ISIS success in Iraq threatens to redraw borders


 

ISIS success in Iraq threatens to redraw borders

Middle East due to be reshaped politically and geographically by ISIS advancements in Iraq and Syria as Iran mulls military involvement.

Reuters


It could also redesign Middle Eastern national boundaries set nearly a century ago after the fall of the Ottoman empire, and lead to a forging of new regional alliances.

As well-armed forces of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) raised their black flags over Mosul this week, routing an Iraqi army that fled rather than fight, the future of Iraq as a unitary state hung in the balance.

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As they pressed south towards Baghdad, the rest of the region, the United States and other powers woke up to the prospect that this Jihadi comeback could establish a dangerous base in the heart of the Middle East - an Afghanistan on the Mediterranean.

"What we are witnessing is the fragmentation of power. The government of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki will never be able to centralize power in the same way he has," says Fawaz Gerges, a Middle East expert at the London School of Economics.


ISIS on the road to Tikrit, just north of Baghdad (Photo: AFP)
ISIS on the road to Tikrit, just north of Baghdad (Photo: AFP)

"We are seeing a redrawing of boundaries for sure," he said.

As the conflict escalated, Iraq's most senior Shiite cleric on Friday urged his followers to take up arms to defend themselves against the Sunni revolt. A rare message from Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, the highest religious authority for Shiites in Iraq, said people should unite to fight back against the insurgency by ISIS fighters and former Saddam loyalists.

Sistanis's intervention followed the failure of the government of Nuri al-Maliki, the Shiite prime minister re-elected in April, to convene a quorum in parliament to grant him emergency powers. Sunni and Kurdish lawmakers had stayed away.

A stunned region

The peshmerga forces of the Kurdish region of northern Iraq meanwhile seized Kirkuk, the oil-rich region bordering their self-governing territory, stepping into a security vacuum to claim a prize they have always regarded as their own.

The ease with which ISIS, a Sunni Jihadi movement that has fed on the civil war in Syria and staked out the ungoverned space between eastern Syria and western Iraq, swept into Iraqi cities has stunned a region seemingly inured to shock.

The insurgents, led by Iraqis who broke with al-Qaeda, are pressing south to Baghdad.

Some experts say they may be over-reaching. But while ISIS' predecessors were defeated in 2007-08 by Sunni tribal militias empowered by US forces, ISIS has exploited Sunni anger at Maliki's sectarianism and inherited networks from Saddam Hussein's army.

"ISIS has been able to embed itself with a disaffected and alienated Sunni community", says Gerges.

"In fact, the most important development about ISIS in the last year is its ability to recruit former officers and soldiers of the dissolved Iraqi army. If you observe how ISIS has been waging war you see a skilled mini army, confident, that has command and control, is motivated and using war tactics."

The ISIS advance has been joined by former Baathist officers who were loyal to Saddam as well as disaffected armed groups and tribes who want to topple Maliki. So far the towns and cities that have fallen to the militants have been Sunni.

"The Sunnis of Iraq are willing to go to bed with the devil to defeat Maliki, this is where the danger lies," Gerges said.

Redrawing the borders

The million-strong Iraqi army, by contrast, trained by the United States at a cost of more than $20bn, is hobbled by low morale and corruption that impedes its supply lines.

Its effectiveness is hurt by a perception among Sunnis that it pursues the hostile interests of the Shiites, a majority in Iraq, raised to power by the US led invasion of 2003.

The Kurdish capture of Kirkuk overturns a fragile balance of power that has held Iraq together since Saddam's fall.

Iraq's Kurds have done well since 2003, running their own affairs while being given a fixed percentage of the country's overall oil revenue. But with full control of Kirkuk - and the vast oil deposits beneath it - they could earn more on their own, eliminating the incentive to remain part of a failing Iraq.

US President Barack Obama threatened military strikes against ISIS, highlighting the gravity of the group's threat to redraw borders in a region already wracked by war.

Hayder al-Khoei, Associate Fellow at Chatham House, said the jihadi onslaught leaves Washington in an awkward position.

"With US-made military vehicles and weapons being paraded by jihadists in Mosul, policy-makers will be questioning the effectiveness of providing Baghdad with even more military hardware that may end up in the hands of the very people they want to defeat," he said.

Ambivilant to hostile

Reactions inside the region are ambivalent to hostile.

Deep down Saudi Arabia and its Sunni allies, which have never reconciled themselves to the loss of Sunni-ruled Iraq to the Shiites, detest Maliki for his alliance with non-Arab Shiite Iran. They would like to see Maliki brought down but did not want al-Qaeda affiliates to be the ones doing it.

They believe Iran, backed by its allies, wants to build a Shiite crescent from Iraq through Syria to Lebanon.

"I can imagine a Saudi official saying 'the wrong people are doing the right thing'," said Jamal Khashoggi, head of a TV news station owned by Saudi billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal.

On the other hand, Iran, which has strong leverage in Iraq, is so alarmed by the ISIS advances that it may be ready to cooperate with Washington in helping Baghdad fight back.

A senior Iranian official told Reuters the idea is being discussed among the Islamic Republic's leadership. For now, officials say, Iran will send its neighbour advisers and weaponry, although probably not troops, to help Maliki.

Turkey, which has turned a blind eye to Jihadis crossing its border to fight Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, is not ready to intervene militarily because it fears its own sectarian demons and will focus on securing its borders, experts say.

The Kurds, crucial players, will likely resist Baghdad's calls to be drawn in by sending troops to recapture Mosul and other towns. They will instead consolidate their presence in Kirkuk and along their borders, Kurdish officials said.

Iran weighing in

Iraq watchers say ISIS, estimated to have a few thousand fighters inside Iraq, won't be able to advance into Baghdad, a capital of 6 million where Maliki has his special forces deployed, backed by Iranian-trained militias.

"I don't think they will run as far as Baghdad. They haven't got the numbers, they overreached themselves...It is more about the weakness of the Iraqi state than it is about the state of ISIS," said Toby Dodge, Director of the Middle East Centre at the London School of Economics.

Just as there is little chance of ISIS taking over the Shiite-dominated capital, the Iraqi army is unlikely to dislodge ISIS from Mosul or regain full control of the north of the country, even with Shiite militia volunteers and likely Iranian support.

With the rising Sunni insurgency, Iran may have to weigh in to salvage its ally and Tehran's influence in Iraq as it did in neighbouring Syria.

Diplomatic sources said Iran already has high-ranking commanders, including two close aides of Qassem Suleimani, the commander of the Revolutionary Guards elite Quds force, regularly holding meetings with Maliki.

Malikis' mobilisation of Shiite militias, endorsed by the highest religious authority, has the potential to trigger all-out sectarian strife, analysts say.

And there are concerns that Iraq might disintegrate into sectarian and tribal conflict, shattering into Shi'ite, Sunni and Kurdish entities.

"Maliki is playing with fire by trying to unleash Shi'ite militias, this is a recipe for disaster. That's exactly what ISIS wants - to trigger all-out sectarian war," Gerges said.

"Iraq has never healed, it is a mutilated country. The crisis is reaching a tipping point whereby Iraq will splinter into 3 or 4 states or reconcile. To reconcile you need a new leader, a new mindset and you don't have it there."

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4530063,00.html

Defense Experts Warn Israel of Possible ISIS Threat

Defense Experts Warn Israel of Possible ISIS Threat

Expert: battle between Islamist, Iraqi forces can snowball to cause terrorism closer to home - and IDF should prepare itself in the interim.
By Tova Dvorin First Publish: 6/13/2014, 12:05 PM

As the battle rages between Islamists from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) and Iraqi forces, the US, EU, and UN have begun to take notice - and Middle Eastern leaders are expressing concern for their safety.
But how far can the battle reach?
On Friday, former Israeli intelligence expert Jacques Neriah suggested in a CNN interview that Israel must prepare itself for the eventuality that the battle could reach the shores of Tel Aviv - despite the fact that the fighting rages more than 915 kilometers (595 miles) away.

According to Neriah, the current crisis in the Middle East has made Israel relatively quiet, and could buy the IDF time to prepare.
"Everyone is busy killing one another in the Arab world - it gives Israel a 'time out' to reorganize and to prepare itself for the long run," Neriah stated.
"If Iraq falls in the hands of ISIS, then we will have a terrorist state - where terrorists will be trained, will be equipped, will be financed by an [entire] state and not by an organization which is [in] hiding."
Analysts have noted that the real threat to Israel's security would not be a direct assault from ISIS, which would have to overcome the forces of Syrian President Bashar Assad in Syria, re-mobilize, and then launch an attack from Israel's northern neighbor to succeed.
The real threat from the ISIS stems from its reputation, as its success could spur increased terror activity from ISIS-affiliated groups in Gaza and the Sinai desert.
The ISIS has already controlled the Iraqi city of Fallujah for five months, and has also led one of the strongest rebel movements fighting Syrian President Bashar Assad in Syria.
But this week's offensive has seen the ISIS claim a stunning number of victories in a lighting-fast takeover of the flashpoint region.
So far, the Islamists have made a systemic advance from northern Iraq southward.
On Tuesday, ISIS leaders seized Mosul; just 48 hours later, Tikrit - birthplace of former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein - fell to the terrorists.
Advancing toward Baghdad, large-scale clashes have erupted in Samarra; on the eastern front, Kurdish forces took Kirkuk to fend off the Islamist advance on Thursday, and the town of Jawlala fell to ISIS on Friday.

https://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=6328587525941842807&pli=1#editor/target=post;postID=3961305255679601695

An In Depth Look at the Modern Equivalent to Biblical Names in Ezek. 38

An In Depth Look at the Modern Equivalent to Biblical Names in Ezek. 38

A Bible Study by Jack Kelley
Many of the nations we hear about in today’s news existed in ancient times but under different names. By using the ancient names for the countries He prophesied about, the Lord made possible the use of scripture to interpret scripture. Much of the information below can be gained by referencing Genesis 10, the so-called Table of Nations, in a good study Bible. Learning the modern names of the nations whose founding families are listed there really helps connect Bible prophecy to current events.

Gog

I believe that Gog is a supernatural being (showing up in the battle of Ezekiel 38 and the final battle at the end of the Millennium) perhaps Satan’s counter part to Michael the Arkangel. There is an obscure reference in the Septuigent translation of the Book of Amos in 7:1 to a Gog, King of the Locusts, for what that’s worth. You won’t find any hint of this in translations rendered into English from Hebrew. You can only get there from the Greek (Septuigent) translation. But with no connection to any physical territory or people as there is with Magog and the others named in Ezekiel 38, and with Biblical appearances so far apart in time, there’s good reason to believe that Gog is a non-human character, one of Satan’s own.

Magog

In contrast, there are over 130 historical references tying Magog to the ancient Scythians.  In Colossians 3:11 Paul mentioned the Scythians.  The Strong’s concordance identifies a Scythian as an inhabitant of Scythia or modern day Russia.  The Great Wall of China was known as the “Ramparts of Magog” in ancient times and was built to protect China from Magog.  Magog was a son of Japeth and inhabited central Asia. His children, the Scythians, are the ancestors of today’s Russian people.

Meshech and Tubal

These two were brothers of Magog and are linked to the same general area, but more likely with the Turkic people. Josephus associated Meshech with Cappodocia, home of the ancient Hittite Empire in Eastern Turkey.

Persia

This one’s easier because the name changed to Iran in our memory.

Cush and Put

These two were sons of Ham and brothers to Mizraim (which means “two Egypts”) and Canaan. Narrowly they are called Ethiopia (Cush) and Lybia (Put) but both were in possession of much larger territory in the past. The word Cush has a Hebrew root meaning black, and can be representative of the black races of Africa, while Put can represent the north part of the continent; Algeria, Tunisia, Morocco, Mauritania, etc. Note that all are sons of Ham and therefore not Semitic. The common denominator among African nations is religion (Islam) not race (Arab).

Gomer

Another son of Japeth and brother to Magog, Gomer inhabited the Rhine and Danube valleys, and can be associated with Eastern Europe of today.

Beth Togarmah

Beth means house in Hebrew. Togarmah was a son of Gomer. The Armenians of today call themselves the House of Togarmah. The Turks (but not the Kurds, who are the ancient Medes of Media-Persia fame) are also included, and they’re the ones Ezekiel had in view.

Sheba and Dedan

These two are first mentioned as grandsons of Cush in Genesis 10:7. Later, inGenesis 25:3, we read of two grandsons of Abraham’s named Sheba and Dedan as well, born to Jokshan, a son of Abraham and his 2nd wife, Keturah. It’s not clear which pair of grandsons is being referenced, but commentaries none-the-less identify these two as probably representing the nations of the Arabian Penninsula, notably Saudi Arabia.
According to archaeologists W. F. Albright and Wendell Phillips, Sheba was on the southwestern edge of the Arabian Peninsula across the Red Sea from present-day Ethiopia. Sheba is known in history as Saba in Southern Arabia, the Sabaeans of classical geography, who carried on the trade in spices with the other peoples of the ancient world. Dedan was probably the habitat of the Arabs on the northern part of the Arabian Desert, which is modern-day Saudi Arabia. The ancient capital of Saudi Arabia is still called Dedan on many maps today.

Tarshish

Tarshish was a son of Javan, who settled the area of Southern Greece. There are three schools of thought where Tarshish is concerned. One view locates Tarshish to the East, accessible from Solomon’s great seaport at Ezion Geber on the Red Sea. Since Javan and his family traveled north and west from Babel at the confusion of tongues, it seems unlikely. Large sea going vessels were often nicknamed “Ships of Tarshish” and more likely this is how Tarshish came to be linked with Ezion Geber, since both Solomon and Hezekiah built such vessels there.
Others see this as a reference to ancient Tartessus, a seaport in southern Spain, near Gibraltar. Still others recall the sea going navies of the Phoenicians, who operated Ships of Tarshish out of nearby Cadiz and sailed as far north as England for tin, a metal used in the making of bronze and other alloys, which they mined in Cornwall. Some believe that the name Britannia is actually derived from a Phoenician word meaning “source of tin.” If so, since the ships of Tarshish brought tin to the ancient world, this reference could be to Great Britain making the “lions” (KJV) or “villages”(NIV) of Tarshish Great Britain’s colonies, of which the US is most prominent today. The fact that the lion is a symbol of the British Empire lends support to this view.

Summary

Again, it’s instructive to view the common motivator as religion, not race. Some years ago, an editorial in the Jerusalem Post outlined the “Arab” plan as being composed of two phases. Phase one was to gain as much as possible through the inexpensive negotiating process while simultaneously weakening Israel and strengthening the Moslem coalition. Phase two, after no more negotiated gain can be made, is to go to war for the rest

Tigris and Euphrates Rivers are Drying Up

Tigris and Euphrates Rivers are Drying Up

Loss of fresh water in Middle East, NASA image
NASA studies recently have indicated that the Fertile Crescent region in the Middle East is losing fresh water at a rapid rate.  The water flow in the important Euphrates and Tigris Rivers has decreased as a result of this trend and formerly arable land in the area has become cracked and dry.  The Tigris and Euphrates Rivers are drying up, and these are the very rivers that were once a critical part of the Cradle of Civilization in ancient Mesopotamia 2000 years before Christ.  The decrease in water primarily has resulted from a major drought in 2007 and the loss of snow pack in the mountains to the north.  The image map from NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and the National Center for Atmospheric Research shows the vast decrease in fresh water in 2008, which continues today.  This loss has occurred over the last decade and amounts to over 144 cubic kilometers of water lost from these ancient river basins, which include vast areas in Turkey, Syria, Iraq, and Iran.
The Euphrates River is mentioned in the Bible in the Book of Revelation in a prophecy that is predicted to occur just before Jesus returns.  During the Great Tribulation when the global destruction of the last days is threatening the very existence of life on Earth, the Apostle John says:
“And the sixth angel poured out his vial upon the great river Euphrates; and the water thereof was dried up, that the way of the kings of the east might be prepared.”
During the coming World War III, just before the attack of China and the other countries to the east upon Israel, the Euphrates River will be removed as being an obstacle by being dried up.  This will permit the march of a 200,000,000-man army to reach the Valley of Jehoshaphat (Armageddon) just as Christ returns to fight against them (Rev. 9:16).  Could the current trend toward drought in this region and the dramatic decrease in the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers in recent years be the first stage of the fulfillment of this prophecy?  It appears that this is only another important indication of how close we are to the Second Coming!

Turkey shuts off the water supply to the Euphrates River

The Turkish government recently cut off the flow of the Euphrates River, threatening primarily Syria but also Iraq with a major water crisis. Al-Akhbar found out that the water level in Lake Assad has dropped by about six meters, leaving millions of Syrians without drinking water.Two weeks ago, the Turkish government once again intervened in the Syrian crisis. This time was different from anything it had attempted before and the repercussions of which may bring unprecedented catastrophes onto both Iraq and Syria.
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Violating international norms, the Turkish government recently cut off the water supply of the Euphrates River completely. In fact, Ankara began to gradually reduce pumping Euphrates water about a month and half ago, then cut if off completely two weeks ago, according to information received by Al-Akhbar.
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A source who spoke on the condition of anonymity revealed that water levels in the Lake Assad (a man-made water reservoir on the Euphrates) recently dropped by six meters from its normal levels (which means losing millions of cubic meters of water). The source warned that “a further drop of one additional meter would put the dam out of service.”
“We should cut off or reduce the water output of the dam, until the original problem regarding the blockage of the water supply is fixed,” the source explained.
The Euphrates River has historically been at the center of a conflict between Turkey on the one hand and both Syria and Iraq on the other. Ankara insists on considering the Euphrates a “trans-boundary river” and not an “international river,” hence it is “not subject to international laws.” Also, Turkey is one of the only three countries in the world (along with China and Burundi) that opposed the Convention on the Law of the Non-Navigational Uses of International Watercourses adopted by the General Assembly of the United Nations in 1997.
In 1987, a temporary agreement between Syria and Turkey was signed to share the water supplies of the Euphrates during the period when the basin of the Ataturk Dam was being filled. In virtue of the agreement, Turkey pledged to provide an annual level of over 500 cubic meters of water a second on the Turkish-Syrian borders, until reaching a final agreement about sharing the water supplies of the river between the three countries. In 1994, Syria registered the agreement at the United Nations to guarantee the minimum amount of Iraq and Syria’s right to the water from the Euphrates River.

Codex Alimentarius: Control the World by Controlling the Food

Codex Alimentarius

Control the World by Controlling the Food
The United Nations globalist agency located in Rome Italy, the World Agriculture and Food Organization, will soon tell farmers in the U.S.A. and around the world what and when to plant.

No one will be able to buy or sell food (Revelation 13:16-17) not approved by the global organization.

This is the reason why the U.S. Department of Agriculture is demanding that every farm animal—horses, cows, sheep, goats—be microchipped and tagged and that ranchers and farmers maintain exhaustive records of the birth, death, and life of each and every animal. Soon, you will not be able to own livestock or any other farm animal without obtaining a government permit.

Legislation being pushed through Congress with support from multinational pharmaceutical corporatons such as Monsanto, ADM, Sodexo, and Tyson, is so broad based that technically someone with a little backyard garden could get fined and have their property seized. It will impact anyone who produces food even if they do not sell but only consume it. It will literally put all independent farmers and food producers out of business due to the huge amounts of money it will take to conform to factory farming methods. If people choose to farm without industry standards such as chemical pesticides and fertilizers they will be subject to a variety of harassment from government agencies that has never before existed. That’s right, whole new government agencies are being created just to police food, for our own protection of course.

Codex Alimentarius
Codex Alimentarius, the UN program to control food and health products internationally with the goal of HARMonization of food, means that plants, seeds, livestock, farming and how all food is processed is to become uniform.
Of course, GMO foodis a major component of this scheme. Codex Alimentarius operates under two UN agencies: the WHO (World Health Organization), notorious for pushing unsafe vaccines for the H1N1 flu and insider deals with Big Pharma, and the corrupt FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization). Kevin Miller’s excellent film “We Become Silent” is recommended for more details.

There are several unpopular US “food safety” bills currently under consideration. By simply reading the short summary of Senate bill S 510, it is clear that the bill is not designed for food safety, but for government (Department of Health and Human Services, the EPA and the CDC) expansion, control and monetary gain. There are only a few representatives in Washington that are even remotely interested in true food safety and a real solution, which would include the abolition of GMOs, or at least the labeling of GMO food, so that consumers can make an informed choice.

Barack Obama issued an Executive Order on June 10, 2010 that opens the door to Codex Alimentarius in the United States. “Section 6 (g) contains specific plans to ensure that all prevention programs outside the Department of Health and Human Services are based on the science-based guidelines developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention under subsection (d) of this section.”

In other words, ALL prevention programs, even those outside of the umbrella of the Department of Health and Human Services, must align with CDC guidelines, which are “science-based.” What do we take for prevention? Herbs and vitamins. Herbs that you grow in your backyard and vitamins that are not approved by your doctor do not fall under these “science-based” guidelines, and are not allowed. Therefore, this will effectively open the door to outlawing ALL disease prevention practices that use herbs and vitamins not prescribed by a doctor, and implement Codex Alimentarius right here in America.

Signs of the Last Days: Mark of the Beast

Signs of the Last Days: Mark of the Beast

The book of Revelation reveals that at some point in time the antichrist will be able to:
  • Track and control all financial transactions, and
  • That NO MAN will be able to buy or sell anything unless he has the mark of the beast.
And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. - Revelation 13:16-17
Not until recent times did people understand how this prophecy could possibly come to pass. There was simply no way that anyone could control the buying and selling activities on such a large scale.

No one knows how the mark will be imprinted on the hand or the forehead and I am not saying everything described here will necessarily become the mark of the beast. What I am saying and warning you about is that whatever the mark of the beast turns out to be and however it is implemented, you are being prepared today to accept it without question.

Numerous things including bar code labels and Social Security numbers have been identified in the past as "the mark of the beast", and have been proven wrong. Rather, those technologies were precursors to later technologies even more powerful in the hands of the antichrist. Given rapidly evolving modern technology, if the Lord tarries a bit longer there may be some new development that would fit the bill even more closely. However, there are some good candidates and numerous ways this can be accomplished today.

The AntiChrist System Is Closer Than You May Think
The technological challenges of an antichrist marking and tracking system are being overcome today at an ever increasing pace and should be ominous signs for serious students of Bible prophecy.

Modern technology has created a brave new electronic world without borders. With modern computer technology, satellites, GPS, biometric and smart card technology, people can now be tracked within 3 feet anywhere in the world. Advances in digital technology have made it possible now to engineer an identification system capable of monitoring virtually every human transaction.

Indeed, Anticrhist's world government is not only believeable but may have actually arrived.

Homeland SecurityIn the wake of events following Sept. 11, 2001, the monitoring and tracking of people have become commonplace and huge databases are being compiled on every citizen. The American and British minion governments have essentially eliminated personal privacy and is now collecting data and tracking its citizens in nearly everything they do. Telephone conversations are being recorded, emails are being read, tweets and instant messages on social networking sites are being monitored, every purchase you make is being documented, and your movements are being tracked with GPS in your car and cell phone and we're being recorded by monitoring cameras all around us.

Your movements and access to resources are being controlled, and in many cases citizens are being deprived of their Constitutional rights in the name of safety and security.

TSAToday, you cannot board an airplane or enter a government facility without being subjected to an invasive search that violates not only the Constitution but violates your personal privacy.

The TSA (Transportation Security Administration) warns that any “would-be commercial airline passenger” who enters an airport checkpoint and refuses to be subjected to “the method of inspection designated by the TSA will not be allowed to fly and also will not be permitted to simply leave the airport.” Americans may be arrested and fined $11,000 if they refuse to cooperate with the agency’s invasive and humiliating techniques.

Of course, the safety and security argument made by the TSA to advance their unconstitutional agenda is totally bogus as the real continuity of agenda is rooted in the antichrist system of command and control.

If Americans continue to allow their government to violate their Fourth Amendmentprotection against unreasonable search and seizures and be humiliated with naked body scans and enhanced pat downs in order to travel, what else will they let the government do? Homeland Security is considering replacing the naked body scanners with body scanners that scan and store biometric data.

You cannot open a bank account or conduct many other commercial transactions without providing government approved identity documents. These same proceedures are also now being extended to other forms of transportation and entry into public events.
  • Governments and large corporations are now introducing systems to identify individuals using biometric data as opposed to traditional card forms of identification, such as drivers’ licenses and membership cards. Providing Biometric date, including a fingerprint scan, is an act of submission that is being required by government and private venues more and more.
  • To obtain a driver’s license, you must submit to a thumb scan. If you refuse, you will not be issued a license, your right to travel will be severely limited, and you will lack a common form of personal identification.
  • In California, a thumb scan is required to obtain a real estate/mortgage broker’s license.
  • Beginning February 1, 2011, California will also require fingerprints to purchase ammunition, a substantial infringement on privacy and the right to bear arms.
  • The U.S. House of representatives approved the Katie Sepich Enhanced DNA Collection Act of 2010 (H.R. 4614) by a vote of 357 to 32., allowing for compiling national DNA databases taken from people arrested for but not convicted of crimes.
  • Newborn babies in the United States are routinely screened for a panel of genetic diseases by taking blood samples without parental consent. States mandate that newborns DNA samples are stored in state labs for anywhere from three months to indefinitely, depending on the state.
While most of the control is now being exerted by Homeland Security over access to public facilities and transportation, the day is not far off when the globalists will also control world food and water supplies, and other necessary things necessary to live. The U.N. sponsoredCodex Alimentarius is quickly becoming the controlling entity of everything that provides nutrition to humans. People will ultimately be required to either accept the mark of the beast or starve to death.
What they can't accomplish through willfull compliance using fear and intimidation or legislation disguised as security, they do so illegally as President George W. Bush demonstrated during his term of office.

I believe the most important point is that each of the technologies developed is moving the world closer to the ultimate tool to be used by the Antichrist, and perhaps even more important is that as each technology is embraced by our society, people of all stripes are being conditioned to ultimately ACCEPT the mark of the beast.

We have already demonstrated our willingness to accept devices to electronically tag or track individuals. It has become quite commonplace, for example, for law enforcement agencies to require individuals to wear electronic bracelets in order to monitor their activities. The traveling public have accepted the notion of abandoning their Constitutional rights at the airport and be subjected to intrusive bodily searches in exchange for perceived safety. Amazingly, in a poll conducted by CBS News in Nov. 2010, 81 percent of Americans support the TSA's use of naked body scanners at airports. The Department of Homeland Security is incrementally conditioning the public to accept a Global Biometric Plan.
Bar Codes
Bar codes are everywhere: they are as familiar as a trip to buy groceries. Now part of almost every package that crosses the supermarket, drugstore, and retail counter, bar codes and other related technology stand poised to move into many other facets of society.

In their quest for better device identification, the U.S. Department of Defense and NASA are testing coding systems that pack in much more information than current bar codes. These new "two-dimensional" bar codes can squeeze in enough information to fit the Gettysburg Address into a two-inch square. This next generation of identification codes needs no centralized database. Instead, the symbol itself can contain all the necessary information, thus these codes can help companies and the military keep better track of products that "cross organizational boundaries." When the device, substance or person travels to a new warehouse, store, hospital or location, all its data go along, in compact form, accessible to anyone with a machine that can read the symbol.

"It's a portable data file," says Doug Mohr, mechanical engineer in program development at the Idaho National Engineering Laboratory in Idaho Falls, who is evaluating these technologies for use by the federal government. At the Wilford Hall U.S. Air Force Medical Center in San Antonio, Tex., hospital administrators expect that within a year patients there will carry ID cards with medical histories and personal data encoded on the back. The hospital had evaluated other types of codes, including current bar codes, but discovered with the two-dimensional format that "we didn't need to tie up our database memory," says Lt. Col. Frank J. Criddle, an emergency room physician at Wilford Hall.

Miniaturized, some of these new codes can identify electronic components, jewelry or even medical devices. "It represents a giant step in component traceability," says Robert S. Anselmo, president of Veritec, Inc., in Chatsworth, Calif. He boasts that his company's symbols could fit on a grain of rice. Others say they can make their codes invisible to the eye but still readable to a scanner.
RFID
Expected to replace bar-code labels on consumer goods, RFID (radio frequency identification) is fast becoming a part of passports and payment cards. RFID chips contain unique identification codes, and can be read at varying distances with special reader devices.

The Real ID Act, supported by both Democrat and Republican politicians says that driver's licenses and other ID cards must include a digital photograph, anticounterfeiting features and undefined "machine-readable technology, with defined minimum data elements" that could include a magnetic strip or RFID tag. When this is implemented, American citizens without drivers' licenses that conform to the federal standards find themselves essentially stripped of their ability to participate in life as we know it. Americans cannot get a job, open a bank account, apply for Social Security or Medicare, exercise their Second Amendment rights, or even take an airplane flight, unless they can produce a state-issued ID that conforms to the federal specifications.
Subcutaneous implant
The technology now exists and has been successfully tested to allow an identification device of some type, including a tiny microchip, to be implanted under the skin of the hand.

Programmable subcutaneous visible implants could contain biosensors to monitor temperature and blood pressure, and display these readings -- clearly a medical advancement. But the devices could have a more serious purpose. They could be used for electronic tagging. Whenever anyone wanted to buy or sell someting, he could be required to wave his hand over a scanning device that would read the chip, identify the buyer or seller, and validate or invalidate the sale.

Interval Research (Palo Alto) has patented a "programmable tattoo." The biologically inert subcutaneous implant is constructed of a flexible material so as to conform to the skin's surface. The small liquid-crystal display can be inserted just beneath the skin (e.g., in place of a wrist watch). Because human skin is partially transparent, the display is clearly visible. The implant also includes a receiver for receiving programming information from a user, and a display for displaying the programming information through the skin. The display is connected to a control chip and power comes from a small battery. Both of these are implanted beneath the skin. Implanting is an outpatient operation and the battery can be recharged inductively, by holding the wrist near a charger.
Digital Angel
The Digital Angel™ technology incorporates a microchip that can be worn close to the body and includes biosensors that can measure the biological parameters of the body and send the information with RFID (radio frequency identification) technology to a ground station or computer. It will also have an antenna that can receive signals from GPS satellites, thus pinpointing the location of the wearer.

According the the Digital Angel™ web site, "While a number of other tracking and monitoring technologies have been patented and marketed in the past, they are all unsuitable for the widespread tracking, recovery and identification of people due to a variety of limitations, including unwieldy size, maintenance requirements, insufficient or inconvenient power-supply and activation difficulties. For the first time in the history of location and monitoring technology, Digital Angel™ overcomes these limitations.

Some of it's potential uses, according the their web site includes: monitor patients by doctors, commodities supply chain management, locating people such as small children and the elderly, tracking parolees, people under house arrest, and individuals in witness protection programs, trace valuable items such as art pieces or computer equipment. Of particular interest is its application as an important security measure. It can carry personal identification information and transmit this information via wireless communication with personal computers.

Palm Beach-based Applied Digital Solutions unveiled the VeriChip immediately after the 9/11 tragedy. Similar to pet identification chips, the human VeriChip is a syringe-injectable radio frequency identification microchip that can be read from a few feet away by either a hand-held scanner or by the implantee walking through a "portal" scanner. Information can be wirelessly written to the chip, which contains a unique 10-digit identification number.

The Digital Angel human implant, called VeriChips, was recently approved by the FDA for storing medical information and the company is going forward to market their implantable chips that would provide easy access to individual medical records. (WorldNetDaily, October 21, 2004)

Applied Digital Solutions, based in Delray Beach, Fla., expressed hope that such medical uses would accelerate the acceptance of under-the-skin ID chips as security and access-control devices. (The New York Times, October 14, 2004)

All it takes is a syringe-injected microchip implant for patrons of the Baja Beach Club in Barcelona, Spain to breeze past a "reader" that recognizes their identity, credit balance and even automatically opens doors to exclusive areas of the club for them. "By simply passing by our reader, the Baja Beach Club will know who you are and what your credit balance is," Conrad K. Chase explains. (WorldNetDaily, April 14, 2004)
Iriscans
Iriscan technology is already being introduced in financial organizations here and abroad that require nonintrusive, noncontact, and accurate electronic identification.
IriscanIriscan technology identifies people by analyzing the unique pattern in the iris of the human eye. The iris is the colored ring of tissue that surrounds the pupil of the eye and is a complex combination of patterns that can be recorded and stored by the computer. The iris-recognition product captures a photographic image of the iris, analyzes its unique visual structure, and then compares it to previously stored Iriscodes for authentication of identity. ["Security for Your Eyes Only," Byte, May 1998.] Imagine this technology being in place providing access control to facilities and point-of-sale control. It's already in place at some bank ATMs.
Thermograms
Thermogram's are a type of imagery that translates a person's heat-emitting facial features into an infrared image. Registering the various heat peaks and valleys in surface, the thermogram looks like a colorful, face-shaped topographic map. Like a fingerprint, each person's face creates a unique thermal pattern. Captured by a special infrared camera, the image can be digitized and stored in a computer. Later, the person is rephotographed and the new thermal image is electronically compared with the old. ["Smile, You're on Thermogram," ID Systems, August 1995.]
Smart Cards
The smart card - a piece of plastic with a computer chip on its face - is becoming entrenched in the United States with uses from defense and health care to retailing and transportation. It looks and acts like your average bank card, but it knows a lot more about you than you may think. The cards have replaced food stamps for many and meal tickets for students in college. Marines and peanut farmers are whipping them out for boot polish and crop reports. The Clinton Administration announced a nationwide system to use electronic banking technology to deliver billions of dollars in government benefits and President Clinton's proposed health-reform plan would have required every American to carry a health identification card bearing, at a minimum, his or her Social Security number.

For businesses, the card is a shortcut to valuable market research. With your card in its computer, a company could learn your ZIP code, shoe size, what magazines you subscribe to, or the date of your sporty sedan's last oil change, and respond accordingly. Already, the Vision marketing system for supermarkets is tailoring coupons to U.S. shoppers who use smart cards. Customers insert their Vision cards into computers at the checkout line. Then the card tracks purchases and supplies the customer with product coupons, allowing the store to collect marketing data and pitch its products more effectively.

New computerized systems are being implemented for drivers licenses. Instead of the cumbersome Polaroids, the new system will use a special camera that will store the photographic image that is on the card on a computer instead. Weight, eye color, and signature will be stored on a magnetic strip on the card as well as to a computer data base. Copies will be shared with the Kansas Bureau of Investigation, giving agents quick access to photographs of suspects and victims. The KBI will share copies with other law enforcement agencies. [Dave Ranney, "Say goodbye to Polaroids next time you get your license renewed," The Wichita Eagle, April 19, 1994]

Smart card acceptance in the U.S. has skyrocketed in recent years. The Smart Card Forum, a consortium of organizations utilizing smart card technology, forecasts between 1-1.5 billion smart cards will be in use by the year 2000.

At the Smart Card Alliance 2004 annual fall conference in San Francisco, a number of sessions indicated strong growth and continuing interest in applications for contactless payment devices for fare collection in mass transit systems across the country. During the conference, Ann Flemer, deputy director of operations for the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, the transportation planning, coordinating and financing agency for the nine-county San Francisco Bay area, gave an overview of her organization’s TransLink program, which is developing a single contactless payment system for the more than 20 transit agencies, including Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART), San Francisco Municipal Railway (Muni) and Golden Gate Ferries, with 1.5 million daily users combined.

The U.S. State Department is switching over to new passports that will be fitted with chips using RFID, or radio frequency identification, technology. Reader devices at borders and customs checkpoints will be able to read the information stored on the chip, including the person's name, address and digital photo.

To increase use, card makers are forming alliances with companies that are closer to consumers. Micro Card Technologies Inc. supplies cards to Copicard Inc., which worked with the University of Calgary to convert student and staff IDs to smart cards and is doing the same at several U.S. colleges. Micro Card Vice President John Taskett said a few U.S. airlines briefly tested the smart cars for frequent flyers. Meanwhile, AT&T and Lockheed Corp. will jointly seek contracts for public highways where drivers would pay tolls with dashboard-mounted smart cards. A transmitter at the tollbooth would read the card as the car goes by.

The average American who has a dozen pieces of plastic in their pocket probably doesn't even know what a smart card is," said Nicolas Samaras, a technology analyst at Dataquest Inc. in San Jose, Calif. technology analyst at Dataquest Inc. in San Jose, Calif.
*Unlike today's financial cards, the smart card doesn't need a magnetic stripe on the back.
*Instead, it's equipped with a wiry silicon chip, often displayed at left center but sometimes hidden in the plastic. (Smart cards may also have embossed account numbers, holograms, graphics and photos on the front or back.)
*Like a bank card, the smart card is slipped into a computer. Then the owner enters a four - or five-digit ID number and uses the card to make purchases, convey information, or both.
*The card can hold three pages worth of typewritten data, compared to one line of type for a magnetic-stripe card. That means several accounts could be loaded onto one smart card, said Diane R. Wetherington, president of smart card systems at American Telephone & Telegraph Co. For example, the same card that checks out library books and buys clothes on credit could give an emergency-room clerk a patient's blood type insurance data and doctor's name. Each account would have a separate ID number, so the librarian couldn't see your blood type.
He also forced everyone, small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark of his right hand or on his forehead, so that no one could buy or sell unless he had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of his name. [Revelation 13:16-17]
Mark of the Beast?
I do not believe that the people developing this technology are necessarily conspirators purposely developing a system they know the Antichrist will use for his own wicked purposes. These people are compartmentalized where those at different levels of development do not know what others at other levels are doing and visa versa. These are men and women who are developing what, to the natural eye, are brilliant ideas for the world's future.

Nor, do I believe that today, as I am writing this piece, that the technologies I write about are NOW the mark of the Beast. Rather, I see them as being potential technologies that need be in place in order for the Antichrist to accomplish his nefarious scheme. Each technology builds upon previous technologies and are each designed to incrementally condition us to accept even more invasive technologies.

So, what's so bad about these technologies. They improve our lives ... right?

David Chaum, a leading cryptographer, believes that an identification-based system could lay the groundwork for a future dictatorship. As a Jew, Chaum is sensitive to the memory of how government records enabled the Nazis to systematically identify Jews. He is also concerned that competition and self-interest could be causing many decision-makers in this new technology to miss the broader social consequences of their decisions.

One critic calls them "little brother in your wallet." David Banisar of the Electronic Privacy Information Center believes that the ability to monitor every transaction an individual makes will soon be in place. While tracking single transactions may be harmless, the combined trail left behind by an identification system that tracks all financial transactions could one day become a tyrant's dream. What's wrong with having a single card that contains all of your personal history from medical files to veteran's status to tax records to your bank balance and credit available? It's convenient, portable and you have at your fingertips access to all the details of your life. It's like carrying around a little computer that has stored every piece of information about you.

The Smart Card - A Way To Control The World?

President Bill Clinton proposed a health plan where there is a provision for a national health identification card, and eventually, a state-of-the-art, tamper-proof numbering system. This probably means an implantation device in the head, arm or somewhere on the body. No one will receive health coverage without a number. We are also headed for a cashless society - first by credit card, and later by a laser implantation beneath the skin. The European Community has already planned for this.
Technology is sold to the public for it's beneficial aspects. 
The U.S. government is already using smart cards to replace food stamps and reduce fraud. With Electronic Benefits transfer there will be an electronic audit trail for every transaction, making fraud much easier to detect and prosecute.

One concern about the smart card is privacy. Even though manufacturers are confident that accounts on the same card would remain separate, some are still unsettled that so much personal information could be stored on one little computer chip. What if the librarian could look up someone's doctor bills? And, asked Richard Civilles, program director at Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility, could using smart cards as national IDs give the government more control over citizens at employment agencies or highway checkpoints? What if the government denied a job or benefits to someone based on personal tidbits gleaned from the card?

But manufacturers are optimistic that consumers will warm up to smart cards as they become more prevalent, said Amy Wight Eckel, product manager for AT&T smart cards. "It looks and feels like a credit card," she said. "People already know how to use it."
The Coming New World Order
One of the goals of the Jeremiah Project is to warn people of the New World Order and a One World Government, which is being set up today. One of the methods to be used to enslave every man, woman and child on the face of the earth will be a new money systemthat will be introduced taking us into a "The Cashless Society". Sadly, many people today find it difficult to believe that those days will ever come or if it does how they can be hurt by it.

When the mark of the beast comes full force, it is going to be hard for people to trade any other way but by using the mark.

I hear many Christians say, "I won't take that mark". Well, Satan has been a little smarter than most Christians. He is slowly implementing the mark. Like a fisherman, Satan is getting people to swallow the whole bait (mark) just a little at a time (Social Security number, Federal Reserve Notes, National I.D. card) until one day we will wake up in his boat.
The transition from the beneficial uses of technology to that of the Beast spoken of in Revelation 13 will happen quickly. Prophecy teachers have been speaking these words for many, many years. It is only just now, during your lifetime, that the prophecies are literally being fulfilled. You would be enlightened if you were to turn to the Word of God particularly the prophecies in the books of Daniel and Revelation and understand that these are no idle words of a mere man but these are words of the living God.

Once the Antichrist is revealed and wielding power on the earth, it will be difficult for everyone... especially the unprepared Christian. Lacking any real knowledge of the Bible and having only a superficial trust in God, many will fall away at that time and accept the Antichrist system. Exchanging their liberty in Christ for the safety and security of the new world order, they will lose both when they willingly take the mark of the beast.
I believe this time may be somewhat similar to the testing God made of Abraham when God commanded him to sacrifice his son Isaac (Genesis 22). Because Abraham passed the test and was willing to obey God, even not withholding his son (v.16). Because of that trust and faith in God, Isaac was spared and Abraham was blessed by God. That is the kind of faith we will need in the end days when presented with the mark of the beast.
Tragically, many of those God ordained to be leaders among men and shepherds protecting their flock, will become pawns in the diabolical hands of the Antichrist. Already a nationwide FEMA program is training Pastors and other religious representatives to become secret police enforcers for the New World Order who teach their congregations to "obey the government" in preparation for a declaration of martial law, property and firearm seizures, forced relocation, and acceptance of the mark of the beast.
The kings of the earth, and all the inhabitants of the world, would not have believed that the adversary and the enemy should have entered into the gates of Jerusalem. For the sins of her prophets, and the iniquities of her priests, that have shed the blood of the just in the midst of her, They have wandered as blind men in the streets, they have polluted themselves with blood, so that men could not touch their garments. [Lamentations 4:12-14]

We are now living in the "last days!"
Taken by itself, these technological signs do not prove we are now living in the last days. However, when combined with the big picture of what the Bible and the various categories of signs that the Bible predicted would come together just before the return of Christ, it's easy to conclude that we are now living in the end times. Jesus Himself gave us the best insight shortly before his execution on the cross.
"Take heed that no man deceive you. For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many. And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places. All these are the beginning of sorrows.

"Then shall they deliver you up to be afflicted, and shall kill you: and ye shall be hated of all nations for my name’s sake. And then shall many be offended, and shall betray one another, and shall hate one another. And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many. And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold. But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come. [Matthew 24:4-14]
General 'signs' Jesus said would be visible prior to His return.