Free Republic

To keep insisting that terrorism has nothing to do with religion after every new jihadi atrocity is no longer tenable. It is galling for millions of people, not just Indians but around the world, when this clichéd phrase is parroted even as reports go viral of the attackers’ in-your-face assertion of religion. Followers of most major religions have killed in the name of their faith (more on this later). But as author and TV host Fareed Zakaria has said, “The next time you hear of a terror attack – no matter where, no matter what the circumstances, you will likely...

Illustrative: The Israel Navy launches its new 'Barak 8' missile defense system on November 26, 2015. (screen capture: IDF Spokesperson's Unit) The Indian military on Thursday successfully test fired the Barak 8, a surface-to-air missile defense system it developed jointly with Israel, reports in Indian media said. The system, made up of a radar array and missile launcher, successfully detected and downed an unmanned aerial vehicle, an official from India’s Defense Research and Development Organization said. “The test launch was a grand success and it met all the targets,” he told the local NDTV News. Developed jointly by the DRDL...

It is almost the norm for soldiers, on leaving the IDF, to fly to India to ‘decompress.’ Here, a tank commander who served in the 2014 Gaza war explains the appeal, and details the process of regaining control over his life after ‘3 years of alarms each morning, of always having an assignment, of constant uncertainty as to when I’d be home next’ I wake up to the sound of laughing children, stare out the window at the blanket of clouds covering the valley below, and think of nothing. Finally, nothing. Like many of those traveling to India, I have...

Congress should quit funding Pakistan's due to the country's complicity in terrorism.Ted Poe is a Republican U.S. representative for Texas' 2nd district. He is a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee and serves as chairman of the Subcommittee on Terrorism, Non-Proliferation and Trade. The House of Representatives recently gave Pakistan a $200 million raise. In all, it was a $900 million payday for a country that to this day is supporting terrorist groups that kill our service men and women in Afghanistan. It is well known by now that Pakistan gave safe harbor to Osama bin Laden. Before he met...

Pakistani security forces appeared to be trying to dampen down reporting this weekend on the background of Tashfeen Malik, who mounted an attack alongside her husband that killed 14 people in California. Three professors at Malik's university said they had been advised not to talk to the media, while men claiming to be from Pakistan's security agencies told reporters to drop their investigations into her background on pain of arrest. An official at the interior ministry later said this was due to a "misunderstanding". U.S. authorities are treating last Wednesday's mass shooting in San Bernardino as an "act of terrorism"....

To say that what follows is pure fiction, is insulting those who lost their lives, finding out otherwise. But to be more accurate, is to endanger those who are still battling for theirs.ROPEBy Capt Raghu RamanChandigarh. The last link between madness and sanity. I arrived in the late hours of the night. It was bitterly cold. Usually is, this time of the year. Clear sky though. They told me there was a confirmed flight next morning with my name on the manifest. There was nothing to do but to kill the night. The bar at 204 transit mess is a...

Union Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar left for Moscow on 30 October for a three-day visit before he leaves for ASEAN Defence Ministers' Meeting (ADMM-Plus) in Malaysia. The takeaway of this trip is however the fact that all measures are in place for India to acquire world's most advanced anti-ballistic missile system — the S-400. Previously known as S-300PMU-3, S-400 is a new generation anti-aircraft weapon system developed by Russia's Almaz Central Design Bureau as an upgrade of the S-300 family. It is currently in service with the Russian Armed Forces. The S-400 is designed to protect nuclear reactors, population centres...

These great photos and statement out of HAL today on the LCH's progress, including hot & high tests in Ladakh. Here's what they sent out: HAL successfully carried out the hot and the high-altitude trials of indigenously designed, developed attack chopper Light Combat Helicopter (LCH) at Leh recently. “These seasonal trials - including cold weather trials carried out at Leh during February this year - have been completed as part of the certification process. The flight trials at Leh have established hover performance and low speed handling characteristics of the helicopter under extreme weather conditions at different altitudes (3200...

The 22-year-old was one of the five terrorists who had crossed over from Pakistan-occupied Kashmir (PoK) and hid in the cave after army detected the infiltration and was hunting for them in Rafiabad area of Kashmir. He panicked and begged for mercy after army commandos fired ‘chilly grenades’ and teargas shells into a cave to flush out the terrorists who were holed up there since last night. After crossing over from PoK in a place over 100 kms north of here, the five Lashker-e-Taiba militants made several attempts to breach the tight cordon placed along the LoC, army officials said....

“Its fun doing this,” said Naved, a suspected Lashker-e-Taiba militant from Pakistan who was caught alive after the attack on a BSF convoy here on Wednesday that killed two constables. Usman, who says he hails from Faislabad in Pakistan, claimed before the media that he entered the Jammu region 12 days ago along with a fellow terrorist identified as Momin Khan. Khan was killed in retaliatory fire by BSF. This is the first suspected Pakistani terrorist to be captured alive after Ajmal Kasab, who was nabbed during the dreaded terror attack in Mumbai in 2008. “I came to kill Hindus,”...

Urdu document passed to U.S. media by Pakistani with links to the Taliban Preparations underway to attack India as a way of enticing U.S. into battle Urges Taliban factions to join with ISIS in bid to form a worldwide caliphate Worldwide caliphate will 'behead every person that rebels against Allah' U.S. intelligence officials say they believe the document is authenticA recruitment document understood to be written by ISIS militants has revealed the terrorist group's plans for all-out war to bring about 'the end of the world'. The Urdu document, passed to the American Media Institute by a Pakistani citizen...

Barak-8 eight-round launchers can be rapidly deployed on land to provide point defense for critical locations, and in networked groups for area defense. Following successful trials late last year, IAI’s Barak-8 medium-range surface-to-air missile is being delivered to customers, and is also now fielded with the IDF (Israel Defense Forces). The company does not discuss its customers, but acknowledges that the missile has been procured by Israel and India, plus others. Non-Israeli sources state that the Barak-8 has been adopted by the Indian Navy, which already employs the Barak-1, for service aboard its latest frigates, destroyers and aircraft carriers. Following...

The winning words in the nail-biter final were 'scherenschnitte' and 'nunatak' In a dramatic, flawless final round, two eighth-graders proved to be joint winners at the 2015 Scripps National Spelling Bee. One a girl and one a boy, one from Kansas and one from Missouri, one a five-time finalist and one a six-timer, 13-year-old Vanya Shivashankar and 14-year-old Gokul Venkatachalam put both their hands on the trophy and thrust it into the air on Thursday evening—after spelling word after word that few people could even hope to pronounce correctly. Shivashankar’s winning word was scherenschnitte, meaning the art of cutting paper...

Washington: The median income of Indian-Americans, which is the richest ethnic community in the US, in the year 2013 was $100,547, Census Bureau said in its latest report. The figure is almost double the national median income and significantly more than even white, non-Hispanic Americans whose median income is approximately $57,000. In its latest report, the US Census Bureau said Indian Americans are the third largest Asian community in the United States after Chinese and Filipinos. The Chinese (except Taiwanese) population was the largest Asian group, followed by Filipinos (3.6 million), Indian American (3.5 million), Vietnamese (1.9 million), Koreans (1.8...

The non-issuance of visas to India continues to irk thousands of Pakistani Americans as the former remains hell bent to grind an axe with Pakistanis, regardless of borders or their new nationalities. At the moment, there are an estimated 500,000 Pakistani Americans in the US and the rate of their continually burgeoning numbers makes them the second fastest growing group of Asian immigrants in the US. According to the Pew Research Centre, the entire population of Asian Americans, which includes Pakistanis, is among those in the highest income bracket as well as the best educated in the country. However, despite...

1971, A War Hero Remembers War Hero Major General Ian Cardozo (retd)was wounded in the battle of Sylhet in Bangladesh in the 1971 war with Pakistan. He lost his leg in a landmine blast, but conquered his disability and went became the first disabled officer in the Indian Army to command an infantry battalion and then a brigade. Awarded a Sena Medal for gallantry, General Cardozo is presently Chairman of the Rehabilitation Council of India and has authored The Sinking of INS Khukri -- Survivors Stories and Param Vir -- Our Heroes In Battle. In conversation with Claude Arpi, the...

Madison police today released video of officers throwing a 57-year-old Indian citizen on the sidewalk outside his son's home. The incident left the grandfather temporarily paralyzed and hospitalized with fused vertebrae. Chirag Patel said his father, Sureshbhai Patel, was visiting to help his wife care for their new baby, a 17-month-old son, so he could pursue his masters degree in electrical engineering at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. Madison police officer Eric Parker today turned himself in to face assault charges. Chief Larry Muncey told a small press conference in Madison that he also recommended that Parker be fired...

Another barbaric chapter of an epic conflict between the presence and promise of modernity, and the bitter, toxic romance of regression was written on January 7 in Paris. This war, raging across the world, is a confrontation between the lethal adrenalin of faith supremacy and belief that faith equality is the basis of civilised political and social stability. The epicentre of this war is within the Muslim successor states of the Mughal and Ottoman empires; but its destructive reach extends far beyond its immediate habitat. The warriors of this Islamic jihad are the masked vanguard of a movement that found...

Benjamin Netanyahu, left, meets with Narenda Modi in New York City on September 28, 2014. (Photo credit: Avi Ohayon/GPO) With the EU moving farther away from its traditional support of Israel, it seems as if the Jewish state is finding a new ally in an uncommon place. According to The Hindu newspaper, India is considering moving away from supporting the Palestinian cause at the UN, Indian government sources said. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is looking to move his foreign policies regarding the Palestinians to a state of abstention, the two sources claimed. “Like other foreign policy issues, the Modi...

n the fall of 2008, a 30-year-old computer expert named Zarrar Shah roamed from outposts in the northern mountains of Pakistan to safe houses near the Arabian Sea, plotting mayhem in Mumbai, India’s commercial gem. Mr. Shah, the technology chief of Lashkar-e-Taiba, the Pakistani terror group, and fellow conspirators used Google Earth to show militants the routes to their targets in the city. He set up an Internet phone system to disguise his location by routing his calls through New Jersey. Shortly before an assault that would kill 166 people, including six Americans, Mr. Shah searched online for a Jewish...