Free Republic

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,”...

The Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society has always pursued noble goals and sought to strengthen Russia’s position in the Middle East. June 3, 2017 will mark 135 years since this ancient society was founded. Question: What do you think of its current activities, including its friendly ties with Middle Eastern people, its contribution to cultural, historical and spiritual heritage, and mainly the phenomenon of “Russian Palestine”? Lavrov: This society was designed to promote friendly relations with the people of the region, particularly to create favourable conditions for pilgrims. However, it didn’t just seek to make it possible for Russian people to...

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...

"I just spoke with the King of Saudi Arabia who denies any knowledge of what took place in regard to as he said 'his Saudi Arabian citizen'....and he firmly denies that.... ...it sounded to me like these could have been rogue killers, who knows....." President Trump speaks outside the White House 10/15/2018- President Trump Does Sword Dance In Saudi Arabia 5/20/2017- "This country has been living in the pocket of the Saudi despotism for decades. Our crazy policy in Syria, of supporting jihadis we would lock up if we found them in Birmingham, was adopted to please the Saudis. We...

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....

Political parties aligned with the German government of Chancellor Angela Merkel lost over 21 percent of the popular vote in yesterday's Bavarian state election. The Christian Social Union lost its majority and the Social Democratic Party lost half its support from the last election in 2014..... The Speaker of Sweden's Parliament, the Riksdag, will now give the task of forming a government to another party leader. Moderate Party leader Ulf Kristersson abandoned his effort to form a new government.... A very disturbing lead story appeared on the BBC website overnight. A story detailing the notion of chemical attacks in Syria...

Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman (Yisrael Beytenu) on Saturday said that Israel will not provide fuel or gas to Gaza if conflicts continue. Liberman halted the transfer of fuel to Gaza on Friday, after several Gaza terrorists who detonated a bomb on the Israel-Gaza border fence and attacked an IDF position inside Israel. "As long as the violence in Gaza - including sending incendiary balloons and burning tires opposite Israeli towns - does not cease completely, we will not renew the provision of fuels and gas to Gaza," Liberman tweeted. Earlier on Saturday, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh said that conflict...

President Donald Trump has said the US will inflict "severe punishment" on Saudi Arabia if the kingdom is found to be responsible for the death of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. He said he would be "very upset and angry if that were the case", but ruled out halting big military contracts. Mr. Khashoggi, a critic of the Saudi government, vanished on October 2 after visiting its consulate in Istanbul...…

Violence on Friday included incident where four Palestinians were shot dead after breaching security fence Israeli forces have shot dead six Palestinians, including four in a single incident, in one of the deadliest days in months of mass protests along the security fence separating Gaza and Israel, Gaza’s health ministry said. The ministry said four were killed in one location, where the Israeli military said it opened fire on Palestinians who breached the fence and approached an army post. No Israeli troops were harmed, the army added. At least 140 Palestinians were wounded by live bullets, the ministry said. The...

Khashoggi never had much time for western-style pluralistic democracy. In the 1970s he joined the Muslim Brotherhood, which exists to rid the Islamic world of western influence. He was a political Islamist until the end, recently praising the Muslim Brotherhood in the Washington Post. He championed the ‘moderate’ Islamist opposition in Syria, whose crimes against humanity are a matter of record. Khashoggi frequently sugarcoated his Islamist beliefs with constant references to freedom and democracy. But he never hid that he was in favour of a Muslim Brotherhood arc throughout the Middle East. His recurring plea to bin Salman in his...

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s threat to remove any mayors chosen in local elections next March deemed to be “contaminated by terrorism” is a rejection of democracy and an attempt to scare voters away from the main pro-Kurdish party, one of its members of parliament said. Turkish authorities stepped up pressure on the pro-Kurdish opposition Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) following the breakdown of a ceasefire with Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militants in July 2015. The government says the HDP is, in effect, the political wing of the PKK. The crackdown gained momentum after a failed coup a year later that...

WASHINGTON DC (Kurdistan 24) – Syria’s Kurds “have been great partners,” US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Wednesday evening in Washington DC, as he addressed a conference of the Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA.)Pompeo affirmed that the Kurds would be party to negotiations over Syria’s political future.“We are now driving,” he said, stressing that last word, “to make sure that they have a seat at the table.”Pompeo is the most senior US official to affirm a long-term commitment to Syria’s Kurds.Previously, Amb. James Jeffrey, who was appointed Pompeo’s Representative for Syria Engagement in late August,...

Syrian rebel fighters have pulled the last of their heavy weapons from front-line positions in Idlib Province, meeting the deadline for a truce negotiated by Russia and Turkey — and possibly sparing the civilian population from a bloody government offensive. It was a rare act of unity for the ordinarily fractious rebel forces, who on Monday drove trucks carrying a tank, artillery and missile batteries out of their base in this small town, as a small group of international journalists looked on. “We are now standing in the demilitarized zone,” said Saif al-Raad, a spokesman for the National Liberation Front,...

A big drop in stock prices yesterday with the Dow Jones going down 3 percent in value and NASDAQ even more at 4 percent. Asian markets in Japan and Hong Kong also fell overnight and in Europe today there were also declines.... Two are reported dead after Hurricane Michael slammed into the Florida Panhandle and southwestern Georgia.... An emergency landing this morning in Kazakhstan for an American and a Russian astronaut headed for the international space station.... President Trump stumped for Republicans at a rally in Erie, Pennsylvania last night..... President Trump says that the United States is demanding answers...

Xelil Åžirvan, a commander of a group of Kurdish Peshmerga fighters, told Sputnik that a US military base had been detected near the town of Al-Qa'im in northwest Iraq on the border with Syria. "According to our data, the United States has set up a new military base in the strategically important region of Al-Qa'im in Anbar province on the Iraqi-Syrian border. Americans are building up their military presence in the region, which is why Iraqi government forces have sent more military reinforcements to Al-Qa'im to boost border protection," he said. A spokesperson for the Syrian Democratic Forces, a Kurdish-led...

US Ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley has announced she is resigning-after nearly two years in the post. President Trump appeared in the Oval Office alongside Mrs. Haley to say she had done "an incredible job"..... Mrs. Haley did not give details about her move....

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his cabinet on Sunday that he is preparing for a military solution to the violence on the country’s southern border. “If the reality of civil distress in Gaza is diminished, that is desirable, but that is not certain to happen, and so we are preparing militarily,” Netanyahu said in the cabinet meeting. “That is not an empty statement.” The prime minister’s remarks come after the Defense Ministry ordered IDF troops to send reinforcements to the region on Thursday in preparation for a possible escalation.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel will allegedly fire the head of the country’s domestic intelligence service after he countered claims of “migrant hunts” during one of the many Chemnitz protests. Government sources claim that the German leader has decided to relieve Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) chief Hans-Georg Maassen of his post following a number of incidents including his rejection of a video that allegedly showed angry demonstrators in Chemnitz “hunting” migrants following the murder of Daniel Hillig, Die Welt reports. The sources claim that Merkel decided the fate of the spy chief over the weekend, telling...

It has long been charged that Antifa operatives enter the crowds of pro-freedom rallies and say and do things in order to discredit those rallies. In the protests in Chemnitz against mass Muslim migration, this man made a Hitler salute, which was picked up by the international media as proof that the rallies were full of neo-Nazis. But this man has now been unmasked as a supporter of the Red Army Faction, a Communist terrorist group. Even the German media is admitting it. But it is unlikely there will follow any retractions from the media outside the country, which is...

Thousands have marched through a German city after racist violence flared up following the arrest of an Iraqi and a Syrian over a fatal stabbing. Marchers demonstrated both for and against migrants in the eastern city of Chemnitz. Sunday and Monday evenings saw outbreaks of violence triggered by the arrest of two suspects allegedly involved in the stabbing of Daniel Hillig, a 35-year-old German-Cuban. Following the arrests, mobs attacked people they took to be foreigners, including an Afghan, a Syrian and a Bulgarian man.