A New Perspective on Constantine

(Worthy News) – A high level US delegation including senior White House adviser Jared Kushner arrived in Israel late Wednesday, ahead of meetings with Palestinian and Israeli leaders aimed at looking for way to jumpstart peace talks.

The visit by senior White House aide Jared Kushner, who is also US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Special Envoy for International Negotiations Jason Greenblatt and Deputy National Security Adviser for Strategy Dina Powell comes as Palestinian figures have become more vocal in expressing disappointment in Washington’s unclear approach to peace efforts so far.

The American delegation arrived Wednesday night and is set to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority head Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah starting on Thursday. [ Source (Read More…) ]

Restoration of Calm Opens Pathway to Peace Talks

The visit’s goal, a White House source told Politico, is to “focus on the path to substantive Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, combating extremism, the situation in Gaza, including how to ease the humanitarian crisis there.”

Trump, the source added, “believes that the restoration of calm and the stabilized situation in Jerusalem after the recent crisis on the Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif has created an opportunity to continue discussions and the pursuit of peace.”

Before coming to Israel, the American met with leaders from the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Qatar and Saudi Arabia. On Wednesday, they sat down with Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. This marks Kushner’s third visit to the Middle East since assuming his role as Trump’s advisor. [ Source (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – Egypt criticized a US decision to freeze $195 million in military aid on Wednesday, as a US delegation including presidential adviser Jared Kushner visited Cairo for meetings on the Middle East peace process.

The decision to withhold some financial and military aid in response to Egypt’s poor record on democracy and civil liberties came as a surprise, after US President Donald Trump pledged strong tries with the key US ally after they had deteriorated under his predecessor Barack Obama.

The US delegation met Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry on Wednesday, his spokesman said, after the meeting had earlier been dropped with no explanation from the minister’s schedule sent to reporters. [ Source (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – The United States still has doubts and concerns over the nuclear deal with Iran, the US ambassador to the United Nations said Wednesday, after a meeting with atomic officials intended to allay American anxieties over the landmark accord.

Nikki Haley also said the US is determined to ensure the UN’s International Atomic Energy Agency has the resources it needs for “robust verification of nuclear-related activities in Iran.”

Haley met behind closed doors in Vienna Wednesday with IAEA Director General Yukiya Amano to be briefed on Iran’s compliance with the nuclear agreement, which US President Donald Trump has called into question, drawing threats from Iran of restarting its high-enrichment program. [ Source (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – President Trump’s willingness to brave a government shutdown in order to get funding for his border wall roiled Capitol Hill, where Democrats on Wednesday called him reckless and redoubled their promise to resist any more money for the president’s immigration crackdown plans.

With the next round of government funding due by Oct. 1, the wall fight is the biggest flash point, but by no means the only one that could result in a second shutdown this decade.

Mr. Trump raised the stakes in the fight late Tuesday at a rally in Phoenix, where he said fulfilling his campaign promise to erect a border wall was a big enough priority that it’s worth a shutdown. [ Source (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – President Trump has pinned the blame for his stalled agenda on Congress, chastising lawmakers of both parties who stand in his way and urging the Republican-run Senate to abolish filibuster rules in order to ram though bills for a border wall, tax cuts and a replacement of Obamacare.

Relishing his status as an outsider occupying the White House, Mr. Trump dug in as a nemesis of the Washington establishment in a rally speech in Phoenix Tuesday night. He waged verbal warfare on his political enemies, the news media and even his erstwhile allies on Capitol Hill.

The tension was so great that the White House felt obliged Wednesday to affirm Mr. Trump had a good working relationship with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Kentucky Republican. [ Source (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – Congressional Republicans working to craft a tax reform package are taking their pitches to major Fortune 500 companies this week, as they look to coalesce support from the business community ahead of an expected legislative push in the fall.

House Speaker Paul D. Ryan said Wednesday the GOP learned their lesson from the failed health care process, where outside groups were often at odds and there were conflicting messages out of the House, Senate and White House.

“Unity between the House, the Senate, and the White House first, nail down understandings, get on the same page, and then go forward together. That’s the big lesson,” Mr. Ryan said at an Intel facility in Oregon. [ Source (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – A conservative Christian media group has slapped the Southern Poverty Law Center with a defamation lawsuit after being listed alongside neo-Nazis and white supremacists on its ‘hate map.’

D. James Kennedy Ministries filed a lawsuit this week in federal court in Alabama alleging that the SPLC “illegally trafficked in false and misleading descriptions of the services” offered by the ministry, subjecting it to “disgrace, ridicule, odium, and contempt in the estimation of the public.”

“These false and illegal characterizations have a chilling effect on the free exercise of religion and on religious free speech for all people of faith,” said president and CEO Frank Wright in a Wednesday statement.

(Worthy News) – President Trump bookended a free-wheeling rally on Tuesday evening — which featured attacks on the media and incumbent Republicans — with a pair of disciplined speeches both before and afterward that promoted unity, creating a volatile three days for Republicans still reeling from the backlash to Trump’s controversial comments on recent violence in Charlottesville, Va.

The series of speeches extended coverage of his response to the Charlottesville clashes into a second week and coincided with increased scrutiny of his relationship with GOP congressional leaders. Press secretary Sarah Sanders even felt the need to speak out publicly on reports that the lines of communication between Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell had frozen over amid tensions that the Charlottesville imbroglio had only made worse.

“He’s literally trying to do three things at once,” Ford O’Connell, a Republican strategist, said of Trump. “[He’s trying to] pass his legislative agenda, fire up the base and push back on the media narrative that he’s a racist.” [ Source (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – The White House is expected to send guidance to the Pentagon in coming days on how to implement a new administration ban on transgender people in the military, issuing a policy that will allow Defense Secretary Jim Mattis to consider a service member’s ability to deploy in deciding whether to kick them out of the military.

The White House memo also directs the Pentagon to deny admittance to transgender individuals and to stop spending on medical treatment regimens for those currently serving, according to U.S. officials familiar with the document.

The 2½-page memo gives Mr. Mattis six months to prepare to fully implement the new ban, according to these officials. [ Source (Read More…) ]

(Worthy News) – The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals has refused to reinstate former Bremerton High School football coach Joseph Kennedy, who lost his job after he refused to stop praying on the field after games.

A three-judge panel ruled Wednesday that Kennedy was acting as a teacher, with a duty to the district, students and parents to set an example and “communicate demonstratively” to those groups. The appeals court found Kennedy “took advantage of his position to press his particular views upon impressionable and captive minds before him.”

In two opinions totaling 62 pages, the appeals judges said Kennedy could not prove he was exercising his First Amendment rights as a private citizen when he insisted, against orders by the Bremerton School District, on taking a knee at the 50-yard line after football games and praying. [ Source (Read More…) ]