Free Republic

A ship has been struck in the Strait of Hormuz nearly every day this month, according to the International Maritime Organization. Between Oct. 1 and Tuesday, nine ships – mostly crude oil tankers – were struck in the Strait of Hormuz or off the coast of Oman, according to the IMO. Two additional ships were hit since, with one struck on Wednesday and another struck on Friday, according to the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations. Wednesday’s attack was on an unnamed tanker off the coast of Madinat ash Shamal, Qatar, in the Persian Gulf. Friday’s attack was on an unnamed...

Iran announces a large oil tanker has hit a naval mine while exiting the Strait of Hormuz through the US-backed southern Omani corridor, with a massive explosion and fire in the engine room. It is the second such incident under 24 hours. A crude oil supertanker exploded and caught fire after it hit a mine while trying to leave the Strait of Hormuz using an "unauthorised and dangerous route", Iranian media Press TV has reported. The Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) in a statement said the crude oil supertanker had switched off its navigation and global positioning systems while trying...

Governments caution flying to Saudi Arabia, or through its airspace, after weekend attack left at least 12 deadCommercial air travel has been dragged into the front lines of escalating conflicts across the globe, with airports, planes and airspace becoming the deliberate target of missile and drone attacks on a scale not seen before.Since the U.S. and Israel started the Iran war in February, major airports across the Middle East have been repeatedly targeted. Parked aircraft have been hit by missiles or falling debris from interceptor systems, killing crew members and passengers. The threat culminated Saturday in a Houthi missile strike...

Secretary of State Marco Rubio has waived a restriction on $320 million in military aid to Egypt that had been previously withheld over human rights concerns, citing Egypt’s help in dealing with Iran since the conflict began earlier this year. The State Department said Thursday that Rubio had signed off on the waiver “in the interest of U.S. national security.” "The Secretary’s determination reflects the importance of Egypt to U.S. national security interests, and the concrete security cooperation Egypt provides to the United States,” the department said. In a letter sent to lawmakers whose contents were shared with The Associated...

The airport in the Saudi capital was attacked again Saturday and was evacuated, two regional officials said, two days after three Saudi citizens including a pilot were killed there as the kingdom faces an extraordinary series of assaults in the new front in the Iran war. One official said air traffic to the Riyadh airport had stopped. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they weren't authorized to speak to the media. King Khalid International Airport has been targeted multiple times in the week since a Saudi-led coalition launched a major military offensive against Iran-backed Houthi rebels in neighboring...

At least 12 people were killed – including one American – and more than 300 injured in an attack Saturday at Saudi Arabia’s international airport in Riyadh, aviation authorities there said, as the Persian Gulf nation faced some of the biggest attacks it has seen in years by Iranian-backed Houthi militants. While the rebel group did not immediately claim responsibility for the attack, it came during a week where smoke could be seen billowing above the airport and explosions sounded in Saudi Arabia’s capital in a wave of intensifying Houthi strikes. As Saturday’s attack forced aviation authorities to suspend operations...

Zohran Mamdani, New York City’s mayor, set off a firestorm of criticism Wednesday morning with a social media post ostensibly intended to commemorate the Oct. 7, 2023, massacre of Israelis. It devoted a brief paragraph to condemning Hamas and commiserating with its victims. The rest was a much longer denunciation of Israel’s “ongoing genocide in Gaza,” a “world in which occupation and apartheid continue” and a situation in which “our federal government continues its complicity with every arms shipment.” In response, Ammiel Hirsch, the president of the New York Board of Rabbis, said the statement was “so offensive to so...

Hamas is generating as much as $5 million a day from goods entering Gaza while rebuilding tunnels, accumulating weapons, and planning possible attacks on Israeli troops, including attempts to kidnap soldiers, according to separate Israeli television reports this week citing security officials. Neomi Neumann, a former head of research at Israel’s Shin Bet security agency, told the Kan public broadcaster on Thursday that Hamas continues to exercise effective control over Gaza’s population through a decentralized system of taxation, aid distribution, and covert enforcement. Neumann, now an adjunct fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, estimated that Hamas earns...

It’s been three years since the savage Oct. 7, 2023 Hamas terror attacks, which killed 1,200 people, often in barbaric, inhuman ways.As we reported, Democratic Socialist New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani celebrated the occasion by firing off an incendiary statement accusing Israel of committing war crimes and genocide in Gaza. (See: Morally Bankrupt Mamdani Spits on October 7 Victims to Demonize Israel.)If he wanted to stoke a response, he succeeded, because anti-Israel, pro-Hamas protests broke out throughout the Big Apple Wednesday. Not surprisingly, Columbia University and NYU once again played their part in the twisted response to the anniversary...

Russia has finalized preparations to provide a $1 billion loan to Iran, with the funds ready for transfer once Tehran provides bank account details, Iranian media reported Tuesday. Iran’s semi-official Fars News Agency said the payment process had been finalized but disagreements among Iranian government bodies over how the money should be spent have delayed the transfer. The loan was first reported in June and was described as the first installment of a planned $20 billion Russian loan to Iran, according to Fars.

Hezbollah has received $200 million from Iran to help Lebanese people displaced by this year’s war with Israel, say two people with direct knowledge of the transfer, the first significant aid from the group to supporters who bore the brunt of the conflict. Asked for comment, a Hezbollah official says an amount has been secured and a plan for distributing it will be announced in the coming days, without elaborating on the source of the funds. Iran has maintained financial support to Hezbollah through years of crippling US sanctions: it transferred $1 ​billion to the group in the first 10...

Hundreds of Palestinians reportedly marched in Gaza City on Saturday, chanting against #Hamas after activist Iyad Abu Jendeya was detained following social media posts accusing businessmen and Hamas-linked figures of corruption. Independent journalists and activists said protesters gathered near Ahli Hospital, where they believed Abu Jendeya was being held. The corruption allegations and circumstances surrounding his detention have not been independently verified.

Prof. Chen Kugel says forensic evidence showed systematic killing methods across attack sites; he recalls burned and mutilated bodies, the race to identify every victim and the psychological toll that ultimately left him with PTSD; this article contains graphic images and descriptions that some readers may find disturbing. “Here we see the body of a person who was burned,” he says, pausing over one of the photographs. “We know he was burned alive: When we open his airway, we can see soot inside. That means he inhaled smoke while he was being burned.” Prof. Chen Kugel, director of the National...

John Spencer, an expert on urban warfare and Chair of Urban Warfare Studies at the Modern War Institute at West Point, sharply criticized the documentary NAZA on Monday, accusing it of presenting claims about the war in Gaza that go beyond even those made by Hamas. “Worse than Hamas propaganda," Spencer wrote in a post on X after watching the documentary in its entirety. “Over three years, I’ve tried not to be surprised by ignorance, disinformation, and distortions relating to war, but this is at the top for many reasons." Spencer said he intends to publish a detailed analysis of...

Yemeni government forces claimed on Monday to have retaken control of key positions near the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, a vital chokepoint for global trade, as they launch a renewed campaign to roll back recent gains made by the Iran-backed Houthi movement. Military spokesperson Majid Al-Nuzaili claimed on X that government forces “have succeeded in controlling Bab al-Mandeb,” adding that they have “cut off” and taken control of the road between Dhubab district, which overlooks Bab al-Mandeb, and the port town of Mocha, previously seized by the Houthis. CNN hasn’t independently verified the claim. Forces, which are backed by Saudi Arabia,...

Iran’s worsening economic crisis has opened an increasingly bitter argument over who is responsible, as the government points to outside pressure and market psychology while hardliners accuse Tehran’s own economic officials of making the situation worse. On Thursday, the end of Iran’s market week, the rial fell to another record low. Year-on-year inflation has reached almost 90 percent, with food prices rising even faster. The deterioration comes as US sanctions and a naval blockade squeeze Iran’s sources of revenue. The blockade has severely constrained oil exports, while Washington on Thursday expanded sanctions into the automotive and rail sectors, targeting some...

Two terrorist attacks were attempted on Monday within hours of each other in Judea and Samaria. IDF forces operating near Bani Naim in the Hebron Hills saw a vehicle with three terrorists moving suspiciously. The vehicle then accelerated toward the forces' vehicle and struck it. In response, the soldiers fired toward the vehicle, and hits were identified. No IDF soldiers were hurt. According to reports from the scene, one of the suspects was killed, another was severely wounded, and the third was arrested. A few hours later, two terrorists, at least one armed with a knife, entered the grazing areas...

Iran’s oil minister, Mohsen Paknejad, has resigned and been replaced by the country’s top oil executive, the president’s office says in a statement, amid a blockade on Tehran’s oil exports by the United States. “Following the acceptance of Mohsen Paknejad’s resignation, Hamid Bovard,” the CEO of the National Iranian Oil Company, “has been appointed as acting Minister of Oil by a decree from the president,” says the statement carried by state broadcaster IRIB. In a news bulletin on the minister’s resignation, state television runs an interview with an official from the Iranian presidential office who says Paknejad initially offered his...

Dear Tucker, As men with public platforms, our responsibility is to tell the truth — whether one may or may not receive payment from middle eastern antisemitic propagandists. That standard applies to me. It applies to you too, Mr. Carlson. For months, you and others have used the word "genocide" to describe what's happened in Gaza — not as a legal conclusion reached through evidence and process, but as settled, obvious fact, repeated with total confidence to millions of listeners. This week, the Gaza Health Ministry itself — the same Hamas-run body that has supplied you the death toll numbers...

The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), a terrorist organization formally belonging to the Iranian armed forces, published a 26-page open letter to the American people on Tuesday inviting Americans to visit the Strait of Hormuz, insisting “death to America” did not mean Iran wished death on America, and suggesting the September 11, 2001, jihadist attacks were a “false-flag operation.”“It should be fairly obvious that the phrase ‘Death to America,’ which Iranians have been chanting since the triumph of the Islamic Revolution, does not in any way express any ill will toward the American people,” the IRGC officials wrote. “Death to...