Free Republic

Interpol has rejected the Palestinian Authority's request to arrest Mohammed Rashid, a, who is wanted for embezzling hundreds of millions of dollars, the PA attorney-general, Ahmed al-Mughni, announced over the weekend. Rashid is wanted by the PA in connection with 21 cases of embezzlement, fraud and money-laundering, al-Mughni revealed. He said that he personally had contacted Rashid and asked him to hand himself in to the PA authorities, but to no avail. "The problem with Interpol is that they are saying that we are not a sovereign state and that's why they won't comply," al-Mughni told...

European Union Committee for Foreign Affairs chairman Dr. Fiorello Provera said this week that the EU was obligated to intervene on behalf of Muhammad Abu Shahala. Abu Shahala was sentenced to death by a Palestinian Authority court for selling the Beit HaMachpela (House of the Patriarchs) to Jewish families in Hevron. "Abu Shahala's conviction has no justification, and therefore the European Union will intervene to save his life," Provera wrote in response to a plea by Hevron's Jewish community asking the EU intervene on Abu Shahala's behalf. "It is inconceivable that a man who sells his house will be convicted...

MK Danny Danon (Likud) on Monday slammed a deal signed Monday between Israel's Shin Bet and hunger-striking Arab security prisoners being held on suspicion of terrorism. "This deal is a serious mistake," Danon said. "Rather than making things harder on the terrorists, they give them gifts." "The situation of security prisoners must be clear: no family visits, no special benefits, and key prisoners must be confined seperately," he added. "We would not allow a Hizbullah prisoner visits, and there is no reason to give Hamas prisoners visits," he said. "Both deny the existence of Israel." Danon told Arutz Sheva he...

A Palestinian Authority lawmaker says a deal has been reached with Israel to end a hunger strike by Arab prison inmates. The announcement confirmed a statement made earlier in the day by the Hamas terrorist organization that an agreement was in the process of being formulated. Hundreds of prisoners agreed Monday to end their strike after concessions were agreed to by the two sides, according to PA Minister for Prisoner Affairs Issa Qaraqe, who spoke with reporters. The agreement, brokered by Egyptian mediators, was reached at a prison in Ashkelon, with representatives of the Israel Security Agency (Shin Bet) and...

Soldiers, Border Police, and other security forces work around the clock to fight illegal Palestinian Authority entry to Israel. At the same time, however, PA Arabs are able to travel to the heart of central Israel without the need to go through any security checks, simply by boarding a bus. Malkiel Feder of Har Bracha in Samaria was traveling to the city of Ramat Gan on a bus run by the Afikim company when he noticed that PA Arabs were getting on and off freely. At first he assumed they were Israeli Arabs from Kfar Kassem, but as the bus...

PITTSBURGH - A suspected robber and his target exchanged gunfire on an Oakland street early Friday morning, Pittsburgh police said. The victim was walking out of the McDonald's restaurant on Forbes Avenue with friends at about 2:40 a.m. when he was confronted by Jason Woodall, who wanted to steal a bracelet that the man was wearing, police said. Woodall went to a nearby parked car and got a handgun -- which was stolen -- then came back and tried to rob the man at gunpoint, police said. The victim pulled out a legally registered and licensed handgun and exchanged shots...

The Palestinian Airlines, which had been suspended for seven years, has resumed operations with flights between Egypt’s El-Arish and Amman, its director general told AFP on Thursday. The renewal of operations was facilitated by an agreement reached between the Palestinian Transportation Ministry and the authorities in Egypt and Jordan. The airline was forced to shut down after an onslaught of Arab terrorism during second Intifada caused Israel to retaliate, damaging the roadways. “We started yesterday from Amman to El-Arish and from El-Arish to Amman,” Palestinian Airlines director general Zeyad Albad said. “We are going to have flights from El-Arish to...

ELIZABETH TOWNSHIP, Pa. — Police said they caught a home invasion suspect moments after he was shot while breaking into a home Tuesday morning. According to police, Raymond Hills, 25, fled from the Elizabeth Township home just after 4:30 a.m. when 84-year-old Fred Ricciutti shot him with the German Luger he used in the Korean War. "I said 'Halt, who's there?'" said Ricciutti. "I'm thinking, friend or foe, he shouldn't be there that time of day." Ricciutti said he was awoken when he heard Hiles breaking in through an unlocked kitchen window. When he confronted the intruder standing in his...

_ Chants in English and Spanish echoed through the Capitol dome Monday during a rally against bills that critics say would hurt ordinary citizens even as they try to clamp down on illegal immigration.More than 300 demonstrators crowded onto the stairways and balconies of the Capitol rotunda during the 90-minute long bilingual rally where speakers compared more than a dozen bills before the House and Senate to tough immigration legislation passed in Arizona and Alabama.Lorenzo Montalvo, an organizer with JUNTOS, the south-Philadelphia based immigrant advocacy group that organized the event, spoke out against the bills through a translator. "These [bills]...

Pennsylvania gun owners are furious about a planned 60-hour shutdown of the state instant check system (PICS) later this month so the State Police can upgrade its fingerprint system. While a press release says the shutdown will “temporarily restrict the purchase of firearms and negate the ability to obtain criminal history checks,” an earlier “important notice” from Major Martin L. Henry III put it more bluntly. “During this time,” Henry said, “all calls will be forwarded to an operator and placed in an undetermined or denied status. Undetermined status queries will not be processed until after the system is back...

In the weeks after state Rep. Jaret Gibbons and two aides were robbed last month in Harrisburg, local legislators have heightened safety concerns in the state capital, and the incident convinced one House member to get a permit to carry a concealed weapon. "It was kind of the final straw as for me going and getting a permit," said Jim Christiana, R-15, Beaver, who applied for a permit a few weeks after Gibbons was robbed and has since received it. "It really opened a lot of eyes," Christiana said of the robbery March 12 in an alley about a block...

An untold story today following yesterday’s Pennsylvania primaries is what a bad, bad night it was for Planned Parenthood.In Pennsylvania’s 134th House district, they spent an eye-popping $100,000 on a TV ad campaign trying to sink the candidacy of Republican Ryan Mackenzie by linking him to ultrasound legislation that was before the legislature.As Politico noted, this was seen as a trial-balloon of sorts: Most state legislative races and ad campaigns don’t necessarily have any larger resonance, but Democrats have been working to make the ultrasound bill the kind of liability for Republicans in Pennsylvania that a related proposal became for...

ALLENTOWN, Pa. - Three men who allegedly tried to rob a Allentown store owner at knifepoint didn't get far Sunday. The owner of Tommy's Mini-Mart at Sixth and Tilghman grabbed a gun and fired two shots at them, scaring them off. Speaking exclusively to 69 News, the store owner said he didn't want to use a weapon but felt he had no choice. Just as Nahy Hadeed was closing for the day, he said three men walked in and demanded all his money, pushing his face into the counter and pressing a sharp object against his throat. "Any movement, any...

The Palestinian Authority and PLO cannot be sued for the death by torture of a man killed in PA custody, the United States Supreme Court has ruled. The court found that the Torture Victim Protection Act allows for civil suits against individuals only, and not against organizations. The family of PA resident Azzam Rahim, a naturalized U.S. citizen, had sought to sue the PA and PLO for Rahim’s death in 1995. The family alleges that Rahim was tortured to death in PA custody. The PA and PLO have denied the charges. In a unanimous ruling, justices upheld a lower court’s...

Shurat HaDin – Israel Law Center has received notice that the US Supreme Court decided to dismiss a lawsuit brought on behalf of the family of a Palestinian-American murdered at the hands of Palestinian intelligence officers in Jericho in 1995. The Court ruled that the Torture Victim Protection Act, as it is currently drafted, did not allow the family to sue the Palestinian Authority and Palestine Liberation Organization. The Justices held that the use of the term “individual” in the law’s wording denoted that only private individuals, rather than corporations or organizations, could be targeted. “We were sorry to hear...

Israel’s actions have stripped the Palestinian Authority of its “raison d'etre”, creating a reality which cannot continue, PA Chairman Mahmoud Abbas will say in a letter to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, AFP reported on Sunday. The French news agency’s report was based on a copy it saw of the letter. Abbas recently revealed some of the letter's contents in a speech in Cairo. In the letter, which will be delivered to Netanyahu this week, Abbas warns that “the current status quo cannot continue”, according to the AFP report. “As a result of actions taken by successive Israeli governments, the Palestinian...

A man who police say shot and killed a Good Samaritan who intervened in a holdup at a North Philadelphia corner store last month was arrested Tuesday, police said. Police had been hunting for Angel Nieves, 18, of Schiller Street near H Street in Harrowgate, since the March 18 holdup of La Familia Latina Mini Market at Fifth Street and Glenwood Avenue that left Rafael Del Valle, 26, of North Philadelphia, dead on the street after he attempted to chase down the robber. Police gave this account: A masked gunman identified as Edward Friedland, 26, of 15th Street near Venango...

Former U.S. Senator Rick Santorum holds a four-point lead in his home state in Rasmussen Reports’ first look at the upcoming Pennsylvania Republican Primary. A new statewide telephone survey finds that 42% of Likely GOP Primary Voters support Santorum, while former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney picks up 38% of the vote. Texas Congressman Ron Paul earns seven percent (7%), and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich is at six percent (6%). Two percent (2%) like some other candidate in the race, and five percent (5%) are undecided.

WASHINGTON, DC --(Ammoland.com)- Several of the states where we have been working to introduce bills to remove restrictions for law-abiding knife owners are moving forward. There’s exciting things happening in several states. Take action TODAY to tell your legislators to vote YES. LOUISIANA KNIFE BILL WILL PROVIDE CLEAR DEFINITION OF SWITCHBLADES SB 78 sponsored by Senator Dan “Blade” Morrish will clearly separate utility, work and hunting knives from being classified as illegal switchblades. Incorporating our “bias toward closure” language will align Louisiana knife law with the 2009 definition amended to the Federal Switchblade Act. Dan Lawson, AKTI’s Legal Contributing Counsel,...

Simon Glik, the attorney who last year forced the First Circuit Court of Appeals to affirm that recording police in public is not a crime, will receive a $170,000 settlement from the City of Boston, stemming from his 2007 arrest for recording police in a public park. Even though criminal charges against Glik were quickly dismissed, it took five years to settle the case because police were seeking qualified immunity in making unlawful arrests, which would have protected them from such lawsuits. Obviously, they were under the impression that the long-standing legal principle of ignorance of the law excuses no...