Marked For �Murder�
Columns
Benson C Saili
THIS EARTH, MY BROTHER
Jehovah undertakes to destroy the Igigi’s, their children, and mankind in general
If there was one event that further drove a wedge between the Enlilites and the Enkites, it was the settlement of the 200 Igigi’s here on Earth. Now that they were no longer “Watchers” – cosmonauts who were based in the “heavens” (space or Mars) – they came to be known as Titans.
This derives from the Sumerian Ti-Ta-An, meaning “Mighty Ones From The Heavens”. The “mighty” aspect relates to their size. Like all Anunnaki, they were huge people. In their case in fact, their height was further boosted by the planet Mars’ weaker gravitational pull compared to Earth. It explains why the term Igigi in some languages came to mean “giants”, cases in point being gigantes in Latin and n’gigi in Nguni.
In the Bible, however, the same beings are referred to as the Nephilim (GENESIS 6:4). This means “those who fell in ignominy”. This is the same as the “Fallen Angel” tag Enlil put on the Igigi’s when they bluffed their way to Earth (on the pretext of attending Marduk’s wedding) and in defiance of Enlil forcibly took human wives and settled on Earth, thus abandoning their official Mars-based responsibilities. The term Nephilim, or rather Nefilim, comes from the Hebrew verb Nafol, which means to fall down, to be downed, or to come down.
Having noted the affinity the Nefilim had for Marduk, Enlil was suspicious. He thought Marduk and the Nefilim wanted to set up their own fiefdom, particularly in north Africa, and use it as a countervailing force against central authority. This paranoia was not exactly unfounded: Enoch, who was an informer on behalf of the Enlilites, had told Enlil that Marduk’s ultimate aim was to topple Enlil and become Earth’s Commander-in-Chief. Having been banished to Earth, Marduk’s only hope of rising to supremacy of any guise vested only in this planet.
Thus alarmed, Enlil detailed his firstborn son Ninurta to travel to today’s Americas and locate “the offspring of Cain”. This could mean some of Cain’s descendents who had remained there when he returned to the Edin at the time his curse was lifted. It could also mean the Native Americans, the race Cain founded, nurtured, and groomed. Ninurta was to forge his own domain there and endear himself to the people by teaching them the full spectrum of mining activities, tool-making, boat-making, and playing music. Like Cain before him, Ninurta was to establish himself a twin-towered Temple where he would be worshipped.
Just as Enlil was averse to Enkites and the Nefilim, he also had quite a loathing for Serpanit, Marduk’s wife. Now, Serpanit was not her original name: it was a titular name Marduk gave her when he married her. It meant “Earth’s Protector”. This is one typical term by which great kings or queens are addressed. It was the equivalent of “Queen of Earth”, the title of Enlil’s wife Ninlil, and also echoed the status of Marduk’s grandmother, who was the Queen of the Sirian-Orion star system.
Thanks to Enlil’s intrigue, the name Serpanit was over time corrupted to “Serpent”. The Enlilites derided her as a snake for having married into the Serpentine clan, as the Enkites were dismissively called. Meanwhile, the example set by Marduk was being xeroxed by even members of the Anunnaki pantheon. One of these was Ishkur-Adad, Enlil’s youngest son who on some Sumerian God Lists is also referred to as “a young god called Martu”.
Martu approached his father and asked his permission to marry an Earthling known as Shala. Enlil gave consent but made it clear that both his wife and offspring were not welcome on Nibiru. Martu was a hot-blooded young Anunnaki royal who was in love. As such, he didn’t care about what would happen shars in the future. He went ahead and married Shala damn the consequences. Martu’s hitching of Shala could also have been strategic – a means to curry favour with the now teeming human population as a counterweight to Marduk’s own populist gambit. Enlil hardly blamed him: it was Marduk he faulted for having set such a sacrilegious pace.
CHILDREN OF THE ROCKETSHIPS
In time, the Nefilim had children with Earthling women. Because the Nefilim were astronauts by occupation, the children they had with Earthlings were known as “Children of the Rocketships”. Like the Anunnaki themselves, these children were also phenomenally huge. In Genesis, these children are called the Anakims (DEUTERONOMY 9:2), meaning “offspring of the Anunnaki”. The Anakims who specialised in healing were known as Rephaites (GENESIS 14:5). GENESIS 6:1-4 provides a sneak peek into the saga of the Nefilim as follows:
“And it came to pass, when men began to multiply on the face of the Earth and daughters were born unto them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair, and they took them wives of all which they chose … There were giants upon the Earth in those days and also thereafter too, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men and they bore children to them. These were the Mighty Men of old, Men of Renown.”
The passage though is replete with deliberate distortions, on the part of the translators, of terms in the Hebrew, a tongue in which the Old Testament was written. Firstly, the original Hebrew doesn’t say “men”: it says Ha’Adam, meaning the human species as a whole and not males alone. Secondly, “sons of God” is totally wrong. The Hebrew says Bnei Ha-Elohim, or “the sons of the Ilu’s” in English. The Ilu’s (“transcendent ones”) as you may now know were the Anunnaki, who called themselves “gods”. Therefore, Bnei Ha-Elohim in this context refers to the Nefilim as it was they indeed who mass-married our women.
Thirdly, where the English translation says “giants”, the Hebrew term is Nefilim. Whilst giants is not that far-fetched in view of the fact that the Nefilim were indeed huge people, it is inexact translation anyway. Fourthly, the “Daughters of Men” are not described as “fair” in the Hebrew: they are described as “compatible”, meaning the Nefilim were able to have sexual relations with them and procreate with them. Maybe penile size did matter but it was not so freakishly outsized as to make copulation impossible.
Finally, the Hebrew does not say “Mighty Men of old, Men of Renown.” To the contrary, it says “Mighty Ones of Eternity, the People of the Shem”. This refers both to the Nefilim and the Anunnaki in general. Humans regarded the Anunnaki as immortal since they never saw them die. Shem as you now know was the Sumerian term for “Rocket”. Almost every Anunnaki was first and foremost an astronaut.
MARDUK MOVES TO ILLUMINATE MANKIND
Since Marduk’s eventual goal was to be Ea Bel, or Lord of Earth, he and the Nefilim decided that humans must be taught the secrets of the Anunnaki. “Secrets” simply meant privileged knowledge, which was basically scientific and metaphysical and which Enlil had withheld from ordinary mankind as a matter of official Anunnaki policy. Marduk also decided that humans too were to be fed on Ormus, the monoatomic white powder of gold which dramatically lengthened life spans. Marduk wanted to rule over a knowledgeable and durable race, not a perpetually benighted one with lifespans that were only a fraction of a year on Nibiru. In other words, long life must not be the preserve only of the ruling human elite: every human was entitled to it, from the lowliest to nobles.
In the event, the Brotherhood of the Snake, the secret knowledge dissemination fraternity Enki had formed for the benefit of human initiates, went to work. Marduk now presided over it in place of his father. The Nefilim were commissioned to up the tempo in enlightening mankind in practically every branch of knowledge, starting with a few selected clever ones, who would in turn mainstream the knowledge to fellow mankind. Within a few shars, mankind would virtually be on par with the Anunnaki and in practically every field of inquiry. At that stage, Marduk would then mobilise mankind and war against Enlil, defeat him and his fellow Enlilites, and eject them from Earth once and for all.
Leading the charge of Marduk’s illuminational revolution were several Nefilim who included Semjaza, Azazel, and Sariel. According to the Book of Enoch, humans were taught herbal medicine; how to cast a spell against an enemy and how to defend against such spells, what we today call witchcraft but which is simply a form of sophisticated metaphysical knowledge; mineralogy; metallurgy; mineral beneficiation; astrology; astronomy; mathematics; physics; chemistry; how to make cosmetics; and how to make weapons and apparels of war (swords, knives, shields, breastplates, etc). Of particular significance was “the use of antimony”.
As we elucidated in one of our earlier articles, antimony is one of the three primary ingredients in the manufacture of Ormus, the other two being mercury and gold.
It goes without saying that Marduk and the Nefilim went out of their way to provide every kind of knowledge that contributed to human development. Of course Enlil-Jehovah, who regarded humans as no more than serfs, was not amused.
DISSENT AGAINST JEHOVAH ESCALATES
Enlil was aware in Marduk, the Nefilim, and the Anakim, he had a formidable force to contend with. Already, Marduk was proving to be very popular with mankind and in mankind itself was another equally formidable threat. When people read of the antediluvian times (the era that preceded the Deluge of Noah’s day) in the Bible, the one thing they omit to do is pose to contemplate just how many humans there were on the planet at the time. Let us consider our population today.
The Deluge took place 13,000 years ago and almost completely wiped out the entire human population. Yet in the space of only 13,000 years, we’re now over 7 billion, from practically zero. At the time of the Nefilim, about 85,000 years ago, mankind had been in existence for 215,000 years. You can imagine how many people were on the planet then. Of course, given that the world then was not as sophisticated as it is today, the rate of population increase was not the same as it is today.
For example, in modern times, we were just under a billion in the 18th century. Today, in the 21st century, we‘re 7.3 billion. That is a 6-billion jump in only 200-odd years. So if we extrapolate back to the time of the Nefilim, we can conservatively put the world population at about 40 billion, which according to the experts is said to be the maximum carrying capacity of Earth.
Now, if you think my estimate is outrageous, consider what Enlil kept complaining about day in and day out: he used to say, “Their (mankind’s) conjugations of sleep deprive me.” That is to say, sex-crazed mankind was reproducing at such an alarming rate that Enlil was spending sleepless nights contemplating a means to effectually contain the population explosion. As significant, humans were now pestering him non-stop: they wanted a change of the guard right at the top. Marduk had won them over and it was him they would rather he was Earth’s principal “god”. “Oppressive the pronouncements of Earthlings has become,” Enlil complained to fellow members of the Anunnaki’s ruling pantheon.
All told, Enlil now was ranged against both the Anunnaki and humans. Of course there were some Anunnaki and humans who remained loyal to him but these were a tiny minority who did so simply out of fear. When he approached Enki and asked him to rein in his son Marduk, Enki told him point-blank that he and King Anu on Nibiru were responsible for the upheaval that was looming on Earth. They had turned Marduk into a pariah by banishing him to Earth and since this was now his permanent home, he had every right to contend for supremacy. He did not necessarily have to topple Enlil but he wanted a status that was of a similar clout.
“Put yourself in his position,” Enki said to his step-brother. “He will never be king of Nibiru. He will never be King of the Sirian-Orion Empire. He will never be head of the fledgling planet Mars. The only thing he has is Earth. Trust me Brother, he will move Heaven and Earth to ascend to the commanding heights of this planet. But if that were to happen, I’d rather it did so peacefully. I don’t want humans, the race I created, to be caught in the crossfire. I’m heavily emotionally invested in the race.” As far as Enlil was concerned, his detractors had crossed a line. It was time to act.
JEHOVAH MOVES TO DESTROY INNOCENT AND HAPLESS LIVES
Enlil decided he was going to punish the Nefilim, the Anakim, and mankind in general. He had to flex muscles, to unequivocally demonstrate to Marduk and his father Enki that it was he who called the shots on this planet, that the buck stopped with him. First, he said thus to Raphael (his youngest son Ishkur-Adad): “Bind Azazel hand and foot, and cast him into the darkness: and make an opening in the desert and cast him therein. And place upon him rough and jagged rocks … The whole earth has been corrupted through the works that were taught by Azazel: to him ascribe all sin.” That’s the inspiration of the Azazel-goat sin-offering in relation to the Jewish annual Day of Atonement.
To Gabriel (Nannar-Sin, his second-born son), he said: “Proceed against the bastards and the reprobates, and against the children of fornication: and destroy the children of fornication and the children of the Watchers from amongst men: send them one against the other that they may destroy each other in battle: for length of days shall they not have.”
Finally, to Michael (his firstborn son Ninurta) he said: “Go, bind Semjaza and his associates who have united themselves with women so as to have defiled themselves with them in all their uncleanness … Destroy all the spirits of the reprobate and the children of the Watchers.” But the person who would deliver this portentous message was Enoch, who had been spying on the Enkites, the Nefilim, the Anakim and mankind on behalf of the Enlilites out of a hidden place.
Enlil said to him: “Enoch, thou scribe of righteousness, go, declare to the Watchers of the heaven who have left the high heaven and have defiled themselves with women, and have done as the children of Earth do, and have taken unto themselves wives: ‘Ye shall have no peace nor forgiveness of sin: and inasmuch as they delight themselves in their children, the murder of their beloved ones shall they see, and over the destruction of their children shall they lament, and shall make supplication unto eternity, but mercy and peace shall ye not attain."'
Enlil fired off the first salvo by pouncing on the Nefilim ring leaders Semjaza and Azazel, tried them, and condemned them to indefinite confinement in a wilderness dungeon. That done, he decided not only to instigate violent activity amongst the Anakim but to “murder” them. Yet both the Nefilim and the Anakim didn’t commit a single crime.
All the Nefilim did was to educate their children and the rest of mankind in regard to how they could develop themselves and improve their standard of living, just as Ninurta was commissioned to do in North America. As for the Anakim and mankind in general, they had to be destroyed because now that they were being fed on Ormus, they had the benefit of “length of days”, which would bring them on par, ultimately, with the Anunnaki. Furthermore, the greater majority of them were rallying to Marduk at the expense of Enlil himself, making the chances of his replacement as Earth’s Chief Executive highly plausible. Exactly how was Enlil going to effect his destruction of the poor souls he had earmarked?
NEXT WEEK: ENKI HAS A NEW “STRATEGIC” SON
Columns
GONE FISHING
In recent years, using personal devices in working environments has become so commonplace it now has its own acronym, BOYD (Bring Your Own Device). But as employees skip between corporate tools and personal applications on their own devices, their actions introduce a number of possible risks that should be managed and mitigated with careful consideration. Consider these examples:
Si-lwli, a small family-run business in Wales, is arguably as niche a company as you could find, producing talking toys used to promote the Welsh language. Their potential market is small, with only some 300,000 Welsh language speakers in the world and in reality the business is really more of a hobby for the husband-and-wife team, who both still have day jobs. Yet, despite still managing to be successful in terms of sales, the business is now fighting for survival after recently falling prey to cybercriminals. Emails between Si-Iwli and their Chinese suppliers were intercepted by hackers who altered the banking details in the correspondence, causing Si-Iwli to hand over £18,000 (around P ¼ m) to the thieves. That might not sound much to a large enterprise, but to a small or medium business it can be devastating.
Another recent SMB hacking story which appeared in the Wall Street Journal concerned Innovative Higher Ed Consulting (IHED) Inc, a small New York start-up with a handful of employees. IHED didn’t even have a website, but fraudsters were able to run stolen credit card numbers through the company’s payment system and reverse the charges to the tune of $27,000, around the same loss faced by Si-Iwli. As the WSJ put it, the hackers completely destroyed the company, forcing its owners to fold.
And in May 2019, the city of Baltimore’s computer system was hit by a ransomware attack, with hackers using a variant called RobinHood. The hack, which has lasted more than a month, paralysed the computer system for city employees, with the hackers demanding a payment in Bitcoin to give access back to the city.
Of course, hackers target governments or business giants but small and medium businesses are certainly not immune. In fact, 67% of SMBs reported that they had experienced a cyber attack across a period of 12 months, according to a 2018 survey carried out by security research firm Ponemon Institute. Additionally, Verizon issued a report in May 2019 that small businesses accounted for 43% of its reported data breaches. Once seen as less vulnerable than PCs, smartphone attacks are on the rise, with movements like the Dark Caracal spyware campaign underlining the allure of mobile devices to hackers. Last year, the US Federal Trade Commission released a statement calling for greater education on mobile security, coming at a time when around 42% of all Android devices are believed to not carry the latest security updates.
This is an era when employees increasingly use their smartphones for work-related purposes so is your business doing enough to protect against data breaches on their employees’ phones? The SME Cyber Crime Survey 2018 carried out for risk management specialists AON showed that more than 80% of small businesses did not view this as a threat yet if as shown, 67% of SMBs were said to have been victims of hacking, either the stats are wrong or business owners are underestimating their vulnerability. A 2019 report by PricewaterhouseCoopers suggests the latter, stating that the majority of global businesses are unprepared for cyber attacks.
Consider that a workstation no longer means a desk in an office: It can be a phone in the back of a taxi or Uber; a laptop in a coffee shop, or a tablet in an airport lounge. Wherever the device is used, employees can potentially install applications that could be harmful to your business, even from something as seemingly insignificant as clicking on an accidental download or opening a link on a phishing email. Out of the physical workplace, your employees’ activities might not have the same protections as they would on a company-monitored PC.
Yet many businesses not only encourage their employees to work remotely, but assume working from coffee shops, bookstores, and airports can boost employees’ productivity. Unfortunately, many remote hot spots do not provide secure Wi-Fi so if your employee is accessing their work account on unsecured public Wi-Fi, sensitive business data could be at risk. Furthermore, even if your employee uses a company smartphone or has access to company data through a personal mobile device, there is always a chance data could be in jeopardy with a lost or stolen device, even information as basic as clients’ addresses and phone numbers.
BOYDs are also at risk from malware designed to harm and infect the host system, transmittable to smartphones when downloading malicious third-party apps. Then there is ransomware, a type of malware used by hackers to specifically take control of a system’s data, blocking access or threatening to release sensitive information unless a ransom is paid such as the one which affected Baltimore. Ransomware attacks are on the increase, predicted to occur every 14 seconds, potentially costing billions of dollars per year.
Lastly there is phishing – the cyber equivalent of the metaphorical fishing exercise – whereby cybercriminals attempt to obtain sensitive data –usernames, passwords, credit card details –usually through a phoney email designed to look legitimate which directs the user to a fraudulent website or requests the data be emailed back directly. Most of us like to think we could recognize a phishing email when we see it, but these emails have become more sophisticated and can come through other forms of communication such as messaging apps.
Bottom line is to be aware of the potential problems with BOYDs and if in doubt, consult your IT security consultants. You can’t put the own-device genie back in the bottle but you can make data protection one of your three wishes!
Columns
“I Propose to Diana Tonight”
About five days before Princess Diana and Dodi Al Fayed landed in Paris, General Atiku, a certain Edward Williams was taking a walk in a woods in the Welsh town of Mountain Ash. Williams, then 73, was a psychic of some renown. He had in the past foretold assassination attempts on US President Ronald Reagan, which occurred on March 30, 1981, and Pope John Paul II, which came to pass on May 13, 1981.
As he trudged the woods, Williams had a sudden premonition that pointed to Diana’s imminent fate as per Christopher Andersen’s book The Day Diana Died. “When the vision struck me, it was as if everything around me was obscured and replaced by shadowy figures,” Williams was later to reminisce. “In the middle was the face of Princess Diana. Her expression was sad and full of pathos. She was wearing what looked like a floral dress with a short dark cardigan. But it was vague. I went cold with fear and knew it was a sign that she was in danger.”
Williams hastily beat a retreat to his home, which he shared with his wife Mary, and related to her his presentiment, trembling like an aspen leaf as he did so. “I have never seen him so upset,” Mary recounted. “He felt he was given a sign and when he came back from his walk he was deeply shaken.”
The following day, Williams frantically sauntered into a police station to inform the police of his premonition. The officer who attended to him would have dismissed him as no more than a crackpot but he treated him seriously in view of the accuracy of his past predictions. He took a statement and immediately passed it on to the Special Branch Investigative Unit.
The report read as follows:
“On 27 August, at 14:12 hrs, a man by the name of Edward Williams came to Mountain Ash police station. He said he was a psychic and predicted that Princess Diana was going to die. In previous years, he has predicted that the Pope and Ronald Reagan were going to be the victims of assassination attempts. On both occasions he was proved to be correct. Mr Williams appeared to be quite normal.”
Williams, General, was spot-on as usual: four days later, the princess was no more.
Meanwhile, General, even as Dodi and Diana were making their way to the Fayed-owned Ritz Hotel in central Paris, British newspapers were awash with headlines that suggested Diana was kind of deranged. Writes Andrew Morton in Diana in Pursuit of Love: “In The Independent Diana was described as ‘a woman with fundamentally nothing to say about anything’. She was ‘suffering from a form of arrested development’. ‘Isn’t it time she started using her head?’ asked The Mail on Sunday. The Sunday Mirror printed a special supplement entitled ‘A Story of Love’; The News of the World claimed that William had demanded that Diana should split from Dodi: ‘William can’t help it, he just doesn’t like the man.’ William was reportedly ‘horrified’ and ‘doesn’t think Mr Fayed is good for his mother’ – or was that just the press projecting their own prejudices? The upmarket Sunday Times newspaper, which had first serialised my biography of the princess, now put her in the psychiatrist’s chair for daring to be wooed by a Muslim. The pop-psychologist Oliver James put Diana ‘On the Couch’, asking why she was so ‘depressed’ and desperate for love. Other tabloids piled in with dire prognostications – about Prince Philip’s hostility to the relationship, Diana’s prospect of exile, and the social ostracism she would face if she married Dodi.”
DIANA AND DODI AT THE RITZ
Before Diana and Dodi departed the Villa Windsor sometime after 16 hrs, General, one of Dodi’s bodyguards Trevor Rees-Jones furtively asked Diana as to what the programme for the evening was. This Trevor did out of sheer desperation as Dodi had ceased and desisted from telling members of his security detail, let alone anyone else for that matter, what his onward destination was for fear that that piece of information would be passed on to the paparazzi. Diana kindly obliged Trevor though her response was terse and scarcely revealing. “Well, eventually we will be going out to a restaurant”, that was all Diana said. Without advance knowledge of exactly what restaurant that was, Trevor and his colleagues’ hands were tied: they could not do a recce on it as was standard practice for the security team of a VIP principal. Dodi certainly, General, was being recklessly by throwing such caution to the winds.
At about 16:30, Diana and Dodi drew up at the Ritz Hotel, where they were received by acting hotel manager Claude Roulet. The front entrance of the hotel was already crawling with paparazzi, as a result of which the couple took the precaution of using the rear entrance, where hopefully they would make their entry unperturbed and unmolested. The first thing they did when they were ensconced in the now $10,000 a night Imperial Suite was to spend some time on their mobiles and set about touching base with friends, relations, and associates. Diana called at least two people, her clairvoyant friend Rita Rogers and her favourite journalist Richard Kay of The Daily Mail.
Rita, General, was alarmed that Diana had proceeded to venture to Paris notwithstanding the warning she had given Dodi and herself in relation to what she had seen of him in the crystal ball when the couple had consulted her. When quizzed as to what the hell she indeed was doing in Paris at that juncture, Diana replied that she and Dodi had simply come to do some shopping, which though partially true was not the material reason they were there. “But Diana, remember what I told Dodi,” Rita said somewhat reprovingly. Diana a bit apprehensively replied, “Yes I remember. I will be careful. I promise.” Well, she did not live up to her promise as we shall soon unpack General.
As for Richard Kay, Diana made known to him that, “I have decided I am going to radically change my life. I am going to complete my obligations to charities and to the anti-personnel land mines cause, but in November I want to completely withdraw from formal public life.”
Once she was done with her round of calls, Diana went down to the hair saloon by the hotel swimming pool to have her hair washed and blow-dried ahead of the scheduled evening dinner.
THE “TELL ME YES” RING IS DELIVERED
Since the main object of their Paris trip was to pick up the “Tell Me Yes” engagement ring Dodi had ordered in Monte Carlo a week earlier, Dodi decided to check on Repossi Jewellery, which was right within the Ritz prencincts, known as the Place Vendome. It could have taken less than a minute for Dodi to get to the store on foot but he decided to use a car to outsmart the paparazzi invasion. He was driven there by Trevor Rees-Jones, with Alexander Kez Wingfield and Claude Roulet following on foot, though he entered the shop alone.
The Repossi store had closed for the holiday season but Alberto Repossi, accompanied by his wife and brother-in-law, had decided to travel all the way from his home in Monaco and momentarily open it for the sake of the potentially highly lucrative Dodi transaction. Alberto, however, disappointed Dodi as the ring he had chosen was not the one he produced. The one he showed Dodi was pricier and perhaps more exquisite but Dodi was adamant that he wanted the exact one he had ordered as that was what Diana herself had picked. It was a ploy on the part of Repossi to make a real killing on the sale, his excuse to that effect being that Diana deserved a ring tha was well worthy of her social pedigree. With Dodi having expressed disaffection, Repossi rendered his apologies and assured Dodi he would make the right ring available shortly, whereupon Dodi repaired back to the hotel to await its delivery. But Dodi did insist nonetheless that the pricier ring be delivered too in case it appealed to Diana anyway.
Repossi delivered the two rings an hour later. They were collected by Roulet. On inspecting them, Dodi chose the very one he had seen in Monte Carlo, apparently at the insistence of Diana. There is a possibility that Diana, who was very much aware of her public image and was not comfortable with ostentatious displays of wealth, may have deliberately shown an interest in a less expensive engagement ring. It may have been a purely romantic as opposed to a prestigious choice for her.
The value of the ring, which was found on a wardrobe shelf in Dodi’s apartment after the crash, has been estimated to be between $20,000 and $250,000 as Repossi has always refused to be drawn into revealing how much Dodi paid for it. The sum, which enjoyed a 25 percent discount, was in truth paid for not by Dodi himself but by his father as was the usual practice.
Dodi was also shown Repossi’s sketches for a bracelet, a watch, and earrings which he proposed to create if Diana approved of them.
DIANA AND DODI GUSH OVER IMMINENT NUPTIALS
At about 7 pm, Dodi and Diana left the Ritz and headed for Dodi’s apartment at a place known as the Arc de Trompe. They went there to properly tog themselves out for the scheduled evening dinner. They spent two hours at the luxurious apartment. As usual, the ubiquitous paparazzi were patiently waiting for them there.
As they lingered in the apartment, Dodi beckoned over to his butler Rene Delorm and showed him the engagement ring. “Dodi came into my kitchen,” Delorm relates. “He looked into the hallway to check that Diana couldn’t hear and reached into his pocket and pulled out the box … He said, ‘Rene, I’m going to propose to the princess tonight. Make sure that we have champagne on ice when we come back from dinner’.” Rene described the ring as “a spectacular diamond encrusted ring, a massive emerald surrounded by a cluster of diamonds, set on a yellow and white gold band sitting in a small light-grey velvet box”.
Just before 9 pm, Dodi called the brother of his step-father, Hassan Yassen, who also was staying at the Ritz that night, and told him that he hoped to get married to Diana by the end of the year.
Later that same evening, both Dodi and Diana would talk to Mohamed Al Fayed, Dodi’s dad, and make known to him their pre-nuptial intentions. “They called me and said we’re coming back (to London) on Sunday (August 31) and on Monday (September 1) they are
Columns
RAMADAN – The Blessed Month of Fasting
Ramadan is the fasting month for Muslims, where over one billion Muslims throughout the world fast from dawn to sunset, and pray additional prayers at night. It is a time for inner reflection, devotion to Allah, and self-control. It is the ninth month in the Islamic calendar. As you read this Muslims the world over have already begun fasting as the month of Ramadan has commenced (depending on the sighting of the new moon).
‘The month of Ramadan is that in which the Qur’an was revealed as guidance for people, in it are clear signs of guidance and Criterion, therefore whoever of you who witnesses this month, it is obligatory on him to fast it. But whoever is ill or traveling let him fast the same number of other days, God desires ease for you and not hardship, and He desires that you complete the ordained period and glorify God for His guidance to you, that you may be grateful”. Holy Qur’an (2 : 185)
Fasting during Ramadan is one of the five pillars upon which the structure of Islam is built. The other four are: the declaration of one’s belief in Allah’s oneness and in the message of Muhammad (PBUH); regular attendance to prayer; payment of zakaat (obligatory charity); and the pilgrimage to Mecca.
As explained in an earlier article, fasting includes total abstinence from eating, drinking, smoking, refraining from obscenity, avoiding getting into arguments and including abstaining from marital relations, from sunrise to sunset. While fasting may appear to some as difficult Muslims see it as an opportunity to get closer to their Lord, a chance to develop spiritually and at the same time the act of fasting builds character, discipline and self-restraint.
Just as our cars require servicing at regular intervals, so do Muslims consider Ramadan as a month in which the body and spirit undergoes as it were a ‘full service’. This ‘service’ includes heightened spiritual awareness both the mental and physical aspects and also the body undergoing a process of detoxification and some of the organs get to ‘rest’ through fasting.
Because of the intensive devotional activity fasting, Ramadan has a particularly high importance, derived from its very personal nature as an act of worship but there is nothing to stop anyone from privately violating Allah’s commandment of fasting if one chooses to do so by claiming to be fasting yet eating on the sly. This means that although fasting is obligatory, its observance is purely voluntary. If a person claims to be a Muslim, he is expected to fast in Ramadan.
The reward Allah gives for proper fasting is very generous. Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) quotes Allah as saying: “All actions done by a human being are his own except fasting, which belongs to Me and I will reward it accordingly.” We are also told by the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) that the reward for proper fasting is admittance into heaven.
Fasting earns great reward when it is done in a ‘proper’ manner. This is because every Muslim is required to make his worship perfect. For example perfection of fasting can be achieved through restraint of one’s feelings and emotions. Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) said that when fasting, a person should not allow himself to be drawn into a quarrel or a slanging match. He teaches us: “On a day of fasting, let no one of you indulge in any obscenity, or enter into a slanging match. Should someone abuse or fight him, let him respond by saying: ‘I am fasting!’”
This high standard of self-restraint fits in well with fasting, which is considered as an act of self-discipline. Islam requires us to couple patience with voluntary abstention from indulgence in our physical desires. The purpose of fasting helps man to attain a high degree of sublimity, discipline and self-restraint. In other words, this standard CAN BE achieved by every Muslim who knows the purpose of fasting and strives to fulfill it.
Fasting has another special aspect. It makes all people share in the feelings of hunger and thirst. In normal circumstances, people with decent income may go from one year’s end to another without experiencing the pangs of hunger which a poor person may feel every day of his life. Such an experience helps to draw the rich one’s conscience nearer to needs of the poor. A Muslim is encouraged to be more charitable and learns to give generously for a good cause.
Fasting also has a universal or communal aspect to it. As Muslims throughout the world share in this blessed act of worship, their sense of unity is enhanced by the fact that every Muslim individual joins willingly in the fulfillment of this divine commandment. This is a unity of action and purpose, since they all fast in order to be better human beings. As a person restrains himself from the things he desires most, in the hope that he will earn Allah’s pleasure, self-discipline and sacrifice become part of his nature.
The month of Ramadan can aptly be described as a “season of worship.” Fasting is the main aspect of worship in this month, because people are more attentive to their prayers, read the Qur’an more frequently and also strive to improve on their inner and outer character. Thus, their devotion is more complete and they feel much happier in Ramadan because they feel themselves to be closer to their Creator.