Free Republic

Going Entebbe on the hostage-taking dictator, right in front of his patron, Vladimir Putin. For Venezuela's fraudulently elected Nicolas Maduro, in Moscow to pay tribute to his patron Vlad Putin, yesterday was kind of embarrassing for both of them. Way under the radar, Secretary of State Marco Rubio had been busy, figuring out a way to make both of them look like weaklings, and with perfect timing, he succeeded: The U.S. welcomes the successful rescue of all hostages held by the Maduro regime at the Argentinian Embassy in Caracas. Following a precise operation, all hostages are now safely on U.S....

Donald Trump has once again made headlines, this time for hiring Christian Craighead, a former SAS soldier celebrated for his heroism during the 2019 Nairobi DusitD2 terror attack. Known as “Obi Wan Nairobi,” Craighead earned global recognition for his decisive actions that saved lives during the al-Shabaab assault. Trump, reportedly disillusioned with the Secret Service after the Butler attack, has opted to pay out-of-pocket for a private security team, with Craighead taking a central role. The Nairobi attack, which unfolded on January 15, 2019, was a coordinated assault by al-Shabaab militants on the DusitD2 hotel complex. The siege lasted over...

WORLD — Authorities across the globe have forcefully condemned Liam Neeson for killing dozens of kindly human traffickers just to save one lousy hostage. "We are absolutely disgusted by this rampage of violence against innocent human traffickers trying to make a living," said U.S. Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre. "One measly little hostage is no excuse for Neeson's horrific actions." According to sources, Neeson began hunting down the human traffickers after they kidnapped his daughter to sell as a sex slave. "Terrorists violently taking his daughter to rape is simply no justification for violence," said British politician Jeremy Corbyn. "We called...

Vice President Kamala Harris told a Democratic Party dinner in Michigan on Saturday evening that she mourned the “innocent lives” lost among Palestinians in Gaza during an Israeli rescue mission that freed four hostages. Fox 2 Detroit reported: “Before I begin, I just say a few words about the morning which I know weighs heavily on all of our hearts,” [Harris] said.”On October 7th, Hamas committed a brutal massacre of 1,200 innocent people and abducted 250 hostages.” “Thankfully four of those hostages were reunited with their families tonight. And we mourn all of the innocent lives that have been lost...

The commander of the team who rescued the hostages was killed in the operation. The operation was named after him, "Arnon".

Egypt and Jordan, two countries that have peace treaties with Israel, condemned the Israeli rescue of four hostages on Saturday — as did officials from the European Union (EU) and United Nations (UN) — over Palestinian casualties. As Breitbart News reported, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), Israel Police, and Israel Security Agency (ISA) rescued four hostages: Noa Argamani, 25; Almog Meir Jan, 21,; Andrey Kozlov, 27; and Shlomi Ziv, 40. The commander of the elite Israeli police anti-terror “Yamam” unit, Arnon Zamora, was wounded in the attack and later died in the hospital. Palestinian sources claimed that over 200 people...

JERUSALEM -- Israel says 4 hostages have been rescued in the largest hostage rescue since war began on Oct. 7.

This is the dramatic moment an Israeli snatch squad led freed hostages into a waiting helicopter to escape Gaza after a deadly firefight that killed one IDF soldier. The quick escape came after four Israeli hostages were freed by the rescue squad who came under heavy fire while they carried out a daring raid in Hamas-controlled Gaza. But the mission left one officer Arnon Zmora dead after troops raided two locations in a 'complex daytime operation' at 11:00am (8am GMT) today.

The first commanding officer of SEAL Team Six - the US military's vaunted counter-terrorism unit that would hunt down and kill Osama Bin Laden - died Sunday at age 81. Richard 'Dick' Marcinko was tasked with designing the counter-terrorist team after the Iran hostage crisis in 1979. Marcinko, along with another Navy representative, was on a task force to help free the American hostages in Iran, but were unsuccessful. The mission, known as Operation Eagle Claw, highlighted deficiencies within the US military command structure and revealed the need for a full-time counter-terrorist team. Marcinko launched the United States' third SEAL...

The material suggests that Gaetz’s father was told his son’s legal problems could go away if he gave $25 million to help secure the release of Iranian hostage Bob Levinson. --- The scandal swirling around Rep. Matt Gaetz took a stunning turn Wednesday with the news that a former Air Force intelligence official and a Florida lawyer tried to get the congressman’s dad to cough up $25 million that would be used to free American Bob Levinson from Iranian custody—and somehow release Gaetz from a federal sex-crimes investigation. And if that wasn’t enough, here’s one more strange fact: Levinson was...

There are many "what would you do?" scenario in law enforcement. In this video not sure if this is a training exercise or a real world life threatening situation from the Far East Asia. Scenario looks to be a hostage taking at a hospital. The bad guy has a cleaver to a female nurse’s neck. While a male (maybe a PO) is trying to talk to him, possibly to get him to calm down. He is shown making a call over the radio. A second female nurse arrives with something in her left hand. She is holding it out as...

ISLAMABAD — A 72-year-old American development worker who was kidnapped in Pakistan by al-Qaeda more than two years ago appealed to President Obama in a video released Thursday to negotiate his release, saying he feels “totally abandoned and forgotten.” The video of Warren Weinstein was the first since two videos released in September 2012. Weinstein, the country director in Pakistan for J.E. Austin Associates, a U.S.-based firm that advises a range of Pakistani business and government sectors, was abducted from his house in the eastern city of Lahore in August 2011. **SNIP** “Nine years ago I came to Pakistan to...

FBI agents die in Virginia training accidentPair of agents from elite hostage rescue team (excerpt)

Argentina's relations with the U.S. worsened sharply Monday as the South American country continued to hold military equipment it confiscated last week from a U.S. Air Force C-17 transport plane sent as part of a training course for local police. U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Arturo Valenzuela, called on Argentina to return the property without delay. "It's absolutely necessary that they immediately return that material. It makes no sense for it to have been confiscated this way. This material was intended for a joint exercise in training people to rescue hostages," Mr. Valenzuela Monday said on...

Military officials in Pakistan say a siege by militants near the army's headquarters in Rawalpindi, near the capital, Islamabad, is over. Commando forces raided a building where militants were holding hostages just before dawn Sunday. Four militants, two soldiers and three hostages were killed during the operation. Another wounded militant was captured. The violence began just before midday Saturday when a group of heavily armed militants in army uniforms tried to enter the Pakistani military headquarters. As soon as they were stopped at a main check post, the attackers lobbed several grenades and opened fire with automatic weapons on the...

An American engineer held hostage by Islamic militants in Afghanistan was freed in a daring nighttime raid by a Special Operations team last month, a rare move in a country where hostages often pay ransoms — or don't come home at all. A team of about 30 special operators composed mostly of Navy SEALs flew into the mountains outside Kabul on October 14 to retrieve the 61-year-old American businessman, killing his captors and returning him to safety after nearly two months in captivity, according to an account in the Army Times. -snip-

I am going to be interviewed on Pat Dollard's radio show tonight concernign events surrounding the Iranian Revolution and events leading up to the Hostage Rescue Attempt in Iran. The show is a 2200 Eastern and 1900 Pacific time that's 10 PM Eastern and 7 PM eastern for you civilian types. :P

A sensation in the 'Nord-Ost' case: the victims of the tragedy could for the first time read the attorney general's resolution refusing to bring a criminal complaint Judge Susina's achievement. The intriguing part of the sensation, and not there would be no sensation at all, if the machines of government had simply carried out the law. The 'Nord-Ost' victims had no access to the case materials for more than two years. The ice began to crack only on November 11th, 2004, and only as if by accident. Judge Natalya Susina of the capital's Zamoskvoreche law court, during the course of...

THE editor of Melbourne's The Age newspaper has defended Australia's Journalist of the Year, Paul McGeough, in the wake of revelations that he may have erred in two significant reports he filed from Iraq. McGeough claimed in an article published in The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald that former Iraqi interim leader Iyad Allawi shot dead as many as six prisoners in June last year. But the story was discredited by a report yesterday that Iraqi officials and US special forces bodyguards assigned to Allawi had passed lie detector tests in denying the murder allegations. "My view is that...

<p>Tune in tonight as The Wall Street Journal editorial board discusses the battle for the Senate, the Haitian refugee situation, the fallout of Russia's hostage-rescue operation, the trial lawyers' latest shenanigans, and the issue of free speech in the workplace. OpinionJournal.com's "Political Diary" columnist John Fund. joins the panel for a segment on voter fraud and election litigation.</p>