Free Republic

Saudi Arabia condemns “in the strongest terms” Israel’s decision to turn the Jerusalem headquarters of the UN’s Palestinian refugee agency into apartments. Last week, the Israel Land Authority said it was preparing plans to turn the Ma’alot Dafna complex into 1,440 housing units, after telling UNRWA it must evacuate the premises. The Saudi Foreign Ministry notes in an English-language statement “the Kingdom’s rejection of the continued blatant Israeli violations of international laws and resolutions…and its systematic political and military targeting of the United Nations agencies and its relief organizations. “The Kingdom also rejects the continued endangerment of the lives of...

...The Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee on Sunday unanimously approved Illouz's bill, which would bar Israeli officials from having "any contact" with UNRWA or anyone acting on its behalf. All the committee members also voted to advance a related bill that would revoke UNRWA's authorization to conduct "any activity, either directly or indirectly," on Israeli territory.Lawmakers from both coalition and opposition parties cosponsored the bills, combining a slate of previous proposals...Last week, Israeli foreign minister Israel Katz barred Guterres from the country, citing the U.N. chief's failure to "unequivocally condemn" Iran's missile attack on Israel a day earlier. Guterres...

A US National Security Council spokesperson commented this morning on an incident in which IDF forces fired towards UNIFIL positions in Lebanon. "We understand Israel is conducting targeted operations near the Blue Line to destroy Hezbollah infrastructure that could be used to threaten Israeli citizens. While they undertake these operations, it is critical that they not threaten UN peacekeepers’ safety and security," said the spokesperson. "We reached out immediately to our Israeli counterparts about it and pressed them for more details."

A press conference was held today by the Hostages Families Forum in response to UNRWA being among the nominees for the Nobel Peace Prize, which will be announced tomorrow. Ayelet Samerano, mother of Yonatan Samerano who was murdered on October 7th and whose body was taken to Gaza by an UNRWA social worker, spoke at the press conference. She was joined by Daniel Carmon, the Deputy Permanent Representative at Israel's UN mission and Ambassador to India, and Hillel Neuer, Executive Director of UN Watch. Ayelet stated, "In the first few months after October 7, we reached out to many human...

The countries of the West have watched the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians for decades, baffled because every diplomatic effort to establish the much-vaunted ‘two-state solution’ has failed. The atrocities committed by Hamas on October 7, one year ago, left those of us in the West horrified by the barbaric savagery we witnessed, much of it documented and broadcast by Hamas itself. It’s been almost 80 years since the Nazis’ genocidal crusade against the Jews, but the heinous acts committed by Hamas have brought back the Nazi abominations of World War II with all their horror in stark relief....

President Joe Biden privately referred to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a "son of a bitch," among other profane insults, over Israel's military actions against the terrorist group Hamas inside Gaza, according to a new Bob Woodward book. In addition, Biden called Netanyahu a "bad guy," according to CNN, citing an advance copy of Woodward's book titled "War" ahead of its Oct. 15 release. Woodward's book gives a behind-the-scenes account of Biden's thinking and reactions to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, his selection of Merrick Garland as attorney general, and his criticism of former President Barack Obama's handling of Russian...

President Biden was furious after the elimination of a Hezbollah leader who had a $5 million bounty on his head from the US for his role in killing hundreds of American servicemen. Conversations from the past year between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Joe Biden were revealed today (Tuesday) in a new book by journalist Bob Woodward, 'War,' an advanced copy of which was obtained by CNN. According to Woodward, after the elimination of Hezbollah's second-highest ranking figure Fuad Shukr, Biden was furious with Netanyahu and told him: "Bibi, what the f-?" Biden added, “You know the...

At least 70 people have been killed in a gang massacre in Haiti, the UN has said. Armed gunmen belonging to the Gran Grif gang passed through the town of Pont-Sonde with automatic rifles, shooting at residents on Thursday, according to the United Nations' Human Rights Office.

The Dominican Republic says it plans to expel as many as 10,000 Haitian migrants per week, despite a longstanding call from the United Nations to end forced returns to Haiti amid a surge in gang violence there. Homero Figueroa, a Dominican presidential spokesman, said on Wednesday that the “operation aims to reduce the excessive migrant populations detected in Dominican communities”. Figueroa added that the expulsions to Haiti, which shares a border with the Dominican Republic on the Caribbean island of Hispaniola, would begin “immediately”. The announcement comes just days after the UN reported that at least 3,661 people had been...

The USA and France want a ceasefire — which is to say they want Israel to allow Hezb’allah to regroup and attack again. Reuters reports, “Israel rejects US-backed Lebanon ceasefire plan, hits Beirut again” and adds that France also supports a ceasefire. It is easily understandable, given that the last time France won a major war on its own was during Napoleon’s reign, that this country wants Israel to stop battering the same terrorists who murdered 53 French troops in 1983. French president Emmanuel Macron said of Benjamin Netanyahu, “It would be a mistake by the prime minister to refuse...

During an interview with Nexstar Media’s Austin, TX NBC affiliate KXAN on Wednesday that was released on Thursday, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) stated that while Iran’s missile attack against Israel “is unacceptable.” He agrees with the United Nations “and others who are fighting for an immediate ceasefire. The last thing in the world this country needs is to see American troops getting engaged in another Middle East war.” And so, we have to make sure the war doesn’t expand. Sanders said, “The fear right now — obviously, what Iran did and all of those 180 missiles coming into Israel is...

Britain’s left-wing government announced a plan on Thursday to surrender sovereignty of a British Overseas Territory in the Indian Ocean that has hosted an important joint U.S.-UK military base and listening post for the past 50 years. The United Kingdom is giving the Chagos Islands to Mauritius, from whom it bought the archipelago in the 1960s. The announcement is the latest development in years of sovereignty claims by Mauritius, now drifting into China’s sphere of influence, which until recently were not even recognised as legitimate by the UK or its allies. Just last week, President of Mauritius Prithvirajsing Roopun barracked...

The deal on the Chagos Islands ends a battle over Britain’s last overseas territory in Africa and preserves the Diego Garcia air base but has been criticized as aiding China. Britain said Thursday that it would cede sovereignty of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius in a deal it said secured the future of the UK-U.S. Diego Garcia military base, and which could also pave the way for people displaced decades ago to return home. President Joe Biden welcomed the deal, saying it would secure the effective operation of Diego Garcia, a strategically important air base in the Indian Ocean, into...

<p>A station platform has been cordoned off at Hamburg central station in northern Germany amid fears that a train passenger may have arrived carrying a dangerous virus.</p><p>A fire department spokesman told the Bild tabloid that the man and his girlfriend had developed flu-like symptoms on a high-speed train from Frankfurt.</p>

"Israel will continue to defend its citizens and uphold its national dignity, with or without António Guterres," he concluded. Israel's foreign minister declared UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres 'persona non grata' and was henceforth banning him from entering Israel, according to a post on X/Twitter on Wednesday. The ban on entry, said FM Israel Katz, was due to Guterres's failure to "unequivocally condemn" Iran's massive missile attack on Israel. "Anyone who cannot unequivocally condemn Iran's heinous attack on Israel, as almost every country in the world has done, does not deserve to step foot on Israeli soil," Katz wrote. He...

A United Nations agency expressed “profound concern” on Monday over the Biden administration’s updated asylum restrictions along the U.S-Mexico border. ...the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) condemned the move in a public statement and called on the White House to reconsider....Matthew Reynolds, UNHCR Representative to the U.S. and the Caribbean, stated. “The regulation severely curtails access to protection for people fleeing conflict, persecution, and violence...Limiting or blocking such access is a violation of international refugee law and the humanitarian principles...” Biden on Monday tweaked the threshold at which the partial asylum ban would be deactivated...deactivating the asylum restrictions...

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the United Nations a “joke” in his address to the opening of the General Assembly in New York on Friday, as he noted its obsession with attacking Israel, inverting good and evil. Netanyahu spoke after a countless heads of state had demonized Israel for “genocide” in Gaza, and with his country facing a war on seven fronts against Iran and its terrorist proxies. “In this swamp of antisemitic bile, there’s an automatic majority willing to demonize Israel on anything,” he noted, calling it an “anti-Israel flat-earth society.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu denounced the United Nations General Assembly as a “swamp of antisemitic bile” during a fiery address Friday morning — as dozens of diplomats walked out in protest ahead of the speech. Netanyahu slammed the mounting criticism of Israel’s handling of the nearly year-long war against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The UN, he claimed, represented an “anti-Israel flat-earth society.” He also denounced the International Criminal Court’s allegations that Israel has deliberately targeted civilians in Gaza as the product of “profound moral confusion.” He scoffed at the “self-described progressives” who marched against Israel’s war effort in...

On Tuesday, as reports were coming in of Iran's ballistic missiles hitting Israel, António Guterres, the Secretary-General of the anti-Israel United Nations, posted his demands for a ceasefire. "I condemn the broadening of the Middle East conflict with escalation after escalation," Guterres posted. "We absolutely need a ceasefire," he also insisted, as if we haven't already heard such a call from the UN so many times before. I condemn the broadening of the Middle East conflict with escalation after escalation.This must stop.We absolutely need a ceasefire.— António Guterres (@antonioguterres) October 1, 2024UN Secretary General calls for a CEASEFIRE during the...

Iran warned Israel and the United States against any reaction to its massive missile strike against the Jewish State on Tuesday night. “Should the Zionist regime dare to respond or commit further acts of malevolence, a subsequent and crushing response will ensue,” Iran’s mission to the United Nations wrote in a post on X. Iran’s legal, rational, and legitimate response to the terrorist acts of the Zionist regime—which involved targeting Iranian nationals and interests and infringing upon the national sovereignty of the Islamic Republic of Iran—has been duly carried out. Should the Zionist regime… — I.R.IRAN Mission to UN, NY...