Free Republic

(Reuters) - The first of a series of security powers requested by Australia's government to combat Islamist militants passed through parliament on Wednesday, despite criticism that they could land journalists in jail for reporting on national security. Australia is increasingly concerned over the number of its citizens heading to Iraq and Syria to fight alongside radical Islamists, and police said they foiled a plot by the Islamic State group last month to behead a random Australian citizen. Conservative Prime Minister Tony Abbott has warned that the balance between freedom and security "may have to shift" in the wake of a...

To the American Public: In light of the wars and violent turbulence that currently engulf the Middle East and parts of Africa, a coalition of concerned citizens, journalists, and activists are launching a campaign to expose a most infamous and pernicious sponsor of Islamic terror: the Gulf state of Qatar. Qatar, (pronounced “cutter,” or "gutter"), is, per capita, the richest country in the world ($93,352 in 2013). This is partly due to the fact that they control the third largest natural gas reserves in the world, the North Dome field in the Persian Gulf. It is also because Qatar has...

Characteristically penetrating insight from El Rushbo on his radio show, Sept. 24, 2014

Claims he represents ISIS. Jacob Mugambi Muriithi, a Muslim from Kenya, was arrested after he threatened to behead a coworker at the Bellevue Nursing Home. Muriithi told the coworker he “represented ISIS and that ISIS kills Christians.”

It’s been 48 hours since Jah’Keem Yisrael — AKA Alton Noel — perpetrated a horrific terrorist attack on 54 year old co-worker Colleen Hufford, stabbing her repeatedly and then sawing her head off with a knife, and we have yet to hear any acknowledgment from President Obama of this worrisome incident. Why not? All the elements of an Islamic act of terror are present: the savagery,the shouting of Islamic verses during the act, the stated determination to carry out jihad, and a fanatical belief in Islam that, in his mind, justified everything. From a political standpoint, it’s a bad idea...

Colleen Hufford of Moore Oklahoma may be missing her head, but the real victims are Muslims, or so we are being asked to believe. In fact, according to the Imam of the Islamic Institute of Boston, Islam suffers a “double hurt.” And here I thought Ms. Hufford had it bad. The imam should know, after all, it was his Institute’s “resident scholar” who was reportedly the former imam of the Oklahoma mosque attended by Alton Alexander Nolen, aka Jah’Keem Yisrael, who wielded the knife separating Ms. H’s head from her body. And the leadership of that Oklahoma mosque agree that...

The infiltration of Syrian militants into Lebanon threatens Hezbollah’s presence in the strategic Golan Heights. First, Jabhat al-Nusra has taken control of the Syrian side of the border facing the Lebanese area of Shebaa, which is occupied by Israel, isolating Hezbollah from the Syrian extension in the Golan Heights. Hezbollah considers the area a strategic position in its conflict with Israel... Jabhat al-Nusra’s control of the Syrian-Lebanese-Israeli triangle has put an end to this and prevented it from being used as a multidisciplinary card in the hands of Hezbollah. Second... It isolates Hezbollah and its supporting forces in Lebanon and...

LONDON (AFP) — British Prime Minister David Cameron will hold talks on Wednesday with Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani over unrest in Iraq and Syria, officials said, announcing the first meeting between the countries’ leaders since the 1979 Islamic Revolution. The talks will occur on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York. They come as Western powers seek to build support for the fight against the Islamic State (IS) jihadist group, which holds swaths of territory in Iraq and Syria and which has beheaded two US journalists and a British aid worker. Britain has had tense ties with...

U.S. and coalition warplanes pounded ISIS positions in eastern Syria on Wednesday, targeting what a Pentagon official described as mobile oil refineries being used by the so-called Islamic State terror group.

Police say a woman who was killed by a co-worker at a food distribution center in suburban Oklahoma City was beheaded. Moore Police Sgt. Jeremy Lewis said Friday that the woman, who has not been identified, was beheaded by a man who attacked her and another woman Thursday at Vaughan Foods in Moore.

The Pentagon dispatched eight military personnel to Kiev to provide tips to Ukrainian security forces on counterinsurgency and military planning tactics. Military staff will share with Ukrainians some Pentagon’s planning tactics, techniques and procedures while collecting data on the needs of its security forces. Staff arrived in Kiev, the country’s capital, on Thursday and Friday and are beginning to assess the operations of the Ukraine Ministry of Defense, Ms. Lainez told The Washington Times. The eight military personnel have been split up into two teams One team has been told to assess the security needs of the Ukrainian government and...

An A-10 Thunderbolt II banks after a strafing run on Aug. 21, 2014, during the Red Flag-Alaska 14-3 exercise at the Yukon Training Area, Alaska. Months after staving off a trip to the boneyard, the embattled A-10 Thunderbolt II is headed to the Middle East where it could be used to fight Islamic militants in Iraq and Syria. An Indiana Air National Guard unit that flies the Cold War-era gunships, known as Warthogs, is planning to deploy about 300 airmen and an unknown number of its aircraft to the U.S. Central Command region early next month, says a Sept. 17...

Rival Palestinian factions Hamas and Fatah reached a “comprehensive” agreement Thursday for the return of their “unity government” in Gaza after two days of talks in Cairo, negotiators from both sides said. “Fatah and Hamas have reached a comprehensive agreement for the unity government to return to the Gaza Strip,” Jibril Rajoub of Fatah told AFP. Senior Hamas official Mousa Abu Marzouk and Fatah’s head of delegation, Azam al-Ahmad, confirmed that an agreement had been reached. “The unity government will supervise the crossings (into Gaza)… to facilitate the reconstruction of the Gaza Strip,” Abu Marzuk said. He said the two...

BreitBart.com has a report this morning that indicates that Jah’Keem Yisrael (aka Alton Nolen) the Oklahoma Muslim who beheaded a former co-worker following an argument about the Islamic practice of stoning women has ties to some direct and indirect ties prominent figures in the US Islamic community. Yisrael attended the Islamic Society of Greater Oklahoma City, a mosque affiliated with the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA). ISNA is the largest Muslim organization in the US. It was exposed as a Muslim Brotherhood front in documents stipulated to by the defense and entered into evidence in the largest terrorism financing...

The Al Nusrah Front for the People of the Levant, al Qaeda in Iraq's affiliate in Syria, led an assault today that resulted in the takeover of a major dam on the Euphrates River in northern Syria. Additionally, the terror group claimed credit for a suicide assault on an intelligence headquarters in the city of Palmyra. The Al Nusrah Front spearheaded today's assault on the "strategic" dam in Thawra in Raqqa province, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. The Nusrah Front led "other factions" of the insurgency to take control of Thawra, which "is considered one of the...

No U.S. lawmaker has better learned the lessons of both the Obama and Bush failures. Reaganesque? America has been screwing up on the foreign policy front for a long time. George W. Bush's efforts to spread democracy were laudable — but quixotic and ill-fated. And Barack Obama's "leading from behind" and"don't do stupid stuff" strategies, which supposedly learned all the right lessons from Bush-era misadventures? These also did not work. So as we head toward a critical presidential election in 2016, what should we be looking for when it comes to foreign policy? The answer is Ted Cruz. Don't laugh...

Two major groups of Arab sates questioned Israel’s right to defend itself against Hamas in Gaza, in addresses to the United Nations Human Rights Council on Monday in Geneva. Describing Israel’s actions in Gaza as self-defense is both “legally incorrect” and “morally abhorrent,” said Pakistan, speaking on behalf of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation. […] Switzerland, Ireland, and Iceland were among the few Western countries to address to address the UNHRC under Agenda Item 7. Ireland condemned both Israel and Hamas as unacceptable for attacking innocent civilians during the Gaza war. With respect to Israeli attacks in Gaza, Ireland said,...

As the White House and Congress consider a shifting of U.S. alliances in the war against ISIS, a prominent Lebanese analyst warns Washington against establishing a partnership with Iran, Syria, and Hezbollah, saying it would be a "very serious mistake." Walid Phares, PhD., who briefed members of Congress this week, said instead pressure should be placed on Hezbollah to abide by terms of U.N. resolution 1701 requiring the group to disarm. The resolution was approved by the world body follow ing Lebanon's 2006 war with Israel and it has yet to be honored by Hezbollah. Phares reminds U.S. government leaders...

merican airstrikes against ISIS targets are under way in Syria, according to a Pentagon official. "I can confirm that U.S. military and partner nation forces are undertaking military action against ISIL [ISIS] terrorists in Syria using a mix of fighter, bomber and Tomahawk Land Attack Missiles," Pentagon Press Secretary Rear Admiral John Kirby said. "Given that these operations are ongoing, we are not in a position to provide additional details at this time. The decision to conduct theses strikes was made earlier today by the U.S. Central Command commander under authorization granted him by the commander in chief. We will...

Islamic State urged its followers on Monday to attack citizens of the United States, France and other countries which have joined a coalition to destroy the ultra-radical group. Islamic State spokesman Abu Muhammad al-Adnani also taunted U.S. President Barack Obama and other Western "crusaders" in a statement carried by the SITE monitoring website, saying their forces faced inevitable defeat at the insurgents' hands.