Free Republic

ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – A US official confirmed coalition forces exchanged fire with armed groups on October 15 near Manbij as suspicions rise that they were Turkish-backed rebel factions.“They [coalitions forces] received gunfire from undisclosed persons and returned fire, and it ended quickly, skirmish at best,” Army Colonel Sean Ryan, Spokesman for Operation Inherent Resolve (OIR), told Kurdistan 24.“But we don’t know who fired and it was during a US-MMC [Manbij Military Council] patrol,” he added.Syrian Kurdish journalist Hosheng Hesen posted a video on his Twitter account that reportedly showed the clashes between US troops in Manbij and armed rebel...

Pastor Andrew Brunson (@BrunsonPastor) apparently created a Twitter account on the day he was released from Turkey. The archive.org version says his twitter account was created on October 12th. >P> Here is his suspended page https:/twitter.com/BrunsonPastor Here is the October 13th save of his page at archive.org https://web.archive.org/web/20181013113932/https:/twitter.com/BrunsonPastor Pastor Andrew Brunson (@BrunsonPastor) Official Account Pastor Andrew Brunson (@BrunsonPastor) Beigetreten Oktober 2018 Pastor Andrew Brunson (@BrunsonPastor) {when you hold your mouse over the word Oktober, it shows that the account was created on October 12.} This graphic says the pastor violated Twitter rules. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Dpa13mMXUAUoGf8.jpg

American evangelicals and human rights advocates are encouraging the United States to pressure Turkey to release American missionary Andrew Brunson, who faces ridiculous allegations of complicity in Kurdish terrorism. Are they right to do so, even if the price is estrangement with a key NATO member and harm to US regional interests? How should Christians in their political witness balance Christian causes versus the wider national good? The president, vice president and secretary of state have all denounced Turkey's imprisonment of Brunson. Economic sanctions have been levied against Turkish products, and personal sanctions have targeted two Turkish officials. Congress has...

President Trump on Friday denied a report that Secretary of State Mike Pompeo heard an audio recording of journalist Jamal Khashoggi's murder inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. "Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was never given or shown a Transcript or Video of the Saudi Consulate event. FAKE NEWS!" Trump tweeted. The president's comments come one day after ABC News reported Pompeo listened to the recording and was given a transcript of it during meetings this week in Turkey scheduled in response to Khashoggi's disappearance. Trump administration officials have repeatedly denied the report, which was based on the account of...

Some conservatives have been peddling smears against missing Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in an effort to cushion President Donald Trump from blowback over his handling of the situation with Saudi Arabia, The Washington Post reported Thursday. Efforts to raise questions about Khashoggi have made their way to Capitol Hill, where a group of House Republicans have been circulating articles from conservative outlets that tie the missing journalist to the Muslim Brotherhood and Osama bin Laden, the Post reported. Among those circulating such claims is Donald Trump Jr., who last week retweeted an unsubstantiated claim insinuating Khashoggi is a terrorist sympathizer....

The debate over free speech and content policy on Twitter– like on other social media sites— is often centered on issues relevant to political and cultural debates in the United States, where the company is headquartered. Yet this discussion of hypothetical censorship obscures the fact that company policies today are already used to silence important voices— journalists reporting from Kurdistan, who provide key information on political and military developments there at great personal risk.  While Twitter is a safer platform for Kurdish reporters and supporters of the Kurdish cause than sites like Facebook— which ban pages and accounts for posting photos of the...

Why has the media and much of the political establishment made the presumed murder of an Islamist Saudi dissident on Turkish soil a defining issue in American foreign policy? Jamal Khashoggi is not a U.S. citizen, despite his past residence in Virginia, nor is he a lover of liberty, despite his criticism of Saudi Arabia’s despotic regime. He previously served that regime as a mouthpiece for, and adviser to, the alleged al-Qaeda-tied Saudi intelligence leader Turki bin Faisal. Khashoggi mourned the death of Osama bin Laden, whom Khashoggi had been granted unusual levels of access for numerous interviews. Khashoggi was...

American and western intelligence sources believe Iran has been increasing its shipments of advanced weaponry to Hezbollah, and that the deliveries now include Global Positioning System (GPS) components to make previously unguided rockets into precision guided-missiles, increasing the threat to Israel, Fox News reported on Friday. One of the Iranian flights arrived in Lebanon three days ago, officials told the news channel. Iran’s Fars Air Qeshm flight number QFZ-9950 departed Tehran International Airport on Tuesday at 9:33 a.m. local time, and flew to an unknown destination, according to flight data obtained by Fox News. Later in the day, the Boeing...

The United States on Thursday downgraded the status of its main diplomatic mission to the Palestinians by placing it under the authority of the U.S. Embassy to Israel. The move, which was immediately denounced by the Palestinians and hailed by Israel, is the latest Trump administration decision to align with Israeli government views and a victory for U.S. Ambassador David Friedman. He had long sought to end the Jerusalem consulate’s independent status but had faced resistance from within the State Department. Friedman’s push picked up steam in May after the Trump administration moved the embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem...

If you get your news from the media, then you will have heard that Jamal Khashoggi was a heroic reform who sought freedom for the region, and was brutally murdered to the strains of hip-hop music by a legion of Saudi assassins. And it was all recorded on his Apple Watch. If you're interested in the facts, instead of the fake news, you probably already know that Jamal Khashoggi was a Muslim Brotherhood leader and an old friend of Osama bin Laden. He's being mourned by the media that backed the Muslim Brotherhood.

....Israel does not need the love of the Arabs nor does it need to convince them of its right to exist in their midst. It knows that its existence is outside the context of history and logic and that it came into being by force, it will live by force and it will die by force. Consequently, it will have to live with its finger on the trigger... ....this doctrine is still alive. It is exactly what the current Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is implementing so faithfully in Gaza today, in the footsteps of his predecessors. In brief, and...

Until recently the United States viewed the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, or ISIS, as a major threat to regional stability in the Middle East. Barack Obama made it a mission to roll back ISIS’s territorial and propagandistic gain, and Donald Trump campaigned on a promise to “kick ISIS’s ass.” The United States expended considerable effort, both military and political, in a campaign to defeat the terror group in Iraq and, to a lesser extent, Syria. But there is also no doubt that the bulk of the effort came from Iran, not the United States. Without Iranian involvement, ISIS...

he Russian leader said the depraved terrorists had expanded its control in territory controlled by US and US-backed forces. ISIS issued Russia with an ultimatum promising to execute ten people every day. Speaking in the Black Sea resort city of Sochi, Putin said the hostages included several US and European nationals. Putin told the Valdai discussion forum in Sochi: "They have issued ultimatums, specific demands and warned that if these ultimatums are not met they will execute 10 people every day. "The day before yesterday they executed 10 people." Putin did not specify what the militants' demands were. He said...

“The Palestinians are not a UN Member State or any state at all. The United States will continually point that out in our remarks at UN events led by the Palestinians,” Haley said. The United States does not recognize Palestine as a state, its envoys said on Tuesday as they opposed United Nations General Assembly move to enhance the stature of the Palestinian Authority. “The Palestinians are not a UN Member State or any state at all. The United States will continually point that out in our remarks at UN events led by the Palestinians,” US Ambassador to the United...

President Trump on Wednesday said the U.S. has requested audio and video from Turkey related to the disappearance of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. "We've asked for it, if it exists," Trump said in the Oval Office. Trump told reporters he is not sure if a recording exists, but conceded it "probably does," and indicated it could play a role in assigning blame for his fate. "We will probably know that by the end of the week," Trump said regarding the Khashoggi case. The president spoke as grisly details emerged about the Saudis alleged interrogation of Khashoggi inside their consulate in Istanbul...

Demonstrators at the march hoisted symbols in support of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. BERLIN – A march estimated by police to have included 100,000 demonstrators took place in Germany’s capital on Saturday to protest right-wing extremism. Speakers urged the obliteration of the Jewish state and support for the BDS campaign against Israel. The Jerusalem Post reviewed a video showing two speakers who called for the “liberation of all of Palestine 48” and “We must take a stand and boycott Israel. BDS.” The slogan to “liberate all of Palestine” refers to the founding of the Jewish state...

Major General Herzi Halevi, the Commanding Officer of the IDF Southern Command, slammed the Hamas terrorist organization following the rocket attack on Be'er Sheva early Wednesday morning. "Hamas pretends to govern in Gaza, and tells the Gazan population that it seeks to improve their lives. However, in reality, Hamas specializes in riots at the border fence and in using explosive devices, incendiary and explosive balloons, and, as we saw last night, rockets," Gen. Halevi said in a statement. "Hamas worsens the lives of ordinary Gazans and last night took actions which forced us to strike a range of weapon production...

MOSCOW — It would be one of the world’s more unusual direct flights. But bringing Syrian soldiers and civilians to a Black Sea resort is exactly what was on offer Tuesday, when a delegation from Crimea visited Damascus, the Syrian capital. “We understand that restrictions related to trade, money transfers and tourism are similar to what we have in Crimea,” said Prime Minister Sergei Aksyonov, Russia’s top official there. Both Syria and Crimea, which Russia annexed from Ukraine four years ago, have been hit by Western sanctions, and their economies are struggling. “We should turn our minuses into our advantages,”...

Israel and the United States sent a secret military delegation to Ukraine to test the Russian-made S-300 missile defense system, which Moscow recently provided to Syria, Hadashot TV news reported Monday, citing Syrian and Russian news outlets. There was no comment on the reports from either Israel or the US. According to the reports, members of the Ukrainian military instructed their US and Israeli counterparts on the capabilities of the system, as well as running through various possible scenarios. One Russian report said that F-15 planes are training in Ukraine against the S-300 as part of an international exercise that...

The Palestinian Authority President delivered his statement on Sunday as pressures mount on Saudi Arabia following the disappearance of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas issued a statement on Sunday in which he voiced "full confidence" in Saudi Arabia and praised its leaders for their support for the Palestinians. The statement, which was published by the PA president's office, quoted Abbas as saying he has "absolute confidence" in Saudi Arabia's King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud and Crown Prince, Mohammed bin Salman. "Palestine was - and shall remain - on the side of Saudi Arabia," Abbas said....