"For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but wanting to have their ears tickled, they will accumulate for themselves teachers in accordance to their own desires, and will turn away their ears from the truth and will turn aside to myths." Northwoods is a ministry dedicated to refreshing Christians and challenging them to search for the truth in Christianity, politics, sociology, and science
"I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life"
Father God, thank you for the love of the truth you have given me. Please bless me with the wisdom, knowledge and discernment needed to always present the truth in an attitude of grace and love. Use this blog and Northwoods Ministries for your glory. Help us all to read and to study Your Word without preconceived notions, but rather, let scripture interpret scripture in the presence of the Holy Spirit. All praise to our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
Please note: All my writings and comments appear in bold italics in this colour
Australian police have given no indication as to what kind of attack this was to be, and so its claim that there is “no further threat to the Jewish community” rings hollow. If Islamic jihadis planned this, there are still plenty of them in Australia. The same goes for leftists, and even for resurgent National Socialists.
Australian police foil antisemitic attack involving explosives
by Alasdair Pal and Christine Chen, Reuters, January 29, 2025:
SYDNEY, Jan 29 (Reuters) – Australian police said on Wednesday they had foiled a planned antisemitic attack after discovering a caravan containing explosives, in an escalation of threats against the Jewish community that authorities called terrorism.
The caravan was discovered on Jan. 19 in Dural, a suburb some 36 kms (22 miles) northwest of the centre of Sydney, New South Wales Deputy Police Commissioner David Hudson told a news conference.
“That caravan contained an amount of explosives and some indication that those explosives might be used in some form of antisemitic attack,” he told a news conference.
The threat had been fully contained and there was no further threat to the Jewish community, he added….
This sentence is remarkably emphatic since the previous sentence was remarkably tenuous.
New South Wales Premier Chris Minns said over 100 officers were investigating the incident, under a joint counter-terrorism operation involving state and federal police.
“This is the discovery of a potential mass casualty event. There is only one way of calling it out, and that is terrorism,” he said….
NSW man allegedly linked to Dural caravan filled with explosives ‘has nothing to do with it’, brother says
Jordyn Beazley, The Guardian
Wed 5 Feb 2025 05.33 GMT
Scott Marshall and his partner, Tammie Farrugia, were named in the search warrant relating to a caravan and are in custody on unrelated charges
The brother of a man allegedly connected to a caravan found laden with explosives inSydneyhas said his sibling is “just a normal person, he doesn’t hate anyone”.
Scott Marshall, 36, and his partner, Tammie Farrugia, 34, were named on a police search warrant as part of the investigation into the caravan, which police found on 19 January. Neither have been charged in relation to the explosives in the caravan and the Guardian does not suggest any wrongdoing on their part.
Scott’s brother Stewart Marshall told media outside Liverpool local court on Wednesday that Scott “has nothing to do with it, he’s innocent”. Farrugia’s separate and unrelated matter was heard at the court earlier on Wednesday.
The caravan was found in Dural on the outskirts of north-west Sydney laden with Powergel explosives that police estimated were capable of creating a 40-metre blast radius.A note was also found in the caravan containing names of alleged targets, including a Sydney synagogue. No detonator was found.
Scott Marshall is in custody on remand on unrelated drugs and weapons charges which were investigated as part of Strike Force Pearl, the New South Wales police operation dedicated to antisemitism. He has pleaded not guilty and is due before Liverpool local court again on 3 March.
Farrugia is in custody on remandfor unrelated matters, an alleged arson and alleged anti-Israel graffiti attack in Woollahra in December. Among the charges, she is accused of participating in a criminal group with at least two others as an accessory before allegedly damaging three homes and a vehicle. Farrugia has not yet entered a plea.
Farrugia’s matter was briefly heard in Liverpool local court on Wednesday. The court heard the NSW director of public prosecutions will be taking over the case from police. The matter has been adjourned to 3 April.
Stewart Marshall told media outside court that Scott had been in custody in isolation and didn’t know about the caravan matter becoming news until several days ago.
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“He’s not allowed to talk to anyone or associate with anyone,” Stewart said.
Farrugia is among at least 11 people who have been charged in relation to a spate of antisemitic vandalism and arson attacks in Sydney over the past two months. This has included the graffiti of two separate synagogues and the firebombing of a childcare centre, which was also graffitied with the words: “F*** the Jews”.
British government to place some asylum seekers on a barge
By Clyde Hughes
British Home Secretary Suella Braverman approved a plan to house single male asylum seekers on a barge off the Dorset coast. File Photo by Tolga Akmen/EPA-EFE
April 5 (UPI) -- Britain's Home Office said on Wednesday that it will place 500 immigrants seeking asylum and other refugees on a barge along the Dorset coast over complaints from locals.
The government said the Bibby Stockholm, which will house single men, will be anchored in Portland Port. The barge, which is Barbados registered, can sleep about 500 along with having "basic and functional accommodations."
The Home Office, under Minister Suella Braverman, said the barge would "reduce the unsustainable pressure on the U.K.'s asylum system and cut the cost to the taxpayer caused by the significant increase in Channel crossings. Currently, hotel accommodation for asylum seekers is costing [$7.47 million] a day."
Officials added that the barge will have healthcare provisions, catering facilities and around-the-clock security. It said men who have had their asylum claims refused and have exhausted appeal options will be removed from Britain.
"The Home Secretary and I have been clear that the use of expensive hotels to house those making unnecessary and dangerous journeys must stop," Immigration Minister Robert Jenrick said in a statement. "We will not elevate the interests of illegal migrants over the British people we are elected to serve."
Immigrant rights groups and local lawmakers have been largely opposed to the barge, which had been used by the Netherlands for asylum seekers.
Enver Soloman, chief executive of the Refugee Council, said the barge "does not provide what they need nor the respect, dignity and support they deserve."
Do they really deserve respect, dignity, and support?
Steve Valdez-Symonds, from Amnesty International Britain, said moving immigrants to a barge offshore has more to do with politics than actually solving issues around Britain's growing migration challenges.
"Along with the disastrous Rwanda scheme, all talk of barges, cruise ships and former military barracks should be abandoned," Valdez-Symonds said. "Anyone seeking asylum in this country should be housed in decent accommodation with proper facilities and, crucially, their claims should be properly and consistently processed."
Perhaps if Amnesty Int'l would come up with the $7.5mn a day, the government might revisit the plan. But, as I see it, little British girls will be a lot safer from migrant men who gang-rape them in the name of Allah.
Mohammad Nurujjaman, Seikh Miraj Uddin arrested in detonator consignment case,
27,000 kgs of ammonium nitrate, enough to flatten a city, recovered
OpIndia, April 1, 2023:
In the course of conducting searches at various locations in West Bengal, the National Investigating Agency (NIA) detained two additional individuals on Friday who were reportedly engaged in a detonator shipment case.
One of the two people detained has been identified as Mir Mohammad Nurujjaman, who NIA alleges worked as a contract worker in the IT department of West Bengal’s Education Ministry, Bikash Bhawan.
The NIA further said that the other individual was detained after a search in Asansol, which is part of the Paschim Bardhaman district. The second accused has been identified as Seikh Miraj Uddin. 27,000 kgs of ammonium nitrate, an ingredient used to build bombs, enough to flatten cities, were recovered from the accused.
On Saturday, both defendants were scheduled to be presented before the NIA special court. In July 2022, West Bengal’s Special Task Unit carried out a raid in Birbhum district’s Mahammad Bazar neighbourhood and detained a pick-up vehicle that was reportedly carrying 81,000 detonators.
The police said that the criminals planned an explosion but that the authorities jeopardised their plot by apprehending three persons in connection with the case. The Union Home Ministry had asked the NIA to conduct an inquiry after a significant amount of explosive materials were recovered.
Rintu Seikh, who was allegedly the case’s mastermind and the supplier of the detonators, was detained by the National Investigation Agency (NIA) during the investigation. Two additional identities surfaced after Rintu Sheikh was questioned by the NIA….
Dutch media might not have found this story newsworthy, but several American and foreign newsrooms did, including The Washington Post:
So what coups might John Bolton have been involved in, exactly?
Analysis by Philip Bump
National correspondent
The Washington Post
July 13, 2022 at 12:25 p.m. EDT
Then-national security adviser John Bolton speaks on Oct. 3, 2018, at the White House. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
Tuesday’s hearing of the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the Capitol led to a remarkable admission: A member of President Donald Trump’s senior team confessed to having plotted a coup.
But not the attempted coup that occurred on Jan. 6, and not a member of Trump’s team at that point.
The admission came from former national security adviser John Bolton, and it came with the caveat that the coups he had planned were targeted at foreign countries.
Bolton made the surprising claim during an interview Tuesday with CNN’s Jake Tapper. Bolton was fired by Trump in late 2019, just before the country learned of the president’s efforts to pressure Ukraine into announcing a probe of Joe Biden. Since leaving Trump’s team, Bolton has been a fervent critic of his former boss and vice versa.
In the interview, Bolton objected to the idea that the events of Jan. 6 were part of “a carefully planned coup d’etat aimed at the Constitution.” His reasoning was personal: Trump was simply too much of a mess to construct anything that organized.
Tapper disagreed, saying that “one doesn’t have to be brilliant to attempt a coup.”
Then, Bolton’s admission.
“I disagree with that. As somebody who has helped plan coups d’etat, not here, but other places, it takes a lot of work,” Bolton said. “And that’s not what he did.”
We can set aside the idea that Trump “didn’t do a lot of work” as he tried to retain power after losing the 2020 election. This is subjective, certainly, although one could make a robust case that Trump invested a tremendous amount of time and energy into doing precisely that. Let’s instead just consider what Bolton is blithely copping to here: helping to try to overthrow foreign leaders. He made the admission, it seems, largely so that he could contrast his own brilliance with Trump’s dopiness, but he made the admission, nonetheless.
Tapper, of course, had a follow-up question. It ran along the lines of: Uh, where?
“I wrote about Venezuela in the book, and it turned out not to be successful,” Bolton said. “Not that we had all that much to do with it, but I saw what it took for an opposition to try to overturn an illegally elected president.”
“I feel like there’s other stuff you’re not telling me,” Tapper replied.
“I’m sure there is,” Bolton said.
So let’s assume that there is “other stuff,” no matter how useful it is to Bolton’s public presentation that he be seen as a powerful behind-the-scenes actor. When and where might Bolton have had his fingers in foreign coup events?
The Cline Center at the University of Illinois tracks coup attempts (including the one in the United States on Jan. 6). Since Bolton joined government during the Reagan administration in 1982, there have been more than 350 coup attempts around the world, nearly 150 of them successful. That includes events (such as Jan. 6) that one might not think of as a coup attempt — like the U.S.-led toppling of the government in Afghanistan after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Of those 350-plus coup attempts, 191 occurred when Bolton held a position with the U.S. government. (We will assume that Bolton was not involved in attempted coups while outside government service, although, of course, who knows.) That figure, however, includes coup attempts that occurred when Bolton was in positions that one might assume were less coup-adjacent, like serving as an assistant administrator at the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) or as an assistant attorney general in the Justice Department. There were 131 coup attempts internationally that occurred when Bolton served in the State Department, as U.N. ambassador or as Trump’s national security adviser — the tenure during which the Venezuela coup attempt unfolded.
Then Bolton joined State. In October 1989, there was an attempt to oust Panamanian dictator Manuel Antonio Noriega. He was removed from power following an American invasion that December. In 1992, a coup in Afghanistan similarly led to the ouster of the country’s leader, a longtime ally of the Soviet Union. There were also coup attempts in a number of other countries while Bolton served under President George H.W. Bush, including the Philippines, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh and Romania, where General Secretary Nicolae Ceausescu was ousted.
In 2018, Bolton became Trump’s third national security adviser. It was during this period that rebels tried more than once to remove Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro from power, unsuccessfully. Bolton’s attempt to distance himself from the planning of those efforts — “I saw what it took” to effect an overthrow — does little to diminish American involvement.
This, again, was the only coup attempt to which Bolton admitted involvement, despite his telling Tapper that he had helped plan similar insurrections. (In an interview with Newsmax, Bolton dismissed questions about his comments as being a function of “snowflakes out there who don’t understand what you need to do to protect the United States.”) Perhaps he was puffing himself up at Trump’s expense, casting himself as a brilliant strategist who had deigned to work for the fumbling Trump. Or perhaps one of those other 131 coup attempts that occurred while Bolton was in government bear, however faintly, his fingerprints.
Under a cliff in Vlora bay, one of the most beautiful sites on the Albanian Riviera, a diver emerges from the water carrying an artillery shell which he carefully places on the pebbly beach.
Beneath the crystal-clear water of the Adriatic, shells and grenades dating back to World War II rust on the seabed, polluting the water and posing a deadly threat to life.
Aboard the "Pluton" diving support vessel, a group of some 10 French and Albanian de-mining divers are on a joint mission to find and remove the munitions -- but nobody knows how many still remain.
In less than two hours, the divers collected an impressive 85 pieces of ammunition, which were likely deliberately thrown into the sea by occupying Italian troops over seven decades ago.
"It's joint work with the Albanian navy, which knows the site better than we do," Captain Aymeric Barazer de Lannurien, commander of the French contingent, told AFP.
Specialists recovered a total of 310 devices during last year's joint Franco-Albanian effort.
Barazer de Lannurien said most of the shells found were artillery shells, lodged between rocks on the seabed.
- 'One or two grenades' -
"We found one or two grenades that were on the bottom between the rocks, easily accessible to the population (that) could be dangerous for swimmers," he recalled of last year's mission.
This time around, the team said they recovered mortars and shells with calibres ranging from 20 mm to 155 mm.
While there are no official estimates of the quantities of submerged munitions, experts estimate that at least 20 World War II wrecks are located near Albania's Adriatic coast.
The teams are well-versed in handling the potentially lethal cast-offs, but an ambulance is parked nearby just in case.
Divers pass the explosive devices between them before carefully lining them up on the beach, reminders of past conflicts.
Albanian troops then collect the shells and destroy them at a military base in the capital Tirana.
The teams face not only the ever-present risk of detonation, but also choppy seas and scorching heat.
U.S. to ship another $550M security package to Ukraine
By Darryl Coote
Among the package the United States announced Monday for Ukraine included ammunition for High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems. Photo courtesy of Ukrainian Minister of Defense Oleksii Reznikov/Twitter
Aug. 1 (UPI) -- The United States on Monday announced it was shipping Ukraine an additional $550 million in weapons to aid the war-torn country in its fight against Russia.
The drawdown of weapons from the Department of Defense stockpile for Ukraine is the 17th since August and equals more than $8 billion in U.S. funded-arms for Kyiv since Russia invaded on Feb. 24.
Biden continues to transfer American dollars from taxpayers to weapons manufacturers. $8bn works out to about $25 per person, or $55 per taxpayer.
The security package was authorized by U.S. President Joe Biden on Monday, with top-ranking U.S. brass informing their Ukrainian counterparts of the decision, National Security Council Coordinator for Strategic Communications John Kirby said during a press briefing in Washington, D.C.
The Department of Defense published a list detailing the security package as containing 75,000 rounds of 155mm artillery ammunition and additional ammunition for High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems.
"To meet its evolving battlefield requirements, the United States will continue to work with its Allies and partners to provide Ukraine with key capabilities," it said.
Of course, the real 'key capability' is to keep the proxy war going which will bring great destruction upon Ukraine and death and destruction upon the population.
The package was announced as Ukraine has been asking allies for additional air defense support systems including last month when Ukrainian first lady Olena Zelenska told Congress in Washington, D.C, that it requires them to stop Russia's terror.
"I'm asking for air defense systems in order for rockets not to kill children in their strollers, in order for rockets not to destroy children's rooms and kill entire families," she told the lawmakers.
Am I the only one who sees the madness in that statement? She wants to stop rockets from killing children and families, so she asks for more rockets from the USA. As if only Russian rockets are capable of killing civilians.
The same day the package was unveiled four previously announced HIMARS from the United States arrived in Ukraine, Kyiv's minister of defense, Oleksii Reznikov, tweeted.
"We have proven to be smart operators of this weapon," he said. "The sound of the [HIMARS] volley has become a top hit ... of this summer at the front line!"
Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, who has been calling for additional weapons for Ukraine, called the package and the arrival of the HIMARS "good news" for Kyiv, stating the systems have degraded Russia's ability to make war.
"HIMARS have enabled Ukrainian forces to reach behind Russian lines to strike critical logistics nodes and command & control centers," he tweeted. "This has frustrated Russia's attempts to continue its brutal invasion.
"I urge the admin to continue sending more HIMARS and ammo to [Ukraine]."
For his leadership and "robust" support, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky thanked Biden in a statement.
"Together, we are defending values of freedom common to both [Ukraine] & [the United States]," Zelensky said. "New defense assistance package is bringing us closer to victory."
The announcement came as the first shipment of Ukrainian grain was permitted to leave the Russian-blockaded city of Odessa amid the war.
Guterres: Humanity is one mistake away from nuclear annihilation
By Darryl Coote
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned world leaders on Monday in New York that humanity is
one mistake away from nuclear annihilation. Photo by John Angelillo/UPI | License Photo
Aug. 2 (UPI) -- The threat the world currently faces has not been seen since the height of the Cold War, the head of the United Nations said while warning "humanity is one misunderstanding, one miscalculation away from nuclear annihilation."
U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres made the warning Monday during a speech to open a conference on the Non-Proliferation Treaty, the landmark 1970 pact that's been joined by 191 governments vowing to prevent the spread of atomic arms.
The 10th Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons runs until Aug. 26 when the implementation of the agreement will be reviewed.
During his remarks, Guterres said the world needs this treaty now as much as ever before, citing Russia's invasion of Ukraine, North Korea's development of its nuclear arsenal and tensions in the Middle East.
"The clouds that parted following the end of the Cold War are gathering once more. We have been extraordinarily lucky so far. But luck is not a strategy," he said. "Nor is it a shield from geopolitical tensions boiling over into nuclear conflict."
He said the conference is being held at a time when the risks of proliferation are growing, protections against escalation are weakening and crisis "with nuclear undertones" are festering.
"That is why this Review Conference is so important," he said. "It's an opportunity to hammer-out the measures that will help avoid certain disaster."
Fears of nuclear war have grown since Russia invaded Ukraine in late February. Amid the conflict, Russia has repeatedly suggested that it would retaliate against intervening NATO nations in its invasion with nuclear arms as well as having turned Europe's largest nuclear power plant, Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia, into a military base knowing that an attack against it would risk catastrophe.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken accused Moscow during his remarks at the conference of engaging in "reckless, dangerous nuclear saber-rattling" and of taking the notion of a human shield "to an entirely different and horrific level."
Blinken added that Russia's war in Ukraine is "directly relevant" to what brings them to this conference.
"Its actions are also contrary to the assurances that it provided to Ukraine in 1994" that included handing over its sovereignty and independence in exchange for giving up its nuclear weapons it inherited when the Soviet Union dissolved, he said.
"What message does this send to any country around the world that may think that it needs to have nuclear weapons to protect, to defend, to deter aggression against its sovereignty and independence? The worst possible message," he said.
Russia, which is among the signatories of the treaty, rejected the accusations, with its foreign ministry tweeting that it took over the Zaporizhzhia plant in order to protect it from "nationalist formations & foreign mercenaries."
Russian President Vladimir Putin also sent a letter of greetings to the conference, stating Moscow "consistently follows the letter and spirit of the Treaty."
"We believe that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought, and we stand for equal and indivisible security for all members of the world community," Putin wrote.
Scott Marshall and his partner, Tammie Farrugia, were named in the search warrant relating to a caravan and are in custody on unrelated charges
