ISRAEL
UNSC to vote on ending Israeli settlement activity
The United Nations Security Council is due to vote on a draft resolution that would demand Israel “immediately and completely cease all settlement activities in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem”.
Egypt circulated the draft late on Wednesday and a vote was scheduled for 3pm (20:00 GMT) on Thursday.
Israel urges U.S. to veto U.N. resolution on halting settlements Is this Obama’s opening to do last minute destruction to Israel?
Amona resident on Temple Mount: Our hearts are broken
‘Israel, ISIL plotted Russian envoy’s assassination in Turkey’ Since there are still Jews on the earth, it is imperative that they be blamed for everything whether they did anything or not.
There’s more than one way to move a US embassy
You can, as the head of Republicans Overseas in Israel, Marc Zell, suggested last week, simply change the plaque on the current US consulate. Or you can spend years building an entirely new structure. You can announce the move as an in-your-face rejection of all non-Israeli sovereign claims throughout the city. Or you can highlight the fact that the location is in pre-1967, ostensibly non-disputed Israeli West Jerusalem, and assert that its opening prejudges nothing in the disputed East. You can calibrate the announcement as the intended culmination of the peace negotiations you intend to convene. Taking a leaf out of a French diplomatic book, you can make plain that you seek to broker an accommodation, but that, come what may in those talks, you’ll be moving your embassy to Jerusalem on a specific date.
Erekat threatens: PLO will cancel its ‘recognition of Israel’
Arab MK admits smuggling cell phones, messages to jailed terrorists
Priests Partake of Leviticus Showbreads in Preparation for Third Temple [PHOTOS]
Hezbollah Fighting in Syria With U.S. Weapons Supplied to Lebanese Army, IDF Says
WARS & RUMORS THEREOF
Bashar al-Assad takes control of Aleppo, last fighters gone
Hundreds of rebel fighters and civilians, including small children swaddled in thick blankets, have been transported out of war-ravaged Aleppo in heavy snow as the evacuation of former rebel strongholds enters its final phase. Scenes of buses slowly driving out of Aleppo on Wednesday in a shroud of white marked an end to what has been one of the most brutal chapters in Syria’s civil war.
The departures from Aleppo pave the way for Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad to assume full control there, after more than four years of fighting over Syria’s largest city. It marks the most significant victory for Assad since an uprising against his family’s four-decade rule swept the country in 2011.
ISIS targets civilians in Mosul; Iraqi, coalition forces also cause civilian deaths
NATO – Russia Council ends with no result
NATO and Russia still “have profound disagreements on the crisis” in Ukraine, Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said.
Russia, Iran, Turkey meet without US on Syria and agree to broker peace talks
Turkey Is Now Acting Independently of the U.S. and NATO on Syria
Russia, Iran, Turkey ready to guarantee Syria deal
NATO, EU talks overshadowed by Russian ambassador murder
Russian leaders blame ambassador assassination on Britain and NATO
US & GLOBAL ECONOMY
Stock market retreats off records as Dow falters in quest for 20000
The Dow Jones Industrial Average DJIA, -0.16% DJIA, -0.16% ended 32.66 points, or 0.2%, lower at 19,941.96, as the 20,000 milestone eluded the benchmark for yet another session. Still, the blue-chip gauge is up 14.4% year to date, having outperformed the broader S&P 500 index by more than 3 percentage points.
Obama bans oil drilling in large areas of Atlantic and Arctic oceans
Obama moved to solidify his environmental legacy Tuesday by withdrawing hundreds of millions of acres of federally owned land in the Arctic and Atlantic Ocean from new offshore oil and gas drilling. Obama used a little-known law called the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act to protect large portions of the Chukchi and Beaufort seas in the Arctic and a string of canyons in the Atlantic stretching from Massachusetts to Virginia.
WHITE HOUSE
BERLIN ATTACK PROMPTS HIGH SECURITY IN US CITIES FOR HOLIDAY
In the wake of the Berlin truck attack, police departments around the U.S. are making a show of force at places where crowds gather at Christmastime. In New York City, police dispatched heavily-armed counterterrorism officers to stand guard at crowded pop-up Christmas markets in Union Square, Bryant Park and Columbus Circle only an hour after news broke Tuesday about the carnage in Berlin, where a stolen truck slammed into a crowd and killed 12 people.
Trump adds billionaire Carl Icahn to team as special adviser on regulation
Donald Trump added another billionaire to his presidential transition team on Wednesday: Carl Icahn, the 80-year-old activist shareholder and long-time friend who once helped Trump keep control of his troubled New Jersey casinos. Icahn will be a special adviser to the president-elect overseeing regulation, according to the transition team. According to Forbes, Icahn has a net worth of $16.5bn adding his wealth to a team that already looks set to be the wealthiest White House team in history.
ISLAM & NEW WORLD ORDER
ANOTHER STEP CLOSER TO NEW WORLD ORDER TRACKING
Congress on December 8, 2016 passed H.R.4919, a bill that will allow state and local law enforcement or public safety agencies and nonprofit organizations, to use tracking technology to locate missing individuals with dementia or developmental disabilities. Kevin and Avonte’s Law of 2016, the Missing Americans Alert Program Act of 2016. The tracking, or rather enslaving, of individuals may be moving up a notch. The Bill’s next destination is the Senate.