The PA asked the Arab League Tuesday to hold an emergency session on Wednesday to discuss Israeli policy toward the Temple Mount, Ma’an news agency reported. “If Israel continues this policy,” said PA ambassador to Egypt Barakat al-Farra, “it proves that it does not want peace but continues to violate international laws and resolutions.”

In Jordan, 47 out of 150 members of the country’s lower house signed a motion late Tuesday that the treaty be annulled, the government-owned al-Rai newspaper reported.

“The motion came in response to Israel’s actions in Jerusalem and to the Knesset debate of a law that seeks to impose Israel’s sovereignty over Al-Aqsa,” Al-Rai quoted MPs as saying in the motion. “Israel’s actions clearly violate the peace treaty… it is aggression against Jordanian custodianship,” the motion said. Hamas and Palestinian Authority officials, together with leaders of the Islamic Movement in Galilee, have long accused Israel of planning to take control of the Muslim sites on the Mount.

Japan argues that the islands were vacant until 1895, when the Japanese government laid claim to them. Japanese nationals used and lived on them in the following decades — a fish-processing plant owned by a Japanese national once chugged away here. China did not dispute Japan’s claim to the islands during this period. Nor did China object when the United States took control of them during the occupation of Japan starting in 1945. The US handed the islands back to Japan in 1972.

But since the early ’70s, China has argued that Japan seized the islands in violation of international law. China argues it owned the islands before 1895, based on some ancient Chinese texts and maps that it says show that the Chinese regarded the islands as theirs, which would mean Japan’s seizure of the islands violated China’s rights. Also, in China’s view, Japan obtained control over the islands as a result of a treaty that ended the First Sino-Japanese War in 1895. Japan took control of the islands, via the treaty, when it forced China, which lost the war, to cede Taiwan to Japan — and in China’s view, the islands are part of Taiwan.

When Taiwan was returned to China after World War II, the islands should have gone back with it. Except that by that time, Japan was occupied by the United States, which took administrative control over the islands (without claiming sovereignty) and then returned control of the islands to Japan in 1972.

In the end, whether Japan should resist or retreat is a military and political question, not a legal one. If China’s ambitions extend only to the tiny unoccupied islands in the region, yielding these fisheries and hydrocarbons may be worth it to keep the peace. But if this is the first step in a larger march of conquest, then there’s a strong case that Japan (and the US as its ally) should counter force with force.

Germany would like the world to believe in a simple narrative regarding privacy and surveillance: Unlike the NSA, Germany does not spy on its citizens, and it respects privacy rights. But, like most things in Germany, it’s more complicated than that. Germany does monitor citizens and foreign nationals living within its borders — it just does so quietly.

German intelligence officials meet regularly with American counterparts and share information on domestic and international threats. Germany’s domestic intelligence agency, the Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz (Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution), and its foreign intelligence agency, the Bundesnachrichtendienst (Federal Intelligence Service), then use this information to police extremist activities within their borders.

German security services keep their work quiet in large part because of German history. In the last century, Germans were subject to surveillance from two of the most ruthless groups in modern history: the Nazis and then the Stasi, the Soviet secret police in East Germany. One of the reasons Merkel was so incensed by being targeted by NSA surveillance is that she grew up under the Stasi’s watch in East Germany. The fact that her American and British allies were doing the same thing made it all the more insulting — to her and to her compatriots.

The shipment includes the first offering from Japan, where collections were threatened by the devastating earthquake and tsunami in 2011. The facility is designed to withstand all natural and human disasters. Deep inside a mountain on a remote island in the Svalbard archipelago - located halfway between mainland Norway and the North Pole - the vault, which cost £5 million (US $7 million) and took 12 months to build, offers permanent protection for the world's food crops, say its operators.

The purpose of the depository, owned by the Norwegian government and maintained by the Global Crop Diversity Trust (GCDT) and the Nordic Genetic Resources Center, is to store duplicates of all seed samples from crop collections around the world.

The GCDT says permafrost and thick rock ensure that, even in the case of a power cut, the seed samples will remain frozen. "The vault can therefore be considered the ultimate insurance policy for the world's food supply," it adds. "It will secure, for centuries, millions of seeds representing every important crop variety available in the world today."

The Congressional EMP Commission warned that Iran has several times detonated its Shahab III missile at high altitudes, apparently simulating a nuclear EMP attack. Iran has also demonstrated the capability to launch a ballistic missile from a freighter and make a nuclear EMP strike anonymously, and so perhaps escape retaliation. Iran has also orbited several satellites on trajectories consistent with practicing a surprise nuclear EMP attack against the United States.

Iran has not conducted a nuclear test because its theocracy is not interested in diplomatic "signaling" or Western theories of nuclear deterrence and arms control bargaining. When the mullahs are ready, they will make a surprise nuclear attack. The vaporization of New York City and an EMP attack that crashes American society will be their nuclear tests.

The bottom line is that Iran is a nuclear truck bomb headed our way.

While unspecified, defense and industry sources here said a defense trade deal involving German offshore patrol vessels for the Israeli Navy could be included in agreements signed between the two governments. “Germany has played a critical role in strengthening Israel’s deterrence capacities in supplying Israel with six Dolphin submarines, the most expensive weapon system in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF),” wrote Ra’anan Eliaz, co-founder of ELNET, an organization promoting closer relations between Israel and key European countries.

Speaking to Cabinet ministers February 23, Netanyahu hailed Merkel as “a friend of Israel.” Netanyahu said talks will focus on ongoing international efforts to reach a deal with Iran and to forge a two-state agreement between Israel and the Palestine Authority. “Regarding our negotiations with the Palestinians, I will make it clear that the infrastructure of peace between us and the Palestinians will be based on the mutual recognition of two national states, ie the necessity of Palestinian recognition of the Jewish state, the national state of the Jewish people,” he said.

In the clip, Ayalon notes that 85% of the resolutions passed by the UN in 2013 were against Israel, despite the atrocities being committed by numerous regimes such as Syria and North Korea, and despite Israel being the only stable democracy in the Middle East.

Ayalon argues that countries have joined the UN and pushed aside the charter calling for equal human rights in favor of political interests. Arab, Islamic and non-aligned nations have merged into a voting bloc with an automatic majority, and pursued a goal of discrediting the US and delegitimizing Israel, argues Ayalon.

The assessment offered by Ayalon comes from first hand experience, as he was the Director of the Bureau of Israel's Ambassador to the United Nations from 1993 to 1997. Ayalon has in the past criticized the UN for donating to the Palestinian Authority (PA) "blindly," without acting to prevent its money from funding terrorism.

After noting that in joining the coalition he agreed to let the peace talks happen and even reach a national referendum if an agreement was to materialize, Bennett stressed that his opposition to dividing the country lies in the historical ties of the Jewish people to the land of Israel. "We've been in this land way longer than Americans have been in American land and the British have been in British land," remarked Bennett.

Bennett argued that the two-state solution being discussed is a mistaken approach, which has been proven as a failure following Israeli land withdrawals from Lebanon, Judea and Samaria, as well as Gaza. "Three times already we handed land over to the Arabs and within days they started shooting at us missiles. It's not working apparently," emphasized the Economics Minister. Bennett added that not only has the approach failed, but that the Palestinian Authority (PA) refuses to recognize Israel as a Jewish state.

The CDU European parliamentarian, Elmar Brok, predicts "difficult times" ahead: "It has never rained gold coins, except in fairy tales." In fact back in the fall, experts had already indicated that, because of its out-dated industry, the Ukraine would have to expect dramatic economic slumps if it signs the EU Association Agreements - unemployment and poverty would dramatically rise. In a position paper, the Berlin-based German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP) is now proposing the introduction of a special status in EU ties for the Ukraine as well as other countries, such as Turkey.

This sort of EU "second ring" would also permit the economic integration of such countries as Switzerland, which politically resists joining the EU. The SWP contends that these plans could also be used for Catalonia, should it secede from Spain and Scotland, from Britain.