Free Republic

The nation with the largest Muslim population in the world has officially banned support for the terrorist group the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), which is responsible for mass killings of religious minorities in Iraq that has forced the U.S. government to respond with air strikes. Indonesia, whose citizens comprise over 10 percent of the global Islamic population, recently announced the ISIS ban in response to ISIS recruiting efforts. Coordinating Political, Legal and Security Affairs Minister Djoko Suyanto said in a statement that ISIS, also known as ISIL, posed a threat to the nation's religious and cultural diversity....

Fringes of the jihadist movement already active in 16 provinces in the Indonesian archipelago. Thousands of people have sworn allegiance to the fundamentalist leader Abu Bakar Al-Baghdadi. Most are veterans of the jihad with extensive experience in Afghanistan or, on the domestic front of the Moluccas. Jakarta: some areas are "fertile ground" for enrollment. Jakarta (AsiaNews) - It has yet to make any startling conquests in the Asian nation, but the Indonesian section of the Islamic State (formerly ISIS, Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant) has already started mass recruitment - as recently reported- in over 16 provinces of...

Occidental College transcripts provides concrete evidence to annul Obama presidency. The smoking gun evidence that annuls Obama’s presidency is Obama’s college transcripts regarding his application for and receiving of foreign student aid. Obama’s college transcripts from Occidental College indicates that Obama, under the name Barry Soetoro, received financial aid as a foreign student from Indonesia as an undergraduate at the school. The transcript from Occidental College shows that Obama (Barry Soetoro) applied for financial aid and was awarded a fellowship (scholarship) for foreign students from the Fulbright Foundation Scholarship program – an international educational exchange program sponsored by the U.S....

A federal judge handed a landmark victory to Kane County and the state of Utah on Wednesday in a years-long dispute with the federal government over whether some rural routes should remain in use as roads, or if they should be closed to the public. In two decisions, U.S. District Judge Clark Waddoups found he had jurisdiction to hear Kane County's claim, gave parameters for "reasonable" right-of-way widths on some routes and determined that 12 of 15 routes in dispute were roads and therefore accessible by the public. The distinction hinged on an 1866 law through which Congress sought to...

Navi Pillay said Tel Aviv's two-week onslaught on Gaza - which has cost more than 650 Palestinians lives - would be thoroughly investigated. Ms Pillay, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said the attacks have destroyed houses and hospitals and killed civilians. "These are just a few examples where there seems to be a strong possibility that international humanitarian law has been violated, in a manner that could amount to war crimes. "Every one of these incidents must be properly and independently investigated." According to Gaza officials, 475 houses have been destroyed and 2,644 damaged, while 46 schools, 56 mosques...

GENEVA, July 23 (Reuters) - The United Nations on Wednesday launched an international inquiry into human rights violations and crimes that may have been committed by Israel during its military offensive in the Gaza Strip. The U.N. Human Rights Council condemned the Israeli assault which it said had involved "disproportionate and indiscriminate attacks", including aerial bombing of civilian areas, collective punishment, and the killing of more than 650 Palestinians. At the end of an emergency session, the 47-member forum adopted a resolution presented by Palestinians by a vote of 29 states in favor, 1 against (the United States) with 17...

Just as many (23%) say the theory that Obama is not an American citizen is true, with another 17% who aren't sure. Sixty percent (60%) reject that theory as false.

Eruptions continue at the volcano after yesterday's major explosion. Dense ash plumes rising from the summit crater can be seen on this morning's satellite images, and a MODIS hot spot is visible on the latest satellite data, suggesting fresh magma continues to arrive at the volcano's summit crater. In the meanwhile, the ash and SO2 plume has drifted and spread over more than 3000 km to the E and SE, covering a vast area that includes parts of northern and eastern Australia.

While his government’s focus remains squarely on domestic issues, Mr Modi is also charting a rather ambitious foreign policy course. He has already visited Bhutan and his future destinations over the next few months are likely to include Japan, Brazil, Southeast Asia, Australia and Nepal. Meanwhile, the Chinese foreign minister has saluted the new Modi government for injecting “new vitality into an ancient civilisation”.

Militants from Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim nation, are being lured by ISIS's hard-line Sunni extremism.Men in balaclavas are cradling Kalashnikovs as they look into a camera, somewhere in Syria. They are university students, businessmen, former soldiers and even teenagers. One by one, they urge their fellow countrymen to join the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), the jihadist group so extreme that it has been denounced by al-Qaeda. But these aren’t Syrians, or Uzbeks, or Chechens. They are Indonesian. “Let us fight in the path of Allah because it is our duty to do jihad in the...

Render to all what is due them: tax to whom tax is due; custom to whom custom; fear to whom fear; honor to whom honor. - Romans 13:7 (NASB) GALLATIN, Tenn. (BP)--March 25, 2003, Chief Petty Officer Jordan Joseph Garrett, United States Navy (Retired), received honors long overdue for actions that "reflected great credit" upon himself, the United States Navy and the United States of America. When the USS Houston was attacked by Japanese ships on March 1, 1942, Garrett refused to leave the vessel until the third "abandon ship" alert was issued. With two broken feet, shrapnel in his...

Divers from the U.S. Navy will visit the World War II graveyard of the "Galloping Ghost of the Java Coast” — the sunken USS Houston — later this month in a bid to determine what remains of the ship, which went down with more than 700 sailors off the coast of Indonesia. The wreck of the Northampton-class heavy cruiser, which was sunk by the Japanese during the World War II battle of Sunda Strait on Feb. 28, 1942, will be surveyed by Navy divers working with their counterparts from Indonesia. The ship lies about 125 feet deep, near Java, Indonesia,...

Two locally made documentaries will run in conjunction with this week's premiere of Ken Burns' film The War. Our Nation's Highest Honor (9 p.m. Monday, Channel 8) is a half-hour report on those in the Houston area who have received the Medal of Honor. Interviews with descendants are included. The special, unavailable for preview, was produced by longtime KUHT documentary maker Jim Fisher. Fisher is also producer of Cruiser Houston: Of Pride and Purpose (9 p.m. Tuesday, Channel 8), an excellent hourlong report on the USS Houston and its crew. Remarkable footage and superb sound editing hallmark this special, which...

This is a "headsup" for selected reviews/presentations about WWII and the Cold War that will appear on BookTV (C-Span2) this weekend of Jan. 13/14, 2007. Links to the segments of specific reviews (and their broadcast times) will be posted below. The "Ship of Ghosts: The Story of the USS Houston..." might be pretty good. The author also produced "Last Stand of The Tin-Can Sailors" about Taffy 3 (Battle of Samar). The links below are for other WWII and Cold War topics that might be interesting.

He was too sick to eat, and Min Min Chan’s chest ached with each breath he sucked. It didn’t matter: The Thai captain warned him to get back on deck and start hauling fish onto the trawler or be tossed overboard. As a 17-year-old slave stuck in the middle of the sea, he knew no one would come looking if he simply vanished. Less than a month earlier, Chan had left Myanmar for neighboring Thailand, looking for work. Instead, he said a broker tricked and sold him onto the fishing boat for $616. He ended up far away in Indonesian...

The South Side lakefront jewel where Barack and Michelle Obama held their wedding reception vs. a rare, open downtown field set against Chicago's majestic mountain range of skyscrapers. These are just a few of the preliminary offerings area universities plan to present to the president, the first lady and the few confidants helping them as they begin to weigh where to locate the Obama presidential library and museum. Meanwhile, the University of Hawaii, where the president grew up, has said it wants to build the library on oceanfront property in Kakaako, a commercial and retail district of Honolulu between Ala...

On Monday evening, President Obama decided to stop by D.C.’s Friendship Park to surprise some Little Leaguers who were warming up for their game. Many of the young ball players weren’t exactly impressed, though, mostly because they apparently didn’t know who he was. Allow us to repeat that: the President of the United States of America just dropped by to say hey, and they didn’t know who he was. While parents reached for their phones to snap pictures, many of the children held back, skeptical about this strange man who they apparently had never seen before.

A woman allegedly gang-raped in Indonesia's Aceh as a punishment for sleeping with a married man may still be caned for the affair under the province's laws, an fficial said Tuesday. A group of eight men allegedly carried out the sex assault last week on the 25-year-old widow at her house in Langsa in East Aceh district, and also beat up the man with whom she is accused of having an affair. After the attack, which also saw the couple doused with sewage, the pair were handed over to officials. Ibrahim Latif, head of Langsa's Islamic Sharia law office, said...

An Indonesian woman who was gang raped after being accused of having an extramarital affair reportedly is facing a public caning for the offense. “We want the couple to be caned because they violated the religious bylaw on sexual relations,” Ibrahim Latif, the head of the Shariah office in the town of Langsa, said, according to Jakarta Globe. The woman reportedly was raped by eight men and three have been arrested, including a 13-year-old boy. The woman and the man she reportedly had the affair with were hit with sewage.

After Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 veered off its course, civilian air-traffic controllers spent precious predawn hours in befuddled exchanges with counterparts in nearby countries in an effort to locate the jet, according to documents released by investigators Thursday. A series of missteps began less than an hour after the plane disappeared around 1:20 a.m. on March 8.... Through that first stretch, the carrier's operation center continued to advise controllers that the plane was in "normal condition," remained in contact with ground facilities and was flying somewhere in Cambodian airspace—an area that was never on its flight path from Kuala Lumpur...