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In 2014, Sister Hatune Dogan had been rescuing Christian and Yazidi girls from ISIS captivity for eight months, but she was desperate. If only the world could see the harm being done, understand that rescues were possible, people would open their hearts and their wallets, [so she] found an independent British filmmaker, Edward Watts.. In an email dated February 6, 2015, Watts’s producer, Rosie Garthwaite, wrote: "Hatune you will be the lead story in a documentary about women living under IS.” Watts spent nine days in Germany, Turkey, and Iraq with Sister Hatune. She introduced him to Sheikh Khaire, the...

PARIS - Shootings and explosions erupted in the Paris area on Friday night, and French news services said at least 39 people were dead, dozens wounded and others taken hostage in what appeared to be coordinated militant attacks. French television reported that one of at least two explosions had struck near Paris at the country's main sports stadium, forcing the hasty evacuation of President François Hollande. The explosion occurred during a France-Germany soccer match. The shooting broke out at a popular concert hall, The Bataclan, where a death metal band was playing, and the France 24 website said dozens of...

Two police officials said at least 26 people have been killed in shootings and explosions around Paris Friday, in the deadliest violence in France in decades. A police official said 11 people were killed in a Paris restaurant in the 10th arrondissement, and about 15 killed in the Bataclan theater, where a hostage-taking is under way. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to be publicly named according to police policy.

President Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry were convinced their one-sided nuclear deal would lead to better relations with Iran, but it’s already doing the reverse.Tehran has taken two more Americans hostage just this month — and followed up with a massive cyberattack on the US government, especially the State Department’s Office of Iranian Affairs.The kicker: Iran is holding the nuke deal hostage — threatening to junk it if Obama tries to punish the country for its fresh outrages.

  Reports: WaPo's Jason Rezaian convicted in Iran http://t.co/8H5bVnPY5K | AP Photo pic.twitter.com/D1MH9fICXI   — POLITICO (@politico) October 12, 2015 For people who might not have followed the story as it unfolded there’s an easier explanation for why Iran is holding Jason Rezaian.   The underpinning is Iran knowing the U.S. State Department and CNN collaborate to use media as a tool to advance U.S. foreign policy objectives. In December 2014 CNN ran and episode of Anthony Bourdain Parts Unknown filmed in Iran. It seemed innocuous at the time, yet as with all things Turner Broadcasting, it also seemed to be another set...

GOP presidential front-runner Donald Trump says he would renegotiate President Obama's Iran nuclear deal should he make his way into the Oval Office. "If we have to wait until the next president is sworn in to revisit this nuclear weapons agreement, then the next president better be someone who knows how to negotiate and who will do what is best for the United States," Trump wrote in a Tuesday evening op-ed in USA Today. "When I am elected president, I will renegotiate with Iran — right after I enable the immediate release of our American prisoners and ask Congress to...

WASHINGTON, DC – Today, President Barack Obama announced his intent to appoint the following individuals to key Administration posts: James O’Brien – Special Presidential Envoy for Hostage Affairs, Department of State Charles “Chip” Lyons – United States Representative, Executive Board of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) Aaron Williams – United States Alternate Representative, Executive Board of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) Esther Brimmer – Member, National Security Education Board Michael Guest – Member, National Security Education Board President Obama said, “These fine public servants bring a depth of experience and tremendous dedication to their important roles. I look...

McALLEN, Texas — Two illegal aliens from Mexico joined forces with human smugglers to kidnap and torture unsuspecting illegal immigrants being held at a stash house. Instead of charging the group with hostage taking or kidnapping charges, prosecutors charged them with human smuggling. Federal authorities this week raided a house in the border city of Mission, where they arrested a group of illegal immigrants as well as Arthur Flores, a U.S citizen, and two illegal aliens from Mexico described as his henchmen. The two henchmen had been tasked with holding the immigrants under threats of violence, court records obtained by...

United States military and intelligence officials are still piecing together what happened early Saturday that sabotaged an attempt to rescue two hostages from al Qaeda in Yemen. Despite being ready with a roughly 40-man special operations team and days to plan the operation, U.S. photojournalist Luke Somers and South African teacher Pierre Korki both died shortly after the midnight raid. The key problem, officials told the Wall Street Journal, came when some kind of sound alerted militants who were holding the hostages that the special operations team was nearby. The militants were part of al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula,...

President Obama called Tuesday for the release of Americans held in Iran, individually naming them during a speech at the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention -- a week after his diplomatic team helped strike a nuclear accord with Iran that did not secure the prisoners' freedom. The deal's failure to address the prisoners' status has fueled criticism of the Obama administration, though State Department officials have said they raised their imprisonment repeatedly. The president also scolded a reporter last week at a White House press conference for suggesting he was "content" to leave the prisoners out of the deal.

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) wrote Secretary of State John Kerry today to remind him that “American citizens remain unjustly imprisoned by the Iranian regime even as you have finalized a nuclear deal with Iran,” and urging him “to use every tool at your disposal to secure their freedom” unconditionally. “It is unacceptable that the United States has reached a final agreement with Iran while innocent Americans languish in the most brutal conditions of Iranian jail cells. I am profoundly disappointed that the agreement with Iran did not ensure the unconditional release of American citizens: Jason Rezaian, Pastor Saeed Abedini and...

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said the four American hostages being held in Iran should not have been released as a pre-condition to the Iran nuclear deal, but she added that because “we have a nuclear agreement, that a much brighter light is being shone on the prisoners of conscience in Iran.” At a Capitol Hill press conference, CNSNews.com asked Rep. Pelosi, “Do you think the four American hostages being held in Iran should have been released as a pre-condition to any deal made about Iran’s nuclear program?” Pelosi answered, “No, no, it would have been good but it’s...

IN HIS remarks to the White House Correspondents' Dinner in April, President Obama pledged that his administration would work tirelessly for the freedom of Jason Rezaian, the Washington Post reporter who has been held hostage by Iran since last summer on spurious espionage charges. "Jason has been in prison for nothing more than writing about the hopes and fears of the Iranian people," Obama said. "We will not rest until we bring him home to his family, safe and sound." Yet just four days later, the president warned Congress that he would veto any bill making approval of a nuclear...

The rebel group that has seized power in Yemen has taken at least four U.S. citizens prisoner, according to U.S. officials who said that efforts to secure the Americans’ release have faltered. One of the prisoners had been cleared for release in recent days only to have that decision reversed by members of the Houthi rebellion that toppled the U.S.-backed government earlier this year and now controls most levers of power in Yemen.

Lawfare Blog: Following an American special forces raid on the compound of Islamic State operative Abu Sayyaf, U.S. interrogators, who are part of the High Value Detainee Interrogation Group, have flown to Iraq in order to question Umm Sayyaf, the wife of Abu Sayyaf, who was taken during the operation. Umm Sayyaf was allegedly involved in the workings of the Islamic State and could possibly have played a role in “the enslavement of women in Iraq and Syria.” U.S. interrogators plan to talk to Umm Sayyaf about U.S. hostages held by the militant group. However, according to the Washington Post,...

Forget for an instant – if you can– the ethics of negotiating with a terrorist state that is openly and brazenly holding U.S. citizens as hostages. After all, America’s formerly worst president, Jimmy Carter, did just that for 444 days. But Carter was negotiating the whole time to achieve the release of the hostages, not the rehabilitation of the Islamist regime that had taken them. Today, the Obama White House absurdly claims that Iran has “already been punished” for holding U.S. hostages — by being excluded from Obama’s presence. Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker elevated the status of America’s forgotten hostages...

The Senate lent strong support today to a simply worded resolution calling on Iran to let four Americans come home. The bipartisan resolution from Sen. Jim Risch (R-Idaho) passed 90-0. It states that it’s the policy of the United States that “the Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran should immediately release Saeed Abedini, Amir Hekmati, and Jason Rezaian, and cooperate with the United States Government to locate and return Robert Levinson; and the United States Government should undertake every effort using every diplomatic tool at its disposal to secure their immediate release.” Washington Post bureau chief Rezaian, a California...

<p>Novi, Michigan(CNN)Gov. Scott Walker on Monday sought to use President Barack Obama's slipping popularity on foreign policy issues as a punching bag and sought to bolster his own credentials ahead of a likely presidential bid.</p> <p>Speaking in Novi, Michigan, the Wisconsin Republican rallied around the plight of a Michigan man who has been held hostage in Iran since 2011 and blasted Obama for failing to do enough on the missing man's behalf--as well as failing to ward off attacks by Islamic terrorists around the world.</p>

Tuesday, 28 April 2015 Iran has fired at a U.S. cargo ship and has directed it to Bandar Abbas port on the southern coast of Iran, Al Arabiya News Channel has reported on Tuesday. Up to 34 American sailors are believed to be onboard the ship, Al Arabiya reported. (developing story) Last Update: Tuesday, 28 April 2015 KSA 17:32 - GMT 14:32

Moments ago according to the native Twitter feed of Arabiya, Iranian forces have seized a US cargo ship, which has some 34 American sailors, which they have taken to the port of Bandar Abbas. More as we get it.