A New Perspective on Constantine

(Worthy News) – Some 2,000 members of the Hamas terror group marched in the Gaza Strip Wednesday to mark “victory” after Israel removed contested metal detectors from entrances to the Temple Mount a day earlier in a bid to calm tensions.

The group also called for a fresh “day of rage” throughout the West Bank on Friday to protest continued Israeli security measures at the site.

The group urged Palestinians to “respond to the ongoing events in order to deter Israel from continuing its violations against our people and holy places,” according to Israel’s Channel 2. [ Source:Times of Israel (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday commandeered a Democrat resolution demanding more information about Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ actions and turned it into a resolution demanding further investigation into Hillary Clinton.

It happened after a 2.5-hour debate that devolved into a series of partisan point scoring and sanctimony on dozens of political scandals ranging from the Nixon administration to the Clinton impeachment, to the more modern inquiries to determine how damaging Russia’s influence was on the 2016 elections.

Democrats were hoping to put Republicans on the spot with a “resolution of inquiry” that, if it had passed, would have asked the Department of Justice to provide documents related to any potential involvement Sessions had in the firing of former FBI Director James Comey.

But Republicans used their majority in the committee to tack on an amendment that struck the Democrats’ language and instead called for a special counsel to investigate matters more closely related to Hillary Clinton and the Obama administration. That includes the recently revealed information that former Attorney General Loretta Lynch asked Comey to refer to the Clinton email scandal as a “matter” instead of an “investigation.” [ Source:Washington Examiner (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – The European Union’s top court kept Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas on the EU terrorism blacklist on Wednesday and removed Sri Lankan separatist rebels, the Tamil Tigers.

Judges at the European Court of Justice (ECJ) overruled the General Court’s view of 2014 that the Council of the European Union, the 28-nation grouping, had insufficient evidence to maintain asset freezes and travel bans on Hamas.

The lower court had found that the listing was based on media and internet reports rather than decisions by a “competent authority”. But the ECJ said such decisions were not required for groups to stay on the list, only for their initial listing. [ Source:Reuters (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – The Central Intelligence Agency under President Trump is giving more authority to field operatives and cutting excessive bureaucracy in a bid to boost intelligence operations, CIA Director Mike Pompeo says.

In his first news interview since taking charge of the agency in January, Pompeo also said he believes America’s greatest long-term security challenge is the threat posed by China, not Russia.

During the wide-ranging interview on the sidelines of a security conference in Aspen, Colo., Pompeo revealed the CIA is preparing intelligence options for the president, including covert action, for use against North Korea in efforts to counter the threat of a future nuclear missile attack. [ Source: Washington Free Beacon (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – Berating and slapping a pastor for reading the Bible instead of Hindu texts, police in Uttar Pradesh state, India last month detained six Christians under “unlawful assembly” laws for worshiping together, sources said.

After traveling from Etah village to a church in nearby Pujaripurvah, the six Christians were detained for nine days before they were granted bail by Bahriach District’s Second Class Judicial Magistrate Court on July 5.

Police on June 25 arrived at the worship service in Pujaripurvah village and confiscated Bibles, hymn books and devotionals. Station House Officer (SHO) Aravind Kumar of Nanpara demanded that Pastor Asha Ram Sahni hand over literature he suspected was used to convert people, the church leader said. [ Source:MorningStar (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – A court on the semi-autonomous island of Zanzibar, off the coast of Tanzania, ruled on Thursday (July 20) that a church cannot continue constructing a worship building it has tried to finish for eight years, sources said.

Hard-line Muslims outside Zanzibar City have been fighting construction of the Pentecostal Assemblies of God building since 2009, having demolished the partially built structure twice before then. They claim the party that sold the property to the church was not the rightful owner.

Christians believe the court on the overwhelmingly Muslim island acted out of religious bias. A previous court ruling allowed construction to go forward. [ Source:Morningstar (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – The Palestinian Authority and Islamic religious authorities said Israel’s removal of recently installed metal detectors and security cameras at an entrance to the Temple Mount is not enough.

Both entities further rejected the Security Cabinet’s decision to replace the metal detectors with more advanced surveillance, including “smart cameras,” which will take up to six months to be ready to use at an estimated cost of $23 million.

P.A. Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah called the decision “unacceptable,” the Palestinian Authority’s official Ma’an news agency reported Tuesday. [ Source:CBN News (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – U.S. stock indexes inched further into record territory Wednesday after AT&T, Boeing and others joined the parade of big companies reporting stronger profits than analysts expected. Stocks that pay big dividends were particularly strong after the Federal Reserve took a pause in its slow-moving campaign to lift interest rates, as Treasury yields sank lower.

While announcing its decision to hold short-term rates steady, the Federal Reserve said that it may begin paring the massive $4.5 trillion balance sheet it built up following the financial crisis “relatively soon,” which some analysts took to mean as September. The Fed also said that inflation looks to remain below its target of 2 percent in the near term. [ Source:CBN News (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – The first known attempt at creating genetically modified human embryos in the United States has been carried out by a team of researchers in Portland, Oregon, Technology Review has learned.

The effort, led by Shoukhrat Mitalipov of Oregon Health and Science University, involved changing the DNA of a large number of one-cell embryos with the gene-editing technique CRISPR, according to people familiar with the scientific results.

Some critics say germline experiments could open the floodgates to a brave new world of “designer babies” engineered with genetic enhancements—a prospect bitterly opposed by a range of religious organizations, civil society groups, and biotech companies.

The U.S. intelligence community last year called CRISPR a potential “weapon of mass destruction.” [ Source:MIT Technology Review (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – President Trump took a swipe at his attorney general on Wednesday for his failure to replace the acting FBI director — a curious critique give the statutory authority to appoint someone outside the normal line of succession rests squarely on the president’s shoulders.

The president fired off a tweet attacking Attorney General Jeff Sessions — the third in three days — and questioned why he didn’t replace Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe.

“Why didn’t A.G. Sessions replace Acting FBI Director Andrew McCabe, a Comey friend who was in charge of Clinton investigation but got….big dollars ($700,000) for his wife’s political run from Hillary Clinton and her representatives. Drain the Swamp!” Mr. Trump wrote. [ Source:Washington Times (Read More…) ]