Lebanese militants and Israeli Defense Force (IDF) traded cross-border fire after the news that Hezbollah commander Samir Kuntar was killed in an airstrike in Damascus. Israel fired artillery over the border after rocket fire hit northern Israel on Sunday.

The IDF "responded with targeted artillery fire following the rockets that hit Israel earlier today from southern Lebanon," an army statement said.

Meanwhile, Lebanon's national news agency NNA said Israel fired nine rounds of artillery at the south of the country.

No casualties were reported on either side.

It seems that in Western countries, the people who follow the mainstream media and public school narrative have a pretty twisted outlook on how people in other countries live. They like to focus on the absolute worst things that happen in that society, and act like that defines the society. The perception is that people in non-NATO countries are primitive savages who are constantly attacking and hurting one other, but this type of behavior occurs to a certain degree in nearly every society.

The mainstream western narrative does not pay any attention to the actual daily lives of the people who live in foreign countries. Instead, only they only focus on the tragedies. Just like in the US and Europe, people in the middle east, Africa, and other areas of the world have thriving music scenes, talented artists, brilliant philosophers, exceptional athletes, and children that play games similar to those played by western children. In fact, National Geographic Traveler recently named Iran as the #1 tourist destination in the world.

People who live in other parts of the world have festivals and holidays and favorite foods, they also have sickness, traffic jams, and crime, just as we do.

As Christians mark another Winter Solstice by celebrating the coincident anniversary of the birth of 'Jesus Christ' - a name that has loomed over Western civilization for some 2,000 years - we're taking the opportunity to talk once again with author and historian, Laura Knight-Jadczyk about her latest research.

Despite much scholarly research already providing grounds for doubting the historical accuracy of 'Jesus', most assume that this figure nevertheless had at least some historical basis in fact. Fundamental to this is the pairing of Roman historical data with key elements of the Jesus story.

Laura Knight-Jadczyk believes she has found conclusive evidence that there was no 'Jesus', and that the figure we know by this name is a composite of different narratives woven together to create a new religion. But if there was no 'Jesus', why and how can there today be three major world religions based (or reliant) on one?

Join your hosts this Sunday 20th December 2015 from 2-4pm EST / 11am-1pm PST / 7-9pm UTC / 8-10pm CET for the answers to the greatest story ever sold.

Running Time: 01:55:00

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First published in Paris-Match magazine on the 30th of September...

THE ALARM CRY OF JUDGE TREVIDIC

« France is the number one enemy of the Islamic state. We lack of means. The worse is yet to come ».

For 10 years, he hosted the antiterrorist judicial pole forced to step down in a tempest to become Vice President de Grande Instance of Lille, Marc Trevidic spoke to us at length, last September. His alarm cry unfortunately found its echo on Friday night with a series of unprecedented attacks in Paris. Here is the terribly premonitory full version.

Paris-Match: Based on your experience, your knowledge of the files, everything you know, can you estimate the level of threat to the hexagon?

Marc Trévidic: It has reached its maximum level, never reached before. First of all, we have clearly become the number one enemy to the Islasmic state. The French should know: France is the main target of an army of terrorists with unlimited means. We are particularly vulnerable because of our geographical location, the facility to enter our territory for all the jihadists from Europe, French or not, and because of the clear and constant will expressed by the men of Islamic State (ISIS) to hit us. Then it must be said that given the scale of the threat, and diversity of forms it can take, our anti-terrorism controls have become permeable, fallible, and it is no longer effective like it used to be . Finally, I have become convinced that men of ISIS (acronym of the Islamic state) have the ambition and the means to hit us much harder by organizing larger scale actions incomparable to those conducted so far. I say this as a technician: The darkest days are ahead. The real war that the Islamic state intends to bring to our soil has not yet begun.

Why such a dark observation ?

First of all, it must be understood that we have in front of us a more powerful terrorist group than ever. Much more powerful that al Qaeda during its great past. To give you an idea, Islamic state has about 30,000 « soldiers » recruited over al Qaeda members in 15 years! And it is not the end. We are indeed facing a double threat. That of the surge of what I call « human scuds » individual Jihadists who take action without much training or preparation, acting alone, with more or less success, like we've seen lately. And that the incommensurable I dread: Undoubtedly Islamic state is preparing major actions, such as those conducted in the past by al Qaeda, which have sometimes resulted in appalling slaughter.

You have elements that indicate we are heading towards these type of large-scale actions?

The new documentary film World Order was aired on Rossiya 1 television channel Sunday. Vladimir Putin was among those interviewed for the documentary. For your convenience Sputnik compiled best bits and pieces of the interview with the Russian president.

Putin emphasized the importance of being careful when it comes to nuclear weapons, stating that although Russia has its nukes ready, it "never either swung or would never swing its nuclear club at others."

"I hope no person is insane enough on Planet Earth who would dare to use nuclear weapons," Putin said.

On the issue of foreign interference into internal affairs of countries, the Russian president said a national government's drawbacks shouldn't be a reason for an intervention.

"The most important thing is not to undermine legitimate governments, not to destroy their statehood even if it appears to be imperfect," the president said.

"I think that no one should ever impose any values, which he/she considers to be correct, on others. We [Russia] have our own values and our own ideas about justice," Putin explained.

Some countries out there have "lost a sense of reality" thinking that they could tell Russia how to conduct its politics. That isn't going to happen, according to Putin.

"I guess that political nouveaux riches have lost a sense of reality... There are some countries and nations that will never accept a secondary role, a role of an occupied country or some kind of a vassal. It will end sooner or later. Soon enough, I guess," Putin said

Geopolitics is an important issue the world has always faced. Putin thinks if the geopolitical struggle cannot be avoided, then it should at least be civilized, with its principles uniformly understood and supervised.

It is well enough that people of the nation do not understand our banking and monetary system, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning. (Henry Ford)

Give me control of a Nation's money supply, and I care not who makes its laws. (M. A. Rothschild)

The Federal Reserve Bank (or simply the Fed), is shrouded in a number of myths and mysteries. These include its name, its ownership, its purported independence form external influences, and its presumed commitment to market stability, economic growth and public interest.

It's no wonder the Obama administration tried to keep this secret—the corporate-friendly trade agreement, decoded.

In October, President Obama hailed the proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) as "the most progressive trade deal in history."

But progressive public-interest organizations say that the final text, the fruit of seven years of secretive trade talks between the United States and 11 other Pacific Rim countries, dashed even their low expectations. The deal not only continues most of the troubling features of trade agreements since NAFTA but also breaks worrisome new ground.

Like most recent international economic agreements, the TPP only glancingly resembles a classic trade deal, concerned mainly with tariffs and quotas. Rather, like the WTO agreements or NAFTA, it is an attempt to set the rules of the global economy to favor multinational corporations over everything else, trampling on democracy, national sovereignty and the public good. The more than 600 corporate lobbyists who had access to the draft texts used their insider status to shape the deal, while labor unions, environmentalists and others offered testimony from outside, with little impact.

A report compiled by an independent Norwegian oil and gas consulting firm verified earlier claims that Daesh, also known as ISIL/ISIS, smuggles most of its oil to Turkey, where it is then sold on the black market at reduced prices.

After the request of the Norwegian Foreign Ministry the petroleum consulting firm Rystad Energy came up with the report back in July, using its own database and sources in the region. The Norwegian daily Klassekampen got its hands on it and leaked the details of the report on Sunday.

"Large amounts of oil have been smuggled across the border to Turkey from IS-controlled areas in Syria and Iraq... Oil is sent by tankers via smuggling routes across the border [and] is sold at greatly reduced prices, from $25 to $45 a barrel," the report said, as cited by the Norwegian daily.

United Nations experts have called for an end to the harassment of human right defenders in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, calling the attacks which include physical violence and death threats "unacceptable".

The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) says human rights defenders in the region are being subjected to abuse, arrest, detention and harassment by the Israeli authorities and settler elements, in what is thought to be a bid to stop their work.

"Amidst a charged and violent atmosphere over past months in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, Palestinian and international defenders are providing a 'protective presence' for Palestinians at risk of violence, and documenting human rights violations," said the UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders, Michel Forst.

Earlier this month UN human rights experts urged the Israeli government to allow for a protective space for human rights defenders to work without restriction and fear.

Israeli authorities had carried out raids on the Youth Against Settlement organisation in Hebron and settlers called for its closure.

"The Center has now effectively been shut down as a result of the Israeli military declaring the surrounding area a military zone," UN Special Rapporteur Makarim Wibisono said.

Wibisono, special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, urged the Israeli authorities to lift the military order.

His statement that has been endorsed by the special rapporteur on torture and degrading treatment and the special rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly.

The main purpose of the Pakistani Taliban is to overthrow the leadership of the country and establish a Sharia state. However, as reported by the media, the rebels are not going to take the oath of allegiance to Daesh.

Pakistani Taliban, just like Afghanistan's Taliban, have refused to pledge allegiance to the terrorists of Daesh (Islamic State) and their leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, newspaper Dawn reported.