Germany to allow domestic military operations as 'last resort'

Doves may be interested in this news article from the Australian ABC news website (www.abc.net.au/news/justin - direct link to article below).  Following a landmark court hearing German soldiers will be able to be deployed on the country's streets for the first time since World War II.   The ruling says they can be deployed if Germany faces an assault of "catastrophic proportions", but not to control demonstrations.

Now this may seem a very thin edge of the wedge, but in the troubled times that lay ahead for the world, and for Europe, this ‘last resort’ provision could open the way for persecution of organisations and individuals within the country. The decision brings Germany broadly in line with European allies including Italy, France and Britain.      

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-08-18/germany-allows-domestic-military-ops/4207348

To Save a People - Alex Kershaw

(Arrow Books 2010

Along these lines, I have just finished reading a remarkable book - To Save a People -  based on the true life story of a young Swedish diplomat (Raoul Wallenburg) and his mission to save the last Jews of Europe in Hungary during WWII.  The back cover highlights that he succeeded in outwitting SS Colonel Adolf Eichmann and the Nazi mission to exterminate all surviving Jews in Hungary.  The book also shows the role of the Arrow Cross - Hungarians carrying out atrocities against its own people. 

I can highly recommend this book, it is easy to read and incisive, and a strong reminder of what war can do to human behaviour.

I would like to share two quotes from page 27 of the book.  The intention was stated as follows: “The first deportation to Auschwitz would begin in just a matter of weeks, on 15 May 1944, and then proceed at such a startling pace that by July all but those living in Budapest would have been removed, the vast majority ending up in the ovens of Auschwitz.  As many as three hundred thousand would be shot or gassed, their bodies thrown into hastily dug pits and burned, in just forty six days.” 

And further down that page:  With intentional cruelty, if not irony, the first day of the round up was scheduled for the first day of Passover.”

God’s eternal plans move quickly and surely - just four years after 15 May 1944 a new country Israel emerged to start its journey, in the midst of much resistance.  Now it stands in the centre of the Earth ready to play a far greater role in God’s end-time purposes, in the weeks, months and years that lie just ahead.  Maranatha!  Denis