TEL AVIV : Syria aided by Iran is making preparations for a summer war with Israel, including acquisition of advanced weaponry, placement of missiles near the Jewish state's border, and training and movements of strategic troop battalions, Israeli security officials told WND.

The information follows media interviews last week in which Syrian President Bashar Assad stated he doesn't rule out the possibility of war with Israel. Syrian officials recently have also been warning if Israel doesn't vacate the Golan Heights, Damascus will resort to "resistance." The Heights is strategic mountainous territory that looks down on Israeli and Syrian population centers; it was twice used by Damascus to mount ground invasions into the Jewish state.

The security officials said the greatest threat Syria poses to the Jewish state are the country's missiles and rockets. They noted Syria recently test-fired two Scud-D surface-to-surface missiles, which have a range of about 250 miles, covering most Israeli territory.

Israel has information Syria recently acquired and deployed Chinese-made C-802 missiles, which were successfully used against the Israeli navy during Israel's war against the Lebanese Hezbollah militia this pasty July and August. Russia recently sold to Syria advanced anti-tank missiles similar to the projectiles that devastated Israeli tanks during the last Lebanon war, causing the highest number of Israeli troop casualties during the 34 days of military confrontations. Syria and Russia are negotiating the sale of advanced anti-aircraft missiles.

Israeli security officials told WND Syria is preparing for a summer war, but said the war preparations are defensive in nature. They said Syrian war preparations are being coordinated by Iran. The officials said Syria believes Israel will attack first in response to ongoing support of Hezbollah, including the passage of large quantities of rockets to the Lebanese group. The officials also said Syria estimates the U.S. or Israel will attack Iran, and that Syria will be drawn into a larger military confrontation.

Israeli security officials note in recent months, state-run Syrian media have been broadcasting regular warlike messages unseen since the 1973 Yom Kippur War, in which Syria and Egypt launched invasions from the Golan and the Sinai desert. "The tone [in Syria] is one of preparing the public for a war," said one senior security official. He said any Syrian provocation would likely be coordinated with Iran. Tehran and Damascus, which both support Hezbollah, have signed several military pacts.

Alongside the reports of Syrian war preparations, Israel has also been taking some defensive measures. Last month, the Jewish state engaged in a nationwide wartime drill, acting out responses to various wartime scenarios, including salvos of chemical-tipped missiles and major terrorist attacks. It was the largest war drill held in Israel since its establishment in 1948.

Cho Seung-Hui's murderous rampage during which he killed 32 students and faculty members at Virginia Tech is prompting research into gun laws, resident aliens and graphically violent writings. Investigators also may want to check his medicine cabinet, because psychiatric drugs have been linked to hundreds of violent episodes, including most of the school shootings in the last two decades.

The New York Times has reported the killer was on a prescription medication, and authorities have said he was confined briefly several years ago for a mental episode. They also have confirmed that the "prescription drugs" found among his effects related to the treatment of psychological problems.

Dr. Peter Breggin, a prominent critic of psychiatric drugs and founder of the International Center for the Study of Psychiatry and Psychology, said even if Cho wasn't taking psychiatric drugs the day of the shooting, "he might have been tipped over into violent madness weeks or months earlier by a drug like Prozac, Paxil, or Zoloft."

While media reports have focused on guns and gun laws, Cho's violent writings and autistic behavior at Virginia Tech and the delay in notifying students and faculty of the beginnings of the shootings, there are those who say the focus should be on his medical history.

"In my book 'Reclaiming Our Children,' I analyzed the clinical and scientific reasons for believing that Eric Harris's violence was caused by prescribed Luvox and I've also testified to the same under oath in depositions in a case related to Columbine," Breggin wrote, referring to the 1999 tragedy when Harris and classmate Dylan Klebold shot and bombed students at the Colorado school until a dozen were dead.

"In my book "The Antidepressant Fact Book," I also warned that stopping antidepressants can be as dangerous as starting them, since they can cause very disturbing and painful withdrawal reactions," he added.

He wrote that "it's not politically correct to bring criminal charges against someone who is 'mentally ill' and it's not politically correct to prosecute him or to remove him from the campus. Yet that's what was needed to protect the students. Two known episodes of stalking, setting a fire, and his threatening behavior in class should have been more than enough for the university administration to bring charges against him and to send him off campus."

He continued with a warning, "And what about drugs for the treatment of violence? The FDA has not approved any medications for the control of violence because there are no such medications. Yes, it is possible to temporarily immobilize mind and body alike with a shot of an 'antipsychotic' drug like Haldol; but that only works as long as the person is virtually paralyzed and confined and forced drugging invariably breeds more resentment.

"Instead of offering the promise of reducing violence, all psychiatric drugs carry the potential risk of driving the individual into violent madness. For example, both the newer antidepressants such as Prozac, Paxil, Zoloft and Celexa, and the antipsychotic drugs such as Risperdal and Zyprexa, cause a disorder caused akathisia a terrible inner sensation of agitation accompanied by a compulsion to move about. Akathisia is known to drive people to suicide and to aggression."

He said he's been writing for more than 15 years about the capacity for psychiatric drugs to cause mayhem, murder and suicide, but it wasn't until 2005 when the FDA issued a warning that such drugs produce "anxiety, agitation, panic attacks " Dr. John Breeding concluded in a report shortly after Columbine that there were about five million school children now being given psychiatric drugs, and the number had been doubling every 10 years since the 1970s.

"This has got to be a cause for major alarm in all adults," he said. "The bottom line is that we are giving stronger and stronger psychiatric drugs to more and more children. Many of our children are taking more than one of these drugs at a time, and many of these drugs were never even tested and approved for children."

The German Chancellor listed 12 discussion points for a new treaty, including a new name for the proposed EU foreign minister, as well as the document itself, to make the idea more palatable to sceptical nations such as the British, Czechs and Dutch.

Tony Blair insisted in interviews yesterday that a new EU treaty would not require the referendum he first promised in 2004 because the revised version would not involve constitutional changes. However, in her letter, seen by The Times, Mrs Merkel showed that she was determined to make only minimal changes to the EU Constitution rejected by French and Dutch voters in 2005.

She said: Every effort will have to be made to restrict change to what is absolutely necessary to reach an overall agreement and to ensure ratification by all member states. Mrs Merkel will use the letter as the basis of one-to-one talks with key EU leaders over the next two weeks, including Mr Blair. She hopes to set out a plan for a new treaty at the EU summit in June.

It would be written by Christmas, leaving a year for the 27 EU nations to ratify it before the next European Parliament elections. Neil O'Brien, director of the eurosceptic Open Europe think-tank, said: This leak shows that we are going to have the same proposals pushed through under a different name, with a few 'presentational changes'. It is incredibly cynical but the voters are not stupid and will not be fooled.

William Hague, the Shadow Foreign Secretary, said: It is vital that any new treaty that transfers power from Britain to the EU should be subject to a referendum.

Concerns have been raised that exposure to electromagnetic fields from the power lines could be linked to health problems, including childhood leukaemia. A leaked report suggests that banning power lines within 60 metres of homes, and stopping developments within the same distance of lines is the best option to reduce exposure.

But some of those in the group that compiled the report, which includes scientists, electricity companies, and the National Grid, said it had been watered down by the industry and government bodies involved.The report stops short of recommending such a ban, which could wipe £2 billion off property prices across Britain and limit development land, instead, suggesting the government consider such a move.

In 2005, research by Oxford University found that children who lived within 200 metres of high-voltage lines had a 70 per cent higher risk of leukaemia than those who lived more than 600 metres away. Other experts have suggested that electromagnetic fields from such lines are "possibly carcinogenic" with relation to leukaemia, and some suggest illnesses including brain tumours could also be linked.

In a long-awaited document, the Church's International Theological Commission said limbo reflected an "unduly restrictive view of salvation."

The 41-page document was published on Friday by Origins, the documentary service of the US-based Catholic News Service, which is part of the US Conference of Catholic Bishops.

Pope Benedict, himself a top theologian who before his election in 2005 expressed doubts about limbo, authorized the publication of the document, called "The Hope of Salvation for Infants Who Die Without Being Baptised."

The verdict that limbo could now rest in peace had been expected for years. The document was seen as most likely the final word since limbo was never part of Church doctrine, even though it was taught to Catholics well into the 20th century.

"The conclusion of this study is that there are theological and liturgical reasons to hope that infants who die without baptism may be saved and brought into eternal happiness even if there is not an explicit teaching on this question found in revelation," it said.

"There are reasons to hope that God will save these infants precisely because it was not possible (to baptize them)."
Limbo, which comes from the Latin word meaning "border" or "edge," was considered by medieval theologians to be a state or place reserved for the unbaptized dead, including good people who lived before the coming of Christ.

"People find it increasingly difficult to accept that God is just and merciful if he excludes infants, who have no personal sins, from eternal happiness, whether they are Christian or non-Christian," the document said.

In writings before his election as Pope in 2005, the then Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger made it clear he believed the concept of limbo should be abandoned because it was "only a theological hypothesis" and "never a defined truth of faith."

In the Divine Comedy, Dante placed virtuous pagans and great classical philosophers, including Plato and Socrates, in limbo. The Catholic Church's official catechism, issued in 1992 after decades of work, dropped the mention of limbo.

As the dollar sinks to near-record lows against the euro and the British pound, the stock market has returned to record highs, but investors are being advised to anticipate a worldwide downturn and the U.S. economy may have already entered a recession.

An explanation may be found in a private investment letter published by the Carlyle Group to its "professional investors." In the letter, Conway attributes the continued rise of world stock markets to a glut of liquidity in the world financial system, which he describes as "the availability of enormous amounts of cheap debt."
Conway writes, "This cheap debt has been available for almost all maturities, most industries, infrastructure, real estate and at all levels of the capital structure."

He says there is so much liquidity in world financial systems that "lenders (even 'our' lenders) are making very risky credit decisions." "Liquidity" is defined by economists as money available in all forms to be given out as debt, ranging from credit card debt to mortgage debt to large quantities of institutional debt typically used in complex financial transactions such as highly leveraged corporate acquisitions.

Excess liquidity, as reflected in the rise of highly leveraged hedge fund accounts, has been widely seen as a major factor in the rise of the stock market in the recovery since 9/11. Conway cautions that "this liquidity environment cannot go on forever." He warns that "the longer it lasts, the worse it will be when it ends."

Bob Chapman, who publishes a bi-weekly Internet newsletter, The International Forecaster, has issued his reconstructed M3 estimate to100,000 subscribers. "The world is awash in money and credit," Chapman said. "My numbers show M3 increasing at about a 10-percent rate right now." The euro late last week was trading as high as $1.3576, near its December 2004 record of $1.3539. At the same time, the pound rose to $1.9938, its highest point since September 1992. The pound last reached the $2 mark 14 years ago, when the UK was ousted from the European Exchange Rate Mechanism.

Chapman has argued the U.S. Treasury and Federal Reserve have been trying to manage a gradual devaluation of the U.S. dollar. Chapman expects the dollar could lose as much as an additional 20 percent of its value this year alone. In the last five years, the dollar has lost 35 percent of its value against the euro.

Still, until debt defaults force a crisis in the world debt markets, Chapman agrees with the Carlyle Group that excess liquidity will continue to buoy the world stock markets, including the New York Stock Exchange, to new highs. Chapman also agrees with Conway that when the liquidity bubble bursts, the decline in world stock markets could be sharp and severe, possibly even reaching crash magnitudes on the downside.

"Tens of billions of dollars have already been lost in the U.S. sub-prime lending market and the contagion is spreading as the media tries to cover-up what is really going on," Chapmen wrote in his March 28 newsletter. "We are watching the disintegration to an extent of the entire mortgage market, which encompasses 25 percent of all outstanding credit."

Spy chiefs warn that one operative had said he was planning an attack on a par with Hiroshima and Nagasaki in an attempt to shake the Roman throne, a reference to the West. Another plot could be timed to coincide with Tony Blair stepping down as prime minister, an event described by Al-Qaeda planners as a hange in the head of the company.

The report, produced earlier this month and seen by The Sunday Times, appears to provide evidence that Al-Qaeda is active in Iran and has ambitions far beyond the improvised attacks it has been waging against British and American soldiers in Iraq. The intelligence report also makes it clear that senior Al-Qaeda figures in the region have been in recent contact with operatives in Britain.

It follows revelations last year that up to 150 Britons had travelled to Iraq to fight as part of Al-Qaeda's foreign legion. A number are thought to have returned to the UK, after receiving terrorist training, to form sleeper cells.
The report continues: Recent reporting has described AQI's Kurdish network in Iran planning what we believe may be a large-scale attack against a western target.

A member of this network is reportedly involved in an operation which he believes requires AQ Core authorisation. He claims the operation will be on 'a par with Hiroshima and Naga-saki' and will 'shake the Roman throne'. We assess that this operation is most likely to be a large-scale, mass casualty attack against the West.

The report says there is no indication this attack would specifically target Britain, although we are aware that AQI . . . Networks are active in the UK. Analysts believe the reference to Hiroshima and Naga-saki, where more than 200,000 people died in nuclear attacks on Japan at the end of the second world war, is unlikely to be a literal boast.

It could be just a reference to a huge explosion, said a counter-terrorist source. They [Al-Qaeda] have got to do something soon that is radical otherwise they start losing credibility.

Despite aspiring to a nuclear capability, Al-Qaeda is not thought to have acquired weapons grade material. However, several plots involving "dirty bombs" - conventional explosive devices surrounded by radioactive material - have been foiled. Last year Al-Qaeda's leader in Iraq called on nuclear scientists to apply their knowledge of biological and radiological weapons to "the field of jihad."

Details of a separate plot to attack Britain, ideally before Blair steps down this summer, were contained in a letter written by Abdul al-Hadi al-Iraqi, an Iraqi Kurd and senior Al-Qaeda commander. According to the JTAC document, Hadi stressed "the need to take care to ensure that the attack was successful and on a large scale". The plan was to be relayed to an Iran-based Al-Qaeda facilitator.

The Home Office declined to comment.

Prince Harry was left under no illusions of his value as a scalp for Iraqi insurgents. Even so, senior military officers could never have predicted the sheer scale of and nature of the threats lying in wait.

Iraqi militia groups have already hatched detailed plans to seize him as a hostage when he arrives in Iraq next month. In a remarkable series of interviews, some of the most notorious paramilitary factions in southern Iraq claim that informants placed inside British military barracks in Iraq have received orders to 'track' the movements of the third in line to the throne.

The claims again question the Ministry of Defence's decision to allow Harry to serve in Iraq where he and his unit will be seen as a valuable target to those attacking US and British forces.Last night a Ministry of Defence spokesman said: 'We have not concealed the fact that he is going out there and the bad guys know that he's coming and we expect that they will consider him a high-profile scalp.' Despite the threats, Whitehall officials ruled out the possibility of the prince not being sent to Maysan, the most volatile province in southern Iraq, where attacks against British forces are mounting.

He will serve with his regiment, the Blues and Royals, for a six-month tour of duty. He is trained as a troop leader to take command of four Scimitar armoured reconnaissance vehicles and will be deployed in Iraq alongside 11 men who will serve under him.

One senior army officer who has completed three tours of duty in Basra, confirmed yesterday that Harry's imminent arrival in Iraq was causing 'disquiet at senior levels' within the military. He warned that those around him, particular those under Harry's direct command, could be at an increased risk: 'Wherever they place him in theatre, the concern is it will attract fire towards everyone on the ground.'

He described Harry, who says he does not want to 'sit on my arse back home while my boys are out fighting for their country', as the 'mother of all targets'.Militia leaders claim photographs of Harry have already been downloaded from the internet and disseminated to the main insurgent groups in the area where the prince will be deployed.

Snipers belonging to Shia militia groups have, they claim, been ordered to target the 22-year-old while Sunni insurgents say they plan to hold the prince hostage to demand the release of prisoners and immediate withdrawal of British troops.Together the testimonies suggest that Shia and Sunni paramilitary forces, traditionally sworn enemies, have joined forces to try to capture Harry, a deeply disquieting development for British senior officers.

Abu Zaid, commander of the Malik Ibn Al Ashtar Brigade of the notorious Mehdi Army militia, said: 'We are awaiting the arrival of the young, handsome, spoilt prince with baited breath and we confidently expect he will come out into the open on the battlefield.'We will be generous with him. For he will return him to his grandmother [the Queen] but without ears,' added Zaid, a senior figure within the largest and strongest Shia militia group operating where British troops are deployed.

Abu Samir, a leader of the Iranian-backed Sunni group Thar-allah - meaning God's revenge - added: 'Our people are ready to welcome him in their special way - like Leachman.' This was a reference to a British officer Colonel Gerard Leachman who was murdered by Sheikh Dhari, a tribal leader, in Iraq in 1920. Dhari is still considered by many Iraqis as a hero. While news of his death shocked the British public, it is credited with inspiring Arab tribes to revolt against Western occupying forces.

Abu, a Sunni insurgent commander and former major in the Iraqi army, said that they had insiders supplying a 'constant' flow of information from within UK military barracks.

He said: 'When they [the British] first arrived in Basra, we planted our people inside the British bases and headquarters, and it is these people who are now our constant source of information.

'They have new orders to track Prince Harry's movements. Once we have that information we will make appropriate plans to capture him. Wherever the British army decides to keep the prince we will find him.'
Zaid, who commands an arm of Muqtada al-Sadr's Mehdi Army which has been responsible for attacks against British troops, said that if plans to abduct the prince failed then militias would try and assassinate the prince. He said: 'Our sniper teams have also been issued with pictures so they will know his face long before he arrives in our land.

'I would like to advise him [Harry] to stay at home among his friends. He should learn a serious lesson what is happening to British soldiers in Basra and I would like him to think 100 times before boarding a plane for Iraq.'

YOUR home is a castle, so long as the state doesn't suspect you of crimes such as growing "virulent weeds", hiding materials for making "horror comics" or hacking into satellite television without paying.

These and other offences are among the 266 ways in which the state can require entry to any Briton's home, often without having to gain a warrant and almost always with the option of using force to back up the demand for access. The figure is revealed in a report by academic and civil-rights campaigner Harry Snook, and reinforces fears that Britain is drifting towards a "surveillance society".

His report, 'Crossing the Threshold: 266 Ways the State Can Enter Your Home', underlines fears the state is continually giving itself greater authority to demand access to what was once a private domain. "Where our home life is concerned, the duties of the state are less, and so, concomitantly, should be its powers," said Snook, a long-time critic of the EU who is now a barrister.

"In a democracy, almost nobody suggests that we should be overseen in our living room to the same degree that we are outside," he said. He warns that the first decade of the 21st century has already seen 25 new statutory entry powers enacted, including some which can be carried out without a warrant.

The catalogue of official rights of entry includes conventional powers, such as police authority to enter a house to search for a missing child or to arrest someone suspected of driving under the influence of drink or drugs. But the list also includes a series of more surprising powers of entry, such as:

"fact-finding missions" under an international landmines convention;

to allow intelligence services access "for purposes of national security";

to inspect a knacker's yard;

to seize equipment used in illegal broadcasting or evidence of related offences;

to search for non-qualified provision of immigration advice or related services.

Snook's report highlights how entry powers have proliferated over recent decades. He said: "The law of entry is failing citizens. It fails to protect them from over-zealous officials, it fails to provide them with simple and consistent rules on when someone can enter their home, and it fails to ensure that such incidents are properly recorded."

As he approaches the third year of his reign, Pope Benedict XVI is turning into the kind of pontiff that liberals feared and conservatives hoped for. Elected April 19, 2005, to succeed his dear friend John Paul II, the leader of the world's Roman Catholics slid smoothly into his job as pastor of an enormous flock. He reached out to dissidents, other faiths and countries long hostile to the church.

But recently, as his 80th birthday approached, the former Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger has drawn a tougher line. He has rebuffed calls, including by bishops in his native Germany, to let divorced Catholics who remarry participate fully in the church.

He has warned Catholic politicians who must decide on such issues as abortion, euthanasia and marriage that the faith's values are "not negotiable." And he has closed the door on any relaxation of the celibacy requirement for priests.

Benedict's persistent defence of the "traditional family" based on marriage between a man and a woman has emboldened Italy's bishops, who are waging a fierce battle against the government's proposal to extend some rights to unmarried couples, including same-sex unions.

And there was last September's trip to Germany, when the pope's references to Islam and holy war infuriated the Muslim world. Benedict has since stepped back a bit, while continuing to condemn violence in the name of religion and demanding freedom of religion, he has refrained from pointing a finger at Islam. Indeed, Marco Politi, the Vatican correspondent for the Italian daily La Repubblica and a biographer of John Paul II, sees Benedict's tenure as mainly focused internally.

The pope has been primarily interested in teaching Catholicism to Catholics. One of the pope's prime targets for a rekindling of the faith is Europe, which he recently described as "going down a road which could lead it to take its leave from history."

A speech given by its No. 2 official and longtime Benedict aide Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone to an audience of industrialists in Milan listed the fight against relativism and Benedict's vision of a Europe "that must not only be an economic and political reality but must draw from its spiritual foundations." It cited the need for a "Christian identity" that contrasts with "widespread secularism."

Before his Germany trip in September, Benedict told a German TV interviewer that "Christianity, Catholicism isn't a collection of prohibitions." But in March he issued a 131-page "exhortation" to ensure that bishops, priests and the world's 1.2 billion faithful strictly follow church teaching.

David Crowe, of the Restore America ministry said the referendum is one option being considered following the votes in the state House approving the two plans. The votes were 34-26 in favor of "gay" marriage in the state and 35-25 on Senate Bill 2 in favor of granting homosexuals the protected status as a civil rights minority.
"So one option is a referendum that would put the issues before voters, he said. "I don't think we can allow this not to happen," he said. "I think the people are outraged. For us as Christians to roll over when there's still another stop to go isn't right."

Crowe said Christian leaders from around the state, including many who worked on the campaign three years ago through which voters decided to limit marriage in the state to one man and one woman, are planning a meeting to discuss the next steps. "I have to do something," he told WND. "Someone has to do it, or the Christian community is sending the signal we'll put sandbags around the church but the rest of you are on your own and we'll just watch this moral freefall.

"That's not really loving your neighbor," he said. "We have the opportunity to clarify to the public what is moral and what is not. "We can communicate that we Christians are not stupid and we are concerned about others. These plans affect everybody's free speech, family and religious rights," he said. "Also, PRAY!" said a message from Marks to the church group's pastors. "This is possibly the most dangerous piece of legislation to come from Oregon's legislature." The Constitution Party said the plan is a "recipe for civil war."

"Everyone should read this legislation. It clearly gives those who choose non-traditional sexual behavior preference over those with traditional moral values," said state Chairman Jack Brown. "This legislation will lock religious people inside their church buildings and let perversion occupy the rest of the landscape!" The second plan, classifying homosexuals as a protected minority, is "the most sweeping and culturally devastating law in Oregon history, establishing pagan morality under the guise of a 'civil right,' and imposing it upon all Oregonians under the cover of 'law,'" Crowe said.

"A clause that talks about developing a program of education to change our attitudes," Crowe said. "To change our attitudes? Is it the government's business to change attitudes? But that's precisely what's in the bill."
The plans have been approved by both legislative houses and once minor amendments are approved, they will head for Democratic Gov. Ted Kulongoski, who has expressed support for the plans. The civil rights changes would give broad new powers to homosexuals and would impact churches, businesses, individuals, school children and others.

Crowe said homosexuals could demand that churches hire them, business owners would be facing huge costs to make "accommodations" for employees choosing that alternative lifestyle and schools would be forced to make those accommodations as well as teach the abolition of traditional family values. The "civil unions" plan "defied the people of Oregon who clearly said in 2004 that they wanted marriage to be between a man and a woman only," Crowe said. And the civil rights blessings for homosexuals came from "a scene of the worst sort of obfuscation, assertion without facts, feelings without wisdom, and political chicanery you can imagine."

"The people of Oregon deserve people in office who respect their wishes, not those of a small minority who wish to impose their morality upon others while forcing acquiescence by using the authority of human law, in disregard of God's Law," he said. "Our next step in opposing these bills is a Referral to the people of Oregon. They have the right to approve or disapprove the actions of the legislature."

Crowe said he attended the hearings on the proposals, and Democrats in support of the proposals were unable to answer such questions as what sexual acts would be protected by the civil rights legislation, would pedophiles find new protection from prosecution, and who defines "sexual orientation."

"The bill forces Christians and specifically Churches to ACCEPT this lifestyle, not TOLERATE it, that is unacceptable," said Kathy, on the Baltimore Reporter blog.

Mr Howard said there would only be enough water in the huge Murray-Darling river system for drinking purposes. He acknowledged that this would have a "potentially devastating" impact on many horticultural, crop and dairy industries around the river basin. But he said there was no choice, and he described the situation as "grim".

Irrigators are already warning that if they cannot water their land, there will be huge crop losses and Australian consumers will face large price rises. Australia is suffering from its worst drought on record, and the lack of rainfall has already severely reduced the production of major irrigated crops in the Murray-Darling river basin.

The basin, which covers an area the size of France and Spain combined, accounts for 41% of Australian agriculture and usually provides about 85% of the nation's irrigation supply. "If it doesn't rain in sufficient volume over the next six to eight weeks, there will be no water allocations for irrigation purposes in the basin" until May 2008, Mr Howard told reporters in Canberra.

There would be water only for "critical urban supplies" and farmers' own domestic use, he said. "It is a grim situation, and there is no point in pretending to Australia otherwise," he said. "We must all hope and pray there is rain." Mr Howard acknowledged that banning irrigation for crops and livestock in the Murray-Darling basin would have a "critical" impact on many industries in the area.

Farmers are warning that Australians could face major food price rises if no water is allocated to irrigators in the Murray-Darling Basin. National Farmers' Federation head Ben Fargher said that thousands of farmers could lose their citrus, almond and olives trees if they cannot be watered this year. "If those ... trees do die, then it takes a number of years to recover - maybe five to six years of lost production," he told ABC radio.

Australia may not have a rice crop at all this season if it gets no irrigation allocations, Laurie Arthur, president of the Ricegrowers Association, told Reuters news agency. "If it stays dry there will potentially be catastrophic losses," he said.

The 5-4 ruling said the Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act that Congress passed and President Bush signed into law in 2003 does not violate a woman's constitutional right to an abortion.The opponents of the act "have not demonstrated that the Act would be unconstitutional in a large fraction of relevant cases," Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in the majority opinion.

The decision pitted the court's conservatives against its liberals, with President Bush's two appointees, Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito, siding with the majority.Justices Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia also were in the majority. It was the first time the court banned a specific procedure in a case over how not whether to perform an abortion.

The outcome is likely to spur efforts at the state level to place more restrictions on abortions. More than 1 million abortions are performed in the United States each year, according to recent statistics.

Monday's departure of six government cabinet ministers from the Iraqi government will indeed erode support for American-backed Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. The ministers represented radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, on whom Mr. Maliki relied to take the top government post in Iraq.

But the withdrawal of the Sadrists who left in protest over the prime minister's refusal to set a date for the departure of US troops highlights more troubling developments: widening fissures within the country's ruling coalition and a brewing Shiite fight for supremacy that threatens to unravel the leading political coalition, the United Iraqi Alliance (UIA).

"The fragmentation of the Shiites, and the fights that are taking place, are much more serious than what gets talked about publicly," says Hosham Dawod, a Paris-based Iraqi academic and author.
To win these fights that have on occasion taken the form of armed confrontation and threaten to do so again leading Shiite political figures are rallying popular support by clutching on big emotional causes.
In the case of Mr. Sadr, it's taking on the US military presence.

For the rival Fadhila Islamic party, it's confronting Iranian influence and meddling. And for the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) led by the influential Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, it's purging all remnants of the Saddam Hussein regime.

Adding further complications is Iran's suspected support for both politics and violence, the role of the powerful tribes in this struggle especially in the south, and the emergence of well-armed Shiite splinter groups, some of which thrive on extortion and protection money.

The stakes are immense. The political battle is about control. Each Shiite party wants power in Baghdad, the so-called mid-Euphrates provinces, Najaf and Karbala, which are home to Shiite Islam's holiest sites, and the southern province Basra with its vital oil resources and maritime facilities. "The only thing that [the parties] agree on is remaining in power and confronting one another. There is a negative meeting point, and that's not enough to build a government," says Mr. Dawod.

President Bush did offer a biblical message of hope, when he suggested the school community that lost 32 members to the shootings by an out-of-control resident alien student find "comfort in the grace and guidance of a loving God." But even he didn't bring Jesus, the only hope of comfort and future life for Christians, into the memorials.

"I'm sitting here watching the convocation service at VT," wrote a WND reader who was given anonymity. "Five minutes ago they had four representatives from the local 'religious community.' The Muslim specifically invoked Allah's blessings and he didn't shy away from saying the name of Allah. The Jewish rep asked for God's blessings. Buddha was represented. The only name that [was] omitted, of course, Jesus Christ."