Early on Sunday, dozens of police and internal intelligence agents raided the offices of the al-Aqsa institution, which belongs to the movement, in the northern city of Umm al-Fahm in the occupied territories. The Israeli forces carried away documents, computers, and a safe with hundreds of thousands of shekels (dollars) in the operation which was ordered by the Israeli Defense Ministry, AFP quoted a police official as saying.

Over the past two months, Israelis have raided Hamas institutions including mosques, charities and medical centers and confiscated their property. The al-Aqsa institution protects al-Aqsa Mosque in al-Quds, the third holiest site in Islam, from Israeli excavations.

ISRAEL IS BUILDING A TUNNEL UNDER AL-AQSA MOSQUE which experts warn is menacing the foundations of the building, increasing the probability of collapse.

"The army of our enemy will witness an unprecedented method of fighting by courageous, tough and devoted resistance fighters in the battlefield; something they had never seen since the establishment of their usurping entity," the Hezbollah leader told al-Manar TV on Sunday. Nasrallah made the remarks shortly AFTER ISRAELI PREMIER EHUD OLMERT THREATENED TO WAGE A NEW WAR AGAINST LEBANON if the Lebanese government allows Hezbollah to gain more power.

"We do not underestimate or undervalue these threats, but we deal with them with confidence and resolution," Nasrallah said adding that any aggression against Lebanon would be short term and followed by a quick and decisive victory.

He said that the recent Israeli threats fell within the regime's same policy of intimidation and spywar against Lebanon and were rooted from the regime's internal crisis. The regime is facing one of its worst crises with Olmert setting to resign within few months. Olmert is accused of receiving bribes from a U.S. businessman during his tenure as trade minister.

This is not a matter of producing gourmet food for environmentally attuned consumers but rather something of a life-and-death choice in villages like this one, where the benefits of the Green Revolution have been coupled WITH UNANTICIPATED HARMFUL CONSEQUENCES FROM CHEMICAL POLLUTION.

As for driving their actions, the new organic farmers cite the rising costs of seed, fertilizer, and pesticides, and concerns that DECADES OF CHEMICAL USE IS RUINING THE SOIL. But many are also revolting against what they see as the environmental degradation that has come with the new farming techniques, particularly the serious pollution of drinking water that village residents blame for causing cancer and other diseases. "People are fed up with chemical farming," says Amarjit Sharma, a farmer for 30 years who began organic farming four years ago. "THE EARTH IS NOW ADDICTED TO THE USE OF THESE CHEMICALS."

Lying under a tree on a charpoi, a traditional bed made of taut rope, Santosh Rani, 30, believes she is one of the victims. "I have cancer," she says, her voice barely above a whisper as she clenches her stomach. Since 2001, 40 people have died from various forms of cancer in Rani's village of about 3,300; UNTIL 10 YEARS AGO, VILLAGE RESIDENTS SAY CANCER WAS VERY RARE or at least largely unknown by villagers who now regard it as a menace stalking all of them.

The signing was aborted after local officials of Christian-dominated provinces petitioned the Philippine Supreme Court in protest. In response, some members of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the separatist group, went on a two-day rampage in which 33 people were killed and dozens of houses burned. That violence left the peace process in tatters.

It also left Mrs. Arroyo with a difficult choice: whether to try to salvage the peace negotiations or abandon them and rely on force to combat the rebels, as her predecessor, Joseph Estrada, had done. Either way, according to analysts and experts, THERE ARE BIG POLITICAL RISKS.

Mr. Lingga of the Institute of Bangsamoro Studies warned that failing to forge a peace settlement would be very costly. "As the conflict will be prolonged," he said, "secession might become an option to some." Indeed, the front's chairman, Ebrahim Murad, said Saturday at his camp that "war is among the options." Zachary Abuza, an American expert on Islamic extremism and a senior fellow at the United States Institute of Peace, said, "IF THE SUPREME COURT RULES AGAINST THE AGREEMENT, BRACE YOURSELF FOR A LOT MORE FIGHTING."

Amateur investors who plunged money into familiar brands and those who clung to privatisation and demutualisation stocks were the worst hit, financial advisers say. Shrewder investors who picked less-well-known mining and oil companies prospered. Ben Yearsley, the investment manager for Hargreaves Lansdown, said: "You've had the popular names and free shares falling, which has added up to a torrid year for private shareholders."

Research by Capita Registrars indicates that total private shareholdings hit a peak of £209 billion in May last year. By July last year, however, they were down to £196.4 billion and at the end of last month they had shrunk to £161 billion.

Hurling up a cloud of blinding white dust, Chinese road engineers are helping to lay down the first kilometres of tarmac to replace a 530-km (330-mile) forbidding rock track that joins Kenya's farms and port to landlocked Ethiopia. The stretch of road from Isiolo to Moyale on the border is one of the last unpaved sections of the Great North Road, a British colonial dream to connect Cape Town to Cairo.

BUT WHERE BRITAIN AND POST-INDEPENDENCE KENYAN GOVERNMENTS FAILED, CHINA IS LEADING THE WAY: helping to build a major trade route that will open up the northern half of Kenya, a region that has been effectively sealed off for 100 years. In what is a now familiar sight across Africa, CHINA'S DRIVE TO SECURE MINERALS, OIL, AND A PLACE FOR ITS WORKERS AND INDUSTRIES TO THRIVE is converging with Kenyan government plans to tap the potential of undeveloped regions.

The road could turn promises of oil into reality and increase tourism and trade in a starkly beautiful land where, until now, only banditry, desolation and poverty had flourished.

"About 2,000 organised Zionists and 7,000 to 8,000 agents of Zionism have dragged the world into turmoil," Ahmadinejad told a rally in the central Iranian city of Arak carried live on state television. He said that if the West does not restrain Zionism, "the powerful hand of the nations will clean these sources of corruption from the face of the earth," without specifying which nations.

Iran does not recognise the Jewish state and Ahmadinejad has drawn international condemnation by repeatedly saying since his election in 2005 that Israel is doomed to disappear.

Israel, the Middle East's sole if undeclared nuclear power, accuses Iran of seeking atomic weapons and wants tougher sanctions against the Islamic republic to make it halt its controversial nuclear programme. Iran insists that its nuclear ambitions are purely peaceful and aimed at meeting the country's growing energy needs.

The National Weather Service says areas of northeast Minnesota and northwest Wisconsin could see patchy frost this weekend. That's right, patchy frost in August. The weather agency says clear skies could allow temperatures to dip into the low to mid-30s late tonight into early Monday. Meteorologist Roman Berdes says an unusual cold-air mass from Canada will bring lower temperatures.

The sporting extravaganza failed to quell criticism of China's human rights record, although the International Olympic Committee (IOC) gave the organisers the thumbs-up and said the Games would leave a positive legacy for future generations. China's Communist leadership no doubt breathed a collective sigh of relief as the giant Olympic torch was extinguished. The run-up to the Games had cast a harsh light on China, bringing unrest in its Tibetan region to a global audience and showing that its rulers would not brook internal dissent.

But critics said enough jarring notes had sounded to spoil the symphony, with China refusing any protests during the Games, and sentencing two elderly women to a year of re-education for pushing for the right to demonstrate. Rogge told reporters on Sunday the IOC could not force change on a state "or solve all the ills of the world", but that the Games had promoted a heightened awareness of the environment in China and left an array of venues to nurture future champions.

It all ended tonight with a suitably sacred ceremony in the Bird's Nest Stadium. Our camera position was a few metres away from the VIP section. China's leaders sat in the front row with the IOC President Jacques Rogge. On each of their desks was a pair of binoculars and also a pen and paper (just in case any of them suddenly felt moved to write a speech).

London's mayor, Boris Johnson took part in a rather solemn three-way Olympic flag waving contest. Then came the final moment of a decade of work. The Olympic flame (always known here as the "sacred flame") was put out. A BILLION PEOPLE WILL NOW HAVE TO FIND SOMETHING ELSE TO BELIEVE IN.

THE lead singer, with yarmulke, beard and guitar, appears with a sheep on the cover of the latest record by Lechatchila, a religious-rock group popular among Orthodox young Israelis. "Don't stare at me," the lyrics go. "THE TEMPLE IS SURE TO BE REBUILT RIGHT NOW. WE'VE GOT TO PREPARE, TO BELIEVE, TO MAKE THE REDEMPTION HAPPEN."

For two millennia, ever since the Temple in Jerusalem was destroyed by the Romans, Jews have continued to study, write and indeed sing about the intricate rituals of service and sacrifice, in the belief that one day the Messiah would come and the Temple would be rebuilt. Meanwhile, the faithful were forbidden even to walk on the Holy Mount, let alone worship there.

Recently the rabbinical consensus has been fraying. Nationalist rabbis close to Jews who have settled on the Palestinian West Bank are permitting - even encouraging - their followers to visit the mount. Separately, the energetic and well-endowed TEMPLE INSTITUTE in Jerusalem's old city has been diligently recreating ancient Temple vessels and priestly garments to be ready when needed. The institute runs guided tours of the mount and publishes prayer books in which former Jewish glories are graphically depicted; its director reassures readers of its website that there is no call "for the launching of missiles or the exploding of the mosque". But the Temple is "not just something historic, stored in a memory chest". For nationalist-Orthodox children, it is increasingly a reality.

The larger, ultra-Orthodox community remains ostensibly unaffected. Its rabbis still forbid even walking on the mount and are content to wait for the Messiah without spurring him on. But between the two groups there is a theological overlap that translates into a tough brand of politics. THE ULTRA-ORTHODOX SHAS PARTY, A PIVOTAL PART OF THE GOVERNMENT'S COALITION, HAS GIVEN NOTICE THAT IT WILL WALK OUT IF THERE IS ANY NEGOTIATION OVER JERUSALEM. Sure enough, in leaked draft proposals put by Israel's prime minister, Ehud Olmert, to the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, the question of Jerusalem is postponed indefinitely. Or until the Messiah comes?

Electricity grids down, uncontrolled fires from exploding gas transport systems, no communication to call for help, no water to battle fires: It's all part of a catastrophic scenario some scientists predict could happen under an electromagnetic pulse attack – and the Department of Homeland Security's emergency plan includes no mention of EMP or how it might respond to such an attack. When WND contacted the Department of Homeland Security, a representative explained why a course of action was not included in the National Emergency Communications Plan – a strategy that relies heavily on the ability of authorities at all levels of government to communicate using radios, computers and other electronic devices that could be disabled by an EMP attack.

"When we look at the strategic threat picture, when we look at patterns of criminal activity that all levels of government show, when we look at what is ultimately going to involve limited resources, we have to get to a point where we prioritize," DHS spokesman Russ Knocke said. "We prioritize based upon threat vulnerability and consequence. As we speak today, there's nothing in the threat picture that would suggest an imminent EMP attack."

However, Congress has expressed concern regarding the threat of EMP. A top scientist warned the House Armed Services Committee in July that America remains vulnerable to a "catastrophe" from a nuclear electromagnetic pulse attack that could be launched with plausible deniability by hostile rogue nations or terrorists.

The interim parliament has no binding legislative authority and gives its opinion on matters referred to it by the Arab League council. Al-Saqer also repeated charges that the alleged "Jewish settlement plans of digging under the Aqsa Mosque had reached a dangerous stage."

The Islamic courts movement, which controlled the capital, Mogadishu, and much of the south for six months in 2006, said it wrested control of the southern port city of Kismayo from clan militias. About 70 people were killed during the fighting which started Wednesday and 170 were wounded, said Dr. Ali Hassan of Kismayo Hospital.

Somalia has been at war since 1991, when clan-based militias ousted a socialist dictator and then fought for power among themselves. The conflict is complicated by clan loyalties and the involvement of archenemies Eritrea and Ethiopia, who both back opposite sides in the fighting. The last U.N. peacekeeping force in Somalia included American troops who arrived in 1992 and tried to arrest warlords and create a government. That experiment in nation-building ended in October 1993, when fighters shot down a U.S. Army Black Hawk helicopter during a battle that killed 18 American soldiers.

Since then, Ethiopian troops have helped Somalia's shaky transitional government push the Islamists from power in Mogadishu and much of the south, but failed to establish security or improve living standards. The Islamic courts movement launched an insurgency in the impoverished country nearly two years ago, but Kismayo would be the biggest city seized since early 2007. Spokesman Sheik Ibrahim Shukri said its forces moved into Kismayo at the request of its residents and that the city "will remain under Islamic control." Government officials declined to comment on the claim.

The comments by deputy head of the general staff Col.-Gen. Anatoly Nogovitsyn, reported by Russian news agencies, showed that despite protests from the United States, France and Britain, Russia was confident enough to occupy whatever part of Georgia it deemed necessary.

"Russian military: You are not a liberating military, you are an occupying force!" one man shouted at the Poti protest. Banners read "Say No to War" and "Russia go home." On Sunday, a U.S. Navy warship carrying humanitarian aid for Georgia anchored in the southern Georgian port of Batumi. It was the first of five American ships scheduled to arrive this week with supplies.