Free Republic

After a suspicious absence from the limelight following the start of war between Israel and Hamas terrorists on Oct. 7, Hezbollah’s Sec.-Gen. Hassan Nasrallah announced that he will be giving a major address to his supporters in Beirut, Lebanon on Friday at 3 p.m. local time. The speech is widely expected to reveal the direction the Iranian-backed terror organization Hezbollah intends to take in the conflict with Israel. Israel and the U.S. have so far made major efforts to keep Hezbollah on the sidelines of the war. U.S. President Joe Biden sent a strong message to that effect with his...

JERUSALEM, ISRAEL – As the situation here in Israel goes from bad to worse, and the death toll and number of wounded continues to climb on both sides of the border, Christians around the world are sending me great questions via email, text message, WhatsApp, and Twitter’s Direct Messaging. Above all, they want to know not just what’s happening moment to moment but where is this all going and what it all means from a biblical perspective.

Most people have no idea what is about to happen in the Middle East. The mainstream media is treating this crisis as simply a temporary conflict between Israel and Hamas that will eventually pass. But that isn’t what this is. This is the final conflict between Israel and Hamas, and it is going to spark a much wider war. Sadly, after the atrocities that Hamas has just committed, the Israelis have no choice. If U.S. women were raped and U.S. babies were ruthlessly slaughtered most Americans would feel the exact same way. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is telling us...

As Israelis grieve the death of more than 1,200 of our fellow citizens, and the wounding of 3,000 more, our country is beginning to shift from defense to offense. Already, the Israeli Air Force is bombing hundreds of terror targets in the Gaza Strip. At the same time, the IDF has called up more than 300,000 reservists to serve on the ground. These soldiers are currently preparing, training, equipping and deploying to invade the Gaza Strip and destroy Hamas once and for all. Yet even as Prime Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu and his military planners organize such an invasion, they...

Shalom from a grieving Israel. I finally was able to make it home yesterday after days of trying to catch earlier flights. What I found here was a nation that is brokenhearted, yet full of resolve. We have put up with the terrorists surrounding us and picking off our people one-by-one. When we would respond, it would be with a method of retaliation commensurate to the murderous action taken against us. But then a terrorist army invaded from Gaza and horrifically slaughtered more than 1200 of our innocent babies, children, elderly, women, and men. They shot them, burned them, stabbed...

The IDF said several launches from Syria into Israeli territory were identified. The IDF said that “part of the launches crossed into Israeli territory and presumably fell in an open area.” Israel responded with artillery fire. Meanwhile, near Gaza, IDF soldiers killed two terrorists in the area of Kibbutz Re'im and killed another two terrorists in the area of Kibbutz Mefalsim. In Lebanon, terrorists fired an anti-tank missile toward a military vehicle near Avivim. The conflict that Israel has prepared for appears to be emerging. It is increasingly clear that a large number of incidents are coming together. This includes...

We have entered into a new era in which the Middle East will never be the same. Every major news organization is covering current developments going on in Israel and we will do our best to include stories and links to the most important developments. We have been blessed to develop many friendships and associations with people and organizations on the ground in Israel and hope to bring you stories from those living through the current situation so that you can receive first hand information. Much of this information will change rapidly and our updates may be more frequent or...

President Donald Trump expects “seven or eight or nine” additional Arab states to sign peace agreements with Israel in the near future, including Saudi Arabia, he announced Tuesday during a White House ceremony. Trump made the comments after formally signing peace agreements between Israel, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain. Known as the Abraham Accords, Trump and its other signatories hope it heralds “a new dawn for peace in the Middle East.” Trump also said that he spoke with the King of Saudi Arabia and expects the country to join the agreement “at the right time,” according Agence France...

Last Saturday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union Party voted down a motion to freeze funding for the Palestinian Authority until it stops its “pay to slay” imbursements to terrorists and their families. The motion stated that “with the payments, the PA knowingly and willingly supports terror against Israel and makes this a worthy financial business.” But Merkel’s party wasn’t moved. One day later, a Palestinian terror attack seriously wounded a pregnant woman. The baby, who was delivered in an emergency procedure, held out for a few days and died on Wednesday. In October during a visit to...

The German Defense Minister was in Saudi Arabia on Thursday aiming to conclude a training deal for Saudi military officers, eliciting sharp criticism from German left-leaning parties. Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen held talks with her Saudi counterpart, Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, on boosting the “excellent bilateral relations” between the two countries, the German embassy said. “In addition to that, the visit aims to finalize the talks on enhanced cooperation in the training sector. Beginning from next year, the German Defense College will host several young officers and staff from the Saudi military,” the embassy said in...

Global military spending reached almost $1.7 trillion in 2015, marking a year-on-year increase for the first time since 2011, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, which tracks arms expenditure around the world. The United States remained far and away the top spender, which despite a dip from 2014, accounted for more than a third of total global spending. It was followed by China and then, perhaps surprisingly, Saudi Arabia, which supplanted Russia in third place.

With about 10 months left in office, President Barack Obama is considering unprecedented moves to implement a two-state solution, according to a Wall Street Journal report. Senior US officials revealed that the President is looking to initiate a final negotiated settlement between Israel and the Palestinian Authority using United Nations Security Council resolutions, a step that would obligate not only Israel and the Palestinian Authority, but effectively determine the direction of US policy for the president’s successor as well. The report comes ahead of Vice President Joe Biden’s visit to Israel on Tuesday, where he is scheduled to meet with...

UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas told world leaders Wednesday that he is no longer bound by agreements that have defined relations with Israel for the past two decades and are meant to form the basis for a two-state solution to the Middle East conflict. But what sounded like a potentially explosive declaration was blunted by the lack of any detail on how he plans to move forward. Addressing the United Nations General Assembly, Abbas said Israel had repeatedly violated its commitments, most notably by expanding settlements in the West Bank and east Jerusalem, on lands the Palestinians...

'I don't read Farsi': State Department spokeswoman brushes off claims that Iran is misrepresenting terms of nuclear deal Within hours of a formal announcement that the United States, Iran and a group of five other world powers had brokered a deal keep Iran obtaining an atomic bomb in exchange for the relief of certain sanctions, cracks began to appear in the tediously negotiated preliminary agreement. The United States insisted in public statements and a fact sheet on the deal that sanctions on the country would be 'suspended' or 'phased' out over time after a final deal is inked while leaving...

Noha Hashad (51), an Egyptian nuclear scientist who fled the Nile state in 2011 after her support of Israel made her a target for torture over many long years, has exposed troubling insights regarding Egypt’s military buildup in the Sinai Peninsula, as it fights terrorist organizations there. Speaking to Israel Hayom’s Emily Amrousi from her new home in Haifa, Hashad was asked to give her take about Egypt’s actions in Sinai, where the Egyptian army has been fighting radical groups such as Ansar Bayt al-Maqdis, a group that recently swore allegiance to Islamic State (ISIS). “That’s all for show,” appraised...

The United States is closing its embassy in Yemen amid political deadlock and deteriorating security conditions after the takeover of the country by Shiite rebels, two U.S. officials said. The officials said diplomats were being evacuated from the country on Tuesday and the embassy will suspend operations until conditions improve. Yemen has been in crisis for months with Iran-linked Shiite Houthi rebels besieging the capital and then taking control. The U.S. officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the closure publicly on the record.

Israel and Hezbollah are at war. On top of everything else that is going on in the world, now we have a new war in the Middle East, and nobody is quite certain what is going to happen next. Israel has been preparing for this moment for more than 8 years. So has Hezbollah. According to some reports, Hezbollah has amassed an arsenal of 50,000 rockets since the end of the Hezbollah-Israel war in 2006. If all-out warfare does erupt, we could potentially see tens of thousands of missiles rain down into an area not too much larger than the...

BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Union on Monday called for an anti-terror alliance with Arab countries to boost cooperation and information-sharing in the wake of deadly attacks and arrests across Europe. EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini said Monday that "we need an alliance. We need to strengthen our way of cooperating together."...

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu likened Hamas to al Qaeda, ISIS and other extremist Islamist groups Tuesday as he implored the international community to hold Palestinian militants responsible for the bloodshed in Gaza. Israel's top politician said Hamas must be held accountable for rejecting multiple cease-fire agreements and a relentless attack on Israeli civilians. Netanyahu made his comments at a joint press conference in Tel Aviv alongside U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon. "What we're seeing here with Hamas is another instance of Islamist extremism, violent extremism that has no resolvable grievance," Netanyahu said. "Hamas is like ISIS, Hamas is like al...

CAIRO (AP) — U.S. Arab allies Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait are discussing the creation of a military pact to take on Islamic militants, with the possibility of a joint force to intervene around the Middle East, The Associated Press has learned. The alliance would also serve as a show of strength to counterbalance their traditional rival, Shiite-dominated, Iran. Two countries are seen as potential theaters for the alliance to act, senior Egyptian military officials said: Libya, where Islamic militants have taken over several cities, and Yemen, where Shiite rebels suspected of links to Iran have...