The largest French aliya flight of the summer landed at Israel's Ben-Gurion airport on 20 July 2016. More than 200 French Jews were aboard the flight. The arrival of the olim (new immigrants) comes days after a deadly terror attack rocked Nice, France. The Jewish Agency, however, emphasized that the flight was planned months ago without any connection to the recent events in France. "French Jews who immigrate to Israel are coming out of choice: they have a whole world of opportunities before them, and they are choosing to come to Israel," Jewish Agency Chairman Natan Sharansky stated. "Their choice demonstrates that Israel affords a sense of Jewish identity and attachment to those Jews who wish to take an active part in the Jewish story. We must do everything we can to ease their professional, educational, and personal integration into Israeli society and ensure that they feel at home from the moment they first set foot on our homeland’s soil.” (J.Post) "Your children hasten back, and those who laid you waste depart from you. Lift up your eyes and look around; all your children gather and come to you.” Isa 49:17-18 [Comment]

European powers are looking to Israeli-developed technology to develop better means for spotting "lone-wolf" terrorists based on their online activity, a senior EU security official said this week. "How do you capture some signs of someone who has no contact with any organization, is just inspired and started expressing some kind of allegiance? I don't know. It's a challenge," EU Counter-Terrorism Coordinator Gilles de Kerchove said at an intelligence conference in Tel Aviv. "That is why I am here," he said of his visit to Israel. "We know Israel has developed a lot of capability in cyber." An Israeli military official who administers these methods said human intervention is required to set parameters such as age, religiosity, socio-economic background or links to known terrorists for the population being monitored. With the pool of potential suspects thus narrowed, the system can flag social media messages that may spell an imminent attack. (Reuters/NY Times) [Comment]

 Guinea is a country of some 10.5 million people, 85% of whom are Muslim. Israel is set to announce the establishment of new ties with Guinea. The move comes after PM Netanyahu spoke by phone with Guinean President Alpha Conde during his recent visit to Africa. That conversation was facilitated by one of the leaders of the seven east African leaders he met with in Uganda on the first day of his visit. (J.Post) [Comment]

 Iran's foreign minister on 19 July 2016, extolled the country's ability to bring its nuclear program back on track as limits on the landmark 15-year accord between Tehran and world powers ease in the coming years. Mohammad Javad Zarif said a document, submitted by Iran to the International Atomic Energy Agency and outlining plans to expand Iran's uranium enrichment program, is a "matter of pride." He said it was created by Iran's "negotiators and industry experts" and that even foreign media have noted Iran is likely to strive for restoring its full enrichment after 10 years. Zarif's remarks followed revelations the day before of the confidential document - an add-on agreement to the nuclear deal with world powers - that Iran gave the IAEA. It's the only text linked to last year's deal between Iran and six world powers - the United States, Britain, France, Russia, China plus Germany - that has not been made public, although USA officials say members of Congress who expressed interest were briefed on its substance. (AP) [Comment]

The confidential document revealed by AP marks yet another problematic revelation related to the nuclear deal signed with Iran. In February 2016 the IAEA said Iran briefly exceeded a limit set by its deal with major powers, though it stressed that Tehran then came back within the permitted bounds. An IAEA report dated 2 December 2015, found that Iran had conducted "a range of activities relevant to the development" of a nuclear bomb until 2009. The UN watchdog had also previously released a report which determined that Iran had violated the terms of its nuclear deal with the West by increasing its stockpile of low-enriched uranium by 460.2 kilograms. Despite these violations, the IAEA chose to close its probe into whether Iran had developed nuclear weapons in the past and subsequently announced that Iran met its initial obligations under the terms of the nuclear deal, enabling the implementation of the agreement and lifting of the sanctions on Iran. (Arutz-7) [Comment]

The recent report on the Iran nuclear deal sheds light on a highly problematic aspect of the agreement, namely, that the Islamic Republic has been authorized to upgrade its uranium enrichment abilities, a senior Israeli arms expert warned on 19 July 2016. Emily Landau, head of the Arms Control and Regional Security Program at the Tel Aviv-based Institute for National Security, said that a report by the Associated Press that was published this week, underlined "a big concern – that Iran is allowed to work on research and development of a full range of advanced centrifuge models.” According to the report, a confidential add-on agreement linked to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), spells out Iranian plans to develop and install a range of new enrichment machines after the first ten years of the agreement pass.

In 2027, according to the report, Iran will start replacing its older centrifuges with thousands of advanced, faster centrifuges, allowing it to enrich uranium at twice the current speed. That would reduce Iran’s breakout time from a year to six months, even though Iran will still be limited to possessing 300 kilograms of low enriched uranium for the first 15 years of the JCPOA, the report said. After the 15-year-mark, that limitation too will be lifted. "The fact that the Iranians are allowed to work on research and development is something I found to be a major source of concern. The implications are very serious,” Landau said. "After testing, they can install these centrifuges once ten years pass,” she added. "The difference between Iran saying that it plans to develop new centrifuges, and the revelation of a document that says the P5+1 countries agreed to so many centrifuges being installed, is substantial,” she added. "The very fact that the JCPOA enables this, on a whole range of centrifuges, is problematic. It just proves that Iran’s enrichment program has been totally legitimized by this deal.” Landau noted that no senior members of the Obama administration have challenged the veracity of the report, or the existence of the secret document, seeking instead to promote their own interpretation of it. (J.Post) "Blessed is that man who makes the Lord his trust, and does not respect the proud, nor such as turn aside to lies.” Ps 40:4. Indeed it is true, having been played out repeatedly, that Israel cannot and must not put her trust in the world’s political leaders to have regard for her national security. Pray the Lord will give Israel all the necessary strategies to deal with enemies such as Iran, Hezbollah, Hamas and the increasingly radical and hostile Palestinian Authority, at the right time.

State Department spokesman Mark Toner on 19 July 2016, acknowledged that the public was kept in the dark about a side deal of the Iran nuclear agreement that would lift some of the nuclear restrictions on Iran in a decade. The revelation was made through a confidential document obtained by the Associated Press (AP). The document says that as of January 2027 - 11 years after the deal was implemented - Iran will start replacing its mainstay centrifuges with thousands of advanced machines. From year 11 to 13 of the agreement, the document reveals, Iran will install centrifuges up to five times as efficient as the 5,060 machines it is now restricted to using. While Toner acknowledged the public was kept in the dark about the confidential document, he denied when grilled by AP reporter Matt Lee that the document was, indeed, "secret.” Lee asked Toner what qualified as secret to him, noting that he thought anything that was "not public” was the same as secret. Toner answered that the circumstances of the document were known to the world powers that brokered the Iran deal, meaning that it was not secret. Lee pressed Toner on the issue, pointing out that the citizens outside of Congress and the nuclear discussions were kept in the dark to this facet of the Iran deal. "No one outside that knew what it was or knew its contents,” Lee said. "Did they? Toner admitted, "I’m not going to argue that, yes. That’s true.” (Arutz-7) Is it not a crime and betrayal that Obama, Clinton and Kerry made this suicide deal with Iran? They should all be tried for treason and deception for their part in what is the greatest threat of terror and of nuclear war to the world. [Comment]

A French government committee has heard testimony, suppressed by the French government at the time and not published until this week, that the killers in the Bataclan terrorist attack tortured their victims on the second floor of the club. The chief police witness in Parliament said that an investigating officer, tears streaming down his face, rushed out of the Bataclan and vomited in front of him just after seeing the disfigured bodies. According to this testimony, terrorists gouged out eyes, castrated victims, and shoved their testicles in their mouths. They also reportedly disemboweled some poor souls. Women were stabbed in the genitals – and the torture was, victims told police, filmed for ISIS propaganda. For that reason, medics did not release the bodies of torture victims to the families, investigators said. (Fox) Can it be denied that tens of thousands of little Hitlers now roam the earth? Celebrated Christian author C.S. Lewis rightly said, "I think earth, if chosen instead of heaven, will turn out to have been all along, only a region of Hell.” Pray for revival to come to the Middle East and to all who revere terrorism and death over hope, love and eternal life. [Comment]

The attempted coup in Turkey caught Istanbul's Jews by surprise as they were finishing their Friday night 15 July meals. Though Air Force planes only flew low over populated areas in Ankara, residents of Istanbul quickly understood that security tensions were at their highest, which led to the synagogues of Istanbul being half empty on Shabbat morning. "On Friday night we went to the synagogue as usual. It was only at 11:30 at night, when we were finishing our Shabbat meal, that neighbors came to tell us about the dramatic coup happening right then, with violent clashes in some places.” According to the source, morning prayers were finished hastily and the congregants returned to their houses quickly. "There was a large police and military presence in the streets. Naturally there was a lot of tension, though we already knew that the coup had failed.” In the hours since Friday's uprising - which left some 265 people dead in a chaotic night of violence and uncertainty - thousands of soldiers have been arrested and hundreds of judiciary members removed. The country's Prime Minister has vowed that "they will pay a heavy price." (Arutz-7) [Comment]