Free Republic

A member of one of the world’s wealthiest royal families was found passed out on a busy London street after a cocaine binge while a barefoot toddler wandered dangerously close to traffic, a British court has heard. Mahrah Al Nahyan, 32, a member of Abu Dhabi’s ruling family through marriage, was discovered slumped against railings alongside an unconscious man as a three-year-old child played unattended nearby. The shocking incident unfolded June 13 in west London, where concerned members of the public rushed to protect the child before alerting police, according to The Times. Al Nahyan reportedly remained unconscious for approximately...

London | The co-pilot accused of attempting to hijack a passenger jet full of Israeli passengers watched terror videos and glorified attackers as part of his radicalisation while studying in Melbourne almost a decade ago, the United Arab Emirates top prosecutor said on Friday (Saturday AEDT). The Omani co-pilot planned to crash the plane into the passenger terminal at Tel Aviv airport to kill the most number of people in a September 11 style plot, UAE Attorney-General Hamad Saif Al Shamsi revealed. The co-pilot told investigators he had acted alone, the attorney-general said. Omani pilot Hamam al-Hammami is accused of...

Yemeni government forces claimed on Monday to have retaken control of key positions near the Bab al-Mandeb Strait, a vital chokepoint for global trade, as they launch a renewed campaign to roll back recent gains made by the Iran-backed Houthi movement. Military spokesperson Majid Al-Nuzaili claimed on X that government forces “have succeeded in controlling Bab al-Mandeb,” adding that they have “cut off” and taken control of the road between Dhubab district, which overlooks Bab al-Mandeb, and the port town of Mocha, previously seized by the Houthis. CNN hasn’t independently verified the claim. Forces, which are backed by Saudi Arabia,...

One of the most prominent and politically active left-wing think tanks in the United States, the Center for American Progress, has announced that it will no longer accept funding from the United Arab Emirates, the Guardian reported Friday. “With a rising undemocratic tide around the world, and serious questions about which side of that struggle our own president stands on, it seemed clear that all Americans should take extra steps and leave no doubt where they stand,” a spokesperson for the liberal organization told the Guardian. The spokesperson added, “This funding never impacted any CAP position or policy, but everybody...

UAE is in serious trouble. Israel is now suspecting the direct involvement of certain UAE officials in the attempted hijacking of FlyDubai Flight FZ1073. Without several deliberate security violations, the hijacking would have been impossible. To make matters even more suspicious, UAE and Saudi officials still refuse to release the name of the suicidal Omani pilot. The pilot went through 2 body scanners, a metal detector and an X-ray scanner with a knife. No alarm went off during the screening. Another suspicion is that an influential airport official may have already placed the weapon inside the cockpit. Things get even...

A California man was charged Monday with operating a ring of illegal test-takers who helped dozens of Middle Eastern nationals obtain U.S. student visas by passing proficiency and college-placement exams for them. Eamonn Daniel Higgins, 46, of Laguna Niguel made an appearance in U.S. District Court in Santa Ana on one count of conspiracy to commit visa fraud as immigration agents arrested 16 of his suspected clients who remained in Southern California... The allegations revealed a potentially dangerous security breach in the country's student visa system and underscored the vulnerability of a tracking process that relies on schools to verify...

The new season of Fauda, released on September 8 on Netflix, is a hit around the world, as the series tends to be – but the big news is that, even as anti-Israel sentiment mounts around the world, it is the number one show in Lebanon, according to tracking sites such as FlixPatrol. Not only is it the top show in Lebanon, which has been in a state of war with Israel since 1948, but it is or has been in the top 10 in nine other Arab countries that have different relationships with Israel. At the time of writing,...

A wide spread scale over the secret network used to move Iran's oil revenues around international sanctions has [received] criticism. Senior officials have discovered that [corrupt intermediaries] have misappropriated at least $1.6 billion, with some fleeing the country. The controversy has expose the unofficial network of so-called trusts: companies and intermediates entrusted with receiving and transferring oil revenues outside the international banking system. Speaking on state television on Sunday, the head of Iran's State Inspection Organization, Zabihollah Khodaeian, said one intermediart alone had failed to return $200 million in state funds before leaving the country. Khudaeian added that judicial authorities...

Oil producers in the Persian Gulf are making plans to bypass the Strait of Hormuz with new pipelines and a new port after Iran has repeatedly attacked ships and blocked traffic. The idea is to minimize Tehran’s leverage on the waterway that once saw 20% of the world’s oil pass through it as the war stretches into its fifth month. Iran has already insisted that it will impose tolls on the strait, which could cost tens of billions of dollars. And in some cases, it is extracting millions of dollars of protection money per oil tanker. Two such projects are...

The unexplained attacks have added a dangerous new layer of uncertainty to an already volatile conflict, raising concerns that additional countries may now be conducting military operations against Iran without publicly acknowledging their involvement.New Airstrikes Came After U.S. Said Its Campaign Had EndedThe U.S. military’s Central Command (CENTCOM) announced Thursday morning that it had completed a coordinated operation striking approximately 90 targets inside Iran.Yet only hours later, Iranian state media reported another wave of explosions and airstrikes across the southern provinces of Bushehr and Sistan and Baluchestan.Those attacks occurred after the United States had publicly stated its operation was complete.CENTCOM...

The Iran war exposed a long-simmering feud within the world’s most powerful oil cartel, boiling over this spring when it contended with the biggest oil supply shock in history. Now OPEC faces a fight for its existence. The Strait of Hormuz has started to reopen, and some OPEC nations are clamoring to ramp up oil production The ultimate decider will be Saudi Arabia Unlike Iraq and Kuwait, the Saudis don’t need production to ramp up . The country was able to keep its oil business afloat by bypassing the strait with pipelines that shipped oil to a port in Yanbu...

U.S. President Donald Trump will meet with Middle ‌Eastern leaders and attend a working ‌session with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy during the ​G7 summit in France next week, senior U.S. administration officials said on Saturday. Officials said Trump would meet separately with the ‌leaders of Egypt, ⁠Qatar, United Arab Emirate, France and India. No bilateral meeting ⁠was planned with Zelenskiy but the two leaders could meet on the sidelines ​of the ​summit, they added. Trump ​planned to raise ‌issues of shared importance with leaders at the summit, including economic growth and development, supply chain resilience, illegal migration and AI, one...

The United Arab Emirates has agreed to unlock billions of dollars for Iran, four sources ​said, in a tactical shift after weeks of Iranian attacks on the wealthy Gulf Arab state during the U.S.-Israeli war with the Islamic Republic. (snip) Two regional sources told Reuters the UAE had agreed to release a total of $10 billion, more than $3 billion of which had already been delivered. Two other sources with knowledge of the arrangement put the total funds involved at $20 billion, adding that the move had been agreed in return for a ​halt to Iranian attacks on the UAE....

KAN Israel News, citing an Iranian-linked news network, reports that $3 billion was transferred from Abu Dhabi to Tehran aboard a private Boeing 737. According to the report, Iran agreed to halt direct attacks on Israel after receiving a U.S. message, delivered through Qatar, in from further strikes in Lebanon. The funds were reportedly flown to Tehran’s Mehrabad Airport aboard UAE Royal Jet aircraft A6-RJF, which was tracked traveling from Abu Dhabi to Iran. At this stage, the flight itself was genuine (it happened during Irans airspace closure) and the presence of a UAE delegation in Tehran has been reported...

Mehek Cooke@MehekCookeTrump just turned the Abraham Accords into an accountability trap for the Gulf states and Iran walked right into it.Gulf states like Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and Turkey have never held Iran accountable is due to exposure. They share a neighborhood. They can't sanction, shame, or confront Iran while having zero security architecture binding them to the West or to each other.The Abraham Accords change that math entirely. Once Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Pakistan, Egypt, and Turkey are signatories, they aren't just recognizing Israel they are locking themselves into a collective security posture.A breach of the Iran deal becomes their problem...

Big things are happening at the White House right now. The rumors started earlier today, Trump had either reached a deal with Iran or he has rejected a deal and would increase the bombings. Secretary Rubio dropped a hint on Saturday that the next step in the Iran war/conflict/whatever would be decided imminently. And it appears that Trump has gathered his top officials to Washington immediately, reportedly to discuss a draft of a deal proposed by Iran. JD Vance was rushed to the White House, interrupting his Ohio Memorial Day weekend plans. Secretary Hegseth and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs...

These figures are based on annualized data from January to November 2025, compiled by the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) and reported by Visual Capitalist and other sources. The United States is the world’s largest oil producer, followed by Russia and Saudi Arabia, with the top 10 countries supplying over 70% of global crude oil.United States 16.1%Russia 11.7%Saudi Arabia 11.3%Canada 5.9%Iraq 5.2%China 5.1%Iran 5.0%United Arab Emirates 4.5%Brazil 4.4%Kuwait 3.1%

President Donald Trump is back from China with a very clear message to the Iranian regime. “For Iran, the Clock is Ticking, and they better get moving, FAST, or there won’t be anything left of them. TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE!” - President Donald J. Trump pic.twitter.com/33gyF0c0O5 — The White House (@WhiteHouse) May 17, 2026 “For Iran, the Clock is Ticking, and they better get moving, FAST, or there won’t be anything left of them. TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE!” Before Trump left for China, it was clear that his patience with the Iranian regime was wearing thin. So if...

Saudi fighter jets carried out airstrikes on Iran-linked Shi’ite militia targets inside Iraq during the Iran war, while retaliatory strikes were also launched from Kuwait into Iraqi territory, Reuters reported citing multiple sources familiar with the matter. Sources cited by Reuters included three Iraqi military and security officials, a Western official and two people briefed on the matter, including one in the United States. According to one Western official and another source familiar with the operations, Saudi air force fighter jets targeted Iran-backed militia positions near the kingdom’s northern border with Iraq. The Western official said some of the Saudi...

The Legislature was jubilant as it passed SB2471 on Friday, seeking to overturn the effects of the Citizens United decision in Hawai‘i and get big money and outside influences out of our elections. The irony is, Mainland power players were pulling our strings the whole time. The rhetoric on Friday when the Legislature passed SB2471, was triumphant. All but one of the legislators voted for this attempt to nullify the Citizen’s United decision for Hawai‘i, and did so with bold claims. We’re standing up for Hawai‘i! We’re standing against dark money! We’re making history! We’re protecting democracy! These people are...