Free Republic

ISIS is bigger, badder, richer, and better organized than any jihadi threat the United States has faced thus far. Its rise represents a foreign policy disaster of the first order. A group more radical than al-Qaeda, better organized, better financed, commanding the loyalty of thousands of dedicated fanatics including many with Western and even U.S. passports? And this group now controls some of the most strategic territory at the heart of the Middle East? Welcome to President Obama’s brave new world. [....] One wishes we had a Republican President right now if only because when a Republican is in the...

Hillary Clinton is doing it. Glenn Beck did it too. And Dick Cheney? Not so much. This is the season for admitting you were wrong on Iraq in 2003. And all Republicans who either regret their vote to authorize the invasion of Iraq, or who were silent on foreign policy matters back then, should take this occasion to step up and say they'll never make the same mistake twice. To them I say: Do it for the sake of your conscience, and if not that, at least for the sake of your career.In the Obama years, Republicans have habituated...

Yes, it is true that there was no al-Qaeda in Iraq when George W. Bush took office. But it is equally true that there was essentially no al-Qaeda in Iraq remaining when Barack Obama took office. Which makes Bush responsible for the terrible costs incurred to defeat the 2003-09 jihadist war engendered by his invasion. We can debate forever whether those costs were worth it, but what is not debatable is Obama’s responsibility for the return of the Islamist insurgency that had been routed by the time he became president.

<p>Cheney re Obama: Rarely has a U.S. president been so wrong about so much at the expense of so many.</p> <p>As the terrorists of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) threaten Baghdad, thousands of slaughtered Iraqis in their wake, it is worth recalling a few of President Obama's past statements about ISIS and al Qaeda. "If a J.V. team puts on Lakers' uniforms that doesn't make them Kobe Bryant" (January 2014). "[C]ore al Qaeda is on its heels, has been decimated" (August 2013). "So, let there be no doubt: The tide of war is receding" (September 2011).</p>

A three word text was released from inside the Embassy about six hours ago: “Too late Alamo.” That message is open to interpretation. Just minutes ago news came from within the United States Embassy in Baghdad that the Iraqis have shut down internet service for those barricaded inside. Limited text messages via private cell phones are still coming through. It is unknown how many of the more than 5,000 U.S. civilians in Baghdad are actually taking refuge inside the embassy compound. NBC war correspondent, Richard Engel reported last night that civilians in and around Baghdad have boarded up residences and...

After the U.S. military battled heroically to liberate Iraq from Saddam Hussein’s dictatorship and to eliminate the possibility that it might become a staging area for terrorist attacks, the Obama administration has created a vacuum now being filled by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), an Al Qaeda affiliate, which has overrun Mosul and Fallujah, cities liberated by American soldiers. ISIS now threatens Baghdad. The administration and much of the media try to separate “fanatical Muslims” from “peaceful” ones, but the distinction is meaningless when the fanatics have the weapons and are willing to die for their cause....

Many of us declared the Arab Spring dead and buried. But the Arab Spring really came in two phases. The first phase was the political destabilization of formerly stable Arab countries by liberals and Islamists. The second phase was an armed conflict by Islamists to take over entire countries. These phases overlapped in some cases and the second phase has been underway for a while already. In Libya and Syria the first phase of the Arab Spring became the second phase. When protests didn’t work, the Islamists turned to force. When elections didn’t work for them in Libya, they turned...

State Department counterterrorism officials warned in late April that Iran had “trained, funded, and provided guidance” to ethnic Iraqi terror groups bent on destabilizing the country. The April warning appears to directly contradict and undermine comments last week by a State Department spokeswoman claiming that the United States and Iran have a “shared interest.” As Iraqi militants continue to wage attacks and seize territory, the State Department has signaled that it is willing to work with neighboring Iran to stabilize the country. They have even raised the idea of discussing Iraq on the sidelines of the ongoing nuclear discussions taking...

A spokeswoman for the State Department referred to the Taliban operatives released from Guantanamo Bay as part of the deal to retrieve Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl as "gentlemen." In a Monday afternoon appearance with Andrew Mitchell on MSNBC, Marie Harf, the deputy spokesperson at State and an alumna of the Obama campaign, argued with Mitchell over the question of whether or not Congress should have ben notified about the exchange before it occured. Noah Rothman at Hot Air documents the conversation, and near the end of the interview, Harf defends the deal against questions about whether or not the Taliban operatives...

Walid Shoebat has had a look at Bob Bergdahl’s playlist and it’s ugly and uglier. It’s a mix of Islamism videos and moonbat materials. Bergdahl favorited Anwar Al-Awlaki’s “Why The World Hates America” uploaded by HayaAlalJihad. He also subscribed to more Westernized Islamic propaganda channels like Deen and Journeyman Pictures. Some of his channels were about learning Arabic. Others were full of technical Islamic material unlikely to be of any interest or relevance to non-Muslims. He appeared to be drawn in particular to Salafist materials which would match his beard. Then he subscribed to leftist outlets like Brave New Films...

No, it didn’t happen exactly that way this week. But hippie jihadist Bob Bergdahl got his chance to stage a classic agitprop stunt (“spontaneously,” of course), by twice reciting the jihadist credo in Arabic as a public signal of surrender to the Haqqani terror network in Afghanistan --- a bunch of evil killers who rival the Taliban in their militant hatred for the United States. And Obama just gave our American jihadist a little smile. But what does Obama know? He’s just a passenger on this cruise ship to hell. The Hitler salute meant something so cruel and dangerous that...

JNS.org – A Cleveland gas station owned by a Palestinian American is drawing attention for a series of grotesque anti-Israel and anti-Semitic murals featured on its walls. The gas station and convenience store called Biggie’s, located on East 55th Street and Cedar Ave in Cleveland, is owned by Palestinian-American Brahim “Abe” Ayad, who has been the target of criticism for several years due to the hateful images, the Cleveland Jewish News reported. One of the most offensive images is that of a so-called “Talmudic Priest” wearing a yarmulke while circumcising an infant with his teeth, accompanied by the words “sex...

Bergdahl's hometown is carrying on with a celebration for the returned sergeant at the end of the month, despite a rising backlash A rally in U.S. Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl’s Idaho hometown celebrating his release after nearly five years of captivity will go on as planned, despite growing questions about the circumstances of the soldier’s capture. The joy over the soldier’s return among residents of the small mountain community of Hailey, Idaho has been dampened by claims that he abandoned his post. Some have also claimed that the subsequent search for Bergdahl cost the lives of up to six soldiers,...

Robert Bergdahl said he began growing the beard as soon as he received news of his son’s capture. ...those attempts to understand the Taliban have occasionally shaded into acts and gestures that strike some critics as a little too close for comfort. Just recently, reports surfaced of a tweet deleted from Bob Bergdahl’s Twitter account that directly addressed a Taliban spokesman. “I am still working to free all Guantanamo prisoners,” it read. “God will repay for the death of every Afghan child, ameen.”

Chuck Todd told Matt Lauer on Wednesday that the White House was “caught flat-footed” on the backlash against the prisoner swap for Sergeant Bergdahl. “I’ve had a few aides describe it to me as ‘we didn’t know that they were going to Swift Boat Bergdahl’,” Todd said, “And Matt, of course, that’s a reference to that political fight back in 2004 over John Kerry’s military service which became so controversial in that campaign. So there’s some fighting words there.”

WASHINGTON (CBSDC/AP) — White House aides are accusing soldiers who served with Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl are “swift boating” him following his release over the weekend after five years in captivity. NBC News’ Chuck Todd reported Monday that the White House did not expect this sort of vitriolic backlash exchanging five high-level Taliban members held at Guantanamo Bay for Bergdahl, who left his Army post in 2009 in Afghanistan and was subsequently taken captive. “They did not expect this backlash on Bergdahl himself,” Todd reported on NBC’s “Today.” I’ve had a few aides describe it to me as we didn’t...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK) Todd: White House was 'caught off guard' MSNBC’S Chuck Todd observed Tuesday that the White House was “caught off guard” by the disastrous public roll out of their prisoner exchange for Army Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl. Todd and Andrea Mitchell agreed that the White House had likely thought there would be “some euphoria around this, the only POW that was remaining in Afghanistan, that there would be a rally around the flag. That didn’t happen.” “They were expecting criticisms of Gitmo, criticisms of the detainees that were chosen,” Todd said. “They did not expect this criticism of the attempt to...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States is re-establishing a law enforcement group to fight those it designates as domestic terrorists, with an announcement expected on Tuesday, Department of Justice officials said. Following hate-motivated shootings such as the one at a Jewish Community Center in Kansas City, Missouri in April, federal prosecutors have pressed the need to coordinate intelligence of such criminals on a national level, said the officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity. The group will coordinate cases that involve Americans who may be spurred to violence for political or prejudicial reasons.

@daqeqa Agree! "Democracy" is a cult in the West. I think most of afgs see law in terms of sharia not secular democracy, man centric laws.

THE US government secretly advised Scottish ministers it would be "far preferable" to free the Lockerbie bomber than jail him in Libya. Correspondence obtained by The Sunday Times reveals the Obama administration considered compassionate release more palatable than locking up Abdel Baset al-Megrahi in a Libyan prison. The intervention, which has angered US relatives of those who died in the attack, was made by Richard LeBaron, deputy head of the US embassy in London, a week before Megrahi was freed in August last year on grounds that he had terminal cancer. The document, acquired by a well-placed US source, threatens...