Free Republic

The United States' commitment to global development does not look good compared with that of other wealthy countries — and it's likely to get worse. According to an annual index released Tuesday by the Center for Global Development that ranks 27 of the world's wealthiest countries, the U.S. scored dead last on foreign aid contributions and quality — despite being the largest donor in dollar amount. That's because in 2017, it allocated a mere 0.18 percent of its gross national income for development assistance. That is well short of the 0.7 percent that wealthy countries have committed to strive for...

Russia has blamed Israel for the downing of one of its military planes in Syria and threatened "retaliation." An Ilyushin IL-20 aircraft was shot down by Syrian air defense missiles in what has been called a "friendly fire" incident. The Russian defense ministry has claimed that Israeli jets were attacking nearby targets and purposely "used the Russian plane as a cover, exposing it to fire from Syrian air defenses."

A British aid worker was killed Friday in a U.N. compound in the West Bank during a gunbattle between Israeli troops and Palestinian gunmen — the first senior U.N. official to die in over two years of fighting. The United Nations accused Israeli soldiers of preventing an ambulance from immediately reaching Iain Hook, a senior manager for UNRWA, the U.N. agency that helps Palestinian refugees. The Israeli army said he was evacuated from the U.N. compound in the Jenin refugee camp as soon as possible. The death occurred hours after Israel reoccupied the West Bank town of Bethlehem for the...

There were times during a Thursday rally Barack Obama couldn’t help but talk about himself, even though he was supposed to be talking about other people. There were other times he could barely talk at all. During the Cleveland rally for Rich Cordray and Betty Sutton, Obama repeatedly talked about himself, despite the candidates sitting behind him. Several times, he stuttered as he attempted to attack President Trump and the success of recent Republican initiatives.

The United States is intensifying its pressure on the Palestinian Authority (PA). The Al-Jazeera network reported on Sunday evening that the US administration has decided to immediately close all bank accounts linked to the PA or the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in banks across the United States. The US is not confirming the report at the moment, but the State Department hinted last week after the closure of the PLO’s mission in Washington that there would be further steps against the Palestinian Arabs. Earlier on Sunday, the Lebanon-based Al-Mayadeen television reported that the US ordered the PLO envoy to the...

Are we on the brink of a new war?... They will go to war without waiting for the facts to be checked, and without recalling Parliament..... he was asked about plans-now being openly discussed at high levels in Washington-for a devastating attack on Damascus. This will be in response to a supposed atrocity that has yet to take place but about which the Americans openly say they already have evidence-probably an alleged poison gas attack, in which we will see heartbreaking but unverified film of dead or dying children, from propaganda sources, and claims of multiple deaths from untraceable 'eyewitnesses'........

Organizers of a music festival in Düsseldorf, Germany, withdrew their invitation to composer and singer Brian Eno over his longtime involvement in attempts to boycott Israel, JTA reported on Friday. Eno was slated to appear at the Electricity Conference festival in October, but last week he was among a group of artists who signed a letter urging a boycott of the Eurovision Song Contest that will be held next year in Israel. Festival organizer Rüdiger Esch told the Westdeutsche Zeitung that it “was the only right decision” to disinvite Eno because “we don’t want to invite anyone who supports activities...

Pointing out that a Chinese company will soon start operating Haifa Port, he said that Israel needs to create a mechanism that will examine Chinese investments to ensure that they do not put Israel’s security interests at risk. “When China acquires ports,” Horev said, “it does so under the guise of maintaining a trade route from the Indian Ocean via the Suez Canal to Europe, such as the port of Piraeus in Greece. Does an economic horizon like this have a security impact? We are not weighing that possibility sufficiently. One of the senior American figures at the conference raised...

The State could face infringement proceedings by the EU or a third party if a Bill that would ban imports from Israeli settlements in occupied Palestinian territories is passed, the European Commission has warned. A Government official privately sought the advice of the Commission’s trade directorate last week on the proposed legislation, which is sponsored by Independent Senator Frances Black and passed its first vote in the Seanad in July with the support of Fianna Fáil, Sinn Féin, Labour and some independents. Fine Gael opposes the passage of the Control of Economic Activity (Occupied Territories) Bill 2018 on the basis...

Comparing the jihadist attacks on September 11, 2001 to the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor has become a staple of commentary on the worst terrorist attack in U.S. history. Google this topic and nearly half a million links will pop up; google “lesson plans” and you’ll get nearly five million hits. In the catalogue of historical analogies, the comparison of 9/11 to 12/7 is perhaps the most popular outside the historians’ guild. Historical analogies have been a feature of history since its beginnings in ancient Athens. Thucydides explained that he wrote his brilliant and still instructive History of...

Hypocrisy appears to be the leading trait we can expect from high-ranking UN officials such as the High Commissioner for Human Rights. Sadly, Ms. Bachelet is no exception The new United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet has unfortunately continued the one-sided anti-Israel narrative that her anti-Semitic predecessor, Prince Zeid Raad Al Hussein, propagated whenever he got a chance. In her first speech to the UN Human Rights Council on September 10, 2018, Ms. Bachelet blamed Israel’s so-called “blockade” and its alleged “excessive use of force” for all the problems suffered by the Palestinians in Hamas-run Gaza. “Prospects...

In a blistering takedown of U.S. policy toward Syria, Rep. Adam Kinzinger on Thursday said “it’s time to act” in the war-torn nation as dictator Bashar Assad’s forces prepare to launch an assault on Idlib that many fear could one of the bloodiest campaigns in the ongoing war. Mr. Kinzinger, Illinois Republican and an outspoken voice on national security issues, argued in an op-ed for Defense One that the U.S. approach in Syria — both during the Obama administration and now under President Trump — has been an abject failure. While he stressed that an all-out ground invasion isn’t the...

Syrian school textbooks repeatedly accuse Israel of stealing lands in order to "fabricate Arab-Syrian history", and make no mention of Hezbollah or the Holocaust, according to a new study that provides information about school curriculum in Syria in the wake of the Syrian civil war. Marcus Sheff, commented on the textbook: "While Syrian children witness the civil war raging around them, their textbooks give no explanation for this war. There is no hope that Syria will moderate its traditional Ba'athist hostility towards Israel even after the end of this terrible civil war." One of the most serious accusations against Israel,...

Bucking--not backing - Trump is a sure-fire recipe for committing political suicide President Trump has created a veritable diplomatic tsunami affecting the political fortunes of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), Hamas and Jordan - with his decision to cease all future donations to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) - currently US$360million per annum and comprising about 30% of UNRWA’s budget. The numbers of UNRWA-registered Palestinian Arab refugees in Jordan, the West Bank and Gaza have been increasing in leaps and bounds annually because they include all the descendants of those Palestinian Arabs caught up in the 1948...

Last week California’s Department of Motor Vehicles sent 23,000 “erroneous” voter registrations to the office of Secretary of State Alex Padilla, who maintains the list of registered voters. The DMV blamed it technical errors and said none of the erroneous registrations involved undocumented immigrants. Padilla was “extremely disappointed and deeply frustrated” and the DMV assured him it wouldn’t happen again. Legitimate voters have good reason to believe Padilla was not disappointed but delighted. The odds are strong that illegals make up most if not all of the newly registered voters. The registrations of illegals will be happening again, in...

The Soviet-Afghan War changed the world. This nine-year power struggle in a small, landlocked country ultimately led to some of the most profound moments in modern history. This one conflict sparked the collapse of the Soviet Union, the rise of Osama bin Laden, the age of jihadist terrorism, and the birth of the Taliban and Al Qaeda. In time, the ripples of the Soviet-Afghan War brought the Twin Towers to the ground, brought American troops to the Middle East, and created a new era of wars and terrorism that plague the world today...

Secret KGB documents reveal just how deeply involved the Soviet Union was in the spilling of Israeli blood. The Russian spy agency provided Palestinian terror organizations with funds, training and arms, running agents like 'Krotov' - aka Mahmoud Abbas, 'Aref' - or Yasser Arafat, and 'Nationalist,' who was behind several plane hijackings long before 9/11. The genesis of the KGB’s developing ties with Palestinian terror organizations can be traced back to the end of the 1960s. The two most important KGB recruitments from the PLO during the second half of the 1970s were of people who still play a major...

"You Tube has banned a number of Syrian state-run and pro-government channels....The reason provided was that these accounts allegedly violate 'You Tube's Terms of Service'" "Southfront"-9/10/2018 "Around four weeks ago, we knew that British intelligence was working toward a chemical attack in order to blame the Syrian government to hold Syria responsible" Virginia State Senator Richard Black (R-Loudoun) quoted by "Washington Post" 9/8/2018 "We've tried to convey the message in recent days that if there's a third use of chemical weapons, the response will be much stronger" National Security Adviser John Bolton 9/10/2018 "When it comes once again the debt...

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is closing the Palestine Liberation Organization’s mission in Washington, the latest U.S. blow against the Palestinians and an international court during the stalled Mideast peace process. Some things to know: THE GIST The administration’s move to close the PLO office in Washington is not directly connected to the Trump White House’s opposition to the International Criminal Court, although the administration is trying to link them. But the Trump administration is trotting out discussions about the two on the same day — Rosh Hashana, the Jewish New Year — in a move certain to inflame...

The Administration has determined after careful review that the office of the General Delegation of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in Washington should close. We have permitted the PLO office to conduct operations that support the objective of achieving a lasting, comprehensive peace between Israelis and the Palestinians since the expiration of a previous waiver in November 2017. However, the PLO has not taken steps to advance the start of direct and meaningful negotiations with Israel. To the contrary, PLO leadership has condemned a U.S. peace plan they have not yet seen and refused to engage with the U.S. government...