Free Republic

Con Coughlin, The TelegraphJuly 26, 2014 Exclusive: Hamas has paid North Korea for missiles and communications equipment in arms deal worth hundreds of thousands of dollars Hamas militants are attempting to negotiate a new arms deal with North Korea for missiles and communications equipment that will allow them to maintain their offensive against Israel, according to Western security sources. Security officials say the deal between Hamas and North Korea is worth hundreds of thousands of dollars and is being handled by a Lebanese-based trading company with close ties to the militant Palestinian organisation based in east Beirut. Hamas officials are...

Speaking at a high-level security conference in Aspen, Colorado, outgoing US Defense Intelligence Agency head Michael Flynn warned against the dangers of toppling Hamas, saying what may replace the Islamist group could be even worse. “If Hamas were destroyed and gone, we would probably end up with something much worse. The region would end up with something much worse,” Flynn, a lieutenant general, told the conference Saturday, according to Reuters.He warned that with Hamas out of the picture, the Islamic State, or something like the brutal Islamist group ruling over parts of Syria and Iraq, could take its place.Flynn also said...

Gallup has released the results of a poll on American views of the ongoing Israeli ground incursion into Gaza and larger Israel-Palestine issues, which it conducted on July 22 and 23. Gallup asked Americans whether they thought Israel's actions in Gaza were "mostly justified" or "mostly unjustified." Americans are split on that question, but overwhelmingly think Hamas' actions are "mostly unjustified." There are a number of other findings: Americans who have more education are more likely to support Israel's Gaza incursion, for example, while Americans under age 30 oppose it by a two-to-one margin. There a number of interesting findings in...

JERUSALEM — Israel’s top ministers decided Saturday night to extend a humanitarian halt to hostilities in the Gaza Strip for 24 hours, but said their troops would continue to operate to destroy tunnels from Gaza into its territory during Sunday’s pause. The decision came despite continued fire from Gaza into Israel during Israel’s initial four-hour extension of a 12-hour humanitarian pause on Saturday that both sides had agreed to at the request of the United Nations. Three mortars landed in open areas near Gaza just as the original lull was expiring at 8 p.m. Before midnight, more than a dozen...

The United Nations is facing tough criticism and allegations of major misconduct after caches of rockets were found hidden at a UN-run school in Gaza before reportedly being handed to terrorists, sparking a global scandal that threatens to further undermine the credibility of the dictator-dominated world body. Making matters even worse, after being found, the U.S. taxpayer-funded UN “Relief and Works Agency” (UNRWA) handed the deadly rockets over to Hamas, the terrorist group that runs Gaza with an iron fist and hides behind Arab civilians while firing thousands of rockets into Israel. Now the global outfit is complaining that its...

Militants resumed firings rockets into Israel from Gaza on Saturday, rejecting an extension to a ceasefire in a conflict in which more than 1,000 Palestinians, mostly civilians, have died. Israel had agreed to extend an initial 12-hour pause in the fighting by a further four hours but this was rejected by Islamist group Hamas, which dominates Gaza. Warning sirens sounded across the country as rockets were fired as far as the Tel Aviv area, police said. Israeli tank fire killed a man in the southern Gaza Strip, a local official said, announcing the first fatality after the breakdown of the...

Hamas militants are attempting to negotiate a new arms deal with North Korea for missiles and communications equipment that will allow them to maintain their offensive against Israel, according to Western security sources. Security officials say the deal between Hamas and North Korea is worth hundreds of thousands of dollars and is being handled by a Lebanese-based trading company with close ties to the militant Palestinian organisation based in east Beirut. Hamas officials are believed to have already made an initial cash down payment to secure the deal, and are now hoping that North Korea will soon begin shipping extra...

Warning video has very graphic content! It is being reported as suicide vest bomb, a car bomb, an Israel missile and as fake....?? Most likely a Hamas bomb killing Palestinians to falsely accuse Israel.

The Israeli military says three rockets were fired from Gaza after a Hamas official told reporters the group has rejected a four-hour extension of a humanitarian truce proposed by Israel. Sami Abu Zuhri sent a text message to reporters Saturday, saying: "No agreement to extending the calm for an additional four hours." Israel has set its own terms for the lull, saying it would continue demolishing Hamas military tunnels under the Gaza-Israel border.

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli aircraft struck 30 houses in the Gaza Strip early Friday, killing a leader of the militant Islamic Jihad group and two of his sons, as Israel's Security Cabinet was to decide whether to expand its operation or consider ideas for a cease-fire.

Israeli anger at US envoy for his attempt to forge a ceasefire with Hamas sponsors Turkey, Qatar, in Paris talks. An Israeli minister accused U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry of “digging a tunnel under the the Egyptian ceasefire proposal” by accepting Hamas's conditions for a ceasefire in Paris talks Saturday, Channel 2 reported. The minister's identity was not revealed. Kerry and top diplomats from Europe and the Middle East who gathered in Paris Saturday called for an extension to a temporary truce declared Saturday between Israel and Hamas. However, neither Israel, nor Egypt, nor the Palestinian Authority under Mahmoud...

Israel’s Iron Dome missile defense system has been highly visible protecting its airspace during Operation Protective Edge. But exactly how the military is locating Hamas’ labyrinth of underground tunnels between Israel and Gaza – and whether it is using new technologies to uncover them – remains a closely held secret. “Due to security concerns, we cannot specify the tools or methods used to uncover these tunnels. Exposing our capabilities would hamper our ability to address this lethal threat,” an Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokeswoman said in an email to FoxNews.com. “However, using precise intelligence combined with specialized units which use...

Three rockets were fired at the Eshkol Regional Council as the 12 hour cease-fire that began at 8 a.m. on Saturday came to an end.

Unguarded Comments Suggest Kerry Frustration At Civilian Toll In Gaza • 'It's a hell of a pinpoint operation' captured on open microphone Dominic Rushe in New York 20 July 2014 The secretary of state, John Kerry, on Sunday appeared to criticise Israel’s claims about the targeted scope of its attacks on Gaza, as a open microphone caught him talking to an aide ahead of a TV interview. “It’s a hell of a pinpoint operation, it’s a hell of a pinpoint operation,” Kerry, who was appearing on Fox News Sunday as part of a tour of all five main US talkshows,...

When TMZ caught up with comedian Joan Rivers Thursday outside of LAX she unleashed an emotional rant on the Israeli and Palestinian conflict, screaming, "You are all insane, they [Palestinians] started it!" Rivers got animated at the paparazzi's question about the mounting civilian casualties, saying, “Let me just tell you, if New Jersey were firing rockets into New York, we would wipe them out. If we heard they were digging tunnels from New Jersey to New York, we would get rid of Jersey." Raising her voice, Rivers said, "Don't put your God damn things in private homes, don't put your...

(Language Warning) When TMZ caught up with comedian Joan Rivers Thursday outside of LAX she unleashed an emotional rant on the Israeli and Palestinian conflict, screaming, "You are all insane, they [Palestinians] started it!" Rivers got animated at the paparazzi's question about the mounting civilian casualties, saying, “Let me just tell you, if New Jersey were firing rockets into New York, we would wipe them out. If we heard they were digging tunnels from New Jersey to New York, we would get rid of Jersey."

There is a growing consensus in the United States and around the world that the way to end the Israel-Gaza war is to disarm Hamas. President Obama seems to be the only hold-out. On July 24, a bipartisan group of U.S. senators introduced a resolution calling on the Obama Administration to make the disarming of Hamas a central part of any cease-fire proposal. Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, a Republican, is spearheading this effort together with Democratic Senators Charles Schumer of New York and Ben Cardin of Maryland. When Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agreed on July 15 to...

“This was a not-so-subtle message delivered by the el-Sissi regime that the ties between the United States and Egypt have cooled considerably,” Jonathan Schanzer, vice president for research at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, told TheBlaze on Wednesday. State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki brushed off any concerns about the security screening, tweeting that Kerry was focused on the objective of his mission – securing a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas. The Jewish-American news site the Algemeiner termed the incident “symbolic,” describing it in part as “humiliation in Egypt.” The International Business Times observed that foreign governments “normally trust U.S....

12-hour humanitarian truce between Israel and Hamas went into force on Saturday morning, as top diplomats pressed efforts to secure a longer-term ceasefire. The fragile ceasefire began at 8:00 am (0500 GMT). Hamas said it and other groups in Gaza had reached “national consensus on a humanitarian truce”, and Israel later confirmed it would observe “a humanitarian window in the Gaza Strip”. The Hamas-run interior ministry in Gaza advised people not to approach bombed-out buildings and militant bases for fear of “explosive objects”. The Israeli military warned Gaza residents who had been told to evacuate their homes not to return...

During the ground offensive IDF soldiers have also exposed a tunnel camouflaged under a bathroom. Inside a house in the neighborhood of Shuja'iyya in Gaza a tunnel shaft was found under the sink, in between the sewage pipes and the cleaning supplies. According to IDF assessments this tunnel was not originally destined to aid terrorists with infiltration to Israel, but was built for a different destination. This is a command and control tunnels which connects between different destinations inside Gaza Strip, in order to enable Hamas activists to hide inside it for longer periods of time, without being exposed to...