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Ahead of a possible presidential run, Hillary Clinton appears to be distancing herself from what she called President Barack Obama's foreign policy "failure": the decision not to intervene during the early stages of the Syrian civil war. In an interview with The Atlantic published on Sunday, the former secretary of state says the "failure" of the United States to those protesting the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad led to the rise of al-Qaida-inspired groups like ISIS, the militants currently creating havoc in Syria and Iraq. “The failure to help build up a credible fighting force of the people who...

The Egyptian government should consider a military solution for the unrest in Libya, Amr Moussa said in a statement issued Sunday. The former Egyptian foreign minister raised speculation that Egypt is considering an armed incursion into Libya, where fierce fighting continues between rebel groups and security forces. The current unrest in Libya, Egypt’s neigbour to the west, poses threats to Egyptian national security, the statement added. "The situation in Libya is a major concern for Egypt, Libya's neighboring countries, and the Arab world at large," Moussa said. "Statelets, sects and extremist factions in Libya directly threaten Egypt's national security. I...

On July 31, when all eyes were focused on the Ted Cruz-stoked chaos unfolding in the House chamber over the border bill, the Republican-led House Intelligence Committee did something rather remarkable. It voted to declassify its Benghazi report. After two years of investigation, it found no evidence to buttress any of the conspiracy theories surrounding the Sept. 11, 2012, attack that killed Chris Stevens, the U.S. ambassador to Libya, and three other Americans. We didn’t get this news from committee chairman Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.). Nope. There was a story in the San Francisco Chronicle on Friday. A press release...

(Please Make Note Of The WARNING not everyone can bear to view this video) The brutality of ISIS in Iraq and Syria has been well documented – even al Qaeda warns ISIS not to be “too extreme.” But the horrors these monsters invent are terrifyingly new each day, and the latest example is the stuff of horror movies. Is our planet entering a new day where a large portion of our population is cloaked behind an “Iron Curtain” of Islamic barbarism? How can life continue “normally” in Syria, Iraq, Libya, Yemen, Pakistan, Nigeria, Somalia, Egypt, Lebanon, Gaza and the West...

The House Intelligence Committee, led by Republicans, has concluded that there was no deliberate wrongdoing by the Obama administration in the 2012 attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi, Libya, that killed Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans, said Rep. Mike Thompson of St. Helena, the second-ranking Democrat on the committee. The panel voted Thursday to declassify the report, the result of two years of investigation by the committee. U.S. intelligence agencies will have to approve making the report public. Thompson said the report “confirms that no one was deliberately misled, no military assets were withheld and no stand-down...

In Libya, Islamist Rebels Claim Control of Benghazi Islamist militias said they had taken control of Libya's second largest city, Benghazi, on Thursday, declaring it "an Islamic emirate." The announcement comes a day after the militant group Ansar al Sharia defeated government troops fighting alongside rogue former general Khalifa Haftar's army to take over the biggest special forces base in the city. The group joined forces with other Islamist militias under the umbrella of the Shura Council of Benghazi Revolutionaries. At Least 30 People Killed In Libya's Benghazi In Heavy Fighting Medical sources tell Reuters that at least 30 people...

After failing to attract al-Qaeda in Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), the group formerly known as the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) is now trying to gain the support of Libya's Ansar al-Sharia. An ISIS supporter recently endorsed the terror group on a global jihadist forum. On July 23rd, the militant urged ISIS followers to repost his comments on social networking websites, in order to push Ansar al-Sharia in Libya to swear allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. Earlier this month, Abdelmalek Droukdel's al-Qaeda subsidiary refused to recognise the self-proclaimed caliphate and instead renewed allegiance to the parent organisation led by...

...The militant violence in the oil-rich country threatens to destabilize the region, and prove a big embarrassment to the Obama administration and other governments that helped topple Gadhafi.... ....Obama hailed Gadhafi’s ouster as “the end of a long and painful chapter for the people of Libya.” Less than three years on, the U.S. has seen one ambassador killed and another forced out of the country by the violence. The September 2012 killings of Christopher Stevens, and U.S. Foreign Service Information Management Officer Sean Smith, still pose serious political problems for the Obama administration.

Hillary Clinton has been working full-time to control the story of her time as Secretary of State. That was the point of her clunky, largely unread book, and the point of her awkward, gaffe-laden book tour. Clinton argues (plausibly) that she wanted a more activist approach to Syria than that served up by her boss. She argues (implausibly) that she wasn’t really sold on the “reset” with Russia. As to Libya, Clinton’s priority must be to duck, to the extent possible, the political fallout from the killing of our ambassador and three other Americans by terrorists in Benghazi. But what...

The Obama administration often denies any responsibility for the current global chaos or claims that it erupted spontaneously. Yet most of the mess was caused by, or made worse by, growing U.S. indifference and paralysis. Over the last five and a half years, America has had lots of clear choices, but the administration usually took the path of least short-term trouble, which has ensured long-term hardship. There was no need to "reset" the relatively mild punishments that the George W. Bush administration had accorded Vladimir Putin's Russia for invading Georgia in 2008. By unilaterally normalizing relations with Russia and trashing...

The unintended consequences of military intervention are nearly impossible to predict. ___ "Islamist militants armed with antiaircraft weapons and rocket-propelled grenades stormed a lightly defended United States diplomatic mission in Benghazi, Libya," The New York Times reported on September 12, 2012. " The attack, which killed the American ambassador and three staffers, would ultimately reveal that the CIA was running a secret mission out of Benghazi. Ross Douthat: The worst-case situation has not come to pass in Libya itself. But thanks to the ripple effects from Colonel Qaddafi’s fall, it’s well on its way to happening in nearby Mali. Not...

A British embassy convoy in Tripoli came under fire on Sunday in an attempted carjacking but no-one was hurt, a spokesman for London's mission in Libya said. "Early this morning a British embassy convoy was subject to an attempted carjacking. Shots were fired at our vehicles but they managed to drive on and leave the area," spokesman Bob Phillipson said. "All embassy personnel are safe and accounted for and there were no injuries," he said.

Germany on Sunday advised all citizens currently in Libya to immediately leave the strife-torn country, following measures taken by countries including Britain and the United States to protect citizens from increasing violence. “The situation is extremely unpredictable and uncertain,” the German foreign ministry said. “German nationals are at increased risk of kidnapping and attacks.” …

The United States shut down its embassy in Libya on Saturday and evacuated its diplomats to neighboring Tunisia under U.S. military escort amid a significant deterioration in security in Tripoli as fighting intensified between rival militias, the State Department said. "Due to the ongoing violence resulting from clashes between Libyan militias in the immediate vicinity of the U.S. Embassy in Tripoli, we have temporarily relocated all of our personnel out of Libya," spokeswoman Marie Harf said. The withdrawal underscored the Obama administration's concern about the heightened risk to American diplomats abroad, particularly in Libya where memories of the deadly 2012...

The U.S. Embassy in Libya evacuated its personnel on Saturday because of ongoing militia violence in the capital, Tripoli, U.S. officials said. About 150 personnel, including 80 U.S. Marines were evacuated from the embassy in the early hours of Saturday morning and were driven across the border into Tunisia, U.S. officials confirm to CNN.

Under a 2009 agreement, Libya also agreed to allow Italian coastguard to stop boatloads of African migrants on the seas and forcibly return them to Libya. ... Europe's reliance on Libyan complicity in holding back asylum seekers became particularly clear in the final days of Gaddafi's regime when the threatened dictator warned that if he was deposed, "thousands of people from Libya will invade Europe and there will be no one to stop them." In fact, Gaddafi made good on his promise when, in May 2011, Libyan authorities reportedly began putting non-Libyan citizens on boats and sending them north to...

MANILA, Philippines (AP) — A Filipino construction worker kidnapped by militia men in Libya has been beheaded by his captors, becoming the first Filipino casualty in the renewed violence in the North African state, the Philippine government said. Department of Foreign Affairs spokesman Charles Jose said the Filipino worker was kidnapped on July 15. He was subsequently beheaded and his decomposed body was found Sunday in a hospital in Benghazi, Libya's second-largest city. "The vehicle he was riding in was stopped in a checkpoint. There were three of them - a Libyan a Pakistani and a Filipino and he was...

Cairo (AFP) - Egypt's military said militants firing machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades attacked a border guards checkpoint Saturday, killing 21 soldiers in one of the biggest assaults since Islamist president Mohamed Morsi's ouster. The attack in a desert area 630 kilometres (390 miles) west of Cairo left four soldiers wounded, the military said in a statement, blaming "terrorists". It said a rocket propelled grenade fired by the militants set off an explosion in an ammunition depot at the El-Farafrah post, killing the soldiers. Militants have stepped up attacks on the security forces since Morsi was toppled in July 2013...

On October, 2011, amid a lethargic economic recovery, President Barack Obama – a man who prided himself on ending wars, not starting them – touted his foreign policy successes. Beyond the successful raid that resulted in the death of Osama bin Laden, Obama noted that he had successfully solved two thorny international puzzles; ending the war in Iraq and successfully prosecuting a brief campaign to stem the violence in Libya. In a speech in the White House, the president made the case for his own competency within an announcement regarding the beginning of the full withdrawal of American troops...

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. expressed “extreme, extreme concern” on Sunday over reports that bomb makers from Yemen responsible for the 2009 underwear-bomb plot are now in Syria cooperating with foreign militants there, possibly to develop new, nearly undetectable explosive devices. Asked on Sunday whether that threat was a “clear and present danger,” Mr. Holder responded: “I think it is. In some ways, it’s more frightening than anything I think I’ve seen as attorney general.”