Free Republic

Michigan Senate hopeful Abdul El-Sayed’s father sits on the board of an Islamic charity that was previously accused of funneling cash to late Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein’s regime. Imam Dr. Mohammed El-Sayed is currently a board member of Life for Relief and Development, a charity he’s worked with since at least 2020, according to tax forms. In 2004, the US military and FBI raided Life for Relief and Development’s Baghdad facilities, confiscating 20 boxes and 12 computers amid suspicions that the charity had been aiding insurgents, the San Francisco Chronicle reported. Later, the Islamic charity’s public relations coordinator Muthanna al-Hanooti...

Six people have died and 28 have been injured after gunmen opened fire on a funeral at a church in Jordan. It took place at a Greek Orthodox church in Karak governorate, about 110 miles south of the capital Amman. A witness told TV channel Al Mamlaka that two men - one carrying a rifle and another a ‌pistol - opened fire for several minutes. The station said the men had got out of a vehicle before attacking the funeral at Hamoud church. Local reports initially said seven people had been killed, but Jordan's public security directorate later said there...

Oil flows out of the Persian Gulf in October nearly returned to levels seen before the start of the Iran war, but traders remain wary about a fragile recovery. Total crude exports in the region, or flows coming out of Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Oman, recently recovered to within 10% of their previous levels in January and February, according to data compiled by TankerTrackers.com, a maritime intelligence firm tracking crude oil shipments (see chart below).

Haaretz reports that Emma Pomeroy of the University of Cambridge and her colleagues examined the remains of Shanidar A, a Neanderthal of about 45 years of age who was buried in Iraqi Kurdistan's Shanidar Cave some 75,000 years ago. The researchers suggest that the individual had been killed when a weapon, likely a sharpened stick, was forced into his chest from the front, passed through a lung, and punched a hole in his left shoulder blade. Similar holes have been identified in fossilized animal bones. About a year before his death, this individual had also suffered facial injuries, including a...

Jhonf Fonseca@Jhonffonseca·Oct 5Translated from SpanishShow originalApril 6, 2007. Anbar, Iraq. Mike Day, Navy SEAL, enters a room measuring about 3×3 meters first. Inside, four Al Qaeda terrorists, armed, are waiting for him. They shoot him at point-blank range. His rifle falls. He drops to the ground. 27 hits: 16 bullets in the body—legs, arms, abdomen, glutes, scrotum—and 11 in the vest. A grenade explodes at his feet and leaves him unconscious amid dust and shrapnel. He opens his eyes. Switches to the pistol. Kills all four, one by one. Clears the house. Walks alone to the evacuation helicopter: he fears...

Raith Al-Tamimi, an Iraqi living in the UK, is one of those rare people willing to state the obvious truth: While the Arab world demands that the rest of the world defend it, Benjamin Netanyahu defends his country and, most especially, his country’s women.The funniest part of the video is watching the female host who, I presume, also lives in the UK, try to defend Muslim nations’ sorry record with their women, only to be overridden by the impassioned Al-Tamimi.Here’s the video and a transcript based on the subtitles:https://x.com/nick_matau/status/2105106820574650791

US forces leave country where 4,500 of them died in worst US war of 21st century BAGHDAD, Sept 29 (Reuters) - US forces are set to pull out from their last bases in Iraq by Wednesday, a departure celebrated as a victory by Iran and its allies ​who now have deep influence in the country where 4,500 Americans died during more than two decades of war. Iraqi security experts say the withdrawal — agreed in 2024 under President Joe Biden and carried ‌out by Donald Trump's administration even as it wages war against Iran — could give Tehran and its...

An Iraqi demand that tens of thousands of militants turn in their weapons falls short in a conflict fed by America’s war with Iran BAGHDAD—After spending more than 23 years and $1.7 trillion, America is winding down what critics have called its forever war in Iraq, closing the last major U.S. military base on Wednesday.“We don’t think we need the military there anymore,” President Trump said during a White House visit by Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi in July. “We have a fantastic champion, a new champion,” the president said. “He’s young, and he’s handsome.”Zaidi, a 41-year-old businessman, sat beside...

“Turkish journalist İbrahim Karagül, who is close to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has published columns since the start of the Iran War envisioning the destruction of Israel at the hands of Turkey. In a March 13, 2026 column titled "If it makes that 'fatal mistake,' Turkey will invade Israel! It will burn and destroy Tel Aviv and liberate Jerusalem. You have not understood the turn of history! Our silence is dangerous! They cannot invade Iran. There will no longer be Arab-Persian wars or a sectarian war either. The 'Middle Eastern order' has collapsed. Israel is a one-day state."

American B-52 bombers have begun arriving in Britain, as Iraq claims six civilians were killed and 15 others injured in the latest round of US and British air raids inside the no-fly zone. The last time the bombers were stationed on British soil was for the attacks on Yugoslavia four years ago. Once again the long-range B-52s are based at RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire. The first of the huge jets landed just before noon on Monday. About an hour earlier, what appeared to be a U-2 spy plane had taken off. Two transporters aircraft are also at the base. British...

Engines were appearing to start the taxi.Would this put a possible drop at dawn?

Neoconservatism is an elite calling. It thrives in think tanks, not union halls; its proponents want most of all to influence the powerful. No wonder Ivy League labels have always been important to neocons. This fixation on intellectual prestige explains the recent neocon uprising over the possibility that Juan Cole, scholar and blogger, would become a Yale professor. It was one thing for Cole to hold forth from the University of Michigan, where he has been a professor for twenty years. But Yale would provide "honor" and "imprimatur," says Scott Johnson, a right-wing blogger. "That's a huge thing, to have...

As one American university after another suspended research ties with Huawei for its alleged ties to Chinese espionage, MIT Media Lab founder Nicholas Negroponte offered a full-throttle defense of the company. "Don't ban Huawei," read a May 2019 column published under Negroponte's name. "The U.S. should collaborate with leading technology companies and their research labs, rather than banning them." Negroponte, however, did not write the column, at least according to Huawei employee Winter Wright, who noted on his LinkedIn profile that he ghostwrote the article on behalf of the MIT scholar, whose research center has received millions of dollars in...

MS NOW's Deadline: White House, or the Nicolle Wallace show, is where Democrats go to hear other Democrats throw rhetorical bombs at the Republicans. No one is any good in the GOP. On Thursday, Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) greeted Attorney General Pam Bondi's dismissal with a “good riddance”—then dismissed every potential replacement, all while being encouraged by host Alicia Menendez. Lofgren didn’t limit herself to criticism of Bondi’s tenure: LOFGREN: Good riddance to Pam Bondi. But good luck to us for who might come next. She then turned her disdain on possible successors. Menendez named some rumored replacements -- "Lee...

Defying Iran and heading through the Strait of Hormuz is a gamble. But like all the best gambles, it is a lucrative one, so crews are inclined to fancy their odds. To counter the high insurance costs for buyers, countries such as Iraq and Qatar have been offering crude oil at steep discounts. “People just assume one ship in 12 or one ship in 15 is going to get hit by an Iranian drone, but you make enough money on the rest of them,” said Rory Johnston, founder of the market research firm Commodity Context.

New photos obtained exclusively by CBS News reveal for the first time the widespread damage and destruction of buildings and vehicles at multiple U.S. positions across the Middle East, as a result of Iranian missile and drone attacks. The Defense Department's inspector general this week released a fresh report on the war in Iran that revealed "equipment losses" worth up to $3.7 billion — including nearly 60 aircraft. In a first-of-its-kind mandatory report to Congress, the inspector general added that U.S. Central Command reported Iranian strikes at U.S. bases in Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Oman and Jordan.

Ahmed al-Sharaa – Montage Image Wiki Commons A former al-Qaida terrorist is now sitting on a treasure trove of nuclear material that can be weaponized. A United Nations team has excavated a ‘previously undisclosed site’ in Syria and found several tons of nuclear material from the days of the Bashar al-Assad rule. The agreed plan was for the International Atomic Energy Agency to remove the material from Syria – but that’s not what’s going to happen, anymore. Syria is now holding the nuclear material, and refuses the handover, saying ‘it will remain under IAEA safeguards for peaceful civilian use’. The...

Washington and Baghdad agreed in 2024 to wind down the much smaller US-led operations against the Islamic State jihadist group in the country. US troops pulled out of bases in most areas of Iraq last year but maintained a presence in the semi-autonomous northern Kurdish region. Bases there have regularly come under attack since the US and Israel launched the war with Iran on February 28. A US official confirmed that the US expects to complete its pullout by September 30, but declined to say how many troops remain in Iraq or where they would be redeployed “The United States,...

Egyptian officials have officially confirmed that an Iranian drone strike was responsible for damaging two US energy tankers at the port of Damietta. Following the strike, the United States carried out limited conventional air raids, opting against a broader military escalation despite warnings of a much harsher response. Egyptian authorities officially confirmed Thursday that an explosion damaging two American energy tankers at Damietta Port was caused by an Iranian drone strike. Egyptian officials emphasized that an investigation into the incident remains underway, noting that no group has formally claimed responsibility for the operation. The official confirmation from Cairo follows statements...

The US military says it’s launching strikes on Iranian targets in response to Tehran’s attack on American forces a day earlier. US Central Command said the strikes are “a powerful response to yesterday’s attempted Iranian attack” and that they began Wednesday evening, in a post on social media. It’s a further escalation after a period of calm, with the U.S. saying it had intercepted strikes from Iran a day earlier and carried out separate strikes alongside Saudi Arabia on Tehran-backed militias in neighboring Iraq.