In the news:

Today's news are centered on Iran and the growing influence of radical Islam on a world-wide basis:

Gantz: 2012 WIll Be A Critical Year Regarding Iran

IDF Chief of Staff Lt.- Gen. Benny Gantz said Tuesday that 2012 would be a critical year regarding Iran and that there may be more "unnatural" events that happen to them.

Speaking during a Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee meeting, Gantz warned that "2012 will be a critical year in the connection between Iran gaining nuclear power, changes in leadership, continuing pressure from the international community and events that happen unnaturally."

Israel Preparing For A Nuclear-Armed Iran

Israel is preparing for Iran to become a nuclear power and has accepted it may happen within a year, the London Times reported on Monday citing an Israeli security report.

The Institute for National Security Studies (INSS) think-tank prepared scenarios for the day after an Iranian nuclear weapons test at the request of former Israeli ambassadors, intelligence officials and ex-military chiefs, the paper reported.

Israel has so far maintained it will do all within its power to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear capabilities, but has shifted its position following recent United Nations’ reports, according to the Times.

Escalation: Iran To Close Strait If Further Sanctioned

The war of words between Iran and the United States escalated dangerously Sunday over the Islamic regime’s determination to develop nuclear weapons.

The Iranian leadership officially ordered its military commanders to close the Strait of Hormuz should Western sanctions be implemented on Iranian oil. Iran also announced it would be conducting ground war games, which would complement their recent naval war games intended to show they have the capacity to shut down the Strait.

The United States responded that it will not allow Iran to acquire nuclear weapons — Defense Secretary Leon Panetta stated that such a development was a “red line” for the United States. General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, warned that the United States has the ability to reopen the strait should Iran close it:

We made very clear that the United States will not tolerate the blocking of the Straits of Hormuz. … That’s another red line for us and that we will respond to them.

Yet we see this from Iran:

Hadi Mohammadi, political deputy of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, made the announcement regarding the escalation. He told Iranian newspaper Khorasan that the Guards have received orders from the highest authority in the Islamic regime to close the Strait of Hormuz:

Iran cannot remain indifferent to the actions by the West and their threats in implementing sanctions on Iran’s oil. … The Strait of Hormuz is within the strategic space of the Islamic Republic, and the leadership is determined to not allow a drop of oil to pass through if our oil exports are affected.

Rumors of war indeed.

Iran Plans One-Kiloton Underground Nuclear Test in 2012

Tehran is preparing an underground test of a one-kiloton nuclear device during 2012, much like the test carried out by North Korea in 2006. Underground facilities are under construction in great secrecy behind the noise and fury raised by the start of advanced uranium enrichment at Iran's fortified, subterranean Fordo site near Qom.

Iran's Islamist rulers have come to the conclusion from the Bush and Obama presidencies that America is a paper tiger and sure to shrink from attacking their nuclear program – especially while the West is sunk in profound economic distress.

Iran And Russia End Trading In Dollars

Iran and Russia replaced the U.S. dollar with their national currencies in bilateral trade, Iran's state-run Fars news agency reported Saturday, citing Seyed Reza Sajjadi, the Iranian ambassador in Moscow.

The proposal to switch to the ruble and the rial was raised by President Dmitry Medvedev at a meeting with his Iranian counterpart, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, in Astana, Kazakhstan, at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the ambassador said. The meeting was in June of last year.

Iran has replaced the dollar in its oil trade with India, China and Japan, Fars reported.

Ex-Adviser: Obama Ready To Strike To Stop Iran

No one should doubt that US President Barack Obama is prepared to use military force to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon if sanctions and diplomacy fail, the president’s former special assistant on Iran said Monday.

Obama has “made it very clear” that he regards a nuclear-armed Iran as so great a threat to international security that “the Iranians should never think that there’s a reluctance to use the force” to stop them, Dennis Ross, who served two years on Obama’s National Security Council and a year as US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s special adviser on Iran, said in an interview.

Ross acknowledged that a military strike would have serious consequences as well, including Iranian retaliation, either directly or through terrorist proxies around the world, a possible effort to shut down the Strait of Hormuz, and a spike in oil prices.

“I wouldn’t discount the possibility that the Israelis would act if they came to the conclusion that basically the world was prepared to live with Iran with nuclear weapons,” he said. “They certainly have the capability by themselves to set back the Iranian nuclear program.”

U.S., EU Spearhead Islamic Bid To Criminalize Free Speech

The European Union has offered to host the next meeting of the so-called Istanbul Process, an aggressive effort by Muslim countries to make it an international crime to criticize Islam.

The announcement comes less than one month after the United States hosted its own Istanbul Process conference in Washington, DC.

The Istanbul Process – its explicit aim is to enshrine in international law a global ban on all critical scrutiny of Islam and/or Islamic Sharia law – is being spearheaded by the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), a bloc of 57 Muslim countries.

Based in Saudi Arabia, the OIC has long pressed the European Union and the United States to impose limits on free speech and expression about Islam.

Christianity Under Fire By Radical Islam

The stage is set. Christians in Islamic Africa and the Islamic-dominated middle east are on the chopping block and barely a peep is heard from the left-leaning media.

So much for the Arab Spring rebels seeking freedom. They were seeking freedom all right, freedom to kill, pillage and ethnically cleanse without reprisals.

Little attention is given in the media to the new crises being suffered by Christians in Islamic nations. With the de facto backing that the United States government has provided the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt and other places, they are doing exactly what their manifestos have predicted which is to fundamentally Islamize the region. To do that, is to oust non-Muslims.

Where’s the outrage? Where’s the UN?

Three months after the “Freedom Fighters” began their uprising in Egypt, and it appeared the Muslim Brotherhood was taking control of the country, Coptic Christians started to come under fire, with hundreds killed and several churches burned.

There are no accurate statistics on how many have been killed but there are numerous reports. Here’s a sampling:

Read the article; it includes a summary of persecution in various Islamic dominated countries and it's an "eye-opener".

This blog could easily be ten times the length if I would include the bulk of attacks and intimidation toward Christians throughout Europe, the Middle East and Africa, but you get the picture. While we like to think ourselves as “tolerant” people wishing to living a peaceful coexistence, that has to be a two-sided goal, or it will never work.

As the Islamic population grows and becomes more emboldened with power in the United States, we will see more of what is happening in places like England, Netherlands, Sweden, Norway, and France where they have over 750 Islamic enclaves which are “no-go zones” for French authorities. Sharia is the law.

West Must Wake Up To Islamic Threat

When the Republican presidential candidates tire of bashing each other, perhaps they will start addressing the expansion of radical Islam. Only Rick Santorum raised the issue in last Saturday's debate in New Hampshire.

Next door in Spain, two new satellite TV stations recently signed on. They won't be airing "Judge Judy," but instead are broadcasting Islamic theology and political propaganda.

It was not coincidental that the launch of Islamic TV in Spain coincided with Christmas. One of the early broadcasts featured a story, from Islam's perspective, on the Virgin Mary and the birth of Jesus. Not surprisingly, it differs significantly from the biblical account with which even secular Americans are familiar.

The Iranian government sponsors the program, which, according to Soeren Kern, a senior fellow at the Strategic Studies Group in Madrid, "will focus on spreading Shiite Islam" in Spain and Latin America.

Video: Why The West Won't Hear About Persecution

Hundreds of millions of Christians have suffered discrimination or even persecution in lands as diverse as China and India, but mostly in countries where Islam is the top religion.

Despite this, persecution of Christians is one topic the American public doesn't hear much about. One possible reason: an anti-Christian bias among Western elites.

These Western elites often control the media and educational institutions that spread information to the general public.

But they rarely cover or discuss the reality that Christians may well be the most persecuted religious group on the planet. It has been estimated that Christians number some 2.2 billion people. Harassment of them can range from loss of life to loss of livelihood.

Egypt Liberal Secular Leader To Be Put On Trial For Minnie Mouse In A Burka Cartoons

Naguib Sawiris, Egypt's richest man and figurehead of the liberal movement for the country's political leadership, is to be put on trial for insulting religion over cartoons he put on Twitter showing Mickey and Minnie Mouse in traditional Muslim clothing.

The case against Mr Sawiris, owner of the Orascom business empire and the country's most prominent Christian, was filed originally by a group of lawyers affiliated to the radical Salafi Islamist movement. Few expected it to be taken up by the prosecuting authorities.

But the Salafis have become a powerful force in the new Egypt after sweeping to second place behind the Muslim Brotherhood-backed Freedom and Justice Party in elections. They are pushing for tighter implementation if not a rewriting of Egypt's constitution, which is supposed to be based on the principles of Sharia law.

Also in the news:

Totally Drug-Resistant Form Of TB Emerging In Second Country

Three years after the first reports in the world of a totally drug-resistant (TDR) form of tuberculosis (TB) in Iran, at least 12 cases of TDR-TB have been confirmed in India over the last few months.

According to the Times of India, cases began emerging in October 2011, making it the second country find this deadliest strain of TB among patients. The U.S. Center for Disease Control categorizes resistance levels of TB as multi-drug resistant or extremely drug resistant. TDR is not even classified yet on the CDC’s website and there has been no reported cures for such a strain of this bacterium yet.

Supreme Court Justices "Blast" EPA

Several conservative members of the Supreme Court criticized the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on Monday for heavy-handed enforcement of rules affecting homeowners after the government told an Idaho couple they can’t challenge an order declaring their future home site a “protected wetlands.”

Justice Antonin Scalia assailed the “high-handedness” of the environmental agency when dealing with private property, and Justice Samuel Alito described some of the EPA’s actions as “outrageous,“ arguing that most people would say ”this kind of thing can’t happen in the United States.”