Free Republic

(IsraelNN.com) Hamas spokesman Mahmoud Zahar issued a demand Sunday evening that Israel remove the stripes from its flag. "Israel must remove the two blue stripes from its national flag", Zahar said. "The stripes are symbols of occupation – they signify Israel's borders, stretching from the River Euphrates to the River Nile." The Hamas official's comments followed Defense Minister Shaul Mofaz's assessment at the weekly Cabinet meeting that the newly elected terror group was "acting responsibly so far." Zahar also told CNN's Late Edition that the world should not be asking Hamas to recognize Israel, but rather demanding that the Jewish...

Airline bans Bibles to avoid offending Muslims Carrier to Saudi Arabia also precluding crucifixes, teddy bears Posted: January 9, 2006 11:20 p.m. Eastern  © 2006 WorldNetDaily.com A British airline banned its staff from taking Bibles and wearing crucifixes or St. Christopher medals on flights to Saudi Arabia to avoid offend the country's Muslims. British Midland International also has told female flight attendants they must walk two paces behind male colleagues and cover themselves from head to foot in a headscarf and robe known as an abaya, the Mirror newspaper of London reported. Teddy bears or other cuddly toys also are not...

COPENHAGEN (Reuters) - Muslim leaders welcomed steps by Denmark on Wednesday to defuse a diplomatic row over newspaper cartoons that seemed to portray Prophet Mohammad as a terrorist. A Muslim community spokesman and Egypt's ambassador in Copenhagen welcomed Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen's New Year address, in which he defended free speech but urged Danes to exercise the right without inciting hatred against Muslims. Rasmussen's conciliatory words, which Copenhagen translated into Arabic and distributed to Middle Eastern countries, came after Arab foreign ministers last week condemned the Danish government for not acting against the Jyllands-Posten daily. Denmark's largest newspaper ran...

Palestinian Legislative Council Candidate and Mother of Three Hamas Terrorists Umm Nidal Farhat: Israelis are Not Civilians and There are No Prohibitions on Killing Them; I Am Willing to Sacrifice My Ten Sons The following are excerpts from an interview with Umm Nidal [1], Palestinian Legislative Council Candidate and the mother of three Hamas terrorists who were killed while taking part in "martyrdom" operations. Dream2 TV aired this interview on December 21, 2005.TO VIEW THIS CLIP, VISIT: http://www.memritv.org/search.asp?ACT=S9&P1=980 . Interviewer: "Umm Nidal is a woman who voluntarily sacrificed her sons for the sake of resisting the occupiers. This woman...

Damascus, Dec 31 - Palestinians share Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's view that Zionist regime cannot co-exist with other nations in the region, said a senior Palestinian official Friday. Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's view is based on historical realities, the representative of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), Mahir al-Tahir, added. At an international conference held in Tehran in late October, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called for Israel to be "wiped off the map." The conference was titled `world without Zionism'. The president, who said in his speech that Israel was an illegitimate regime and, therefore, had no...

THE eldest of four Pakistani gang rapist brothers has admitted lying at trial and apologised to his victims but said he thought he had a right to rape the "promiscuous" teenage girls. MSK, 27, told the NSW Supreme Court yesterday that this was because the girls did not wear headscarves, were drinking alcohol and were unaccompanied when they went to his Ashfield home. MSK also blamed his intoxication, "cultural beliefs" and an undiagnosed mental disorder. He and his brothers MAK, 25, MRK, 21, and MMK, 19 - who cannot be named for legal reasons - are serving between 10 and...

AULNAY-SOUS-BOIS, France -- A week of riots in poor neighborhoods outside Paris gained dangerous new momentum Thursday, with youths shooting at police and firefighters and attacking trains and symbols of the French state. Facing mounting criticism, Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin vowed to restore order as the violence that erupted Oct. 27 spread to at least 20 towns, highlighting the frustration simmering in housing projects that are home to many North African immigrants. Police deployed for a feared eighth night of clashes, after bands of youths lobbing stones and petrol bombs ignored President Jacques Chirac's appeal for calm a day...