Free Republic

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration has decided that the U.N. agency for Palestinian refugees is not immune from being sued, reversing the U.S. government’s position that the organization was protected from civil liability.The Justice Department revealed its new stance in a letter it filed in federal court in New York on Thursday as part of a lawsuit that aims to hold the agency, known as UNRWA, accountable for the Oct. 7, 2023, deadly attack on Israel by Hamas. The change in position underscores the hardened perspective toward the agency under the Trump administration following allegations by Israel that some...

Multiple explosions and fires in Iran ... Hmmm Something when Boom!!

While the media and military have been silent, what the Navy did against a Houthi attack is pretty magnificent. Has the U.S. grown ashamed of its military victories? There are reasons to believe this is true. In April 1988, the U.S. Navy effectively destroyed the Iranian navy following a mine attack on the destroyer USS Roberts. The Navy sank an Iranian frigate, four armed speedboats, blew up two armed oil platforms, and damaged another frigate in one of the shortest and most successful campaigns of the postwar period. Yet even today, there is no actual name attached to the engagement....

A new federal indictment was issued against a Jewish woman, a self-described Lebanese-American Hamas operative and a third person on charges of conspiracy, defacing and damaging a Jewish religious site, making false statements in a matter within the jurisdiction of the Executive branch of the United States, and possession of destructive devices, the US Justice Department announced on Wednesday. Mohamad Hamad, 23, of Coraopolis, Talya A. Lubit, 24, a Jewish resident of Pittsburgh, were previously indicted for defacing synagogues with pro-Palestinian, anti-Zionist graffiti. Antisemitism is at a record high. We're keeping our eyes on it >> Hamad, according to the...

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke via phone on Tuesday with US President Donald Trump, the American leader said, declaring that the pair “are on the same side of every issue.” The call covered “numerous subjects including Trade, Iran, etc.,” Trump wrote on his social media platform, Truth Social, adding that the conversation went “very well.” Notably, Trump did not include Gaza or the 59 hostages being held there in his list of topics discussed amid the ongoing impasse in ceasefire negotiations between Israel and Hamas. However, according to a report in Axios, the pair did talk about efforts to reach...

Fatima Hassouna, a war documentarian who had covered the conflict in Gaza on the ground for 18 months and the subject of a new documentary to be screened at the Cannes Film Festival next month, was killed along with seven members of her family in an Israeli strike this week. “If I die, I want a resounding death, I do not want me in urgent news, nor in a number with a group,” Hassouna wrote in a post on Instagram in August 2024. “I want a death that the world hears, an effect that remains for the extent of the...

Sen. John Fetterman (D., Pa.) says the Trump administration should drop nuclear negotiations with Iran and finish off the country's nuclear facilities with a military strike. "Waste that s—t," the Pennsylvania Democrat told the Washington Free Beacon in an interview on Wednesday. "You're never going to be able to negotiate with that kind of regime that has been destabilizing the region for decades already, and now we have an incredible window, I believe, to do that, to strike and destroy Iran's nuclear facilities." Fetterman dismissed the foreign policy experts who warn that striking Iran would lead to the outbreak of...

The powerful unit, and Tehran's insistence: "We will not give it up." Why did Iran set a red line, and how dangerous is it for us? All the details. "Outside the scope of any agreement": Iran's insistence on the missile force, and Israel's containment battle. While the Iranian foreign minister claims that the American team did not raise "any issue other than nuclear" in the talks, Israel insists that any agreement with Iran must also limit the Iranian missile program. • How long will it take Iran to adapt a missile to a nuclear warhead? Can the Iranian missile array...

If there is a single moment in time in which the fate of Western civilization was decided, it is the battle of Marathon, 490 BC. The Persians under their king Darius landed in Greece, only 26 miles from Athens itself. A vastly outnumbered Greek force marched out to meet them. The Persians had already conquered huge swathes of the Middle East and South Asia. A relative handful of quarrelsome Greeks seemed unlikely to pose much of a challenge to them. But they were. When the day was done, the Persians were vanquished. The idea of Persian invincibility was destroyed forever....

In a recent social media incident, Lauren Young, a Democratic campaign strategist known for her involvement in Hillary Clinton’s campaign, sparked significant controversy with a Facebook post that suggested Iran should target President Donald Trump at his Mar-A-Lago residence. This provocative statement has raised alarms about the implications of such rhetoric and the broader narrative surrounding political discourse in the United States. Background of the Incident Lauren Young’s comments were made public through a tweet by the account Libs of TikTok, which highlighted her suggestion and branded the Democratic Party as "the party of violence." This incident has reignited discussions...

The Islamic regime is weak and teetering on its own structural flaws, but no one would know it by the rhetoric coming out of Iran. In fact, just as Moscow did before the collapse of the Soviet Union, Tehran is deflecting blame for troubles at home and engaging in double-talk abroad. Ask any Iranian observer and they will tell you that obfuscation has been standard practice of the regime since the Islamic Revolution. While U.S. Special Envoy to the Middle East Steve Witkoff is preparing to meet his Iranian counterparts in Oman this Saturday, Tehran continues to quibble over whether...

Iran’s so-called “Supreme Leader,” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, was reportedly persuaded to talk with the Trump administration about a new nuclear deal after being told by advisers that the regime could collapse if he did not. Khamenei had previously rejected talks with Trump. But with Trump’s “maximum pressure” campaign of sanctions, his military action against the Iranian-backed Houthis in Yemen, and Israel’s destruction of Iran’s air defenses last year, Khamenei’s advisers appear to have believed that the regime was on the ropes. The New York Times reported Friday: Mr. Khamenei had publicly and repeatedly banned engaging with Washington, calling it unwise...

This weekend, the US and Iran will hold their first semi-direct talks in years, despite the previous insistence of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in barring such talks. What changed? First, the Iranian security situation has degraded rapidly over the last few months, thanks to their stupidity in attacking Israel directly as well as indirectly through their proxies. That has left the mullahs more exposed than ever before in their 46-year run as theocratic tyrants in Iran. That's not the only reason, the New York Times reports today. The Iranians may have finally realized that Donald Trump returned to office with the...

The United States imposed new sanctions on five Iranian entities and one individual accused of supporting Iran’s nuclear program. IRNA - The United States Department of the Treasury issued new sanctions against Iran just two days after President Donald Trump announced plans for discussions with Tehran regarding its nuclear program. In a statement on Wednesday, the Treasury identified five Iranian entities and one individual as targets for their alleged support of Iran’s nuclear program. Among the designated groups were the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran and its subsidiary, the Iran Centrifuge Technology Company. The sanctions also included Majid Mosallat, head...

IRNA – Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi has rejected the idea of holding direct negotiations with the United States as long as the “maximum pressure” campaign against Iran is in place, saying Washington has agreed to hold indirect negotiations. Speaking at a meeting with Algerian elites and media figures in Algiers on Tuesday, Araqchi said bilateral talks should be conducted on equal footing, not under maximum pressure and military threats. “As long as maximum pressure and threats exist, there is no ground for fair negotiations, and we will not hold direct negotiations,” he said. However, he hastened to add, the path...

US military airlifters flew over 70 cargo loads of equipment from the Pacific to the Middle East, moving a Patriot air defense battalion from a priority theater to the tense region, a top commander said on Thursday. The recent relocation of the high-profile air defense system comes amid a broader build-up of US military assets in the Middle East, including aircraft and warships. Tensions with Iran and the Houthi rebels in Yemen are running high. During testimony to the Senate Armed Services Committee, Adm. Sam Paparo, who leads US Indo-Pacific Command, was asked about the military's capability gaps that exist...

Lawmakers in Russia’s lower-house State Duma on Tuesday ratified a 20-year strategic partnership treaty with Iran, deepening military and political ties between the two countries as they remain under heavy Western sanctions. The pact, signed by President Vladimir Putin and his Iranian counterpart Masoud Pezeshkian in January, aims to strengthen cooperation in areas including defense, intelligence sharing, trade and nuclear energy. “The agreement takes [Russian-Iranian relations] to a fundamentally new level,” Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin said last week ahead of the vote. One of the treaty’s key provisions commits Russia and Iran to counter shared security threats, exchange intelligence and...

Iran is beating a retreat from Yemen, where it has backed the Houthi rebels, who in turn have launched missiles and drones against Israel, and have also attacked international shipping in the Red Sea, as well as western naval vessels. The reason: U.S. President Donald Trump has launched a relentless assault on the Houthis while also restoring a “maximum pressure” campaign of sanctions that makes it impossible for Iran to sustain its overseas terror proxies. The UK Telegraph reported on Thursday: Iran has ordered military personnel to leave Yemen, abandoning its Houthi allies as the US escalates an air strike...

Astonishing news out of Israel today and confirmed by at least one Israeli TV network that Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) Gen. Esmail Qaani, commander of the crack Quds Force, is in Jerusalem after being identified as an Israeli intelligence asset.There's no doubt that Qaani was under suspicion. On Sept. 27, 2024, Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah, one of the most well-guarded people in the world, was killed when at least 80 bombs were dropped on a bunker in Beirut, where Nasrallah was meeting with top aides. Qaani was placed under house arrest and interrogated, according to Middle East sources. Qaani...

Yemen launched a major assault, firing ballistic and hypersonic missiles at Israel and U.S. warships. The attack marks a dangerous escalation in regional tensions, with the Yemeni Armed Forces vowing to continue their blockade on Israeli navigation in the Red and Arabian Seas.