Free Republic

Ali Akbar Mohtashamipour, a Shiite cleric who as Iran's ambassador to Syria helped found the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah and lost his right hand to a book bombing reportedly carried out by Israel, died Monday of the coronavirus. He was 74. A close ally of Iran's late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Mohtashamipour in the 1970s formed alliances with Muslim militant groups across the Mideast. After the Islamic Revolution, he helped found the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard in Iran and as ambassador to Syria brought the force into the region to help form Hezbollah.

Baghdad (AFP) - Iraqi armed factions called on Tuesday for an urgent meeting to face "the war against the resistance," after a US strike on Baghdad last week killed top Iranian and Iraqi commanders. "We will regroup the forces of the resistance in a single entity to respond to Washington," said Nasr al-Shammary, deputy head of the Harakat al-Nujaba group.

In a bold move, Iraq’s Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr spoke in favor of the return of the Jews who were evicted from the country half a century ago. Sadr responded to a question posed by one of his followers June 2 on whether Iraqi Jews have a right to return after having been forcibly displaced due to previous Iraqi policies, noting that they used to own properties and were part of the Iraqi community. He said, "If their loyalty was to Iraq, they are welcome." His answer was taken as tantamount to a religious edict, or fatwa. The response has...

Shia populist cleric and Iraqi nationalist Moqtada al Sadr won the May 12 Iraqi elections to the surprise of Iran, Turkey, the United States and many Iraq experts. Sadr is against Israel, the United States and Iran, and also opposes the presence of Turkish troops on Iraqi territory. Now he is the kingmaker of Iraq’s elections, winning 54 out of 329 seats in the Iraqi parliament. Washington was hoping Iraqi Prime Minister Haidar al Abadi would win as a result of his defeat of Islamic State (ISIS), while Iran backed the Conquest alliance headed by the leader of the paramilitary...

Based on journalist Martha Raddatz's same-named best-seller, "The Long Road Home" dramatizes the heroism on the front lines of the Iraq War. On April 4, 2004 -- a day that came to be known in military annals as "Black Sunday" -- the 1st Cavalry Division from Fort Hood was brutally ambushed, an incident that changed the U.S. military's view of Iraq from a peacekeeping mission to a fight against domestic insurgents. Across eight episodes, the series cuts between the battle in Iraq and the homefront in Texas, where wives and families anxiously await news for 48 agonizing hours.

Hundreds of supporters of Shi'ite Muslim cleric Moqtada al-Sadr stormed into Baghdad's Green Zone and broke into the Iraqi parliament building. The protesters, who had gathered outside the heavily fortified district, known as the Green Zone, crossed a bridge over the Tigris River chanting: 'The cowards ran away!' in apparent reference to departing lawmakers before breaking into the parliament building. The staggering scenes came after Sadr denounced Iraq's politicians' for their failure to reform a political quota system blamed for rampant corruption.

The Obama administration is declining to inform Congress about the number of American citizens and troops killed by Iran and its terror proxies, according to a document provided to Congress and obtained by the Washington Free Beacon. The administration was repeatedly asked by Congress to release figures describing how many Americans and Israelis have been killed by Iran’s military and terror activities since the country’s 1979 revolution. In a series of on-the-record responses obtained exclusively by the Free Beacon, and provided in written form to Sen. Marco Rubio (R., Fla.), Kerry sidestepped the questions on all of the three separate...

Washington Dispatch: The Iraq general's testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee was predictable: progress is real, we must stay the course. But committee Democrats missed an opportunity to undercut the White House story. By David Corn April 8, 2008 As General David Petraeus and U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Ryan Crocker testified to the Senate Armed Services Committee on Tuesday and pitched a story of success in Iraq, a news update flashed on the television screen: Sadr threatens to end cease-fire. Meaning that civil war between the Shiite-dominated government of Baghdad and the Shiite movement led by cleric Moqtada al-Sadr could...

Explanation: In cosmic brush strokes of glowing hydrogen gas, this beautiful skyscape unfolds across the plane of our Milky Way Galaxy and the center of the northern constellation Cygnus the Swan. The featured image spans about six degrees. Bright supergiant star Gamma Cygni (Sadr) to the upper left of the image center lies in the foreground of the complex gas and dust clouds and crowded star fields. Left of Gamma Cygni, shaped like two luminous wings divided by a long dark dust lane is IC 1318, whose popular name is understandably the Butterfly Nebula. The more compact, bright nebula at...

Explanation: Supergiant star Gamma Cygni lies at the center of the Northern Cross, a famous asterism in the constellation of the Swan (Cygnus). Known by the proper name Sadr, the bright star also lies at the center of this gorgeous skyscape, featuring a complex of stars, dust clouds, and glowing nebulae along the plane of our Milky Way galaxy. The field of view spans over 3 degrees (six Full Moons) on the sky and includes emission nebula IC 1318 and open star cluster NGC 6910. Left of Gamma Cygni and shaped like two glowing cosmic wings divided by a long...

Americans were stunned on October 11 when the Justice Department unsealed its complaint against Mansour Arbabsiar, a 56-year-old used-car dealer from Corpus Christi now in federal custody, and Ali Gholam Shakuri, a member of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps-Quds Force. Shakuri remains inside Iran. The pair have been charged with conspiring to kill the Saudi ambassador in Washington, Adel Al-Jubeir. As disclosed by the Treasury Department, the plot was coordinated by Arbabsiar’s cousin, Abdul Reza Shahlai, a top Quds Force functionary whom the Treasury designated in 2008 as one of several “individuals and entities fueling violence in Iraq.” Shahlai was...

New Delhi An Israeli official said an explosion was hit an Israeli diplomat's car in New Delhi on Monday. He said one person was hurt in the blast, but did not identify the victim. Israeli Embassy spokesman David Goldfarb said the car was near the embassy when the blast went off. Indian police said only that a car was on fire on the street outside the embassy.

Suspected Iranian Blew Off His Own Leg In A Botched Terror Attack In Bangkok Robert JohnsonFeburary 14, 2012 One day after bombs targeting Israeli embassy staff went off in India and Georgia, another botched attack played out this morning in Bangkok. Through several reports, the incident appears to have played out something like this: Saeib Morabi, a suspected Iranian, was fleeing an explosion that rocked through his rented home in central Bangkok. While he was on the road looking for transportation, another explosion went off "on a nearby road." When Morabi finally managed to flag down a cab, the driver...

Head of Iraq's Sadr movement, Muqtada al-Sadr, has called for the complete withdrawal of all American troops from the country by the end of the year. Speaking in the holy city of Najaf on Wednesday, the cleric rejected any form of US presence in the country, as Washington and Baghdad are discussing keeping a limited number of US troops as military trainers in Iraq. Sadr said the presence of US military trainers in Iraq beyond the Dec. 31 deadline is an ''organized occupation''. He also dismissed any negotiation with the US before the full withdrawal of all foreign soldiers and...

(Reuters) - Iraq's fiercely anti-American cleric Moqtada al-Sadr on Sunday called on his followers to suspend attacks against U.S. troops to ensure they leave Iraq by a year-end deadline. But the Shi'ite cleric, whose Mehdi Army militia fought U.S. forces until 2008, warned that if they did not depart on time, military operations would resume and be "very severe." "Because of my eagerness to accomplish the independence of Iraq and have the invader forces withdraw from our holy land, it has become imperative for me to stop military operations ... until the invader forces complete their withdrawal," Sadr said in...

Radical anti-US cleric Moqtada al-Sadr today rejected Western calls for Syria's President Bashar al-Assad to quit, calling the embattled leader a"brother"who stood in opposition to the United States. For the first time Thursday, US President Barack Obama and Western leaders said that Assad must step down. "We reject Obama's interference in Syrian affairs,"Sadr said in a statement released by his office in the holy Shiite city of Najaf in south Iraq. Sadr said he supported revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt that overthrew despots there, but added that"there are many differences between the popular revolutions and what is happening in Syria."...

BAGHDAD (AP) — A powerful anti-American Shiite cleric in Iraq with thousands of loyal followers threatened on Sunday that U.S. forces who stay past the Dec. 31 withdrawal deadline are fair game to attack.Iraqi officials, worried about a potential backlash if U.S. troops remain in the country, have tried to portray any American force that does not withdraw as trainers of the still-growing Iraqi military rather than as combat troops.While the security situation in Iraq has improved over the past few years, attacks are still commonplace. In June alone, 15 U.S. soldiers were killed, making it the bloodiest month for...

BAGHDAD -- A roadside bomb killed two U.S. soldiers Thursday outside the main American military base in Baghdad in what U.S. officials said appeared to be another attack by Shiite militias hoping to drive U.S. troops out of Iraq. The attack follows the deadliest month for U.S. troops in Iraq in two years. Fifteen U.S. soldiers died in June, nearly all in attacks by Shiite militias. ----- Thursday's bomb, which was detonated near a checkpoint outside Victory Base Camp, was a powerful armor-piercing explosive known as an EFP, according to two military officials with knowledge of the attack. EFPs typically...

Moqtada al Sadr, a prominent Iraqi Shia cleric, has threatened to revive his Mehdi Army and relaunch armed resistance against continued US presence in the country. The threat came as tens of thousands of people marched across the capital Baghdad, marking the eighth anniversary of former leader Saddam Hussein's fall on Saturday. A spokesperson of al Sadr, said the US had until the end of the year to meet the cleric's demands. The Shia leader, returned to Iraq from a self-imposed exile following a strong showing by his bloc in the 2010 parliamentary election in January 2011. Al Jazeera correspondent...

Iraqi Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr urged a sea of rapturous followers Saturday to resist all occupiers of Iraq and oppose the United States, but not necessarily with arms. In his first speech since his homecoming Wednesday after years of self-imposed exile in Iran, the one-time firebrand burnished his anti-U.S. credentials and urged supporters to give Iraq's new government led by Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki a chance. "We are still fighters," said Sadr, who led two uprisings against the U.S. military after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion and has called for an earlier U.S. withdrawal than the agreed deadline of the...