Free Republic

A SEEMINGLY un-American fact about America today is that for some groups, much more than others, upward mobility and the American dream are alive and well. It may be taboo to say it, but certain ethnic, religious and national-origin groups are doing strikingly better than Americans overall. Indian-Americans earn almost double the national figure (roughly $90,000 per year in median household income versus $50,000). Iranian-, Lebanese- and Chinese-Americans are also top-earners. In the last 30 years, Mormons have become leaders of corporate America, holding top positions in many of America’s most recognizable companies. These facts don’t make some groups “better”...

Americans were stunned on October 11 when the Justice Department unsealed its complaint against Mansour Arbabsiar, a 56-year-old used-car dealer from Corpus Christi now in federal custody, and Ali Gholam Shakuri, a member of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force. Shakuri remains inside Iran. The pair have been charged with conspiring to kill the Saudi ambassador in Washington, Adel Al-Jubeir. As disclosed by the Treasury Department, the plot was coordinated by Arbabsiar’s cousin, Abdul Reza Shahlai, a top Quds Force functionary whom the Treasury designated in 2008 as one of several “individuals and entities fueling violence in Iraq.” Shahlai was...

Hezbollah in Yucatán Posted on January 30, 2013 by Baron Bodissey As mentioned here many times in the past, the southern border of the United States is porous not just to Mexicans, Salvadorans, and Guatemalans, but also to Islamic terrorists. Operatives from Al Qaeda and Hezbollah acquire a Latin American passport and enough Spanish to allow their swarthiness to pass as Latino.This latest report concerns the arrival of a Hezbollah associate in Mexico. Many thanks to Iz-M (via Vlad) for the translation from Diario de Yucatán: More signs of the presence of HezbollahLabboun Rafic Mohammed, the Muslim cleric allegedly linked...

Multiple foreign corporations that have bypassed or attempted to bypass United States and European Union sanctions against Iran are funding the Atlantic Council, a Washington-based think tank chaired by defense secretary nominee Chuck Hagel. One council sponsor, Italian oil company Eni, has vehemently defended its trade with Iran, saying it was “proud” of its cooperation with the regime. “Given the existence of foreign pressures, implementation of most projects in Iran is challenging and complicated,” Eni’s Executive Vice President Guido Michelotti told reporters during a 2011 visit to Iran. “Yet, we have always been interested in cooperation with the Iranian side...

Syrian rebel groups have freed 48 Iranians captured last year in exchange for prisoners held by Syrian security services, according to Iran's state-run Press TV. The report did not specify the number of prisoners freed by the government, but said the group included Turks. Earlier on Wednesday, the Turkish humanitarian aid agency IHH said that the Syrian government would free 2,130 prisoners in exchange for the Iranians. Bulent Yildirim, the head of IHH, was in Damascus to help negotiate the deal. Turkey's state-run Anatolian news agency said the deal was brokered by Turkey and Qatar. The Iranians were captured in...

Amnesty International (AI) is sponsoring an event in Los Angeles under the title,“Human Rights in Iran: How to Move Forward” on February 22, 2008. Mr. Trita Parsi, president of National Iranian American Council (NIAC) an extremely dedicated activist for the establishment of normal and unconditional relations between the religious dictatorship in Iran and the U.S. [1] is one of the panelists in this event. This is not the first time NIAC has manipulated AI. On July 26, 2007, AI was one of the sponsors of an event organized by NIAC under the title, “Human Rights in Iran and U.S. Foreign...

A recent report in the Sudanese opposition media suggests that Iran may be operating a weapons factory near Khartoum. Have the two countries taken their military alliance to the next level? The Sudanese newspaper Rai al-Shaab (Opinion of the People), owned and controlled by Sudanese opposition leader Hassan al-Turabi, recently published an article that potentially provides new and important insight into Sudan's terrorist ties to Iran. The article alleges that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), a U.S.-designated terrorist organization, is operating a secret weapons factory in Sudan to funnel weapons to Iran-sponsored terrorist organizations in Africa and the Middle...

TORONTO - The fur will be flying at an east-Toronto Mosque Friday afternoon, when a group of dog owners plan to walk their canines outside the building during prayer sessions. It was toward the end of August that two groups — the Canadian Hindu Advocacy and Canadians United Against Terror - set up a Facebook page inviting people to walk their dogs in front the Salahuddin mosque in Scarborough. Their call was a response to an incident in August that took place during an anti-Israel demonstration at Queen’s Park by an Islamic group where a Jewish man was arrested for...

According to the latest census, Iran’s population is at 75.2 million, with 99.4 percent being Muslims, 55 percent under the age of 30, and the literacy rate at 93 percent Iran is a very urbanized society with a largely educated, young Muslim population that ranks as the Middle East’s second-largest, its latest census figures published yesterday show. The snapshot, issued on the website of the presidency’s planning and strategic supervision department (www.amar.org.ir), also corrected some misconceptions about the country, notably by reporting fewer than expected Jews and Internet users. The census, whose data was collected in 2011 and presented in...

hey’re rich. They’re spoiled. They’re Persian. Which means Bravo’s latest reality endeavor, “The Shahs of Sunset,” has Iranian-Americans up in arms over the stereotypes they claim it perpetuates. So much so, in fact, that petitions are circulating in Iranian communities to have the show yanked off the air. The program, which premiered on Sunday night, follows a group of six Persian-American socialites in Los Angeles as they navigate love and life with what seems like bottomless checking accounts. They are the children of the Iranians who escaped their country after the 1979 Iranian Revolution ended the reign of the Shah...

Suspected Iranian Blew Off His Own Leg In A Botched Terror Attack In Bangkok Robert JohnsonFeburary 14, 2012 One day after bombs targeting Israeli embassy staff went off in India and Georgia, another botched attack played out this morning in Bangkok. Through several reports, the incident appears to have played out something like this: Saeib Morabi, a suspected Iranian, was fleeing an explosion that rocked through his rented home in central Bangkok. While he was on the road looking for transportation, another explosion went off "on a nearby road." When Morabi finally managed to flag down a cab, the driver...

"Azerbaijan thwarts terror attack against Israeli, Jewish targets Security official in Baku links Iran to planned operation; three men detained." SNIPPET: "Three men were detained last week after planning to attack two Israelis employed by a Jewish school in Baku, the Azerbaijan Ministry of National Security has revealed. Meanwhile, an Azeri commentator considered close to the republic's president has launched a scathing indictment of Iran. The Azeri ministry said it had arrested a cell that planned to "kill public activists," before it became apparent that the intended victims were two Israeli Chabad emissaries, a rabbi and a teacher employed by...

Hundreds of students in Iran gathered at the uranium conversion plant in central Iran on Tuesday to form a temporary human shield for the facility. Students reportedly locked arms and formed a human chain around the plants perimeter to show that Iranians support the sacrifice their lives in the event of an aerial strike by Israel. The Iranian students, according to Ha’aretz, “held a noon prayer session in front of one of the plants, and students from Isfahan universities shouted ‘Death to Israel’ and “Death to America.’ They vowed to resist in the event of an attack.” News outlets speculate...

INDIANAPOLIS -- Texas Gov. Rick Perry says an Iranian-backed terror plot coordinated in Mexico proves the U.S. must secure its southern border. The Republican presidential hopeful used Tuesday's announcement that Iranian forces had sought to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the U.S. to call for more border troops, improved fencing along the Mexican border and increased border patrols including the use of predator drone surveillance. Perry opened his speech to Republican activists in Indianapolis on Wednesday with a call for increased border security. He called allegations that Iranian forces sought to kill the Saudi diplomat "business as usual" for Iran.

WASHINGTON — US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Friday the United States is easing visa terms for Iranian students here as part of efforts to support their aspirations for political change back home. In what she called a "big step forward" in the Obama administration support's for Iran's people, Clinton said Iranian students and exchange visitors are now eligible for two-year, multiple entry visas. "This gives young Iranians the opportunity to return home for family events, to participate in internships, to travel outside the United States -- and they won't need to get a new visa every time," she...

Was it just a wrong turn, or something more sinister? Marine base Camp Pendleton — one of the largest military bases in the country — is reportedly on high alert after three Middle Eastern men tried to enter the base last weekend on multiple occasions in multiple vehicles. And while the men initially claimed they didn’t know each other and simply took a wrong turn, new information from a local gas station about “hateful comments” and “terrorist threats” casts doubt on their story: http://clipsyndicate.com/video/playlist/8178/2340295?wpid=9528 KGTV explains some of the shocking details: According to a Be On the Lookout (BOLO) alert...

Iranian computer hackers on Monday hijacked the website of the Voice of America, replacing its Internet home page with a banner bearing an Iranian flag and an image of an AK-47 assault rifle. The group called on Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to “hear the voice of oppressed nations.” The banner stated that “we have proven that we can.” The message called on the United States to “stop interfering in Islamic countries.” It then listed more 90 websites of VOA it claimed has also been hacked.

For the FReeper national security community -- Whereas the Iranians have promised/threatened something big on the 11th, and Whereas polar orbit satellites pass over the CONUS repeatedly, and Whereas satellite orbits can be willfully decayed to reach a given altitude at a given Long/Lat., and Whereas the US has no defense against or ability to recover from an EMP attack from near space, and Whereas the TOTUS is a FNG/REMF when it comes to serious national security; Do the Iranians or their proxies have a satellite in low-earth/ polar orbit at the present time?

What appears to be of particular concern to the EMP commission is the scepter of terrorist groups or so-called “rogue” nations carrying out such an attack. As outlined by Dr. Pry, one of the commissioners, before a 2005 Senate Subcommittee on Terrorism, Technology and Homeland Security, “[a] nuclear missile concealed in the hold of a freighter would give Iran, or terrorists, the capability to perform an EMP attack against the United States homeland, without developing an ICBM, and with some prospect of remaining anonymous. Iran’s Shahab-3 medium-range missile… is a mobile missile, and small enough to be transported in the...

His first impulse was to dismiss the ominous email as a prank, says a young Iranian-American named Koosha. It warned the 29-year-old engineering student that his relatives in Tehran would be harmed if he didn't stop criticizing Iran on Facebook. Two days later, his mom called. Security agents had arrested his father in his home in Tehran and threatened him by saying his son could no longer safely return to Iran. "When they arrested my father, I realized the email was no joke," said Koosha, who asked that his full name not be used. Tehran's leadership faces its biggest crisis...