Free Republic

A court in Iran has sentenced the jailed Nobel Peace Prize winner Narges Mohammadi to an additional year in prison, her lawyer says. The 52-year-old human rights activist was convicted of spreading “propaganda against the system” by a branch of Tehran’s Revolutionary Court, Mostafa Nili wrote on X, formerly Twitter. He said the reasons cited by the court included “comments about Ms Dina Qalibaf”, a student who alleged she was tortured and sexually assaulted by security forces, as well as her call to boycott March’s election and letters to Swedish and Norwegian MPs. Ms Mohammadi had refused to attend the...

Why does it seem the Pentagon is far better at spending money than actually putting together a successful operation? The failed “Operation Prosperity Guardian” and the disastrous floating Gaza pier are but two recent examples of enormously expensive initiatives that, though they no-doubt enriched military contractors, were incapable of meeting their stated goals. To great fanfare, last December the Pentagon announced the launch of Operation Prosperity Guardian, a joint US/UK military operation to halt the Yemeni Houthi disruption of Israel-linked commercial shipping through the Red Sea. The Houthis announced their policy in response to civilian deaths in Israel’s war on...

Former Secretary of State John Kerry used a pseudonymous government email address while serving as the nation’s top diplomat during the Obama administration, whistleblowers told Sens. Chuck Grassley and Ron Johnson. Fox News Digital obtained a letter Grassley, R-Iowa, and Johnson, R-Wis., sent to Secretary of State Antony Blinken, demanding answers on whether Kerry properly complied with federal records law as secretary of state. Whistleblowers told Grassley and Johnson that Kerry used the email address “SESTravel1@state.gov” while serving in his official capacity. “We want to know whether then-Secretary Kerry properly complied with all federal records laws and regulations with respect...

And the terrorists can thank Rep. Ilhan Omar. After six months of Iran using its Houthi Jihadis to impose a blockade near Yemen while defying Biden to do anything about it, the Islamic global terror state is moving on to a Somali blockade.Current reports suggest that the Houthis, an Iranian Shiite terror group, is negotiating to provide weapons to Yemen’s Al-Shabaab, a Sunni Jihadist group allied with Al Qaeda, to expand Iran’s control over shipping. While Al-Shabaab has operated using the conventional Al Qaeda playbook of rifles and IEDs, the Houthis (pictured above) can offer upgraded drones and missile technology.And...

Members of a small far-right group advocating the annexation and settlement of southern Lebanon are set to hold a video conference on Monday, claiming their approach is the “only solution” to the ongoing clashes with Hezbollah amid increasingly vocal calls for Israel to invade its northern neighbor. “More assassinations in Lebanon, more firing of missiles, more alarms in the northern settlements, and no real change is visible on the horizon,” the Uri Tzafon organization said in a statement last week decrying the current escalation in the north. As an alternative, it invited the public to participate in what it is...

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) – Iran and Sweden carried out a prisoner swap Saturday that saw Tehran release a European Union diplomat and another man for an Iranian convicted in Stockholm of committing war crimes over his part in 1988 mass executions in the Islamic Republic. The arrest of Hamid Nouri by Sweden in 2019 as he traveled there as a tourist likely sparked the detentions of the two Swedes, part of a long-running strategy by Iran since its 1979 Islamic Revolution to use those with ties abroad as chip in negotiations with the West.

The U.S. Navy prepared for decades to potentially fight the Soviet Union, then later Russia and China, on the world's waterways. But instead of a global power, the Navy finds itself locked in combat with a shadowy, Iran-backed rebel group based in Yemen. The U.S.-led campaign against the Houthi rebels, overshadowed by the Israel-Hamas war in the Gaza Strip, has turned into the most intense running sea battle the Navy has faced since World War II, its leaders and experts told The Associated Press. The combat pits the Navy's mission to keep international waterways open against a group whose former...

A video went viral on Thursday that showed Israeli troops using a trebuchet to lob fireballs over the wall near the Israeli border with Lebanon, apparently to clear brush. The Israeli broadcaster KAN published a video of the “creative solution” the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) soldiers used to reportedly clear dense brush near the border with Lebanon. Trebuchets, which drop a heavy weight to propel a long throwing arm with a sling assembly on the end, have considerably longer range and better accuracy than older catapult designs. They were regarded as such a marvel of technology in their day that...

"The powerful elimination worries Hezbollah members. They now understand that the IDF knows much more about them than they know about us," says Professor Amatzia Baram. Approximately 250 rockets were launched on Wednesday towards northern Israel, disrupting the holiday calm with successive alerts. Rockets that exploded in open areas caused fires. In the city of Tiberias, a siren was activated for the first time since October. These launches come after the assassination of senior Hezbollah official Sami Taleb Abdullah, whose rank was equivalent to a brigadier general in the IDF. For the past 20 years, Abdullah had led rocket fire...

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...

Representative Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) said Friday on CNN’s “Inside Politics” that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “absolutely” should not have been invited to address Congress. Host Dana Bash said, “If you were still speaker, would you have invited him?” Pelosi said, “No. Absolutely not, absolutely not. I think this is wrong. Frankly, I didn’t approve of his being invited the last time. But the speaker, just on his own, invited him without consulting with the rest of the leadership. And he came and he criticized, President Obama for the masterful work that he had done with the nuclear agreement regarding...

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has vowed to enact tougher measures to deport criminals, terrorists, and terror supporters after a 25-year-old Afghan man committed a fatal stabbing last week. Currently, Germany does not deport people back to Afghanistan or Syria partly due to the harsh conditions and oppressive leadership in those countries. Afghanistan is run by the Taliban, a brutal Islamist militant organization with which Germany does not have diplomatic relations, while Syria is led by Bashar al-Assad, the Iran-backed leader who has been accused of mass war crimes during his country’s ongoing civil war. But Scholz is looking to restore...

AF Post @AFpost Congressman Thomas Massie reveals to Tucker Carlson that his Republican colleagues have an “AIPAC babysitter” to ensure they vote in the interests of Israel at all times. “It’s the only country that does this,” Massie adds.

Syrian President Bashar Assad has reason to distance himself from his erstwhile ally Iran. It’s true that Iran helped stabilize the government in Damascus and was instrumental in putting down a rebel uprising, but its continued presence on Syrian territory is a threat to Assad – not least because it invites occasional strikes from Israel. Assad sees Israeli pressure as an opportunity to get rid of Iran for good, and to that end he has signaled an interest in meeting with the United States, which sees ousting Iran as a necessary step in rehabilitating the Syrian regime. Given the escalation...

Gunmen attacked the United States embassy building in Lebanon on Wednesday morning, according to statements from the U.S. government and the Lebanese army. “At 8:34 a.m. local time, small arms fire was reported in the vicinity of the entrance to the U.S. Embassy. Thanks to the quick reaction of the LAF [Lebanon Armed Forces], ISF [Israel Security Forces], and our Embassy security team, our facility and our team are safe. Investigations are underway and we are in close contact with host country law enforcement,” the embassy said in a statement on X. At 8:34 a.m. local time, small arms fire...

One of the most influential Arab journalists in the world, Jamal Khashoggi, went missing after entering the Saudi consulate in Istanbul last week. Turkish authorities have blamed the Saudis, but Riyadh has denied harming the veteran reporter.Jamal Khashoggi, 59, was born in Medina, Saudi Arabia, one of the holiest cities in Islam. Like many Saudis at the time, Khashoggi left to study abroad. He earned a business administration degree in 1983 at Indiana State University in the United States.Career in journalismKhashoggi began his career as a reporter for the English language newspaper Saudi Gazette. He went on to work for...

There is much about the war against Israel to which the mainstream media pays scant attention. That journalistic failure is discussed here: “What mainstream media isn’t reporting during the Israel-Hamas war – opinion,” by Andrea Samuels, Jerusalem Post, May 24, 2024:In general, from watching MSM [mainstream media], we have the impression that the IDF is killing innocent children, unopposed, and there is no mention of the ongoing rocket attacks on Israel apart from the Iranian attack which was portrayed as a harmless gesture,” explained Paul Martin Gurnett from Britain….The rocket attacks launched by Hamas into southern Israel, and by Hezbollah...

2024. (Ayal Margolin/Flash90) IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi said Tuesday that Israel is close to making a decision regarding Hezbollah’s daily attacks on northern Israel amid the Gaza war. “We are approaching the point where a decision will have to be made, and the IDF is prepared and very ready for this decision,” Halevi said during an assessment with military officials and Fire Commissioner Eyal Caspi, at an army base in Kiryat Shmona. “We have been attacking for eight months, and Hezbollah is paying a very, very high price. It has increased its strengths in recent days...

BEIRUT (AP) — Israeli airstrikes around the Syrian city of Aleppo killed several people early on Monday, including an Iranian military adviser, the Syrian state media and Iranian news outlets reported. Israel did not immediately acknowledge the strikes. It was the first strike to kill an Iranian official since the April 1 attack on the Iranian Consulate in the Syrian capital of Damascus that killed seven people, including two Iranian generals and a member of Lebanon’s militant Hezbollah group. The strike triggered a first-ever direct Iranian military assault on Israel, sparking fears of a regionwide war. Syria's state-run SANA news...

The Iran-backed Palestinian Hamas terror organization released a video on Friday providing another indication that hostage Noa Argamani, a young Israeli woman abducted by Palestinians during the October 7 massacre, is still alive. The one-minute clip, which appears to contain an audio recording of the 26-year-old Israeli university student taken hostage from a music festival, urges Israelis to protest against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government, accusing it of abandoning those kidnapped by Hamas. Hamas released a psychological warfare video with the voice of hostage Noa Argamani. Even while Hamas broadcasts their war crime for the world to see, the International...