to build the risk and fraud management component of the system, with Capgemini as the second option. G+D and its partners Nexi and Capgemini have been chosen for the offline solution, with the second option yet-unnamed. Partners Sapient and Tremend Software Consulting have been named for the alias lookup component, with Dutch payment company equensWorldline as backup. Almaviva and Fabrick won the app and SDK development job, with Sapient and Tremend second choice, and Senacor will get first dibs on the secure exchange of payment information, followed by equensWorldline.All of the above have signed framework agreements, which do not entail any payment yet, but Feedzai estimates the risk and fraud management component alone could be worth 79.1 million euros (approximately US$92.9 million) or more, up to €237.3 million (US$278.6 million). Feedzai has subcontracted PwC for its work on that component.“Being selected as the first-ranked tenderer in the framework agreement to secure the digital euro is both an honor and a responsibility,” says Feedzai CEO and Co-founder Nuno Sebastião. “With tens of billions of transactions expected across the eurozone, success depends on AI that can adapt as quickly as fraud evolves. Our role is to provide the intelligence that keeps even the most sophisticated fraud out, ensuring trust in every digital euro transaction from day one.”Feedzai detects fraud risk through behavior analysis, transaction history monitoring and device data.The company also just announced a $75 million investment round at a $2 billion valuation.G+D notes the digital euro is expected to enable direct peer-to-peer payments without the involvement of a third party, like cash is in the physical world. The estimated value of its component is €220.7 million, with a cap of €662.1 million.The contracts are for 4 years, but could be extended to 15.The ECB brought in experts in digital identity and authentication to help establish the rules for the digital euro in 2023, but has committed to issue digital euros only after the Digital Euro Regulation has been adopted.

Biometrics enrollment and Big Brother fears loom: is the post office the answer? Oct 4, 2025, 1:49 pm EDT    | Chris Burt

Biometrics hold stunning potential for establishing trust and enabling inclusion for people living outside of bureaucratic systems, but these goals can clash. A possible solution for national ID systems emerges from some of the week’s top articles on Biometric Update.The role of the post office in an era of digital government may be delivering trust, in the form of biometric binding for digital credentials. Governments and online platforms around the world are running up huge trust deficits, but perhaps one of the more reliable public institutions, possibly rebranded as the “trust office,” can provide some of the basic assurances necessary.Feedzai’s impressive funding round shows the confidence investors have in the latest fraud prevention technologies once people are interacting with digital financial services.Public opinion divide-The UK government’s mandatory digital ID plan has left digital identity providers certified under the DIATF wondering if they have wasted effort and money only to be undercut. PM Kier Starmer’s proposal aligns with suggestions from former Labour PM Tony Blair’s eponymous institute, which counts an American Big Tech mogul among its major doners, and is facing immediate resistance in Ireland and Scotland. DSIT has promised a consultation, but offered little detail on the plan so far.Switzerland is also divided over digital ID, with 50.4 percent approving a government plan in a national referendum. The narrow margin laid bare a lack of trust that the government will have to address as it rolls out the optional digital ID and Swiyu digital wallet. The result does represent 14 percent more support than the Swiss national digital ID had in 2021, though, providing some hope for its proponents.People are right to be skeptical of digital IDs, says Andy Higgs of DINZ, but the group sees New Zealand as ready for decentralized identities in the form of mobile driver’s licenses, which could be launched by the end of 2025. Open standards for digital wallets, ZKPs and the Biometric Processing Privacy Code all contribute to that readiness.Countries around the world are looking for a range of benefits from their digital ID, from the immigration reduction intentions of the UK to the economic boost Sri Lanka is hoping for by enabling its fintech sector. Most of these goals require a tricky combination of robust biometric enrollment and identity binding and inclusive availability. One institution that has long trafficked in trust and accessibility is the post office.A new purpose for a venerable institution? In the UK, the Post Office is already a digital ID provider, through a partnership with Yoti, but a new paper from the organization says it can do more. The paper says the removal of Biometric Residence Card collection and other services has hurt its bottom line, but it could be made sustainable again if designated the in-person contact point for the digital ID system for interactions like biometrics enrollment.Poste Italiane is already Italy’s top provider of digital ID services, and it has provoked some criticism from the public with the announcement of plans to start charging fees for them. Competitors Aruba and InfoCert are already charging for SPID services though, and Post Italiane serves around half of the country’s digital ID users.A new report from eu-LISA on digital travel identity management emphasizes the need for continuous research and investment in technology. The report delves into the potential of blockchain for people claiming asylum, and the challenge of remote biometrics enrollment.America’s border biometrics-Bi2 has won a contract with ICE worth up to $4.6 million to supply iris biometrics for enforcement field operations. ICE will use the MORIS mobile front-end system and the IRIS back-end to match subjects against millions of arrest records.The golden work visa scheme put in place by U.S. President Donald Trump could dramatically cut a source of funding to DHS for the biometric entry-exit system. But the collections have disappointed so far anyway, and funding specifically allocated to biometrics spiked with the allocation of $165 billion for the department earlier this year.CBP’s biometric exit is continuing to evolve, quietly adding scans with mobile devices carried by federal officers to the cameras installed at boarding gates by airlines, following an extensive testing process. Little is known about the mobile devices used, however, fueling suspicions about government surveillance.Startup and scale-up-Handwave CEO Janis Sturna discuss the potential of hashed palm biometrics for a range of applications including payments, loyalty programs and age assurance in the latest episode of the Biometric Update Podcast. He explains the combination of characteristics his company uses, and its U.S. expansion plans.Feedzai has raised $75 million at a $2 billion valuation, and plans to scale its fraud protection business and developing technology for its comprehensive platform. The company also signed a potentially lucrative agreement with the ECB to support the digital euro.Please let us know if you spot any webinars, reports or other content we should share with the people in biometrics and the digital identity community, either in the comments below or via social media.

Hold your horses and don’t call it a card’: UK govt to digital ID petitioners-Clarity on DIATF certifications for Right to Work pending-Oct 2, 2025, 5:00 pm EDT    | Chris Burt

The UK government has responded to a petition calling for a commitment to not launch a national digital ID with a firm “no.”A response from the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) to the petition, which had garnered 2.7 million signatures as of late evening UK time on October 2, promises a public consultation in the weeks ahead. It also casts the status of numerous businesses and their investments in supporting the UK’s digital ambitions into doubt.“By the end of this Parliament, employers will have to check the new digital ID when conducting a ‘right to work’ check,” DSIT says.There are currently more than 40 service providers certified for Right to Work checks under the Digital Identity and Attributes Trust Framework (DIATF). The government has previously suggested that its plans for GOV.UK still leave plenty of room for private sector roles, particularly around orchestration. But less than 20 percent of those certified for Right to Work qualify as orchestration service providers (OSPs)Robin Tombs, co-founder and CEO of one of those DIATF-certified providers, Yoti, commented on the success of the private-sector issued credentials and expressed hope for clarity in a LinkedIn post.The response from DSIT begins by explaining the rationale behind the move, in terms of first tackling illegal migration, then of “making people’s everyday lives easier and more secure,” and finally “driving growth.”  By way of clarification, the government says “the new digital ID will build on the GOV.UK One Login and the GOV.UK Wallet.” DSIT also notes: “This is not a card.”The Department says it will consult with employers, trade unions, civil society “and other stakeholders” on the new system’s design, and then bring forward legislation to back it.At the recent Labour Party conference, Prime Minister Kier Starmer did not talk about his digital ID plans. But his former communications adviser Peter Hyman said at a meeting during the conference that the plan “will be dead in the water in six months’ time” if the approach to communicating about it is not corrected, The Register reports.Here come the exceptions-Another type of consultation has already begun, with Secretary of State for Northern Ireland Hilary Benn holding discussions with the Irish Government about how the plan will apply there.He acknowledged the possibility that Ireland could issue its own digital ID, and expressed optimism that the system could be applied in a way that aligns with the Good Friday Agreement and the Common Travel Area.Lindsay de Sausmarez, President of Guernsey’s Policy and Resources Committee says “no decision” has been made yet on whether the digital ID plans apply in the self-governing Crown dependency, the BBC reports.

Denmark closes airspace to civilian drones amid rise in sightings-by Danielle Haynes

Washington DC (UPI) Sep 29, 2025-Denmark will ban all civilian drones beginning Monday over safety concerns as Copenhagen prepares to host an EU summit on European defense.Transport Minister Thomas Danielsen announced the airspace closure Sunday after a slew of incidents involving unidentified drones in recent weeks. The closure will be in effect from Monday to Friday.He said the drones have created disruption and uncertainty in the country, particularly among the military and police. He said the closure of airspace to civilian drone use will allow law enforcement to focus on security for EU meetings Thursday and Friday.The European Council is meeting informally Thursday to address general defense in Europe as well as the body's support for Ukraine amid its war with Russia. A more formal summit of the European political community is expected to take place Friday.Last week, Denmark's defense minister, Troels Lund Poulson, said the recent drone sightings in Danish airspace likely weren't by Russia though there has been a rise in Russian violations of allied airspace. He instead described them as "hybrid attacks," meaning they were the result of different types of drones. Authorities believed they were launched from somewhere local.The drone incidents have caused Denmark to at times shut down airports and the airspace around its largest military base.During his speech Wednesday before the U.N. General Assembly in New York City, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned the international community that Russia's advanced weaponry and defense technology is putting the entirety of Europe under threat. He cited Moscow's use of drones and artificial intelligence."We are living through the most destructive arms race in human history," Zelensky said.European leaders, including Poulson, met on the sidelines of the U.N. general debate last week to discuss the establishment of a "drone wall" to prevent drone attacks -- from Russia or otherwise. The system to detect and disable drones would create a virtual wall along eastern EU countries, including Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland.There have been other unidentified drone sightings in Lithuania, Poland and Romania.

Former Boston Police Commissioner joins ROC Board of Directors-One Identity names CEO, Signicat, Alcatraz, Ping focus on market expansion-Oct 5, 2025, 2:26 pm EDT    | Stephen Mayhew

U.S. biometrics firm ROC has appointed former Boston Police Commissioner Edward F. Davis III to its Board of Directors.Commissioner Davis, who guided the city through the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing response, brings more than 35 years of frontline leadership in law enforcement, crisis management, and public safety innovation to the dual role as Independent Board Director and Chair of ROC’s Audit Committee.Davis will provide ROC strategic guidance and oversight as the company expands its AI-powered biometrics, video analytics, and decision intelligence platform to serve law enforcement, national security, and commercial markets worldwide.Praerit Garg named One Identity CEO-Unified cloud-first identity solutions provider One Identity has named Praerit Garg Chief Executive Officer replacing current CEO Mark Logan.Garg brings deep expertise in identity and access management and SaaS product leadership across both startups and large enterprises.Prior to joining One Identity, Garg served as President of Product & Innovation at Smartsheet; GM of Identity, Directory, and Access Services at Amazon Web Services (AWS); co-founder of Symform, a cloud- storage startup later acquired by Quantum; and held various product and engineering roles at Microsoft, contributing to the development of Windows software and its security features, including Active Directory.Signicat appoints to drive growth Sweden-Signicat has named Sofia Busck as Country Manager Sweden to strengthen the digital IDV provider’s customer relationships and drive growth in Sweden, the wider Nordic region, as well as Europe.Busck brings more than a decade of leadership experience across commercial strategy, customer success, and operational growth in regulated and technology-driven sectors, most recently as Chief Revenue Officer at Worldfavor. She has served in market expansion and operational excellence roles at Klarna, and managed strategy and operational transformation projects for financial services clients at EY.Busck will be based in Stockholm and report to Joakim Harging, Chief Enterprise Nordics & UK at Signicat.Alcatraz taps security industry vet to expand strategic partnerships-Alcatraz has appointed Kasia Hanson to Vice President of Strategic Partnerships, responsible for expanding the facial biometric authentication company’s partner ecosystem and deepening relationships across key sectors including critical infrastructure, corporate campuses, higher education, and major stadiums and venues.Hanson’s experience includes more than two decades at Intel, where she led the Global Security Ecosystem Development and Partnerships team in the Security Center of Excellence and advanced go-to-market strategies for AI, IoT, edge computing and cybersecurity.Ping Identity names new ANZ sales director-Daniel Gardner has been appointed Ping Identity Sales Director for Australia and New Zealand.Based in Sydney, Gardner will focus on expanding the presence of the Ping Identity Platform among public and private sector organizations. Gardner returns to Ping Identity after having previously served Account Executive.Alcatraz CEO joins Bay Area Council Board of Directors-Alcatraz CEO Tina D’Agostin has been appointed to the Bay Area Council Board of Directors and will serve as Co-Chair of the Council’s Public Safety Committee.D’Agostin is a recognized leader in biometric authentication and security with more than 25 years of experience in smart building and city technologies. She has contributed to skyline-changing projects across the Bay Area, bringing advanced security and infrastructure expertise to some of the region’s most ambitious developments.The Bay Area Council is a business-sponsored public policy organization and plays a vital role in convening government and industry leaders to address issues of public trust, infrastructure resilience, and technology readiness.

FTC warns companies not to soften policy to accommodate UK, EU online safety laws-Transatlantic sparring continues, this time over iffy cybersecurity concerns-Oct 3, 2025, 2:46 pm EDT    | Joel R. McConvey

The U.S. government does not like Europe’s new digital safety laws. It does not like them on free speech, claiming that they stifle the First Amendment rights of American companies. And now, it has issued a warning that companies implementing policies to comply with foreign tech laws could be engaging in deceptive or unfair business practices.A report from MLex cites comments from the chairman of the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC), Andrew Ferguson, who says weakening encryption or other security measures to comply with laws like the UK’s Online Safety Act (OSA) or the EU’s Digital Services Act (DSA) could violate Section 5 of the FTC Act.If a company tells consumers that it “encrypts or otherwise keeps secure online communications but adopts weaker security due to the actions of a foreign government, such conduct may deceive consumers who rightfully expect effective security, not the increased susceptibility to breach or intercept desired by a foreign power.”The suggestion is that the U.S. law offers better data protection than the EU or UK for tech giants like Apple, Amazon, Meta and X. Given how the current administration is trending, it is most likely to be one of two things: a warning not to put foreign interests ahead of America’s, or a boastful slight aimed at the EU and UK.Meanwhile, UK regulatory developments continue to fell violators – or at least chase them away. Having received notice that it faced an imminent fine from the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) over violations of the Children’s Code, MediaLab, which owns image sharing site Imgur, has yanked the site from the UK.“From September 30, 2025, access to Imgur from the United Kingdom is no longer available,” says a notice on its website. “UK users will not be able to log in, view content, or upload images. Imgur content embedded on third-party sites will not display for UK users.”According to The Register, the ICO’s interim executive director, Tim Capel, says its findings are provisional, and that the ICO is willing to consider evidence before issuing a fine. However, he also says MediaMatters can be fined even if Imgur is no longer available to UK users: “We have been clear that exiting the UK does not allow an organization to avoid responsibility for any prior infringement of data protection law, and our investigation remains ongoing.”OneID to enable age verification per item on ShopWired-UK-based eCommerce platform ShopWired has integrated OneID’s bank-based digital identity and age verification offerings. A release from OneID says it means merchants on ShopWired can now apply product-level age restrictions, marking individual items for automatic age checks during checkout.Customizable settings mean merchants can enable an “always verify” option for stricter compliance, and comprehensive admin controls that allow merchants to manage and audit age verification and import and export verification details for reporting purposes.“We are delighted to partner with ShopWired to deliver frictionless, bank-verified age checks at the point of purchase,” says Keith Mabbitt, Chief Commercial Officer at OneID. “This collaboration ensures merchants can comply with regulations while offering customers the simplest, most secure way to prove their age – without ever oversharing personal data.”KWS to power age checks for Bluesky in Ohio-Ohio’s age assurance law for adult content is now in effect, and that means implementing age verification for red hot, salacious nookie sites – like left-wing social media platform Bluesky, which has announced it will enable Kids Web Services’ (KWS) age verification in the state, according to the Columbus Dispatch.Once Missouri’s law goes into effect later this year, half of all states in the U.S. will have enacted online safety laws with age verification requirements.

Biometrics, identity services caught in crossfire of Washington funding stalemate-Oct 3, 2025, 2:05 pm EDT    | Anthony Kimery

The U.S. government’s lapse in congressional funding has produced a patchwork of stoppages and slowdowns across federal systems that hinge on biometrics and digital identity. Some high-visibility programs are fully suspended; others are operating under “excepted” status with fewer staff and longer delays.The clearest shutdowns so far are at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) where the government’s gold-standard biometric evaluations have been taken offline, and at U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ (USCIS) E-Verify program, which is unavailable to employers.Meanwhile, credentialing centers that enroll federal workers for PIV cards are warning of limited coverage or closures. At the same time, frontline border and aviation screening are continuing, albeit with the strains that come with extended operations during a shutdown.The most consequential pause for the biometrics industry is at NIST. The agency has posted an explicit banner stating that its Face Recognition Technology Evaluation (FRTE), Face Analysis Technology Evaluation (FATE), and iris evaluation (IREX) are suspended for the duration of the shutdown, with no submissions processed and no inquiries answered until funding resumes.For companies that time product launches, accuracy claims, or sales cycles to new leaderboard results, the stoppage freezes a primary yardstick of performance and a key source of marketing validation. That affects a broad swath of face and iris vendors that regularly participate in NIST testing.E-Verify, the employment eligibility system used by millions of workers and hundreds of thousands of participating employers, is also down. USCIS has placed an “E-Verify is Temporarily Unavailable” notice on its program pages and on the public E-Verify site, reflecting the program’s reliance on annual appropriations rather than user fees.In practical terms, employers cannot create new cases, resolve tentative nonconfirmations, enroll new accounts, or access case data while the system is offline. Advisories emphasize that standard Form I-9 obligations still apply and that, consistent with prior shutdowns, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) suspends E-Verify’s three-day case-creation deadline and tolls the clock on mismatch resolution until the system returns.For HR platforms and employer agents that integrate directly with E-Verify’s APIs, this means building queues and preparing for a surge of backlogged submissions once funding is restored.Not everything tied to biometrics is shuttered. USCIS’s core casework continues because the agency is primarily fee-funded. That includes routine application processing and the operation of Application Support Centers that capture biometrics, though USCIS has cautioned that dependencies on other agencies or conditions created by the broader shutdown can still introduce delays.In short, while petition adjudications keep moving, some steps that rely on outside systems may slow.At DHS’s operational components, most frontline screening and enforcement remain “excepted” activities. DHS’s contingency guidance outlines how essential functions continue during a lapse in appropriations and travel reporting this week reflects that Transportation Security Administration officers and other critical staff are working without pay, a dynamic that can stretch operations if the shutdown persists.For the public, that means airports and land borders remain open and biometric traveler screening continues, but protracted shutdowns can translate into longer lines or episodic service disruptions as fatigue and staffing constraints mount.Customs and Border Protection’s (CBP) traveler statistics and advisory pages carry the standard banner noting that sites won’t be actively updated during the lapse, which is a signal of staffing limitations rather than a shutdown of border operations themselves.One federal identity service that is seeing immediate, tangible effects is the government’s HSPD-12 credentialing network for federal employees and contractors. The General Services Administration (GSA), which oversees USAccess credentialing centers where enrollees provide fingerprints and identity documents for PIV cards is warning that centers may be operating under limited coverage or closed during the shutdown.Federal workers scheduled for enrollments, activations, or maintenance appointments are being told to check for cancellations and confirm a site’s status before traveling. That translates into potential delays for on- and off-boarding and for routine card maintenance across agencies that rely on USAccess sites.By contrast, the government’s public authentication hub, Login.gov, has no outage notice and continues to be described in GSA documentation as a shared service with a standing authority to operate. That said, during previous government shutdowns GSA has prioritized continuity for core services while deferring some noncritical support and feature work.Users should expect the authentication experience to remain available, even if ancillary program updates are slower while the agency manages through the funding gap.The indirect effects are more diffuse but no less real. TSA and CBP continue biometric screening at checkpoints and ports of entry, which prevents the kind of cascading disruption a full stop would cause, but prolonged shutdowns have historically produced absenteeism and operational stress, and this one begins against a backdrop of national staffing shortfalls in aviation.If the stalemate in Congress lingers, travelers could see longer queues, slower redress, and federal agencies may defer non-urgent technology deployments or data refreshes. Those decisions reverberate into industry roadmaps, especially for airport biometrics and identity-verification pilots that depend on government personnel for testing, data collection, or approvals.For federal identity credentials, the USAccess warnings translate into concrete scheduling risk for the workforce and for vendors that support identity proofing, card issuance, and lifecycle management.Missed or delayed appointments ripple into delayed building and system access for new hires, postponed renewals for expiring credentials, and slowed remediation when cards or certificates need reissuance.In the private sector, contractors that require timely PIV provisioning to begin work on site can find contract start dates slipping day by day.If the standoff is resolved quickly, the impact will look like a temporary freeze with a noisy restart. If it doesn’t, watch three pressure points. NIST’s testing calendar, which sets an industry tempo for face and iris claims, will compress, crowding releases later into the year.Employer compliance operations will be juggling paper-first I-9s and pent-up E-Verify submissions, a burden that falls heavily on large onboarding platforms and employer agents.And finally, the longer USAccess sites run on reduced coverage, the more agencies and contractors will slip schedules that depend on PIV enrollments and reissuances. Those are the places where a funding fight spills directly into the identity layer of government services, and into the timelines of the companies that power it.

NYPD turns public housing Internet program into surveillance network-Oct 3, 2025, 1:35 pm EDT    | Anthony Kimery

The New York Police Department (NYPD) has quietly begun wiring cameras at scale in public housing into its real-time surveillance network, sparking a political battle over privacy, transparency, and the use of digital-equity infrastructure as a policing tool.By tapping the broadband lines of the city’s Big Apple Connect program, officers are now able to watch New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) residents through a live feed connected to NYPD’s Domain Awareness System (DAS), a move officials say will speed investigations, but which critics warn turns public housing into a testing ground for expanded government monitoring.Originally designed as a counterterrorism platform, DAS now aggregates CCTV, license-plate readers, 911 calls, complaint, arrest and warrant data, and other NYPD databases, and can surface linked records about people, locations, and vehicles.The public first got a clear picture of the scope of the system’s expansion this week when the New York City Council held an emergency oversight hearing in response to reporting that the mayor’s administration has been using Big Apple Connect to wire NYCHA’s CCTV network directly into DAS.At the hearing, the NYPD’s information-technology chief testified that 68 cameras at one development are already live and that the department plans to add roughly 1,900 cameras across 19 properties by year’s end, with a longer-term buildout to nearly 17,900 cameras at 119 developments.He framed the change as an “unbelievably valuable” shift from after-the-fact retrieval to instant access that can show crimes unfolding and rapidly identify suspects, witnesses, or dead ends.Council members pressed officials on why none of this had been publicly disclosed until contract records surfaced. City technology officials conceded they had not notified residents and apologized for contradictory statements given over the summer.The NYPD also acknowledged it may share information gleaned from NYCHA feeds with federal immigration authorities “when required by law.”The broadband program was extended last week through 2028, locking in city spending at an annual cost of about $38 million, well over $100 million over the term.The mayor’s office touted the digital-equity benefits, including free Internet for more than 300,000 residents while advocates warn that an infrastructure marketed as a social good is now doubling as a law-enforcement backhaul.Civil liberties organizations and technologists reacted sharply as details emerged. The Surveillance Technology Oversight Project argued that public housing has repeatedly been used as a proving ground for invasive policing tools, and that “using public broadband does not mean anyone invited NYPD into their homes.”The group said residents need “surveillance-free broadband” to participate in daily life without becoming the subjects of continuous monitoring.BetaNYC’s executive director likewise warned that linking public-housing cameras to the Domain Awareness System without POST Act transparency or resident input “erodes trust and threatens civil liberties” and undermines public support for the very broadband programs meant to close the digital divide.The POST Act, in its current or revised form, mandates certain disclosures of surveillance technologies, data flows, retention, and usage policies, though gaps and enforcement challenges persist.Defense attorneys and community advocates carried their concerns into the council chamber. A Harlem public defender testified that NYPD surveillance in NYCHA has already been used to watch who young people spend time with on camera, raising First Amendment questions about freedom of association.Council members also honed in on the integration with the Domain Awareness System, which has long been criticized for opacity around facial recognition and “precision policing” models.NYPD officials said they can audit which officers view specific feeds and for how long. Council members suggested that independent, proactive auditing is needed to prevent “suspicionless long-term monitoring of individual residents.”In the weeks leading up to the hearing, New York Focus traced how the plan evolved behind closed doors. NYCHA initially told the outlet that Big Apple Connect “is not intended to support” its cameras; OTI, the city’s tech office, insisted there were “no live feeds.”Later, NYPD confirmed the program allows officers to view live video, access playback, and pull up to 30 days of footage, contradictions that fueled council demands for a halt and a full accounting. Local coverage by News12 and amNewYork amplified those findings and helped trigger the emergency session.In April the city council strengthened the POST Act with a package that, among other provisions, empowers the Department of Investigation to demand detailed inventories of surveillance tech, mandated a public policy and biannual audits for facial recognition, and requires disclosure of all outside entities that receive NYPD surveillance data.The Brennan Center, which pushed for the reforms after the city’s inspector general flagged compliance gaps, said the updated law closes some longstanding loopholes that let the NYPD sidestep meaningful disclosure. Council leaders who shepherded the package through have since signaled they want tighter auditing and clearer rules for inter-agency data sharing connected to NYCHA feeds.Lawmakers meanwhile have begun to introduce measures specifically aimed at oversight of the NYCHA pipeline.Sponsors and privacy groups are also floating resident-centric guardrails, notifying tenants when live access is activated at a development, posting clear signage and impact-use policies at building entrances, publishing selection criteria for camera integration, and setting retention limits with independent audits.The mayoral administration and NYPD argue the change is a technical modernization, not a “new technology,” and therefore not subject to the POST Act’s public notice provisions.That interpretation landed poorly with council members and civil liberties groups, who countered saying that swapping “how” access occurs is precisely the sort of shift the POST Act was written to surface.The debate matters because the POST Act’s updated rules now require disclosure of data flows to outside agencies and regular audits of sensitive systems, obligations that would directly address advocates’ concerns about immigration referrals and cross-database profiling.For residents, the stakes are immediate. Real-time camera access, wired through an equity-branded broadband network, risks normalizing continuous observation of exteriors, lobbies, and corridors with potential ripple effects into gang databases, predictive-policing models, and immigration enforcement.The city council’s hearing, powered by document disclosures pried loose through records litigation, forced the city to acknowledge that residents were not informed and that public explanations shifted under scrutiny.With the broadband program extended through 2028, pressure is likely to climb for statutory guardrails that move oversight from internal logs to independent audits that treat method changes as “new” for transparency purposes, and that guarantee public-housing tenants the right to know when their buildings become nodes in the city’s surveillance web.

Norway’s data privacy watchdog seeks ban on remote biometric identification-DPA lobbying to become designated market surveillance authority-Oct 3, 2025, 12:58 pm EDT    | Joel R. McConvey

Norway is exploring stronger regulations on AI – and a potential ban on biometric recognition technology for surveillance.A translated statement from Datatilsynet, the Norwegian Data Protection Authority (DPA), offers recommendations on a new law submitted for consultation by the Ministry of Digitalisation and Public Administration.Among the main recommendations are a demand for a national ban on what translates as “remote biometric identification” – defined here as tech that “aims to identify natural persons without their participation, usually at a distance, by comparing a person’s biometric data with the biometric data in a reference database.” (In other words, 1-n facial recognition, including live facial recognition.)“The use of remote biometric identification constitutes a serious infringement of privacy and the right to privacy,” it says. As such, it calls for a general ban in Norway against the use of biometric recognition, regardless of purpose.“These are measures that involve major interference with the right to privacy, cf. Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) and Section 102 of the Constitution, and which may also have consequences for other fundamental rights, such as freedom of expression and freedom of assembly.”It notes that “the Ministry is assuming that such use is illegal today in any case. However, the Norwegian Data Protection Authority believes that borderline cases and situations of doubt may arise, and that this should therefore be included and specified in a prohibitory provision in law.”Full adoption of the AI Act into national law-The DPA also calls for clearer frameworks on the implementation of the EU AI Act in Norwegian law, emphasizing that the entire regulation is implemented in Norwegian law to “ensure that the legal protection of Norwegian citizens is not weaker than for other citizens in the EU.”The agency says it is “positive about taking on a role as a market surveillance authority,” as designated by the ministry, and believes it should be given “supervisory responsibility for the use of high-risk AI systems for law enforcement purposes.”Alas, it says, this requires sufficient resources. Or – in a cruder translation – ante up to support protections.But, keep your distance.“We also emphasize the need for independence, both in its own role and in the case of a possible complaints body. We further point out that a complaints body must have sufficient expertise and that the market surveillance authorities must be able to bring legal proceedings in important cases.”Additional recommendations seek clarification on questions of jurisdiction, fines and information sharing, and call for the establishment of “a list of public authorities that oversee fundamental rights.”

Zambia plans domestic digital ID development with help from international partners-Deals to support national ID, biometric cards for refugees-Oct 3, 2025, 12:20 pm EDT    | Chris Burt

Zambia is engaging with a continental leader in digital identity and international institutions as it works to issue digital identity to its people and improve the conditions for refugees and their host communities in the country.The government is launching the new Zambia Refugee and Host Communities Project (ZRHCP) with $30 million in support from the World Bank and technical support from UNHCR. The funding is provided under the IDA20 Window for Host Communities and Refugees (WHR).The World Bank committed $120 million to support Zambia’s implementation of digital public infrastructure (DPI) earlier this year.Biometric national registration cards will be issued to refugees and former refugees under the initiative, which is managed by Zambia’s Ministry of Home Affairs and Internal Security (MoHAIS).Home Affairs and Internal Security Minister Jack Mwiimbu said in the announcement by UNHCR that the biometric cards are intended “to improve access to socio-economic opportunities for both refugees and host communities.” The government also hopes to improve access to essential services.Schools, healthcare facilities, water systems and roads will be upgraded as part of the project, in a bid to enable sustainable development.The country participated in a workshop with the UNHCR on forcibly displaced people at ID4Africa’s 2024 AGM.There are 112,000 refugees and forcibly displaced persons residing in Zambia. The project is planned for completing at the end of October, 2028.MoU with Ethiopia-The leaders of SMART Zambia and Ethiopia’s national ID authority have signed a Memorandum of Understanding to collaborate on digital identity implementation, TechAfrica News reports.SMART Zambia Institute National Coordinator Percy Chinyama noted the value of digital ID for public access to healthcare, education, banking, and social services, as well as benefits to government transparency and accountability.The agreement, signed by Chinyama and Yodahe Zemichael, ED of Ethiopia’s NIDP, deepens bilateral relations between the countries, according to the report.Chinyama said during the Africa Innovation Conference, held in April in Addis Ababa, that Zambia wants to follow Ethiopia’s model for national digital identity because it is centered on a domestically developed system, according to reporting by TechAfrica News at the time.Zambia’s E-Government Division, meanwhile, is taking proposals at it prepares to tender a contract for a Mobile Virtual Network Operator for the SMART Zambia Institute (SZI) under a public-private partnership (PPP).The goal is to upgrade the e-government platform to lower the cost of service delivery and enable the agency to tailor the services it is rolling out. Perhaps most importantly, the current platform is hindering government efforts to identify duplicate social program beneficiaries.

Papua New Guinea prepares digital ID trust framework ahead of 2026 launch-Oct 3, 2025, 12:13 pm EDT    | Chris Burt

Papua New Guinea’s Cabinet has approved the National Digital Identity Policy 2025, under which the government plans to issue a secure and interoperable digital ID to all citizens.The National Executive Council (NEC) endorsed the plan from the Department of Information and Communications Technology, which would establish a Digital Identity and Trust Framework. The digital ID is intended for use with public services, the government says, and could lower fraud and improve data protection in the country.PNG piloted its SevisPass digital identity successfully in 2024, and began promoting it to stakeholders and integrating data earlier this year.Acting Minister for ICT Peter Tsiamalili Jr. hailed the approval as a transformative moment for PNG.“We are not just catching up—we are setting a new standard for digital governance in the Pacific,” Minister Tsiamalili said in a government announcement. “This is about building trust, protecting rights, and unlocking opportunities for every citizen.”The implementation is planned to begin early next year, and proceed in phases.PNG’s government is also warning the public about fake websites requesting personal information from visitors.Digital ID details emerge-The policy document positions Papua New Guinea’s Digital Identity and Trust Framework as a foundational piece of its digital public infrastructure (DPI). The framework will be built with “an open, modular and interoperable architecture, aligned with international best practices such as ITU’s GovStack.”The government wants to roll out the “SevisPass Digital ID and Trust Framework” over 18 months, with a six-month “stabilization” period following.It will involve developing minimum viable products for the SevisPass, SevisWallet, SevisPortal, SevisAdminPortal, and SevisDEx, which are identified as key system components.While the government announcement stresses the use of the digital ID for government services, the policy notes its value for financial services, including in completing KYC and AML checks and meeting FATF standards.It also stipulates that the system must include multiple authentication options, including biometrics, one-time passwords (OTPs), QR codes and PINs.Enrollment will include biometrics, but allowances will be made for those medically unable to provide them.The policy also explicitly states that digital ID cannot be required to access essential services.

Facial recognition strengthens security for Asia’s expanding rail, metro sector: Panel-Oct 3, 2025, 11:16 am EDT    | Ayang Macdonald

In a recent webinar organized by RecFaces, biometrics and transportations security experts explored how facial recognition systems can be useful in ensuring the safety and security of rail and metro passengers in Asia.Contributions during the exchange came from Oleg Kurychkin, Business Development executive for Asia Pacific at RecFaces; Dr. Ajay Talwar, head of Business Verticals for India & SARC at Bosch Security and Safety Systems, and Shadan Khan, chief security commissioner at South Central Railway (SCR) in India.The discussions come on the heels of a surge in those modes of public transportation and the challenges that come with them in countries including Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand, the Philippines, Cambodia and India. Projections suggest the use of rail and metro means of transportation in Asia will reach 97 percent by 2050.In the course of the webinar, discussants touched on how face biometrics can strengthen both security and operational capacity, cited examples of successful biometric deployments for transit, and looked at how operational optimization can be achieved using data-driven approaches.The panelists acknowledged that Asia’s rail and metro sector is expanding rapidly, driven by a number of factors that include government investment, sustainability goals, and passenger demand. Alongside infrastructure growth, operators are increasingly embracing digitalization and, specifically, facial biometrics to enhance security, streamline operations, and improve the passenger experience.Kurychkin noted the security pressures that come with those systems of transport. “Railways are the critical infrastructure. They move millions of people and goods every day, and that makes them attractive targets for organized theft, vandalism and even terrorism,” he said,He then added why biometrics should be used as a proactive security measure. “Manual ID checks take 30-60 seconds. With facial biometrics, verification takes less than one second. They just have to approach the gate, look at the camera, and pass through. It is simple, intuitive, and effortless.”Talwar emphasized that biometric security for these transport systems must be deployed with reliable and proven surveillance infrastructure in order to be effective. He also highlighted Bosch’s long-standing role in metro and railway security, citing the Delhi Metro where their platforms have been operational since 2002.“Delhi Metro Rail Corporation has been using our solution for more than two decades now, at more than 300 locations,” he said, before adding that “these systems are very complex; it is not simple installing cameras nowadays, it is becoming more of an AI-based thing.”Khan, for his part, admitted that rail and metro projects are capital-intensive which means there’s need for stronger government involvement. He also shared his thoughts about the issue of security, stating that because of the growing vulnerability to theft, vandalism, and terrorism and with rising passenger volumes, technology must be inevitably used to fill the gap. He referenced their own system.“Thanks to a very well-functioning facial recognition system, we could handle the Kumbh Mela mega event [a religious gathering] successfully and securely,” he said. “The smartness of the system is that even with cover-ups like masks or caps, it recognizes the face and gives us the real-time alert.”Facial recognition shaping urban mobility-Meanwhile, in an analysis, RecFaces explains that many of the countries in Asia are resorting to rail and metro facial recognition for several reasons including ticketless boarding, contactless travel payments, enhanced security through real-time alerts, fraud reduction and operational efficiency.The analysis cites examples from Japan, Indonesia and India where rail and metro networks have face biometrics systems, some on pilots and others on full deployment.Japan’s Osaka Metro, it says, has installed facial recognition gates at 130 of its 134 stations in order to improve passenger flow and security, while JR East network is trialling facial recognition on the Joetsu Shinkansen line for ticketless boarding.The write-up mentions the Indonesia example where facial recognition systems have been installed and are active in 22 major rail and metro stations. Passengers can use the system from a mobile app to complete contactless boarding in a move that also seeks fight congestion and contribute to greener travel following a jump in car ownership.In India, biometrics deployments appear to be motivated more by security, rather than easily ticketing, RecFaces notes. It mentions that an AI-based face biometrics system is being deployed in seven of the country’s busiest railway stations to assist in the real-time identification of persons linked to serious offenses.RecFaces says it is well positioned “to provide the expertize, technology, and compliance needed to make Asian metros and railways ticketless, contactless, and secure for millions of daily passengers.”

Meta allows impersonation scams to run rampant as political deepfakes hawk phony benefits-Fake likenesses of Trump, Musk, Ocasio-Cortez flood social giant’s ad library-Oct 3, 2025, 12:08 pm EDT    | Joel R. McConvey

By now, it is hardly a secret that social media, and Facebook in particular, has become a garbage dump for bad information. Already targeted by foreign actors as fertile ground in which to sow discontent and partisan hostility, its inextricable ties to AI development mean it is now awash in so-called AI slop: memes, images and advertisements created with generative learning models.It’s an ideal habitat for scammers. A new investigation by the Tech Transparency Project (TTP) has found that scammers are spending heavily on Facebook ads that use deepfake videos of prominent political figures to push bogus government benefits. They come from groups with names like I Love My Freedom and End the Wokeness, and Get Covered Today.“Scammers who use deepfake videos of Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and lawmakers like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Bernie Sanders to promote fictitious government benefits are among the top political ad spenders on Meta platforms,” it says.Sixty-three 63 scam advertisers are responsible for 150,000 political ads on Meta platforms, spending a whopping 49 million dollars – putting them among the top political ad spenders on Facebook and Instagram in 2025.Scams target seniors with dubious incentives-The bait is fake stimulus checks, government spending cards and Medicare payments, alongside old fashioned investment scams and snake oil sales. (“Get a free ICE hat just by paying this mandatory packaging fee!”) The quarry is seniors, who are young enough to be on social media, but often lack the digital literacy needed to spot scams and deepfake media.“The findings show how scammers are taking advantage of advances in artificial intelligence technology, public confusion around the status of social safety net programs, and lax Meta content moderation to target new victims,” TTP says. “Meta is allowing this activity even though it prohibits scams and says it invests in scam prevention to keep users safe.”“All of the 63 scam advertisers showed they had ads removed by Meta within the past 12 months for violating the company’s policies, though nearly half (30) continued to advertise as of Sept. 30, 2025.”TPP says Meta did not respond to its request for comment, but did make a statement to the New York Times, which reported on the findings, saying it will “invest in building new technical defenses.”Time to stop believing what Meta says-Social media companies have been promising to make their platforms safe and secure for as long as there’s been doubt about their safety and security. Yet the fraud problem keeps getting worse: according to the Pew Research Center, nearly three quarters of U.S. adults have experienced some kind of online scam or attack. Some older adults have lost their life savings to scammers.It is past time to stop taking what Meta and its offshoots say at face value. The firm says it is “constantly working” to weed out scams. Yet a May 2025 report from the Wall Street Journal asserts that “current and former employees say Meta is reluctant to add impediments for ad-buying clients who drove a 22 percent increase in its advertising business last year to over $160 billion.” Meta knows some of these are scammers – but the money’s too good to get rid of them.TTP’s research, conducted using Meta’s Ad Library, found that Meta subjects political ads to an “enhanced level of scrutiny.” Nonetheless, it found dozens of advertisers running scam ads targeting U.S. users: “for example, during the 90-day period from April 3 to July 1, 2025, at least 45 scam advertisers spent more than 18 million dollars on Meta platforms.”In its conclusion, TTP says that, “even when Meta disables these accounts or removes the ads, the damage has already been done to consumers – and the company has already profited.” It believes that the mass availability of generative AI tools is likely to further turbo-charge scams “unless Meta takes steps to improve enforcement of its own policies.”This seems unlikely to happen in any comprehensive way. However, there are efforts being made on the biometrics front to try and stem the bleeding. Meta already has a facial recognition system that flags suspicious celebrity faces in ads (so-called “celeb-bait”) and matches them to the profile photo of the celebrity in question, to determine if they are real. Last month, the government of Singapore ordered Meta to deploy its biometric systems to crack down on government official impersonation scams.Regardless, the current status underlines a concerning truth that is becoming more evident by the day. To quote a statement issued by U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders, whose likeness has been used to push fake benefit scams: “AI is advancing rapidly, but the laws and protections we have in place for everyday Americans are dangerously outdated.”Stronger regulations for AI are presumably not high on the list of priorities for a U.S. administration that, right out of the gate, tried to block any AI regulation at all for ten years. As such, the problem is likely to get worse before it gets better.

Croatian digitalization head shares concerns about EUDI Wallet certification-Oct 3, 2025, 10:58 am EDT    | Lu-Hai Liang

Croatia is steadily advancing toward the rollout of the European Digital Identity (EUDI) Wallet. It is aligning national infrastructure, policy, and services to meet the requirements of the new EU framework. As Igor Ljubi, head of division for the Croatian Ministry of Digital Transformation, took to the stage at the 11th Trust Services and eID Forum, he spoke on trust, usability and cross-border functionality.At the heart of the transformation is the belief that digital identity must be more than just a technical tool: it must be a trusted gateway to public services. “If you don’t know who’s behind the screen, then you won’t feel safe sharing data,” Ljubi said. This principle is especially critical in cross-border scenarios, which is key to the EUDI Wallet.Croatia’s journey began in 2014 with the launch of the National Identification and Authentication System (NIAS), offering seven credentials. By 2025, this has expanded to 29 credentials, including eight at a high level of assurance, 17 significant, and four low-level. The country’s eIDAS node was established in 2017, and by 2018, Croatia’s eID and NIAS were notified for cross-border use.Croatia is implementing the EU Digital Identity framework into its national Digital Information Infrastructure (DII), and aligning with the Architecture Reference Framework (ARF) to ensure wallet rollout within 24 months. This includes upgrades to the DII system, development of the wallet, initiation of certification processes, and preparation of attribute sources. The issuance of the certified EUDI Wallet is planned for Q4 2026, alongside the integration of private electronic services and public promotion efforts.But as Ljubi emphasizes, “The wallet is not just an app.” The focus has to be on building an ecosystem that delivers meaningful use cases — such as insurance, driving license, and digital diplomas — that make the wallet relevant and useful to citizens. One example is ISeVO, the Digital Diploma Register, which is integrated with the e-Citizens platform and will serve as the central registry for higher education entities in Croatia.The country’s mobile digital identity solution, Certilia, developed by Agencija za komercijalnu djelatnost (AKD), already supports a wide range of credentials including eID, health insurance cards, student cards, and the EU Digital Travel Credential (DTC) as part of an EU pilot. Certilia is integrated with national registries and open to third-party app integration via Certilia Developer. With over 350,000 users and 100,000 daily mobile interactions, it has facilitated more than 11 million qualified remote signatures.Croatia is also an active participant in the EU Digital Identity Coordination Group (EUDICG), contributing to the drafting of implementing and delegated acts and sharing best practices with the European Commission. At home, the government is upgrading digital platforms like mCitizens and the e-Citizens portal to improve user experience and expand access to public services.Technical and safety activities are underway, including the implementation of ODIC, Verifiable Credentials, and W3C standards. Croatia is working closely with the Croatian Personal Data Protection Agency, ENISA, and FESA to ensure privacy and cybersecurity compliance. However, challenges remain, particularly around interoperability, GDPR alignment, and the lack of a national certification scheme for wallet solutions.Ljubi acknowledges these hurdles candidly: “I’m worried about certification. If there’s no scheme, there is no wallet.” He said Croatia hopes to learn from other countries and explore training opportunities to catch up. The National Working Group is currently drafting the Implementation Act to formalize roles and responsibilities across creation, issuance, management, supervision and reporting.

UN panel on digital ID and AI coasts on assumptions about role of AI agents-Equating people and agentic bots, UN panel highlights tech’s zeal for the next thing-Oct 3, 2025, 10:34 am EDT    | Joel R. McConvey

At an event held during the 80th UN General Assembly, a discussion addressed the question of “Trusted Digital Identity for People & AI,” through the lens of deploying Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) that is secure and equitable – with the topic of AI agents dominating the conversation.A blog from the Decentralized Identity Foundation (DIF), which had two members on the panel, says the primary challenge that panelists looked at is “the persistent gap between policy and production.”“While global goals like SDG 16.9 are clear, the goal of providing legal identity for all by 2030 is often stalled by protocol fragmentation and the lack of a robust architectural model for a world where both people and AI agents are first-class citizens,” it says.The UN Sustainable Development Goals were not designed with AI agents in mind, nor is it clear on what basis they would claim citizenship. But the current moment proceeds as though AI is inevitable, and as such it must be tabled for discussion.“Today there’s not really a robust model for AI agents,” says Matt McKinney, CEO of AIGNE, “the agentic ecosystem for AI apps,” and one of the aforementioned DID members. “That’s something a lot of people are working on, but there really is no clear line of sight or clear path in terms of bringing AI agents into our trusted ecosystem.”No structured framework, but AI agents welcomed into ecosystem anyway-That statement raises the question of whether or not agentic AI – a relatively new entrant into the tech ideasphere – should be part of a robust, trusted digital identity ecosystem at all. Nonetheless, McKinney says that, “as we build identity and as we think about bringing people into a kind of trusted environment, we first need to acknowledge that there are two types of subjects that we’re dealing with. One is people and the second is AI agents that they authorize.”For all its purported transformational power, however, agentic AI never comes without a warning that we need some way to distinguish who’s real from who’s bot. Humans, McKinney says, “need the ability to safely delegate tasks without actually handing over the keys to their entire entire digital life. And as AI moves closer and closer to us, this is becoming a bigger and bigger issue: how do we actually maintain our personal identity from an agent’s perspective?”Once again, rather than ask, “should we step back and ask whether a continued convergence of humanity with algorithmic large language models is actually beneficial,” McKinney suggests the trick is in the right settings: you just have to make sure the agents only have the keys they need to unlock the doors you want them to.He suggests this can be accomplished through controller-bound credentials, “a special ID that permanently links the AI to its owner so we always know who’s accountable,” often achieved with encrypted biometrics; and by ensuring that AI is audible and accountable by implementing “scoped and time box permissions.”Most important, however, is “having an auditable path to revocation, meaning we log every time the AI uses its key and we have the power to turn off that key at any time.”AI adds another element to be sold to doubting public-The confidence in models that has seized the identity sector reflects boundless optimism about the potential for mass uptake of digital identity. But adding AI agents to the mix means adding a layer of trust that will need to be sold to the public just like digital identity itself. Given the recent reception to Kier Starmer’s digital ID salvo in the UK, there is already more than enough work to be done before we begin granting citizenship to algorithms.“The next question is how do we actually build this without taking on a big risk,” McKinney observes. He outlines four key steps. The first is “starting from policy. So, first policy and architecture: before we actually build anything, we sit down and we create the rules.”That approach is dead on arrival, in that it has already failed: the tech is built, and the rules are not yet written.“An internet of trust” comes up in the discussion, as does “trust elevation,” both phrases of Nicola Gallo of Nitro Agility. Ken Ebert, CEO of Indicio, steers the conversation toward biometric verifiable credentials, as a defense against AI deepfakes and exploding financial fraud.So the conversation cycles: AI will do everything for us, but the risks mean we need to control it, and since we can’t yet we need more AI to combat fraud enabled by AI, because AI will do everything for us.Which is to say, AI agents in the workflow have been sold as a revolution in efficiency. But if every innovation creates a new problem, trust will be elusive – which will only make the sales pitch for digital ID even harder.The session as described aimed to focus on “turning the UN’s digital identity strategy into a deployable reality, grounded in the core principles of interoperability, privacy by design, and inclusion for all.” Inadvertently, it highlighted the tension between these stated goals and a relentless culture of innovation that will tell us something is indispensable before it even exists.

CLEAR+ enrollment opens US biometric lanes to passengers from 40 more countries-Oct 3, 2025, 9:52 am EDT    | Anthony Kimery

Clear Secure, Inc. announced a sweeping expansion of its premium identity service, Clear+, opening enrollment to passport holders from 40 additional nations across Europe, Asia, and the Americas.With this move, international travelers arriving in the U.S. can now join Clear+ by beginning the process online and finalizing it in person at participating airports with a valid passport.Enrollment opens the door to Clear’s network of more than 150 biometric lanes across 60 U.S. airports, enabling members to expedite the identity-check stage of airport security.Caryn Seidman Becker, CEO of Clear, framed the announcement as more than a product extension. “We’re thrilled that travelers from 40 additional countries can finally enjoy a seamless airport experience here in the U.S. with Clear+,” she said.“As millions arrive for holidays, sporting events, and once-in-a-lifetime celebrations, we’re excited to provide more international visitors with the ability to relax on their travels knowing that CLEAR is their partner helping them move through airports more quickly and easily,” Becker said.This expansion builds on a prior enlargement of eligibility in August when Clear opened enrollment to travelers from the U.K., Canada, Australia, and New Zealand.Together, these moves enlarge Clear’s addressable market globally and position the company for heightened traffic during major upcoming events such as the 2026 FIFA World Cup and the U.S.’s 250th anniversary celebrations.The list of newly eligible countries now includes France, Germany, Spain, South Korea, Singapore, Switzerland, Italy, Poland, Portugal, and Taiwan. Once travelers enroll, they can use Clear’s lanes to skip parts of the identity verification line and move more directly into screening.Clear said it currently serves more than 7.6 million Clear+ members and over 33 million users on its broader secure identity platform.The company asserts that this global enrollment expansion is part of its continuing investment in a technology-enabled airport experience, and is accompanied by plans to scale automated biometric gates deployment across its airport footprint.The timing is strategic. The biometric eGate model, already deployed at airports including Atlanta’s Hartsfield–Jackson, John F. Kennedy International Airport and LaGuardia Airport in New York, Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport in Washington ,and Seattle–Tacoma International Airport in Seattle, gives enrolled Clear+ members a gateway that captures and matches a live facial image to booking and ID data, opening the gate in a few seconds and ushering travelers into the screening zone without stopping at a manned identity station.The deployment of eGates dovetails with TSA’s broader push to modernize checkpoint operations through advanced technology such as Credential Authentication Technology (CAT-2) systems, AI-enhanced threat detection, and upgraded Computed Tomography (CT) carry-on scanners.One of the arguments behind automation is that freeing up personnel from manual identity checking allows them to be redeployed to more critical security tasks as passenger volumes rise.Instead of handing a boarding pass and identification to a security officer, Clear+ members step up to an automated portal where a live facial image is captured and compared against their booking and ID data. If the match is successful, the gate opens and the traveler walks directly into the physical screening area.According to TSA and Clear, the process takes between three and six seconds. For TSA, the benefit is not just faster lines, but the ability to reassign personnel to higher-priority security functions. As passenger volumes continue to rise, automating identity verification is viewed as essential to maintaining efficiency.Clear operates and finances the gates, but TSA retains authority over access, vetting, and watchlist enforcement. TSA officials have stressed that the arrangement comes at no cost to taxpayers.The program is expected to expand soon to Washington Reagan National Airport and Seattle–Tacoma International, with additional airports likely to follow if the pilot proves successful.For Clear, the eGates are not merely an add-on to its service, but a sign that the company is becoming part of the mainstream security checkpoint architecture.The eGate initiative is part of TSA’s larger modernization agenda, which includes deploying CAT-2 machines and advanced CT scanners. Automating the ID check aligns with TSA’s long-term strategy of using technology to offset staffing pressures while attempting to improve both security and customer experience.For Clear, this alignment with TSA’s modernization plan is strategically advantageous. By funding and operating infrastructure that TSA endorses but does not directly pay for, CLEAR strengthens its value proposition to airports and the federal government alike.The company’s executives argue that their biometric network complements TSA’s mission while creating a scalable business model based on membership fees rather than taxpayer dollars.While Clear and TSA insist the program is voluntary, the reality of long lines and slow processing in conventional lanes can pressure travelers into opting in, an issue that has provoked the ire of lawmakers.Privacy advocates also question whether images truly remain ephemeral. TSA says they are deleted after successful matching except in limited testing scenarios. The collection and transmission of biometric data in real time, combined with the use of private contractors at critical choke points, has sparked calls for stronger statutory safeguards.Another concern lies in the perception of a two-tier system. Clear+ is a subscription service that costs members $189 a year, though airline partnerships and credit card perks often lower the effective price. That price point means only certain travelers will benefit from faster, automated lines, raising questions about equity in access to public infrastructure. While TSA PreCheck and Global Entry are also fee-based programs, critics argue that outsourcing part of the checkpoint to a private subscription model represents a more profound shift.Today’s expansion announcement underscores Clear’s ambition to scale its membership base at a time when biometric eGates are gaining traction.By opening enrollment to dozens of new countries, the company ensures that the system will not be limited to U.S. citizens and a small group of allied nations. Instead, international travelers who enroll can arrive in the United States already prepared to use the biometric gates.The move also expands Clear’s operational leverage. With physical infrastructure already in place at more than 60 U.S. airports, each additional enrollee increases throughput and revenue without proportionally increasing costs. The economics become more favorable as more travelers subscribe, and the network effect strengthens as biometric gates become more common place.

Cybernetica to provide interoperability layer for digital government in Côte d’Ivoire-Oct 2, 2025, 4:09 pm EDT    | Chris Burt

Côte d’Ivoire’s national IT development company and Cybernetica have signed a contract for the Estonia-headquartered company to provide a secure data exchange layer for as part of its digital government transformation.The Société Nationale de Développement Informatique (SNDI) was commissioned to set up the data exchange by the Ministry of Digital Transition and Digitalization (MTND). An implementation project is expected to take 20 months and will be carried out in partnership with Digital Afrique Telecom (DAT).Côte d’Ivoire intends to complete its digital transformation by 2030 under its National Digital Development Strategy.Cybernetica is tasked with enabling data interoperability among government institutions, but also between the public and private sector. Its Unified eXchange Platform (UXP) will provide the basis for the exchange of data, documents and services, according to the company announcement.“We have chosen a robust solution that guarantees our digital sovereignty and will accelerate the digital transformation of our country,” says SNDI Director General Soro Nongolougo.If successful, the project will also speed up administrative procedures for individuals and make interactions with businesses more efficient.“While the individual level of digitalisation of services in the country is already quite high, the next step is enabling these systems to work together,” says Cybernetica Head of Data Exchange Technologies Ants Anupold. “With our secure data exchange solution (UXP), organisations can communicate more easily, reducing the administrative burden for civil servants and making services more convenient for it’s citizens. This project will open new doors for digital governance and lay a strong foundation for further interoperability developments. By connecting organisations and systems, the government will be able to provide faster, more reliable services and strengthen engagement between citizens, businesses, and the state.”Côte d’Ivoire’s fellow West African nation Benin also uses Cybernetica’s UXP for a data exchange layer to make its digital ID interoperable.

THE FALSE VATICAN POPE LEO 14TH

ISAIAH 23:15-17
15  And it shall come to pass in that day, that Tyre shall be forgotten seventy years, according to the days of one king: after the end of seventy years shall Tyre sing as an harlot.
16  Take an harp, go about the city, thou harlot that hast been forgotten; make sweet melody, sing many songs, that thou mayest be remembered.
17  And it shall come to pass after the end of seventy years, that the LORD will visit Tyre, and she shall turn to her hire, and shall commit fornication with all the kingdoms of the world upon the face of the earth.(COULD THIS BE 70 YEARS AFTER ISRAEL BECAME A NATION IN 1948)(IF SO THIS SATANIC ONE WORLD WHORE CHURCH WILL MINGLE TOGETHER BY 2018)(AND NOW ISLAM AND CHRISTIANITY AND ALL RELIGIONS ARE MINGLING AS ONE PEACE-LOVE-JOY-GET ALONG RELIGION LEAD BY THE VATICAN RIGHT NOW 4 YEARS FROM THE 70 YEAR TIME WHEN ISRAEL BECAME A NATION).AND IN CONTROL OF JERUSALEM.

REVELATION 13:11-18
11 And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth;(FALSE VATICAN POPE) and he had two horns like a lamb,(JESUS IS THE LAMB OF GOD) and he spake as a dragon.(HES SATANICALLY INSPIRED,HES A CHRISTIAN DEFECTOR FROM THE FAITH)
12 And he exerciseth all the power of the first beast before him,(WORLD DICTATOR) and causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed.(THE WORLD DICTATOR CREATES A FALSE RESURRECTION AND IS CROWNED LEADER OF THE NEW WORLD ORDER).
13 And he doeth great wonders, so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men,
14 And deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast; saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live.
15 And he had power to give life unto the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak, and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed.
16 And he(FALSE POPE) causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads:(CHIP IMPLANT)
17 And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.
18 Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.(6-6-6) A NUMBER SYSTEM

REVELATION 17:1-18
1 And there came one of the seven angels which had the seven vials, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come hither; I will shew unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters:(VATICAN)
2 With whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication,(VATICAN IN POLITICS) and the inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication.(THATS PEDOPHELIA-FORNICATION IS SINGLES HAVING SEX OUT SIDE OF MARRIAGE)(AND SINCE PREISTS CAN NOT MARRY IN THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. WHAT HAPPENS WHEN THIS FALSE CHURCH GOES AGAINST THE BIBLE.THE CATHOLIC CHURCH BECOMES A HOMOSEXUAL HAVEN OF PEDOPHILIAS FACTORY).  
3 So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns.
4 And the woman (FALSE CHURCH) was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour,(VATICAN COLOURS)(ANOTHER REASON WE KNOW THE FALSE POPE COMES FROM THE VATICAN) and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication:(THE VATICAN GOES AGAINST A PRIEST MARRING A WOMAN-LIKE THE BIBLE SAYS-AND WHATS AN ABOMINATION AGAINST GOD-HOMOSEXUALITY AND PEDOPHILIA JUST LIKE THIS SCRIPTURE SAYS-FORNICATION IS THE SINGLE HOMOSEXUAL PRIESTS IN THE CATHOLIC CHURCH HAVING UNMARRIED FORNICATION OR SEX WITH SINGLES-IN THIS CASE ITS SEX WITH CHILDREN OR PEDOPHILIA)
5 And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.
6 And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration.
7 And the angel said unto me, Wherefore didst thou marvel? I will tell thee the mystery of the woman, and of the beast that carrieth her, which hath the seven heads and ten horns.
8 The beast that thou sawest was, and is not; and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit, and go into perdition: and they that dwell on the earth shall wonder, whose names were not written in the book of life from the foundation of the world, when they behold the beast that was, and is not, and yet is.
9 And here is the mind which hath wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains, on which the woman sitteth.(THE VATICAN IS BUILT ON 7 HILLS OR MOUNTAINS)
10 And there are seven kings: five are fallen,(1-ASSYRIA,2-EGYPT,3-BABYLON,4-MEDO-PERSIA,5-GREECE) and one is,(IN POWER IN JOHNS AND JESUS DAY-6-ROME) and the other is not yet come; and when he cometh, he must continue a short space.(7TH-REVIVED ROMAN EMPIRE OR THE EUROPEAN UNION TODAY AND THE SHORT SPACE IS-THE EUROPEAN UNION WILL HAVE WORLD CONTROL FOR THE LAST 3 1/2 YEARS.BUT WILL HAVE ITS MIGHTY WORLD POWER FOR THE FULL 7 YEARS OF THE 7 YEAR TRIBULATION PERIOD.AND THE WORLD DICTATOR WILL BE THE BEAST FROM THE EU.AND THE VATICAN POPE WILL BE THE WHORE THAT RIDES THE EUROPEAN UNION TO POWER.AND THE 2 EUROPEAN UNION POWER FREAKS WILL CONTROL AND DECIEVE THE WHOLE EARTH INTO THEIR DESTRUCTION.IF YOU ARE NOT SAVED BY THE BLOOD OF JESUS.YOU WILL BE DECIEVED BY THESE TWO.THE WORLD POLITICIAN-THE EUROPEAN UNION DICTATOR.AND THE FALSE PROPHET THAT DEFECTS CHRISTIANITY-THE FALSE VATICAN POPE.
11 And the beast that was, and is not, even he is the eighth, and is of the seven, and goeth into perdition.
12 And the ten horns which thou sawest are ten kings, which have received no kingdom as yet; but receive power as kings one hour with the beast.
13 These have one mind, and shall give their power and strength unto the beast.
14 These shall make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb shall overcome them: for he is Lord of lords, and King of kings: and they that are with him are called, and chosen, and faithful.
15 And he saith unto me, The waters which thou sawest, where the whore sitteth, are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues.(VATICAN-CATHOLICS ALL AROUND THE WORLD OVER 1 BILLION)
16 And the ten horns which thou sawest upon the beast,(WORLD DICTATOR) these shall hate the whore, and shall make her desolate and naked, and shall eat her flesh, and burn her with fire.(GOD HIMSELF GIVES THE OK TO NUKE THE VATICAN)
17 For God hath put in their hearts to fulfil his will, and to agree, and give their kingdom unto the beast, until the words of God shall be fulfilled.
18 And the woman which thou sawest is that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the earth.(VATICAN)

HOW THE FALSE POPE IS ELECTED
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nj3Qnr_30Z4
POPE FRANCIS SISTER (PEDOPHILIA WAY WORSE THEN THOUGHT) (CARDINAL MATEO TERESCO-THE NEXT COVERUP POPE OF PEDOPHILIA)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=usFshfmBPmY
FALSE POPE LEO 14TH 2012 INTERVIEW
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QXVkJ5TQi1s
POPE 14TH WILL BE WORSE THAN FRANCIS.
https://banned.video/watch?id=681cf97a22a2c8ae0e09b5d0

I GUESS POPE LEO 14TH BLESSED THE GREEN LAND ICE FOR THE GOOD OF THE EARTH AND FOR THE CHILDREN.LIKE ALL THE LIBERALS DO FOR THE GOOD OF THE EARTHS CLIMATE CHANGE SCAM HOGWASH.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUnngkHkHEI
Pope Leo Blessing Ice Sparks Anger: ‘Pagan Earth-Worship Ritual’Published-Oct 02, 2025 at 12:17 PM EDT-By Jordan King-US News Reporter

Multiple people have spoken out against Pope Leo blessing a block of ice during  a global church summit on climate change, with one calling it part of a “weird pagan Earth-worshipping hippy ritual.”Leo carried out the blessing while he presided over the 10th anniversary celebration of immediate predecessor Pope Francis's landmark ecological encyclical (a papal letter sent to all Roman Catholic bishops), Laudato Si, or Praised Be.Pope Leo was presiding over the Raising Hope for Climate Justice’ International Conference at Castel Gandolfo, just south of Rome, in front of more than 1,000 people, according to the National Catholic Reporter.Footage of him blessing a block of ice has been shared widely online. Several figures have criticized the move, classing it as “paganism” and saying the “the leader of the Catholic Church shouldn’t be anywhere near this nonsense.”Newsweek has contacted the Vatican, via email, for comment.Why It Matters-The event unfolded against the backdrop of heightened U.S. political polarization around climate issues, with Pope Leo delivering veiled criticism of those who ridicule global warming science.This comes as Leo is already facing backlash for his comments about abortion and what it means to be consistently pro-life.What People Are Saying-The Pope used the event, attended by bishops, indigenous and environmental groups and former California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, to call on people to "put pressure on governments to develop and implement more rigorous regulations, procedures and controls.""The challenges identified in Laudato Si are in fact even more relevant today than they were 10 years ago," Leo said. "These challenges are of a social and political nature, but first and foremost of a spiritual nature: they call for conversion."Matt Walsh, the influential conservative commentator, said in a post on X: “Horrific. The whole thing. Pope Leo blesses a block of ice and then stands there while these communist freaks do some kind of weird pagan Earth worshipping hippy ritual. The leader of the Catholic Church shouldn’t be anywhere near this nonsense. What the hell are we doing here.”Similarly, Social media commentator Ian Miles Cheong said: “The Pope blesses a slab of ice and then just lingers there while a bunch of communist weirdos prance around in some pagan Earth-worship ritual. The head of the Catholic Church has no business being anywhere near this circus.”An account called “Catholics for Catholics” (@CforCatholics) said: “Pope Leo blesses ice at a Raising Hope for Climate Justice Conference. What are we doing here...?”Father Federico Palma, a traditionalist Catholic priest, said: “The Vatican II religion touched a new low. Leo XIV in one week did perhaps more damage to the Catholic Faith than Francis in a couple of years. First, he undermines the pro-life cause, secondly, he promotes ecumenism and religious indifferentism, and now he performs this truly esoteric ‘blessing’ of water. What a disgrace.”Others have defended the move, including Roman Catholic Levi Borba (@abrobivel), who said: “Ice is just water. The church has been blessing water since the 4 century and it is widely justified both by the tradition and the scriptures. Jesus was baptized in Blessed water by the way.”Pope Leo posted on X on Wednesday: "We are one family, with the same Father, who makes the sun to rise and sends rain on everyone (Mt 5:45). We live on the same planet, and must care for it together. I renew my heartfelt appeal for unity around integral ecology and for peace!"What To Know-Leo is already under fire for his comments on Tuesday, when he said: “Someone who says I’m against abortion but is in favor of the death penalty is not really pro-life. Someone who says I’m against abortion but I’m in agreement with the inhuman treatment of immigrants in the United States, I don’t know if that’s pro-life.”He was speaking about an ongoing dispute between U.S. Catholic leaders over plans by Cardinal Blase Cupich, Archbishop of Chicago, to honor Democrat Illinois Senator Dick Durbin, a Catholic politician who supports abortion rights, with a lifetime achievement award for his immigration advocacy.Cupich was planning on honoring Durbin with the award at the “Keep Hope Alive Benefit 2025” on November 3, hosted by Cupich himself and the Archdiocese’s Office of Human Dignity and Solidarity Immigration Ministry at St. Ignatius College Prep in Chicago.The Archbishop has defended the award, arguing that the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in 2022 instructed bishops “to reach out to and engage in dialogue with Catholic politicians within their jurisdictions.” But multiple people have spoken out against this too.Since Tuesday, Durbin has “decided not to receive an award at our Keep Hope Alive celebration,” Cupich said in a statement.What Happens Next-The ice blessing episode adds fuel to long-standing tensions between the Vatican and political conservatives—especially Trump supporters—who challenge the Church's engagement with contemporary social and ecological issues. The controversy underscores broader debates within American Catholicism about the intersection of faith, ritual, and political advocacy.

Pope Leo XIV Attends Swearing-In of Swiss Guards, First for a Pope in Nearly 60 Years

The Holy Father was joined by a crowd of spectators watching as the 27 new members were sworn into the ranks of the papal guard.Pope Leo XIV on Saturday attended the swearing-in of Swiss Guards at the Vatican, the first time a pope has attended the pomp-filled ceremony since the pontificate of Pope Paul VI in 1968.The event took place in the Vatican's San Damaso Courtyard. The Holy Father was joined by a crowd of spectators watching as the 27 new members were sworn into the ranks of the papal guard.The swearing-in ceremony, when the new guards promise to protect the pope, if necessary with their lives, was postponed from the traditional date of May 6 due to the conclave that saw Leo elected.Swiss Guards swearing-in 2025-Pope Leo XIV observes the Swiss Guard during a swearing-in ceremony at the Vatican, Saturday, Oct. 4, 2025. (Photo: Francesco Sforza)@Vatican Media-Swiss Guards 2025-The Pope observes the Oct. 4 ceremony.Swiss guard ceremony 2025-The Pope met the recruits and their families at the Apostolic Palace on Oct. 3, ahead of the swearing-in ceremony.“From the first steps of my pontificate, dear Swiss Guards, I have been able to count on your faithful service,” the Pope said on Oct. 3.“The successor of Peter can fulfill his mission in service to the Church and the world in the certainty that you are watching over his safety,” he added.He encouraged the new guards to draw inspiration from the stories of the first Christian martyrs in Rome to deepen their relationships with Jesus and to cultivate their interior lives “amid the frenzy of our society.”

Cardinal Cupich Is Right: We Need to Work This Out-EDITORIAL: Catholics must model unity and dialogue if we hope to help heal a divided nation.The Editors Editorial-October 3, 2025

Much ink has already been spilled over Cardinal Blase Cupich’s plan to give one of the nation’s leading pro-abortion politicians a “lifetime achievement award” in recognition for his work on immigration issues.Our purpose here is not to heap further scorn on what was, it must be said, a shocking lapse of judgment. The idea that the Archdiocese of Chicago’s Office of Human Dignity and Solidarity would fete Sen. Dick Durbin, someone who obstinately and repeatedly denies the inherent human dignity of the unborn, predictably provoked a firestorm of outrage. Who thought we needed more of that right now? That the controversy came to cause problems for our Holy Father, who has consistently called for peace and unity since the moment of his election, only added further to the needless tumult.Enough said. As members of the Body of Christ, more pressing than casting aspersions and pointing blame is to start taking seriously the question, “Where do we go from here?”Tragically, too many of us in the American Catholic Church are at each other’s throats over the hair-trigger issues of our day: sexual morality, liturgy, immigration policy and anything and everything connected with Donald Trump, to name but a few. The intensity of this crippling polarization isn’t so surprising, given the divisiveness of our wider society. Why should Catholics be any different? Because we’re supposed to be different. We’re supposed to set an example.Make no mistake: Those on the outside of our Church see how divided we are, and they’re watching us very closely to see if we can figure out how to put the brakes on this runaway train of suspicion and animosity. Because if we can manage to do that, maybe the country can, too. Conversely, if we can’t, how can we hope the country will? In that spirit, it’s worth taking a serious look at some of the laudable things that Cardinal Cupich had to say when he announced the news on Sept. 30 that Sen. Durbin (to his credit) had declined the archdiocese’s honor. Here are the highlights:Cardinal Cupich spoke strongly in defense of the unborn. He clarified that the decision to honor Durbin was not meant to signal “a softening of our position on abortion.” That’s good to hear.Instead, he said, “We firmly assert what the Catechism of the Catholic Church makes clear: ‘Since the first century the Church has affirmed the moral evil of every procured abortion. This teaching has not changed and remains unchangeable.’” “The Catholic bishops heroically responded when the right to life of the unborn was negated by the 1973 decisions of the Supreme Court,” he added. “That right to life still needs to be defended without compromise.”He correctly reminds us that we can’t be “one-issue Catholics.” How simple life would be if we could take a one-and-done approach to politics. But life is complicated. So is defending life, in all its stages and vulnerabilities. “The tragedy of our current situation in the United States is that Catholics find themselves politically homeless. The policies of neither political party perfectly encapsulate the breadth of Catholic teaching,” Cardinal Cupich observed, adding that “the tragic reality in our nation today is that there are essentially no Catholic public officials who consistently pursue the essential elements of Catholic social teaching because our party system will not permit them to do so.”“Total condemnation is not the way forward, for it shuts down discussion,” he said. That’s 100% true. Yet finding some better way to function in today’s overheated public square won’t come easy. The social media giants have figured out that keeping us all at an “11” on the anger amp is a wonderfully lucrative business model. But look around and see where that’s gotten us. Criticism and debate are foundational to healthy civil discourse. Demonization and denunciation undermine it. “No one wants to engage with someone who treats them as a thoroughgoing moral threat to the community,” Cardinal Cupich said in his statement. “But people will engage with, and may even learn from, those who recognize them as making some contribution to a common endeavor.” This is one of the great challenges of our day, especially for Christians.Cardinal Cupich said he is “open to suggestions” for how we can promote a more constructive dialogue. Let’s take him at his word. Giving awards to those who fundamentally disrespect our core values is not the way to go about this, obviously. But there are plenty of other means. Can we discuss that? Cardinal Cupich, for his part, suggests “synodal gatherings,” which some Catholics might view with skepticism. Call it whatever you want, but we desperately need to learn to listen — to those we vehemently disagree with — and to Pope Leo and especially to Our Lord, whose prayer that “they may all be one” remains unrealized yet unceasing.

A Papal Intervention and a Canceled Award: What (If Anything) Did Pope Leo XIV’s Comments Have to Do with Sen. Durbin’s Decision? The next day, Catholics are still trying to understand what just happened.Jonathan Liedl Nation-October 1, 2025

It all went down with breakneck speed: a papal intervention into a weekslong controversy in the Pontiff’s home city, followed just hours later by the abrupt end of the controversy in question. The next day, Catholics are still trying to understand what just happened.A tumultuous five hours on Tuesday began at about 2 p.m. ET, when an EWTN Vatican journalist asked Pope Leo XIV to address the ongoing controversy over Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich’s plan to give a “lifetime achievement award” to Sen. Dick Durbin, a baptized Catholic who has long advocated and voted for legalized abortion.Back home in the U.S., the controversy had dominated headlines for nearly two weeks. Eight sitting diocesan bishops had publicly asked Cardinal Cupich to rescind the award over concerns that it would compromise the Church’s pro-life witness, a rarity for a group of men who tend to keep their disagreements private. Furthermore, the story was front and center for Catholic media outlets across the ecclesial spectrum. It had even been picked up by secular media, including The Associated Press.The Pope’s Response-EWTN Vatican’s query was the last of several questions posed to Pope Leo by members of the media during what have become regular weekly conversations between the Pope and the press as he arrives at Castel Gandolfo, where he typically spends his Tuesdays. “I wanted to ask one thing that has become a divisive subject in the U.S. right now, with Cardinal Cupich giving an award to Sen. Durbin,” asked the reporter, Valentina Di Donato. “Some people are having a hard time understanding this because he is for legalized abortion. How would you help people of faith right now decipher that, feel about that, and how do you feel about that?”In his response, Pope Leo XIV began by noting that he was “not terribly familiar with the particular case” before adding that “it’s important to look at the overall work that a senator has done during, if I’m not mistaken, in 40 years of service in the United States Senate.”“I understand the difficulty and the tensions,” said Pope Leo XIV. “But I think as I myself have spoken in the past, it’s important to look at many issues that are related to the teachings of the Church.”The Pope continued: “Someone who says, ‘I’m against abortion’ but is in favor of the death penalty is not really pro-life,” the Pope explained. “Someone who says, ‘I’m against abortion but I’m in agreement with the inhuman treatment of immigrants in the United States,’ I don’t know if that’s pro-life.”“So they are very complex issues, and I don’t know if anyone has all the truth on them,” he said, “but I would ask, first and foremost, that they would have respect for one another and that we search together both as human beings, and in that case as American citizens and citizens of the state of Illinois, as well as Catholics, to say that we need to be close to all of these ethical issues. And to find the way forward as a Church. The Church teaching on each one of those issues is very clear.”Strong Reactions-Pope Leo’s response sparked strong reactions back home in the United States. Some suggested that by emphasizing the need to look at all aspects of the Church’s social teaching, Pope Leo was clearly giving reason to question the logic of honoring a pro-abortion senator. “The question is whether Durbin is pro-life,” wrote Phil Lawler at Catholic Culture. “By the Pope’s own statement, he is not. … Therefore Durbin should not be honored by a Catholic institution. Case closed."But others contended that by shifting the focus to self-identified pro-lifers who don’t follow Church teaching on immigration or the death penalty, the Pope was giving cover for the award. For instance, a headline from Politico read: “Pope Leo defends Church honoring Durbin.” But just hours after the Pope’s comments hit the wire, the debate over the meaning of his words was diverted. Because at about 7 p.m. ET, Cardinal Cupich announced that Durbin “had decided not to receive” the award. “While I am saddened by this news, I respect his decision,” said Cardinal Cupich in a two-page statement, adding that the award had been meant to recognize the Illinois Democrat’s “singular contribution to immigration reform and his unwavering support of immigrants.” Cardinal Cupich also lamented that neither major political party in the U.S. embraces the totality of the Church’s social teaching, adding that his outreach had been an attempt to encourage Durbin to “extend [his] good work to other areas and issues.”Lingering Questions-The immediate controversy seems effectively over. But in the aftermath, people are still wondering what, if anything, Pope Leo’s comments and the subsequent announcement of Durbin’s decision had to do with each other.Did Pope Leo XIV request that Cardinal Cupich’s award to Sen. Durbin be spiked? Or was the fact that the senator declined the award mere hours after the Pope’s comments purely coincidence? Despite speculation being rife on social-media platforms like X, these, and other related questions, remain unanswered. But other relevant facts have emerged that add some important context.At the end of last week, multiple sources had told the Register that the only likely “off-ramp” for Cardinal Cupich to not go through with giving the award would be for Durbin to decline it, given that the Chicago cardinal had already doubled down on his intent to give the award despite criticism. Furthermore, The Pillar reported late last night that the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops was preparing to release a statement on the Durbin-Cupich situation, after several bishops had written into the conference requesting that the controversy be addressed. The report indicated that the apostolic nuncio, Cardinal Christoph Pierre, had been made aware of the development. Citing unnamed bishops, The Pillar also suggested that Cardinal Cupich may have shut down the award so as not to be seen as opposed by the USCCB, or because the nuncio had urged him to do so.But while the controversy over the Durbin award might be over, what isn’t is the deep-seated divergence between some U.S bishops on the priority abortion should or should not have in their advocacy. In November 2023, the USCCB voted to reaffirm that abortion is their “preeminent priority,” given its scope and the fact that it targets the most vulnerable members of the human family. But a minority of bishops, including Cardinal Cupich, have long advocated for removing the “preeminent” language, arguing that in a polarized society, it undermines advocacy on other issues like immigration or care for creation.This divide between the bishops will likely be in the background next month at the USCCB’s November meeting in Baltimore. So, too, will questions of Pope Leo’s own priorities as they relate to the Church and society in the United States, especially considering that the bishops are set to elect a new conference president to a three-year term.As Pope Leo has said in a Sept. 14 interview, he wants to influence American politics and society by engaging “with the bishops primarily,” as opposed to the more direct approach Pope Francis often took with figures like President Donald Trump. To do so will require good bilateral relations between the Pope and the bishops’ conference of his native land. That relationship will be defined in a major way at the upcoming USCCB meeting, which will now be colored by the dispute American Catholics just saw play out between their bishops.

HOARDING OF GOLD AND SILVER

JAMES 5:1-3
1 Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you.
2 Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten.
3 Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days.

REVELATION 18:10,17,19
10 Standing afar off for the fear of her torment, saying, Alas, alas that great city Babylon, that mighty city! for in one hour is thy judgment come.(IN 1 HR THE STOCK MARKETS WORLDWIDE WILL CRASH)
17 For in one hour so great riches is come to nought. And every shipmaster, and all the company in ships, and sailors, and as many as trade by sea, stood afar off,
19 And they cast dust on their heads, and cried, weeping and wailing, saying, Alas, alas that great city, wherein were made rich all that had ships in the sea by reason of her costliness! for in one hour is she made desolate.

EZEKIEL 7:19
19 They shall cast their silver in the streets, and their gold shall be removed:(CONFISCATED) their silver and their gold shall not be able to deliver them in the day of the wrath of the LORD: they shall not satisfy their souls, neither fill their bowels: because it is the stumblingblock of their iniquity.

MARK OF THE BEAST (engraved microchip in your hand or forehead)

AI in an 'industrial bubble' but will benefit society: Bezos.

Turin, Italy, Oct 3 (AFP) Oct 03, 2025-Artificial intelligence technology is in an "industrial bubble," Amazon founder Jeff Bezos told a tech conference in Italy on Friday, but the benefits to society will be "immense"."Investors don't usually give a team of six people a couple billion dollars with no product... and that's happening today," Bezos told an audience at Tech Week in Turin."This is a kind of industrial bubble," said Bezos, who has invested in the American generative AI start-up Perplexity.But that is not the same as a banking bubble such as the 2008 financial crisis, he argued."Those bubbles society wants to avoid. The ones that are industrial are not nearly as bad, it could even be good, because when the dust settles and you see who are the winners, society benefits from those inventions... and that's what's going to happen here.""This is real," Bezos continued. "The benefits to society from AI are going to be gigantic."Multiple technologies are in a kind of "golden age," he said, echoing language used by US President Donald Trump. "There's never been a better time to be excited about the future.""AI is real. And it is going to change every industry... it is going to affect every company in the world."tsz/jra/LyS/st/rl-Amazon.com-EXOR-Stellantis-FERRARI N.V.

Hong Kong to install surveillance cameras with AI facial recognition.

Hong Kong, Oct 3 (AFP) Oct 03, 2025-Hong Kong plans to install tens of thousands of surveillance cameras that will make use of AI-powered facial recognition, the city's security chief said on Friday, bringing it closer to China where authorities often monitor public spaces with cutting-edge technology.The Chinese finance hub has already installed almost 4,000 closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras under a police crime-fighting programme. That number will increase to a total of 60,000 by 2028, according to documents submitted to the legislature.Artificial intelligence is being used to monitor crowds and read licence plates, and that technology "will naturally be applied to people, such as tracking a criminal suspect", Hong Kong's security chief Chris Tang told lawmakers."That is something we must do," he said, adding that authorities are still considering issues such as resource allocation and choice of technology, without specifying a timeline for the rollout.Police say the SmartView programme is needed to safeguard national security and to prevent and detect crimes, crediting the use of CCTV cameras with solving more than 400 cases and scoring 787 arrests since the initiative was launched last year.Officers will start using real-time facial recognition "as early as the end of this year", the South China Morning Post reported in July.Similar technology has also been adopted in Britain, although critics argue that it grants the government unchecked power to invade privacy on a massive scale.Concerns have also been raised over false matches leading to wrongful arrests.The European Union adopted an Artificial Intelligence Act last year that banned "the use of 'real-time' remote biometric identification systems in publicly accessible spaces for the purposes of law enforcement", with some exceptions.Hong Kong's privacy watchdog, an independent statutory body, declined on Friday to say whether it had been consulted in drawing up plans to expand the surveillance camera programme.Eric Lai, a Senior Fellow at the Georgetown Center for Asian Law, said Hong Kong's police have not been subject to effective oversight by independent watchdogs and the city has no clear rules on AI use by law enforcement agencies."It is therefore questionable whether the existing legal and regulatory framework is sufficient to prevent police abuse of power in deploying AI technology for surveillance, or whether procurement processes are conducted with proper regard for human rights due diligence," Lai told AFP.

Cyberattack halts shipments from Japan's biggest brewer.

Tokyo, Oct 3 (AFP) Oct 03, 2025-A damaging cyberattack on Japanese beer giant Asahi this week has halted shipments from its breweries and there is no resumption in sight, the company warned Friday, fuelling fears of shortages.Asahi Group, producer of Japan's most popular beers, said Monday it had "experienced a system failure" owing to a cyberattack that forced the suspension of orders and shipments of various beverages -- including its flagship Asahi Super Dry."No immediate recovery of our system is in sight at the moment. Ordinary shipments remain halted," a spokesperson, who declined to be named, told AFP on Friday."Production is not directly affected (by the system dysfunction) but it has been halted because shipments are suspended."The company said it was looking into the possibility of a ransomware attack after announcing in Monday's statement that its local operations had been hit.The news is worrying for Japan's ubiquitous convenience stores, who are major stockists of Asahi beer.A spokesperson for Seven & I Holdings, which operates the 7-11 convenience store chain, said it was preparing to put up notices to warn customers of the suspension, but added that the halt "had not yet caused major disruptions"."We don't expect (Asahi drinks) to disappear from all our stores at once, although it all depends on how sales will go at each of these outlets."AFP visited several convenience stores and supermarkets in Tokyo Friday, all of which still had stock.Asahi Group's shares are down almost seven percent from last Friday's close.The attack comes after a cyberattack halted operations at Jaguar Land Rover's British factories for almost a month.The Indian-owned automaker said on September 2 that it had been targeted by hackers, severely disrupting sales and production and forcing it to seek emergency funding.The firm announced on Monday that it would partially restart production.tmo-aph/dan

US says kills four in new attack on alleged drug-smuggling boat.

Washington, Oct 4 (AFP) Oct 04, 2025-US forces carried out a strike on an alleged drug-smuggling boat off the coast of Venezuela on Friday, killing four people, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said.The latest strike, which Hegseth announced in a post on X, brings the number of such US attacks to at least four, leaving at least 21 people dead.An accompanying video shared by Hegseth showed a boat speeding across the waves before being engulfed in smoke and flames."Four male narco-terrorists aboard the vessel were killed," the Pentagon chief wrote.He said the strike "was conducted in international waters just off the coast of Venezuela while the vessel was transporting substantial amounts of narcotics -- headed to America to poison our people.""These strikes will continue until the attacks on the American people are over!!!!" he added.Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and some of his allies in the region condemned the attack.The latest military action comes after President Donald Trump's administration said in a notice to Congress that he has determined the United States is engaged in "armed conflict" with drug cartels.Washington has not released evidence to support its assertion that the targets of its strikes are drug smugglers, and experts say the summary killings are illegal even if they target confirmed narcotics traffickers.The administration's letter, a copy of which was obtained by AFP on Thursday, was designed as a legal justification for at least three previous strikes."The president determined these cartels are non-state armed groups, designated them as terrorist organizations, and determined that their actions constitute an armed attack against the United States," said the notice from the Pentagon, which also described suspected smugglers as "unlawful combatants."- 'Armed aggression' -Trump posted the same video as Hegseth on his Truth Social platform, saying that "a boat loaded with enough drugs to kill 25 TO 50 THOUSAND PEOPLE was stopped... from entering American Territory."Maduro called US actions in the region "an armed aggression to impose regime change, to impose puppet governments, and to steal Venezuela's oil, gas, gold and all natural resources."Speaking at an event in Caracas, Maduro ordered the mobilization of reservists and militias "if it is necessary to move from unarmed combat to armed combat."The Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America (ALBA), a leftist Latin American bloc co-founded by Maduro's late mentor, Hugo Chavez, condemned in a statement the "illegal incursion" by US fighter jets, deeming the raid a violation of international law.ALBA argued that the repeated US strikes aim to "destabilize the region" and instill fear in its people.Colombian President Gustavo Petro -- a fierce critic of Trump's policy of striking alleged traffickers -- wrote on X that "the narco-terrorists don't go in the boats -- the narcos live in the US, Europe and Dubai.""There were poor Caribbean youths on that boat," Petro wrote, adding that striking vessels that could instead be intercepted at sea "violates the universal judicial principal of proportionality."Tensions between the United States and Venezuela have been high over the deployment of multiple American warships in the region.Venezuela said Thursday it had detected "an illegal incursion" by five US fighter jets flying off its shores, with Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino denouncing the alleged flights as a "provocation."Trump last month dispatched 10 F-35 aircraft to Puerto Rico, a US territory in the Caribbean, as part of the biggest military deployment in the area in over three decades.wd/dw/acb/ami/mtp

French navy responds to drone threat with jamming and a 'wall of steel'

Toulon, France, Oct 3 (AFP) Oct 03, 2025-The 76-mm cannon fires three shells into the sky, shaking the floor of the bridge. "UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) destroyed," shouts a sailor on board the French frigate Lorraine, his eyes glued to binoculars.Moments earlier, a target representing a surface drone slowly sank into the depths of the Mediterranean Sea, riddled with 12.7-mm machine gun bullets."You nailed it, Tristan!" the crew cheered the 20-year-old seaman for his perfect shot from a distance of 300 metres (984 feet).Sailors on the Lorraine have been training in counter-drone warfare and testing new equipment, firing at aerial or surface drones singly or in groups, as well as electronic warfare exercises against aircraft simulating drones or missiles."We adapt our methods and equipment through innovation," said the ship's captain, Laurent Toncelli.The threat from drones is transforming the battlefield, from Ukraine to the Red Sea and hybrid operations in the skies above Europe.A recent spate of mysterious drone sightings over European countries has caused surging tension with Russia, which denies being behind them.The French navy, like military forces across the continent, wants to modernise as quickly as it can against the new threats."It's better to have a partial but rapid response than a total one that will come too late or so late that it's obsolete," said Frederic Petit, a weapons engineer and innovation advisor to the naval chief of staff.- Better detection -The new equipment tested on the Lorraine is housed in a container installed at the rear on the helicopter platform, bristling with antennae, radars and optics out of bounds for visitors and photographers.A handful of industry representatives and France's Directorate General of Armaments mill around it.The equipment allows them to "explore jamming capabilities, increase the lethality of our weapons, particularly small-calibre ones, and integrate additional optronics to better detect the threat", the ship's commander said.The ship's crew are testing, for example, a new firing assistance system on the two Narwhal 20-mm cannons remotely operated from the bridge, which detects and tracks targets more effectively.On the screen, boxes with numbers appear."This is the percentage the system is confident is a target," said Baptiste, 21, wearing a headset to listen to orders and instructions, and holding a walkie-talkie to communicate directly with industry representatives."I told them I was above the threshold on my shots," he said.- 'Full beam' -"There are two ways (to take down drones): the old-fashioned way, like at Pearl Harbor, which is labour- and ammunition-intensive, and the refined technical approach, where we aim for a strike on the first shot," said artillery officer Francois, 36, from the operations nerve centre on the frigate.The navy is combining the two approaches, as well as improving accuracy."We are strengthening our capacity to create a steel wall," added Francois."Since 2025, we've installed additional machine guns at the rear of the frigate and during this exercise we've tested twin-barrel machine guns that are even more efficient, with more ammunition, higher firing rates and better aiming aids."Beyond focusing on short-range destruction of drones, "electronic warfare and jamming are effective methods" to neutralise them from a distance, without having to fire the very costly Aster missiles housed in the bow, said Petit.Jamming theoretically allows several targets -- like a swarm of drones -- to be neutralised at once."The cannon aims at only one target, whereas we target an area," explained Kevin, a 33-year-old electronic warfare operator."It's like a full beam in your eyes at night: you're blinded. It's the same for the drone."fz/sva/lpt/phz/jhb