Free Republic

Some 150 Israeli Arabic-speaking Christians on Sunday demonstrated outside the European Union mission in Tel Aviv, demanding that the international community stop nitpicking against Israel and start combatting the severe persecution of Christians everywhere else in the Middle East. “Nations, organizations and international missions are quick to raise an accusing finger against Israel at every opportunity,” said Father Gabriel Nadaf, spiritual father of the Israeli Christian Recruitment Forum, which organized the rally. Those same nations and organizations “don’t life a finger against the ethnic cleansing of Christians in the Middle East,” the priest continued. Father Nadaf went on to explain...

Today, the G8 minus 1 met in the Hague and, rather than kick out Russia outright, simply reformed as the G7, thereby punishing (in their minds) Russia for annexing part of the sovereign nation of Ukraine. ("Countries of the G7 end their membership in the G8," read the headline of the Soviet-era wire agency ITAR-TASS.)Really, though, it was the organization--and Russia--returning to a more natural state: The G8 just went back to being the organization it was until 1998, when Bill Clinton invited Russia in, hammering what he hoped would be the final nail in the Cold War coffin. Since then, Russia underwent...

Europe’s far left is set to almost double its deputies in the upcoming European Parliament elections in May. Poll predictions indicate that the European United Left/Nordic Green Left (GUE/NGL) group is set to become the parliament’s third or fourth largest group, with the number of deputies rising from the current 35 to around 60. At third place, it would replace the liberals (ALDE), behind the center-left S&D and center-right EPP. […] The parties are against what they describe as neo-liberal policy-making at the EU level, want more funding for social programs, and want to create what they describe as “another...

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D–Nev.) is facing a revolt among Republicans for adding controversial language to an aid package for Ukraine.The Senate is expected to vote on the Ukraine measure next week. The controversial provisions, which have support of the Obama administration and liberals from both parties, would increase U.S. financial support to the International Monetary Fund.A growing number of Republicans warn that attaching the IMF language would reduce U.S. power while expanding Russia’s influence on the global stage in the wake of its annexation of Crimea.>>> Q&A: Why Do Conservatives Oppose the IMF Reform Package?Yesterday, Sen. Ted Cruz...

Vladimir Putin running rampant in Ukraine showcases how the Obama administration's abdication of global leadership is making the world a more dangerous place. Instead of providing clarity to our nation and our allies, the Obama administration offers tortured semantics. "Kinetic action" glamorizes the failed policy of leading from behind in Libya. A "spontaneous protest" explains the coordinated al Qaeda attack on American officials in Benghazi. The interim agreement over Iran's nuclear program -- described by one of our closest allies as a "historic mistake" -- is in this universe referred to as a display of "international unity." And on Friday,...

President Obama promised Friday there would be “costs” if Russia moved troops into Ukraine, but he didn’t specify what those costs might be. Sen. John McCain has several suggestions for Obama, including the sanctioning of high-level Russian officials; restarting missile defense plans in Eastern Europe; and bringing Georgia, a former Soviet republic, into NATO. McCain said he plans to push from the Congressional side, he told The Daily Beast in an exclusive interview Saturday evening. McCain wants the administration to expand its threat to pull out of the G8 Summit in Sochi scheduled for June. That limited move is unlikely...

The leaders of the Group of Eight have suspended Russia's participation in the body over Moscow's activities in Ukraine, the French foreign minister said Tuesday. In an interview with Europe-1 radio, Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said that "it is envisaged that all the other countries, the seven leading countries, will unite without Russia," The Associated Press reported. The other seven members had already pulled out of preparations for a G8 summit set to be held in June in the Russian city of Sochi. Fabius and French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian earlier postponed a trip to Moscow to meet with...

The world's leading industrial powers threatened further sanctions to deter the Kremlin from invading other parts of Ukraine and boycotted what was to be a Group of Eight summit hosted by President Vladimir Putin. Meeting for the first time since last week's annexation of Crimea by Russia, Group of Seven leaders said they won't attend the planned G-8 meeting which was to have to been held in Sochi, site of the Winter Olympics, and will instead hold their own summit in June in Brussels. "We remain ready to intensify actions including coordinated sectoral sanctions that will have an increasingly significant...

President Barack Obama and leaders of the world’s largest industrialized countries expelled Russia from the group until it “changes course” in Ukraine and formally canceled plans to attend an economic summit in Russia in June. The move was aimed at Russian President Vladmir Putin’s plan to host the G-8 group of economic powers at Sochi, Russia, which would have been its second starring role on the world stage after this winter’s Olympics. Instead, the G-7 leaders will meet in Brussels without Putin. At the same time, the group said it would not send its foreign ministers to a planned G-8...

A “Special Report” panel today discussed how G7 leaders met today in The Hague and announced that they would be excluding Russia from the G8 and boycotting a planned summit in Sochi. Jason Riley, of the Wall Street Journal, said Russian President Vladimir Putin is rebuilding the Russian empire while President Barack Obama and our allies in Europe are sitting around discussing international law and “kicking Putin out of clubs he doesn’t care about in the first place.” Riley said Putin knows that the administration doesn’t have the stomach for confrontation and will continue to take advantage of that.

THE HAGUE—Leaders of the world's largest economies agreed Monday to effectively remove Russia from the Group of Eight nations in response to Moscow's military intervention in Ukraine. The leaders, meeting in emergency session, also agreed that they would begin to exert punitive sanctions on Russia's energy, banking, finance and arms industries unless Moscow dialed back plans to seize the region of Crimea from Ukraine. "This group came together because of shared beliefs and shared responsibilities. Russia's actions in recent weeks are not consistent with them," the U.S., U.K., Germany, France, Canada, Japan and Italy said in a joint statement. "We...

Russia is winning the Ukraine crisis. While Moscow may have suffered some economic sanctions, the world saw a disobedient Russian neighbor being forcibly brought to heel. The land grab was no doubt designed to encourage the others—Estonia, Latvia, Hungary, Georgia – all those unfortunates who live nearby. And it will. There are other winners, even on the side of the somewhat hapless angels. Like Germany, which is currently less an angel, and Poland, which is currently more. Before taking a mildly more aggressive position on sanctions Friday, Germany had been the least enthusiastic major European power about aggressively confronting Russia....

Cars were set alight and stink bombs set off after a far-left demo against “state repression” descended into chaos in Berlin over the weekend. Two policemen were injured and 17 protesters arrested in the 12-hour long police operation across the city, which saw almost 2,000 officers deployed. Organizers said they were protesting against heavy-handed police tactics such as those seen in Hamburg in early January, where disturbances led to a long crackdown and police restricted zone. Over the course of the weekend, an estimated 1,300 people took to the streets in Kreuzberg, Moabit and Friedrichshain including feminists, members of the...

William Hague has warned Russia that it faces long-term "isolation and stagnation" over the crisis in Ukraine. The foreign secretary said it was time to consider a "new state of relations" different to that of the past 20 years. Writing in the Sunday Telegraph, he said the UK and its European allies would not "run scared".

STOCKHOLM—A dispute between the Swedish armed forces and ThyssenKrupp AG TKA.XE +1.39% threatens one of the German industrial giant's most-profitable operations and could shake up the growing global submarine business. The row, which is partly over export possibilities, has prompted Sweden to yank contracts for the next generation of Swedish submarines from ThyssenKrupp, the world's largest exporter of nonnuclear submarines. Sweden has signaled that it instead is considering giving the work to Swedish defense company Saab AB. Currently, Saab doesn't build manned submarines, but it acknowledges it is trying to poach engineers from ThyssenKrupp's submarine unit, which is based around...

German police have arrested a former Nazi medic on suspicion of "multiple counts" of aiding and abetting murder when he was serving as a medic in the Auschwitz death camp, according to the local prosecutors’ office. A 93-year-old suspect was arrested on Monday at his home near the town of Neubrandenburg, in the federal state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern in northern Germany. A doctor examined the man after his arrest and determined that the suspect “was in good enough health to be held in custody while authorities investigate further,” according to Stefan Urbanek, spokesman from the prosecutors' office in Schwerin, the state...

resident Barack Obama flies Sunday to a Europe shaken by Vladimir Putin’s seizure of Crimea and his threats against eastern parts of Ukraine. At a summit conference at The Hague on preventing nuclear terrorism – scheduled long before the Ukraine crisis – Obama will confer with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and other leaders. On Monday afternoon Obama will meet with President Xi Jinping of China, Russia’s neighbor and sometime rival. Putin has forced the United States and Europe to refocus on the origins of the modern transatlantic alliance -- the 1949 NATO defense partnership designed to prevent a Russian invasion...

An overwhelming majority of Lufthansa pilots voted on Friday to go on strike over pay and conditions. No date has yet been set for the action. Of the airline's 5,400 pilots, 99.1 percent voted to take industrial action on Friday. The as-yet unscheduled strike could hit Europe's biggest airline any time in the coming weeks. Flights operated by Lufthansa, Lufthansa Cargo and Germanwings will be affected. Pilots' union Vereinigung Cockpit (VC) said it would give 48 hours' notice before any strike, in order to minimise inconvenience to passengers. Pilots would also avoid the busy period over the Easter break from...

Germany on Saturday accused Russia of trying to splinter Europe, as a Cold War-style struggle over the future of ex-Soviet Ukraine ratcheted up following the Kremlin’s defiant annexation of Crimea. The haunting warning from a nation whose friendship Russian President Vladimir Putin had nurtured over his 14 years in power came amid Western efforts to shore up backing for the besieged interim leaders in Kiev who toppled a Kremlin-backed regime last month. […] The foreign minister of Germany—its economic power playing a decisive role in forging Europe’s response to Putin’s increasingly belligerent stance—warned that the continent’s entire future was at...

Back in 2010, I shared a video that predicted a catastrophic end to the welfare state. I said it was an example of “Libertarian Porn” because: …it is designed for the dark enjoyment of people who think the government is destroying the nation. If you don’t like bloated government and statist intervention and you think that the policies being imposed by Washington are going to lead to hyperinflation and societal collapse, then you will get a certain level of grim satisfaction by watching the video. While I also stated in that post that I thought the video was far too...