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As the NIAC and Trita Parsi story unfolds in the wake of Eli Lake’s bombshell story, it is interesting to note just how it might be that many on the Left are simultaneously reaching the same conclusions (e.g., it’s all a neocon conspiracy, Parsi is besieged by an MEK agent). On Parsi and NIAC’s side is Brown Lloyd James, a PR firm with much experience in this area. The firm’s website tells us: “Brown Lloyd James handled the international launch of Al Jazeera English.” And we also know from news reports that “Brown Lloyd James, a public relations firm with...

It’s the latest Leftist talking point: Rick Santorum is a bit dangerous, a bit unhinged, deeply religious and dangerously fanatical, not to be trusted with the governance of our pluralistic republic, and certainly not with guardianship of the First Amendment protection of the freedom of religion. The prominent Leftist Muslim writer Reza Aslan has recently become a foremost exponent of these claims, although they did not by any means originate with him. Leftist journalists and Islamic supremacist spokesmen always march in lockstep, using the same talking points, as I’ve pointed out previously in connection with Islamic supremacist boy Reza Aslan’s...

Iran's Revolutionary Guards have stolen dozens of sophisticated Russian-made surface-to-air missiles from Libya and smuggled them across the border to neighbouring Sudan, according to Western intelligence reports. The weapons were seized by units attached to the Guards' elite Quds Force, which travelled to Libya from their base in southern Sudan. Acting on orders received from Revolutionary Guards commanders in Iran, they took advantage of the chaos that engulfed Libya following the collapse of the regime of former dictator Colonel Muammar Gaddafi to seize "significant quantities" of advanced weaponry, according to military intelligence officers in Libya. They say the weapons stolen...

It was here at the courthouse in Benghazi where the first spark of the Libyan revolution ignited. It’s the symbolic seat of the revolution; post-Gaddafi Libya’s equivalent of Egypt’s Tahrir Square. And it was here, in the tumultuous months of civil war, that the ragtag rebel forces established their provisional government and primitive, yet effective, media center from which to tell foreign journalists about their “fight for freedom.” But according to multiple eyewitnesses—myself included—one can now see both the Libyan rebel flag and the flag of al Qaeda fluttering atop Benghazi’s courthouse. According to one Benghazi resident, Islamists are driving...

President Obama went on Safari, killing a defanged, declawed, compliant old lion, already hobbled into docility.  All that's missing is a picture of the "brave" hunter standing astride his prey, brandishing the blunderbuss, oversize pith helmet propped  up only by his cartoonishly large ears... Khadaffi was once a dangerous beast, killing American GIs in Germany and bringing down an airliner over Lockerbie, Scotland, among many other bloody predations. His eccentric behavior and outlandishly gaudy costumes brought to mind perhaps a darkly dangerous Michael Jackson of North Africa.  And the busty female bodyguards... What happened to them?  Given the track...

Startling revelations by French intelligence experts back David Shayler's alleged 'fantasy'about Gadaffi plot Martin Bright, home affairs editor Sunday November 10, 2002 The Observer British intelligence paid large sums of money to an al-Qaeda cell in Libya in a doomed attempt to assassinate Colonel Gadaffi in 1996 and thwarted early attempts to bring Osama bin Laden to justice. The latest claims of MI6 involvement with Libya's fearsome Islamic Fighting Group, which is connected to one of bin Laden's trusted lieutenants, will be embarrassing to the Government, which described similar claims by renegade MI5 officer David Shayler as 'pure fantasy'. The...

Israel Radio has just reported that Muammar Gadhafi has fled and the city of Tripoli has fallen. More to follow. What happens next remains to be seen. UPDATE 11:54 PM Here's a report and video from Sky News which has a reporter embedded with the rebels: Sky's special correspondent Alex Crawford, accompanying the rebels, said the opposition fighters were greeted with scenes of jubilation as they made their way through the outskirts of the capital. As they entered the city, their cars gridlocked the roads, she said, and hundreds of people came out onto the streets to greet them. The...

Euphoric Libyan rebels have pushed to the western outskirts of Tripoli without meeting any resistance after they overran a major military base that defends the capital. Associated Press reporters with the rebels said they reached the Tripoli suburb of Janzour around nightfall Sunday. They were greeted by civilians lining the streets and waving rebel flags. Hours earlier, the same rebel force of hundreds drove out elite forces led by Muammar al-Qaddafi's son in a brief gunbattle. The fighters hauled off truckloads of weapons and advanced full speed toward the capital. Related Video Rebel Forces Closes in on Libyan Capital Pressure...

Tension have been mounting in Libya today, with rebel forces encircling Tripoli, causing Qaddafi to lose his grip, according to the New York Times. "By Saturday afternoon, the rebels had driven Colonel Qaddafi’s forces out of the strategic oil refinery town of Zawiyah, 30 miles west of Tripoli. After a week of heavy fighting there, residents began to celebrate in the main square." Although, in Tripoli, still a Qaddafi stronghold, government officials "continued to insist that they would fight to the end," the Times wrote that "rumors swept Libya that [Qaddafi] was preparing to flee, if he had not already."...

The head of the Libyan rebel's armed forces and two of his aides were killed by gunmen Thursday, the head of the rebel leadership said. The death of Abdel Fattah Younes was announced at a press conference in the de facto rebel capital, Benghazi, by the head of the rebels' National Transitional Council, Mustafa Abdul Jalil. He told reporters that rebel security had arrested the head of the group behind the killing. Rebel security had arrested Younes and two of his aides early on Thursday from their operations room near the rebels' eastern front. Security officials said at the time...

The US national intelligence director has predicted embattled Libyan leader Col Muammar Gaddafi will defeat the rebels challenging his grip on power. James Clapper told the US Senate that Col Gaddafi's superior military force would prevail over the long term. And Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said the US would not act in Libya without international authorisation. Meanwhile, Libyan rebels are fleeing the port of Ras Lanuf after sustained attacks by Col Gaddafi's forces. In Washington, Gen Clapper, who is the top intelligence adviser to US President Barack Obama, told the Senate he saw no evidence Col Gaddafi would step...

ROME (Reuters) - At least 40 civilians have been killed in air strikes by Western forces on Tripoli, the top Vatican official in the Libyan capital told a Catholic news agency on Thursday, quoting witnesses. "The so-called humanitarian raids have killed dozens of civilian victims in some neighborhoods of Tripoli," said Giovanni Innocenzo Martinelli, the Apostolic Vicar of Tripoli. "I have collected several witness accounts from reliable people. In particular, in the Buslim neighborhood, due to the bombardments, a civilian building collapsed, causing the death of 40 people," he told Fides, the news agency of the Vatican missionary arm. Libyan...

Col. Muammar al-Qaddafi is well known now for the abuses he has inflicted on his own people during more than four decades of brutal rule in Libya, but few remember the vast campaign of carnage and terrorism he orchestrated across West Africa and Europe when he was at the height of his powers. Nor are his more recent alliance with Hugo Chávez of Venezuela and his long-standing relationship with Daniel Ortega of Nicaragua -- both of whom are busy trampling their constitutions and moving toward dictatorship -- well understood. And the fact that all three governments support the Revolutionary Armed...

The Obama administration may seek the prosecution of Muammar Qaddafi for the 1988 Pan Am bombing over Lockerbie, Scotland, following claims of some ex-Libyan officials that the embattled dictator personally ordered the airline attack that killed 270 people. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told Congress this week that she has asked the FBI and Justice Department to look into the matter in response to lawmakers' requests. "I think justice must be served," she told a Senate legislative committee Wednesday.

Aisha Qadaffi Flees The Country But Her Plane Is Denied Entry Into Malta Joe Weisenthal Feb. 23, 2011, 11:27 AM Libyan leader Muommar Qaddafi says he'll stay and die on Libyan soil, but that apparently doesn't apply to his lone daughter, Aisha. Word is she's left the country, but having a hard time finding a country that will take her. A plane she was on just got denied entry into Malta, says Al-Jazeera. Meanwhile, the Lebanese wife of Qaddai son Hanibal was denied entry into Lebanon last night.

Moammar Gadhafi emerged Tuesday morning on state-run television in a 40-second appearance to say that he is not in Venezuela as rumored, but in Tripoli. "I want to have some rest," the embattled Libyan leader told a reporter in front of what Libyan television said was his house as he pulled out an umbrella in the rain. "Because I was talking to the young man at Green Square, and I want to stay the night with them but then it started raining. I want to show them that I am in Tripoli, not in Venezuela. Don't believe those dogs in...

CNN in a news flash is reporting that several Libian towns have "fallen" to protesters, in a wave moving west to east, and that there are now reports of govt/protester clashes coming from Tripoli...

It's good, occasionally, to take a trip down memory lane. It helps to put things into perspective. Hugo Chavez ought never to have been elected president. By rights, he ought to be growing old in a jail cell somewhere. Well, it's been seventeen years, maybe he’d be in a half-way house by now. As an army officer in 1992, he led a military revolt against the legal, constitutional government of Venezuela, and attempted to overthrow the democratically elected president of the time, Carlos Andres Perez. He gambled that once the shooting started, the minister of defense and the rest of...

As a fellow traveler, Barack Obama, who has managed to impress the Bolivian dictator President as the Bolivian slammed capitalism at the UN, has also made his mark on Lybia's dictator. In a speech with as much substance as many of Obama's, Qadaffi said in his meandering and disconnected hour and a half rant that Obama is "Our Son," and "His son." This raises the proverbial question, does the fruit fall far from the tree? He apparently was unaware when he said that he wished that Obama could be President "forever" that unlike himself as head of the Lybian government,...