Free Republic

The ammunition boxes stacked on the stage opened up to reveal figurines of angels and an infant Jesus lying in his manger. Six actors sang plaintive carols, accompanied by readings of the brooding poetry of Kharkiv writer Serhiy Zhadan. The audience sat, transfixed by the almost unbearable intensity of the spectacle. The nativity play, performed on a recent evening at Kharkiv’s puppet theatre, was a reminder that conflict has seeped into the fabric of almost everything in Ukrainian life over the past four years. “We can’t just put on comedies and escape from reality,” said Oksana Dmitrieva, the nativity play’s...

Donald Trump’s Department of Justice on Friday released more than 300,000 pages of photos and evidence connected to convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. The vast trove includes images showing the disgraced financier and his longtime associate Ghislaine Maxwell socializing with high-profile figures, including former president Bill Clinton and Michael Jackson. One photograph appears to show Clinton in a swimming pool alongside Maxwell and several unidentified, partially clothed women. Clinton broke his silence on Friday to turn the tables on Trump, releasing a statement that declared: 'The White House hasn’t been hiding these files for months only to dump them late...

Secretary of War Pete Hegseth is driving a major overhaul to pivot the US military away from Europe and the Middle East and refocus operations on the Western Hemisphere, sources indicate to the Washington Post. Top Pentagon leadership are finalizing a plan that would dramatically downgrade America's military presence in traditional theaters while consolidating power closer to home – marking a fundamental shift in US strategic priorities. The proposal would reduce US Central Command, US Africa Command and US European Command to subordinate status under a new umbrella organization called US International Command – stripping these Middle Eastern and European-focused...

Donald Trump has doubled down on his attacks on Rob Reiner after the Hollywood star and his wife were apparently murdered. The President appeared to blame Reiner and Michele's killings on the liberal director's 'Trump Derangement Syndrome' in a Monday post on Truth Social. Hollywood celebrities and Republicans pushed back on his statement, with some calling it 'disgusting and vile.' But the President seemed undeterred in his criticism of the late director. When pressed by a reporter in the Oval Office about his previous statement, he said: 'Well, I wasn't a fan of his at all. He was a deranged...

FOR THE respectable men running western Europe’s three biggest countries, misery is heaped upon misery. All are presiding over stagnant living standards and declining global influence. In Britain and France their rivals from the populist right are itching to take power (even the Alternative for Germany, or the AfD, may win a couple of state elections next year). And America, their key ally, has just accused them of hastening Europe towards what it calls “civilisational erasure”. Those three leaders also warn of a catastrophe—if the parties of the populist right should triumph. Friedrich Merz, Germany’s chancellor, describes his government as...

The United States would suffer a devasting defeat and lose its biggest aircraft carrier if it tried to stop China invading Taiwan, according to a top secret Pentagon report. War games showed the U.S. would be overwhelmed by China's arsenal of around 600 hypersonic weapons, along with missiles and nuclear submarines. The grim assessment, revealed by the New York Times, confirmed the conclusions of previous war games, but it also highlighted wider concerns about the future direction of the U.S. military and its continued reliance on outdated methods. *** Ships like the $13 billion USS Gerald R. Ford - the...

Donald Trump on Tuesday called Somali immigrants “garbage” and said they should be sent back home in a rant that came as the administration is reportedly increasing immigration enforcement against undocumented Somalis in Minnesota. In a xenophobic rant during a cabinet meeting, Trump went off on Somalis and Ilhan Omar, the congressional representative who is from Somalia and is a US citizen. He said Somalia “stinks” and is “no good for a reason”. “They contribute nothing. I don’t want them in our country, I’ll be honest with you,” he said. He called Omar “garbage” and said “we’re going to go...

It has been dubbed “Witi-Leaks” – an explosive insight into Donald Trump’s peace negotiations that could blow the lid off the plan to end the war in Ukraine.Steve Witkoff, Mr Trump’s peace envoy, was caught red-handed coaching the Russian side on how to appeal to his boss’s better nature, according to the transcripts of several phone calls that were leaked on Tuesday evening. Mr Witkoff, a former New York real estate developer turned high-level diplomat, faced criticism for his lack of experience at the coalface of international affairs. In discussions with The Telegraph, European sources have called him names, such...

The Telegraph has published a draft of the European “peace plan” for Ukraine — an alternative to the U.S. proposal. It includes 24 points, and many of them look tougher in Kyiv’s favor compared to the American version. Key points: 🔵 Full ceasefire and international monitoring (U.S. + Europe, satellites, drones, on-the-ground inspections). 🔵 Russia must return all deported Ukrainian children and all detained civilians. 🔵 Exchange of all prisoners of war under the “all for all” formula. 🔵 Ukraine receives legally binding security guarantees from the U.S. — effectively a version of Article 5. 🔵 No restrictions on the...

American troops have stormed a Mexican beach setting off a diplomatic firestorm amid soaring tensions after Donald Trump threatened to bomb the country. US 'contractors' arrived by boat on Monday to 'Playa Bagdad', driving signs into the sand near where the Rio Grande empties into the Gulf of Mexico. Alarmed witnesses quickly alerted officials and heavily-armed Mexican security personnel rushed to the scene on trucks mounted with machine guns in a terrifying standoff.

Watch in full: In a world exclusive from inside the White House, GB News’s Bev Turner sits down with President Donald Trump for an explosive and revealing interview. President Trump launches a blistering criticism of the BBC, insisting he has an ‘obligation’ to pursue a $1billion lawsuit over what he describes as a deeply misleading edit of his January 6th 2021 speech. While the BBC has already issued a public apology, President Trump tells GB News that the matter is far from over. He argues that pursuing legal action is essential to preventing such misrepresentations happening again. “This was so...

The BBC will apologise for the misleading editing of a Donald Trump speech in a Panorama documentary, the Telegraph can disclose. Samir Shah, the BBC’s chairman, will write to the culture, media and sport committee on Monday to express regret for the way the speech, made on the day of the Jan 6 2021 Capitol riot, was spliced together. The apology will heap further pressure on Tim Davie, the BBC’s director general, to quit over an 8,000-word dossier compiled by a whistleblower that alleged widespread bias within the corporation. The Telegraph has previously disclosed that both Mr Davie and Mr...

After New York City’s race for mayor catapulted Zohran Mamdani from state assembly member into one of the world’s most prominent progressive voices, intense debate swirled over the ideas at the heart of his campaign. His critics and opponents painted pledges such as free bus service, universal childcare and rent freezes as unworkable, unrealistic and exorbitantly expensive. But some have hit back, highlighting the quirk of geography that underpins some of this view. “He promised things that Europeans take for granted, but Americans are told are impossible,” said the Dutch environmentalist and former government adviser Alexander Verbeek in the wake...

Distressing footage showed a female migrant scream 'help me, I have my papers' as she was detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers at Salt Lake City airport. Marta Brizeyda Renderos Leiva, 39, was dragged away by plainclothes agents at the Utah travel hub on Wednesday. Footage emerged of her arrest, with Leiva seen being grabbed her by the arms as she was placed in cuffs, pulling her up from the floor as she kicked out her legs and stamped her feet. She let out bloodcurdling cries as they did, saying: 'Help me, help me, I have my papers. Help...

The only upside to living through this dark time is it pushes us to rethink and perhaps totally remake things we once thought immutable. Like the Democratic party. In case you hadn’t noticed, the current Democratic party is dysfunctional, if not dead. Better dysfunctional than a fascist cult like the Trump Republican party. But if there were ever a time when America needed a strong, vibrant Democratic party, it’s now. And we don’t have one. The brightest light in the Democratic party is Zohran Mamdani, the 34-year-old member of the New York state assembly who has a good chance of...

There are a few reasons to doubt the American government's stated aim of wiping out these so-called "narco terrorist" gangs threatening the US from Venezuela, even after one takes out of the equation the sort of equipment the military is deploying - which isn't what they would need for effective drug smuggling interdiction. While the president acknowledges that the synthetic opioid fentanyl is a huge killer in the US (which it is) and is supplied by drug gangs (which it is), to blame Venezuela for fentanyl production is simply incorrect.Mexican cartels produce fentanyl with precursors largely supplied from China, and...

America’s Founders made the presidential pardon power absolute, and they did so as a protection against injustice. But Hamilton and Madison might be having second thoughts as they watch President Trump dole out pardons as a form of political legal tender. In the latest example, Mr. Trump on Wednesday pardoned crypto kingpin Changpeng Zhao, who happens to be a Trump family business partner. “I gave him a pardon at the request of a lot of very good people,” Mr. Trump said. “A lot of people say that he wasn’t guilty of anything.” One of those people wasn’t Mr. Zhao, unless...

A blind man protesting in front of a South Portland ICE facility was brutally detained by federal agents who allegedly dropped him on his head as they hauled him away. Quinn Haberl wore a neon vest as he sat on the side of the building's driveway during a protest on Saturday. While he was right beside a thick blue line painted on the ground to indicate where federal property begins, suggesting he had not passed the boundary. Gut-wrenching footage from the incident showed officers swarming Haberl - who was seated on the ground, holding his walking stick. Agents grabbed each...

Sir Sadiq Khan has been called a “disgrace” after he suggested that protesters who chant “From the river to the sea” were not anti-Semitic. The slogan is frequently chanted at pro-Palestinian marches, despite claims that it envisages the destruction of the state of Israel. The Mayor of London said that whether the phrase was anti-Semitic or not depended on the context in which it was spoken. He made his comment during Mayor’s Question Time at City Hall on Thursday, a week after protests that took place on the evening of the Manchester synagogue attack. Susan Hall, the leader of the...

US stocks tumbled Friday after President Donald Trump threatened a massive increase in tariffs on Chinese imports. The threat is retaliation for China's new restrictions on rare earth exports — materials vital for AI, semiconductors, defense, and high-tech industries. The S&P 500 fell 1.7 percent, the Nasdaq dropped 2.5 percent, and the Dow Jones lost more than 500 points, as investors reacted to escalating trade tensions and uncertainty over US-China relations. 'Some very strange things are happening in China,' Trump wrote on Truth Social. 'They are becoming very hostile, and sending letters to countries throughout the world, that they want...