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Dozens of young British women are using social media to boast of joining the Islamic State's terrifying all-female police force – claiming to be doling out savage beatings, punishment lashings, ordering executions and managing brothels where thousands of Yazidi sex slaves are imprisoned and raped daily after being sold for as little as £27. Britons including privately-educated Glaswegian Aqsa Mahmood, 20, and Lewisham-born Khadijah Dare, 22, are understood to have joined the Al-Khansa Brigade in ISIS' Syrian de facto capital Raqqa, helping to patrol the city with guns and daggers hidden beneath their religious robes. The group, which is largely...

Some of the bravest martyrs this generation may ever know are teenagers—and perhaps even younger. When Islamic State militants threatened four children in Iraq—all under the age of 15—with death if they did not promise to follow Islam's "prophet" Muhammad, they defiantly stated, "No. We love Yasua (Jesus). We have always followed Yasua." Andrew White, an Anglican priest known as the "Vicar of Baghdad," has seen violence and persecution against Christians unprecedented in recent decades. In a CBN News video embedded on this site, he recounts the story of the Iraqi Christian children who were told by ISIS militants to...

America’s new Ambassador to Iraq says his government has come to an agreement with Baghdad on “privileges and immunities” for U.S. troops based in the country. […] Under former Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, immunity was a major sticking point between Washington and Baghdad, ultimately leading to the decision to withdraw all remaining U.S. troops in late 2011. …

Baghdad: When Islamic State group fighters swept into northern Iraq's second city Mosul in a lightning June offensive, their propaganda trumpeted a better life for the people under jihadist rule. Now, nearly six months later, residents there are suffering from a lack of clean water and also a shortage of medicine to treat illnesses caused by it. [snip]But "the hardships of the locals certainly undermine IS claims to be a state meeting the needs of the people and offering them real security," he said.

The first-ever contract for exports of the S-400 Triumf air defense missile system has been signed. "A contract between Rosoboronexport and the Chinese Defense Ministry was signed at the beginning of this fall for the delivery of at least six battalions of S-400 air defense missile systems worth of more than $3 billion," Vedomosti reported on Wednesday. Negotiations on the delivery of S-400 systems to China had been in progress for several years and the Russian Defense Ministry said in 2011 that exports might begin no earlier than 2016 because the Russian Armed Forces would have to be provided for...

China has plans to grow its navy to 351 ships by 2020 as the Chinese continue to develop their military’s ability to strike global targets, according to a new report. The 2014 U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission recommended to Congress the U.S. Navy respond by building more ships and increase its presence in the Pacific region – a strategy they U.S. military has already started. The commission asked Congress to increase its Pacific fleet up to 67 ships and rebalance homeports such that 60-percent of the force is based in the region by 2020. The commissions’ recommendations, which are...

Technology is cheaper and West doesn’t use oil to fund a welfare state Give Saudi Arabia credit: Whoever sets oil-production policy for the desert kingdom has guts. Unfortunately, the sheiks have made what’s likely to become a sucker’s bet.You know this part already, but the 12-nation Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries last week declined to cut production, sending Brent crude oil futures tumbling to their cheapest point since 2009. The Saudis appear to be spoiling for a fight, trying to find out exactly how cheap oil must be to force surging U.S. shale-oil production to seize up like an...

The Islamic State Widens its Bridgehead in North AfricaPosted By Ari Lieberman On December 3, 2014 @ 12:05 am In Daily Mailer,FrontPage | 6 Comments As ISIS continues its brutal occupation of large swaths of territory in Syria and Iraq, effectively blurring the border between those two pseudo nations, a new, if not more menacing threat is emerging in North Africa where the Islamic State is looking to plant its cancerous roots.In Egypt, the Sinai based Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, an Islamist organization responsible for dozens of terror attacks throughout the country announced on its Twitter account that it had...

President Barack Obama has stressed that the U.S.-led coalition fight against the Islamic State can be won without “boots on the ground.” But it depends on who’s wearing the boots. Thousands of private security contractors, who played critical, below-the-radar and at times controversial roles in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, are being asked to consider joining this latest battle against Islamic extremists in Iraq and Syria and possibly elsewhere in the Middle East. What specific jobs they will fill, and which departments or countries will be paying for their services, remains to be seen. But the demand for their...

Islamic State militants are boasting that they have developed a dirty bomb — a crude nuclear weapon using materials seized from Mosul University, Iraq. [A] letter written by the Iraqi Ambassador to the U.N. to the body’s Secretary-General confirm[ed] that some 88 pounds of uranium that could be adapted for a dirty bomb was seized by militants.

Erik Prince is not whining, he wants that clear. “However much I had to put up with, in terms of the assault from all sides, from the lawyers and the bureaucrats, pales in comparison to guys who lost their lives, who were maimed, either active-duty military or contractors,” he says. “I’m just providing a cautionary tale to the next guy dumb enough to run to the sound of the alarm bell. Because the government can drop you on a dime and leave you hanging.” For Prince, who in less than a decade took an obscure military training facility, Blackwater USA,...

Whether they're directly cooperating or just "deconflicting," the US air force is operating alongside the Syrian and the Iranian air forces over Iraq and Syria. On Monday, an unnamed US defense official told the Huffington Post that the US was aware that the Iranian Air Force was carrying out air strikes against ISIS targets in eastern Iraq. "We are aware of that. I wouldn't say we're necessarily concerned with it — we kind of have our eyes on it," the official told the Huffington Post. The official noted that the Iranian strikes occurred close to the Iran-Iraq border, away from...

Lebanese forces have detained a wife and daughter of Islamic State (IS) leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi near the Syrian border, security and military sources say. The woman was identified as Saja al-Dulaimi, an Iraqi, by a senior Lebanese political source and security official. A senior Lebanese security official said Baghdadi's wife had been travelling with one of their daughters, contradicting earlier reports that it was his son. DNA tests were conducted to verify it was Baghdadi's child, the official said. The Lebanese newspaper As-Safir reported she had been detained in coordination with "foreign intelligence". They were detained in northern Lebanon....

Pope Francis traveled on his first trip to Turkey over the weekend attempting to reach out to the Muslim community, warning that the Islamic State is a major threat to Christians in the Middle East and calling on moderate Muslims to join in constructive dialogue and solidarity with the rest of the world. Instead, Turkish President Recept Tayyp Erdogan, who had a message of his own for the Pope, greeted him at his $600 million palace and blamed the rise of ISIS and the recent violence in Syria and Iraq, including beheadings, enslavements, and the wholesale ethnic cleansing of the...

British, American and other allied forces are now fighting directly alongside their former rivals Iran, according to new footage of the war in Iraq. An Iranian jet has been filmed for the first time bombing positions of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isil), during a battle for the town of Saadiya, north-east of Baghdad. United State Air Force jets have been flying missions over Iraq since August, and the RAF since September. Pentagon officials later confirmed that Iranian jets had taken part in bombing raids. Iranian advisers are known to have been embedded with the Iraqi army...

Vicar of Baghdad: Four Iraqi Christian Kids Beheaded After Refusing to Convert to Islam, Telling ISIS Militants 'No, We Love Jesus' Four Iraqi Christian children, who were all beheaded by the Islamic State, refused to betray Jesus and graciously died in his name when the ISIS militants gave them one last chance to say the Islamic words of conversion, the Rev. Canon Andrew White revealed in a recent interview. In an interview last week with the Christian Broadcast Network published on the Orthodox Christian Network, White, who is the only Anglican vicar in Iraq and is know as "The Vicar...

An Iranian McDonnell Douglas F-4 Phantom II jet has struck Islamic State targets in the eastern Iraqi province of Diyala, footage shot by regional media shows. At least one F-4 is seen conducting a bombing run against ground targets in the footage shot by Al Jazeera , which erroneously identified the aircraft as an Iraqi fighter. Iran and Turkey are the only regional operators of the F-4, and the location of the incident not far from the Iranian border, and Turkey's unwillingness to get involved in the conflict militarily, indicate this to be an Islamic Republic of Iran Air Force...

The Iranian Air Force is bombing Islamic State (ISIS) targets inside Iraqi territory. It is an intensification of Iran's military involvement on the side of the Shia regime of its neighbor and most likely also a sign of its alleged coordination with the U.S. military which is leading the international coalition fighting ISIS. The first footage of an Iranian aircraft bombing inside Iraq was broadcast by Al Jazeera a few days ago in a report on a joint operation by the Kurdish Peshmerga forces, Iraq's army and Shia militias to recapture two Kurdish towns in northeastern Iraq, near the Iranian...

Andrew White, an Anglican priest known as the “Vicar of Baghdad,” has seen violence and persecution against Christians unprecedented in recent decades. In the video embedded below, he recounts the story of Iraqi Christian children who were told by ISIS militants to convert to Islam or be killed. Their response? “No, We Love Yeshua (Jesus).”Find out more about Andrew White’s ministry, The Foundation for Relief and Reconciliation in the Middle East, which provides humanitarian assistance to many of the Christians under attack by ISIS. Be sure to watch his interview below, and spread the word about the horrific persecution going...

These fictional soldiers may be the ones Obama was counting on to fight the Islamic State — after all, his “vetted moderates” among the “Syrian rebels” are no more real than these guys. “Iraq PM Haidar al-Abadi promises corruption crackdown after probe finds 50,000 ghost soldiers,” AFP, November 30, 2014 (thanks to Bill): Iraq’s prime minister Haidar al-Abadi has promised to crackdown on corruption after an investigation uncovered the existence of 50,000 “ghost soldiers”. “The prime minister revealed the existence of 50,000 fictitious names” in the military, Mr Abadi’s office said in a statement. The 50,000 jobs were equivalent to...