Free Republic

BEIRUT -- A Saudi-dominated political bloc on Wednesday formally designated Lebanon's Hezbollah militia a terrorist organization, a move that signals dangerously escalating tensions between regional rivals Saudi Arabia and Iran. The Gulf Cooperation Council's decision against the Iranian-allied group comes two weeks after Saudi Arabia canceled $4 billion aid package for strengthening Lebanese security services. Saudi Arabia and other GCC member states have advised their citizens to leave Lebanon. An announcement posted on the GCC website accused Hezbollah, a powerful Shiite Muslim movement, of unspecified hostile acts in the six states in the bloc: Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates,...

New review of Palestinian Authority textbooks finds systematic incitement against Jews, erasure of Israel continues. A review of dozens of Palestinian Authority educational books for the 2015-2016 school year found that the PA education system continues to encourage terror against Jews and completely ignores the Holocaust in history books discussing World War II. In addition, this year's textbooks continue to systematically erase the State of Israel from maps and texts. Gal Berger, a journalist focusing on Palestinian affairs with Reshet B, carried out a comprehensive investigation of about 70 textbooks for first through twelfth grades on the subjects of civics,...

Trump Gains Among Christians in the Middle East By Ray Hanania February 18, 2016 Donald Trump may have angered Muslims with his broad swipes at Islamic terrorism and violence, but he has garnered more positive sentiment from Christians in the Middle East. ...snip... Trump's comments have gained strong support among Arab Christians and Middle East Christians who feel as though mainstream Muslim activists have failed to fully confront extremists. Though Muslims reject the radicals' tactics of terrorism and violence, arguing that they twist the true face of Islam, their leadership fails in strategic communications. Trump is honest and compensates for...

One of the few interesting items in the New York Times' whitewash of Hillary and Obama's illegal Libyan war is the confirmation of weapons shipments. ... The story blames the problem on Qatar aiding Jihadists and Obama's unwillingness to defy the terror oil state. But the claim that we had to arm terrorists to fight Qatar's arming of terrorists doesn't hold up too well. Furthermore we already know that US forces were told to turn a blind eye to Qatar's weapons shipments. We could have blocked them instead. ... Qatar was backing the Muslim Brotherhood. Just like Hillary and Obama.

The European Union fears Mediterranean migrant smuggling gangs are reviving a route from Egypt, officials told Reuters, putting thousands of people to sea in recent months as they face problems in Libya and Turkey. "It's an increasing issue," an EU official said of increased activity after a quiet year among smugglers around Alexandria that has raised particular concerns in Europe about Islamist militants from Sinai using the route to reach Greece or Italy. Departures from Egypt were a tiny part of the million people who arrived in Europe by sea last year; more than 80 percent came from Turkey to...

One thing George W. Bush got right: the Islamic Republic of Iran is an evil regime. It seems an elementary point. It seems obvious. The regime is responsible for the murder and disfigurement of many Americans. It is the proud supporter of terrorist organizations including but not limited to Hamas and Hezbollah. It is itself a tyrannical, murderous, terrorist regime. Yet President Obama is operating on a theory of international relations that has enriched and empowered the regime. Iran took at least $100 billion as the downpayment for its professed support for the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action. The JCPOA...

Kabul (BNA) The Russian government has recently handed over its first military assistance consisting of 10000 Ak-47 to ANP. While the Afghan government sincerely appreciates Russian assistance and requesting further contribution for ANSF equipping and capacity building. A number of experts and law makers on the role of regional countries in war on terror who were optimist on these assistance and future of Afghanistan and believed that Moscow is concerned on influence of terrorists and extremists into their borders said that if regional countries make honest cooperation with us in the direction of restoration of stability, we would witness it...

It seems that nearly every week Iran is insulting, mocking, spitting on and embarrassing the United States of America. The idiots in the Obama Administration and the Commander in Fool himself actually believe that by cowering, groveling and apologizing to the Iranians on a constant basis, the Iranians will have a Come to Allah meeting and miraculously turn into our new best friends forever. Like all thugs from time immemorial, the only thing the Iranians understand is power and force, two things the US is not exhibiting under the Obama Administration. We are literally the weakling on the beach, getting...

Security forces say that they arrested three Palestinians who crossed the fence bordering Gaza this morning (Saturday), under the cover of heavy fog. An early investigation found that the three did not intend to perpetrate and attack on Israelis. They told their interrogators that they were escaping the Gaza Strip due to the difficult situation prevailing there. Earlier this morning, a state of emergency was declared in several communities in the Eshkol region due to reports of the infiltrators. .....

The US Didn’t Create ISIS -- Assad and Saddam Did Dictators pay a price for allying with Islamic terrorism November 4, 2015 Daniel Greenfield 314 Daniel Greenfield, a Shillman Journalism Fellow at the Freedom Center, is a New York writer focusing on radical Islam. The Russia-Iran-Assad axis and its useful idiots in the West claim that the United States created ISIS. Some of the loonier conspiracy sites that gleefully repost Russian propaganda allege that the Caliph of ISIS is a Jewish Mossad agent named Elliot Shimon or a CIA agent named Simon Elliot.  Elliot doesn’t exist, but ISIS’ Deputy Caliph...

"This shows that Iran, even after the nuclear agreement, is continuing to aid terrorism," says Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu • U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry "extremely disturbed" by offer • PM: Nations of the world must confront and condemn this. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Thursday an Iranian offer to compensate the families of Palestinians terrorists killed in a wave of attacks on Israelis, proves Iran continues to "aid terrorism" even after the landmark nuclear deal reached between Tehran and Western powers last year. His comments come a day after Iran's ambassador to Lebanon, Mohammad Fathali, said that Iran...

A group of United Nations' member-states on Thursday elected the Assad regime to a leadership post of a special committee dealing with decolonization, sparking protests from a human rights group that had earlier urged U.N. secretary-general Ban Ki-moon to intervene. At a meeting in New York, the committee's newly-elected chairman, Venezuelan ambassador Rafael Ramirez, asked the member-states whether there were any objections to putting forward Syrian ambassador Bashar Ja'afari as its "rapporteur" for the coming year. Hearing no objectives, Ramirez declared Ja'afari -- as well as three nominated vice chairmen, the representatives of Cuba, Sierra Leone and Indonesia -- "elected...

The wave of attacks lacks not just a name and an ending but also a definite starting point. The violence stretches back so far it has no beginning. The Palestinian terror attacks are endless," a friend moaned recently. The media and general public are struggling to come up with a name for what is often just referred to as "the current wave of violence" - "the knives' intifada" and "the lone wolves' intifada" are two terms that are competing for the dubious honor in the Hebrew press, the Palestinian media preferring "The Jerusalem intifada." But the wave of attacks lacks...

Appearing as a guest on Friday's Fox and Friends, FNC's Geraldo Rivera touted GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump as "the reasonable man on the stage" at last night's presidential debate, and went on to praise Trump's "unparalleled courage" for taking a position of neutrality on the Arab-Israeli conflict. After acknowledging that the GOP presidential candidate would have to answer for his history of having illegal immigrants doing construction work for him, Rivera brought up Trump's position on Israel as he added: My point, Brian, is that in the big picture this was the reasonable man on the stage. How is...

David Cameron has boasted of his efforts to help sell “brilliant things” such as Eurofighter Typhoons to Saudi Arabia on the day the European parliament voted for an arms embargo on the country over its bombardment of Yemen. The prime minister talked of the UK government’s role in selling equipment made by defence company BAE Systems to Saudi Arabia, Oman and other countries as he visited the firm’s factory in Preston. At almost the same time, the European parliament voted in favour of an EU-wide ban on arms being sold to Saudi Arabia in protest at its heavy aerial bombing...

According to Iranian ambassador to Beirut, every family of a martyr will receive $7,000, while a family whose home was demolished by the IDF will receive $30,000. Speaking at a press conference in Beirut on Wednesday, Iranian ambassador to Lebanon, Mohammad Fathali, said: "Continuing Iran's support for the oppressed Palestinian people, Iran announces the provision of financial aid to families of Palestinian martyrs who were killed in the "Jerusalem intifada." Fathali called on the Arab Muslim nation to unite around the central Palestinian issue and said that "the martyrs' blood will release the entire Palestine, from the river to the...

Turkey is confronting what amounts to a strategic nightmare as bombs explode in its cities, its enemies encroach on its borders and its allies seemingly snub its demands. As recently as four years ago, Turkey appeared poised to become one of the biggest winners of the Arab Spring, an ascendant power hailed by the West as a model and embraced by a region seeking new patrons and new forms of governance. All that has evaporated since the failure of the Arab revolts, shifts in the geopolitical landscape and the trajectory of the Syrian war. Russia, Turkey’s oldest and nearest rival,...

Iran's economy minister said his country is seeking $45 billion in foreign investment following the implementation of a landmark nuclear deal with world powers last month. Ali Tayebnia told reporters Saturday that Iran expects $15 billion in direct foreign investment alone in the next Iranian calendar year, which begins March 20. ...

UK Special Envoy to Yemen Alan Duncan Claims US Controlled by Jewish BankersPosted By Daniel Greenfield On October 15, 2014 @ 12:24 pm In The Point | 18 Comments Alan Duncan, the UK’s Special Envoy to Yemen and Oman, a former oil industry man and current MP, offered a calculated insult to the United States and a staple of Nazi anti-Semitic propaganda as part of his unfortunate campaign against the Jewish State.After denouncing Israeli “Apartheid” despite having built his career working with an oil company that actually propped up Apartheid in South Africa, Duncan demanded that all candidates be...

<p>Saudi Arabia's foreign minister says he favors equipping Syrian rebels with surface-to-air missiles, arguing it would shift the balance of power.</p> <p>Saudi Arabia is a key backer of rebels against President Bashar Assad. Foreign Minister Adel el-Jubeir was quoted as telling German weekly Der Spiegel in an interview published Saturday: "We believe that introducing surface-to-air missiles in Syria is going to change the balance of power on the ground."</p>