Free Republic

Iranian President Mohammad Khatami came to New York City on Nov. 8 to attend a U.N. summit as U.S. intelligence and law-enforcement agencies explored new information tying his regime's intelligence services to Sept. 11 and to previous anti-American terrorist attacks, Insight has learned.The information is coming from a variety of sources and shows a clear pattern of operational contacts between the Iranian government and Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda organization. These contacts include joint planning of terrorist operations, military training of bin Laden operatives inside Iran and by Iranian personnel in Syria and Lebanon, financial assistance to clandestine terrorist and surveillance ...

Greek police say they have arrested a 65-year-old Lebanese man on the island of Mykonos over the hijacking of TWA Flight 847 in 1985 in which a US Navy officer was killed. The suspect, named by Lebanon's foreign ministry as Mohammad Saleh, was stopped on Thursday during a routine security check when his description matched those on a German warrant for his arrest, Greek police told CNN. He was also wanted by German authorities for a kidnapping in 1987... Hijackers seized control of the Boeing 727 aircraft shortly after it took off from Athens, en route to Rome, on June...

“America can’t do a damn thing against us,” Ayatollah Khomeini bragged while holding our hostages. The Carter administration had undermined the Shah’s government in favor of the Islamists who seized power and then prevented the embassy’s Marine guards from defending the facility and the people inside against the Muslim ‘student’ groups who claimed to be coming in peace.The “peaceful” student activists took over our embassy and held our people hostage.Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei taunted President Trump with the same slogan in June after being asked to give up Iran’s nuclear weapons program. “Our response to the US nonsense is clear:...

Al-Qaida had extensive contacts with Iran's Ministry of Intelligence and Security, as well as with an elite military unit which helped the terrorists train and plot attacks against Americans, according to a former intelligence officer who recently fled Iran. Hamid Reza Zakeri, a former inspector and director of Iran's Revolutionary Guards and Ministry of Intelligence, or MOIS, member said models of the World Trade Center, the White House, Pentagon and other United States government buildings "were in our headquarters." In an explosive interview with a London-based Arabic newspaper last week, Zakeri stated that al-Qaida leader and Egyptian terrorist Ayman al-Zawahiri,...

“Robbie” Stethem was born into a proud Navy family on November 17, 1961, in Waterbury, Connecticut. His father Richard served for 26 years and retired as Senior Chief Petty Officer. After retiring, he continued to work for the Navy as a civilian for another 20 years. Robert’s mother Patricia served in the Navy before leaving active duty to raise the family. Brother Kenneth served for 20 years and retired as a Navy SEAL. Brother Patrick, like Robert, was a “Seabee” diver and served for 10 years in the same Underwater Construction Team One.

A Lebanese journalist detained on suspicion he participated in the 1985 hijacking of TWA Flight 847 is back home in Beirut after authorities determined they had the wrong man.

A Navy diver died at the bottom of a Maryland pond last year after refusing to leave his trapped fellow sailor to drown alone. Petty Officer 2nd Class Ryan Harris, 23, and Petty Officer 1st Class James Reyher, 28, were sent to dive in the Aberdeen Proving Ground on February 26 2013, but their lifeless bodies were pulled to the surface just 31 minutes after they started the dive. No one knew what had befallen the pair until an investigation, completed last year but only recently released, pieced together the final 31 minutes of the young men's lives.

Here are two items on different topics related by their common absurdity.Reuters is reporting that some of the ransom money paid for the German government for the release of Susan Osthoff (the archaeologist who was kidnapped by Iraqi militants and later released in exchange for Mohammad Ali Hammadi, the man who killed Navy diver Robert Stethem in a hijacked TWA flight) was found on her effects. (Hat tip: Davids Medienkritik) BERLIN (Reuters) - Part of the ransom money alleged to have been paid by the German government to win the freedom of Iraq hostage Susanne Osthoff last month was found...

US vows to track down hijacker freed early By Anton La Guardia, Diplomatic Editor (Filed: 23/12/2005) The United States has vowed to track down and bring to trial a Lebanese hijacker who has been secretly released after serving 19 years in a German prison for seizing an airliner in 1985 and killing a US navy diver. The Bush administration said it had asked Germany not to release Mohammed Ali Hamadi, who was jailed for life for his role in the hijacking of TWA's Flight 847 from Athens to Rome and the shooting of one of the passengers, Robert Stethem. Despite...

<p>It’s the kind of pride that comes wrapped in hard heartache, watching a boy go off to become a man. Matthew Draughon left his parents’ house that summer of 1998, following a Navy path already worn by his father and again by his older brother. This younger son wanted to catch the ocean, too. He wanted the best underwater training the world offers. He wanted to be a Navy diver.</p>