Important Takeaways:
- US launches airstrike on site in Syria in response to attacks by Iranian-backed militias
- Two U.S. F-15 fighter jets dropped multiple bombs on a weapons storage facility near Maysulun in Deir el-Zour that was known to be used by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, U.S. officials said.
- “The President has no higher priority than the safety of U.S. personnel, and he directed today’s action to make clear that the United States will defend itself, its personnel, and its interests,” Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said in a statement.
- A military official told reporters in a call that people were seen at the warehouse during the day as the U.S. military watched the site for hours, but the number decreased to about “a couple” overnight when the strike occurred. The official said the strike triggered secondary explosions, indicating the presences of weapons, but the U.S. believes that no civilians were killed and any people at the warehouse were tied to the Revolutionary Guard or militia groups.
- The strike, said a senior defense official also on the call, was aimed at “disrupting and degrading the capabilities of groups directly responsible for attacking U.S. forces in the region” by specifically targeting facilities associated with the Revolutionary Guard. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity to provide an assessment of the strike.
- This is the second time in less than two weeks that the U.S. has bombed facilities used by the militant groups, many operating under the umbrella of the Islamic Resistance in Iraq, which U.S. officials say have carried out at least 40 such attacks since Oct. 17.
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Mathew 24:7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places.
Important Takeaways:
- Panic as Turkey, Syria rocked again by 6.3M earthquake
- A magnitude 6.3 earthquake struck southern Turkey near the Syrian border late on Monday, setting off panic and further damaging buildings two weeks after the country’s worst earthquake in modern history left tens of thousands dead.
- Two Reuter’s reporters said the tremors were strong and lasting, damaging buildings and leaving dust in the night air in central Antakya city, where it was centered. It was also felt in Egypt and Lebanon, Reuter’s reporters said.
- The European Mediterranean Seismological Centre (EMSC) said the tremor struck at a shallow depth of 2 km (1.2 miles).
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Mathew 24:7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places.
Important Takeaways:
- Earthquakes that killed thousands in Syria and Turkey are world’s deadliest in nearly two decades
- As of Feb. 16, ten days after the initial 7.8 magnitude earthquake struck the region, more than 41,000 people are known to have died. That earthquake was only the start of the growing disaster, with another 5.7 magnitude quake hitting the following day and hundreds of aftershocks in between.
- The earthquakes are the deadliest to occur in the world since a massive 2005 quake in Pakistan killed more than 70,000 people.
- In 2011, nearly 20,000 people were killed after a 9.0 quake off of Japan’s coast triggered a tsunami.
- And the year before [2010] that, a catastrophic earthquake in Haiti devastated the capital city, Port au Prince, with a death toll estimated at 200,000 or more.
- 2018 in Indonesia at least 4,340 people were killed by the earthquake and its torrential aftermath, including at least 1,200 in the tsunami
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Mathew 24:7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places.
Important Takeaways:
- Turkey Probes Contractors as Earthquake Deaths Pass 33,000
- The death toll from the magnitude 7.8 and 7.5 quakes that struck nine hours apart in southeastern Turkey and northern Syria rose to 33,185 and was certain to increase as search teams find more bodies.
- As despair bred rage at the agonizingly slow rescues, the focus turned to assigning blame.
- Turkey’s construction codes meet current earthquake-engineering standards, at least on paper, but they are rarely enforced, explaining why thousands of buildings toppled over or pancaked down onto the people inside.
- Rescue crews have been overwhelmed by the widespread damage that has affected roads and airports, making it even harder to move quickly.
- Erdogan has acknowledged the initial response was hampered by the damage. He said the worst-affected area was 500 kilometers (310 miles) in diameter and home to 13.5 million people.
- In Syria’s northwestern rebel-held region has reached 2,166, according to the rescue group the White Helmets.
- The overall death toll in Syria stood at 3,553 on Saturday, although the 1,387 deaths reported for government-held parts of the country hadn’t been updated in days. Turkey’s death toll was 29,605 as of Sunday
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Mathew 24:7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places.
Important Takeaways:
- No room for the dead as cemeteries in earthquake-hit Turkey and Syria fill up
- Bodies are piled up in stadiums or car parks for identification; coffins are being brought in and mass graves dug
- At least five imams have rushed to Nurdağı to officiate a ceaseless rush of mass funerals, sometimes for as many as 10 victims at once. Officials brought in deliveries of coffins from neighboring villages and as far as Istanbul to provide a final resting place for the overwhelming numbers of corpses arriving in the town.
- Country’s worst natural disaster in a generation, the death toll has surpassed 21,000 and Nurdağı and towns across southern Turkey and northern Syria are scenes of apocalyptic levels of destruction.
- “Forty per cent of the people who lived in this town could be gone,” said Sadık Güneş, an imam in Nurdağı.
- Across northern Syria, people now living in tents in the snow began burning whatever they could to keep warm. Food and other basic goods remained scarce.
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Mathew 24:7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places
Important Takeaways:
- As the temperatures plunged, anger started to rise in Turkey over the government’s response to two massive earthquakes this week.
- On Thursday, the number of those killed by the tremors in Turkey and neighboring Syria passed 20,000.
- With their homes destroyed, thousands spent a freezing Wednesday night amid the debris in the streets of Adiyaman, huddled around small fires and with little shelter. Electricity and water were nonexistent in the southern city.
- Fearful of another earthquake, some chose to stay out in the open, avoiding buildings that appeared intact, and to brave the subzero temperatures.
- Osman Yıldırım, a civil engineer, said “The government didn’t take necessary steps to minimize risks through urban planning, low-rise buildings, construction codes and strict control,” he said, adding that as a result “new buildings and old buildings collapsed.”
- Opposition leaders and some social media users also blasted his government’s decision to block access to Twitter for about 12 hours, from Wednesday afternoon to early Thursday, as people scrambled to find loved ones and share information on arriving aid and the location of those still trapped in rubble.
- Turkish authorities said they were targeting disinformation and, on Thursday, Erdogan, hit back at critics saying “dishonorable people” were spreading “lies and slander” about the government’s actions.
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Matthew 24:7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places
Important Takeaways:
- Death Toll in Turkey-Syria Earthquake Surges Past 19,000, Rescue Efforts Still Underway
- More than 19,000 people have now died along the Turkey-Syria border from this week’s catastrophic earthquakes. Rescuers are working as quickly as they can as the “survival window” closes fast.
- Time is running out to find survivors in the rubble, now that the first critical 72 hours have passed. But there have still been some miracles.
- A little girl was found alive alongside her father who, as they were loaded into an ambulance, whispered “I love you all.”
- And in the Turkish city of Malatya, a man was found alive who had been trapped under concrete for 65 hours.
- But the losses are staggering. Many victims were refugees who fled the civil war in Syria.
- The final death toll from Turkey and Syria will probably not be known for weeks because of the sheer amount of rubble.
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Matthew 24:7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places.
Important Takeaways:
- Powerful quake leaves thousands dead in Turkey and Syria
- More than 5,000 people have been killed and tens of thousands injured after a magnitude 7.8 earthquake struck Turkey and Syria
- Thousands of buildings collapsed in both countries and aid agencies are particularly worried about northwestern Syria, where more than 4 million people were already relying on humanitarian assistance.
- Freezing weather conditions are further endangering survivors and complicating rescue efforts, as more than 100 aftershocks have struck the region.
- The quake, one of the strongest to hit the region in more than 100 years, struck 23 kilometers (14.2 miles) east of Nurdagi, in Turkey’s Gaziantep province, at a depth of 24.1 kilometers (14.9 miles), the United States Geological Survey said.
- The WHO warned on Monday that the toll could hit 20,000, and on Tuesday said 23 million people – including 1.4 million children – could be affected.
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Matthew 24:7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be famines and earthquakes in various places.
Important Takeaways:
- Huge earthquakes rock Turkey and Syria, at least 2,200 killed
- Israel to send blankets, medicine to Syria, more aid to Turkey • US help underway, Antony Blinken says
- This news follows a deadly earthquake in Turkey and Syria overnight in which at least 2,200 people were killed and thousands more were injured
- “At the request of the Turkish government, I instructed all authorities to prepare immediately to provide medical assistance and to aid with searching and rescuing.” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
- The tremors and aftershocks of the quake were felt in Israel by people up and down the country from the Tel Aviv and Jerusalem areas to Beersheba and Beit She’an.
- It was also felt in other locations across the region, with reports in both Lebanon and Cyprus of intense aftershocks.
- In the Lebanese cities of Beirut and Tripoli, residents ran into the street and took their cars to get away from their buildings in case they collapsed, witnesses said.
- AP reported – “Because the debris removal efforts are continuing in many buildings in the earthquake zone, we do not know how high the number of dead and injured will rise,” Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said.
- The earthquake was felt as far away as Cairo
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Revelations 6:3-4 “when he opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature say, “Come!” 4 And out came another horse, bright red. Its rider was permitted to take peace from the earth, so that people should slay one another, and he was given a great sword.
Important Takeaways:
- Russia Demands Israel Unconditionally Stop ‘Unacceptable’ Airstrikes in Syria
- Moscow on Monday demanded that Israel stop its “categorically unacceptable” airstrike campaign against Iranian-backed targets in Syria, signaling a further breakdown of ties between Jerusalem and the Kremlin.
- “We strongly condemn such irresponsible actions that violate the sovereignty of Syria and the basic norms of international law, and we demand their unconditional cessation,” Russia’s Foreign Ministry said following an alleged Israeli airstrike on Saturday near a Russian stronghold in Syria.
- Syria accused Israel of launching an “air aggression” from the Mediterranean with several missiles hitting near the Syrian city of Tartus, where one of Russia’s main naval bases is located.
- Last month, Russia condemned an alleged Israeli airstrike on June 10 targeting the Damascus International airport. Israel had accused Iran of smuggling weapons to its proxies in the region on civilian flights.
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