Free Republic

Europe Could Face Hundreds Of Iranian Missiles - Gates By REUTERS June 17, 2010 WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. intelligence showing Iran likely would have the capability to attack Europe with "scores or even hundreds" of missiles factored into the Obama administration's decision to overhaul missile defenses, Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Thursday. Citing the growing Iranian missile threat, the United States announced plans last September to integrate sea- and land-based missile defenses in and around its NATO allies in Europe, referred to as the "phased adaptive approach." "One of the elements of the intelligence that contributed to the decision...

Half will be sent through Istanbul; Iranian MPs will fly to Gaza. Two Iranian cargoes of humanitarian aid for Gaza will leave next week and one of them will be shipped through Istanbul, the official Iranian news agency, IRNA reported Monday. The announcement quoted Mohammad Ali Nouraee, an aid official, who said one cargo will be sent to Turkey, and then shipped to Gaza from Istanbul while the other will leave from the port of Khorramshahr. Nouraee said that the ships would sail without protective security because the Iranians “do not want to fight", however he emphasized that "we are...

Hamburg - A senior Iranian ayatollah called Friday for the formation of a new United Nations after the UN Security Council passed new sanctions against Iran over its nuclear programmes. "This UN is not the UN of independent world states but the UN of imperialistic and hegemonic powers," Ayatollah Ahmad Khatami said in the Friday prayer ceremony carried live by Iranian radio.

SEATTLE -- There are more questions than answers in the case of a suspected international arms dealer caught in Washington state with a stockpile of sniper rifles. Oliver King is an Iranian citizen who, in the past, has been a licensed gun dealer. King appeared in court in Seattle on Wednesday, accused of keeping a stash of guns and ammunition hidden in a storage unit near the U.S.-Canada border. According to the U.S. Attorney's Office, King lied to enter the U.S. near Blaine last week. Agents with U.S. Immigration Customs and Enforcement became suspicious of King when he showed up...

MCMINNVILLE, Ore. - Federal agents say an Iranian citizen lied to get across the U.S.-Canadian border and then stashed weapons near the border after transporting them from McMinnville, according to a court document. Agents said last Tuesday night Oliver King crossed the border on a false passport telling customs he had to “pick up his wife at the Target store.” But agents followed him down Interstate 5 to McMinnville, watched him pull up to an office building he leases which is a gun shop, load up boxes and drive back to Ferndale, Wash. There in a storage unit, agents said...

LOS ANGELES, Calif. -- The Iranian regime is notorious for cracking down on dissent inside Iran. Now Mahmoud Ahmadenijad and the mullahs are targeting dissidents in other countries -- including those in the United States. And they are using an international organization to do it. Shahram Homayoun fled Iran for the United States 19 years ago. He was a marked man in his native country, because of his support for democracy and human rights. Now the regime has finally caught up with Homayoun: not in Tehran, but in Los Angeles. "They have managed to keep me here, and it seems...

The US Fifth Fleet and US aircraft carrier USS Eisenhower in the Gulf of Oman were not allowed to shoot at an Iranian Fokker F27 aircraft which on April 21 hovered for 20 minutes 900 meters over the carrier and no more than 250 meters away, even though they saw its flight crew gathering intelligence on the Eisenhower and its warship escorts.DEBKA-Net-Weekly's military sources report that the US Persian Gulf command went public on the incident on April 28, a whole week later, only after Gulf military circles, amazed at the American naval and air units' passivity in the...

Iran is closely watching the unfolding crisis between Israel and the United States over Israeli settlements – and Jerusalem clashes with Palestinians that injured more than 100 today – for ways to rejuvenate its diminished influence in the Middle East. Iran has seen its reputation tarnished across much of the Middle East by weeks of violent street clashes after the June 2009 presidential election, which many Iranians believe was rigged. “The Iranians are going to see an opportunity to improve their position in the region, to capitalize on Israel’s reduced standing vis-à-vis the US, to reduce the chances of an...

The thing that caught our eye in the plot to blow up John F. Kennedy International Airport and its oil lines concerns a detail in respect of the arrest of one of the key Guyanese suspects. It was the fact that the former member of the Guyanese legislature who was fingered in the plot, Abdul Kadir, was arrested in Trinidad on his way to Caracas, Venezuela. According to Mr. Kadir's wife, who was quoted in the Guyanese press, he was there to pick up an Iranian visa that would enable him to attend an Islamic conference in Tehran. No doubt...

Iran's first nuclear power plant will be operating by mid-2011, Iranian and Russian officials say. The Bushehr plant was begun in 1974 and abandoned five years later. Russia took over building work in the 1990s, but it has been beset with delays. Iran's semi-official Fars news agency quoted the head of Iran's atomic agency as saying that the plant had passed most tests successfully.

A remote-controlled bomb killed a Tehran University nuclear scientist today, state media reported, in an attack which Iran blamed on US and Israeli agents. The blast which killed professor Massoud Ali-Mohammadi occurred at a time of heightened tension in the Islamic Republic, seven months after a disputed presidential election plunged the major oil producer into turmoil.

The US administration is heading towards placing "paralyzing" sanctions on Iran, Israeli Ambassador to Washington Michael Oren said Tuesday. Speaking to Army Radio, Oren added that although it was "too early," the US had also not yet abandoned the military option. "The Americans attribute the highest importance to the Iranian issue," he said during the interview. "The US, along with other countries, is preparing to impose paralyzing sanctions on [Iran], and preparations are happening even now." Oren went on to reject claims that US President Barack Obama was trying to downgrade relations between Washington and Jerusalem, saying, "The man is...

Here is truly amazing (and graphic) video of a crowd in Sirjan, Iran storming police to prevent the public execution of two people. The video shows the crowd storming the gallows and cutting down the bodies of two men in the process of being hanged. It shows the protesters being shot at by Iranian forces as they tried to get away with the men. The condition of the men cut down from the gallows is not clear. Reports indicate several protesters were killed in the shooting. Gateway Pundit has much more on the dramatic incident. . . .

They came wanting to say their Islamic prayers, and ended up praying to Jesus for salvation!

Iran 'sentences three to death' President Ahmadinejad's re-election in June triggered mass protests Three people detained after June's disputed presidential election have been sentenced to death, Iran's Isna news agency reports. The judgements are preliminary and must be confirmed by a higher court, Isna says. Full names have not been given. So far the only named opposition activist reported as having been sentenced to death over post-election protests is Mohammad Reza Ali Zamani. The unrest was triggered by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's re-election. On Saturday Isna quoted Zahed Bashiri Rad, a justice ministry official, as saying: "Three people who were accused...

The latest reports of senior nuclear scientists defecting from Iran to the West have caused considerable embarrassment and concern to the regime in Tehran. The reports first broke in Londown-based newspaper Al-Sharq al-Awsat, and were followed up in the Iranian media. The reports suggest that at least one scientist, Shahram Amiri, who worked on nuclear research and development, defected several months ago to the west during the hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia. One more person, whose identity and specialization remains unclear - he may have been a scientist or held another key position in Iran's nuclear program - may have...

The revelation of a second uranium enrichment facility in Iran proves that Iran is seeking to build a nuclear bomb, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman was quoted as saying Saturday. Lieberman urged immediate action, saying, "Without wasting time, we must work towards the overthrow of the mad regime of Teheran." Lieberman's comments came a day after evidence of a second clandestine uranium enrichment facility was presented Friday by US President Barack Obama and the leaders of Britain and France at the G-20 economic summit in Pittsburgh. At a news conference in New York, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said his country had...

NEW YORK -(Dow Jones)- New York businessman and prominent Democratic fund- raiser Hassan Nemazee was indicted Monday for allegedly defrauding three banks out of $292 million in loans. Nemazee, 59 years old, was charged with aggravated identity theft and three counts of bank fraud in the indictment. Each bank fraud count carries a term of up to 30 years in prison. A lawyer for Nemazee didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. Nemazee, who was involved in various presidential campaigns and once served as finance chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, was initially charged criminally in August related...

Hello there. For every post, I need an insperation. This time, it was a song. I usually wait for the right mood, that itching that makes you start tapping away at your keyboard like hell was loose on earth and only your words could save the world from going up in flames. I’m not going to argue that hell exists or not, I –as an atheist– have done quite a lot of that already on the net; of course I’d be dead in a blink if I revealed that in real life. What I mean is that you have to...

The Lebanese Armed Forces (LAF) has accepted an offer by Iran to provide it with weapons produced by the Iranian defense industries, a newspaper in Lebanon reported on Wednesday. According to Al-Akhbar, the proposal was sent from the Iranian Embassy in Beirut. In their response, LAF officers said the army was in need of anti-aircraft weaponry. Israeli officials have expressed concern that the existence of such weapons in Lebanon, whether in the hands of Hizbullah or the army, would constitute a change in the strategic balance between Israel and Lebanon.