My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge: because thou hast rejected knowledge, I will also reject thee, that thou shalt be no priest to me: seeing thou hast forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget thy children.Hosea 4 : 6

Paul Mathiasen

Tue, April 8, 2025 at 3:33 PM GMT+32 min read

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By Paul Mathiasen

SANTO DOMINGO (Reuters) – A catastrophic roof collapse at a nightclub in the Dominican Republic’s capital killed at least 113 people on Tuesday and emergency crews were working frantically after nightfall to pull survivors from the rubble.

About 155 people were injured.

Families of the victims gathered near the Jet Set nightclub seeking information about their loved ones.

“I still have family members that are still in the rubble, and we don’t know what happened to them,” Pedro Martinez, a 17-season Major League Baseball player, said in a video shared on his Instagram account in the evening.

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The deceased include a popular singer, a provincial governor and former Major League Baseball pitcher Octavio Dotel, authorities said.

Everything in the world is in agitation. The signs of the times are ominous. Coming events cast their shadows before. The Spirit of God is withdrawing from the earth, and calamity follows calamity by sea and by land. There are tempests, earthquakes, fires, floods, murders of every grade. Who can read the future? Where is security? There is assurance in nothing that is human or earthly. Rapidly men are ranging themselves under the banner they have chosen. Restlessly they are waiting and watching the movements of their leaders.
An intensity such as never before was seen is taking possession of the world. In amusements, in money-making, in the contest for power, in the very struggle for existence, there is a terrible force that engrosses body and mind and soul. In the midst of this maddening rush, God is speaking. He bids us come apart and commune with Him. “Be still, and know that I am God.”
“Come unto Me,” Christ says, “and I will give you rest. Take My yoke upon you, and learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly in heart; and ye shall find rest.” ST July 6,  1904, par. 1 – ST July 6,  1904, par. 3

Juan Manuel Mendez, head of the Dominican Republic’s emergency operations center, said earlier on Tuesday that the exact number of people inside the club at the time of the collapse remained unclear.

The emergency crews’ capacity was increased as “more heavy equipment has been used to speed up the removal of debris and continue the search efforts”, presidential spokesperson Homero Figueroa said in a statement.

Indulgences_concert by popular Dominican merengue singer!

And it shall come to pass in that day, that Tyre shall be forgotten seventy years, according to the days of one king: after the end of seventy years shall Tyre sing as an harlot.Isaiah 23 : 15, Then the princes, the governors, and captains, the judges, the treasurers, the counsellors, the sheriffs, and all the rulers of the provinces, were gathered together unto the dedication of the image that Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up; and they stood before the image that Nebuchadnezzar had set up.Daniel 3 : 3 

The disaster struck during a concert by popular Dominican merengue singer Rubby Perez, whose body was found on Wednesday morning, according to authorities. The event was attended by politicians, athletes and other prominent figures.

In Germany the sale of indulgences had been committed to the Dominican friars and was conducted by the infamous Tetzel. In Switzerland the traffic was put into the hands of the Franciscans, under the control of Samson, an Italian  monk. Samson had already done good service to the church, having secured immense sums from Germany and Switzerland to fill the papal treasury. Now he traversed Switzerland, attracting great crowds, despoiling the poor peasants of their scanty earnings, and exacting rich gifts from the wealthy classes. But the influence of the reform already made itself felt in curtailing, though it could not stop, the traffic. Zwingli was still at Einsiedeln when Samson, soon after entering Switzerland, arrived with his wares at a neighboring town. Being apprised of his mission, the Reformer immediately set out to oppose him. The two did not meet, but such was Zwingli’s success in exposing the friar’s pretensions that he was obliged to leave for other quarters.
At Zurich, Zwingli preached zealously against the pardonmongers; and when Samson approached the place, he was met by a messenger from the council with an intimation that he was expected to pass on. He finally secured an entrance by stratagem, but was sent away without the sale of a single pardon, and he soon after left Switzerland. GC 178.4 – GC 179.1

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The son of the Dominican minister of public works and communications Eduardo Estrella, Eduardo Guarionex Estrella, was also found among the deceased on Wednesday, authorities said.

Another victim was Nelsy Cruz, the governor of the northern Monte Cristi province, President Luis Abinader said. Cruz was the sister of former baseball player Nelson Cruz, a seven-time MLB All-Star.

Former MLB players Octavio Dotel and Tony Blanco also died in the collapse, local authorities confirmed. Dotel died en route to a local hospital after being pulled from the debris, a spokesman for the nation’s sports ministry said.

Dotel, 51, debuted for the New York Mets in 1999 and played until 2013 for more than a dozen teams.

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“Thinking about our people in the Dominican Republic,” Carlos Mendoza, manager of the Mets, said at a press conference.

[12] And the men said unto Lot, Hast thou here any besides? son in law, and thy sons, and thy daughters, and whatsoever thou hast in the city, bring them out of this place: [13] For we will destroy this place, because the cry of them is waxen great before the face of the LORD; and the LORD hath sent us to destroy it.

Genesis 19 : 12-13

The crisis is stealing gradually upon us. The sun shines in the heavens, passing over its usual round, and the heavens still declare the glory of God. Men are still eating and drinking, planting and building, marrying, and giving in marriage. Merchants are still buying and selling. Men are jostling one against another, contending for the highest place. Pleasure lovers are still crowding to theaters, horse races, gambling hells. The highest excitement prevails, yet probation’s hour is fast closing, and every case is about to be eternally decided. Satan sees that his time is short. He has set all his agencies at work that men may be deceived, deluded, occupied and entranced, until the day of probation shall be ended, and the door of mercy be forever shut.
Solemnly there come to us down through the centuries the warning words of our Lord from the Mount of Olives: “Take heed to yourselves, lest at any time your hearts be overcharged with surfeiting, and drunkenness, and cares of this life, and so that day come upon you unawares.” “Watch ye therefore, and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass, and to stand before the Son of man.” DA 636.2 – DA 636.3

Relatives were receiving psychological support and the cause of the roof collapse remained under investigation, officials said.

[4] Or those eighteen, upon whom the tower in Siloam fell, and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem? [5] I tell you, Nay: but, except ye repent, ye shall all likewise perish. [6] He spake also this parable; A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard; and he came and sought fruit thereon, and found none.

Luke 13 : 4-6

(Reporting by Paul Mathiasen and Erika Santelices in Santo Domingo; Writing by Aida Pelaez-Fernandez, Natalia Siniawski and Isabel Teles; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne, Kevin Liffey, Matthew Lewis, David Gregorio, Lincoln Feast and Alex Richardson)

(For the weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the pulling down of strong holds;)2 Corinthians 10 : 4

Tom Porter

Wed, April 9, 2025 at 1:00 PM GMT+34 min read

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• The war in Ukraine is showing the power of weaponry once thought outdated.
• Mines and artillery have proven essential, alongside cutting-edge tech like AI and drones.
• One expert told BI that mines and shells are “useful, even dominant” when armies are dug in.

The war in Ukraine is showing that weapons once thought redundant remain indispensable — and NATO countries are playing catch-up as they race to rearm.

Last week, Finland became the latest European country to repeal a decades-old ban on the use of anti-personnel land mines. Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia have already announced they were abandoning the 1997 Ottawa Treaty, which prohibited the use, manufacture, and sale of anti-personnel land mines.

[8] Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them; [9] And saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.Matthew 4 : 8-9

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The countries are gearing up to fortify their borders with Russia using land mines as the Kremlin refocuses its economy on its military and relations with the West deteriorate.

While the war includes examples of cutting-edge technology, it also underlines the importance of weapons like shells and mines.

As Europe enters “an era of rearmament,” it’s learning it needs to invest in technology it previously thought would be redundant in fast-moving, tech-heavy wars they envisaged would define the 21st century.

Ukraine has used mines to slow the larger Russian army’s advances in the east and south of the country to a stalemate and to channel enemy troops into areas that its forces can defend.

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While the sophisticated precision-guided missiles NATO has provided Ukraine are susceptible to Russian electronic jamming that scrambles the signals used to guide them, comparatively crude — and cheap — shells don’t have this drawback.

Ukraine’s European allies have boosted shell production. But last week, NATO’s supreme allied commander in Europe, US Army Gen. Christopher Cavoli, told the Senate Armed Services Committee that Russia was on track to build a shell stockpile “three times greater than the United States and Europe combined.”

In a recent paper, the Royal United Services Institute, a UK defense think tank, said European governments had expected private sector defense firms to “solve the problem” of ammunition production but failed to introduce “any incentives or a regulatory environment that would allow it to do so.”

Nato had been planning for a different war

Paul van Hooft, a defense research leader at the UK-based think tank RAND Europe, told BI that the threat from Russia was very different from what Western military leaders had planned for.

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“For three decades, as Western militaries were not focused on large-scale land warfare and territorial-NATO collective defense, these weapons [such as shells and land mines] were not considered as valuable — specifically in Western Europe,” he told BI by email.

After the 9/11 attacks, NATO allies planned for wars against militias such as the Taliban in Afghanistan, where land mines and shells had little obvious use, said van Hooft.

But fighting a land war against a large army requires defending and holding large swaths of territory.

Artillery may be old technology but it’s more effective when used alongside newer surveillance tech like drones, said Van Hooft.

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Mark Cancian, a senior advisor with the Center for Strategic and International Studies Defense and Security Department in Washington, DC, said that as the war in Ukraine has become more static, shells and land mines have once again been proven indispensable.

“These weapons become useful, even dominant, whenever the front lines stabilize,” he said. “They are difficult to employ when armies are maneuvering but easy to employ when armies stalemate and dig in.”

[3] For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction cometh upon them, as travail upon a woman with child; and they shall not escape. [4] But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief. [5] Ye are all the children of light, and the children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness. [6] Therefore let us not sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober. [7] For they that sleep sleep in the night; and they that be drunken are drunken in the night. [8] But let us, who are of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love; and for an helmet, the hope of salvation. 1 Thessalonians 5 : 3-8

In Ukraine, drones have been used to surveil battlefields, identify troops gatherings or command posts — and pinpoint positions to target with artillery barrages.

Cancian cautioned against military planners becoming “enamored with flashy concepts of future warfare” as billions are poured into European defense budgets and military tech startups compete for business selling cutting-edge drones and AI-integrated weapons.

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“Artillery-firing, unguided munitions are still critical,” he said, adding, “Notions that the next war would be fought by small teams firing precision munitions has not turned out to be the case.”

In the last solemn work few great men will be engaged. They are self-sufficient, independent of God, and He cannot use them. The Lord has faithful servants, who in the shaking, testing time will be disclosed  to view. There are precious ones now hidden who have not bowed the knee to Baal 5T 80.1

“The time is not far distant when the test will come to every soul. The mark of the beast will be urged upon us. Those who have step by step yielded to worldly demands, and conformed to worldly customs, will not find it a hard matter to yield to the powers that be, rather than subject themselves to derision, insult, threatened imprisonment, and death. The contest is between the commandments of God and the commandments of men.” RH April 27,  1911, par. 28

Read the original article on Business Insider

For out of prison he cometh to reign; whereas also he that is born in his kingdom becometh poor.Ecclesiastes 4 : 14

David Culver, Abel Alvarado, Evelio Contreras and Rachel Clarke, CNN

Wed, April 9, 2025 at 5:06 AM GMT+34 min read

933

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Men deported by the United States to El Salvador’s notorious Cecot prison are living in “the same” conditions as convicted gangsters, prison director Belarmino García said on Tuesday, during an exclusive tour for CNN, the first US news organization to visit the facility since the latest deportation flight.

The gospel would have brought to France the solution of those political and social problems that baffled the skill of her clergy, her king, and her legislators, and finally plunged the nation into anarchy and ruin. But under the domination of Rome the people had lost the Saviour’s blessed lessons of self-sacrifice and unselfish love. They had been led away from the practice of self-denial for the good of others. The rich had found no rebuke for their oppression of the poor, the poor no help for their servitude and degradation. The selfishness of the wealthy and powerful grew more and more apparent and oppressive. For centuries the greed and profligacy of the noble resulted in grinding extortion toward the peasant. The rich wronged the poor, and the poor hated the rich.
In many provinces the estates were held by the nobles, and the laboring classes were only tenants; they were at the mercy of their landlords and were forced to submit to their exorbitant demands. The burden of supporting both the church and the state fell upon the middle and lower classes, who were heavily taxed by the civil authorities and by the clergy. ” GC 279.3 – GC 279.4

García would not discuss any specifics around the deportees beyond confirming they are in his facility. But when pressed, he said “there are no privileges.”

That would mean the deportees’ heads have been shaved and they are kept in communal cells holding up to 100 men each for 23½ hours a day. Two sources told CNN the situation is less regimented for the deportees, but the facilities are the same. The cells have no privacy, and no furniture beyond rows of stacked metal bunks with no mattresses or pillows.

“The pleasure of the nobles was considered the supreme law; the farmers and the peasants might starve, for aught their oppressors cared…. The people were compelled at every turn to consult the exclusive interest of the landlord. The lives of the agricultural laborers were lives of incessant work and unrelieved misery; their complaints, if they ever dared to complain, were treated with insolent contempt. The courts of justice would always listen to a noble as against a peasant; bribes were notoriously accepted by the judges; and the merest caprice of the aristocracy had the force of law, by virtue of this system of universal corruption. Of the taxes wrung from the commonalty, by the secular magnates on the one hand, and the clergy on the other, not half ever found its way into the royal or episcopal treasury; the rest was squandered in profligate self-indulgence. And the men who thus impoverished their fellow subjects were themselves exempt from taxation, and entitled by law or custom to all the appointments of the state. The privileged classes numbered a hundred and fifty thousand, and for their gratification millions were condemned to hopeless and degrading lives.” (See Appendix.) GC 279.4

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Some 278 men have been deported by the Trump administration to El Salvador, accused of being members of the Venezuelan Tren de Aragua gang or Salvadorans who are said to be part of MS-13.

But they also include Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia, a sheet metal worker and father-of-three from Maryland, who was mistakenly removed from the US through an “administrative error.”

His case is now with the US Supreme Court, which extended the deadline of a lower court judge requiring the administration to get him back by midnight on Monday.

CNN was not permitted inside Sector 8 of Cecot, officially known as the Terrorism Confinement Center, where the deportees are being held.

Bring my soul out of prison, that I may praise thy name: the righteous shall compass me about; for thou shalt deal bountifully with me.Psalm 142 : 7

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García said he was not familiar with the specifics of any individual deportee and could not comment further.`

It had been Rome’s policy, under a profession of reverence for the Bible, to keep it locked up in an unknown tongue and hidden away from the people. Under her rule the witnesses prophesied “clothed in sackcloth.” But another power—the beast from the bottomless pit—was to arise to make open, avowed war upon the word of God.
“The great city” in whose streets the witnesses are slain, and where their dead bodies lie, is “spiritually” Egypt. Of all nations presented in Bible history, Egypt most boldly denied the existence of the living God and resisted His commands. No monarch ever ventured upon more open and highhanded rebellion against the authority of Heaven than did the king of Egypt. When the message was brought him by Moses, in the name of the Lord, Pharaoh proudly answered: “Who is Jehovah, that I should hearken unto His voice to let Israel go? I know not Jehovah, and moreover I will not let Israel go.” Exodus 5:2, A.R.V. This is atheism, and the nation represented by Egypt would give voice to a similar denial of the claims of the living God and would manifest a like spirit of unbelief and defiance. “The great city” is also compared, “spiritually,” to Sodom. The corruption of Sodom in breaking the law of God was especially manifested in licentiousness. And this sin was also to be a pre-eminent characteristic of the nation that should fulfill the specifications of this scripture.
According to the words of the prophet, then, a little before the year 1798 some power of satanic origin and character would rise to make war upon the Bible. And in the land where the testimony of God’s two witnesses should thus be silenced, there would be manifest the atheism of the Pharaoh and the licentiousness of Sodom. GC 269.1 – GC 269.3

But when CNN asked, he was happy to show how Salvadoran inmates were able to participate should they have their own court hearings.

They are removed from their communal cell by armed personnel and taken to a room with video conference facilities. Monitors showed court proceedings in progress, apparently with lawyers and judges present.

Cecot houses both convicted criminals and those still going through El Salvador’s court system. With many constitutional rights suspended under El Salvador’s years-long state of emergency, some people have been detained by mistake, President Nayib Bukele has admitted; several thousand of them have already been released.

Where the lights are always on

Each of the eight sectors is fully self-contained with these conference rooms as well as a medical clinic, with the intention that inmates never step outside their warehouse-like building.

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They are watched through the bars constantly and the lights are always on, García said. There are even guards on catwalks above the cells.

Looking down through the metal-grille ceiling into a cell, the deliberate harshness of the life for the Salvadoran inmates — whether convicted or awaiting trial — is clear. They are allowed no personal possessions; they must use an open toilet and there’s a cement basin for washing and large jug for drinking water.

Still, there are checks for contraband when the inmates are “extricated” from the cells. The men have their hands cuffed behind them and then run to sit in a designated spot, stretching their legs around those of the man in front in what becomes a human herringbone pattern.

When Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem visited Cecot last month, she recorded a video message to say to undocumented immigrants in the US: “This is one of the consequences you could face.”

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“First of all, do not come to our country illegally. You will be removed, and you will be prosecuted,” she said. “But know that this facility is one of the tools in our toolkit that we will use if you commit crimes against the American people.”

CNN visited Cecot late last year, the first major US news organization to be allowed inside the isolated facility that was built away from any town.

It is busier inside now, with more men in each cell.

Last year, García would say only between 10,000 and 20,000 inmates were being held. Now he says it’s getting closer to its 40,000 maximum population, but once again declined to give a specific number, citing security precautions. The growth would include the deportees from the US, but be mostly Salvadorans rounded up under the emergency situation introduced by Bukele.

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A thousand or more armed guards rotate duties at the prison, built in just seven months and opened in January 2023. The prison is also ringed by multiple electric fences and 19 watchtowers.

For critics, Cecot is a sign of how quickly rights can disappear. But for many in El Salvador it is proof of effective control and a return to security in what was once the “murder capital of the world.”

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The highways lie waste, the wayfaring man ceaseth: he hath broken the covenant, he hath despised the cities, he regardeth no man. Isaiah 33 : 8

MEGAN JANETSKY and MATÍAS DELACROIX

Tue, April 8, 2025 at 9:14 PM GMT+33 min read

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Panama Darien Gap Migration

An court stands empty in Lajas Blancas, Panama, Sunday, April 6, 2025, where migrants used to camp out after crossing the Darien Gap on their journey north to the United States. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix)

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Lockdown _Now, the makeshift migrant camp has become a ghost town.

LAJAS BLANCAS, Panama (AP) —

A little more than a year ago, the small Panamanian river port of Lajas Blancas was filled with a crush of people trying to make their way to the United States. Now, the makeshift migrant camp has become a ghost town.

More than a thousand migrants a day would cross the harrowing Darien Gap — a rugged jungle passage between Colombia and Panama. In 2023, migration through the passage’s trenches smashed records with more than 500,000 people making the grueling crossing, according to Panama’s government, in the hope of a better life.

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Vulnerable people would trek for days through the rainforest passages and then board narrow wooden boats across rivers. Most would be dropped off at Lajas Blancas, where they would pack into migrant camps filled with families and board buses to cross Panama to continue their journey north.

It was the desire for liberty of conscience that inspired the Pilgrims to brave the perils of the long journey across the sea, to endure the hardships and dangers of the wilderness, and with God’s blessing to lay, on the shores of America, the foundation of a mighty nation.  GC 292.3

In the few months since U.S. President Donald Trump took office, with his tough stance on migration, his administration effectively cut off access to asylum along the U.S.-Mexico border. And while migration took a sharp dip under the final year of the Biden administration, it slowed to a trickle, with barely 10 people a week at Lajas Blancas.

This has left some stranded, triggering a “reverse flow” of Venezuelan migrants who, without other options, traveled by boat along Panama’s Caribbean coast in an effort to return home.

Last month, Panama President José Raúl Mulino said: “Effectively, the border with Darien is closed. The problem we had in Lajas Blancas eliminated.”

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After months of Panama’s government blocking off journalists from visiting the port and other key points along the former migratory route, authorities granted The Associated Press access to the strictly controlled area. Shortly after arriving, journalists were stopped by migration enforcement and were stripped of those permissions, with authorities vaguely citing security concerns.

Still, AP reporters saw the large tents that once housed migrants stand empty and the boats pulling up to the side of the river were few and far between. Makeshift shops selling food, water and other goods to migrants sit empty.

In the Darien Gap, organizations, like the Red Cross and UNICEF, that provided aid to migrants have shut their doors. Panama’s border police now strictly control access to the port and authorities have long assumed a discourse dissuading people from migrating.

Many earnestly desired to return to the purity and simplicity which characterized the primitive church. They regarded many of the established customs of the English Church as monuments of idolatry, and they could not in conscience unite in her worship. But the church, being supported by the civil authority, would permit no dissent from her forms. Attendance upon her service was required by law, and unauthorized assemblies for religious worship were prohibited, under penalty of imprisonment, exile, and death.
At the opening of the seventeenth century the monarch who had just ascended the throne of England declared his determination to make the Puritans “conform, or … harry them out of the land, or else worse.”—George Bancroft, History of the United States of America, pt. 1, ch. 12, par. 6. Hunted, persecuted, and imprisoned, they could discern in the future no promise of better days, and many yielded to the conviction that for such as would serve God according to the dictates of their conscience, “England was ceasing forever to be a habitable place.”—J. G. Palfrey, History of New England, ch. 3, par. 43. Some at last determined to seek refuge in Holland. Difficulties, losses, and imprisonment were encountered. Their purposes were thwarted, and they were betrayed into the hands of their enemies. But steadfast perseverance finally conquered, and they found shelter on the friendly shores of the Dutch Republic. GC 290.1 – GC 290.2

A handful of migrants from Venezuela, Angola and Nigeria remain in the Lajas Blancas camp and sleep on the dusty ground, guarded by the police.

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Among them was 33-year-old Venezuelan Hermanie Blanco, who arrived in Panama days after Trump took office.

Fleeing economic crisis and political turmoil in her home country, she once hoped to seek asylum in the U.S. but decided after crossing the Darien Gap that she would try to seek refuge in Panama, saying she’s been stranded in the nearly abandoned settlement for months waiting for an answer.

“Doctors Without Borders, the Red Cross, no one comes here anymore,” she said. “It’s deserted.”

A sign at the heart of Lajas Blancas acts as a reminder, reading in Spanish, English, Creole, and Arabic: “Darien is not a route, it’s a jungle.”

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Panama and other countries across Latin America have scrambled to meet demands by the Trump administration to crack down on migration north.

The U.S. recently recognized Panama’s efforts to reduce migration through the Darién region, with a State Department spokesperson saying it has dropped by 98%. View comments (43)

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Trump Has a New Target for His Mass Deportations: U.S. Citizens

Edith Olmsted

This story has been updated.

Not a vestige of the influence of selfish, worldly monopolies is to make the slightest impression on the people who are watching and working and praying for the second coming of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. 16LtMs, Ms 16, 1901, par. 16

ELLEN KNICKMEYER, SAMY MAGDY and DAVID BILLER

Mon, April 7, 2025 at 6:17 PM GMT+35 min read

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Trump USAID

FILE – Food parcels provided by the World Food Program, part of the humanitarian aid shipments into Syria, are stacked at the Reyhanli border crossing with Syria, near Hatay, southern Turkey, Wednesday, May 24, 2017. (AP Photo/Burhan Ozbilici, Pool, File)

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WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration has ended funding to U.N. World Food Program emergency programs helping keep millions alive in Afghanistan, Syria, Yemen and 11 other impoverished countries, many of them struggling with conflict, according to the organization and officials who spoke to The Associated Press.

And they said one to another, Let us make a captain, and let us return into Egypt.

Numbers 14 : 4

We were not to be guided by men who want their word to be the controlling power. The development of the desire to control has been very marked, and God sent warning after warning, forbidding confederacies and consolidations. He warned us against binding ourselves to fulfil certain agreements that would be presented by men laboring to control the movements of their brethren. PUR November 19,  1903, par. 18

The World Food Program, the largest provider of food aid, appealed to the U.S. to roll back the new cuts in a social media post Monday. The unexpected round of contract cancellations has targeted some of the last remaining humanitarian programs run by the U.S. Agency for International Development, according to two U.S. officials, a United Nations official and documents obtained by the AP.

Little Rhode Island Flock : US tourist arrested after allegedly attempting to contact ‘world’s most isolated’ tribe

The agents of Satan are formidable; we shall meet them and must combat them. Our labors are not to be confined to our own country. The field is the world; the harvest is ripe. The command given the disciples just before he ascended was, “Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.”  RH December 15,  1874, par. 29

“This could amount to a death sentence for millions of people facing extreme hunger and starvation,” WFP said on X.

An Educational Center. The Lord is not pleased with some of the arrangements that have been made in Battle Creek. He has declared that other places are being robbed of the light and advantages that have been centered and multiplied in Battle Creek. It is not pleasing to God that our youth from all parts of the country should be called to Battle Creek, to work in the sanitarium, and to receive their education. When we permit this, we are often guilty of robbing needy fields of their most precious treasure. PUR November 19,  1903, par. 19

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The agency said it was in contact with the Trump administration “to urge for continued support” for lifesaving programs and thanked the United States and other donors for past contributions.

Christ is to be our example. The mission of Christ was to live out the law of God. On one occasion when Jesus and his disciples went through the corn, they were hungry, “and began to pluck the ears of corn, and to eat. But when the Pharisees saw it, they said unto him, Behold, thy disciples do that which is not lawful to do upon the Sabbath day.” Jesus immediately brought forward an illustration to vindicate his action, and showed that what they had done was in complete harmony with the law of God. He said to the Pharisees: “But if ye had known what this meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice, ye would not have condemned the guiltless.” “But woe unto you, Pharisees! for ye tithe mint and rue and all manner of herbs, and pass over judgment and the love of God; these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone.” He sought to convince them that while they were so scrupulous in the performance of their ceremonies, they neglected the weightier matters of the law, and failed to exercise mercy, judgment, and the love of God. RH August 13,  1895, par. 3

Secretary of State Marco Rubio and other administration officials had pledged to spare emergency food programs and other life-and-death aid from deep cuts to U.S. foreign assistance. There was no immediate comment Monday from the State Department.

The projects were being canceled “for the convenience of the U.S. Government” at the direction of Jeremy Lewin, a top lieutenant at Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency who was appointed to oversee the elimination of USAID programs, according to termination notices sent to partners and viewed by the AP.

Nothing so distinguished the Jews from surrounding nations, and designated them as true worshipers of the Creator, as the institution of the Sabbath. Its observance was a continual visible token of their connection with God, and separation from other people. All ordinary labor for a livelihood or for worldly profit was forbidden upon the seventh day. According to the fourth commandment the Sabbath was dedicated to rest and religious worship. All secular employment was to be suspended; but works of  mercy and benevolence were in accordance with the purpose of the Lord. They were not to be limited by time nor place. To relieve the afflicted, to comfort the sorrowing is a labor of love that does honor to God’s holy day. 2SP 193.2

Programs targeted by Trump administration

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Same Boat _One Mind Shared Responsibilities : Rubio says US can no longer supply bulk of global humanitarian aid

True missionary workers will not colonize.

And he said, What have they seen in thine house? And Hezekiah answered, All the things that are in mine house have they seen: there is nothing among my treasures that I have not showed them.

2 Kings 20 : 15

In Syria, a country battling poverty, hunger and insecurity after a 13-year civil war and an insurgency by the Islamic State group, some $230 million in contracts with WFP and humanitarian groups was terminated in recent days, according to a State Department document detailing the cuts that was obtained by the AP.

The single biggest of the targeted Syria programs, at $111 million, provided bread and other daily food to 1.5 million people, the document says.

“True missionary workers will not colonize. God’s people are to be pilgrims and strangers on the earth. The investments of large sums of money in the building up of the work in one place is not in the order of God. Plants are to be made in many places. Schools and sanitariums are to be established in places where there is now nothing to represent the truth. These interests are not to be established for the purpose of making money, but for the purpose of spreading the truth. Land should be secured at a distance from the cities, where schools can be built up in which the youth can be given an education in agricultural and mechanical lines. PUR November 19,  1903, par. 10

About 60 letters canceling contracts were sent over the past week. An official with the United Nations in the Middle East said all U.S. aid to WFP food programs across Yemen, another war-divided country that is facing one of the world’s worst humanitarian disasters, has been stopped, apparently including food that already had arrived in distribution centers.

The resolution for consolidation will never be blessed of God, for it is to bring about things that God will not endorse. Those who adopt it know not what they are doing. They are not walking in the counsel of the great I AM. 10LtMs, Ms 56, 1895, par. 2

WFP also received termination letters for U.S.-funded programs in Lebanon and Jordan, where Syrian refugees would be hit hardest, the U.N. official said.

Representative men connected with the work and cause of God will bring a heavy retribution upon themselves if they mislead the people by their spirit and action, and misrepresent the principles of the law of Jehovah. If they weave into the work that which springs from their own natural temperament, and mar the cause by disorders of their own natural disposition, they will cause to appear in the work of God the attributes of the fallen foe and his confederate angels, rather than the attributes of Jesus Christ. The fashion of the work coming forth from every soul that is born of God has been clearly pictured before us. He who is truly a child of God will experience the transforming power of grace upon mind and heart, and his character will develop after the divine similitude. The description of the work of Christ will be the description of the work of every one who is born of God, who walks not after the flesh, but after the Spirit. The apostle says of such, “Ye are laborers together with God,” representing the holy law of God to heaven, to worlds unfallen, and to the fallen world.  RH August 13,  1895, par. 6

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Independent of God!

For His own name’s sake God will not permit the forward and independent to carry out their unsanctified plans. He will visit them for their perversity of action. “There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked.”  PUR November 19,  1903, par. 24

Some of the last remaining U.S. funding for key programs in Somalia, Afghanistan and the southern African nation of Zimbabwe also was affected, including for those providing food, water, medical care and shelter for people displaced by war, one of the U.S. officials said.

Those churches who are the most systematic and liberal in sustaining the cause of God, are the most prosperous spiritually. True liberality in the follower of Christ identifies his interest with that of his Master. In God’s dealing with the Jews and his people to the end of time, he requires systematic benevolence proportionate to their income. The plan of salvation was laid by the infinite sacrifice of the Son of God. The light of the gospel shining from the cross of Christ rebukes selfishness, and encourages liberality and benevolence. It is not to be a lamented fact that there are increasing calls to give. God, in his providence, is calling his people out from their limited sphere of action, to enter upon greater enterprises. Unlimited effort is demanded at this time when moral darkness is covering the world. Worldliness and covetousness are eating out the vitals of God’s people. They should understand that it is his mercy which multiplies the demands for their means. The angel of God places benevolent acts close beside prayer. He said to Cornelius, “Thy prayers and thine alms are come up for a memorial before God.” RH December 15,  1874, par. 26

The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to comment publicly.

[34] But the Pharisees said, He casteth out devils through the prince of the devils. [36] But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd. [37] Then saith he unto his disciples, The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few;

Matthew 9 : 34, 36-37

We feel anguish of spirit because some gifts are lost to us that we might now have if we had only been awake. Laborers have been kept back from the whitening harvest.  RH December 15,  1874, par. 36

Current and former USAID experts and partners said some $560 million in humanitarian aid was cut to Afghanistan, including for emergency food assistance, the treatment of severely malnourished babies, lifesaving medical care, safe drinking water, and emergency mental health treatment for survivors of sexual and physical violence.

Another of the notices, sent Friday, abruptly pulled U.S. funding for a program with strong support in Congress that had sent young Afghan women overseas for schooling because of Taliban prohibitions on women’s education, said an administrator for that project, which is run by Texas A&M University.

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The young women would now face return to Afghanistan, where their lives would be in danger, according to that administrator, who was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Larger impact of cutting aid

The abrupt end of WFP programs threatens some of the world’s most vulnerable populations, many of which depend on such food aid, according to humanitarian groups. The U.S. and other donors long have seen efforts to ease humanitarian crises as being in their strategic interest by stemming mass migration, conflicts and extremism, which struggles for resources can bring.

The special system of tithing was founded upon a principle which was as enduring as the law of God. This system of tithing was a blessing to the Jews, else God would not have given it them. So also will it be a blessing to those who carry it out to the end of time. Our Heavenly Father did not originate the plan of systematic benevolence to enrich himself, but to be a great blessing to man. He saw that this system of beneficence was just what man needed.
Those churches who are the most systematic and liberal in sustaining the cause of God, are the most prosperous spiritually.  RH December 15,  1874, par. 25 – RH December 15,  1874, par. 26

WFP chief Cindy McCain said in a posting on social media that the cuts “undermine global stability.”

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Rubio had notified Congress and courts last month that USAID contract cuts were over, with about 1,000 programs spared worldwide and more than 5,000 others eliminated. That added to the shock of the new cuts.

The Lord gave the word: great was the company of those that published it.Psalm 68 : 11

The Trump administration has accused USAID of wastefulness and advancing liberal causes.

There are many who have looked upon the Jewish nation as a people to be pitied, because they were constantly taxed for the support of their religion; but God, who created man and provided him with all the blessings he enjoys, knew what was for his best good. And he has, through his blessing, made their nine-tenths worth more to them than the entire amount without his blessing. If any through their selfishness robbed God or brought to him an offering not perfect, disaster and loss were sure to follow them. God reads the motives of the heart. He is acquainted with the purposes of men, and will mete out to them in his own good time as they have merited. RH December 15,  1874, par. 24

Trump’s freeze on all foreign assistance through USAID and the State Department led to a brief shutdown of services at the al-Hol camp, where tens of thousands of alleged Islamic State fighters and their families are kept under guard.

Co-workers with Christ, men who feel the need of extended effort, are wanted. The work of our presses should not be lessened, but doubled. Schools should be established in different places to educate our youth preparatory to their laboring to advance the truth. RH December 15,  1874, par. 34

That shutdown raised fears of an uprising or breakout at the camp. U.S. officials quickly intervened to restore services.

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The State Department document obtained by the AP identifies two newly terminated contracts, run by Save the Children and the U.N. Population Fund, which provided mental health services and other care to women and children at al-Hol. It was not immediately clear if any other services were affected at the camp.

The U.S. had been the major funder of the WFP, providing $4.5 billion of the $9.8 billion in donations to the food agency last year.

___

Magdy reported from Cairo and Biller from Rome. AP Diplomatic Writer Matthew Lee in Washington contributed to this report

But we desire to hear of thee what thou thinkest: for as concerning this sect, we know that every where it is spoken against.Acts 28 : 22

Henry Bodkin

Mon, April 7, 2025 at 6:04 PM GMT+35 min read

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America is understood to have delivered an advanced missile defence system to Israel ahead of Benjamin Netanyahu’s visit to Washington to discuss attacking Iran.

And he said, What have they seen in thine house? And Hezekiah answered, All the things that are in mine house have they seen: there is nothing among my treasures that I have not showed them.2 Kings 20 : 15

Flight-tracking websites showed a C-5M Super Galaxy, the US’s largest transport aircraft and capable of carrying the Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (Thaad) system, land at Nevatim air base in southern Israel on Saturday and wait about eight hours before leaving.

US media reported last month that defence officials had approved moving the system to the Middle East. If confirmed, it would mark the second Thaad system sent to Israel by America, the first having been put in place last year.

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It comes amid a rush of US military assets to the Middle East amid hostile rhetoric on Tehran from the White House. One carrier strike group is already operating in the region, while another is en route from Asia.

A number of B-2 Spirit bombers, which can be armed with nuclear weapons, have also been sent to the Indian Ocean base of Diego Garcia, which is in range of Iran.

Preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon is Israel’s number one strategic priority, as well as being a key foreign policy aim for the Trump administration.

Last week, Donald Trump threatened to bomb Iran and impose secondary tariffs if Tehran did not reach an agreement with Washington over its nuclear programme.

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Iran said on Sunday that talks would be “meaningless” if Mr Trump continued to threaten them.

[1] And Saul, yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, went unto the high priest, [2] And desired of him letters to Damascus to the synagogues, that if he found any of this way, whether they were men or women, he might bring them bound unto Jerusalem. [3] And as he journeyed, he came near Damascus: and suddenly there shined round about him a light from heaven:Acts 9 : 1-3

The theocracy, which claims its nuclear programme is for non-military use, is believed to have increased enrichment of uranium to 60 per cent purity, the only country in the world without a nuclear weapon to have done so.

Behind the scenes in Israel there is concern among security officials of a deal that looks significant but does not, in reality, prevent Iran from obtaining a bomb – a so-called Singapore scenario, a reference to Mr Trump’s high-profile, first-term summit with Kim Jong-un, after which North Korea retained its nuclear bombs.

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Sucking Children Forsaken : Iran abandons Houthis under relentless US bombardment

Israeli chiefs are said to be wary of allowing Iran to build up its capability while the US issues threats but takes no action.

Mr Trump campaigned on a platform of ending wars, rather than starting them, and commentators believe JD Vance, his powerful vice-president, is instinctively opposed to striking Iran, as evidenced by the recent leaked Telegram messages in relation to strikes on the Houthis.

Meanwhile, it has been reported for months now that Israeli military chiefs believe they have the capability to destroy Iran’s nuclear enrichment facilities and deal a devastating blow to its stockpiles.

However, in practice, Israel would need a green light from Washington.

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Such an attack, even if conducted unilaterally, would require coordination with the US. It would also need special US bunker-busting bombs that Washington has never before given to Israel, and the potential use of American refuelling aircraft.

Drone Barrages on Israeli cities

The Jewish state would also want US help to fend off retaliatory Iranian missile and drone barrages on Israeli cities and infrastructure.

Thaad batteries integrate well into Israel’s already state-of-the-art missile defence systems and there are believed to be about 100 US troops in Israel to operate them.

The system comprises six truck-mounted launchers, with eight interceptors on each launcher. It costs more than $1 billion per unit, can intercept targets up to 124 miles away and has had a near-perfect success rate during trials.

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Free Buying and Selling : US Senate rejects effort to block arms sales to Israel

However, for a massive Iranian bombardment of the type experienced twice last year, Israel would ideally require US help in the form of intelligence, radar, fighter jets and naval surface-to-air missiles.

Finally, the real-terms goal of a preemptive strike on Iran would be to drive it to accept a strict regime of weapons inspections, a deal that would require US involvement.

Netanyahu’s hastily arranged visit to Washington on Monday is ostensibly to discuss US trade

And he said unto them, How is it that ye sought me? wist ye not that I must be about my Father’s business?Luke 2 : 49

Mr Netanyahu’s hastily arranged visit to Washington on Monday is ostensibly to discuss US trade tariffs on Israel – the White House imposed 17 per cent, despite a last-minute Israeli scramble to remove import duties on American goods – and the war in Gaza and return of the hostages.

Little Rhode Island Flock : US tourist arrested after allegedly attempting to contact ‘world’s most isolated’ tribe

[14] There was a little city, and few men within it; and there came a great king against it, and besieged it, and built great bulwarks against it: [15] Now there was found in it a poor wise man, and he by his wisdom delivered the city; yet no man remembered that same poor man.

Ecclesiastes 9 : 14-15

However, Mr Netanyahu’s office said the “Iranian threat” was also on the agenda.

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Iran’s leader says Yemen’s Houthis act independently, warns against US action

A press conference in the East Wing of the White House will follow the talks.

The last time the two men met in Washington, Mr Trump stunned the world – and, apparently, Mr Netanyahu – by revealing his vision of a “Middle East Riviera” for Gaza.

On Monday, following the signing of a France-Egypt strategic partnership, Emmanuel Macron repeated France’s opposition to any displacement of Palestinians in Gaza, or annexation of the West Bank.

The Three-Part Booklet : Vatican & France issues ‘survival manual’ to prepare citizens for ‘invasion’

He also reiterated his concerns over Iran’s nuclear programme.

‘Negotiations would be meaningless’

Dr Raz Zimmt, an Iran expert, told the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper that Iran believes it can achieve an agreement “between the current situation and the previous nuclear agreement” – which Mr Trump scrapped because he said it was too soft.

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Sabbath Genocide Again? ‘UN is not the Bible,’ Rwanda to contest its reports: Foreign minister

The academic said: “A clear red line is dismantling infrastructure, and I anticipate that if [Ayatollah Ali] Khamenei comes to face a choice between a military attack and dismantling the nuclear infrastructure – he will prefer a military attack.”

Abbas Araghchi, the Iranian foreign minister, said on Sunday that “direct negotiations would be meaningless with a party that constantly threatens to resort to force in violation of the UN Charter and that expresses contradictory positions from its various officials”.

“We remain committed to diplomacy and are ready to try the path of indirect negotiations,” Mr Araghchi added. “Iran keeps itself prepared for all possible or probable events, and just as it is serious in diplomacy and negotiations, it will also be decisive and serious in defending its national interests and sovereignty.”

The Lord of heaven permits the world to choose whom they will have as ruler. Let all read carefully the thirteenth chapter of Revelation, for it concerns every human agent, great and small. Every human being must take sides, either for the true and living God, who has given to the world the memorial of creation in the seventh-day Sabbath, or for a false sabbath, instituted by men who have exalted themselves above all that is called God or that is worshipped, who have taken upon themselves the attributes of Satan, in oppressing the loyal and true who keep the commandments of God. This persecuting power will compel the worship of the beast by insisting on the observance of the Sabbath he has instituted. Thus he blasphemes God, “sitting in the temple of God, and showing himself that he is God.” [2 Thessalonians 2:4.]This worship of a false sabbath is a wedge that split the Protestant churches from God, and left them naked. They had not a text of Scripture to sustain their false god, but yet a deception, hoary with age, but still a deception, was commended to reverence, and exalted, while the Sabbath of the fourth commandment was trampled upon and God dishonored.  11LtMs, Ms 7a, 1896, par. 10 – 11LtMs, Ms 7a, 1896, par. 11

JEAN-YVES KAMALE

Sun, April 6, 2025 at 3:11 PM GMT+31 min read

Christian leaders pray for President Trump in Oval Office, Stirring Him in Judeo-Christian “Idol Sabbath For Family” System!

‘Survival Manual Guide’ : The European Union urges citizens to stockpile supplies to last 3 days in case of crisis

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Congo Flooding

People walk through the flooded streets of Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo Sunday, April 6, 2025. (AP Photo/Samy Ntumba Shambuyi)

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KINSHASA, Congo (AP) — Major flooding in the Congolese capital of Kinshasa has killed at least 22 people and cut off access to over half of the city and the country’s main airport, authorities said Sunday.

Most of the fatalities in Friday’s deluge were caused by collapsing walls, said a provincial health minister, Patricien Ngongo.

Everything in the world is in agitation. The signs of the times are ominous. Coming events cast their shadows before. The Spirit of God is withdrawing from the earth, and calamity follows calamity by sea and by land. There are tempests, earthquakes, fires, floods, murders of every grade. Who can read the future? Where is security? There is assurance in nothing that is human or earthly. Rapidly are men ranging themselves under the banner they have chosen. Restlessly are they waiting and watching the movements of their leaders. There are those who are waiting and watching and working for our Lord’s appearing. Another class are falling into line under the generalship of the first great apostate. Few believe with heart and soul that we have a hell to shun and a heaven to win.
The crisis is stealing gradually upon us.  DA 636.1 – DA 636.2

The main road to the airport was damaged by flooding but has now reopened to light traffic and will be open to all traffic within 72 hours, said Kinshasa Gov. Daniel Bumba.

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A corrupt union has been formed to tear down God’s memorial of creation, the seventh day which He hallowed and blessed, and gave to man to be a sign between God and His people, to be observed throughout their generation forever. A period is coming when every one will take sides between the Sabbath of the fourth commandment, which the Lord has sanctified and blessed, and the spurious sabbath instituted by the man of sin. An idol sabbath has been set up as the golden image was set up in the plains of Dura. And as Nebuchadnezzar, the king of Babylon, issued a decree that all who would not bow down and worship this image should be killed, so a proclamation will be made that all who will not reverence the Sunday institution will be punished with imprisonment and death. Thus the Sabbath of the Lord is trampled under foot. 11LtMs, Ms 7a, 1896, par. 7

The road  links Kinshasa to the rest of Congo and officials worry about the impact on trade.

The Floods Came : Tornadoes will become more frequent in coming weeks. Here’s what to know if your home is destroyed

“We’ve been here since nightfall, but we’re not making any progress, because we’ve been told that the road is cut in two, and we have goods that we’re going to pick up,” said Blaise Ndendo, a truck driver.

In 2022, at least 100 people were killed during similar flooding in Kinshasa.

Following the flooding, several prominent members of civil society in Kinshasa called on the mayor to resign, while the local government claimed the flooded and collapsed home were “not built with urban planning standards.”

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In addition to the 22 deaths, 46 people were hospitalized and a further 75 families will be temporarily housed in a nearby stadium.

Matthew Loh

Mon, April 7, 2025 at 8:43 AM GMT+33 min read

7

The Three-Part Booklet : Vatican & France issues ‘survival manual’ to prepare citizens for ‘invasion’

• Russia’s war gains have slowed considerably in the last five months, after a surge in November.
• Two Western analyses say that Moscow’s advance has declined to as slow as a fifth of its past rate.
• The analysts say progress has dropped month by month to as low as 55 square miles gained in March.

Western analysts say the monthly pace of Russia’s war gains has fallen below a third of its rate of advance from November.

The Institute for the Study of War, a Washington-based think tank, wrote on Sunday that it found Russia had seized 203 square kilometers, or 78 square miles, of Ukrainian territory in March.

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That’s compared to its November assessment that Russia gained about 242 square miles that month. At the time, Moscow had pushed hard on the eastern front by relentlessly deploying troops in small ground assaults to exhaust Ukrainian munitions and drones.

The UK’s Defense Ministry reported an even steeper decline from that period — saying on Saturday that the total rate of advance had dropped to a fifth of November’s pace.

In an intelligence update, it wrote that it believed Russia had seized an additional 55 square miles in March, compared to about 281 square miles in November.

“Russia’s rate of advance has dropped month by month since November 2024, when its forces seized more than 700 sq km,” the update said.

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The defense ministry didn’t say how it arrived at its assessment, and its intelligence updates have regularly relied on statistics and figures from the Ukrainian government.

Meanwhile, the ISW said it used geolocated footage to make its own comparison.

Neither addressed the factor of winter affecting the battlefield over the last few months, since the weather typically introduces logistics and terrain difficulties that reduce the intensity of fighting.

Both analyses partially credited the slowdown to Ukraine’s recent counterattacks, particularly around Toretsk and Pokrovsk — a key town in the central Donetsk region that provides supply routes to other Ukrainian positions in the east.

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The attacks have reversed some of Russia’s gains from last year. In early 2025, Toretsk was considered to be largely under Russian control. Still, fighting has since returned to the city as Ukrainian troops pushed into Russian flanks in an attempt to pincer Moscow’s northern position there.

The UK Defense Ministry said Russia’s limited advances in March mostly occurred in the same region — Donetsk — though it added that Moscow “did not improve its operational position” in the area.

Moscow’s gains on the eastern front have notably come at great human cost. Ukrainian and Western estimates say an average of up to 1,500 Russian soldiers were killed or wounded every day when the fighting was fiercest in the fall.

Its ground assault tactic has worked somewhat, with Russia gaining an estimated 1,600 square miles of Ukrainian territory in 2024. But Ukraine said it’s come at the cost of some 427,000 soldiers wounded or killed.

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That strategy has contributed to a rising narrative in Ukraine and Europe that victory for Kyiv stems from outlasting Russia’s heavy expenditure of personnel and weapons. The Kremlin has to pay families of its fallen and wounded troops while also forking out large bonuses to hire thousands of new replacement soldiers.

Russia’s defense ministry did not respond to a comment request sent outside regular business hours by Business Insider.

Read the original article on Business Insider

Thus saith the LORD of hosts, Behold, evil shall go forth from nation to nation, and a great whirlwind shall be raised up from the coasts of the earth.Jeremiah 25 : 32

JOSEPH WILSON

Sat, April 5, 2025 at 5:17 PM GMT+34 min read

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Spain Housing Protest

People gather during a demonstration to protest high housing costs in Barcelona, Spain, Saturday, April 5, 2025. (AP Photo/Emilio Morenatti)

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BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — Tens of thousands of Spaniards marched in protests held across the European country on Saturday in anger over high housing costs with no relief in sight.

Government authorities said that 15,000 marched in Madrid, while organizers said 10 times that many took to the streets of the capital. In Barcelona, the city hall said 12,000 people took part in the protest, while organizers claimed over 100,000 did.

The massive demonstration of social angst that is a major concern for Spain’s left-wing government and town halls was organized by housing activists and backed by Spain’s main labor unions.

The Saviour’s prophecy concerning the visitation of judgments upon Jerusalem is to have another fulfillment, of which that terrible desolation was but a faint shadow. In the fate of the chosen city we may behold the doom of a world that has rejected God’s mercy and trampled upon His law. Dark are the records of human misery that earth has witnessed during its long centuries of crime.  GC 36.2

Restore, I pray you, to them, even this day, their lands, their vineyards, their oliveyards, and their houses, also the hundredth part of the money, and of the corn, the wine, and the oil, that ye exact of them.Nehemiah 5 : 11

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The housing crisis has hit particularly hard in Spain, where there is a strong tradition of home ownership and scant public housing for rent. Rents have been driven up by increased demand. Buying a home has become unaffordable for many, with market pressures and speculation driving up prices, especially in big cities and coastal areas.

And as for the people, he removed them to cities from one end of the borders of Egypt even to the other end thereof.

Genesis 47 : 21

Through the working of trusts and the results of labor unions and strikes, the conditions of life in the cities are constantly becoming more and more difficult.
The intense passion for money getting, the thirst for display, the luxury and extravagance—all are forces that, with the great mass of mankind, are turning the mind from life’s true purpose. They are opening the door to a thousand evils. Many, absorbed in their interest in worldly treasures, become insensible to the claims of God and the needs of their fellow men. They regard their wealth as a means of glorifying self. They add house to house and land to land; they fill their homes with luxury, while all about them are human beings in misery and crime, in disease and death.
By every species of oppression and extortion, men are piling up colossal fortunes, while the cries of starving humanity are coming up before God 9T 90.2 – 9T 90.4

A generation of young people say they have to stay with their parents or spend big just to share an apartment, with little chance of saving enough to one day purchase a home. High housing costs mean even those with traditionally well-paying jobs are struggling to make ends meet.

“I’m living with four people and still, I allocate 30 or 40% of my salary to rent,” said Mari Sánchez, a 26-year-old lawyer in Madrid. “That doesn’t allow me to save. That doesn’t allow me to do anything. It doesn’t even allow me to buy a car. That’s my current situation, and the one many young people are living through.”

[19] Wherefore shall we die before thine eyes, both we and our land? buy us and our land for bread, and we and our land will be servants unto Pharaoh: and give us seed, that we may live, and not die, that the land be not desolate. [20] And Joseph bought all the land of Egypt for Pharaoh; for the Egyptians sold every man his field, because the famine prevailed over them: so the land became Pharaoh's. Genesis 47 : 19-20

Housing Minister Isabel Rodríguez said on X that “I share the demand of the numerous people who have marched today: that homes are for living in and not for speculating.”

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Lack of public housing

The average rent in Spain has almost doubled in the last 10 years. The price per square meter rose from 7.2 euros ($7.90) in 2014 to 13 euros last year, according to real estate website Idealista. The increase is bigger in Madrid and Barcelona.

Incomes have failed to keep up despite Spain’s recent economic boom, especially for younger people in a country with chronically high unemployment.

[6] For at the window of my house I looked through my casement, [7] And beheld among the simple ones, I discerned among the youths, a young man void of understanding, [8] Passing through the street near her corner; and he went the way to her house, [9] In the twilight, in the evening, in the black and dark night: [10] And, behold, there met him a woman with the attire of an harlot, and subtil of heart.Proverbs 7 : 6-10

Spain does not have the public housing that other European nations have invested in to cushion struggling renters from a market that is pricing them out.

The pursuit of pleasure and amusement centers in the cities. Many parents who choose a city home for their children, thinking to give them greater advantages, meet with disappointment, and too late repent their terrible mistake. The cities of today are fast becoming like Sodom and Gomorrah. The many holidays encourage idleness. The exciting sports—theater-going, horse-racing, gambling, liquor-drinking, and reveling—stimulate every passion to intense activity. The youth are swept away by the popular current.—Christ’s Object Lessons, 54 (1900).
Light has been given me that the cities will be filled with confusion, violence, and crime, and that these things will increase till the end of this earth’s history.—Testimonies for the Church 7:84 (1902). LDE 110.2 – LDE 110.3

Spain is near the bottom end of Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development countries with public housing for rent making up under 2% of all available housing. The OECD average is 7%. In France it is is 14%, Britain 16% and the Netherlands 34%.

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Angry renters point to instances of international hedge funds buying up properties, often with the aim of renting them to foreign tourists. The question has become so politically charged that Barcelona’s city government pledged last year to phase out all its 10,000 permits for short-term rentals, many of them advertised on platforms like Airbnb, by 2028.

Marchers in Madrid on Saturday chanted “Get Airbnb out of our neighborhoods” and held up signs against short-term rentals. In Barcelona, someone carried a sign reading “I am not leaving, vampire,” apparently in a message to would-be real estate speculator seeking to drive him out of his home.

Authorities under pressure

The central government’s biggest initiative for curbing the cost of housing is a rent cap mechanism it has offered to regional authorities, based on a price index established by the housing ministry. The government says the measure has slightly reduced rents in Barcelona, one of the few areas it has been applied.

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Terrible shocks will come upon the earth, and the lordly palaces erected at great expense will certainly become heaps of ruins.—Manuscript Releases 3:312 (1891).
When God’s restraining hand is removed, the destroyer begins his work. Then in our cities the greatest calamities will come.—Manuscript Releases 3:314 (1897). LDE 110.5 – LDE 111.1

But government measures have not proven enough to stop protests over the past two years. Experts say the situation likely won’t improve anytime soon.

“This is not the first, nor will it be the last, (housing protest) given the severity of the housing crisis,” Ignasi Martí, professor with the Esade business school and head of its Dignified Housing Observatory, said in an email.

“We saw this with the financial crisis (of 2008-2012) when (a protest movement) lasted until there was a certain economic recovery and a reduction in the social tension,” Marti added.

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Sat, April 5, 2025 at 11:41 PM GMT+34 min read

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Hundreds gathered in downtown Louisville to voice concerns over President Donald Trump’s administration at a “Hands Off” protest — joining thousands of others globally on Saturday.

Get his “hands off” various items — from Medicaid to Social Security and from free speech to the economy.

As rain fell, people huddled under umbrellas and marched along the streets, starting at Louisville’s Metro Hall and walking down the tourist-populated Whiskey Row. Protesters called on the president to get his “hands off” various items — from Medicaid to Social Security and from free speech to the economy.

For several Louisvillians, it wasn’t one particular issue that brought them out, but the culmination of months of decisions by Trump that they disagree with.

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U.S. Rep. Morgan McGarvey spoke to a cheering crowd after the march, criticizing Trump and billionaire advisor Elon Musk.

“They’re waging a war against our public schools,” McGarvey said on the steps of Metro Hall. “They’re raging a war against our health care. They’re waging a war against our veterans. They’re waging a war against our economy. They’re waging a war against our workers’ rights. They are waging a war against the very country we love and the democracy on which it was built.”

He called on the protesters to “keep showing up.”

never assume that someone else is speaking for them

“Go out there,” McGarvey said. “Talk to your friends, talk to the people you go to church with, talk to the people you work with. Talk to people in your kid’s carpool lane. I don’t care. Tell them how important it is to stand up (and) to never assume that someone else is speaking for them.”

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Louisville Metro Councilman JP Lyninger, the body’s newly elected Democratic socialist, also attended the rally.

“We have an unelected billionaire and all these billionaire donors to Trump who are attacking Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, our national parks, our federal workers and their unions while cutting themselves huge tax cuts, trillions in tax cuts,” Lyninger said. “There’s only one term for what’s happening: That’s class war. Class war is happening to you as a working class member, whether you like it or not.”

There is a generation that are pure in their own eyes, and yet is not washed from their filthiness.
Proverbs 30 : 12

Labor Troubles—Through the working of trusts and the results of labor unions and strikes, the conditions of life in the city are constantly becoming more and more difficult. Serious troubles are before us, and for many families removal from the cities will become a necessity.6
Impending Destruction—The time is near when large cities will be swept away, and all should be warned of these coming judgments. AH 136.4 – AH 136.5

The nationwide protests come at the heels of Trump’s sweeping tariff announcement and a subsequent stock plunge over trade war fears. Since beginning his second term in office, the president has taken numerous controversial steps — from dismantling the U.S. Department of Education to cutting the federal workforce.

But Nineveh is of old like a pool of water: yet they shall flee away. Stand, stand, shall they cry; but none shall look back.Nahum 2 : 8

Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told USA TODAY this week that “protests, lawsuits, and lawfare” will not sway Trump “from delivering on the promises he made to make our federal government more efficient and more accountable.”

Why Louisvillians joined the ‘Hands Off’ protests

Married couple Jim and Agnes Raymone protested together Saturday. Agnes said she was shocked by how “easy it is to dismantle the government,” and she believes checks and balances “don’t seem to exist.”

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She was also surprised and upset over the dismantling of several federal agencies.

“That’s the basis of our government,” Agnes said. “And that’s to provide services to the people. If you don’t have that, what is the purpose of the government? Health care, public education, national parks, medical research — I mean, everything.”

One Louisville man, who asked to remain anonymous, dressed as a naked monarch, drawing attention from other protest goers who posed with him for photos.

“When you have sycophantic people around you in office, you don’t think clearly,” he said. “So if everybody tells the king his clothes look beautiful when he’s naked, we’re in trouble as a society.”

The “Hands Off” march was the man’s first protest, and the recent decisions from the Trump administration — including the numerous executive orders he has issued — brought him out.

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“I have two children,” he said. “I’m worried about their future, and it’s really easy to create damage and chaos and harder to build stuff up. We need to protect our institutions and the younger generation.”

He was not the only protester likening Trump to a king. Kathleen Lolley dressed as a court jester because she believes the country is “going back into the dark ages.” She referenced the defunding of health care systems and disease protections. Lolley also said she believes Trump has had a “blatant disregard of the Constitution and democracy.”

Such were the means which Rome had invoked to quench the light of the Reformation, to withdraw from men the Bible, and to restore the ignorance and superstition of the Dark  Ages. But under God’s blessing and the labors of those noble men whom He had raised up to succeed Luther, Protestantism was not overthrown. Not to the favor or arms of princes was it to owe its strength. The smallest countries, the humblest and least powerful nations, became its strongholds. It was little Geneva in the midst of mighty foes plotting her destruction; it was Holland on her sandbanks by the northern sea, wrestling against the tyranny of Spain, then the greatest and most opulent of kingdoms; it was bleak, sterile Sweden, that gained victories for the Reformation. GC 235.3

Signs reading “No King Trump” and “No Kings” were also present in the Louisville crowd.

It was demonstrated that the principles of the Bible are the surest safeguards of national greatness. The feeble and isolated colonies grew to a confederation of powerful states, and the world marked with wonder the peace and prosperity of “a church without a pope, and a state without a king.”
But continually increasing numbers were attracted to the  shores of America, actuated by motives widely different from those of the first Pilgrims. Though the primitive faith and purity exerted a widespread and molding power, yet its influence became less and less as the numbers increased of those who sought only worldly advantage. GC 296.3 – GC 296.4

Philip Woods, another Louisvillian, held a sign that said “Elon: Hands off my privates!”

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Woods said he has been particularly disturbed by what he views as privacy violations. He referenced the Signal group chat used by top government officials to discuss U.S. military strikes in Yemen — which accidentally included the editor-in-chief of The Atlantic.

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The “Hands Off” rallies are expected to be the largest and most widespread protests since Trump’s second term began, USA TODAY previously reported.

Reach reporter Eleanor McCrary at EMcCrary@courier-journal.com or at @ellie_mccrary on X, formerly known as Twitter.

This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Why Louisville residents joined ‘Hands Off’ protests against Trump