Free Republic

The civilization of Indus River Valley is considered one of the three earliest civilizations in world history, along with Mesopotamia and Egypt. Bigger geographically than those two as it unfolded starting in 3300 BCE across what is now Pakistan and India, the Indus civilization boasted uniform weights and measures, skilled artisans, a multifaceted system of trade and commerce, and upwards of 500 symbols and signs for communicating.But one question has vexed scholars for decades and hindered attempts to learn more about this civilization: Were those characters a language or more akin to pictograms? Even as some experts begin to translate...

Joe Biden turning against Israel puts Scott “in mind of the time when England stood alone against a genocidal maniac.” That was the time when Hitler’s National Socialist regime was allied with Stalin’s Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. They signed their Pact on August 23, 1939, and Stalin began handing Jews directly to the Gestapo. In September, 1939, both powers invaded Poland, effectively starting World War II.In November, 1939, Stalin invaded Finland and in April of 1940 Hitler invaded Denmark and Norway. On May 10, 1940, Hitler invaded France, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands. The genocidal maniac then turned his...

Recep Tayyip Erdogan is the Turkish President, and the rude-and-crude master of all he surveys from the 1,100 room “White Palace” that he had the government build for him in Istanbul, at a cost to the Turkish taxpayers of $615 million. But when a man like Erdogan comes along only once a millennium, why should the national exchequer skimp? In Istanbul, having announced to the world that he will not be running for office again (the hundreds of journalists he has imprisoned in Turkish jails must now be breathing proleptic sighs of relief), just to make sure we do not...

A Lebanese migrant who was caught sneaking over the border admitted he’s a member of Hezbollah, he hoped to make a bomb, and his destination was New York, The Post can reveal. Basel Bassel Ebbadi, 22, was caught by border patrol on March 9 near El Paso, Texas. While in custody he asked what he was doing in the US, to which he replied: “I’m going to try to make a bomb,” according to a Border Patrol document exclusively obtained by The Post. In a subsequent sworn interview, Ebbadi said he had trained with Hezbollah for seven years and served...

WASHINGTON — The White House is considering options for how to respond if Israel defies President Joe Biden’s repeated warnings against launching a military invasion of Rafah without a credible plan to protect Palestinian civilians, according to one former and three current U.S. officials. The discussions are taking place amid growing concern in the administration and frustration among congressional Democrats that the president’s pleas will simply be ignored. Israel this week inched closer to initiating an incursion into the southernmost city in the Gaza Strip. The Biden administration set a March 24 deadline for Israel to provide written assurance, followed...

The parallels between the rise of Nazism and the current global unrest and demonization of the Jewish people is largely incontestable. On the off chance you hadn’t noticed, the world appears to be at an especially precarious moment presently. Obviously, war continues to rage in Ukraine and Gaza, with no end in sight to either conflict. Great Britain and Japan are currently in recession. Canada’s economy is an absolute disaster, with almost no hope of near-term recovery. Much of continental Europe and China are struggling economically, if not officially contracting. Some experts believe that the global economy more generally is...

US Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer gave a speech on "a pathway to peace and achieving a two-state solution" today (Thursday). In his remarks Schumer called for the holding of new elections in Israel, saying that "Netanyahu has lost his way". He further called the Israeli Prime Minister an "obstacle to peace." According to Schumer, Netanyahu is one of four obstacles to peace, among others being Hamas, "radical Israelis", and Palestinian Authority chairman Mahmoud Abbas. Schumer's criticism of Netanyahu centered on the prime minister's "outright" rejection of the idea of creation of a Palestinian state in the aftermath of October...

But even the Israelis have yet to absorb the full scope and magnitude of Biden’s accommodation of Iran. The problem is not that Sullivan and Blinken are failing to restrain Malley, but that they are marching in lockstep with him. A consensus reigns inside the administration, not just on the JCPOA but on every big question of Middle East strategy: Everyone from the president on down agrees about the need to complete what Obama started—which means that the worst is yet to come. If the control that Obama’s project exercises over every mind in the Biden administration is not already...

A senior Israeli official said Tuesday that President Joe Biden should focus on toppling the Hamas terrorist group, rather than trying to topple the democratically-elected government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.The Israeli source was commenting in the wake of a report Monday that said U.S. intelligence agencies "expect" the Israeli prime minister's coalition government to collapse. The assessment, in the middle of a war, was the latest political attack by the Biden Administration against the Netanyahu government. Netanyahu pushed back, and told Fox News on Monday morning that "[t]o the extent that Hamas believes that there's daylight between us, that...

Moscow has been on a drive to replace the use of the US dollar in international trade, but there are barrels of Russian oil stuck at sea due to issues with paying in alternative currencies. Shipments of Russian Sokol grade crude oil to state-owned Indian Oil Corp, or IOC, have been delayed by payment issues, Reuters reported on Tuesday, citing two sources familiar with the matter. The seller is the state-owned Russian oil company Rosneft. The problem arose because Rosneft unit selling the oil hasn't been able to open a bank account in the United Arab Emirates to receive payments...

Forty-four percent of Israelis would rather see former US president Donald Trump return to the White House in 2025, compared to 30% who would prefer US President Joe Biden be elected for a second term, according to a poll published by Channel 12 on Tuesday evening. An additional 26% said they didn’t know which of the two men they would rather see elected. Among respondents who voted for parties in the current government coalition, 72% said they preferred Trump while 8% said they preferred Biden. When asked the same question, 55% of respondents who voted for parties sitting in the...

President Biden will announce during his State of the Union address on Thursday that he’s directing the U.S. military to lead the construction of a port along the coast of Gaza on the Mediterranean Sea to boost the amount of aid getting to Palestinian civilians. “We know the aid flowing into Gaza is nowhere near enough and nowhere near fast enough. The president will make clear again this evening that we all need to do more and the United States is doing more,” a senior administration official said on a call with reporters. The port would be able to receive...

The Washington Post published a report Wednesday that the Biden Administration may limit arms transfers to Israel if it attacks the remaining four Hamas battalions in Rafah, a city on the Egyptian border in the southern Gaza Strip. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that Israel must enter Rafah to destroy Hamas and win the war. His war cabinet is considering a plan to evacuate Palestinian civilians north of the city before a military operation. David Ignatius, a columnist known for his sources in government, published the story, likely leaked from the White House: The Biden administration, worried about...

Apparently AOC isn't anti-Israel enough for the two crazy Pallyweid [Pally Weid] demanding she just "says" the G word. AOC has a long record of anti-Israel outbursts and activities. But she has some idea how Gaza death regime uses its own people and how the Oct 7 war started. Yet, even this radical liberal's stand isn't enough. But they shout: say the G word. Say it. __ Anti-Israel protestors accost AOC outside theater, demand she accuse Israel of (so-called) genocide[sic] despite her anti-Israel record. Gary Willig, Mar 5, 2024, 4:00 PM * Congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez harassed by anti-Israel protestors. The...

Officials say Sheher Bano, an assistant superintendent of police in Lahore, risked her life to rescue the woman after Arabic calligraphy on her outfit was mistaken for verses from the Quran. PESHAWAR, Pakistan — A police officer in Pakistan is being hailed as a hero after she protected a woman from a furious mob accusing her of blasphemy over what she was wearing. Sheher Bano, an assistant superintendent of police in the city of Lahore, “put her life in danger” to rescue the woman after colorful Arabic calligraphy on her outfit was mistaken for verses from the Quran, the Muslim...

That is what Joe Biden demanded of the Israelis, Hamas and representatives of Qatar and Egypt who are trying to broker a cease-fire agreement. As though he were the party in interest. The Telegraph interprets Biden’s motives:Mr Biden is under major pressure from voters over the US alliance with Israel, and the president was punished at the ballot box by protesting young Democrats in the primaries last week.So what would a proposed deal look like?A potential deal could include a six-week pause in fighting, the release of approximately 400 Palestinian prisoners in return for the freeing of 40 Israeli hostages,...

A joint Egyptian-U.S. archaeological mission has uncovered the upper part of a huge statue of King Ramses II during excavations south of the Egyptian city of Minya, Egypt's tourism and antiquities ministry said on Monday.The limestone block is about 3.8 metres (12.5 feet) high and depicts a seated Ramses wearing a double crown and a headdress topped with a royal cobra, Bassem Jihad, head of the mission's Egyptian team, said in a statement.The upper part of the statue's back column shows hieroglyphic writings that glorify the king, one of ancient Egypt's most powerful pharaohs, he said.Also known as Ramses the...

JERUSALEM —As Joe Biden pushes to empower the Palestinian Authority .. the PA has committed tens of millions of dollars for terrorists who were killed or captured while carrying out Hamas’ Oct. 7 terror attack on Israel and the resulting war. Since Oct. 7, the PA has doubled down on its longstanding "pay for slay" policy, which gives salaries and benefits to Palestinians imprisoned for involvement in violence against Israel and to the families of those killed in "the revolution" against the Jewish state. The policy does not distinguish between terrorists and civilians. But based on Israel Defense Forces estimates...

An incident in Lahore Pakistan stands as a damning indictment of modern Islamic society. From distant Pakistan, an NBC news story surfaces that serves to remind us of everything we need to know about our current crisis. A week ago, a female police officer in Lahore, Pakistan, patrolling a shopping district in the busy muslim city, saw a crowd gathering, to taunt, accuse, and threaten a young woman in a colorful Kurta (a long shirt-dress). Her dress was covered with bright and abstract calligraphy that the crowd assumed was an improper quoting of the Koran. In Pakistan, when a crowd...

Israel will not be sending a negotiating team to Cairo, an Israeli official told The Times of Israel Sunday, after receiving an unsatisfactory response from Hamas on the latest framework for a hostage deal hammered out in Paris last weekend. The Gaza-based terror organization refused to address Jerusalem’s demand to provide a list of living hostages and to lock down how many Palestinian prisoners Israel must release for every hostage freed, added the official. Hamas’s position was conveyed to Israel through Qatar. According to Channel 12, the war cabinet and the professional echelon all agreed that there was no point...