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Acting State Department Spokesperson Marie Harf is being promoted to Senior Advisor for Strategic Communications to Secretary of State John Kerry. Harf will focus on negotiations between the U.S. and Iran on nuclear weapons. “Fox and Friends” this morning took a look back at her history of flubs in the media. Harf said on MSNBC’s “Hardball” in February, “We need in the longer term […] to go after the root causes that [lead] people to join these [terror] groups, whether it’s lack of opportunity for jobs … What makes these 17-year-old kids pick up an AK-47 instead of try to...

Painful truth: The really awful thing about speaking for this State Dept is all the spin one must do on behalf of the govt of Iran Frum wrote that yesterday. More than 24 hours later, Harf’s still shilling for our partners in peace in Tehran. To understand what this is about, re-read yesterday’s post about the growing alarm among western diplomats that Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium has been increasing despite their promises to freeze it at a certain level. There may be an innocent-ish explanation for that related to the process of converting uranium into fuel rods; there may...

Q: Regarding the proposed Iran agreement, what are your major concerns? A: We consider the deal a very bad one. There is no doubt that the Iranians’ intention and all of their activities in the last 20 years were in order to reach a military nuclear capability. The deal is going to allow Iran to actually become a military nuclear threshold state. No facilities are going to be shut down, including underground facilities. No centrifuges will be destroyed. They will be able to go on with their research and development to have in the near future — whether it be...

A terror suspect killed by police in Boston was not shot in the back as his family claimed, community leaders said Wednesday after police took the unusual step of showing them footage of the encounter. Usaamah Rahim, 26, was killed Tuesday morning after he was stopped for questioning in a terror investigation. Police said that he threatened them with a military-style knife as officers ordered him to stand down. Rahim's family later claimed that he was on the phone when he was shot, and that he was hit in the back. Police said they showed the surveillance footage to community...

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met with Canadian Foreign Minister Robert Nicholson and told him at the start of their meeting: "Rob, welcome to Jerusalem. Our friendship, the friendship between Canada and Israel, is a model of the partnership between two democracies, exemplary democracies. Israel values the support, unstinting, unfaltering, of Canada in an international environment that is often marked by cynicism and double talk. Canada, led by Prime Minister Harper, is always stalwart and tells the truth. And we think that this is a refreshing wind in an increasingly hostile environment, hostile to the truth. As an example, a national...

Several refugees sent to Norway under the UN’s quota system turned out to have close links to the terror groups Islamic State (IS) and the al-Nusra Front, Norway’s Police Security Service (PST) has revealed. According to the service, between five and ten of the 1,000 Syrians chosen to go to Norway by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), were discovered to have links to the one of the two terror groups. “Unfortunately, there are some who try to exploit and abuse the refugee agency,” Police Superintendent Svein Erik Molstad told Norway’s Dagbladet newspaper. “We have discovered more quota...

State Department spokesperson Marie Harf said she was “perplexed” by a New York Times story Tuesday on Iran’s 20 percent increase in nuclear fuel over the past 18 months. The United States has been in negotiations with Iran for a final deal about their nuclear program. The International Atomic Energy Agency issued a report on Friday that documented an increase of Iran’s nuclear fuel stockpile. A reporter asked Harf if Iran’s increased stockpiles has complicated the current negotiations. “Not at all. Our team read that story this morning and was quite frankly perplexed because the main contentions of it are...

Americans ‘overreacted’ to the 9/11 attacks, according to the newly appointed first female vice-chancellor of Oxford University. Terrorism expert Professor Louise Richardson said the 2001 atrocity provoked such a response because violent extremism was a ‘new experience’ in the US. Widespread panic ensued in America after al-Qaeda hijacked four passenger airliners and flew them into buildings, causing almost 3,000 deaths. In contrast, British citizens have shown themselves to be more ‘resilient’ in the face of terror when dealing with violence during the Troubles in Northern Ireland, she said.

President Barack Obama said Monday that his administration has lifted the U.S. to become “the most respected country in the world.” Obama made the claim during a discussion with Young Southeast Asian Leaders Initiative Fellows at the White House. PRESIDENT OBAMA: People don’t remember, but when I came into office, the United States in world opinion ranked below China and just barley above Russia, and today once again, the United States is the most respected country on earth, and part of that I think is because of the work we did to reengage the world and say that we want...

Secretary of State John Kerry’s severe bicycle accident might have foreign policy implications. He recently broke his leg while cycling in Switzerland. When asked by reporters about the accident, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest admitted that nuclear talks with Iran would be affected by the accident, but reassured them that Kerry would still play a prominent role in the process. “The fact is, we do continue to believe that we have the time and resources necessary to pursue and hopefully complete the Iran negotiations,” he said. “And I’m confident that those negotiations will be affected by the secretary’s injury,...

Earthquake hits near Iran’s current nuke plant Russia announced on Monday that it would start construction this year on a second nuclear plant in Iran, according to regional reports. Russia’s Rosatom State Atomic Energy Corporation made the announcement early on Monday, stating that it will begin building a second nuclear power plant in Iran’s southern region later this year, according to Iran’s state-controlled Fars News Agency. Meanwhile, an earthquake struck Monday morning near the site of Iran’s current nuclear power plant in Bushehr, near where the second plant will be built. Iranian media outlets reported the quake as hitting a...

US President Barack Obama tells Channel 2 in an interview that he can “demonstrate” that a “verifiable” agreement with Iran will be the best way to contain Tehran’s nuclear ambitions. “I can, [I] think, demonstrate, not based on any hope but on facts and analysis, that the best way to prevent Iran from having a nuclear weapon is a verifiable tough agreement. A military solution will not fix it, even if the United States participates. It would temporarily slow down an Iranian nuclear program but it would not eliminate it,” he says. Asked whether Israel may attempt a military strike...

WASHINGTON - The White House is confident it can still pursue Iran nuclear talks despite US Secretary of State John Kerry's injury over the weekend, a spokesman said on Monday. Kerry left Europe for the United States earlier on Monday after breaking his leg in a cycling accident on Sunday. "We do continue to believe that we have the time and resources necessary to pursue, and hopefully complete, the Iran negotiations," White House spokesman Josh Earnest told reporters in a briefing. He added that Kerry would continue to play a critical role in the talks, although it was unclear exactly...

Our fallen heroes, our country, and our civilization deserve no less, no less than our best efforts and no less than our best sense Any reasonable stance about the nature of Islam invites both reasoned and unreasoned Commentary, and from all sides of the spectrum of belief systems. When discussing Islam it seems as if the perspectives we’re stuck with are those of the mink-wearer—vs. the mink. Certainly these two perspectives cannot be reconciled. So it seems with the nature of Islam. Even when we boot irrational arguments from the room, many legitimate but diametrically opposed arguments remain standing.

FIFA is expected to vote on whether to expel Israel and whether to reelect Sepp Blatter President. The Presidential vote will be at 10am ET. Vote on expelling Israel if it happens will come before that. Sepp Blatter is expected to easily win reelection despite the ongoing scandal.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned on Thursday that acceding to the Palestinian demand to suspend Israel from FIFA threatened to unravel the international soccer organization. In an interview with reporters in Tel Aviv, Netanyahu commented on Friday’s upcoming vote to oust Israel at the FIFA congress in Zurich, calling it a “blatant intrusion of politics into the field of sports.” According to Netanyahu, who is also an avid soccer fan, “sport has become an arena of goodwill and cooperation between peoples, and because of that an attempt to attack Israel in FIFA will cause FIFA to collapse.” The prime...

BUREIJ, Gaza Strip — On Friday, the annual congress of FIFA, the governing body of world soccer, is scheduled to vote on a proposal to suspend Israel from the organization. The Palestine Football Association called for this measure because Israel prevents our national team from participating in normal training, travel and competition. If the corruption scandal now enveloping FIFA derails the vote, we will continue to press the issue. The Palestine national team has belonged to FIFA since 1998, but we do not trust the current president, Sepp Blatter, to represent our interests. Past assurances to act have not been...

.....FIFA, the powerful and polarizing governing body for soccer, came under prosecutorial assault from two fronts Wednesday. Acting on an indictment by the U.S. Justice Department, Swiss police arrested several top FIFA officials, including two vice presidents, during an overnight raid in Zurich on charges of corruption Wednesday. The U.S. investigation targets alleged wrongdoing that spans 24 years. U.S. prosecutors issued arrest warrants for 14 people, on charges ranging from money laundering to fraud and racketeering.

A sign was hung in a public square in Antwerp, Belgium threatening Mayor Bart De Wever with death if he did not convert to Islam, Belgian media reported Sunday. The message was written in French, one of the three official languages of Belgium, the others being Dutch and German. Het Laatste Nieuws reported (via Google Translate): “By N-VA chairman Bart De Wever again death threats walked. In a letter drafted in French which was hung on the Handschoenmarkt, the mayor of Antwerp was threatened with execution if he did not convert to Islam. How serious the threat should be taken...

Statement from Washington Post Executive Editor Martin Baron ahead of Jason Rezaian’s trial in Iran: The shameful acts of injustice continue without end in the treatment of Washington Post correspondent Jason Rezaian. Now we learn his trial will be closed to the world. And so it will be closed to the scrutiny it fully deserves. It’s worth recalling what kind of system we’re dealing with. Jason was arrested without charges. He was imprisoned in Iran’s worst prison. He was placed in isolation for many months and denied medical care he needed. His case was assigned to a judge internationally notorious...