Free Republic

Colin Kahl opposed sanctions on IRGC, condemned killing of Iranian terror chief Republicans on the Senate Armed Services Committee are meeting privately on Tuesday morning to discuss their growing policy concerns about Colin Kahl, President Joe Biden's nominee for undersecretary of defense for policy at the Pentagon, according to sources close to the committee. Kahl, a former Obama State Department official, was a key architect of the Iran deal and has been at the forefront of a number of controversial moves, including, reportedly, the decision to remove a statement affirming Jerusalem as Israel's capital from the 2012 Democratic National Convention...

President Joe Biden's administration is moving to revoke the designation of Yemen's Houthis as a terrorist group, citing the need to mitigate one of the world's worst humanitarian disasters.President Donald Trump's administration had branded the Iranian-backed Houthis as a foreign terrorist organization, a move that limited the provision of aid to the beleaguered Yemeni people, who have suffered under a yearslong civil war and famine.A senior State Department official confirmed the move Friday after members of Congress were notified of the administration’s plans. The official, who wasn't authorized to speak publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity, said the removal...

Multiple air traffic controllers in New York heard a chilling threat Monday in audio obtained exclusively by CBS News: "We are flying a plane into the Capitol on Wednesday. Soleimani will be avenged." The threat refers to Qassem Soleimani, the Iranian general killed last year in a U.S. drone strike ordered by President Trump. It was made on the one-year anniversary of Soleimani's death, for which Iranian officials have long vowed revenge. It's unclear who sent the threat. While the government does not believe the warning of an attack is credible, it is being investigated as a breach of aviation...

Iran’s state media has alleged that in addition to the United States, several countries, including Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Kuwait, Qatar, Germany and Britain, had played a role in the assassination of its senior military leader Qassem Soleimani. Soleimani was killed in a US drone strike on January 3, 2020, while visiting Baghdad. According to DEFA Press, more countries would be added to the list once the investigation into Soleimani’s killing is completed. “We must learn from this experience, which came at a great price, and we must make every effort to preserve national unity and cohesion that was achieved...

The protest will go on as planned tomorrow against the coronavirus restrictions endorsed by the incoming Governor of Utah Republican Spencer Cox. The protest to be held as Cox's motorcade heads to an ampitheater in southern Utah for his inauguration... Court hearings for two Washington restaurants opened in spite of COVID-19 restrictions imposed by Democrat Governor Jay Inslee set for Tuesday... The British police crackdown on protests opposing the coronavirus lockdowns and restrictions in the country continued this weekend... British Prime Minister Boris Johnson pushing tighter controls and restrictions in the coming weeks... Restrictions that have been imposed in the...

On Jan. 3, 2020, at 12.47 AM LT, a U.S. drone strike killed Iranian General Qasem Soleimani, head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard’s Quds Force, along with members of the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), including Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, deputy commander of Iraq’s PMF militias. The attack occurred just outside Baghdad International Airport, in Iraq, where Soleimani had just arrived (from Lebanon or Syria) to bring Iran’s response to a letter that Iraq had sent out on behalf of Saudi Arabia in order to ease tensions between the two countries in the region, according to Iraqi prime minister Adil Abdul Mahdi....

The global anti-American alliance is now on full display in the Middle East, with Iran at the lynch point. The headlines have told us about the coordination of Iranian/Iraqi/Syrian/Russian/Chinese activities, and of course there is a division of labor. That was all worked out in recent weeks in a series of Iranian visits to Moscow (General Suleimani, who commands the Revolutionjary Guards’ foreign ops, twice traveled to Russia in open defiance of existing sanctions). Basically, the Russians are sending some crack troops and their favorite heavy weapons (tanks, big guns). It goes via an Iranian air bridge and thence across...

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani declared that President Donald Trump will be dead ''in a few days'' during a speech to his Islamic nation’s cabinet as the first anniversary of the killing of a general in the country’s military approached. Rouhani’s Wednesday speech, excerpts of which were posted in English on the Iranian presidential website, called Qasem Soleimani a ''martyr'' and ''moderate leader with tact.''

Trump Tweets Surprise Threat To Iran After Latest Attack On Baghdad Embassy President Trump in a surprise late Wednesday tweet has directly blamed Iran for the Sunday rocket attack on the US Embassy in Baghdad, which according to prior reports involved eight ground-fired rockets targeting the compound. It comes as the USS Georgia nuclear submarine is currently deployed to the Strait of Hormuz in very open signaling that the Pentagon is prepared to react to any possible escalation form the Islamic Republic. Trump cited intelligence chatter in his latest statement on Twitter, saying, “Our embassy in Baghdad got hit Sunday...

Days ago into last week there were widespread rumors spreading on Mideast social media of the severe health decline of Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei. The persistent rumors ranged from saying he was in a coma even to some claiming his death.But Khamenei put the unfounded speculation to rest after on Wednesday morning he appeared at an event marking the first anniversary of the death of IRGC Quds Force General Qassem Soleimani. He hasn't made a public appearance in three weeks.But more importantly he emerged to give final high level backing to prior statements of Iranian leaders, most notably President...

Iran's Revolutionary Guard on Saturday threatened to avenge the killing of its top general, saying it would go after everyone responsible for the January U.S. drone strike in Iraq. The guard's website quoted Gen. Hossein Salami as saying, "Mr. Trump! Our revenge for martyrdom of our great general is obvious, serious and real." President Trump warned this week that Washington would harshly respond to any Iranian attempts to take revenge for the death of Gen. Qassem Soleimani, tweeting that "if they hit us in any way, any form, written instructions already done we're going to hit them 1000 times harder."...

Iran is allegedly mulling over an attempt to assassinate the United States’ ambassador to South Africa as retaliation for the American drone attack earlier this year that killed Qassem Soleimani, the head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps' elite Quds Force. The news of Tehran’s purported plans was first reported by Politico, who spoke with one official familiar with the issue and another official who has seen the intelligence. If Iran does attempt to carry out the assassination, it would severely ratchet up the already tense relations between Washington and Tehran, along with giving the Trump administration impetus to retaliate.

I realize, it was Biden himself that said that one isn't black if one votes for Trump. But we all know, the idea's root is at AOC, Omar/Tlaib types. Recently, after the Beirut explosion, and Arab Lebanese began criticizing the armed Hezbollah, an Amerucan radical left called these Arabs "sellouts". His name is Ben Norton. Writing at Salon and active at his Grayzone

Iran’s Minister of Foreign Affairs said in a heated speech today in Parliament that he “coordinated” everything with the now dead commander of the Quds Force. Javad Zarif said that he had weekly sessions with Qasem Soleimani and coordinated with him. “In regional talks, whatever we did, we coordinated with each other,” he said today. He told lawmakers who were calling him out for “lying” that those who knew Soleimani and other known regional terrorists knew that he worked very closely with Soleimani. “Those who know Soleimani the Martyr and Seyed Hassan Nasrollah, and the Iraqi, Lebanese, and Palestine Resistance,...

The January U.S. drone strike in Iraq that killed top Iranian general Qassem Soleimani and nine other people represented a violation of international law, a U.N. human rights investigator said on Monday. The United States has failed to provide sufficient evidence of an ongoing or imminent attack against its interests to justify the strike on Soleimani's convoy as it left Baghdad airport, said Agnes Callamard, U.N. special rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions. The attack violated the U.N. Charter, Callamard wrote in a report calling for accountability for targeted killings by armed drones and for greater regulation of the...

Tehran prosecutor Ali Alqasimehr said Trump and 35 others whom Iran accuses of involvement in the Jan. 3 strike that killed Gen. Qassem Soleimani in Baghdad face “murder and terrorism charges,” the state-run IRNA news agency reported. Alqasimehr did not identify anyone else sought other than Trump, but stressed that Iran would continue to pursue his prosecution even after his presidency ends. Alqasimehr also was quoted as saying that Iran requested a “red notice” be put out for Trump and the others, which represents the highest-level arrest request issued by Interpol. Local authorities generally make the arrests on behalf of...

The Israeli intelligence service, Mossad, assassinated a top Syrian rocket scientist on Saturday using a car bomb, the New York Times first reported Tuesday. The scientist, Aziz Asbar, led a confidential unit known as “Sector 4” at the Syrian Scientific Studies and Research Center developing cutting edge missile technology designed to further Syria’s efforts to initiate the long range bombing of Israeli cities. Asbar was killed along with his driver near the research center, which lies in the town of Masyaf and has long been believed to host chemical weapons development. The center has twice been the target of Israeli...

The Iranian government released a profoundly anti-Semitic poster about Palestinian liberation that invoked Nazi Germany’s “final solution” plan for European Jews. Ali Khamenei, the supreme leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran, published a poster on Tuesday that reads “Palestine will be free. The final solution: Resistance until referendum.” Khamenei’s office released the image to celebrate Quds Day, an annual rally in Iran that calls for the destruction of Israel, according to The Jerusalem Post. The poster — which was displayed in English, Arabic and Farsi — depicts a conquered Jerusalem alongside the late Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp Quds Force...

Younis was 'responsible for pursuing spies and collaborators.' Sources stated that Younis was on a mission pursuing a target when he was ambushed... Younis was a “close associate” of former IGRC Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani, Sputnik reported.

So long as the world is entertaining worst-case scenarios, the media does Americans no favors in omitting that Iran-Hezbollah has for years prepared to strike in their own hometowns. Weirdly absent from much of the professional speculation about where and how Iran will exact its promised “severe revenge” for the U.S. drone strike killing of Quds Force Gen. Qassem Suleimani is mention of the dead man’s highly suggestive hint. During a time of intense saber rattling between Iran and President Donald Trump in July 2018, Suleimani gave a speech during which he called out the American president: “Mr. Gambler, Trump!...