Free Republic

Iran’s Plans to Take Over Syria By Shimon Shapira, JCPA In mid-April, Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah paid a secret visit to Tehran where he met with the top Iranian officials headed by Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and Gen. Qasem Suleimani, the commander of the Quds Force of the Revolutionary Guard Corps. Suleimani prepared an operational plan named after him based upon the establishment of a 150,000-man force for Syria, the majority of whom will come from Iran, Iraq, and a smaller number from Hizbullah and the Gulf states. Suleimani’s involvement was significant. He has been the spearhead of Iranian military...

Omar Gala hit world headlines after he was kicked out by Saudi religious policeAn Emirati man was expelled from Saudi Arabia by its feared religious police for being too good looking has become a famous person worldwide after his expulsion hit headlines in global newspapers, triggering a feminine deluge on his social website. Omar Borkan Al Gala, previously a hardly known actor and poet from Dubai, has not confirmed outright he was deported but hinted that he was one of three Emirati men who were reportedly forced out of an annual cultural festival in the conservative Gulf Kingdom last week...

According to Arab media reports that have been verified – officials assassinated by his bodyguard of Syrian President life Heavy security around the hospital a – my mother in Damascus and in-hospital–

Security in Benghazi, the eastern Libyan city where four Americans were killed Sept. 11 in a terrorist attack on the U.S. Consulate, has decayed to the point where Westerners are fleeing, assassinations and kidnappings are rife and residents worry that U.S. drone strikes on jihadist targets are imminent. ... In January, Britain, the Netherlands, Germany and Canada urged their citizens to leave Benghazi. The British Foreign Office said it was aware of “a specific and imminent threat to Westerners in Benghazi.” Several nongovernmental organizations already have left. ... Over the past year, militants in Benghazi have attacked the British envoy’s...

SANAA, Yemen | Yemeni security officials say a gunman has assassinated the Yemeni chief of security at the U.S. Embassy in Sanaa. The officials say Qassem Aqlani, who was in his fifties, was shot dead while on his way to work early on Thursday. They say a gunman on a motorcycle opened fire at him and fled the scene.

‘Once mellowed and moldering, the far-flung civilization of the Arabs is being swept today by invigorating winds of change. A fruitful kind of disorder is replacing the old fixed patterns of life.” Those contemporary-sounding words were published in 1962, in a glossy, picture-laden, 160-page book titled The Arab World. The volume boasts three virtues that make it worth a review a precise half-century later. First, the editors of Life magazine, then the outstanding American weekly, produced it, implying cultural centrality. Second, a retired senior State Department official, George V. Allen, wrote the introduction, pointing to the book’s establishment credentials. Third,...

GENEVA (AP) — The U.N.'s top human rights official says her office estimates the death toll in Syria's nine-month uprising is now "much more" than 4,000. Navi Pillay, the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, gave the latest figure a day before the global body is due to hold an emergency meeting on the crisis in the country. Pillay told reporters in Geneva on Thursday that evidence emerging of abuses committed by Syrian security forces affirms her call that the country's leadership should be prosecuted for "crimes against humanity."

A nephew of late PLO founder Yasser Arafat says the family will be releasing a 558-page French medical report detailing the cause of his death. Naser al-Qudwa told the Palestinian Authority's semi-official Maan News Agency the document is being translated from French before it is released. Al-Qudwa claimed the report would answer "many questions," adding the 'Palestinian people' had a right to clear answers regarding his uncle's death. The report by French doctors reportedly describes a platelet disorder and speculates on its cause. The doctors, however, ruled out cancer or acute infection, Al-Qudwa says. "We have said that it is...

BREAKING NEWS: Gaddafi 'captured' as rebel forces take control of Sirte Leader wounded in both legs prior to capture By DAILY MAIL REPORTER Last updated at 12:27 PM on 20th October 2011 Comments (0) Add to My Stories Share Muammar Gaddafi has been captured by revolutionary forces in Libya, it has been reported today. Gaddafi and his family have been on the run since Nato and rebel forces started closing the net on Tripoli in mid-August. The reports of Gaddafi's capture came on the same day that revolutionary forces said that they had taken control of Sirte - the leader's...

JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli officials harshly criticized an Egyptian television interview with soldier Gilad Schalit minutes after Hamas militants freed him in a prisoner swap Tuesday, saying the questioning was inappropriate and insensitive. In the interview aired on Egyptian state television, a gaunt, sallow and uncomfortable looking Schalit appeared to struggle to speak at times, and his breathing was noticeably labored as he awkwardly answered questions. The footage, along with earlier Egyptian TV video showing Schalit being transferred to Egypt, were the first images seen of the soldier after more than five years in Hamas captivity. Armed Hamas militants were...

On a daily basis, I sit in awe at the amount of nonsense that pervades the world’s media. The latest is the preoccupation with the ethnicity of Steve Jobs’s biological father. Steve Jobs was adopted at birth. And until his untimely death last week, as far as almost anyone in the world knew, he was the son of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Jobs. In fact, as far as Steve Jobs himself was concerned, his only parents were Paul and Clara Jobs. As the New York Times reported nearly 15 years ago (“Creating Jobs,” Jan. 12, 1997): “Jobs holds a firm...

n a blunt assessment, President Obama’s first national security adviser told a private audience this week that there is a “chasm” between the United States and its Gulf Arab allies that has yet to heal since the White House very publicly ushered Egypt’s president out of power in February. Retired Marine Gen. James Jones, who served as national security adviser in 2009-10, told a private meeting at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that the United States’ Persian Gulf allies interpret the president’s handling of the Egyptian revolution as a sign that Washington will dump their monarchies or governments if enough...

Women are to be allowed to vote in Saudi Arabia. K ing Abdullah bin Abdulaziz announced the change yesterday and also said women would be allowed to run in elections. However, the new law will not come into force until 2015. In a speech, the king said the move was in accordance with sharia law.

In Syria on Monday, Mr. Assad continued his assault on the eastern town of Deir el-Zour, a day after his security forces killed 42 people there. The army also killed three people at a funeral in the town of Daraa, human rights activists said. Arab nations applied more diplomatic pressure, as Kuwait and Bahrain on Monday followed Saudi Arabia and withdrew their ambassadors to protest the ongoing violence. Saudi King Abdullah pulled his ambassador out of Damascus on Sunday, denouncing the "bloodshed" in Syria... A cabdriver from Daraa, who asked to be identified as Abu Mahmoud, said he and his...

Some of Islamofascism round-up - July-Aug 2011 UNITED STATESIn-Depth: Accused Fort Hood plotter got bombmaking recipe from Al Qaeda‎ Christian Science MonitorJuly 29, 2011http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Military/2011/0729/Accused-Fort-Hood-plotter-got-bombmaking-recipe-from-Al-QaedaFBI Charges KAC Director with Illegal Pak Lobbying‎ San Leandro India WestJuly 28, 201http://www.indiawest.com/ad.aspx?a=r1No bail for Florida imam accused of aiding Taliban‎Reuters - Peter Cooney - Jul 26, 2011 He has already rejected bail for the men's father, who was an imam at the Miami Mosque, also known as the Flagler Mosque in Miami, at the time of his arrest ...http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/07/26/us-usa-pakistan-charges-idUSTRE76P6KF20110726PAKISTANIslamist students terrorize Pakistan college campuses‎Bradenton Herald - Alex Rodriguez - 23 Jul 2011The organization's clout illustrates...

The United States is viewed less favorably in much of the Arab world today than it was during the final year of the Bush administration, and President Obama is less popular in the region than Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, according to a poll released today by the Arab American Institute, a nonpartisan research and advocacy group. Attitudes towards the US president and the United States as a whole have been growing increasingly negative over the past ten years due to the invasion of Iraq, outrage over Guantanamo Bay, and continued frustration over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, said James Zogby, president of...

Freedom And The Middle East By: Michael Freund Date: Wednesday, February 16 2011 [...] This was borne out most recently by a report issued by Freedom House, the independent Washington-based group that advocates for freedom worldwide. According to its annual survey, "Freedom in the World," of the 18 countries in the Middle East, only one is considered to be "free." And that one, of course, is Israel. Not a single Arab country - not one - did Freedom House consider fully "free." In effect, then, this means that of the approximately 370 million human beings currently residing in the Middle...

An Egyptian protester waved his national flag as tens of thousands gathered for a demonstration at Cairo's Tahrir Square on April 8, 2011. SIDI BOU ZID, Tunisia—Ali Bouazizi, who owns a grocery story at the center of this poor, remote North African town, was ecstatic when protests toppled his nation's dictator in January. These days, he sounds deflated. "This uprising was for what?" he asked in a recent interview. In Tunisia, he said, "the people who have money and the heritage of the old regime aren't giving up control." Mr. Bouazizi is no ordinary bystander to the revolution. He played...

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Five years ago, Lt. Col James G. Lacey published the article "The Impending Collapse of Arab Civilization" in The Naval Institute: Proceedings." He disputed the conclusions of two books which have particularly influenced recent foreign policy and grand strategy: The Crisis of Islam: Holy War and Unholy Terror, by Bernard Lewis, and The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order by Samuel P. Huntington. In his article, he stated: A more accurate understanding of events leads to the conclusion that Arab, not Muslim, civilization is in a state of collapse, and it just happens that most Arabs are...