Free Republic

You may remember former Councilman Shakir Khan from his inspiring life story. When Shakir Khan immigrated to Lodi from Pakistan 23 years ago, he spoke no English. He and his family moved into a one-bedroom apartment on Lodi’s eastside. His father stayed behind to tend the family farm before traveling to America several years later. Khan began school at Washington Elementary on Lockeford Street, but he says he was bullied there by other kids because he didn’t speak English. As a young man growing up in Lodi, Khan says he became concerned that the local Pakistani community, mostly located on...

Iranian state media showed off a fleet of drones lined up inside an underground bunker as part of a chilling propaganda video. Footage, released by the semi-official Fars News Agency, shows the unmanned fleet sitting on rocket launchers and on truck beds, while dramatic background music plays in the background. Drones lined either side of an aisle leading down a brightly lit tunnel with a variety of Iranian flags.

A small cadre of activist judges and environmentalist litigators wields outsized power, crippling industries, mismanaging forests, and undermining America’s interests. With the world anxiously watching the conflict in Iran, it was no surprise that the first segment in the March 1 edition of CBS’s 60 Minutes featured an interview with Reza Pahlavi, the exiled son of Iran’s last Shah. The second segment, however, returned to a staple theme of the CBS news team. It presented a perspective on a current issue calculated to discredit the Trump administration and its supporters. In this case it was threats leveled against activist judges...

CAIRO (AP) — A Russian-flagged tanker carrying liquefied natural gas exploded and erupted in flames before sinking in the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of Libya, authorities in the North African country said Wednesday. No casualties were reported.The tanker was under Western sanctions, suspected to be part of Russia’s shadow fleet of energy tankers trying to bypass sanctions imposed on Moscow over its war in Ukraine. The cause of the explosion was not immediately clear. According to the Libyan Maritime Authority, there was a “sudden explosions, followed by a massive fire” on the Arctic Metagaz on Tuesday while the LNG...

A three-day state funeral for Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei has been 'postponed' hours before it was due to begin, Iranian state media reports. The ceremony was supposed to unfold this evening at the grand mosque in Tehran but, with Israeli and American strikes continuing to pound the city, will now be rearranged. Organisers claimed it was delayed 'in anticipation of unprecedented turnout', and reportedly want to wait until the necessary infrastructure is in place. Iranian TV reported: 'The farewell ceremony for the martyred Imam has been postponed. The new date will be announced later.' Hojjatoleslam Mahmoudi, head of Iran’s...

A prominent Shiite organization in Dearborn, Michigan, held a memorial for the late Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei over the weekend, honoring him for his "martyrdom" while accusing Americans of being led by Satan. "We're gathered here today to commemorate the martyrdom of the great leader of our time, Sayyid Ali Hussein Khamenei," said Hassan Salamey, one of the speakers at the memorial held at the Hadi Institute on Sunday, a day after U.S. and Israeli forces executed Khamenei and other top Iranian officials in Operation Epic Fury. Footage of the service went viral after being shared by the nonprofit...

Israel has eliminated Rahman Makadam, head of the IRGC Special Operations Department, who was behind the assassination attempt on President Donald Trump. Israel has eliminated Rahman Makadam, the head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Special Operations Department, according to a report by Channel 12. Makadam was reportedly responsible for the assassination attempt on Donald Trump ahead of the 2024 U.S. presidential election. The report added that Trump was informed in recent hours by Israeli officials of Makadam’s killing.

🇺🇸Pray For The Peace of Jerusalem 🇮🇱(3/4/26)[Prayer]A New Study For A New Year: PersonalitiesGenesis 31:36-55 36 And Jacob was wroth, and chode with Laban: and Jacob answered and said to Laban, What is my trespass? what is my sin, that thou hast so hotly pursued after me? 37 Whereas thou hast searched all my stuff, what hast thou found of all thy household stuff? set it here before my brethren and thy brethren, that they may judge betwixt us both. 38 This twenty years have I been with thee; thy ewes and thy she goats have not cast their young,...

NEW YORK (AP) — The wealthy Alexander brothers used the same tactics of luring, drugging and humiliation to sexually assault numerous women and girls, bragging about their exploits in blog posts with titles that included “It’s not rape if,” a federal prosecutor told jurors Tuesday. snip... The allegations are corroborated by the “sheer number of victims who testified,” the prosecutor said — women who never have met each other and live different lives, but “have one horrific thing in common: they were raped by these men.” Far from hiding their activity, the brothers bragged about it in text messages, emailed...

RAIFORD, Fla. — Billy Leon Kearse, the Fort Pierce man convicted of shooting and killing a police sergeant 35 years ago, was declared dead at 6:24 p.m. He declined his last meal in the hours before his scheduled execution at Florida State Prison. The Florida Supreme Court officially denied his final appeal earlier the same day. Kearse was sentenced to death for the 1991 shooting death of 29-year-old Fort Pierce Police Sgt. Danny Parrish. WPTV has covered this case for decades, tracking it from sentencing to this moment. ... In his final words, Kearse asked the Parrish family for forgiveness,...

Democratic Representative and Texas Senate candidate Jasmine Crockett is already saying her election was rigged as voters are turned away due to confusion at the polls. You read that right. Crockett, a member of the party that will call you an “election denier” and a “threat to democracy,” is blaming “cheating” is happening in her race. Now, Jasmine Crockett is crying foul play. In a press conference earlier with House candidate Collin Allred, Crockett claimed that she is being cheated, while urging voters to “make sure that you go ahead and figure out where it is that you are supposed...

Luigi: The Musical will premiere in New York City this summer, mere miles from where Luigi Mangione allegedly assassinated the father of two children. The show is already a hit in far-left San Francisco. Prosecutors say Mangione gunned down UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson in cold blood in December of 2024. The motive was to make a statement about the American health care system. “These parasites had it coming,” Mangione reportedly wrote on a note found on him during a police search. The political left immediately embraced the accused murderer as one of their own. CNN’s Kaitlan Collins promoted Mangione’s defense...

The MEK Is Not Pro-Western or Committee to Democracy; It Operates as a Cult and Fosters Anti-Americanism When Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini took power, he denied having any interest in personal power. Rather, he described himself as a figurehead for a coalition of Islamist and leftist groups opposed to the Iranian monarchy. “Personal desire, age, and my health do not allow me to personally have a role in running the country after the fall of the current system,” he told The Associated Press on November 7, 1978. He lied. As soon as Khomeini returned to Iran, he set upon purging his...

The United States and Ecuador conducted joint military operations against "designated terrorist organizations in Ecuador," U.S. Southern Command announced on Tuesday. This marks the first time that the U.S. military has engaged in a land operation against South American drug cartels.

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The Iranian-backed group Hezbollah has fired rockets from Lebanon into Israel for a second day while the Israeli military has sent troops into the south of the country, as Lebanon is dragged into the war between US, Israel and Iran. Israel has also carried out air strikes that have killed dozens of people, according to Lebanese health officials. On Monday, after the regional conflict spread to Lebanon, thousands of residents fled villages in the south and, in Beirut, displaced families gathered in the city's Martyrs' Square and on the promenade along the Mediterranean.

A submarine attack on an Iranian ship off the coast of Sri Lanka has left at least 101 people missing, one dead and 78 injured, sources in Sri Lanka's navy and defence ministry told Reuters on Wednesday. It was unclear who attacked the ship, which the sources said has now sunk.

France's president has joined Spain in condemning US and Israeli strikes on Iran, branding them illegal. In a televised address on Tuesday evening, Emmanuel Macron declared the attacks were 'outside the bounds of international law'. He is the second Western leader to question the legality of the conflict after Spain's Pedro Sanchez warned that strikes from the US and Israel risked bringing about a 'more uncertain and hostile international order'.

Keir Starmer has defied brutal rebukes from Donald Trump insisting the UK is 'not involved' with Iran strikes. The PM made his latest attempt to wash his hands of the US president's military campaign in a speech to Muslims breaking Ramadan fast last night. Sir Keir - who has been desperately trying to shore up Labour's left flank since the Greens inflicted an humiliating by-election defeat - also talked up his determination to get 'justice' for Gaza.

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