Free Republic

Months after declaring an Islamic caliphate, Islamic State, which has seized large swaths of Syria and Iraq, is seeking to address a need of any viable nation: women. In Internet posts and social media messaging, the extremist Sunni militants are recruiting women to marry their fighters and have children, part of a larger strategy of state-building. "They are treating the Islamic State as a country that needs women," said Rita Katz, director of the SITE Intelligence Group, which monitors online activity by militant organizations. "The message is: 'You are coming to marry someone immediately and have kids and cook.' They're...

Rep. Tim Bishop, D-N.Y., warned during a recent speech that up to 40 radicalized U.S. citizens who have fought alongside the Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL or ISIS) have already returned to the United States, where they could pose a terrorist threat. Bishop claims that of the 100 or so Americans who have traveled to the Middle East to join ISIL’s ranks, some 40 have returned and are currently being surveilled by the FBI, according to his remarks, which were filmed and uploaded to YouTube last week.

Even assuming President Obama gets the authority he wants, experts say deciding who exactly should get American aid is an exceedingly difficult task. There are vast differences among Syrian rebel fighters—a conglomerate of varying ideologies, social backgrounds, and loyalties. And the questions of who exactly is a Syrian moderate, and whether these weapons will fall into the wrong hands, loom large on Capitol Hill. There isn't a formal definition of a Syrian moderate, said Leila Hilal of the New America Foundation. But implicit in the word, she says, are a few criteria: a Syrian who is a nationalist and is...

President Barack Obama would seek to overthrow the regime of Bashar al-Assad if American planes were attacked upon entering Syrian air space, Peter Baker of The New York Times reports. If Assad's troops fired at American planes entering Syrian airspace, "Obama said he would order American forces to wipe out Syria’s air defense system," Baker reports. "He went on to say that such an action by Mr. Assad would lead to his overthrow, according to one account."

Let’s just stick to skills. Let’s not talk about how bad his policies are. Because I can’t think of a person who is less suited and less interested in being president of the United States than Barack Obama is.  I’m reminded of this as I see Europe drift from debt to crisis to dissolution. “Events in Greece over the past 24 hours have underscored the importance of implementing the plan, fully and as quickly as possible,” said the US president according to Euronews.I didn’t understand that there was a real plan for the Greek debt crisis. If there is one,...