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Qatar Airways has announced plans to launch the world’s longest direct flight: a 9,034-mile schlep from Doha to Auckland. Should the route get the green light, it would beat the current record holder – Qantas’s Dallas-Sydney service – by almost 500 miles. The journey time would be an estimated 18 hours and 34 minutes, according to the journey planning website travelmath.com.

Republican front-runner Donald Trump has broken just about every rule of conventional US presidential campaigning. Short on a long-term political vision to help shape the destiny of the nation, he has gleefully insulted Muslims, Mexicans, women and virtually all of his opponents. A Trump-in-the-White-House scenario poses high stakes for the Gulf region. Gulf Arabs could pull billion in investment money from the US if Trump, who triggered a global outrage when he advocated a temporary ban on all Muslims entering the US, wins the presidency later this year, prominent UAE businessman Khalaf al-Habtoor said. Saudi billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal,...

Qatar asked for clearance from the U.S. Government to purchase 72 F-15E Strike Eagle derivatives, but the request has been slow-rolled. Now, almost two years later and after the Iran Nuclear Agreement has been implemented, there are high hopes the deal may finally be allowed to move forward. Considering that Qatar remains a close ally of the U.S. in the region, and their fighter business has traditionally gone to European manufacturers, penning a deal for dozens of F-15 Strike Eagles seems like a no-brainer. Yet, politically, this would seem not to be the case. Aside from Israel and Saudi Arabia,...

The White House has appointed pro-Muslim Brotherhood Robert Malley as a new special assistant to President Barack Obama. As if this is not bad enough, Malley is in charge to cover the whole kitten caboodle: The Middle East, North Africa and the Gulf region. This appointment happens to be at the same time that Erdogan of Turkey and Qatar had a millstone breakthrough in reviving the Muslim Brotherhood by gaining special provisions for the Islamist organization in Saudi Arabia and the Arab gulf. Malley, who now works as Senior Director of National Security Council of the White House (NSC) on...

A stunning new Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) report circulating in the Kremlin today states that one of the United States Navy’s top commanders was relieved of his command a few hours ago after he sent out an “email/posting” revealing that President Barack Obama was in the process of purchasing a multi-million dollar seaside luxury villa in the United Arab Emirates city (UAE) of Dubai. According to this report, the Commander of the US Navy’s Carrier Strike Group 15, Rear Admiral Rick Williams, posted a “pointed” query on 8 January [since deleted] to the US Naval Institute’s “Readiness Kill Chain” “recipients/responders”...

By Dick Morris and Eileen McGann January 06, 2016 One thing Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump have in common -- they both like to have big things named after them. The latest batch of emails released by the State Department uncovers a massive ego trip by the former secretary of state. Anxious to etch her name in glass, as well as in history, she and her closest aides raised $37 million from corporations and foreign governments to build a U.S. Diplomacy Center to be named after Clinton. In a Feb. 1, 2013 email -- the last days of Clinton's tenure...

Amid financial hardship, Erdogan looks to Qatar as 'rich daddy' Zülfikar Doğan Posted December 29, 2015 A series of controversial steps in the region has left Turkey increasingly isolated in its neighborhood. As a result, the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government has gone on a hunt for new "friends." Normalizing ties with Israel is now back on the agenda. The second door the government has knocked on is Qatar's. Yet, even Qatar's friendship could not stop the Arab League from adopting a joint statement last week condemning the Turkish troop deployment in Bashiqa, near Mosul, and urging Ankara to...

Qatari royals rush to Switzerland in nine planes after emir breaks leg A fleet of jets, including an Airbus, made emergency landings at Zurich-Kloten airport after Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani suffered a fracture Agence France-Presse Tuesday 29 December 2015 07.05 GMT Unidentified individuals travelling in as many as nine planes belonging to Qatar's royal family made an emergency trip to Switzerland over the weekend for medical reasons, according to a Swiss official. A spokesman for Switzerland's federal office of civil aviation confirmed local media reports that multiple aircraft made unscheduled landings at the Zurich-Kloten airport overnight from 25...

Man, Boeing (NYSE:BA) just cannot catch a break. For a while there, 2015 was starting to look like the year Boeing defense got its wings back. In February, opining that "stealth may be overrated," U.S. Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Jon Greenert began laying the groundwork for the U.S. Navy breaking up with Lockheed Martin's F-35C fighter jet, and buying a bunch of Boeing F/A-18s for its carriers instead. Earlier this month, the Air Force floated a trial balloon of its own. In a controversial revelation, the Air Force suggested it was considering buying as many as six dozen cheaper...

Nine of the Qataris kidnapped from Iraq's Samawa desert are members of the ruling family: sources Published December 19th, 2015 - 20:00 GMT via SyndiGate.info As the mystery surrounding the abduction last week of a Qatari hunting party in Iraq deepened, a report in Kuwait said that nine of its members were from the Al Thani Ruling family. The Al Thani hunters abducted are Shaikh Khalid Bin Ahmad Mohammad Al Thani, Shaikh Nayed Bin Eid Mohammad Al Thani, Shaikh Abdul Rahman Bin Jasem Abdul Aziz Jassem Al Thani, Shaikh Jassem Bin Fahad Mohammad Thani Al Thani, Shaikh Khalid Bin Jassem...

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has lifted the visa ban on the European theoretician of radical Islam and virtuoso Jew-baiter, Tariq Ramadan, allowing him to take up a position similar to that he was offered at Notre Dame University, but which was filled because of his unavailability. At the same time, a U.S. entry prohibition against a South African leftist, Adam Habib of Johannesburg University, was voided. The decision to admit Tariq Ramadan is profoundly wrong. Adam Habib is an innocuous figure. Tariq Ramadan is not. Ramadan was first barred from the U.S. in 2004 ... the denial of...

At some point between 2006 and 2008, the American people decided to turn their backs on the world. Between the seeming futility of the war in Iraq and the financial collapse of 2008, Americans decided they'd had enough. In Barack Obama, they found a leader who could channel their frustration. Obama's foreign policy, based on denying the existence of radical Islam and projecting the responsibility for Islamic aggression on the US and its allies, suited their mood just fine. If America is responsible, then America can walk away. Once it is gone, so the thinking has gone, the Muslims will...

Gunmen kidnap 26 from Qatari hunting group in Iraq Gunmen kidnapped 26 members of a Qatari hunting party in southern Iraq, officials said on Wednesday, the second high-profile seizure of foreign nationals in the country in three months. Posted December 16, 2015 12:35 GMT "Twenty-six Qatari hunters were kidnapped at about 3:00 am (0000 GMT) by unknown gunmen," according to a police major from Muthanna province, where the kidnappings took place. A local council member from the province confirmed the number of people kidnapped but did not specify their nationality. "Unknown gunmen in dozens of pick-up trucks attacked a place...

Charges of unlawful assembly and use of uniform in public were brought against 11 members of a group trying to enforce aspects of strict Islamic Sharia law in the North Rhine-Westphalia city, a spokeswoman for the Wuppertal police told The Local. Officers stopped the 11-man group on the street on Wednesday. Some were wearing orange vests bearing the words 'Shariah Police', in violation of federal German law, the spokeswoman said. The group has been stopping young people at local drinking and gambling establishments and urging them to abstain from activities deemed to be ungodly according to Islam. The Wednesday incident...

Despite Hillary Rodham Clinton’s promise that she had scrubbed illegal cash contributions from her 2008 presidential campaign, prosecutors revealed Monday that the mastermind of Mayor Vincent C. Gray’s “shadow campaign” also funneled hundreds of thousands of dollars to aid Mrs. Clinton’s bid for the White House.

On Friday Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal slammed Donald Trump for proposing a ban on Muslim immigrants in the US until the government could alleviate security concerns. Prince Alwaleed called Donald Trump a "disgrace" for his popular plan. @realDonaldTrump You are a disgrace not only to the GOP but to all America. Withdraw from the U.S presidential race as you will never win. @Alwaleed_Talal) December 11, 2015 On Sunday Donald Trump responded to the Saudi Prince in epic fashion. "@Michael2014abc: @Alwaleed_Talal @realDonaldTrump Has your country, Saudi Arabia, taken ANY of the Syrian refugees? If not, why not?" Donald J. Trump...

While NATO sees no danger of Islamic State (ISIS) gaining a strong enough foothold in Afghanistan to represent a serious threat to regional security, Russia is concerned that the jihadist organization is growing in strength and may soon supplant the Taliban - and Moscow fears that ISIS has ultimate plans to make Central Asia part of its caliphate. Russia and the West diverge in their assessments of whether Islamic State (ISIS) is expanding geographically and constitutes a disaster waiting to happen in Afghanistan. Lack of understanding and cooperation on the ground might once again, as in Syria, only be a...

Police have named a second suspect in the San Bernardino shootings, a 28-year-old Qatari citizen named Tayyeep bin Ardogan, according to Fox News. Fox News Middle East analyst Lisa Daftari tweeted the account late Wednesday night.

Within days of demanding a total of $15 million from the City of Irving and the Irving Independent School District, “Clock Boy” Ahmed Mohamed announced in a long distance phone interview from Qatar, he is homesick and wants to come home to Texas now. In October, Ahmed accepted a fully-funded education scholarship from the Qatar Foundation, an organization with reputed ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, over an invitation to MIT, which is among the most prestigious institutions of higher learning in the world. The family announced they would relocate to Qatar to accommodate his education, which they did. Dallas’ KTVT...

Attorneys representing the family of Ahmed “clock kid” Mohamed sent a letter to Irving, Texas, officials demanding $10 million in compensation for “damages” and written apologies from the city’s mayor and police chief. snip After making appearances at a number of high-profile locations, including the White House, Mohamed and his family moved to Qatar. “For personal security reasons, Ahmed and family are in Doha, Qatar. However, when they feel safe again, all of them want more than anything to come home, to Irving, Texas,” the letter states.