A New Perspective on Constantine

(Worthy News) – Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Wednesday rolled out a new civil asset forfeiture policy aimed at expanding law enforcement’s ability to seize property from people suspected of criminal activity.

Sessions’ new policy reverses a 2015 decision by former Attorney General Eric Holder that put restrictions on civil asset forfeiture.

Holder’s memo told state and local jurisdictions that federal officials would restrict “adoptive” forfeitures, which is when the federal government adopts property taken by law enforcement authorities and forfeits it under federal law. As a result of the process, local agencies can get back up to 80 percent of the proceeds of forfeited property, while the federal government keeps at least 20 percent.

Sessions’ new policy also sets out rules for state and local police when less than $10,000 in assets are seized. If authorities want to pursue adoptive forfeitures in these cases, they must meet one of the following conditions: getting a state warrant, making an arrest related to the seizure, seizing contraband such as drugs along with the money, or when the owner of the property has confessed to a crime.  [ Source:Washington Times (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas spoke by phone late Thursday with Jared Kushner, senior adviser to US President Donald Trump, reportedly to ask that the White House pressure Israel to remove metal detectors installed at the Temple Mount following last Friday’s deadly terror attack.

According to Hebrew-language media, Abbas told Kushner that tensions over the holy site were a serious concern, and threatened to get out of control if Israel did not back down.

Abbas held emergency meetings with senior members of his Fatah party on Friday to discuss the escalating tensions. The meetings with the PLO Executive Committee and the Fatah Central Committee were intended to decide on the Palestinian response to Israel’s decision early Friday to leave the metal detectors in place on the Temple Mount despite Palestinian protests. [ Source (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – The jihadists may have been ousted from their Iraqi hometown of Mosul but many Christians like Haitham Behnam refuse to go back and trade in the stability of their new lives.

“There’s no security, no protection for Christians back there,” said the former resident of the largest city in northern Iraq.

“It’s better for us to stay here and keep our mouths shut,” said the man in his forties who resettled in the Iraqi Kurdish capital of Arbil in 2014 after the Islamic State jihadist group seized control of Mosul. [ Source:Times of Israel (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – Thousands of protesters took to the street in Tel Aviv near the military headquarters to express their dismay at the government’s answer to the High Court of Justice announcing its opposition to adoption by same-sex couples.

The government has changed its position on the issue several times, and the protest tonight appears to have spurred on yet another. The government has requested more time from the High Court to revise its evaluation and provide their decision. [ Source:Jerusalem Post (Read More…) ]

At least nine protesters were arrested after they assaulted police, authorities say. [ Source:Arutz Sheva (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – Members of President Donald Trump’s evangelical advisory council have directly voiced their concerns to the administration about its efforts to deport over 100 Iraqi Christians back to a nation in which they could face persecution for their faith in Christ.

While it’s been widely reported that about 30 evangelical leaders met with Trump at the White House last week and prayed over him in a moment widely shared through a social media picture, the prayer gathering with Trump and Vice President Mike Pence was just a tiny portion of the evangelical leaders’ first all-day workday in the West Wing of the White House.

Members of Trump’s evangelical advisory board who took part in the all-day meeting told The Christian Post that the gathering lasted from about 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Throughout the day, members of the administration would come in and give briefings and generate discussion around certain issues. [ Source:Christian Post (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – Ken Ham, president of the Answers in Genesis Christian ministry that built the $100 million Ark Encounter biblical theme park in Williamstown, Kentucky, riled LGBT advocates Tuesday when he announced that they will be reclaiming the rainbow for God with permanent rainbow lights for their life-sized Noah’s Ark replica.

“We now have new permanent rainbow lights at the Ark Encounter so all can see that it is God’s rainbow and He determines its meaning in Genesis 6,” Ham said in a statement on Facebook. “The rainbow is a reminder God will never again judge the wickedness of man with a global Flood — next time the world will be judged by fire.

“The Ark is lit permanently at night with a rainbow to remind the world that God owns it and He decreed it’s a sign of His covenant with man after the Flood — Christians need to take back the rainbow as we do at the Ark Encounter,” he added. [ Source:Christian Post (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – The U.S. special counsel investigating possible ties between the Donald Trump campaign and Russia in last year’s election is examining a broad range of transactions involving Trump’s businesses as well as those of his associates, according to a person familiar with the probe.

FBI investigators and others are looking at Russian purchases of apartments in Trump buildings, Trump’s involvement in a controversial SoHo development in New York with Russian associates, the 2013 Miss Universe pageant in Moscow and Trump’s sale of a Florida mansion to a Russian oligarch in 2008, the person said.

The investigation also has absorbed a money-laundering probe begun by federal prosecutors in New York into Trump’s former campaign chairman Paul Manafort. [ Source:Bloomberg (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – A 6.7-magnitude earthquake hit popular tourist areas near several Greek islands and Turkey’s Aegean coast, killing at least two people and injuring more than 100 others, according to reports.

Kos, a Greek island popular with tourists, appears to have been the area hardest-hit by the earthquake. Both of the confirmed deaths happened in Kos and at least 120 people have been reported injured, according to the Guardian.

In Turkey, about six miles south of the city of Bodrum, reports indicate at least 70 people have been injured. Turkish officials said that more than 20 aftershocks have. [ Source:UPI (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – The Obama administration pondered deploying armed federal agents to polling places last November to counter any potential cyberattacks targeting the U.S. election system, according to a newly released playbook prepared during last year’s race.

“​I​n almost all potential cases of malicious cyber activity impacting election infrastructure, state, local, tribal and territorial governments, to include their law enforcement agencies, will have primary jurisdiction to respond​,” the document said.

In the event of a “significant incident,” however, the document said the federal government was prepared to activate a range of “enhanced procedures,” including possible domestic military deployment. [ Source:Washington Times (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – U.S. allies in eastern Europe and Ukraine are worried that Russia’s planned war games in September could be a “Trojan horse” aimed at leaving behind military equipment brought into Belarus, the U.S. Army’s top general in Europe said on Thursday.

Russia has sought to reassure NATO that the military exercises will respect international limits on size, but NATO and U.S. official remain wary about their scale and scope.

U.S. Army Lieutenant General Ben Hodges, who heads U.S. Army forces in Europe, told Reuters in an interview that allied officials would keep a close eye on military equipment brought in to Belarus for the Zapad 2017 exercise, and whether it was removed later.

“People are worried, this is a Trojan horse. They say, ‘We’re just doing an exercise,’ and then all of a sudden they’ve moved all these people and capabilities somewhere,” he said. [ Source:Reuters (Read More…) ]