Free Republic

Is the U.S. Failing in Afghanistan? It was malice in wonderland at the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Thursday as Bush Administration envoys insisted things are getting better in Afghanistan, while angry lawmakers from both parties cited facts and figures showing just the opposite. Even the senior Republican on the panel, Senator Richard Lugar, found the Administration's claims wanting. "I'm not sure that we have a plan for Afghanistan," he said. Long seen as the "forgotten war" eclipsed by Iraq in U.S. priorities, Afghanistan is in the Washington spotlight this week with the release of three independent reports concluding...

A human rights organization given special consultative status by the United Nations wants a U.S. judge to make an order halting a Christian man's deportation to Egypt permanent – because of the likelihood he would be tortured. The request comes in the form of a court pleading from the Washington-based American Center for Law and Justice, whose European affiliate, the European Centre for Law and Justice in Strasbourg, France, has been given "special consultative status" from the United Nations. The groups are asking a federal court in Pennsylvania to protect the human rights of Coptic Christian Sameh Khouzam, 38,...

CAIRO, Egypt (AP) -- One person is dead and more than a dozen others wounded in attacks on worshipers today at three Coptic Christian churches in Egypt. The simultaneous assaults in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria were carried out during Friday Mass by knife-wielding assailants. Police have set up checkpoints but the attackers got away. At least two of 17 people hurt are in serious condition.

JERSEY CITY, N.J. — Two people have been arrested in the murder of an Egyptian Christian family, authorities said Friday. The suspects were to be arraigned Friday afternoon in state Superior Court. The Hudson County prosecutor's office would not release the identities of those arrested or the charges they face until they appear in court.

By WAYNE PARRY The Associated Press JERSEY CITY, N.J. - The upstairs neighbor of an Egyptian Christian family found slain in their home in January was charged Friday, along with another man, in the murders. Edward McDonald, 25, who rented a second-floor apartment above Hossam Armanious and his family, pleaded not guilty to four counts of felony murder. Hamilton Sanchez, 30, faces the same charges and also pleaded not guilty. Sanchez during a court hearing began crying as he stood before a judge, his hands cuffed behind his back. "I didn't kill nobody. I didn't kill nobody, man. I didn't...

WASHINGTON -- Relatives of a slain New Jersey family of four were slated to meet with FBI officials and federal lawmakers Tuesday and planned to speak for the first time about the crimes.Hossam Armanious, 47, his 37-year-old wife Amal Garas, and their daughters, Sylvia, 15, and Monica, 8, all had puncture wounds to their throats. Their bodies were found bound and gagged in separate rooms of their Jersey City home on Jan. 14, a day before the family planned to throw Sylvia a Sweet 16 party. The family, Coptic Christians, came to the United States in 1997 from their native...

CAIRO, Egypt -- An estimated 100,000 chanting protesters crammed Cairo's main stadium Thursday in Egypt's largest demonstration against the U.S. threats of war against Iraq. "We came here because we cannot watch our sisters and brothers being killed in Palestine and about to be killed in Iraq and remain silent," said Safeya Mohamed a 20-year-old student from the Suez Canal city of Ismailia. Rally protesters began arriving at the stadium early Thursday from across the country, yelling chants such as "down with America," waving Iraqi and Palestinian flags and kicking effigies of President Bush.