Free Republic

Sipan Hemo stated that their “rightful and legitimate” resistance will continue in the face of the attempted invasion of Afrin, where the Turkish state commits civilian massacres and said: “Victory will certainly be ours.” YPG Commander General Sipan Hemo stated that the Turkish media’s job is “to create the foundations for the invasion of Afrin” and that they insisted on portraying the massacred civilians as fighters. Hemo said, “But the truth is, Erdogan is targeting villages and towns and massacring civilians.” The invading Turkish army launched an attack on Afrin on January 19 with 72 fighter jets. The invasion attack...

Nusra Front is the Sunni Muslim al-Qaida offshoot which is currently fighting the Iranian-backed axis of Bashar Assad and Hezbollah in Syria. Israel has opened its borders with Syria in order to provide medical treatment to Nusra Front and al-Qaida fighters wounded in the ongoing civil war, according to The Wall Street Journal. The prominent American newspaper reported that Nusra Front, the Sunni Muslim al-Qaida offshoot which is currently fighting the Iranian-backed axis of Bashar Assad and Hezbollah, "hasn't bothered Israel since seizing the border area last summer" along the Golan Heights.

In the East Ukraine the fights become more violent again. President Vladimir Putin of Russia is trying to brings down the West. Many Germans are still on his side – partly from a bad tradition. It is strange how strongly the Russian picture in the Germans is marked by the fantasy and projection and how little it deals with the reality. There the respect comes, maybe even the fear of the size of the Russian empire and the raw language of her politics. The power-deprived Germans are afraid to project power and forgot the words of the real politics. These...

Thomas de Waal reviews Saakashvili’s presidency in Foreign Affairs. He recounts how his American cheerleaders enabled some of his most reckless behavior, including the August 2008 war: American support served to insulate him from some of the domestic criticism — but eventually it proved to be his undoing. Although Americans and Georgians had adopted the habit of using the word “ally” to refer to each other, there was never a formal alliance between the two countries. Saakashvili allowed his judgment to be skewed by his glowing testimonials from the Bush White House. Saakashvili’s miscalculations were tragically exposed in August 2008,...