Al-Qaida is ready to exploit a war "by the Jews against Iran," the Sunni group's second-in-command in Yemen, Saeed al-Shehri, said in an audio message this month, according to the Daily Beast.

The mostly Shi'ite nation of Iran is an enemy to Al-Qaida, and al-Shehri predicted that after Israel attacked Iranian nuclear installations, Iran would blame Saudi Arabia - which reports say may let Israel fly through its airspace to attack Iran - and use the opportunity to seize the holy cities of Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia.

Read more at jpost

Iran began fuelling its first nuclear power plant on Saturday, a potent symbol of its growing regional sway and rejection of international sanctions designed to prevent it building a nuclear bomb.

Read more at Yahoo

For Shabbat today, Yediot Aharonot, a widely read and respected Israeli newspaper, and Ynet News, the paper’s popular website, has published a lengthy and fascinating article with this headline: “JESUS LIVES ON IN JERUSALEM: Thousands of Messianic Jews reside in Israel, perform Jewish ceremonies and serve in IDF.” I commend it to your attention, in part because the article reports two facts certain to intrigue secular Jews and infuriate some of the ultra-Orthodox:

• In Israel, there are now some 15,000 Jewish followers of Jesus (known in Hebrew as Yeshua) as the Messiah, and the number is growing.
• In the U.S., there are now some 350,000 Jewish followers of Jesus as the Messiah

Read more by Joel Rosenberg

“Every person, place, and thing on this planet will be connected [to the iris system] within the next 10 years”

A biometrics research and development company is set to roll out iris recognition technology across an entire city in a move that it claims will create a real life Minority Report society where anyone taking a train or shopping in a department store will have their eyes scanned by hi-tech sensors.

Read more at Prison Planet

A Middle East treaty creating a Palestinian state at peace with Israel can be completed in one year of negotiations, said major powers who were due on Friday to invite both parties to start talks in two weeks.

A diplomatic source in the United States said the Quartet of world powers engaged in Middle East peace-making had agreed on the details of the invitation on Thursday and would issue it formally on Friday.

Israeli and Palestinian officials said they expected to see the statement and U.S. invitation by the end of the day.

Read more at Yahoo

Readers of my non-fiction book Epicenter may recall that Chapter Five predicts this future headline: “ISRAEL DISCOVERS MASSIVE RESERVES OF OIL, GAS.” That chapter is based on prophecies in Deuteronomy that specifically indicate that “oil” and “hidden treasures” under the sea and the sands will be found in Israel in the last days of history. It is also based on the prophecies of Ezekiel 38 & 39 indicating that Israel will be significantly prosperous in the last days, before a Russian-Iranian-Turkish alliance forms against her and seeks to destroy her. In recent years — and indeed, in recent months — we seem to be seeing this Russian-Iranian-Turkish alliance growing. We also see Israel’s economy growing significantly and remarkable new discoveries of oil and gas.

Consider today’s headline from Ynet to which a friend just alerted me: “1.5 BILLION BARRELS OF OIL DISCOVERED NEAR ROSH HA’AYIN.” Excerpts: ”Could the State of Israel be sitting on an oil reserve that can provide energy, cash flow, and international political influence? This is the question that everyone is waiting to be answered in the engineering report ordered by Givot Olam Oil, overseeing the drilling at the Megged 5 site, next to Rosh Ha’Ayin. The final report will be submitted on September 5. However, a preliminary report was already issued to Tel Aviv Stock Exchange on the oil reserves on the site. ‘The amount of oil in place in Rosh Ha’Ayin plot is estimated at 1.525 billion barrels of oil.’ In previous reports, the quantity was appraised at only a few hundred barrels of oil a day….”

Read more by Joel Rosenberg

Israeli public must wait until September to see if country is sitting on profitable oil reserve, but statement to TASE gives peek into extent of Megged reserve. Question remains: How much of it is recoverable?

Read more at ynet News

Israel has until the weekend to launch a military strike on Iran's first nuclear plant before the humanitarian risk of an attack becomes too great, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton said Tuesday.

Read more at Fox News

There's never been a hotter year than this year. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has been tracking temperature measurements for both the water and the land since 1880, and so far 2010 is registering at about one degree above the 20th century average. Pretty, possibly apocalyptic pictures after the jump.

Read more at Seattle Blogs

America's health watchdog is considering revoking its approval of the drug Avastin for use on women with advanced breast cancer, leading to accusations that it will mark the start of 'death panel' drug rationing.

A decision to rescind endorsement of the drug would reignite the highly charged debate over US health care reform and how much the state should spend on new and expensive treatments.

Avastin, the world’s best selling cancer drug is primarily used to treat colon cancer and was approved by the US Food and Drug Administration in 2008 for use on women with breast cancer that has spread.

Read more at Telegraph