Free Republic

Israel says it first bombed Iran to stop it from being able to produce nuclear weapons and the “existential threat” they would represent. But the conflict may in the long run serve the opposite purpose: illustrating to Tehran and other nuclear-aspirant nations that nuclear weapons are essential in shielding them against attack. Countries such as North Korea already pointed to Libya, whose leader Moammar Gadhafi gave up his nascent weapons program but was toppled anyway in 2011 after a NATO intervention. That’s one of the reasons Pyongyang has developed its own arsenal — which is believed to have San Francisco...

Israel’s retaliatory attack on Iran’s missile facilities and air defenses on Saturday is a major win for the West — and a major setback for the Iranian regime, as well as for Russia and China, which back it. Though Iran officially minimized the impact of the attack, it severely damaged Iran’s ability to threaten its neighbors, and left it virtually defenseless in future. It also boosted a pro-Western alliance against the “Axis of Resistance” propped up by Moscow and Beijing.

Iran now feels it can launch ballistic missiles at Israel whenever it wants. Israel carried out long-awaited airstrikes on Iran, on Friday night, on precise and targeted military targets. These were aimed at “thwarting immediate threats to the State of Israel,” the IDF said. Despite the much-anticipated attack, Israel reported they finished the attack before the sun rose in Tehran.

House Speaker Mike Johnson expressed deep concerns Sunday about an alleged major leak of US intelligence detailing Israel’s plans to retaliate against Iran and stressed that he’s following the situation “closely.” Johnson (R-La.), who is on the campaign trail in Michigan, talked with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and said that he will receive a “classified-level” briefing on the leak later in the day. “The leak is very concerning. There’s some serious allegations being made there, an investigation underway, and I’ll get a briefing on that in a couple of hours,” Johnson told CNN’s “State of the Union. “We’re following...

U.S. President Joe Biden on Thursday glibly ruled out any imminent Israeli strikes against Iran as the strife-torn region prepares for a response to the recent missile attack on the Jewish state. “First of all, we don’t ‘allow’ Israel, we advise Israel. And there is nothing going to happen today,” Biden told reporters at the White House when asked if he would allow Israel to retaliate against Iran. He made the remarks on the South Lawn before departing aboard Marine One without any further clarification or citing of a source for the military intelligence revelation.

The device explosions in Lebanon last week were part of Israel's "red button" plan, designed to be activated at a critical moment for maximum impact against an adversary, current and former Israeli officials with knowledge of the pager operation told the Washington Post. The double round of device explosions that took place last week throughout Lebanon caused a high number of Hezbollah casualties throughout the country. According to the report, the plot was primarily part of Israel's long-term strategy to develop its "red button capability" to be prepared for critical moments. "A ‘red button’ is a concept for something you...

Sources said Sunday that another round of negotiations over the development of Israel’s Leviathan offshore gas field by a serious player from Russia’s energy sector could be in the works. The degree of Russian interest is still unclear, but the potential renewed Russian interest comes on the heels of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow last Thursday. Some three years ago, the state-run Russian energy giant Gazprom expressed interest in buying gas harvested from Israel’s Tamar offshore filed. While a memorandum of understanding was signed on the issue, it never matured into a...

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Wednesday once again criticized what he called Israel's "stifling occupation" of Palestinians, just one day after appearing to express sympathy for Palestinian Arab terrorists. The UN chief made clear that he would not retreat from his remarks directed at Israel a day earlier, AFP reported. UN diplomats said privately that Ban had upped the pressure on Prime MInister Binyamin Netanyahu in a final bid to revive hopes for peace before he steps down as secretary-general at the end of the year. "After nearly 50 years of occupation -- after decades of waiting for the fulfilment...

White House spokesman Josh Earnest on Friday explained that President Barack Obama’s decision not to meet with Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu when he visits Washington to address Congress, is related solely to the timing of the visit - close to the Israeli elections. Speaking to reporters, Earnest said that even if there are disagreements between the United States and Israel, Washington remains committed to Israel’s security. The comments were made a day after the White House made clear that neither Obama nor Secretary of State John Kerry would meet Netanyahu while he is in Washington for his speech before Congress....

United Nations (UN) Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on Monday condemned Israel’s decision to declare 4,000 dunams (988 acres) of land in Judea as state land, AFP reports. Ban’s spokesman said that the UN chief is "alarmed" by the Israeli plans and feared they could lead to more “settlement activity”. "The Secretary General is alarmed by yesterday's announcement by Israeli authorities to declare as so-called 'state land' nearly 1,000 acres of land in the Bethlehem area of the West Bank," the spokesman said, according to AFP. "The seizure of such a large swath of land risks paving the way for further...

Israel's ambassador to the United Kingdom, Daniel Taub visits Bradford (which George Galloway wanted to make an 'Israel free zone') and blows them away with a great speech.

The UN's top human rights official again condemned Israel for its military actions to stop Hamas rocket attacks against Israeli civilians, accusing the Jewish state of “deliberately defying International Law... in a way that may constitute war crimes.” Navi Pillay told reporters following yet another "emergency" meeting of the Geneva-based UN Human Rights Council that Israel was not doing enough to protect civilians. "There is a strong possibility,” said the known Israel critic, “that international law has been violated, in a manner that could amount to war crimes.” Among the UN’s long bill of particulars against the beleaguered Jewish state...

Facing the Palestinians’ continued defiance of the very notion of peaceful coexistence with Israel, Kerry is planning to present his own peace deal next month and try to force Israel to accept it. There was a ghoulish creepiness to US Secretary of State John Kerry’s visit to Israel last week. Here we were, beset by the greatest winter storm in a hundred years. All roads to Jerusalem were sealed off. Tens of thousands of Jerusalemites and residents of surrounding areas were locked down in their houses, without power, heat, telephone service or water. And all of the sudden, out of...

Israel has established a clear-cut red line when it comes to preventing the transfer of advanced arms from Syria to Hezbollah. And unlike the Obama administration, Israel means what it says. Israel has conducted military strikes to destroy advanced Iranian and Russian weapons in the Syrian regime’s hands before they could be added to Hezbollah’s growing stockpile of offensive arms aimed at Israeli population centers or used to thwart Israeli defense systems. Instead of providing covert support for Israeli operations, or at least staying out of Israel’s way, the Obama administration is deliberately compromising Israel’s security by leaking sensitive information...

JERUSALEM – In a conversation with the Palestinian Authority, a White House official apparently compared Israel’s Knesset, or parliament, to the gravesite of late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, according to a PA official speaking to WND. The Palestinian official, who asked that his name be withheld, said he was in contact with members of the Obama administration regarding Obama’s slated visit to the West Bank city of Ramallah, where the U.S. president will meet PA President Mahmoud Abbas.

Hassan Shateri, the Iranian general whose killing was reported last week, was actually slain last month in an alleged IAF airstrike that was said to have targeted a weapons convoy heading from Syria to the Lebanese group Hezbollah, Britain’s Sunday Times reported. Iran was quick last week to blame “mercenaries and supporters” of Israel for Shateri’s death, although it made no indication that he had been killed in the January airstrike. Tehran “will take revenge on Israel for the killing of a Quds Force general in Syria,” said Ali Shirazi, liaison for Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei to the Revolutionary...

EL AL Airlines. Israel’s nation airline, will no longer provide flights to Cairo. The number of Israelis flying to Cairo has greatly decreased and EL AL Airlines will no longer be flying almost-empty airplanes to Cairo. The StarTribune also reported on September 16 that the rising operating costs and the necessary security is making it almost impossible to finance the flights to Cairo. With the number of Israelis that travel to Cairo dropping, it is not fiscally feasible to keep the flights going.

U.S. Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta arrived in Israel last night for a brief visit that will focus on the American-Israeli dispute over whether to attack Iran's nuclear facilities. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak plan to stress that Israel reserves the right to defend itself, and to make its own decision on whether to attack. (Snip) Netanyahu, meanwhile, said on Tuesday that "things that affect our fate, our very existence, we don't entrust to others - not even to our best friends. Obama and Romney both said that Israel has the right to defend itself against

The head of Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood has called on Arab forces to confront Israel and for the international community to pressure the “Zionist government to withdraw from the land of Palestine.” The statement – the existence of which was revealed Wednesday by the Investigative Project on Terrorism blog – reminds Brotherhood followers of the movement’s decades-long “sacrifices” in efforts to destroy the Jewish state. “On this day, like every year, the Arab and Islamic nations remember the worst catastrophe ever to befall the peoples of the world,” Badie wrote in the text, translated by The Jerusalem Post. “We demand the

Secretary of State Hilary Clinton presented on Thursday the State Department's 2011 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices that criticizes Israel for its treatment of African migrants, an issue vigorously debated in Israeli public discourse lately. The report states that Sudanese and Eritrean asylum seekers, which are about 85 percent of African migrants in Israel "were not allowed access to asylum procedures but were given renewable 'conditional release' documents that deferred deportation and had to be renewed every few months." The report quotes statistics provided by the UNHCR, showing that during the year out of 4,603 new asylum applications 3,692...