Free Republic

Coiffed, groomed and impeccably suited, Mithal al-Alusi cuts an imposing figure at this trendy hotel. In the empty bar lounge, he makes himself at home to a breakfast of fresh fruit, strong coffee and a constant flow of cigarettes. The leader of the Democratic Party of the Iraqi Nation is in town to promote his vision for a new Iraq and accept an accolade from an unlikely sponsor – the American Jewish Committee – who honored him with a Moral Courage award at their annual dinner last week. His act of courage was an attempt to break Iraq's long-standing taboo...

When it comes to sex, Germans are not known for being squeamish. Yet a sex-education book that has been circulating in Berlin elementary schools has some parents up in arms. The book, “Where Do You Come From?” („Wo kommst du her?‟), which is recommended for ages 5 and up, shows a couple, Lisa and Lars, in various stages of arousal. … The text also veers toward the explicit. …

'In America, you have a right to be stupid, if you want to be... and we tolerate that,' Kerry said to a packed Internet cafe in Berlin.Kerry stopped in Berlin as part of his nine-country trip abroad - his first trip as secretary of state He recalled how he learned about the divide in postwar Berlin as a young man living with his American diplomat father

... Speaking at a town hall meeting Tuesday, Kerry spoke a few sentences of passable German to the delight of a crowd in a packed Internet cafe before regaling the audience with tales of his boyhood in Berlin in 1954. He recalled a clandestine bicycle ride into communist East Berlin. "I saw the difference between east and west. I saw the people wearing darker clothing. There were fewer cars. I didn't feel the energy or the movement." When he returned home, Kerry said, his father "got very upset with me and said: `You could have created an international incident. I...

BERLIN -- The Germans play "gotcha" with a decidedly Teutonic skill and attitude. The latest victim is Annette Schavan, Chancellor Merkel's education minister, who resigned her position in a gathering storm of accusations that she plagiarized the doctoral dissertation she wrote 32 years ago. The title sounds particularly apt: "Person and Conscience." She held on for a week, fighting back. She insists she will sue to regain her title of "doctor," revoked by Heinrich Heine University in Dusseldorf. In the age of the Internet, obscure dissertations once relegated to the memory hole, out of mind, unread or assigned to a...

(Reuters) - German firemen rescued a mysteriously naked man trapped in a narrow chimney in central Berlin, a spokesman said on Thursday. The fire brigade was alerted to the emergency after police failed to help the 39-year old man who was wedged 10 metres (yards) down the shoulder-width chimney. "The rescue workers, specialised in saving people at great heights, tried to pull the victim out from above with a crane and a sling," a fire brigade spokesman said. "At first he held on to the rope but then his strength failed him so we had to come up with an...

A proposal by gun store owners to open an indoor gun range in a residential neighborhood in Berlin has homeowners concerned saying it is close to their families. The Berlin Planning and Zoning Commission at 7 p.m. inside the council chambers at Town Hall. The meeting is open to the public. According to the town of Berlin's website, the proposal is to add an indoor gun range to the west side of the Berlin Turnpike in connection with an existing gun shop, BMG Guns & Ammo. The gun shop currently doesn't have gun range for people to practice, which is...

East Germany's secret police sold citizens to western pharmaceutical companies to use as human guinea pigs in drug trials • Tens of thousands tested with experimental drugs not approved in the West • One study of a drug for heart conditions saw six out of 17 patients die • Sinister practice exposed in disturbing new Germany documentary Former Communist East Germany secretly sold its citizens to western pharmaceutical companies to use as human guinea pigs in drug trials. Tens of thousands of sick people in the former German Democratic Republic were treated with medicines not approved in the West to...

The most striking proof that the Arab anti-Israel cause is a common meeting ground for both Nazis and Communists --and that the Arabs welcomed supporters of both ilks-- lies in the friendship of Carlos, the notorious master terrorist who served the PLO, with Fran*ois Genoud, an old Nazi, one of the leading Nazis in pre-War Switzerland, later a financier who provided funds for Habash's faction of the PLO. "Carlos" (his nom de guerre) was what is called a "red diaper baby." His fabulously rich father, a Venezuelan lawyer and owner of estates, gave "Carlos" the name Ilich, Lenin's patronymic, as...

BERLIN (AP) -- Berlin authorities say they shot and killed a 120 kilogram (265-pound) wild boar after it attacked and injured four people including a police officer in a residential neighborhood. ... Wild boars are relatively common in green Berlin, though rarely cause problems beyond digging up gardens.

Jewish institution hosts Judith Butler, who renews support of BDS movement; 700-strong audience cheers boycott call. BERLIN - The internationally renowned Jewish Museum in Berlin hosted a podium discussion on Saturday with US academic Judith Butler, who renewed her calls to boycott Israel. It appears to be the first anti-Israel event held in the Jewish museum since its opening in 2001 with the aim of exhibiting the 2,000- year history of Germany’s Jews. At least 700 people attended the event. The German taxpayer-funded museum’s decision to showcase a speaker in the capital city, which during the Nazi period served as...

One of Germany’s 16 states has declared circumcision legal, but only if performed by doctors — not, as required by Jewish law, by mohels. Berlin, Germany’s capital and itself a state, is the first to declare the practice legal following a Cologne court ruling in June that non-medical circumcisions on children amounted to a criminal offense, according to DPA, a German news wire. National legislation is pending to legalize circumcision. State Justice Minister Thomas Heilmann made the announcement Wednesday, saying he felt it necessary to allay fears in this “difficult transitional period,” the Associated Press reported.

"British suspected Islamic terrorist arrested in Germany A major German security operation targeted "dangerous" Islamist extremists in dawn raids by 850 police officers on 70 mosques, schools and homes across Germany." SNIPPET: "Hans-Peter Friedrich, Germany's interior minister, banned one Salafist network, Millatu Ibrahim, for "working against our constitutional order and against understanding between peoples". He also announced an investigation into two other networks, Dawa FFM and "The True Religion", with a view to a seeking additional bans."" SNIPPET: "Secret intelligence gathered by police and anti-terrorism officers across Europe gave "cause for concern" in Germany, Britain, France, the Netherlands and Austria,...

We welcome change and openness; for we believe that freedom and security go together, that the advance of human liberty can only strengthen the cause of world peace. There is one sign the Soviets can make that would be unmistakable, that would advance dramatically the cause of freedom and peace. General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization, come here to this gate. Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate. Mr. Gorbachev, Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!

Canadian Luka Rocco Magnotta, who allegedly videotaped the murder of his lover and mailed his body parts, has been captured in a Berlin Internet cafe, according to the Berlin Police Department. A man in an Internet cafe spotted Magnotta about 2 p.m. in Germany and recognized him as the Canadian fugitive, Berlin Police spokesman Thomas Neuendors told ABCNews.com.

The 23-year-old photograph is a stunning record of Chinese courage past and an insight into China's present political turmoil. Unless China's government chooses liberty and just law over tyranny and crony corruption, the picture prefigures a bloody future history. I am referring to one of 1989's most famous photos: the lone Chinese protestor in Beijing's Tiananmen Square who stands in front of a People's Liberation Army (PLA) main battle tank. The dramatic confrontation occurred June 5, 1989, the day after PLA gunfire, at the order of Communist leader Deng Xiaoping, killed some 2,000 demonstrators in the square. Everyone in China...

Photographer Stefan Koppelkamm first photographed East Germany in 1990 after the fall of the Berlin Wall but before the reunification. He revisited the same locations a decade later, and rephotographed them from exactly the same viewpoints to document the drastic social and economic transformations that came about during the time between the photos.

A far-right group in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia is running a 'Muslim cartoon contest' and plans to display the works outside mosques. The move has alarmed authorities which fear it could incite violence and hurt German interests abroad, similar to the backlash that followed the 2005 publication of cartoons in Danish newspapers. The German government has voiced concern that far-right activists in the western state of North Rhine-Westphalia may incite violence with plans to hold a so-called "Muhammad cartoon contest" and to stage demonstrations outside mosques in the run-up to a regional election there on May 13.

"Senate Hs Committee Report Finds Online Jihadist 'Activity' Leads To Violent Islamist Extremism" by Anthony Kimery 02/28/2012 ( 9:12am) SNIPPET: "Violent Islamist extremists use the Internet to recruit, radicalize and mobilize individuals -- including Americans -- and “the threat of violent Islamist extremism has become increasingly decentralized and its messaging has followed that same trajectory,” according to a report issued Monday by both the majority and minority staff of the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs." SNIPPET: "The report concluded that “the United States currently has a haphazard approach to dealing with global Internet radicalization and propaganda,” and...

"A Lebanese suspect from the Hezbollah group has been taken into custody by Thai officials and police are investigating further," Chalerm Yoobamrung told Reuters. "Following concern raised by the Israeli embassy about a possible attack by a group of Lebanese terrorists in Bangkok, Thai police officials had been coordinating with Israeli officials since before the New Year."

A friend alerts us to a woman clearly ahead of her time. According to the Telegraph, a Mrs. Berliner-Mauer, of Sweden, recently revealed that she "tied the knot" with the famous wall while visiting Berlin in 1979. The blissful creature-to-creature ceremony was conducted "before a handful of guests." Clearly biased in its reporting, however, the Telegraph castigates the woman as having a "bizarre fetish for inanimate objects." Objectum-Sexuality, to be regressively clinical. But please: Bizarre? What's truly bizarre is the newspaper's own embrace of Objectosexophobia. Shame! Shame on all objectosexophobists! No doubt "wall friendly" New York and California stand ready...

(...) The delegates, many of them former East German Communists but also younger people, will debate an extraordinary motion put forward by some members: They want their party to declare that the building of the wall was an inescapable necessity. If that leaves any doubts about the Left party’s nostalgia for a wall that imprisoned 17 million people for nearly 30 years, a newspaper survey published this month by The Berliner Zeitung showed that 75 percent of that party’s supporters in Berlin thought the wall was justified or partly justified. (...) Respondents said the wall was necessary to stop the...

Addressing the ceremony on Bernauer Street, famously divided by the Wall and now site of a memorial, Mayor Wowereit said the capital was remembering the "saddest day in its recent history". "It is our common responsibility to keep alive the memories and pass them on to the next generation, to maintain freedom and democracy and to do everything so that such injustices may never happen again," he said. At a ceremony at a former crossing-point, President Wulff said the wall had been "an expression of fear" of those who created it.

Like Daniel in the lion’s den, Berlin’s new Catholic archbishop met the media on Tuesday to face accusations he was homophobic and far too conservative for such a prominent post in the free-wheeling German capital. Rainer Maria Woelki, a surprise choice for the high-profile post, professed respect for gays, denied membership in the staunchly conservative Opus Dei group and said he did not come to Berlin to point a censuring finger at non-Catholics.Berlin’s gay community and liberal media reacted with dismay to his appointment last week, saying the Cologne-based prelate was “backwards-minded� and the wrong man for the job. But...

"Refugees ought not to come to Germany," announces Die Welt. The position that Berlin is expected to adopt when European interior ministers meet to discuss immigration on 11 April is unlikely to be welcomed by Italy which has called for solidarity in the drive to cope with thousands of immigrants who have recently arrived from North Africa. “Italy’s dirty tricks amount to unacceptable blackmail," remarks the conservative daily, which nonetheless acknowledges that "it is inadmissible that Italy and Malta pay the price for changes that are in all of Europe’s interest." For Die Welt, Europe should come together to invest...

President Reagan Centennial: Mr. Gorbachev Tear Down This Wall! In honor of the 100th Birthday of President Ronald Reagan below is one of the great hallmarks of his political legacy and Presidency.

Doctors at a Berlin hospital have made a medical breakthrough after capturing live MRI images of the miracle of birth. The pictures, taken after a German mother agreed to give birth inside a magnetic-resonance imaging machine, could provide valuable new insights into the birthing process and allow future lives to be saved. Gynaecologist Ernst Beinder at Berlin's Charité Hospital said the birth proceeded normally and the machine filmed all the movements and processes that went on inside the womb.

Unemployment in Germany fell below 3m in October for the first time in 18 years, according to unadjusted figures released by the federal labour office. The government in Berlin greeted the news with delight and saw it as confirmation that its measures to revive the economy from last year’s recession had been timely and effective. Seasonally adjusted jobless figures showed rather less improvement, with a decline of just 3,000 in registered unemployed for a total figure of 3.153m, or 7.5 per cent of the labour force. The figures were leaked on Wednesday, a day early, by Ursula von der Leyen,...

German flags have sprouted like red, black and gold wildflowers across Berlin this summer. They're appearing on balconies, cars, bicycles, storefront windows, even painted on children's cheeks. Few can match Youssef Bassal's. Eager to show his enthusiasm for Germany's soccer team during the World Cup, Mr. Bassal, a 38-year old Lebanese immigrant, unfurled a 60-by-15-foot German flag a few weeks ago, on the facade of the building that houses his cell-phone store. Mr. Bassal knew his Fahne, as the Germans call it, would draw onlookers. What he didn't anticipate was the reaction—outrage. During the flag's first night on exhibit, Mr....

Does anyone know here I might find online audio and/or video of the Irving Berlin song "This Is a Great Country"? I'd like to post it on my Facebook page.

A Berlin police spokesman told the Jerusalem Post on Monday that two young Israelis were violently attacked in a Berlin disco because of their nationality. The spokesman said the attack prompted the police to issue a statement terming the attack as “anti-Semitic.” According to statements from two male Israelis aged 18 and 22, a Palestinian man was responsible for the assault. He asked the 22-year-old Israeli about his nationality, who replied that he is a citizen of Israel.

BERLIN — German authorities have shut down Berlin's main international airport after construction workers discovered a World War II bomb there. A police spokesman told The Associated Press on Wednesday the bomb's weight is estimated at a quarter ton. Police said no planes are allowed to land or take off from Tegel airport until experts manage to defuse the bomb. Police are blocking all access roads. Local media reported the airport would remain closed until the evening, forcing the cancellation or diversion of dozens of flights.

Germany's Jewish community on Monday warned of an "alarming" rise in anti-Semitic violence by Arab and Turkish immigrants after Berlin police reported two unrelated attacks against Jews over the weekend. "There's an urgent need to fight the roots of anti-Semitism, especially coming from young Turks and Arabs, and to effectively counter it," the Jewish Community in Berlin said in a statement. "That the violence from the immigrant community is being increasingly aimed at Jews or people they assume are Jews is alarming," it added.

Armed robbers on Saturday struck at Germany's largest poker tournament, stealing money and injuring gamblers, police said. The masked gang burst into the Grand Hyatt hotel in central Berlin, where the tournament was taking place, threatening security staff and prompting a brief panic, police spokeswoman Heidi Vogt told AFP. Berlin's Tageszeitung newspaper reported on its website that six raiders armed with Kalashnikov assault rifles and grenades made off with 800,000 euros (1.1 million dollars). "Several masked, armed individuals entered the Grand Hyatt and fled with a haul of money," Vogt said, without giving details of the sum involved. She said...

http://www.un.org "Welcome to the United Nations: It's Your World" # Note: The following text is a quote: http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=33849 UN joins forces with computer giants to tackle Internet terrorism 22 February 2010 – The United Nations and computer giants, including Microsoft and Google, are joining forces to identify ways to combat terrorists’ use of the Internet to recruit members, organize criminal acts and raise money. The UN Working Group on Countering the Use of the Internet for Terrorist Purposes is holding talks with CISCO, Symantec and others in the United States city of Seattle to examine the technical issues involved in...

Artists pour into low rent, laissez-faire capital as new economy makes 20% of debt-hit city's GDP. snip . . . "It takes me back to when I used to go with my mother to the Reichstag in the days after the war and people were selling watches and coffee beans on the black market in an attempt to survive," she says, giving only her first name, Isabel. "In some ways it feels like Berlin is as poor now as it was then." snip . . . From an economic viewpoint the city is in disarray, with a jobless rate of...

The World Bids Farewell To Obama Charles Hawley Jan. 21, 2010, 9:32 AM US President Barack Obama suffered a painful defeat in Massachusetts on Tuesday. With mid-term elections looming, it means that Obama will have to fundamentally re-think his political course. German commentators say it is the end of hope. US President Barack Obama has had a number of difficult weeks during his first year in the White House. Right after he took office, he had to wade through a week full of partisan bickering over his economic stimulus package combined with a tax scandal surrounding Tom Daschle, the man...

The Berlin Wall was a world away from the apartheid wall built by Israel around Palestinian population centers, the U.S./South Korean military wall that separates family members from North Korea, or the expanded U.S. wall against immigrants on the border with Mexico. What is the difference? Those walls are aimed at repressing the workers and oppressed. The Berlin Wall, by contrast, was built in defense of the workers and oppressed.

EasyJet recalls magazine with Holocaust memorial fashion shoot Published: 24 Nov 09 10:14 CETOnline: http://www.thelocal.de/society/20091124-23481.html British discount airline easyJet has recalled some 280,000 copies of its in-flight magazine after complaints about a fashion shoot staged at Berlin’s Holocaust memorial, daily Financial Times Deutschland reported on Tuesday. ADVERTISING Heavy wind storms rage through Germany - National (24 Nov 09)Berlin plans 'integration contract' for immigrants - Politics (23 Nov 09)Antique car dealer finds Hitler's Mercedes - Society (23 Nov 09) The November edition of “easyJet Traveller,” which features a fashion section with fashion models in provocative poses amid the pillars of the...

11/13/2009 - RANDOLPH AIR FORCE BASE, Texas (AFNS) -- They had never met face to face, but a chance encounter between the two conjured a touching reunion six decades later at the Randolph Air Show Nov. 7. Retired Col. Gail Halvorsen, a 1st lieutenant at the time, earned his spot in in history flying C-54s and C-47s during the Berlin Airlift of World War II. He earned the nickname "The Candy Bomber" from dropping candy from his aircraft to children below while flying over the American sector of Berlin. "One day I met some kids in Berlin at the fence...

It is always interesting to see how these two respond to the same event. In the case of the fall of the Berlin Wall, both Obama and McCain delivered remarks -- Obama, via video, to the assembled masses in Berlin, and McCain to the students at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (what a difference a few million votes make). Obama never mentions the words Russia or Soviet Union. As Ed Morrissey writes, to hear Obama tell it you'd think "there was some vague tyrant that used to oppress eastern Europe but has since receded into the mists...

Germany's ranking in the Prosperity Index is a validation of those who risked their lives to tear down the Berlin Wall, writes Ryan Streeter. Twenty years ago, the Berlin Wall fell. Its collapse marked the beginning of a reunified Germany and the end of the Cold War. On Monday, Berliners knocked down a wall of Styrofoam “dominoes” - more fanciful than foreboding - to commemorate the moment when East Germans began hammering their way to freedom. Dominoes are quite a fitting symbol indeed.

It’s bad enough that President Obama could not be bothered to attend the celebrations marking the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. But Hillary Clinton’s refusal to even acknowledge the role played by Ronald Reagan in the Wall’s demise as well as the downfall of Communism was highly insulting towards one of the greatest figures of our time, and reeked of petty and partisan mean-spiritedness. The Secretary of State’s remarks yesterday in Berlin completely erased from history the huge contribution played not only by President Reagan but also by the United States in confronting the Soviet Empire....

The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 was a benchmark that made an impression on me as it did for millions of people around the world. The sight of thousands of East Germans pouring into West Berlin, particularly the youth who had never experienced freedom before, was a surreal scene not only for the people of Europe but also for us born in the Middle East. Westerners looked with shock at the peoples of East Germany, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungary, Rumania, Bulgaria and the Soviet Union surging against totalitarianism. Central Europeans stared with awe at the countries who never surrendered...

On November 9, 2009, the world will celebrate the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Naturally, in Germany, there will be commemorations of the event, and the collapse of Communism in Europe. "snip" And given all of this, it is safe to say that Barack Obama will attend the 20th anniversary celebration of the fall of the Wall, right? Wrong. While Candidate Barack Obama was perfectly willing to go to Germany during the 2008 Presidential campaign, President Barack Obama has chosen to skip the 20th anniversary celebrations altogether. Needless to say, this has not elicited much outrage...

There was one world leader absent for today’s commemorations marking the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Surprisingly enough, it’s President Barack Obama, who found time last year to give a campaign speech there last year, which Der Spiegel summed up as “People of the World, Look at Me”. The White House has cited a packed schedule, though looking at it he had nothing much on yesterday (brief chat to reporters about healthcare – by far his biggest priority) and just blah briefings and a bill signing today until a metting this evening with Benjamin Netanyahu. This...

It has been 20 long years since the fall of the Berlin wall. Millions of people who were trapped in their oppressive, government-planned states suffered as a result of collectivism. Over 100 million people died at the hands of sycophantic, megalomaniac leaders that claimed they could bring us a better world than so-called capitalism and individual liberty has brought us. I say "so-called" because nowhere in the world does capitalism truly exist. In the countries where it is allowed to exist in even small proportions, wealth and prosperity reign. However, the collectivists hate even this small proportion of capitalism that...

Barack Obama was quick off the mark last year in heading for Berlin during his election campaign, when he was cheered by a crowd of 200,000 adoring Germans. Yet as president of the United States he has decided to stay away from Berlin as the city commemorates the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. In contrast, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown have both made the trip to Germany, while Obama has decided to send his Secretary of State. It is shameful when the US president can’t even be bothered to show up...

"The president does not plan to travel to Germany to attend the 20th anniversary celebration Monday of the fall of the Berlin Wall, drawing heated criticism from those who say he's ignoring a shining triumph of American-inspired democracy."

Apparently, he only has time to go to Berlin when it's all about him!Rich Lowry points out that: In his first year in office, Barack Obama has visited more foreign countries than any other president. He’s touched ground in 16 countries, easily outpacing Bill Clinton (3) and George W. Bush(11). But there’s one stop Obama won’t make. He has begged off going to Berlin next week to attend ceremonies commemorating the fall of the Berlin Wall. His schedule is reportedly too crowded. Obama had time to fly all the way over to Copenhagen to plead for Chicago to get the...