Free Republic

Over the past several weeks, we have learned that the Obama administration believes it is at war with Israel. The war is not a shooting war, but a political war. Its goal is to bring the government to its knees to the point where Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu loses power or begs Obama and his advisers to shepherd Israel through a “peace process” in which Israel will renounce its rights to Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria. One component of this war is espionage. Last monthThe Wall Street Journal reported that Israel is a top target for American espionage. The other component...

IBD warned over a year and a half ago that President Obama wasn't about to spend his post-presidency building houses, like Jimmy Carter, but that there were discernible signs that he would seek to become secretary-general of the United Nations. In the West Point speech he gave in May 2014, IBD pointed out that the president denied the reality of the American global decline he has engineered. "Think about it," he told the assembled cadets. "Our military has no peer." It was disturbingly similar to Carter's pathetic 1979 "malaise" speech, in which Carter boasted of "the outward strength of America,...

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu reportedly is planning payback for President Obama's dismissing Mr. Netanyahu's objections to the Iran nuclear deal last year. Mr. Netanyahu is said to be rallying moderate Arabs to thwart Mr. Obama’s bid to become the Secretary-General of the United Nations after he leaves the White House next year. Mr. Obama has already discussed the issue with Republican, Democratic and Jewish officials in the United States, according to Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Jarida. Mr. Netanyahu recently is said to have gotten wind of Obama’s plans which he calls the Obama Project. "Wasn't eight years of having Obama in...

The attorney's office on Friday submitted indictments against two Arab residents of eastern Jerusalem for running an explosives lab, providing aid to an enemy in wartime, and being in contact with a foreign agent -- and planning to assassinate the prime minister. The two terrorists were named as 22-year-old Hazam Sanduka and 19-year-old Fahdi Abu Kia'an, and they are part of a wide Hamas terror cell busted last month. According to the indictment, the two helped a Hamas terrorist in preparing terror attacks with explosives. ...

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu remembers well just how US President Barack Obama brushed aside Israeli objections and went ahead with the P5+1 nuclear agreement with Iran. Now, Netanyahu is reportedly planning some personal payback. According to the Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Jarida, Netanyahu will make common cause with moderate Arab governments in order to sabotage Obama’s plan to succeed Ban Ki-moon when the South Korean diplomat ends his term as United Nations secretary-general on December 31 of this year. Al-Jarida quoted sources as saying that Obama has already discussed the issue of running for secretary-general with Democrats, Republicans, and Jewish officials in...

Enemies and friends: Obama promised change. He delivered. Friends are now enemies, and enemies are now friends This is not a sexy or juicy topic for a commentary, but it is a subject an informed reader should know about. Because, you’re not going to hear about it on the nightly news. Many have pointed out, and rightly so, that it’s hardly unheard of in geopolitics for friends to spy on each other. We all know the U.S. and Israel have done this to each other for years, which is why Jonathan Pollard spent so many decades behind bars. But when...

<p>Putin is Israelis’ person of the year, according to a Panels Research poll taken for The Jerusalem Post and its Hebrew sister publication Ma’ariv Sof Hashavua.</p>

In the midst of its espionage operations against the State of Israel, the Obama administration's National Security Agency (NSA) listened in on private conversations conducted with members of the U.S. Congress and American-Jewish groups, a late Tuesday report in the Wall Street Journal reveals. The NSA operations revealed to President Obama that Israeli officials had coordinated on messaging with U.S. Jewish groups that had come out against the Iran nuclear deal, the report says, citing unnamed officials familiar with the espionage operations. At the time, President Obama was facing a wave of criticism from European leaders-such as French President Francois Hollande...

A House panel on Wednesday announced it is opening an investigation into U.S. intelligence collection that may have swept up members of Congress. The House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence's announcement of the probe comes after a Wall Street Journal report that the U.S. collected information on private exchanges between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and members of Congress during ongoing negotiations for nuclear deal with Iran.

WSJ: White House Used NSA to Spy on Israel's Benjamin Netanyahu, Members of Congress, American Jewish Groups Dec. 30, 2015 7:23am Sharona Schwartz Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was the target of National Security Agency eavesdropping which also netted the private conversations of members of U.S. Congress and American Jewish groups, the Wall Street Journal reported Tuesday. The alleged spying took place despite a promise two years ago by President Barack Obama -- after it was revealed that the NSA had listened in on German Chancellor Angela Merkel's phone calls -- that the U.S. "will not monitor the communications of...

U.S. spying programs scooped up communications between members of Congress and Israeli leaders, giving the White House insight into Israel’s lobbying of U.S. lawmakers against the Iran nuclear deal, current and former U.S. officials told The Wall Street Journal. The article, published Tuesday afternoon, reports that the U.S. continued to spy on select leaders of allied nations despite President Barack Obama’s pledge to curb such surveillance two years ago, and that it was a top priority to maintain spying on Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his government. As part of that continued surveillance, the National Security Agency also swept...

A new profile of US Secretary of State John Kerry in The New Yorker casts light on the stormy relationship between the US and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who have often clashed publicly over the Iran nuclear deal and the Palestinian conflict but who also routinely refer to each other as friends. The piece, written by the magazine’s editor in chief, David Remnick, quotes “American officials” who describe Netanyahu as “myopic, entitled, untrustworthy, routinely disrespectful toward the president, and focused solely on short-term political tactics to keep his right-wing constituency in line.” The piece goes on to describe the “sources...

The Texas senator is seeking an implicit contrast with the more hawkish Marco Rubio.Sen. Ted Cruz on Thursday warned against the deployment of U.S. forces in the Middle East in hopes of creating democracy, nodding to a portion of the Republican Party exhausted with military escapades abroad. Even as he emphasized the need to defeat the Islamic State group in a speech coming just a week after the San Bernardino, California, shooting rampage that's since been linked to radicalization, Cruz, a 2016 presidential candidate, chastised those rushing to place American troops on the ground to fight the enemy. "Some in...

GOP presidential front-runner Donald Trump said Thursday that he is canceling his trip to Israel, one day after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu criticized his proposed ban on Muslims entering the U.S. "I have decided to postpone my trip to Israel and to schedule my meeting with @Netanyahu at a later date after I become president of the U.S.," he tweeted. On Wednesday, Netanyahu joined international condemnation of Trump's plan to halt Muslim travel to America. "The state of Israel respects all religion and adheres to the rights of all citizens," Netanyahu said in a statement. "At the same time, Israel...

Washington (CNN)—Donald Trump said Thursday that he is postponing his trip to Israel, just a day after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned his proposal to ban U.S. travel for all Muslims. "I have decided to postpone my trip to Israel and to schedule my meeting with @Netanyahu at a later date after I become President of the U.S.," Trump tweeted.

I have decided to postpone my trip to Israel and to schedule my meeting with @Netanyahu at a later date after I become President of the U.S.

Serious question: Does Netanyahu's Israel profile or vet Muslims entering the country or are they allowed free and easy entry no matter what?

The State of Israel respects all religions and strictly guarantees the rights of all its citizens, Mr Netanyahu said Benjamin Netanyahu has joined a long list of international leaders to reject Donald Trump’s comments about Muslims, while championing Israel's "respect" for all religions and citizens' rights. The Israeli Prime Minister released a statement saying he will still meet with the Republican Presidential candidate for previously scheduled talks later this month but does not “endorse his views”. “Prime Minister Netanyahu rejects Donald Trump's recent remarks about Muslims,” the statement said. The State of Israel respects all religions and strictly guarantees the...

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is set to meet Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump on December 28, amid calls by a growing number of lawmakers to block the GOP front-runner from entering the Knesset or the country. The meeting was scheduled two weeks ago, prior to Trump's widely criticized proposal of a blanket ban on Muslims entering the United States, sources close to the prime minister said on Wednesday. "Every presidential candidate that wants to may meet briefly with the prime minister," sources said, according to an Army Radio report. "Netanyahu does not agree with every statement made by every candidate."...

In leaked recording of Likud faction meeting, prime minister also questions how New York would cope with wave of violence similar to one faced by Israel. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday that Israel could destroy the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem if it wanted to – but doing so "would be contrary to everything we represent." Netanyahu was speaking during a meeting of the Likud Knesset faction on Thursday. A recording of his words was published by Army Radio. Responding to what he said was Palestinian incitement regarding Israel's supposed interest in getting rid of...