Free Republic

The big question is: How many citizens governed by Islam simpatico Western leaders will be able to dig themselves out from the brutal heel of radical Islam? For the longest time now, all people seem to want to talk about is the weather. Politicians and trends come and go but the weather is always there to talk about and is often used by authorities to scare people out of their wits. The weather, global warming’s biggest Public Relations booster, does not just push common sense into unwitting early retirement, it owns the power to knock the Kardashians and the latest...

The sexual abuse incidents in Europe have exposed the logical flaws in the Swedish debate about immigration and they also show how unprepared Sweden and Europe are in facing the challenges that have arisen because of the migration crisis. After women were assaulted by "asylum seekers" in several places in Europe, it emerged that it also had happened in Sweden. However, in Sweden this had happened in August 2015 at the "We are Sthlm"  festival where about 150 girls had been victims of sexual abuse by "refugee youths" from Afghanistan. The reason that this August 2015 incident was not...

... Germany's Maghreb community has come under a harsh spotlight after hundreds of women were groped and robbed by mainly North African suspects on New Year's Eve outside Cologne's main train station. Only one suspect -- an Algerian asylum seeker -- has been arrested so far over the sex crimes and 25 Moroccans and Algerians count among the 30 suspects under investigation, police said. [...] Even before the full scale of the Cologne rampage emerged, Berlin had already been watching with concern at a sudden jump in the number of Moroccan and Algerian asylum seekers in December. ...

Controversial anti-Israel politician and London Mayoral candidate George Galloway has been accused of "fascism," after refusing a man entry to his events because he is pro-Israel. Jewish activist Ben Gross of the Israel Advocacy Movement had attempted to enter a public talk by Galloway last week, but was rejected and physically blocked from entering. If Gross was under any doubt as to why he was turned away, Galloway himself quickly made it clear to his audience that it was his pro-Israel sympathies which made him a persona non grata. ...

British Prime Minister David Cameron on Friday accused Donald Trump of making it more difficult to defeat Islamic State extremists. Speaking to the US website Mic.Com, the Tory Party leader said the billionaire was making the "fundamental mistake" of trying to blame all Muslims for the violent ideology of a minority while praising Islam as a religion of peace. Trump, currently leading national polls to be the Republican Party nominee ahead of the Iowa caucuses on Feb. 1, sparked international censure in December after he demanded all Muslims be barred from entering the US following the Paris massacre. The property...

Germany's opposition Left party has expressed its suspicions of a "dirty deal" after German Defense Minister Ursula von der Leyen raised the prospect of sending troops to Libya to support a potential unity government in the fractured North African country. [...] Germany is one of a number of states (including Italy, France and Britain) currently discussing Libya in Rome, alongside representatives of the European Union and the United Nations, and van Aken claims that not only is a senior Bundeswehr officer among the German delegation, but the countries are planning to send in ground troops. "The plans for Libya go...

It's 2016. Isn't it about time a black person won an Academy Award? Well, okay, black people have won Academy Awards.* But shouldn't black people be nominated every time the awards are held? And don't say, "Leave us alone, we picked a black guy already," because that makes you sound like the 2016 Democrats. Charlotte Rampling, who's nominated this year for her role in a movie you haven't seen, made the mistake of saying the #OscarsSoWhite boycott campaign is racist. Sure, it's literally true that demanding concessions based on race is racist, but that doesn't mean she should say it....

In a worrying development for free speech and the free exchange of ideas, Facebook has announced a Europeanwide initiative to combat so-called online extremism and "hate speech." The social media giant pledged to spend over $1 million on the new "Initiative for Civil Courage Online," which it launched in Berlin in partnership with the German Ministry of Justice and other organizations. It has even hired a unit of publisher Bertelsmann to monitor and delete "racist" posts on its site in Germany. But critics are concerned the initiative will be used to suppress the free speech of conservative and populist critics...

Professor Saud Saleh - from Al-Azhar University in Cairo, Egypt - reportedly said rape is allowed between times of "legitimate war" between Muslims and their enemies. In a television interview Saleh appears to try to discourage the purchase of slaves from Asian countries for sex, claiming Allah has given Muslim men a "legitimate" way to have sexual relations with slave women.

LONDON — A high-profile British inquiry into the poisoning of Alexander V. Litvinenko, a former K.G.B. officer turned critic of the Kremlin, concluded in a report released on Thursday that his murder “was probably approved” by President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and the head of the country’s spy service. The finding by Robert Owen, a retired High Court judge, in a 328-page report, represented by far the most damning official link between Mr. Litvinenko’s death on Nov. 23, 2006, and the highest levels of the Kremlin.

Follow the hearing on the murder of Litvinenko

Pro-Immigration Activists Urge Them To Remove Evidence From Internet Two Dutch film makers have been attacked in the infamous Calais Jungle camp by migrants wielding pepper spray and a knife. Members of the Calais Migrant Solidarity group have urged them to remove the clip from the Internet, stating menacingly: "You are not doing yourself a favour by putting it online as I think this is not what you came for to Calais..." Ms. Engels released the clip, taken while filming her new documentary, “Calais: Welcome to the Jungle,” via her YouTube account. The clip, which only lasts 41 seconds, clearly...

German Tornado jets deployed to Syria for spying missions can't fly at night because the cockpit lights blind the pilots, it was reported today. It is a fresh embarrassment for the German defence ministry which has been battling equipment problems. The six aircraft sent to Syria are fitted with surveillance technology and had been touted as being capable of taking high-resolution photos and infrared images, even at night and in bad weather.

The former head of the "Christian Social Union" party and former Bavarian Prime Minister Edmund Stoiber delivered an ultimatum to German Chancellor Angela Merkel, demanding reduce the number of refugees in the country until the end of March, 2016. According to Oxu.Az, Stoiber called for the permanent closure of the refugee border with Austria. ...

Saudi Arabia is not ruling out developing a nuclear bomb if its regional rival Iran obtains one, Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir told the Reuters news agency on Tuesday. Asked if Saudi Arabia had discussed seeking a nuclear bomb in the event Iran managed to obtain one, al-Jubeir replied the country would do "whatever we need to do in order to protect our people". "I don't think it would be logical to expect us to discuss any such issue in public and I don't think it would be reasonable to expect me to answer this question one way or another,"...

The Prime Minister’s Office dismissed as “unacceptable and wrong” uncharacteristically sharp public criticism of Israel’s legal standards leveled Monday by US envoy Dan Shapiro, who said at times there seemed to be one standard of law in the West Bank for Israelis, and another for Palestinians. “As Israel's devoted friend, and its most stalwart partner, we believe that Israel must develop stronger and more credible responses to questions about the rule of law in the West Bank,” Shapiro said during an address at the annual Institute for Strategic Studies (INSS) Conference in Tel Aviv. Noting that the recent indictments in...

More than likely originated with an SOS sent to the Brits in an election year by sniveling American Democrats, who, “alas, alas!” intuit that outsiders like Trump and Texas Senator Ted Cruz have a chance to deliver America from Obama’s Fundamental UK’s Parliament and self-professed Barack Obama “bro” Prime Minister David Cameron just gave the world’s chattering classes Lesson 101 in the ‘Hypocrisy of Politically Correct Governments’. Reality TV in America is aided and abetted by Donald J. Trump, the lately-minted Bruce (“call me Caitlyn”) Jenner and assorted others. In England, Reality TV yesterday burned 3 hours of ‘debate’ to...

In our planet's early history, 720 to 640 million years ago, thick sheets of ice covered the majority of the surface, as the Earth was locked in a deep freeze. But explosive underwater volcanoes changed the chemistry of the Earth's oceans and were key to breaking the planet from its icy state, according to a new study. Researchers at the University of Southampton believe underwater volcanoes helped to thaw out "Snowball Earth", and even led to runaway chemical chain reactions, which created the conditions for an explosion of life on Earth. While much of the driving forces behind glaciation during...

Hundreds of years of parliamentary tradition, British expectancy over free speech, and indeed decades of the "special relationship" were tossed out of the window today as hard-line left-wing Members of Parliament, combined with virtue-signalling pseudo-conservatives gathered in a British Parliament committee room to debate banning U.S. Presidential candidate Donald Trump. ... Hands down, Donald Trump won that debate. And he didn't even have to be there.

Germany's ambassador to the Vatican, Annette Schavan, still sees religion as a peacemaker, despite wars and terrorism. In an interview with DW, she calls for more interfaith dialogue and respect between all religions. [...] 'There are warmongers who embrace religion. But that does not mean that religion promotes war. Religion has the great power to bring peace. People are upset by the numerous attacks and wonder, "Should we equate these images of violence with Islam?" One gets the impression that Islam is part of the problem. But that's not true. It must become clear that it is part of the...