Where the Rubber Hits the Road

U.S. plan gives Jerusalem holy sites to Vatican

Israeli prime minister invites Pope Francis to Israel | The Catholic Response to the Huffington Post

The drum beat of war is getting louder and louder and..... Panetta: 'Strong possibility' Israel will strike Iran's nuclear installations in spring - U.s. - Catholic Online

Ahh... the battle between Church and State seems to have a very long history indeed! In a Jerusalem tunnel, a glimpse of an ancient war - CTV News

THE ARCHBISHOP of New York announces that any Catholic who rents out an apartment to a Jew commits a mortal sin and runs the risk of excommunication. A protestant priest in Berlin decrees that a Christian who employs a Jew will be banished from his parish. Impossible? Indeed. Except in Israel – in reverse, of course. The rabbi of Safed, a government employee, has decreed that it is strictly forbidden to let apartments to Arabs – including the Arab students at the local medical school. Twenty other town rabbis – whose salaries are paid by the taxpayers, mostly secular, including Arab citizens – have publicly supported this edict. Click on link to read the rest of the article: The Jewish Ayatollahs | RO: Ramallah Online

An illustrative and thorough disassembling of the specious argument that the US invaded Iraq for motives other than those stated in the Act of Congress authorizing it. It is very much worth the few minutes to give it a read if you are at all interested in understanding the realities of the Middle East... and why the West MUST stand up in Israel's defense if her existence be threatened. The alternative would be far worse for us. A One State Solution for Peace in the Middle East | The American Catholic

GOOD NEWS!! Iran cancels plan for Gaza blockade-busting ship - The Globe and Mail

Our Debt to Jerusalem - UPDATED The late Pope John Paul the Great was acclaimed throughout his pontificate for being the pontiff that finally aligned the barque of Peter with ‘our elder brothers and sisters,’ the first children of Abraham, the Jews. As someone who had resisted antisemitism throughout his life, his apology, offered in Jerusalem in the extraordinary Holy Year of the Millennium, carried the credibility of one who experienced the horrors of the Holocaust first hand in Poland. His acknowledgement of the debt of all Christians to the people of the first covenant should have consequences not only in the spiritual realm but in worldly matters too. It means that we must ensure the welfare of the Jewish people as members of our extended family. Recent and future events in Israel's blockade of the Gaza strip now demand that the nations of the world respond with diplomatic initiatives, supporting either Israel or Hamas. The question then becomes: Do Christians, as citize...