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Israelis are being warned to leave Turkey “immediately”, according to a new warning issued Friday evening by the Counter-Terrorism Bureau. The warning calls on Israelis staying in Turkey to leave the country immediately, due to concrete information about the intention by terrorists to carry out an attack against Israelis. This is the third travel warning to Turkey issued by the Counter-Terrorism Bureau within that last two weeks, the last one being issued on March 28. Friday’s advisory warns of “immediate risks” for attacks in Turkey and stresses that the threat “is applicable to all tourist attractions in the country.” "The...

The US has released a travel warning for Turkey, a day after Israel advised its citizens to "immediately" leave the country. While the US's statement does not instruct tourists to get out of Turkey as soon as possible, it urges US citizens to take "extreme caution" around possible terror targets. "The U.S. Mission in Turkey would like to inform U.S. citizens that there are credible threats to tourist areas, in particular to public squares and docks in Istanbul and Antalya," it reads. "Please exercise extreme caution if you are in the vicinity of such areas. For your personal safety, we...

Syrian rebels massacre Kurdish civilians in Aleppo April 6, 2016 Syria ARA News ERBIL – Dozens of civilians, including women and children, were killed on Tuesday in attacks by Arab rebel groups on a Kurdish neighborhood in Syria’s northern Aleppo city, officials and activists told ARA News. The Kurdish neighborhood of Sheikh Mqsoud in Aleppo –held by fighters of the People’s Protection Units (YPG)– was exposed to heavy shelling by Islamist rebels on Tuesday. At least 70 civilians were reported dead in the bombardment of Sheikh Maqsoud. “The situation in Sheikh Maqsoud is very bad, the attacks of these rebel...

Counter-Terrorism Unit further upgrades travel warning and urges Israelis not to visit Turkey, citing a high-level and concrete threat of an ISIS terror attack in the country. Israel's Counter-Terrorism Unit once again upgraded its travel warning to Turkey on Friday, urging Israelis currently in the country "to leave Turkey as soon as possible." The upgraded and urgent warning, set at level two (indicating a high level, concrete threat) comes on the heels of a warning issued by Turkish authorities a week and a half ago of an ISIS plan to attack Jewish targets in the country, including synagogues, Jewish schools...

Bernie presents a clear and present danger. The joke is over. Done. Finished. Time to quit laughing. What a creepy character this man has turned out to be. He speaks. People listen. Millions pay attention. He tells socialist fairytales, people swoon. So now he's into full-blown "Jews poisoned the wells" territory. Now, as Jewish students are being tormented on campus by BDS and SJP bullies, and as BDS piles up boycott-Israel wins throughout the United States and around the world -- Bernie piles it on with stereotypes borrowed from the darkest of the Dark Ages. Bernie presents a clear and...

Germany’s hippest young comedian faces a jail sentence of up to five years if Turkey decides to press charges over a poem he wrote insulting its head of state. Jan Böhmermann knew what he was doing when he read out a self-penned poem insulting Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan live on his late night show on Thursday evening. He introduced the piece by speaking directly to the Turkish president. “What I’m about to read is not allowed. If it were to be read in public — that would be forbidden in Germany,” Böhmermann said, before proceeding to perform his “smear...

Professional criminals convince parents that their daughters are going to a better life in Turkey. The parents are given 2000-5000 Turkish liras ($700-$1700) as a "bride price" -- an enormous sum for a poor Syrian family. "Girls between the ages of twelve and sixteen are referred to as pistachios, those between seventeen and twenty are called cherries, twenty to twenty-two are apples, and anyone older is a watermelon." — From a report on Turkey, by End Child Prostitution, Child Pornography and Trafficking of Children for Sexual Purposes (ECPAT). ◾Many Muslims have difficulty with, or even an aversion to, assimilating into...

Today had been declared the first day that migrants and refugees would be deported from Greece within the framework of the EU-Turkey deal, and European authorities seemed determined not to miss the date. So as of Sunday, Greek police, along with the EU border agency Frontex, organised a large-scale operation to ensure the smooth handling of today’s returns from the islands of Chios and Lesbos. The operation was initially deemed a success, with reports being limited to the boats and their occupants, which offered some digestible photo ops. There is plenty of evidence, though, that suggests that it has been...

Turkey’s prime minister says his country will not tolerate any insults directed toward President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s “honor,” following German television programs that mocked him. Ahmet Davutoglu said Tuesday any insults to Erdogan amounted to insulting Turkish people’s honor and would not go without a “response.” …

* Three passenger boats return migrants from Lesbos, Chios * Desperate migrants continue to cross despite deal * Turkey says will send non-Syrians to home countries * First Syrian refugees arrive in Germany from Turkey under deal * Rights groups question legality of the agreement (Adds Erdogan; migrants bussed to removal centre)

This is the incredible moment a secret service agent was filmed scolding one of the Turkish president's bodyguards after clashes with protesters and reporters in Washington D.C. on Thursday. Turkey's leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan was in the capital for this week's nuclear summit with other world leaders when scuffles broke out outside the Brookings Institution. Bystanders captured video of the president's security detail tearing anti-Erdogan banners from protesters' hands, while journalists claimed they were also pushed and kicked. Seeming to echo the concerns of many onlookers, one secret service agent was filmed telling the Turkish security detail: 'This is America!'

At the opening of the Turkish government-funded Diyanet Muslim center in Maryland, President Recep Erdogan lashed out at US presidential candidates for encouraging xenophobic and Islamophobic rhetoric against “primary elements” of American society. Speaking to a mainly Muslim crowd at the inauguration of the Turkish-funded Diyanet Center of America, in Maryland, just outside of Washington DC, Erdogan took the opportunity to criticize the American political elite and American society, saying that “there are still people walking around calling Muslims terrorists.” He blamed the US presidential contenders for spreading anti-Muslim sentiment in the US. In their race to secure the Republican...

At least 31 reported killed in fighting between Armenian, Azerbaijani forces By Aida Sultanova April 2 at 6:22 PM BAKU, Azerbaijan — At least 30 soldiers and a boy were reported killed as heavy fighting erupted Saturday between Armenian and Azerbaijani forces over the separatist region of Nagorno-Karabakh. The fighting was the worst outbreak since a full-scale war over the region ended in 1994. Since then, mountainous Nagorno-Karabakh — officially part of Azerbaijan — has been under the control of local ethnic Armenian forces and the Armenian military. Armenian forces also occupy several areas outside Nagorno-Karabakh. The sides are separated...

Turkey’s president comes to Maryland to celebrate Turkish center’s opening By Hamil R. Harris April 2 at 6:30 PM Two decades of praying, planning and building came to fruition Saturday as thousands from across the country and beyond gathered to celebrate the official opening of a $110 million facility in suburban Maryland designed to support and honor Turks and those of the Muslim faith living in the United States. The Diyanet Center of America, which bills itself as the largest Islamic campus “in the Western Hemisphere,” welcomed Turkish immigrants from Canada and Muslims from the Washington region to the facility,...

When Ibrahim El Bakraoui blew himself up in the Brussels Airport check-in area, killing and maiming scores of travelers, it was at least the third time he had passed unimpeded through an airport terminal in recent months. Suspected by Turkey of being a “foreign terrorist fighter” and known at home in Belgium as an ex-con wanted for parole violations, Bakraoui was still allowed to board a commercial airliner unaccompanied last summer, flying freely from Istanbul to the Netherlands and disappearing without a trace. The ease with which he did so raises questions about how much governments know about the movements...

Erdogan has boasted that he is proud of boldly blackmailing EU leaders into paying him protection money. Erdogan's threats were almost criminally sinister: "... the EU will be confronted with more than a dead boy on the shores of Turkey. There will be 10,000 or 15,000. How will you deal with that?" According to the agreement, 80 million Turkish citizens will have visa-free access to the European Union. The nightmare scenario for a desperate EU is that no matter how much it bows to extortionist demands from Turkey, the migrant crisis will continue to grow. Even if Turkey closes down...

WASHINGTON, MARCH 29 - US President Barack Obama has said no to a proposal to inaugurate a mosque in Maryland together with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and no bilateral meeting between the two is scheduled to take place on the sidelines of a nuclear summit in the American capital next Thursday and Friday, the Wall Street Journal reports.

Alparslan Çelik, who allegedly killed the pilot of the Russian warplane downed by Turkey for violating Turkish airspace on November 24, was detained Thursday in the western province of Izmir by security forces. According to information obtained from security sources, 14 suspects including Çelik are under investigation. Çelik, who fights against the Assad regime in Northern Syria's Bayırbucak area, became the target of Russian intelligence upon stating that he and other Turkmen fighters captured the Russian pilot dead who ejected himself from the warplane shot down by the Turkish Air Force. Çelik previously said that Russian warplanes kept striking Bayırbucak...

The recent terrorist attack in Istanbul was not an attack aimed at Israel, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Thursday, according to Reuters. Erdogan made the remarks in a speech at the Brookings Institute think tank. The attack in Istanbul killed three Israelis and an Iranian citizen but Erdogan’s remarks indicated he did not think the terrorists targeted Israelis. The Turkish president also said in his speech he expected a meeting of Turkish and Israeli officials next month to yield positive results, after the sides collaborated closely following the Istanbul attack. .....

This Russian TV news report details a raid on an apartment in Moscow that allegedly served as the headquarters of a cell of operatives for the Islamic State. The men who were arrested were all Uzbeks, but there may well be a Turkish connection, judging by the presence of forged Turkish IDs among the fake documents. It seems that the cell’s function was to facilitate the movement of people to and from Syria and Iraq through Turkey, and within the Russian Federation as well.