Connect with us

Headline News

Defense Department Says Iranian Confrontations With US Navy Up 50 Percent This Year

Dangerous confrontations between Iranian and American warships in the Persian Gulf are up more than 50 percent in 2016

Published

on

SHARE NOW THE END BEGINS:

Dangerous confrontations between Iranian and American warships in the Persian Gulf are up more than 50 percent in 2016 compared with this time last year, according to a U.S. defense official – despite the highly touted nuclear accord, as well as a recent $1.7 billion U.S. payment to Tehran.

The latest incidents of provocative Iranian behavior flared in the Persian Gulf earlier this week, including one filmed by the U.S. Navy. The video showed four Iranian gunboats from its Revolutionary Guard Corps coming within 300 yards of USS Nitze, an Arleigh Burke-class destroyer.

The incident was part of a troubling pattern, according to stats shared with Fox News.

In 2015, there were roughly 30 dangerous interactions between Iranian and U.S. Navy warships in the Persian Gulf, according to the U.S. Navy’s 5th Fleet. The Iranian vessels acted as the aggressors every time, the Navy says.

Iranian vessels harass US Navy destroyer in Strait of Hormuz:

Yet already this year, that number is at least 30. Through the first six months alone of 2016, there were 26 dangerous confrontations that U.S. military officials called “unsafe and unprofessional.”

“We are on pace to exceed last year’s numbers by more than fifty percent,” the defense official told Fox News, while saying the confrontations have risen by that much so far.

Overall encounters involving Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps fleet of largely fast-boats also have increased significantly, corresponding to the spike in dangerous interactions.

In the incident captured on video – one of four such incidents this week – the U.S. destroyer fired flares, increased speed and took evasive maneuvers, while the Iranian ships ignored calls on the radio to stop. Cmdr. William Urban, a spokesman for the Navy’s 5th Fleet, called the actions “unsafe and unprofessional.”

The next day in a separate incident in the northern Persian Gulf, the USS Squall, a coastal patrol ship, fired three warning shots from its .50 caliber machine gun when one Iranian ship came within 200 yards.

This comes after Iranian gunboats from the IRGC in January seized 10 U.S. Navy sailors after their two patrol craft drifted into Iranian waters near Farsi Island in the Persian Gulf. They were released the following day.

U.S.: Navy fired warning shots at Iranian boat

In December, Iranian missile boats fired a burst of unguided rockets near a U.S. Navy aircraft carrier transiting the Strait of Hormuz. The Navy called the act “highly provocative” at the time.

Together, the incidents have stoked concerns that little has changed with Iran despite the nuclear accord.

“Iran’s behavior hasn’t significantly changed as a result of the nuclear agreement,” Gen. Joseph Votel told Fox News in Baghdad last month, while Fox News was traveling with the general responsible for American forces in the region.

During a visit to USS New Orleans, a Navy amphibious transport ship going through the Strait of Hormuz, an Iranian missile ship and three other fast-boats shadowed the U.S. warship with Votel and four reporters aboard, including Fox News.

“What concerns me is our people don’t always have a lot of time to deal with those interactions,” Votel said. “It’s measured in minutes to really have the opportunity to make the right decision.”

Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal first reported that the U.S. paid Iran $400 million in January, as four Americans were being released from the country. The administration denied the money was ransom but conceded it was used as leverage to secure the release. Technically, the money was part of a $1.7 billion payment, apparently to resolve a longstanding financial dispute.

In July, two days before the one-year anniversary of the nuclear agreement, Iran also attempted to launch another ballistic missile in violation of a United Nations resolution.  The launch, first reported by Fox News, failed after the missile exploded shortly after take-off according to U.S. defense officials. The missile was based on a North Korean BM-25 Musudan missile, which has a maximum range of nearly 2,500 miles, putting U.S. forces in the Middle East and Israel within reach, officials tell Fox News.

This week, Iranian Defense Minister Hossein Dehghan said his warships would continue to confront any U.S. Navy ship near Iran’s territorial waters.

“If an American ship enters Iran’s maritime region, it will definitely get a warning. We will monitor them and, if they violate our waters, we will confront them,” he said according to the Iranian Students’ News Agency.

Asked to respond to Dehghan’s comments at a press briefing Thursday, Pentagon Press Secretary Peter Cook said, “[W]e certainly hope it doesn’t continue, because it serves no purpose other than to raise tensions in an important part of the world; and tensions that we don’t seek to have escalated.”

Iran’s defense minister is a former Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps commander who plotted the 1983 the U.S. Marine barracks bombing in Beirut, killing 241 U.S. military personnel.

Earlier this week, the State Department put out a new travel warning to American citizens warning them about “the risk of arrest and detention of U.S. citizens” by Iran. source

Comments

Donald Trump

Boots On The Ground, Soaring Oil Prices, Europe Sending Nuclear Battleships And Thousands Of Americans Stranded But Trump Says Don’t Call It A War

Published

on

SHARE NOW THE END BEGINS:

Trump and Vance promised us no new wars, and they’ve broken that promise in a spectacular end times assault on Iran and the Middle East

During the 2024 campaign, Donald Trump and JD Vance hammered a message that electrified millions of voters weary of endless Middle East entanglements: no new wars. It became a centerpiece of the America First pitch. After decades of Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria, the promise sounded like a breath of fresh air. Trump’s MAGA and QAnon followers went for it hook, line and sinker. But today, with the outbreak of what’s shaping up into a substantial war involving Iran, that campaign slogan is colliding head-on with reality.

“It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in princes.” Psalm 118:9 (KJB)

Trump and Vance told voters they would keep America out of new conflicts. Yet now the United States finds itself engaged in direct military confrontation with one of the most volatile regimes in the Middle East. Whether supporters try to frame it as a “limited operation” or critics call it a full-scale war, one thing is undeniable — the promise of “no new wars” has evaporated. This is not about partisan politics. This is about a biblical truth that Christians should have learned long ago: never put your trust in political leaders. They will let you down every time. Trump and Vance promised restraint. Now there is war with Iran. Why does this happen? Because no political leader — no matter how strong, how popular, or how sincere — has the power to override the prophetic course that God has already set for this world. Jesus Christ told us plainly what the last days would look like.

“And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places.” Matthew 24:6,7 (KJB)

That means no campaign slogan, no peace initiative, and no political movement can stop the trajectory of the last days. The closer we get to the end of the Church Age, the more unstable the world becomes — especially in the Middle East. And that brings us directly to Iran. From a prophetic standpoint, the Middle East will remain a powder keg because Israel sits at the center of God’s prophetic program. The Bible says that Jerusalem will become the focal point of global tension.

French President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday ordered France’s nuclear-powered aircraft carrier to move from the Baltic Sea to the Mediterranean to help protect allied assets during the war in the Middle East. Macron said the Charles de Gaulle carrier will be escorted by frigates and its air wing. In a prerecorded speech on French TV, Macron added that Rafale fighter jets, air-defense systems and airborne radar systems have been deployed over the past few hours in the Middle East. Trump may not be calling it a war, but it looks like everybody else is.

Trump and Vance both campaigned on the slogan of ‘No More Wars!’ but that was then and this is now

FROM THE ATLANITC: If J. D. Vance promised one thing during the 2024 presidential campaign, it was that America would not enter into a war with Iran of the kind that is currently raging. “America doesn’t have to constantly police every region of the world,” Vance told the comedian Tim Dillon on his podcast. He continued: “Our interest, I think very much, is in not going to war with Iran. It would be a huge distraction of resources. It would be massively expensive to our country.” In another podcast interview, with Shawn Ryan, in September 2024, Vance even said that a war between Israel and Iran was in fact “the most likely and most dangerous scenario” for provoking World War III.

These arguments look farcical now that President Trump has chosen—months after bombing Iran’s nuclear facilities and pronouncing its enrichment efforts “completely and totally obliterated”—to join Israel in launching a war on the Islamic Republic. The ensuing conflagration now involves a dozen countries in the Middle East. Trump says that he will do “whatever it takes” militarily and that “wars can be fought ‘forever.’” Vance’s X account, normally hyperactive, went silent in the days after bombs began falling on Saturday morning. The vice president was not at Mar-a-Lago with Trump as he oversaw the attack. The administration instead released a photo of him running a secondary meeting at the White House, flanked by a can of Diet Mountain Dew and a sullen-looking Tulsi Gabbard, the director of national intelligence. READ MORE

Now The End Begins is your front line defense against the rising tide of darkness in the last Days before the Rapture of the Church

When you contribute to this fundraising effort, you are helping us to do what the Lord called us to do. The money you send in goes primarily to the overall daily operations of this site. When people ask for Bibles, we send them out at no charge. When people write in and say how much they would like gospel tracts but cannot afford them, we send them a box at no cost to them for either the tracts or the shipping, no matter where they are in the world. We have a Gospel Billboard program. We are now broadcasting Bible studies, Podcasts and a Sunday Service 5 times a week, thanks to your generous donations. All this is possible because YOU pray for us, YOU support us, and YOU give so we can continue growing.

nteb-free-king-james-bible-program-750-550

But whatever you do, don’t do nothing. Time is short and we need your help right now. The Lord has given us an open door with a tremendous ‘course’ for us to fulfill that will create an excellent experience at the Judgement Seat of Christ. Please pray for our efforts, and if the Lord leads you to donate, be as generous as possible. The war is REAL, the battle HOT and the time is SHORTTO THE FIGHT!!!

“Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;” Titus 2:13 (KJB)

“Thank you very much!” – Geoffrey, editor-in-chief, NTEB

Continue Reading

Free Bible Program

The Massive High Security Miami Correctional Facility And ICE Detainee Center In Bunker Hill, Indiana, Needs King James Bibles For Its 3,188 Inmates

Published

on

SHARE NOW THE END BEGINS:

The Miami Correctional Facility in Indiana needs King James and Spanish Bibles for their thousands of inmates and ICE detainees

The Miami Correctional Facility, situated near Bunker Hill, Indiana, on the grounds of the Grissom Joint Air Reserve Base, was established in 1998 as a state prison. This facility accommodates adult males and includes inmates with high, medium, and minimum-security classifications. Miami is the largest prison in Indiana, boasting a capacity to house 3,188 prisoners when at full occupancy, including ICE detainees. Man, oh man, if you’re looking for fertile ground to start planting the seeds of the gospel, this is it.

But other fell into good ground, and brought forth fruit, some an hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirtyfold. Who hath ears to hear, let him hear.” Matthew 13:8,9 (KJB)

Chaplain Blair writes: “Our incarcerated population is currently about 1000 listed as General Christian or Catholic.  We offer services each week lead by Chaplains and/or outside volunteers.  Offenders are able to attend multiple times per week and often request bibles for personal use. Our ICE detainee population is about 400 General Christian or Catholic.  Services are ran to match the incarcerated population (citizens legally incarcerated). We are a level 3 / level 4 prison, meaning we are classified as medium-high to high security.  Most of the population are between the ages of 20-40. All religious materials we as Chaplains can distribute must come from outside donations from organizations like yours.” Christian, can you get excited by all this? Here is our opportunity to send the preserved word of God into a facility filled to overflowing with Catholics, ICE detainees and Christian and non-Christian inmates. Talk about going into all the world with the gospel. Bibles Behind Bars was raised up for this exact purpose, for such a time as this. Come help us to keep the supply lines open at the Miami Correctional Facility!

If God has prospered you, please take a moment to click on the donate button to help us in this monumental task of providing King James Bibles, New Testaments, scripture portions, gospel tracts as well as Spanish Bibles to inmates in jails and prisons from Florida to Alaska, and every state in between. We need your prayers, we need your generous financial support, and we need you to stand with us in the closing days of the Church Age. Thank you so very much, TO THE FIGHT!!!


NOTE: If you need a 501 C3 Letter of Donation for tax purposes, please send your donation to:

NTEB Ministries
1340 N Great Neck Rd.
Ste. 1272-129
Virginia Beach, VA 23454.

Now The End Begins is your front line defense against the rising tide of darkness in the last Days before the Rapture of the Church

When you contribute to this fundraising effort, you are helping us to do what the Lord called us to do. The money you send in goes primarily to the overall daily operations of this site. When people ask for Bibles, we send them out at no charge. When people write in and say how much they would like gospel tracts but cannot afford them, we send them a box at no cost to them for either the tracts or the shipping, no matter where they are in the world. We have a Gospel Billboard program. We are now broadcasting Bible studies, Podcasts and a Sunday Service 5 times a week, thanks to your generous donations. All this is possible because YOU pray for us, YOU support us, and YOU give so we can continue growing.

nteb-free-king-james-bible-program-750-550

But whatever you do, don’t do nothing. Time is short and we need your help right now. The Lord has given us an open door with a tremendous ‘course’ for us to fulfill that will create an excellent experience at the Judgement Seat of Christ. Please pray for our efforts, and if the Lord leads you to donate, be as generous as possible. The war is REAL, the battle HOT and the time is SHORTTO THE FIGHT!!!

“Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;” Titus 2:13 (KJB)

“Thank you very much!” – Geoffrey, editor-in-chief, NTEB

Continue Reading

Christian Nationalism

Watchdog Group Says Combat Unit Commanders Telling Troops That Donald Trump Has Been ‘Anointed By Jesus To Light The Fire In Iran For Armageddon’

Published

on

SHARE NOW THE END BEGINS:

Combat Unit commanders have been accused of telling troops that Donald Trump is anointed by God and the war with Iran is to bring in Armageddon

Well, it’s official, we’ve arrived in Crazy Town, and it’s exactly as you would expect it to be. Operation Epic Fury is revealing itself to be a hastily-arranged and very poorly planned operation that Trump now says could last for many months. And earlier today a religious watchdog group received over 200 complaints from soldiers being told by their Combat Unit commanders that President Trump has been ‘anointed to light the fire in Iran that will bring Armageddon and the return of Jesus Christ’. Wow, are we there already? It would seem so, Now don’t shoot the messenger, I don’t make the news, I’m just telling you what’s going on here on Day 2,178 of 15 Days To Flatten The Curve. It’s Christian Nationalism out of control.

“Thus shall he do in the most strong holds with a strange god, whom he shall acknowledge and increase with glory: and he shall cause them to rule over many, and shall divide the land for gain.” Daniel 11:39 (KJB)

If even a fraction of these reports are accurate that commanders inside the Department of War are framing geopolitical conflict as the spark that lights Armageddon and preparing troops for the return of Jesus Christ — then we are looking at something profoundly dangerous. Not because prophecy isn’t real, and not because Jesus Christ isn’t coming back. He absolutely is. But because the Church has no business trying to manufacture the Second Coming through military power. Let’s be absolutely clear: the return of Jesus Christ is not triggered by American foreign policy, presidential ambition, or battlefield rhetoric. The prophetic timeline is set by God Almighty, not by generals, politicians, or Christian Nationalist enthusiasm. Armageddon is not something a nation prepares for. It is something God executes on His schedule.

“Behold, the nations are as a drop of a bucket, and are counted as the small dust of the balance: behold, he taketh up the isles as a very little thing.” Isaiah 40:15 (KJB)

Christian Nationalism, at its core, attempts to merge the mission of the Church with the power of the State. It confuses patriotism with piety and assumes that America plays the central prophetic role in God’s end-times program. It does not. America joins all the other nations of the world to come against Israel. America is not Israel, the United States is not the New Jerusalem, and the United States Constitution, however wonderful we might think it to be, is not Scripture. If Donald Trump has been anointed by God to do anything, at this point, it looks like he might be the one to trigger WWIII.

Trump’s commanders tell troops to prepare for Jesus’ return and issue chilling Armageddon prophecy

FROM THE DAILY MAIL UK: The Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF), a non-profit civil rights watchdog, said it has received 110 complaints from troops since the war broke out on Saturday. The complaints span more than 40 different units across 30 military sites, first reported on veteran journalist Jonathan Larsen’s Substack. A non-commissioned officer (NCO) wrote to the MRFF Monday that his combat-unit commander had claimed Trump was ‘anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his return to Earth.’

‘He urged us to tell our troops that this was “all part of God’s divine plan” and he specifically referenced numerous citations out of the Book of Revelation referring to Armageddon and the imminent return of Jesus Christ,’ the NCO said.

The NCO, anonymized by MRFF, said they were writing on behalf of 15 others, including 11 Christians, a Muslim and a Jew. The troops are currently outside the Iran theater but on ‘ready-support’ status, meaning they could be deployed at any time. The NCO said that their commander’s comments ‘destroy morale and unit cohesion and are in violation of the oaths we swore to support the Constitution.’

A White House official denied that commanders were giving orders based on end times scripture, adding that the war had three aims: destroy Iran’s missiles, munitions industry and navy. The Pentagon did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The religious tenor at the top of the military is not confined to the battlefield.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, a born-again Christian, holds monthly prayer meetings at the Pentagon and attends a weekly Bible study at the White House led by a preacher who argues that God blesses those who support Israel. Trump’s longtime spiritual adviser, Paula White, has made similar claims for decades, urging Christians to ‘stand with Israel’.

Pastor John Hagee, who visited the White House multiple times during Trump’s first term, told his congregation on Sunday that the war with Iran signaled we are nearing the end times. ‘Prophetically, we’re right on cue,’ Hagee said. ‘Sirens are wailing and prophecies written thousands of years ago are stepping onto the world stage.’

US Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee claimed that Trump would receive a message from God shortly before the strikes on Iran in June.

‘I believe you will hear from heaven and that voice is far more important than mine or anyone else’s,’ he wrote to Trump. ‘You did not seek this moment. This moment sought you.’

The killing of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in a US-Israeli joint strike on Saturday has plunged the Middle East into crisis. Iranian forces have launched missiles and drones at US embassies and bases across the Middle East, as well as against Israel and America’s Arab allies including Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Trump initially said the war would last four to five weeks but has since warned it could go on ‘far longer.’ READ MORE

Now The End Begins is your front line defense against the rising tide of darkness in the last Days before the Rapture of the Church

When you contribute to this fundraising effort, you are helping us to do what the Lord called us to do. The money you send in goes primarily to the overall daily operations of this site. When people ask for Bibles, we send them out at no charge. When people write in and say how much they would like gospel tracts but cannot afford them, we send them a box at no cost to them for either the tracts or the shipping, no matter where they are in the world. We have a Gospel Billboard program. We are now broadcasting Bible studies, Podcasts and a Sunday Service 5 times a week, thanks to your generous donations. All this is possible because YOU pray for us, YOU support us, and YOU give so we can continue growing.

nteb-free-king-james-bible-program-750-550

But whatever you do, don’t do nothing. Time is short and we need your help right now. The Lord has given us an open door with a tremendous ‘course’ for us to fulfill that will create an excellent experience at the Judgement Seat of Christ. Please pray for our efforts, and if the Lord leads you to donate, be as generous as possible. The war is REAL, the battle HOT and the time is SHORTTO THE FIGHT!!!

“Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;” Titus 2:13 (KJB)

“Thank you very much!” – Geoffrey, editor-in-chief, NTEB

Continue Reading

Trending