Netanyahu Threatens to Retaliate if Palestinians Declare Statehood

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu threatened to retaliate if Palestinians declare a unilateral state, saying such a move would unravel existing agreements with the Israelis.

Netanyahu’s stern comments come the same day that a senior Palestinian official told Fox News they are considering a U.N. resolution to declare a Palestinian state. Palestinian officials had said Sunday they were preparing to ask the United Nations to endorse an independent state without Israel’s consent because they were losing faith in the peace talks.

But Netanyahu, speaking at the Saban Forum in Jerusalem, said there is “no substitute” for negotiations.

“Any unilateral action would only unravel the framework of agreements between us and can only lead to one-sided steps on the part of Israel,” he said. He did not elaborate further.

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Hamas Digging Tunnels Near UN Facilities

Hamas is digging tunnels next to United Nations facilities under the assumption that the IDF will not target them during a future conflict, defense officials warned on Sunday.

The officials said a tunnel Hamas had been digging adjacent to a UN school in Beit Hanun had collapsed earlier this month. According to some reports obtained by Israel, the collapse of the tunnel caused damage inside the school. UNRWA spokesman Chris Gunness denied the report.

According to one official, the tunnel was being dug directly next to the school and likely underneath it as well.

The IDF’s concern, a defense official said, was that Hamas was digging tunnels adjacent to UN and other international facilities because the terror group knew that the IDF would think twice before bombing them.

The official said it was certain that the digging was being done without the UN’s knowledge

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UN Panel Welcomes Debate Over New Global Reserve Currency

Editors Note - For those keeping score… This makes it 3. Russia, China and now the UN have each announced  advocating a move to a global currency at the  upcoming  G20 conference.

The head of a United Nations expert panel discussing solutions to the financial crisis on Thursday welcomed the debate over a new global reserve currency and said it would be best managed by a brand new institution.

Just days ahead of the Group of 20 heads of state meeting in London, several key players have weighed in with solutions to resolve the current financial crisis and to prevent future recurrences. One of the most sensitive subjects is the creation of a new de facto global reserve currency to replace the U.S. dollar.

The debate has shot to the forefront as officials from Russia and China have spoken up, lending weight to the discussions. While the G20 meeting isn’t expected to address it directly, it’s a topic that will continue to be discussed over the longer term.

The U.N. panel’s report published last week said a new global reserve system would “contribute to economic stability and equity,” and would reduce the deflationary effects of the massive reserve accumulations that countries have found necessary to protect them against the high level of global instability.

The International Monetary Fund is often cited as the most obvious choice to run a global reserve system, as it already uses its own currency, known as special drawing rights, or SDRs, in its dealings with member countries.

Joseph Stiglitz, economist and head of the U.N. panel, said Thursday in a teleconference with journalists that, although the IMF might be the fastest route, there’s a stigma associated with it among some developing countries, and there’s also frustration with the way that SDRs are allocated.

“My own longer-term preference is to create a new institution to do this,” Stiglitz said. “That’s a trade-off. I would rather face up to these deeper questions and get the system right.”

via Article – WSJ.com.

U.S. Endorses UN Homosexuality Declaration

The Obama administration announced March 18 its support for a United Nations declaration urging the global decriminalization of homosexuality three months after the Bush administration refused to endorse it.

The news, reported by the Associated Press, marked a reversal in the United States’ position on a non-binding measure considered by the U.N. General Assembly Dec. 18. At that time, 66 countries backed the barrier-breaking declaration, while more than 50 opposed it and the remainder of the 192 members abstained, according to The New York Times.

“The United States supports the U.N.’s statement on human rights, sexual orientation and gender identity and is pleased to join the other 66 U.N. member states who have declared their support of the statement,” State Department spokesman Robert Wood said, according to AP.

“The United States is an outspoken defender of human rights and critic of human rights abuses around the world,” Wood said. “As such, we join with other supporters of this statement, and we will continue to remind countries of the importance of respecting the human rights of all people in all appropriate international fora.”

The U.N. declaration goes beyond decriminalization, according to the Family Research Council (FRC). “It condemns not only ‘violence’ and ‘harassment,’ but also ’stigmatization and prejudice,’ terms which some would apply to any disapproval of homosexual conduct, no matter how peaceful and loving,” FRC President Tony Perkins wrote in his March 18 “Washington Update” e-mail.

via Baptist Press – U.S. endorses homosexuality – News with a Christian Perspective.

U.N. To Make Ban On Criticizing Islam

Muslim-dominated nations at the United Nations are once again pushing a religious “anti-defamation” plan that would bar worldwide all criticism of their founder Muhammad and his teaching

According to a report by CNN’s Lou Dobbs posted on YouTube, the proposal that has been repeatedly brought in recent years by the Organization of Islamic Conference states is expected to resurface as early as this spring.

This time, however, the resolution wouldn’t allow nations to opt out.

“The United Nations has adopted what it calls a Resolution to Combat Defamation of Religion,” Dobbs said in the report. “The U.N. now wants to make that anti-blasphemy resolution binding on member nations, including, of course, our own. That would make it a crime in the United States … to criticize religion, in particular, Islam.”

Constitutional lawyer Floyd Abrams said in the report, “What they would do would be to make it illegal to put out a movie or write a book or a poem that somebody could say was defamatory of Islam.”

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United Nations’ Threat: No More Parental Rights

A United Nations human rights treaty that could prohibit children from being spanked or homeschooled, ban youngsters from facing the death penalty and forbid parents from deciding their families’ religion is on America’s doorstep, a legal expert warns.

Michael Farris of Purcellville, Va., is president of ParentalRights.org, chairman of the Home School Legal Defense Association and chancellor of Patrick Henry College. He told WND that under the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child, or CRC, every decision a parent makes can be reviewed by the government to determine whether it is in the child’s best interest.

“It’s definitely on our doorstep,” he said. “The left wants to make the Obama-Clinton era permanent. Treaties are a way to make it as permanent as stuff gets. It is very difficult to extract yourself from a treaty once you begin it. If they can put all of their left-wing socialist policies into treaty form, we’re stuck with it even if they lose the next election.”

The 1990s-era document was ratified quickly by 193 nations worldwide, but not the United States or Somalia. In Somalia, there was then no recognized government to do the formal recognition, and in the United States there’s been opposition to its power. Countries that ratify the treaty are bound to it by international law.

via United Nations’ threat: No more parental rights.