A New Perspective on Constantine

(Worthy News) – Heading into what is likely his most consequential overseas trip of the year, President Trump will be forced to grapple with a flurry of international crises, tense negotiations and a growing global to-do list.

Trump goes first to Osaka, Japan, for the annual Group of 20 summit, then on to South Korea for consultations on North Korea’s nuclear program. The agenda for his four-day trip is as laden with hazards for the president as it is light on the ceremonial pomp that marked his recent state visits to Japan and the United Kingdom.

The showdown between the U.S. and Iran, a trade war with China and the threat of fresh election interference by Russia are just some of the issues confronting the American leader who has shown little patience for the subtleties of global interactions and whose administration has struggled to grapple with simultaneous challenges. [ Source: Washington Times (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – Both the Senate and House have now passed legislation delivering billions of dollars to address the growing humanitarian crisis at the southern border. But lawmakers have no agreement on how to reconcile those bills before a recess set to start on Friday.

The Senate passed a $4.6 billion emergency spending bill on Wednesday, one day after the Democratic House approved its own competing legislation. House and Senate Democrats immediately then began urging Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) to enter into negotiations to craft compromise legislation.

But McConnell was noncommittal and may simply leave Speaker Nancy Pelosi with a take-it-or-leave-it decision heading into the July Fourth recess. McConnell would only say Congress “is going to try to get it finished this week” when asked if he’d enter into talks with House Democrats. [ Source: Politico (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – U.S. President Donald Trump said on Wednesday that a trade deal with Chinese President Xi Jinping was possible this weekend but he is prepared to impose U.S. tariffs on virtually all remaining Chinese imports if the two countries continue to disagree.

Trump, who departed for the G20 leaders summit in Osaka, Japan, on Wednesday, also raised the possibility that he may impose a lower, 10% duty on a $300 billion list of Chinese imports, instead of the proposed 25% rate.

Trump is expected to meet with Xi on Saturday in Osaka, a conversation that could revive stalled negotiations between the world’s two biggest economies or launch a much deeper, costlier trade war that would drag down global growth and roil financial markets. [ Source: Reuters (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – F-35 fighter jets from Israel, the United States and United Kingdom conducted training flights over the Mediterranean Sea Tuesday in the Israeli aircraft’s first-ever international exercise, the military said.

This marked a significant show of military cooperation between the three countries.

The Israel Defense Forces received the fifth-generation stealth fighter from the United States’ Lockheed Martin defense contractor in late 2016 and declared it operational roughly a year later. In 2018, the Israeli Air Force revealed it had used the F-35 operationally — including at least once over Lebanon — making it the first military in the world to do so. [ Source: Times of Israel (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – Defending the land, sea and airspace of NATO members may soon no longer suffice. At the organization’s Brussels summit this week, NATO defense ministers have for the first time ever discussed branching out into space defense.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has previously insisted that “we do not want to militarize space.” Instead, NATO now says it merely wants to get an “overview” of the current situation.

The alliance says that today, conflicts are being fought on unconventional battlefields, such as the internet — or one day, even outer space. That’s why it is now looking into what space defense could entail. The alliance says that there is the danger that nations may station weapons in the Earth’s orbit, or directly attack satellites. Indeed, diplomats say satellites play an important role not just for military purposes but also in civilian life. Moreover, NATO is concerned it could lose its technological advantage over China or Russia. [ Source:Deutsche Welle (Read More…) ]

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by Jordan Hilger, Worthy News Correspondent

(Worthy News) – Christian leaders met with Kurdish military officials in northern Iraq recently, who sought to position themselves as a natural ally of the US against Iranian aggression, should a conflict develop, and hoped the US would begin to see the cause of Kurdistan as part and parcel of its opposition to Iran.

A delegation from the White House Faith Advisory Board that included Dalton Thomas, founder of Frontiers Alliance Internation (FAI), Ralph Reed from the Faith and Freedom Foundation, and former US congresswoman Michele Bachmann heard testimonies from Kurdish generals and militiamen that pointed to Iran’s sweeping presence in the region.

“They [Iran] have a huge voice here in Iraq and we were told by the general of the military in this region and Iran that Baghdad, the capital of Iraq is essentially controlled by Iran,” explained Bachmann to CBN news.

“He virtually said to us, it’s not Iraq here, it’s Iran here.”

Kurdish fighters expressed hope that the US would take up the cause of the 40-million-strong Kurdish diaspora, which stretches across Turkey, Iran, Iraq, and Syria and regularly butts up against Iran’s wide-ranging influence via its proxy fronts.

“The Shiite militias are a very serious danger because they are run by Iran and they are against any kind of freedom and human rights so they are not a lot of difference between them and ISIS,” Kurdish General Musa Gardi told the delegation.

“I want the Americans to know that the only allies of the Americans here in the Middle East are Israel and the Kurds. And I would like them to support the Kurds.”

The Kurdish people voted overwhelmingly for independence in 2017, but were unable to achieve a sovereign state because of opposition from Turkey, Iran and other countries which feared a loss of territory from a rival ethnic group.

The delegation came to northern Iraq in an unofficial capacity, but will report its findings to the White House nevertheless.

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by Jordan Hilger, Worthy News Correspondent

(Worthy News) – The thinning oxygen in the atmosphere for Iran’s religious minorities came to light Friday with the State Department’s release of its 2018 Report on International Religious Freedom, which detailed the level of suppression suffered by Christians and Baha’i under the Ayatollahs.

The report explained how Iranian law permits little to no room for conversions away from Islam, while giving ample interpretive license to judges to construe conversions as offenses against the country’s majority faith—a penalty deserving of death in Iran.

Capital punishment in Iran, according to the report, is “for proselytizing and attempts by non-Muslims to convert Muslims, as well as for moharebeh (‘enmity against God’) and sabb al-nabi (‘insulting the Prophet’),” making Christians who hold to the basic tenets of their faith easy targets.

As illustrations of Iranian law in action, the report further detailed cases of Christians imprisoned for their faith, such as Pastor Youcef Nadarkhani, Yasser Mossayebzadeh, Saheb Fadaie and Mohammad Reza Omidi, who were sentenced to 10 years in prison for “acting against national security” and “promoting Zionist Christianity” in their capacity as house church leaders.

“Any [Christian]…who cannot prove that his or her family was Christian prior to 1979,” moreover, “is considered Muslim,” meaning that Omidi, Fadaie, and Mossayebzadeh were also sentenced to 80 lashes in 2016 for their consumption of communion wine, alcohol consumption being permitted for “Muslims” only within prescribed religious contexts.

Iran came in at number 9 on Open Doors USA’s World Watch List 2019 for Christian persecution, with a 2016 UK Home Office Report having uncovered over 71 kinds of torture in use at the country’s notorious Evin Prison, where many of its Christians are holed up.

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(Worthy News) – Judicial appointments, abortion, criminal justice reform — all issues of importance to many evangelicals and they were all issues President Trump brought up Wednesday as he spoke to supporters at a conference in the nation’s capitol.

Trump addressed a friendly, exuberant crowd at the Faith and Freedom Coalition’s Road to Majority conference, touting what he says were promises made and kept to his evangelical voting base.

The biggest applause from the audience greeted his pro-life record. [ Source: CBN News (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – A coalition of pro-choice advocates is expanding abortion services via shipments of do-it-yourself medications and telemedicine in several states including Georgia, which recently banned the practice after a fetal heartbeat is detected.

Clinicians from Gynuity Health Projects, Planned Parenthood and other family planning groups are offering “telabortion” services in eight states in an effort to increase access to abortion.

The telabortion effort is being introduced as some states move to enshrine abortion rights into their laws and constitutions while others have enacted restrictions or outright bans against the procedure. Such legislative action has been driven in part by ideas that the new conservative majority of the Supreme Court would overturn the 1973 Roe v. Wade decision that legalized abortion nationwide. [ Source: Washington Times (Read More…) ]

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(Worthy News) – The U.S. House of Representatives on Tuesday approved a $4.5 billion aid package to address the migrant surge along the U.S.-Mexico border, including new standards for migrants in custody following reports of poor conditions facing young children at overcrowded facilities.

The Democratic-led House voted 230-195, mostly along party lines, to pass the measure, but its future is uncertain. The Republican-run Senate is working on its own version of the bill, and Republican President Donald Trump has vowed to veto the House legislation, with White House officials saying it would hamstring the administration’s border enforcement efforts. [ Source: Washington Times (Read More…) ]

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