Naval drones sink Israeli-operated cargo ship off Bulgaria's Black Sea coast

Naval drones sink Israeli-operated cargo ship off Bulgaria's Black Sea coast

i24NEWS

The Greek-owned, Israeli-operated vessel sank off Bulgaria after being struck by three naval drones, as suspicions grow over Russian involvement in a wave of Black Sea shipping attacks

Israeli-operated cargo ship, the Contship Jet, was struck by unidentified naval drones in the Black Sea off Varna, Bulgaria, on Wednesday.

The Contship Jet, a Greek-owned, Israeli-operated cargo ship, departed Haifa on Sunday bound for Constanta, Romania, just north of where it sank.

The Bulgarian Navy said the ship was struck by three unmanned surface vehicles (USVs) at roughly noon local time, sinking hours later and taking 421 containers with it. 

All crew members were rescued unharmed, ZIM announced.

Immediately following reports of the attack, French maritime patrol aircraft conducted reconnaissance missions in the area and supported rescue efforts.

The Contship Jet is the ninth civilian ship struck this month alone in the Black Sea, leaving over 30 sailors dead.

This attack comes as the defence ministers of Bulgaria, Romania, and Turkey were meeting to discuss maritime security in the Black Sea.

Suspicion has fallen on Russia over the attacks, although Bulgaria’s government has been reluctant to assign blame.

Things To Come:

Behold, He Comes!

Tim Moore

The description of Jesus, the Word of God, that John records in Revelation 19:15-16 belies the claim that the Rapture and the Second Coming occur as a single event. We know that when Christ comes for His Church at the Rapture, He comes as a Bridegroom for His Bride. We will meet Him in the air—with the “dead in Christ” rising first, and those who are alive following in the twinkling of an eye.

He will take us to His Father’s house, where we will dwell with Him in the place He has prepared for us. And we will celebrate the Marriage Supper of the Lamb—the title given to the suffering Son of God who redeemed us by His own blood.

When He returns to the earth, we will follow after Him as described above. And His demeanor will not convey the eager love of a Bridegroom, but the indignation of a King. In fact, John’s description is of a Warrior King returning to set right what has long been tolerated.

In Matthew 21, Jesus told of a landowner who planted a vineyard and rented it to tenants to tend. At harvest time, he sent servants to receive his portion. But the tenants beat and killed the servants, along with a larger group he sent to advocate his interests. Finally, he sent his own son, saying, “They will respect my son.” But the evil tenants conspired to kill the son and seize his inheritance.

This parable is a dramatic picture of God’s relationship with the unrepentant world. “The earth is the LORD’s, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell therein” (Psalm 24:1, KJV). He has every right to ownership of every square inch, every living creature, every image-bearing person. And His only begotten Son has the same claim. To quote Abraham Kuyper, “There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry: ‘Mine!'”

Yet evil men—representative of the entirety of the human race—conspired to kill the Son. They hung Him on a cross and buried Him in a borrowed tomb. They thought they had usurped God’s claim, tearing His fetters and casting off His cords. How wrong they were. How wrong all are who continue to flaunt their wickedness and hope that God’s indignation is never aroused.

Jesus’ question at the end of this parable offers a segue to the scene in Revelation 19: “Therefore when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those vine-growers?”(Matthew 21:40). Even the chief priests and elders answered rightly: “He will bring those wretches to a wretched end.”

Thus, in righteousness He will judge and wage war. Jesus will return as a Warrior King. John says, “From His mouth comes a sharp sword, so that with it He may strike down the nations, and He will rule them with a rod of iron; and He treads the winepress of the fierce wrath of God, the Almighty” (Revelation 19:15).

In short order, He will destroy the armies arrayed on the Plain of Jezreel (the Valley of Armageddon), merely speaking a word that will cause those wicked warriors to rot where they stand. He will set foot on the Mount of Olives overlooking Jerusalem from the east. As He begins walking toward the Eastern Gate, the valley containing Jewish and Muslim graves will split in two—with half moving toward the north and half moving toward the south. As He approaches the gate sealed by Suleiman to keep the Jewish Messiah out, the ancient gate will fly open so that the King of Glory might come in.

Lift up your heads, O gates, and be lifted up, O ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in! Who is this King of glory? Yahweh strong and mighty, Yahweh mighty in battle. Lift up your heads, O gates, and lift yourselves up, O ancient doors, that the King of glory may come in! Who is He, this King of glory? Yahweh of hosts, He is the King of glory. Selah (Psalm 24:7-10).

Then Jesus will ascend to the Temple Mount to fulfill the promise prophesied of Him: to reign from the throne of His father, David.

Ezekiel also prophesied of the glorious day when the glory of God would once again fill the Temple. Coming from the east, the glory will return through the Eastern Gate to take up residence in the Temple once again (Ezekiel 43:1-7). That anticipated scene offers a preview of what is described in Revelation 19.

Soon after His return, Jesus will separate the sheep from the goats and initiate His Millennial Reign. Eventually, “every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father” (Philippians 2:10-11). Those who have rejected Him will forever regret hardening their heart against the love and mercy of God.

Even before John described the Second Coming, he recorded the praise that resounded in Heaven. Responding to a voice from the throne of God that said, “Give praise to our God, all you His bond-servants, you who fear Him, the small and the great,” the great multitude preparing to mount their war chargers cried out with the voice of many waters and many peals of thunder, saying, “Hallelujah! For the Lord our God, the Almighty, reigns” (Revelation 19:5–6).

Brothers and sisters in Christ, saints of the living God, we too can resonate with praise right now as we anticipate His soon return and His glorious Second Coming. Far from discouraged or distracted by the trials of this life, we can cry out: “Hallelujah! For the Lord our God, the Almighty, reigns.”

US tells allies: Prepare for possible Iran strikes and retaliation

US tells allies: Prepare for possible Iran strikes and retaliation

Israel National News

The United States has warned several Middle Eastern countries and regional allies to prepare for the possibility of renewed American military strikes against Iran following next week's midterm elections, as well as potential Iranian retaliation targeting their territory, The Associated Press reported Wednesday.

Two diplomats familiar with the warnings said American diplomatic and defense officials had advised regional governments to take precautions against possible attacks by Iran and its proxy groups.

Both diplomats spoke anonymously because they were not authorized to discuss the sensitive communications.

According to the diplomats, President Donald Trump has not yet decided whether to authorize another military operation against the Islamic Republic, although he has repeatedly indicated that additional strikes could take place after the November 3 elections.

American officials have informed regional allies that a new offensive could last several days. However, officials in the Middle East are concerned that retaliatory attacks by Iran and its proxies could prolong the confrontation beyond the initial American operation.

The warnings specifically highlighted the possibility of Iranian strikes against energy installations and other critical infrastructure, prompting Washington to urge its partners to strengthen their defensive preparations.

The White House and other American officials declined to comment on the report.

The latest warnings follow a report published Tuesday by The Wall Street Journal, which revealed that Washington had advised several Gulf Arab countries to prepare for a potentially brief but intensive military campaign against Iran after the midterm elections.

According to that report, the US military has already begun taking precautionary steps in the region, including reinforcing air defense systems and moving personnel away from bases considered vulnerable to Iranian attacks.

Trump, who has spent recent weeks campaigning for Republican candidates ahead of the November 3 vote, has declined to provide a definitive answer about whether he intends to resume military operations against Tehran.

During an election rally in Texas on Tuesday, the President defended his earlier decision to attack Iran and said he would make the same choice again.

“Somebody asked me yesterday, it’s very interesting, ‘If you had to do it again, would you have attacked Iran?’ I said absolutely," Trump told supporters.

“It’s one of the greatest things I ever did," he added.

Trump also insisted that he would determine when the conflict ends, emphasizing that any settlement must ensure Iran never obtains nuclear weapons.

"Somebody asked me before, when will the war in Iran end? I said, whenever I want it to end. It'll be very quick, but we have to have it end properly, with total and complete - a total statement, they will never have a nuclear weapon. Number one state sponsor [of terrorism]. They will never have a nuclear weapon."

The President had previously addressed the prospect of further strikes during an exchange with reporters on Saturday, refusing to disclose whether military action was imminent.

Fire briefly triggers emergency at South Carolina lab on former nuclear weapons site

Fire briefly triggers emergency at South Carolina lab on former nuclear weapons site

HALLIE GOLDEN

A fire at a national lab in South Carolina that is in a complex where key parts for nuclear bombs were once made triggered an emergency declaration Wednesday that shut down incoming traffic and restricted air and rail service in the area.

The fire at the Savannah River National Laboratory on the U.S. Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site was extinguished by Wednesday night and the site returned to normal operations. No detectable levels of contamination were found, according to a Savannah River Site statement.

The Savannah River Site is a massive complex where the federal government once produced materials used in nuclear weapons, primarily tritium and plutonium-239. The lab is in its northwest corner, near the edge of the site.

The site was opened in the early 1950s as the Cold War was heating up. Today it is used for environmental stewardship and cleanup, along with nuclear waste management and disposition of nuclear materials, according to the U.S. Department of Energy.

The lab currently does experiments with nuclear materials and also does processing work with radioactive material, including operating a facility for radioisotope recovery from used nuclear fuel, said Edwin Lyman, director of nuclear power safety at the Union of Concerned Scientists.

Lyman said it is reassuring that officials said there has been no off-site contamination, noting that there is a buffer zone between most of the facilities and the public areas.

But if you have a fire where there is radioactive material, “you need to take extreme precautions because of the potential dispersal of that material and the potential for contamination, potential for the public to be exposed,” he said.

The emergency declaration put out Wednesday is the second-highest of three categories of emergencies at the site and indicates “something more serious has occurred,” according to the site’s community preparedness information. The emergency declaration ended Wednesday night after the fire was extinguished.

The Doomsday Government: Preparing for the End of the World, Not the End of Power

The Doomsday Government: Preparing for the End of the World, Not the End of Power

John W. Whitehead

This time of year, there is no shortage of monsters to frighten us.

Hollywood has given us vampires, zombies, mad scientists, masked killers and creatures that emerge from the darkness to prey upon the unsuspecting.

But perhaps the most frightening monster of all is the government that has become so accustomed to wielding extraordinary power that it cannot imagine a future in which that power is diminished

Enter the Doomsday Plan.

Imagine it: The power grid goes down. Supply chains collapse. Communications fail. Cities are plunged into darkness. Ordinary Americans are left scrambling for food, water, medicine and shelter.

Not to worry, though. The government has a plan for the coming apocalypse.

Unfortunately, the plan seems to have more to do with keeping the police state operational than keeping the American people alive.

In what sounds like a plot lifted straight out of Stanley Kubrick’s Dr. Strangelove, the Pentagon has unveiled an initiative designed to keep the war machine running even if a catastrophic war devastates the country’s civilian infrastructure.

Under an initiative called FORTRESS, the military is preparing major installations across the United States to operate independently for at least 90 days in the event of a catastrophic disruption. The plan includes portable nuclear reactors, independent power grids, stockpiles of fuel and ammunition, backup communications systems and arrangements for civilian factories to switch over to wartime production.

The Pentagon calls this preparedness.

The rest of us might reasonably wonder: what good is a government that can survive the end of the world if the people it was created to serve cannot?

This is the dark absurdity at the heart of Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, Kubrick’s 1964 satire about a collection of military commanders, politicians and bureaucrats who bring the world to the brink of nuclear annihilation while congratulating themselves on their strategic brilliance.

As civilization faces extinction, the men in charge begin discussing how a select portion of the population might survive underground in mineshafts, eventually emerging to rebuild civilization.

Naturally, the planners envision themselves among the survivors.

The resemblance to the present day is difficult to ignore.

Indeed, it sometimes seems as though the Trump administration has been watching every dystopian film and Cold War nightmare ever made and mistaking the villains for role models

George Orwell’s 1984 gave us a surveillance state that watches everything and everyone. Aldous Huxley’s Brave New Worldimagined a population conditioned into compliance. John Carpenter’s They Live exposed a society manipulated by hidden powers, while Escape from New York envisioned an America where whole populations could be abandoned to incarceration and decay.

These works were supposed to serve as warnings.

Yet the machinery of government increasingly resembles the very dystopias they cautioned against: mass surveillance, militarized policing, automated systems of control, a presidency claiming ever-expanding authority, and now elaborate preparations to keep the military functioning in the event of societal collapse.

Of course, governments have a responsibility to prepare for emergencies. No reasonable person would argue otherwise. But there is a world of difference between preparing to protect the nation and preparing to preserve the power of those who govern it.

That distinction matters, especially when the same government that prepares for catastrophic war also helps create the conditions in which such wars become not only likely but imminent.

For decades, presidents of both political parties have pursued policies of military expansion, foreign intervention, escalating confrontation and permanent national emergency. The result has been an increasingly militarized national-security state that operates with fewer meaningful restraints and demands ever greater sacrifices from the American people.

We have been told that these extraordinary powers are necessary to keep us safe.

Yet the government’s answer to nearly every crisis—war, terrorism, civil unrest, economic instability, public health emergencies—has been more government power, more military involvement, more surveillance and fewer constitutional protections.

Now the Pentagon is planning for a world in which the civilian infrastructure that sustains ordinary Americans may no longer function.

What happens then?

The government’s answer, at least in the newly announced FORTRESS initiative, is to make sure the military can continue fighting.

But what about the rest of us?

If the electric grid collapses, who will restore power to civilian communities? If hospitals lose electricity, who will keep patients alive? If food and medicine stop moving through the country, who will feed the population? If communications fail, how will families find one another? And if civil institutions cease functioning, who will ensure that emergency military authority does not become a permanent substitute for constitutional government?

This is precisely the kind of future the Pentagon is anticipating.

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