Free Republic

Sri Lanka has recently witnessed an increase in attacks and threats against the Christian community there. The increase has led to fears that a new wave of anti-Christian violence is about to begin, reports Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW). According to the National Christian Evangelical Alliance of Sri Lanka (NCEASL) "there is a visible increase in the number of attacks on Christian places of worship and acts of intimidation during the past two months." A report from NCEASL claimed that the pastor of the Dutch Reformed Church in Galle was subject to a host of virulent threats on 6th February. He...

1,273 years ago today.

Charles Martel Born about 688; died at Quierzy on the Oise, 21 October, 741. He was the natural son of Pepin of Herstal and a woman named Alpaïde or Chalpaïde. Pepin, who died in 714, had outlived his two legitimate sons, Drogon and Grimoald, and to Theodoald, a son of the latter and then only six years old, fell the burdensome inheritance of the French monarchy. Charles, who was then twenty-six, was not excluded from the succession on account of his birth, Theodoald himself being the son of a concubine, but through the influence of Plectrude, Theodoald's grandmother, who wished...

N A SUSTAINED, century-long rampage that would have wowed Rommel, the Prophet Mohammed and his successors beginning in A.D. 629 conquered not only Arabia, Persia, Syria, Egypt, and North Africa, but also branded the crescent of Islam on lands formerly within the fold of a Christian Roman Empire then in ruins. In 709, Arab horsemen and their allies crossed the Strait of Gibraltar. Four short years later, Spain belonged to the Empire of the Prophet. In the summer of 732, the centennial of Mohammed's death, this veteran Islamic juggernaut, at least 80,000 strong with the skilled and popular general Abd...

NUEVO LAREDO, Mexico (AP) -- The United States is closing its consulate in this violence-wracked border city for a week following a shootout in which assailants used machine guns, grenades and even a rocket launcher to attack a home, the U.S. Ambassador said Friday evening. In a statement from Mexico City, Tony Garza said "in light of this alarming incident and continued violence along the border, I have decided to suspend all operations except for emergency services for American citizens," for one week beginning Aug. 1. He said temporarily closing the consulate would allow officials to "access the security situation...

The fatal flaw of Britain's and Europe's establishment today is not just its shameless worship at the altar of statism; rather, it is its failure to defend the region's historic, Christian-nurtured culture (the West) against Islamic-nurtured culture (the East). By liberally and uncritically opening its borders to millions of fanatical immigrant religionists, all Europe (including the insular Brits) flirts with actual cultural suicide. The epic tragedy could occur in just a few more years (or, at most, for demographic reasons, in seven decades), constituting a violent, ignoble chapter in world history and ushering in a New Dark Age, from the...

Six Navy SEALs filed a lawsuit against the Associated Press and one of its reporters yesterday, saying the news organization revealed their identities, compromised their security and invaded their privacy by publishing personal photographs in a Dec. 4 story.     The complaint says AP reporter Seth Hettena used about 40 images from the personal photo-storage Web site of a Navy SEAL wife. [snip] The images were picked up by the Arab press, including Al Jazeera, and have made their way onto a billboard outside U.S. Naval Base Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, where detainees from the war on terror are being kept. The...

A 12-year-old New Hampshire boy who wanted to jolly up his junior high dance by dressing in a Santa suit instead got a lesson in political correctness when his Scroogelike principal turned the student away, fearing he might offend his classmates.

Only a few years ago, mass-murder attacks on the West in the name of Islam, like those of September 11, would have seemed like a thriller writer’s fantasy. Nor would anyone have imagined that a bombing by Islamists could swing a general election in a European country, that a Dutch movie-maker might be shot dead on the street for a film about the abuse of women in Islam, or that one might find oneself watching, on television, the beheading of Western hostages by men crying out Allahu Akhbar! over their savage deeds.... At present, it is not clear whether the...

Islamists shift focus to Europe as jihad enters third phase Simon Tisdall Thursday November 18, 2004 The Guardian Osama bin Laden's latest videotape, released before the US presidential election, was denounced by many as a crude attempt to scare voters and damage George Bush. But, beyond the US, interpretations differed. Some analysts said the tape showed America was winning the "war on terror" and al-Qaida was in retreat. "The tape is one of capitulation and bankruptcy," wrote Mamoun Fandy in Egypt's al-Ahram. "This tape tells George Bush: 'Leave us alone and we will leave you alone.'" According to the French...

Holland is not a 60-year-old story anymore about Canadian soldiers and liberation from the Nazis. Holland is not a 20-year-old story anymore about lax drug and prostitution laws. To talk seriously about Holland today -- Holland, once a global empire in its own right -- is to talk about whether it yet meets the definition as Saudi Arabia's first European colony, or if that definition will instead be met in five years, or 10. In Holland today, there are more observant Muslims than either observant Catholics or Protestants (but not yet all Christians combined). The most common name for new...

Not only do Islamists want to censure the handling of Islamic topics at U.S. universities, as I noted in “Islamists Police the Classroom [at the University of South Florida],” but they also wish to do the same at grammar schools. More ominously yet, they wish to transform public schools at all levels into venues for spreading Islam. An undated posting at www.SoundVision.com posts a page titled “18 Tips for Imams and Community Leaders.” The 15th tip, “Establish a parents' committee to monitor public schools,” has special interest. It starts by asking if the local public school is teaching 10-year-olds that...

The New York Times, The Providence Journal-Bulletin, Friday, August 1, 1997, page A-1, A-8 -- As heavily armed agents stood guard, a federal judge presided over the arraignment of two suspects charged with conspiracy to blow up a New York subway station and possession of explosives. Other investigators were seeking a reason behind the alleged plot. Gazi Ibrahim Abu Mezer, 23, and Lafi Khalil, 22, both from Israel's West Bank, were charged late Friday as they lay in their hospital beds recovering from gunshot wounds suffered during a shootout with police at their Brooklyn apartment . The men were arrested...

THE Netherlands has long been Europe's most permissive society — everything from window-shopping in Amsterdam for scantily clad hookers (50 to 80 Euros for 15 to 30 minutes) to hashish aroma in marijuana-smoke-filled cafes. The government and the sex workers union protect some 30,000 women. The pimps are landlords and the aging prostitutes are quickly replaced with a steady influx from the former Soviet republics and East European countries. A Dutch brothel chain is suing the government for failing to green-light the "Yum Yum Caviar Club" at Schiphol Airport "to cater to stressed travelers in transit." The government responded that...

 Prominent Muslim lauds van Gogh slaying, blesses murderer     Imminent attacks on Hirsi Ali and Wilders prevented [captured TROP terrorists targeted 2 Dutch MPs]    Dutch Muslims dismayed by anti-Islamic backlash    Netherlands Confirms Iraq Pull-out    Motive sought in New York subway bomb plot (1997)    Anti-Muslim backlash grows in Netherlands     Dutch mosque hit by suspected arson attack (Another Mosque)     Mosque set on fire in Netherlands  Yes I am Dutch. People here have been terrorized by muslims for the past decade: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/fr/573603/postshttp://www.freerepublic.com/focus/fr/582864/postshttp://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/687216/posts (more links in the 3rd one). In their schools they tell their children to...

A prominent German Muslim warns that European Muslims must adopt the majority culture in the countries where they live. Democracy needs to come before religion. Failing that, a clash of civilizations is almost unavoidable. SPIEGEL ONLINE: Professor Tibi, for the second time, a debate is raging in Germany about the term "Leitkultur" ("leading" or "guiding" culture), which you coined in the 90s. Most recently, German Interior Minister Otto Schily branded the term "moronic" and "an ancient relict." Does such an attitude anger you? Tibi: It does amaze me. Recently, when an Italian translation of my book Islamische Zuwanderung -- die...

I have created a public register of "bump lists" here on Free Republic. I define a bump list as a name listed in the "To" field used to index articles. Free Republic Bump List Register

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A tearful U.S. soldier was sentenced to a year in jail Wednesday after pleading guilty to abusing Iraqi detainees in a scandal threatening to undermine President Bush's re-election chances. Military policeman Jeremy Sivits, who apologized to Iraqis at the first court martial of soldiers accused of abuses which sparked worldwide outrage, was also expelled from the army. It was not enough for Iraqis protesting outside Abu Ghraib prison, scene of the scandal that came to light when pictures were published of naked and terrified Iraqi inmates being abused and sexually humiliated. "It's a kangaroo court, set up...

<p>KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia (May 13) - The al-Qaida-linked Web site that first posted a video of American civilian Nicholas Berg's beheading was shut down Thursday by the Malaysian company that hosted it - because it was drawing too much traffic.</p>

frame grab taken from web site video footage May 11, 2004, shows a man, who identified himself as Nick Berg of Philadelphia (C) seated in front of his five masked captors moments before he was executed. Al Qaeda's leader in Iraq beheaded an American civilian and vowed more killings in revenge for the abuse of Iraqi prisoners, an Islamist Web site said on Tuesday. After one of the masked men read out a statement, they pushed Berg to the floor and shouted 'God is greatest' above his screams as one of them sawed his head off with a large knife...