Daily Headlines

There are a lot of interesting stories today, none of which have a common them however:

More Christian-Muslim violence in Egypt

A Muslim mob surrounded and burned a church in the Egyptian capital of Cairo on Saturday, killing at least 10 people and wounding nearly 200 more. The mob began hurling firebombs at the church and reportedly opened fire on the ChristiansIsrael Today reported last month that Christians have begun to flee Egypt following the ouster of former dictator Hosni Mubarak and the rise of more radical Islamic elements within the country.
Dozens of Christians have been killed in sectarian violence with Muslims since Mubarak's downfall. And groups like the Muslim Brotherhood have been taking an increasingly visible role in forming Egypt's next government.

Report: Bin Laden warned U.S. over security of Palestine in final tape

An Islamist website said that Osama bin Laden warned the United States they would not be secure until Palestine is secure, AFP news agency reported on Sunday. "Accordingly, and with the will of God, our attacks will continue against you as long as your support for Israel continues," the al-Qaida chief said in the audio recording.

Watchdog: Palestinian textbooks make peace impossible

Israeli watchdog group Palestinian Media Watch published a detailed report on Sunday showing why the content of Palestinian Authority school textbooks makes reaching a genuine peace accord between Arabs and Jews impossible in the near future.

The report shows how Palestinian Authority schools have for the past decade indoctrinated the next generation of Arabs to view Israel as a blood-thirsty, thieving enemy. This stands in stark contrast to the terms of the already-signed Israeli-Palestinian peace deals, which obligate both sides to educate their people for peaceful coexistence.

One example quotes from a 12th-grade textbook published by the Palestinian Authority, which teaches students that:
"Palestine's war ended with a catastrophe that is unprecedented in history, when the Zionist gangs stole Palestine and expelled its people from their cities, their villages, their lands and their houses, and established the State of Israel."
These types of lessons try to instill in young Arabs the idea that there was once a sovereign and free nation known as "Palestine" and that about 100 years ago the Jews began invading and taking over that nation.

Arabs attack Jews to mark Israel Independence Day

Many Arabs in the region consider the rebirth of Israel as a nation-state 63 years ago to be the greatest catastrophe to befall the Muslims in centuries.
Accordingly, many Arabs mark Israel's Independence Day with unrestrained violence.

Such was the case in Jerusalem on Friday, when an Israeli Jewish woman was assaulted by Arab stone throwers because she was flying a small Israeli flag from her vehicle. These small flags are sold at intersections around Israel in the run-up to Independence Day, and can be seen flying from about half of the cars in Israel.

Friday's attack took place in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Silwan, known to Jews as Shiloach or the City of David. One of the stones hurled by the attackers shattered the car's front windshield, lightly wounding the Jewish woman.

Iran's Leader Orders Murder of Protesters in Syria

An official source within the Sadr movement, the Iraqi Islamist national movement led by Muqtada al-Sadr, is insisting that Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei of Iran has declared the protesters in Syria to be “God’s enemies,” ordering the Revolutionary Guards and Lebanese Hezbollah to fiercely combat the protesters in Syria and enter into an armed battle with them.

Israel's next challenge: Obama's outreach to Muslim Brotherhood

Barack Obama, President of Israel's best friend and ally, has picked the Muslim Brotherhood movement of the Middle East as his chosen partner for promoting American interests in the Arab world in place of its ousted rulers.

Egypt's Hosni Mubarak had to go first - and he was therefore the only Arab ruler whom the US president told bluntly to leave, unlike Muammar Qaddafi or even Bashar Assad – very simply because Egypt is the center of the many-branched Muslim Brotherhood's and its Shura Council.

More than any other Middle East party or organization, the Brotherhood holds powerful levers of influence in Libya, Syria, Jordan, the Palestinian arena and even in Saudi Arabia through its presence in national religious institutions and broad membership. It is therefore suppressed by all those regimes as it was in Egypt.

Saudi King Abdullah fought back with a divorce from Washington. He is bitterly hostile to the Obama administration – not just over Mubarak's humiliating downfall, but because he believes that a US-Muslim Brotherhood pact would threaten the royal House of Saud by engulfing the clerical institutions which give the throne its legitimacy.

Another piece of the Obama game plan was put in place in Cairo Wednesday, May 4, with the inking of the Palestinian unity pact by Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas for Fatah and Khaled Meshaal for Hamas.

While a Brotherhood takeover in neighboring Arab countries, however gradual, would pose a direct threat to Israeli security, Obama in the full flush of success of his initial steps will not be receptive to Israel's arguments.

After a lull, more severe weather, possibly tornadoes, could hit parts of country

May, which typically has the most tornadoes in the USA, will have a hard time equaling April's savagery. However, after a relatively quiet first week of May, the atmosphere appears to be gearing up for another round of violent weather this week in parts of the country.

Why is May prime time for tornadoes in the USA? Not only is it hotter and more humid in the South as the sun climbs higher in the sky, but the warmth and humidity spreads north more often into the Plains and Midwest, Weather Channel meteorologist Jonathan Erdman said.

The key for May, however, is that while it's getting warmer and more humid near the surface, the jet stream remains energetic. This allows for cold, dry air aloft to plow over the top of warm, humid air near the surface.
Erdman says these strong jet-stream disturbances tend to enhance the difference in wind speed and direction at various heights above the surface, which helps sustain the supercell thunderstorms that spawn tornadoes.

Despite sunny skies, Memphis braces for worst from surging Mississippi

Bright skies over Memphis, Tennessee, belied a potential disaster Sunday as a surge of fast-moving water threatened the city and many other communities along the Mississippi River.

"This water that we're seeing coming by is moving 2 million cubic feet per second," said Reichling of the situation on Sunday outside Memphis. "To use an analogy, in one second that water would fill up a football field 44 feet deep."

Reichling noted that a major problem -- and the cause of much of the flooding seen Sunday in Memphis and beyond -- is that such tributaries as the Wolf River are overflowing because there's not enough room in the Mississippi for them to filter into.

China can't pay U.S.' bills

The truth is Washington's "economic structure and policy are responsible for creating the problems", Ma said. "How can the US count on a foreign currency to solve them?"

Zhang Yansheng, director of and professor at the Institute for Foreign Economics, affiliated to the National Development and Reform Commission, voiced a similar opinion: "The US wants China to pay its economic bills by raising the value of the yuan. This is preposterous."