Free Republic

WASHINGTON, (AP) -- The State Department says the United States will seek election to the U.N. Human Rights Council, the Obama administration's latest reversal of President George W. Bush's foreign policies. The department says the Obama administration wants to participate in the council's activities as part of a new era of U.S. engagement with the world.

... In some sense, the outrage about according a degree of official status to Shariah in a Western country should come as no surprise. No legal system has ever had worse press. To many, the word “Shariah” conjures horrors of hands cut off, adulterers stoned and women oppressed. By contrast, who today remembers that the much-loved English common law called for execution as punishment for hundreds of crimes, including theft of any object worth five shillings or more? How many know that until the 18th century, the laws of most European countries authorized torture as an official component of the...

Despite extreme right-wing activists' repeated threats to avenge Jerusalem terror attack, destroy terrorist's home in Arab neighborhood, senior police officials admit 'protestors' determination and use of stones and firecrackers' surprised them Aviram Zino Published: 03.16.08, 23:17 / Israel News The Jerusalem Police on Sunday failed to prevent hundreds of extreme right-wing activists from arriving at the east Jerusalem neighborhood of Jabel Mukaber and hurling stones at its residents, despite repeated threats to by rightists to avenge the murder of eight yeshiva students in Jerusalem 10 days ago and destroy the terrorist's home. "We were surprised by the intensity of the...

As the parents of Daniel Pearl, The Wall Street Journal's reporter who was kidnapped and brutally murdered in Pakistan in 2002, we share the anguish of the families of the kidnapped Israeli soldiers, and their frustration with the international community for failing to secure the release of their loved ones. For more than six weeks now, these soldiers and their families live each day tortured by unimaginable fears and shattered hopes, praying desperately for the nightmare to end; we relive this nightmare each time an innocent person falls victim to the inhumanity of terrorist abduction. Whatever success the U.N. Security...

What could possibly make the Lebanon situation worse today than it was yesterday? Only yesterday the hapless Israeli defense minister, Amir Peretz, said that Israel expected the "international community" to take control of Lebanon's border crossings. Peretz's pointless whine was in response to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan's statement on Saturday that the new UN force in Lebanon won't either disarm Hizballah terrorists or try to interdict shipments of weapons to Hizballah from Syria. But what Peretz said changed nothing. The Son of UNIFIL force won't do anything to inconvenience Hizballah or its Syrian and Iranian suppliers. But yes, today,...

Years of bargaining with Iran has yielded the exact opposite of what was sought: Iran now seems more determined than ever to join the nuclear club. The UN Security Council's deadline for Iran to freeze its uranium enrichment program passes on Thursday. Tehran has refused to comply. The U.S. and others have signaled they will push for sanctions right after the deadline. Question: Can tough economic sanctions persuade Tehran to surrender its nuclear dreams? Yes, strong sanctions might work. Applied to the right pressure points, economic leverage can squeeze a government where it hurts--in the economy. That pain can translate...

TONY BLAIR’S peace mission to the Middle East appeared in jeopardy last night after Hezbollah declared that the Prime Minister would not be welcome in Lebanon because of his support for Israel during the war. A senior member of Hezbollah’s politburo has told The Times that Mr Blair should stay away from the country because he was “up to his ears in the blood of Lebanese women and children”. British officials are confident that Mr Blair would be welcomed by the government of Fouad Siniora, the Prime Minister. But Hezbollah, which has emerged as the real force in the country,...

Liberal under fire from own party over Hezbollah remarksMP denies urging group be taken off terrorist listOTTAWA - An Ontario Liberal MP came under political fire yesterday, including from his own party, for comments indicating Canada should remove Hezbollah from the country's list of terrorist organizations -- remarks he denies making. Borys Wrzesnewskyj, the Liberals' associate Foreign Affairs critic, was quoted in reports from Lebanon saying he favoured lifting the terrorist label from Hezbollah, which has been on Canada's terror list since 2002. But Mr. Wrzesnewskyj, who was in Lebanon with two other MPs on a fact-finding mission over the...

Kenney jumps on Liberals for Mideast commentsCTV.ca News Staff August 22, 2006 The Conservative government is lashing out at comments made by Liberal MPs who were on a fact-finding mission in Lebanon and suggested Canada should be more open to talking to Hezbollah. Tory MP Jason Kenney, parliamentary secretary to the prime minister, said the comments are nothing less than a sign of support for terrorist groups. "Their idea of a balanced approach is one where Israel is always wrong," Kenney told a news conference on Tuesday. "This represents a totally irresponsible approach to foreign security policy." Liberal MP Borys...

In our war against Islamo-fascist terrorism, we face enemies both overt and covert. The overt enemies are, of course, the terrorists themselves. Their motives are clear: They hate our society because of its freedoms and liberties, and want to make us all submit to their totalitarian form of Islam. They are busy trying to wreak harm on us in any way they can. Against them we can fight back, as we did when British authorities arrested the men and women who were plotting to blow up a dozen airliners over the Atlantic. Our covert enemies are harder to identify, for...

Proposed rules of engagement for an expanded U.N. force in southern Lebanon would allow troops to open fire in self-defense, protect civilians and back up the Lebanese army in preventing foreign forces or arms from crossing the border, according to a U.N. document obtained Tuesday. The 20-page draft was circulated to potential troop-contributing countries last week by the U.N. Department of Peacekeeping Operations, which is trying to get an additional 3,500 troops on the ground by the end of next week to strengthen the 2,000 overstretched U.N. peacekeepers already there. The rules of engagement for the expanded force —...

Mourners carry the coffins of Israeli Arabs Hanna Hamam, 62, and Ladida Mazzawi, 67, who were killed Sunday night in a Hezbollah rocket attack, during their funeral in the city of Haifa, northern Israel, Monday, Aug. 7, 2006. Hezbollah fired its deadliest rocket barrage Sunday on Israel, killing 12 Israeli reservists and three civilians. That brought the Israeli death toll to 94, including 46 soldiers, the 12 reservists and 36 civilians.

UNITED NATIONS - Israel's air raid on in the Lebanese town of Qana, which killed 28 people, may be part of a larger pattern of violations of international law in the war between Israel and Hezbollah, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said in a report Monday. In that light, Annan said that the July 30 attack was sufficiently serious to merit a more comprehensive investigation. The attack should be seen "in the broader context of what could be, based on preliminary information available to the United Nations ... a pattern of violations of international law, including international humanitarian law and international...

TYRE, Lebanon - Minutes after Israeli jets attacked Beirut on Monday, killing at least 15, rescue workers were searching for survivors. And Lebanon's Prime Minister Faud Seniora accused Israel of state terrorism and rejected a U.S.-French cease-fire proposal because it would allow Israel to remain in Lebanon until a peacekeeping force is in place. The front line — south Lebanon — is now totally cut off. A single fallen log over the Litani River is now the only way in or out.

Reuters has withdrawn a second photograph and admitted that the image was doctored, following the emergence of new suspicions against images provided by the news organization. On Sunday, Reuters admitted that one of its photographers, Adnan Hajj, used software to distort an image of smoke billowing from buildings in Beirut in order to create the effect of more smoke and damage.

BEIRUT, Lebanon - Israeli warplanes intensified airstrikes and launched a new commando raid in south Lebanon on Monday, killing at least 23 people in one of the heaviest tolls in days. Lebanon's prime minister won strong support from Arab states to plead his case at the United Nations for a full Israeli withdrawal. President Bush said he anticipates that Hezbollah and Israel won't agree with all aspects of a Mideast cease-fire resolution but said "we all recognize that the violence must stop." Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora choked back tears as he told a meeting of Arab League foreign ministers...

Arab League foreign ministers, meeting in Beirut, will send a delegation Monday to try to push through proposed Lebanese amendments to a draft United Nations resolution seeking to end violence, a Lebanese official said.... "The foreign ministers have decided to send a delegation... today to the United Nations to speak on behalf of Lebanon and to seek amendments to the Security Council resolution in line with the Lebanese demands," the official said.... Washington and Paris are expected to circulate a new draft Monday, taking into account some of the amendments proposed by Qatar, the only Arab nation on the Security...

UNITED NATIONS - The United States and France reached agreement Saturday on a U.N. Security Council resolution aimed at ending the fighting between Israel and Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas, U.S. Ambassador John Bolton said. Bolton refused to comment on the text, but an official with knowledge of the document said the draft calls for a “full cessation of violence” between Israel and Hezbollah, but would allow Israel the right to launch strikes if Hezbollah attacks it.

Large sections of the international media are not only misreporting the current conflict in Lebanon. They are actively fanning the flames. The BBC World Service has a strong claim to be the number one villain. It has increasingly come to sound like a virtual propaganda tool for Hizbullah, and as it desperately attempts to prove that Israel is guilty of committing "war crimes" and "crimes against humanity," it has introduced a new charge - one which I have heard several times on air in recent days. The newscaster reads out carefully selected "audience comments," and among these we are told...

You'd hardly know that all of Israel is under siege and that entire cities like Haifa are near desolate. The networks would rather you stay tuned to their pictures from Lebanon. According to ABC TV, CNN and other "Friends of Hizbullah", never mind who started this, and forget the million and a half Israelis who've been made homeless. As usual, NPR Radio is serving as propaganda minister for terror and, also as usual, Israel is at war with the press. Or rather, the press is at war with Israel. Any mention of the 150 bombs that were falling on Israel...