Free Republic

Iran is demanding: 1) reparations for attacks on it, 2) the lifting of all sanctions, 3) the closure of all US military bases in the Persian Gulf as conditions to end the war with the US and Israel, 4) Iran wants guarantees that the war won’t start up again, 5) a halt to Israel’s strikes on Iran’s Lebanese proxy Hezbollah. 6) Iran’s demands also reportedly include a new arrangement in the Gulf that will let the Islamic Republic collect tolls from ships that traverse the strategic Strait of Hormuz, through which a fifth of the world’s oil usually travels. Meanwhile,...

A Florida man has been forced to shoot down the latest Jeffrey Epstein conspiracy — after becoming “a viral sensation” for being the spitting image of the notorious sex trafficker. The silver-haired, square-jawed stranger found himself unexpectedly going viral after someone filmed him driving his convertible down a highway in the Sunshine State, suggesting he was the pedophile who had a Florida home and who many conspiracy theorists refuse to believe is dead. “Epstein is alive! Epstein is alive!” the man who shot the video yelled, sending social media into meltdown.

Large language models aren’t good at lots of stuff, like counting fingers or suggesting pizza recipes. But one thing that “AI” is quite good at is analyzing massive amounts of data and finding possible connections that aren’t immediately obvious. That makes it perfect for unmasking anonymous internet posts, according to a new research paper. Researchers at ETH Zurich and the MATS research fellowship associated with Berkeley ran a program [PDF], collecting data from sources with generally anonymous usernames, like Reddit. By collecting users’ posts across related but distinct movie subreddits, then feeding the LLM data from a Netflix data leak,...

The mask has not just slipped; the high-voltage exposure of leaked diplomatic cables and thousands of internal emails has vaporized it. The Iran Experts Initiative (IEI) stands exposed as a Tehran-directed influence network, a psychological strike force embedded within the very heart of Western decision-making. This is no academic debate. This is a documented, top-down subversion operation launched by the Iranian Foreign Ministry’s Institute for Political and International Studies (IPIS) - a known front for the regime’s intelligence and propaganda apparatus.This cell was never about "cultural exchange"; it was a cold-blooded tactical maneuver designed to inject the Islamic Republic’s talking...

A federal court in New York City convicted an Iranian agent of attempting to assassinate US officials, including US President Donald Trump, in a trial that showcased allegations of Iran-backed plotting on American soil.The verdict on Friday came during the US-Israeli airstrike campaign against the Iranian regime. Asif Merchant, a business owner who has family in Pakistan and Iran, acknowledged during the trial that he sought to put an assassination plot in motion during the 2024 presidential campaign, which was quickly disrupted by American investigators before it had a chance to proceed. ...He admitted at trial that he attempted the...

Americans for Citizens Voting announced it has collected more than 750,000 signatures in hopes of placing its proposal for a new voter ID requirement on the ballot in 2026. Now, it's up to the Michigan Bureau of Elections and the Board of State Canvassers to confirm their validity. "We submitted over 750,000 signatures yesterday to the Secretary of State, and now we look forward to a speedy review by the Bureau of Elections and approval by the Board of State Canvassers to get us on the ballot for 2026," said Kristen Combs, general consultant for the ballot proposal campaign. If...

San Francisco police officers arrested a man accused of stabbing a person at an intersection in Chinatown Thursday afternoon, officials said Friday. The attack, which was captured on surveillance footage and was shared widely online, occurred just before 1:13 p.m. at the corner of Stockton and Sacramento streets. Officers who arrived on scene located a victim suffering from an apparent stab wound and paramedics transferred him to a local hospital with life-threatening injuries, officials said. The victim remained hospitalized Friday, officials said. In the aftermath, a person matching the suspect’s description was apprehended near the 600 block of Powell Street....

A Wisconsin man was sentenced to life in prison Thursday after he pleaded guilty to killing his parents in order to fund a plot to assassinate President Trump involving a drone with explosives or an AR-15 assault rifle. Nikita Casap, 18, pleaded guilty to two counts of first-degree intentional homicide in Waukesha County Circuit Court in January. He and prosecutors struck a deal to drop seven other charges that included two counts of hiding a corpse and theft.... The plot to assassinate Trump developed in late 2024, when he thought of using an AK-47 rifle attached to a drone, she...

MOSCOW, March 6 (Reuters) - Russia said on Friday it would respond if Finland ​placed nuclear weapons on its territory, saying such a move would make the Nordic country more vulnerable. ‌The Kremlin reacted sharply after NATO member Finland said on Thursday it was planning to lift a longstanding ban on hosting such weapons, in a move that could open the door to placing them there during times of war. "This is a statement that leads to an escalation ​of tensions on the European continent," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. "This statement adds to Finland's vulnerability, a ​vulnerability provoked...

US Central Command (CENTCOM) issued a safety warning on March 8 to civilians in Iran, stating that the Iranian regime is endangering its own population by conducting military operations from heavily populated civilian areas.According to the statement, Iranian forces have been launching one-way attack drones and ballistic missiles from locations surrounded by civilians in cities including Dezful, Esfahan, and Shiraz. CENTCOM warned that the use of civilian areas for military activity places residents at risk, noting that locations used for military purposes can lose their protected status under international law and may become legitimate military targets. US forces urged civilians...

BOGOTA, March 8 (Reuters) - Colombians were heading to the polls on Sunday to elect a new Congress and choose three of the presidential candidates who ​will contest elections this May, a vote that will shape the next ‌president's ability to push through legislation and fulfill their agenda. Voters will choose from over 3,000 candidates to fill 102 Senate seats and 182 House seats, in an election analysts predict will ​be divided among some two dozen parties, likely forcing the next president ​to form a coalition government. ... President Gustavo Petro, whose term ends in August, has repeatedly questioned the...

Japan's health ministry has announced formal approval for the domestic manufacture and sale of two products for the treatment of heart disease and Parkinson's disease using iPS cells. It means such treatments will be put to practical use for the first time in the world. One of the products subject to Friday's announcement is cardiomyocyte sheet ReHeart. It was developed by University of Osaka startup Cuorips to treat ischemic cardiomyopathy, a serious heart disease. The other is AMCHEPRY, a cell product for transplantation into the brains of patients with Parkinson's. The disease causes symptoms such as tremors in the limbs....

A cannibal who hacked a homeless Connecticut man to death before devouring his brain and “oyster-tasting” eyeballs stunned a courtroom by saying sorry to his victim’s family. Tyree Lincoln Smith, 35, stood up Monday seconds after being sentenced for up to 60 years in a psychiatric hospital to plead forgiveness for slaying Angel “Tun Tun” Gonzalez.“I’m really sorry for what I did, that I couldn’t be myself,” Smith told a shocked gallery. “It really had nothing to do with the other person.” His surprisingly candid confession sparked Gonzalez’s relative Talitha Frazier to break down in tears. “We waited two years...

More than five years after the high-profile detention of two Australian bloggers, another overland journey through Iran would end in far lengthier imprisonment. British nationals Craig Foreman and Lindsay Foreman, both in their 50s, entered Iran on December 30, 2024 during a round-the-world motorcycle expedition. They crossed from Armenia with valid tourist visas, an approved travel plan, and a licensed Iranian guide. Family members said the couple intended to transit the country en route to Pakistan before continuing toward Australia. Their case followed an earlier incident that had already drawn international scrutiny. In July 2019, Australian travel bloggers Jolie King...

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...

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...

Trade Minister Yeo Han-koo on Wednesday asked the National Assembly to pass a special bill on implementing Korea's investment package for the United States by March 9 as planned, calling it key to maintaining stable trade ties with Washington. Yeo made the remarks in a meeting hosted by the Korea-U.S. parliamentary union at the National Assembly, highlighting the importance of parliamentary support. "The National Assembly's timely passage of the bill is extremely important," Yeo said, noting growing uncertainties in the global trade order following the U.S. Supreme Court's decision to strike down U.S. President Donald Trump's global "reciprocal" tariffs. The...

A Black Lives Matter founder in Illinois was caught on camera in a violent office confrontation with a female worker who accused him of misusing the organization's money, a report said. The violent clash erupted into shoving, grabbing and a physical struggle along a corridor at the group's headquarters, according to a police report. Police in Waukegan, Illinois, were called to the Black Lives Matter Lake County Resource Center on January 12 after reports of a battery involving the group's founder, Clyde J. McLemore, and project manager Nyesha A. Hill. Surveillance footage and police reports detail a heated confrontation that...

An emotional meeting took place at a Sydney hospital between Rabbi Mendel Kastel, the brother-in-law of Rabbi Eli Schlanger, who was murdered in a terrorist attack in the city, and Ahmed al-Ahmad, the Syrian Muslim citizen who courageously intervened and neutralized one of the terrorists during the attack. Al-Ahmad’s attorney, Sam Issa, also attended the meeting, which was reported by Kan News. Speaking to Ahmed at his hospital bedside, Rabbi Kastel expressed his gratitude. “Thank you-not only for saving lives, but for your courage,” he said. “The fact that you come from a non-Jewish background, from a Muslim background, makes...

Frustration had mounted that the murderer had managed to get away and that a clear image of his face hadn't emerged - until a Reddit post finally put police on his trail.The suspect in the Brown University shooting was found after police received a tip referencing a post on the social media platform Reddit, they have revealed. Two students, Mukhammad Aziz Umurzokov and Ella Cook, were killed and nine were injured during the shooting inside a classroom building at the Ivy League university in Providence, Rhode Island, on Saturday. Frustration had mounted in Providence that the murderer had managed to...