Free Republic

Dubai’s iconic five-star Burj Al Arab hotel was struck by an Iranian drone on Saturday evening. The US and Israel conducted military strikes on Iran on Saturday morning. Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was killed in the military strikes. Iran launched retaliatory strikes toward Israel and Dubai. Dubai’s iconic Burj Al Arab was hit by an Iranian drone. Additional Iranian drones were intercepted near Dubai’s iconic skyscraper Burj Khalifa. “Internationally acclaimed for its visionary architecture, Jumeirah Burj Al Arab defines Jumeirah’s exclusive Jumeirah Icons Collection – a celebration of properties renowned for their design, prestige, and extraordinary guest experiences....

Loud explosions were heard in the Saudi Arabian capital, Riyadh, the AFP news agency reported. Iran has announced that all US and Israeli assets and interests in the Middle East have become legitimate targets after the country was jointly attacked by the US and Israel. Qatar's defence ministry on Saturday said that it has downed all missiles targeting the country. Explosions were also heard in Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates on Saturday, Reuters news agency reported.

Dubai news live updates: Dubai airport suspended all flight operations at the International airport until further notice after several explosions were heard near the airport, Reuters reported. This came after the US and Israel launched a major attack on Iran on Saturday, with President Donald Trump urging the Iranian public to “seize control of your destiny.” Hours after the US and Israel struck Iran, Tehran retaliated by targeting US military bases in the Persian Gulf. Missiles were intercepted in cities around the Middle East, including Doha and Abu Dhabi. Smoke seen near hotel in Dubai's Palm Jumeirah Meanwhile, loud explosions...

Smoke all around Burj Khalifa Dubai

The probe of “Squad” Rep. Ilhan Omar’s (D-Minn.) husband Tim Mynett and his shady business ventures could go global. House Oversight Chairman Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.) wants the House Ethics Committee to look beyond the US at Mynett’s failed business ventures and include places such as Somalia, Kenya and the United Arab Emirates. Mynett’s investment firm Rose Lake Capital wanted to build solar panels in Africa and his main business partner received a $10,699 air ticket to Dubai after talks about a deal there, The Post has reported.

WASHINGTON // A Democratic senator said Thursday that he'll prevent an executive with a Dubai-owned company from being appointed head of the agency that oversees ports until he's sure the company is selling all its U.S. port operations to an American buyer. President Bush in January nominated David Sanborn, DP World's director of operations for Europe and Latin America, to head the Maritime Administration. Shortly after the nomination, DP World's planned purchase of a company that runs six major U.S. port facilities became the center of a roiling political controversy. DP World did complete its purchase of London-based Peninsular and...

Dubai-based global supply chain and port manager DP World’s Sultan Ahmed Bin Sulayem stepped down from his role as group Chairman and CEO following the release of his name in the Epstein Files, which had previously been redacted by the Department of Justice. DP World announced the Sultan’s resignation from the board on Friday, “effective immediately.” The company further announced the appointment of a new chairman and CEO. After the DOJ gave members of Congress access to view unredacted Epstein Files, Representatives Thomas Massie (R-KY) and Ro Khanna (D-CA) discovered that the DOJ had improperly redacted the names of Epstein’s...

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez announced sweeping plans at the World Government Summit in Dubai to hold social media executives criminally liable and curb platform algorithms, prompting a sharp and profane response from X owner Elon Musk. Sánchez laid out five measures in a speech, with implementation set to begin next week. "Dirty Sánchez is a tyrant and traitor to the people of Spain," Musk wrote on X, using an explicit insult and a poop emoji. Sánchez framed the proposals by describing social media as a lawless digital ecosystem, arguing that platforms have become a "failed state" where disinformation, hate...

NEWS: Dubai is building a 4 mile long @boringcompany loop tunnel with four stations linking the Dubai International Financial Centre and Dubai Mall, with an eventual length of ~14 miles. Only @Tesla vehicles will be used in the tunnel of course. "This phase will pave the way for expansion into the full project alignment, which will extend up to ~14 miles and include 19 stations, connecting Dubai World Trade Centre and the financial district with Business Bay."

The United States seized an oil tanker off the coast of Venezuela on Wednesday, President Donald Trump said, escalating US pressure on President Nicolas Maduro’s regime. “As you probably know we’ve just seized a tanker on the coast of Venezuela,” Trump said. “Large tanker, very large, largest one ever seized, actually.” Attorney General Pam Bondi said the tanker has been sanctioned by the US for multiple years “due to its involvement in an illicit oil shipping network supporting foreign terrorist organizations,” including Venezuela and Iran.

Kyrgios won the tilt 6-3, 6-3 from a break down in the second set, and afterwards said the match was "a great stepping stone forward for the sport of tennis."The much-talked about "Battle of the Sexes" match between Nick Kyrgios and Aryna Sabalenka was won Sunday by the Aussie in straight sets. The two players promised "a show" in the months leading up to the event at Coca-Cola Arena in Dubai, but the marquee meeting took a while to warm up, both literally and figuratively, as the players adjusted to its modified rules. The court was nearly 10% smaller on...

Rep. Ilhan Omar dodged questions on Thursday about her alleged affair with a DC political consultant who’s on her payroll. The freshman Democratic congresswoman appeared ahead of a scheduled event at the University of Minnesota when a Post reporter asked her about claims she broke up the marriage of Tim and Beth Mynett. But instead of answering, Omar nervously made a beeline to make small talk with a police officer ... Omar has paid Tim Mynett’s E Street Group consulting firm $230,000 since 2018 — raising concerns of potential ethics violations.

Here is the campaign video of Ubax Gardheere, who emigrated to the United States at the age of 15 around 1996, which makes her something like 40 now. She represents herself as a "proud single mother" of three children, an immigrant, a Muslim, and a person of color. Here is a transcript of the video, which is pretty much a word salad that might have been written by an algorithm. Hi! I'm Ubax Gardheere. I'm a single black immigrant mother and homeowner in the unincorporated area of Renton, and I'm running for King County council in district 9. I came...

It is election season in King County and several seats on the King County Council are up for grabs. This year, riding on the energy that was felt during last year’s election cycle, Black women continue to be at the forefront of politics across the nation and in the State of Washington. Saudia J. Abdullah, Lydia Assefa-Dawson, Shukri Olow and Ubax Gardheere are four Black women looking to bring new and empowering energy to politics in the Pacific Northwest, as all four a vying for seats on the King County Council. Now let’s talk about Ubax Gardheere! This is what...

One of the first things I did when I moved to Dubai was buy a Dodge Challenger. Not the volcanic Hellcat or the feral Scat Pack — the SXT, the V6 base model. Nevertheless, for those nine months in 2023, the car carried itself like it had seen things it couldn’t legally discuss. I miss it the way a grounded teenager misses his phone — painfully and often. The car was, in many ways, gloriously pointless. But to me, it was absolutely perfect. Nobody buys a Dodge for practicality. You buy one because fun is a dying art and driving...

"King Salman International Airport (Riyadh, Saudi Arabia)....covers roughly 57 square kilometers....Around 12 square kilometers have already been reserved for residential construction" "Al Maktoum International Airport (Dubai World Central), Dubai, UAE...." "The large-scale Dubai South development program envisions an integrated city with a population of more than one million people that will include housing, business clusters, logistics zones, and technology parks. "According to estimates by analytical agencies, average annual housing price growth in Dubai South is expected to reach 15 to 20 percent in the coming years." "Ho Chi Minh City’s existing airport handles more than 40 million passengers per year...

Minnesota once prided itself on its Scandinavian-style safety net – high taxes, generous benefits and a shared belief that no child should ever go hungry. But that image lies in ruins after a billion-dollar fraud spree that siphoned taxpayer money away from the needy and poured it straight into luxury mansions, high-end cars, overseas real estate and designer lifestyles. What authorities first hoped was a one-off pandemic scam has now been exposed as something far bigger – and far uglier. Federal prosecutors say that over the past five years, scores of scammers – many operating inside Minnesota’s Somali diaspora –...

Archaeologists have uncovered definitive proof of early Christian life in the Arabian Gulf, thanks to the discovery of a plaster Christian cross dating back around 1,400 years. The find was made on Sir Bani Yas Island, about 110 miles southwest of Abu Dhabi, and confirms that a cluster of small courtyard houses found decades ago were part of a monastic Christian community. The cross was discovered by teams from Abu Dhabi's Department of Culture and Tourism during excavations that restarted in January 2025. The artifact was found among courtyard houses north of the main monastery complex, where senior monks are...

Former NFL star Antonio Brown has been arrested on an attempted murder charge stemming from a shooting after a celebrity boxing event in Miami, police confirmed Thursday. Miami police spokesperson Mike Vega said Brown, 37, was taken into custody by U.S. Marshals in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates. He was flown to Essex County, New Jersey, where he is being held pending extradition to Miami, Vega said. It was unclear why Brown was taken to New Jersey first or how long he had been in Dubai, although he has posted several times on social media over the past few...

Malaysian police were investigating a company controlled by a son of Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi over allegations that it was involved in supplying parts for Libya's nuclear weapons programme. National police chief Bakri Omar said in a statement issued to "clarify several questions and confusion" that the probe was sparked by information provided last November by US and British intelligence services. The CIA and MI6 told Malaysia's special branch that the company, Scomi Precision Engineering (Scope), was supplying centrifuge components made in Malaysia for Libya's uranium-enrichment program. Scope is a unit of listed oil and gas firm Scomi Group,...