Free Republic

Full Title: Revealed: Hillary Clinton's State Department refused over and over to brand Al Qaeda group that kidnapped 300 girls in Nigeria as 'terrorists' Under then-Secretary Hillary Clinton, the U.S. State Department repeatedly refused to add the Nigerian al-Qaeda affiliate group Boko Haram – the organization responsible for the recent kidnapping of more than 300 young girls – to its official list of terrorist organizations. In November 2013, current Secretary John Kerry did what Clinton wouldn't. Boko Haram is the group that has claimed responsibility for kidnapping hundreds of girls in Nigeria, promising to sell them into slavery. The Daily...

Russian President Vladimir Putin will meet Palestinian Authority (PA) Chairman Mahmoud Abbas in Moscow on Monday where the issue of Middle East peace talks will be raised, Russian authorities announced Thursday. “The two leaders will hold talks concerning key aspects of Russian-Palestinian relations and their future, with particular attention on the trade, economy and humanitarian sectors,” the Kremlin said in a statement according to AFP. There will also be “an exchange of ideas on the process of Israeli-Palestinian talks and other problematic regional situations,” the statement continued, adding that North Africa would also be on the agenda. …

Arab intelligence agencies tell European countries that Irans military is ready to close Strait of Hormuz if nuclear talks fail. - Ch. 10

The US-led world powers and Iran Monday, March 30, entered the last tense hours for a nuclear deal as though Lausanne was on a different planet from the Middle East, where the Yemen war, in which Iran is deeply involved, abruptly scooped up a power outside the region, Pakistan. A high-level meeting chaired by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in Islamabad on Monday reaffirmed Pakistan’s “firm commitment to supporting the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Saudi Arabia.” Among those attending were Chief of Army Staff (COAS) General Raheel Sharif, Advisor on National Security and Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz and Defense Minister...

Saudi Arabia accused Russian President Vladimir Putin of hypocrisy on Sunday, telling an Arab summit that he should not express support for the Middle East while fuelling instability by supporting Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad. In a rare move, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi announced that a letter from Putin would be read out to the gathering in Egypt, where Arab leaders discussed an array of regional crises, including conflicts in Syria, Yemen and Libya. "We support the Arabs' aspirations for a prosperous future and for the resolution of all the problems the Arab world faces through peaceful means, without any...

The former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency on Sunday described President Obama's Middle East policy as one of "willful ignorance," saying the administration needs a clearer strategy for dealing with conflicts emerging across the region. Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn said during an interview on "Fox News Sunday" that recent developments in the Middle East are moving in a bad direction for the United States, with Iran "clearly on the march" to influence events in a "regional sectarian war." “At the end of the day, we have just this incredible policy confusion — never mind what our strategy is to...

(Reuters) - Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan accused Iran on Thursday of trying to dominate the Middle East and said its efforts have begun annoying Ankara, as well as Saudi Arabia and Gulf Arab countries. Turkey earlier said it supports the Saudi-led military operation against Houthi rebels in Yemen and called on the militia group and its "foreign supporters" to abandon acts which threaten peace and security in the region. "Iran is trying to dominate the region," said Erdogan, who is due to visit Tehran in early April. "Could this be allowed? This has begun annoying us, Saudi Arabia and the...

As airstrikes and ground battles continued across Yemen on Saturday, defiant words were uttered by regional leaders at an Arab summit in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el Sheik.Ousted Yemeni President Abdu Rabu Mansour Hadi said Saudi Arabia-led airstrikes must continue until Shiite Muslim Houthi militants, who drove him from power, agree to surrender. He branded the Houthis as “stooges of Iran” and directly blamed the Islamic Republic for creating chaos in Yemen and forcing him to flee.

It hasn't made much noise worldwide, but Iran's rapidly deteriorating relationships with several African countries is huge news across the continent. On February 16, the Nigerian Federal High Court in Lagos began the prosecution of an alleged member of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), Azim Aghajani, and a Nigerian associate, Usman Abbas Jega. They are accused of arms smuggling. This video link is in Arabic, but is very self-explanatory. It is of the opening day of the court proceedings.The story is a classic, just one of many on the Dark Continent nowadays: In late October 2010, Nigerian intelligence officials...

A recent report in the Sudanese opposition media suggests that Iran may be operating a weapons factory near Khartoum. Have the two countries taken their military alliance to the next level? The Sudanese newspaper Rai al-Shaab (Opinion of the People), owned and controlled by Sudanese opposition leader Hassan al-Turabi, recently published an article that potentially provides new and important insight into Sudan's terrorist ties to Iran. The article alleges that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), a U.S.-designated terrorist organization, is operating a secret weapons factory in Sudan to funnel weapons to Iran-sponsored terrorist organizations in Africa and the Middle...

SNIPPET - QUOTE: Possibly the mystery of the three recent incidents of exploding Yemeni fishing boats can be explained as Iranian missile shipments. The following article asserts Iran is shipping from an African country, likely Sudan, to Yemen. A Yemeni fishing boat also exploded in a Sudanese port and Yemen's Midi Island is a new transit point for Sudanese refugees. Once there's a smuggling route established for weapons, the boats often also transport refugees. However this report is taken from a Yemeni government stooge newspaper, Akhbar al Youm, which once announced that Ayatollah Sistani and I (me Jane) wrote the...

Iran's arab-parast president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said here on Monday, "Iranian and Sudanese governments and nations are friends and brothers and would maintain supporting one another and two pillars of the islamic (arabs) culture." Mullahs' regime president made the comment in its joint press conference with newly arrived visiting Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir, adding, "Sudan is a large and important African country, with a great regional and international role, and Iran-Sudan ties, as two important and independent countries, are always improving." Ahmadinejad emphasized, "The Iranian and Sudanese nations and governments have a joint enemy, that is constantly after creating obstacles...

WASHINGTON [MENL] -- The United States has determined that despite numerous requests China has become a major supplier of weaponry to Iran and Sudan. Officials said China has sold major weapons and components to oil-producing countries in the Middle East banned from receiving Western defense systems. They said Beijing has rebuffed U.S. appeals to halt the weapons supplies. China has supplied components and expertise to Iran's weapons of mass destruction and missile programs, officials said. They said some of the Chinese components have arrived via Pakistan, another key ally of Beijing.

(CNN)Saudi and allied warplanes struck rebels in Yemen on Thursday, with Saudi Arabia threatening to send ground troops and inserting itself into its southern neighbor's civil war, potentially opening up a broader sectarian conflict in the Middle East. The swift and sudden action involved 100 Saudi jets, 30 from the United Arab Emirates, 15 each from Kuwait and Bahrain, 10 from Qatar, and a handful from Jordan, Morocco and Sudan, plus naval help from Pakistan and Egypt, according to a Saudi adviser. The Egyptian state news agency on Thursday quoted Egypt's Foreign Ministry as saying Egypt's support also could involve...

Sudan pledges air and ground troops to Saudi-led strikes on Yemen; Kerry offers logistics, intelligence support in Yemen as Iran-backed Houthi rebels advance on the Strait of Bab-el-Mandeb. Egypt and Sudan on Thursday pledged support for the Saudi-led strikes on Iran's Yemen allies the Houthis, even as four Egyptian naval vessels crossed the Suez Canal en route to Yemen to secure the Gulf of Aden. Maritime sources at the Suez Canal confirmed the vessels' route, saying they expected them to reach the Red Sea by Thursday evening. Sudan's Defense Minister Abdel Raheem Mohammed Hussein told reporters on Thursday that his...

Egypt's President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi continues to reach out to America for help in rallying the forces of good against a rising tide of evil—the ever-spreading virus of militant Islam. And so far we are still snubbing him. As I have written before in this space, Sisi appears to be a surprising successor to the heroic British leader who first rallied his own people, then appealed to the New World to join not only his, but humanity's, cause against the Nazi menace—which is in many ways similar to the Islamist one today. Despite America's declared need for strong Arab allies in...

DC political insiders believe that if President Barack Obama truly seeks compromise with Republicans, he should begin by ditching White House Senior Advisor Valerie Jarrett. It goes without saying that Jarrett, the president's longtime trusted confidante, political ally, and family friend, is a divisive figure inside the beltway. Calls for her dismissal have been rampant since the president began his second term -- and even before then. It is a demand still ignored by the White House.

The Pentagon is unable to account for more than $500 million in U.S. military aid given to Yemen amid fears that the weaponry, aircraft and equipment is at risk of being seized by Iranian-backed rebels or al-Qaeda, according to U.S. officials. With Yemen in turmoil and its government splintering apart, the Defense Department has lost its ability to monitor the whereabouts of U.S.-donated small arms, ammunition, night-vision goggles, patrol boats, vehicles and other supplies. The situation has grown worse since the United States closed its embassy in Sanaa, the capital, last month and withdrew many of its military advisers. In...

Though Iran’s Great Prophet-9 military exercise ended last month, you can count on Tehran’s military to wring every last drop of bellicosity from the event—such as showing off an apparently armed drone taking a bead on a ship crossing the Strait of Hormuz. Iran conducted the exercise during the last week of February, and centered it around the theatrical, Michael Bay-esque destruction of a stationary wooden aircraft carrier prop floating off Iran’s Larak Island.

ISIS has been under attack in the last few days from Twitter, which has quietly suspended at least 2,000 accounts linked to the terror group and its supporters, according to people with knowledge of the operation. The sites shut down include some of the most important distributors of ISIS messages in a major escalation against ISIS's propaganda and recruitment efforts, according to J.M. Berger, a terrorism analyst who monitors ISIS online messaging. "Twitter has been doing a whole lot over the past week. They've slammed them pretty hard, including the official media distribution guys," Berger said. He said 13 of...