Free Republic

With conditions continuing to deteriorate in Syria, the Obama administration is making a major policy shift by agreeing for the first time to allow thousands of new Syrian refugees into the United States, The Cable has learned. The numbers are relatively small: just 2,000 refugees, compared to an estimated two million people who have fled Syria during the civil war. But it's a significant increase from the 90 or so Syrian refugees who have been permanently admitted to the U.S. in the last two years. And it's not entirely uncontroversial. The refugees, mostly women and children, will be screened for...

Those who get their news from the mainstream media (or the Guardian) could be forgiven for believing that there are nearly 5 million Palestinian refugees from the 1948-49 Arab-Israeli War. So often is that figure bandied around that most don’t understand that it only reflects the number of Palestinians qualifying for “refugee” benefits under the bizarre formula of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency by which the children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren (ad infinitum) of actual refugees continue to inherit this status. This designation is even bestowed upon those Palestinians who are already citizens of other countries. (Using such demographic...

Thirty-one migrants, including nine women, drowned off the coast of Libya during an attempted crossing to Italy on a dinghy according to survivors who managed to complete the journey. A dinghy carrying 53 migrants capsized on Friday evening, and witnesses said 31 of those who had been thrown off it drowned in the accident. The twenty-two survivors, who come from Nigeria, Gambia, Benin and Senegal, said the dinghy had capsized after three days at sea. They were rescued by a passing merchant ship and taken to Lampedusa island, the reports said.

One of the first things he did upon his arrival on the Island of Lampedusa, Pope Francis laid a wreath in the waters in memory of the tens of thousands of migrants who have died trying to reach Europe in unsafe and overcrowded boats. Most of them have no names. We do not know their personal stories, their hopes and certainly not their faces. But almost 20.000 people are thought to have died during their journey of hope, across the Mediterranean sea, in the past 25 years. The migrants are all illegal so of course there are no official...

All the “POPS!” and “BANGS!” from fireworks had my single (for the time) mother edgy. Firing-squads had been murdering thousands of Cubans ‘round the clock. Other thousands of Cubans waged a lonely and hopeless guerrilla war against the massively-armed forces of Soviet proxies Che Guevara and the Castro brothers. (All this 90 miles from U.S. shores.) All those bombs and gunshots were only months distant on July 4th 1962--the Fontova family’s first Fourth in the U.S. We landed in south Louisiana, deepest darkest Dixie. Castro’s propaganda constantly hammered that such areas of the U.S. were infested by "gun and religion-clinging...

The Obama administration is considering resettling thousands of refugees who left Syria during the country's ongoing civil war to multiple towns and cities across the United States, the L.A. Times reports.

WASHINGTON — Two years into a civil war that shows no signs of ending, the Obama administration is considering resettling refugees who have fled Syria, part of an international effort that could bring thousands of Syrians to American cities and towns. A resettlement plan under discussion in Washington and other capitals is aimed at relieving pressure on Middle Eastern countries straining to support 1.6 million refugees, as well as assisting hard-hit Syrian families. The State Department is "ready to consider the idea," an official from the department said, if the administration receives a formal request from the United Nations Office...

'Palestinian' refugees from Syria who are staying in the Ain el-Hilweh 'refugee camp' near Sidon have burned aid that was provided to them by Hezbullah, and told Hezbullah to stay out of Syrian affairs. The refugees at the Palestinian Ain el-Hilweh camp in Sidon called on Hizbullah to withdraw its fighters from Syria and not to interfere in Syrian affairs, NNA said. The military support of Hizbullah has helped Syrian regime forces gain the upper hand in the battle for control of Qusayr, a key town for both the regime and the insurgents, where a fierce army assault began 12...

The Washington Times reported Sunday that “the Homeland Security Department has granted legal status to 99.2 percent of all illegal immigrants who have applied under President Obama’s new non-deportation policy for young adults, according to the latest numbers released Friday.” It’s another giant middle finger to the American people by the Obama administration, endangering national security and guaranteeing higher unemployment. Supporters of this policy, according to the Times, “say the high rate makes sense given the motivated pool of youngsters, known as ‘Dreamers’ because of the Dream Act legislation that would give them full citizenship rights.” Yes, the motivated pool...

Snip: We have been importing jihadists for years now with Muslim immigration programs under the Refugee Resettlement program, diversity visas and religious visas. The Refugee Council USA says: “The U.S. has historically maintained a policy of admitting refugees of special humanitarian concern into the country.” Yet what that means in practice is very different from what most Americans would expect. It’s always a shock to people when they first find out how Refugee Resettlement works. Instead of giving refuge to the religious minorities that are persecuted, oppressed and subjugated under the Shariah, we are opening the floodgates to Islamic supremacists...

(JNS.org) A small Massachusetts town has become a growing refuge for Egyptian Christians fleeing persecution in their homeland. Milford, located approximately 40 miles from Boston, has been drawing increasing numbers of Christians from Egypt, bolstering an existing community of Egyptians who settled in the area in the 1980s and founded St. Mark’s Church in nearby Natick, Mass. “Milford is one of the most famous cities that has a lot of Egyptians,” Maged Saad told the Boston Globe. “It is just by luck. We have no experience in USA, but we just asked one friend. He is here also.” As a...

So once again, no good deed goes unpunished. Uncle Sam lets another bunch of leeching future terrorists into the country who have absolutely no business being here, gives them “asylum,” making them immediately eligible for welfare, and this is the thanks we get? They turn into mass murderers. We bring in thousands of Muslims from a primitive society that has been battling Christians for centuries, and put them into a peaceful Christian society — what could possible go wrong? This is what I was thinking about yesterday, with much of the city under what amounted to martial law. Once more,...

The statement of Ramzan Kadyrov, Kremlin-backed president of Chechenya, blames the Tsarnaevs’ American upbringing for their actions and criticizes law enforcement for killing Tamerlan Tsarnaev in a shootout Thursday night: “Tragic events have taken place in Boston. A terrorist attack killed people. We have already expressed our condolences to the people of the city and to the American people. Today, the media reports, one Tsarnaev was killed as [police] tried to arrest him. It would be appropriate if he was detained and investigated, and the circumstances and the extent of his guilt determined. Apparently, the security services needed to calm...

There are numerous lessons to take away from the Marathon Massacre, but one of these is that it’s time to rethink our immigration policy, especially when it comes to refugees. The Tsarnaevs came to the United States as refugees. And like so many other Muslim refugees, they brought terror to our shores. Tamerlan fled Chechnya with his family because of the conflict in the early 90s, and lived for years in Kazakhstan before getting to the United States as a refugee.

A few days ago, in the city of Boston, Massachusetts, United States of America, what has been done each year, the major marathon road race of the Boston Marathon, the 117th, which honors physical strength in the area of running, was marred by the horrible event of two pressure cooker bombing attacks towards the finish line. The result was nothing but horrible, 3 people killed, one of them, an 8-year-old boy and close to 170 injured, many losing limbs in the process. Today, a few days after the Boston Marathon bombings attacks, and the presentation of a video and pictures...

Posted By Daniel Greenfield On April 19, 2013 @ 10:14 am In The Point | 1 Comment There has been too much sympathy in some circles for Chechen terrorists. After the Beslan Massacre, Time Magazine asked, “Does Russia Share Blame for Beslan?” The London Times reported that the mastermind of the massacre was “is in a state of shock over what happened, but blames the Russians.” This was Beslan. “Other survivors told how screaming teenage girls were dragged into rooms adjoining the gymnasium where they were being held and raped by their Chechen captors who chillingly made a video film...

TORONTO - The Etobicoke aunt of two men tied to the Boston Marathon bombings doesn’t want to believe her nephews are being labeled terrorists. In an exclusive interview with the Toronto Sun Friday morning, Maret Tsarnaev said Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19, and his older brother Tamerlan, 26, were being framed. “This is a huge tragedy for the family,” Tsarnaev, 45, said. “My brother’s two boys, they are growing up so fast. My first reaction is, ‘Why the hell would they do this?’ But when I go through all the material, it’s not giving anything … the whole world is now making...

Earlier today, I said that we should cut the father of the two bombing suspects some slack for calling his younger son– now on the run from police — “a true angel.” On the other hand, the apple does not fall far from the tree, apparently:Unfortunately your browser does not support IFrames.Watch More News Videos at ABC |Technology News |Celebrity News The father of suspected Boston Marathon bomber called on his son today to give up peacefully, but warned the U.S. that if his son is killed “all hell will break loose.”Anzor Tsarnaev spoke to ABC News from his home...

Anzor Tsarnaev, the father of the two suspects in the Boston bombings, called on his 19-year-old son, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, to give up peacefully. He also said, in an ABC report, that "all heal will break loose" in the United States if police kill him. He did not specify further in the ABC report. The father made the statements from his home in the Russian city of Makhachkala. He told The Associated Press in an earlier telephone call that ended angrily: My sons "were set up. I saw it on television. They killed my son."

U.S. security officials are investigating a recent intelligence report that a group of 25 Chechen terrorists illegally entered the United States from Mexico in July. The Chechen group is suspected of having links to Islamist terrorists seeking to separate the southern enclave of Chechnya from Russia, according to officials familiar with intelligence reports. Members of the group, said to be wearing backpacks, secretly traveled to northern Mexico and crossed into a mountainous part of Arizona that is difficult for U.S. border security agents to monitor, said officials speaking on the condition of anonymity. The intelligence report was supplied to the...

SNIPPET: "Harun, described as “a prototype al Qaeda operative,” was “arrested by Italian authorities on board a refugee ship and was indicted by the United States in February 2012. Italy extradited him to the United States on Oct. 4, 2012,” the Hill reported. Harun could face life in prison if convicted."

Donor countries have pledged more than $1.5 billion for Syrians displaced by nearly two years of fighting, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said, after a donor conference in Kuwait. Ban told the final session of the one-day conference that the meeting has "reached its target" of $1 billion of aid for Syria's neighbours hosting refugees and another $500 million to fund humanitarian work for 4 million Syrians afflicted by the civil war inside the country. But the funds are only expected to cover the coming months, highlighting the massive burden to cope with needs from Syria's civil war and its...

Executive Summary:On March 21, 2012, a group of Army mutineers appeared on Mali's national television station to declare that they had ended President Amadou Toumani Toure's regime and put in place the “National Committee for the Return of Democracy and the Restoration of State” (CNRDR). In the days following the coup, the leader of the CNRDR – Captain Amadou Sanago, a virtually unknown junior officer, has shown an inability to command discipline from his troops – who have looted the capital. The disappearance of President Toure and the factional infighting of the Army have made the country defenseless against AQIM’s...

Palestinian leaders, who court international sympathy by portraying their people as displaced victims of Israel, are refusing to help tens of thousands of their brethren who have been displaced from homes and refugee camps as a result of the civil war plaguing the neighboring country of Syria. Leaders of both Hamas and the Palestinian Authority have rebuffed requests by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency's (UNRWA) for assistance in stemming the humanitarian crisis in Syria, causing 150,000 Syrian citizens who claim “Palestinian” origins, to remain homeless and “facing freezing temperatures, missiles, bombs and food shortages,” as Paul Alster of...

One of the themes we’ve emphasized on American Rattlesnake this year is the damage inflicted upon American society by ill-conceived policies of refugee resettlement carried out by the federal government. Unlike past generations of refugees who came here from nations behind the Iron Curtain, Cuba, or other Communist states, the ones transplanted to the United States now are not educated, white collar elites or aspiring middle class professionals who have been dispossessed of their property and wealth by tyrannical despots. Unlike the much-maligned Polish plumbers who have migrated to the United Kingdom in order to increase their earnings before returning...

The United States military has secretly sent a task force of more than 150 planners and other specialists to Jordan to help the armed forces there handle a flood of Syrian refugees, prepare for the possibility that Syria will lose control of its chemical weapons and be positioned should the turmoil in Syria expand into a wider conflict. The task force, which has been led by a senior American officer, is based at a Jordanian military training center built into an old rock quarry north of Amman. It is now largely focused on helping Jordanians handle the estimated 180,000 Syrian...

BAMAKO - Tuareg rebels and Islamist militants have joined forces in northern Mali and say they will create an independent Islamist state. The groups took advantage of a military coup in Bamako to seize control of the territory in early April. Resistance is growing in the north to the efforts to introduce Islamic law. In the northern Malian town of Gao, court is in session. Commissioner Abdoulaye Maiga begins by reading from the Quran in the roadside courtyard outside the former police station. Once an area businessman, Maiga is a member of the militant Islamist sect Ansar Dine that residents...

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For over 2,500 years, Jewish communities have existed in the lands now known as the Middle East and North Africa, as well as in Iran. Around one million Jews lived there at the start of the twentieth century; today less than 3 percent of that one million still remain (including Iran). Upon the establishment of the State of Israel, the status of Jews in Arab countries changed dramatically. The Arab world’s rejection of the Jewish state triggered a deliberate surge in state-legislated discrimination and abuse by Arab regimes and their citizenry, making Jewish residence in Arab countries simply untenable. As...

Israel will not attain peace with the PA Arabs until that community gives up its goal of destroying Israel. They will abandon this goal only when they are convinced that there is no way they can succeed. The most important ways to work towards peace are: resettling the Palestinian “refugees” outside of Israel; encouraging reform in the Palestinian education system and speaking the truth regarding the Jews’ ancient roots in the land; reducing the ability of PA leaders to personally benefit from the conflict; and encouraging free debate in PA society. ..... What Can Be Done for the Sake of...

ZAATARI, Jordan (AP) -- More than 50 Syrian refugee youths have tried to tear down an enclosure fence at Jordan's first refugee tent city, saying they wanted to flee. An Associated Press reporter who witnessed the incident at the Zaatari camp near the Syrian border says government security guards fired three warning shots in the air to disperse the angry crowd. No injuries...

Syrian refugees started a riot in a Gaziantep refugee camp today, taking down the Turkish flag and replacing it with their own, DoÄŸan news agency reported. Syrian refugees at the site began protesting about the 1,500 Turkmen refugees that had been added to the camp, precipitating a verbal argument with security officials. The row soon escalated into a riot as hundreds of Syrians took Turkish police officers hostage and seized their guns. The Turkish flag at the entrance was taken down and refugees replaced it with their own. Syrian refugees also heavily damaged the central building nearby while destroying computers...

The U.S. Senate recently passed a precedential decision regarding refugees, UNRWA and the Palestinian Arabs.... ..... This paradox is known to anyone who has eyes in his head. It has many causes. One is the strange definition of an UNRWA refugee as those who: “... were in the territory of Palestine between June 1946 and May 1948 and lost both their homes and livelihoods as a result of the Arab- Israeli conflict.” But over time their descendants also came into the framework, and strangely enough, and contrary to the definition, those who were not needy in the first place, and...

The United States will accelerate the resettlement of about 7,000 Iraqis referred by the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees and will contribute $18 million to the agency's appeal for Iraq, about one-third of the total, Undersecretary of State Paula J. Dobriansky said Wednesday. — Washington Post, 2/15/07 I hope it won't be thought impertinent, over-inquisitive, or — Heaven forfend! — mean-spirited of me to ask, but: Just what, exactly, are these refugees seeking refuge from? Us? A few more questions come to mind. Let us suppose, for example, that Sergeant John Q. American, a serving member of the U.S. armed...

Shin Dong-huyk is 29 years old. He loves Mexican food and going to baseball games. But any similarities between Shin and other young men ends there. Shin Dong-huyk is the only person known to have escaped from a North Korean prison camp. He was born into a life of enslavement and torture inside Camp 14, where he was starved, beaten and forced to watch the executions of his mother and brother. He existed within the camp’s concrete walls, which had no running water or furniture, until aged 23, he escaped. He spent one month on the run before sneaking over...

Shots were fired Wednesday morning by Syrian forces toward a refugee camp in Turkey, located across the border from Syria, Turkish media reported. CNN-Turk broadcast images showing Syrian forces firing at Turkish territory from a border surveillance building flying the Syrian flag near southeastern Turkey. Photo Moreover, Turkish media reported that Assad troops fired at Syrian refugees trying to cross the border with Turkey. On Monday, Syrian forces fired into Turkey and Lebanon, killing two people in a Turkish refugee camp. Meanwhile on Wednesday, Syrian activists have reported fresh violence....

Israel announced Tuesday it will launch an international awareness campaign highlighting the historic injustice done to Jews from Arab countries. Following the declaration of the State of Israel in 1948 numerous Arab countries expelled their Jewish citizens and seized their assets - forcing them to become refugees in Israel. Foreign ministry officials note that 850,000 Jewish refugees lost billions of dollars in assets and were forced to begin anew in Israel with only what they could carry on their backs. The officials added that while Arabs nations have perpetuated the status of "Palestinian refugees" in their nations for generations in...

I have been wondering if the worst President ever would try something like this. Presidents have the power to pardon...if issued millions of full pardons, could the illegals then register them to vote. Thoughts?

The Arab League has instructed its members to deny citizenship to Palestinian Arab refugees (or their descendants) “to... protect their right to return to their homeland”. Read how they are treated by their brothers.

January 10, 2012 NY Speakers Series ” Losing Control of Refugee Resettlement” USARP (United States Refugee Admissions Program) Don Barnett was introduced by Mark Krikorian, Executive Director of the Center For Immigration Studies. Barnett is a former employee of the United States Information Agency within the U.S. State Department, and spent an extensive part of his career working in the former Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc, which produced most of the refugees brought to the United States during the Cold War Era. In approximately 80 minutes, Barnett gave us a sobering presentation of the problem faced by small towns and...

The fireworks at Disneyland had ended. It was past closing time and the crowds were pouring out the gates, but we lingered. Layla Alshawi, the 63-year-old mother of our friends, didn't want to leave. She hugged a light pole, joking that we would have to drag her out. We'd spent three days at the Disneyland Resort in Anaheim with my friend, Saif Alnasseri, his wife, mother and 5-year-old daughter. Like my husband, whose name is also Saif, he was an Iraqi translator I met in 2007 during my rotations in the Los Angeles Times' Baghdad bureau. A little over three...

After the Iraq war broke out, Ghazwan Al-Sharif went to work translating for the U.S. military - a job that paid well but subjected his family to repeated violence, including a brutal attack on his sister. Scared for his life, Al-Sharif accepted the government's offer to come to America as a refugee, one of thousands relocated to this country since the war began. In June 2008, he moved in with two other Iraqi refugees, sharing a two-bedroom apartment in Oakland's Fruitvale neighborhood - a situation arranged by the nonprofit International Rescue Committee. It wasn't long before Al-Sharif said he learned...

The following article is a ** MUST READ ** for anyone who wants to know how public opinion against Israel is fed by the media and academia. Israeli journalist Ben-Dror Yemini's article brilliantly demonstrates how the international community's slanted narrative -- which ignores Muslim and Arab violence against Muslims and Arabs -- does injustice to Israel, which is falsely painted as the ultimate source of all conflict and violence in the world today.

Christians are in imminent danger across the world, and yet they are being refused refugee status, while Muslim refugee immigration goes on unimpeded. U.S. policy regarding refugee resettlement would shock most Americans if they only knew. The United Nations picks who gets to come to the U.S. as a refugee. The mandate of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is to determine which of the world's huddled masses comes to the U.S. as humanitarian refugees. And predictably, this U.N. body is favoring Muslims. Christians from Muslim lands are being refused refugee status. This is occurring despite the fact that...

MANCHESTER, N.H. — This city has long been a resettlement site for refugees, sent here by the State Department for a chance at a better life. More than 60 languages are spoken in the school system, with Somalis, Sudanese, Iraqis and other recent arrivals mixing with children whose ancestors came from Quebec to work in the mighty textile mills along the Merrimack River. But this year, after decades of taking in refugees, Manchester said, “Enough.” In a highly unusual move, Mayor Ted Gatsas and the city’s Board of Aldermen asked the State Department in July to halt resettlements here for...

The riots at the Safi Detention Centre on 16th August have again shone a spotlight on the value and efficacy of Malta’s detention policy. Tear gas was used to quell the riot. Twenty-three immigrants, identified as the most violent of the rioters, were arrested, arraigned and held in custody. Fifteen police officers, three soldiers and one immigrant were slightly injured. Extensive damage was done to the detention centre itself. This incident – the latest in periodic spasms of protest by immigrants held in our Closed Accommodation Centres – raises three issues. First, are the conditions under which the detainees are...

Peshawar, 17 August 2011, Militants from Tehreek Taliban Pakistan (TTP) were again united against the Aman Lashker (Peace Forces) in Mattani, they threatened families whose work with Aman Lashker for Peace and area. More then 10 families were goodbye Mattani because of Militants Threatened. This was disclosing by Shenshah, the relative of Ijaz Ahmed Khan whose lost life in 21 July 2011 Blast at Mattani. Shenshah is one of them whose leave his home city, because of Militants threatened and now he face problem. Shenshah is the Uncle of Ijaz Ahmed Khan and he leaves Mattani area two week before,...

Hundreds of residents of Gush Katif marked on Wednesday the sixth anniversary of their expulsion from their homes, during the Sharon government’s 2005 disengagement plan from Gaza. The annual event marking the anniversary of the expulsion from Gush Katif took place, as it does each year, near the Kissufim crossing, which is the closest point to what was formerly the Jewish communities of Gush Katif. Video “Kissufim, which is right next to where we are, in English means yearning,” said Dror Vanunu, International Director of the Gush Katif Committee. “And the feeling is that all of us are yearning for...

Researchers at the Center for Near East Policy Research have produced a new documentary film entitled “Palestinian Refugee Policy: From Despair to Hope.” The film shows just how deeply Hamas has penetrated UNRWA (United Nations Relief and Works Agency), the UN agency specializing in providing aid to PA Arabs. The film does this by using school posters and interviews with UNRWA teachers to highlight how the ideal of killing Israelis—rather than working for peace—has come to dominate a UN agency. “The system of indoctrination in the Palestinian schools and summer camps run by UNRWA is contrasted with what goes on...

Hollywood star Angelina Jolie travelled to meet some of the thousands of Syrian refugees on the country's border with Turkey. The actress and goodwill ambassador for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), shared fruit and dessert with Syrians who have fled the government's bloody crackdown. Flying in on a private jet, she took boxes of toys for children at a camp in Turkey to which which nearly 10,000 have fled. Jolie spent two-and-a-half hours at camp in Altinozu, 12 miles (20km) away from the Syrian border. She reportedly asked them how they were in Arabic, before speaking with...