Free Republic

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...

The Center for Immigration Studies has called for a “wide-ranging review” of the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP). CIS said the program is out-of-control and "rife with fraud." Hundreds of non-governmental organizations benefit from U.S. taxpayer dollars, but often neglect refugees after they settle in the U.S. CIS said the admissions process has been “surrendered” to the UN and to the NGOs. “In recent years,” said CIS, “up to 95 percent of the refugees coming to the United States were referred by the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) or were putative relatives of U.N.-selected refugees.” CIS provides full details...

With Canada's federal election out of the way, Stephen Harper's Conservative government can get back to work on negotiating and creating the so-called North American Security Perimeter with the United States. The multi-faceted plan is to include programs of shared information between the two countries regarding possible terror threats, at home and abroad. The fact that many Canadians question the effectiveness of making an agreement with an American president whose commitment on such matters is suspect at best is a topic for another day. The quandry of such an agreement is that to be effective, both nations would have to...

Thousands rallied in support of Palestinians on Friday, with demonstrators in Jordan's capital heeding a call by Facebook organizers to demand a sovereign Palestinian state, others near the Jordanian-Israeli border chanting "Death to Israel," and still more activists filling Cairo's Tahrir Square. Palestinian youth groups called for protests in the West Bank and nearby Arab countries to mark the anniversary of the May 15, 1948, creation of the Jewish state. Palestinians call the anniversary the "day of catastrophe" because of the refugee crisis and loss of land that accompanied the creation of Israel. About 500 protesters, demanding a sovereign Palestinian...

Dozens of African migrants were left to die in the Mediterranean after a number of European military units apparently ignored their cries for help, the Guardian has learned. Two of the nine survivors claim this included a Nato ship. A boat carrying 72 passengers, including several women, young children and political refugees, ran into trouble in late March after leaving Tripoli for the Italian island of Lampedusa. Despite alarms being raised with the Italian coastguard and the boat making contact with a military helicopter and a warship, no rescue effort was attempted.

As NewsBusters reported Tuesday, the United Nations in 2005 wrongly predicted there would be 50 million environmental refugees by the end of the previous decade as a result of global warming. Aaron Worthing noticed Friday that the 'handy map" the U.N. had created to identify places most at risk for such population migrations has been removed: You might remember the other day I pointed out how the UN predicted 50 million climate refugees by 2010, a prediction that came up laughably short of the mark by only around 50 million. Well, if you go to that post and click on...

Junk Science: Five years ago, the U.N. predicted that by 2010 some 50 million people would be fleeing climate change, rising seas, mega-hurricanes and so on. Instead, no islands have sunk and their populations are booming. It's been said that when you make a prediction and provide a date, never give a number, and if you give a number, never provide a date. That way you can always claim to be right, even when you are wrong, and that it just hasn't happened yet. The United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) made that mistake in 2005 when it produced a map...

"Refugees ought not to come to Germany," announces Die Welt. The position that Berlin is expected to adopt when European interior ministers meet to discuss immigration on 11 April is unlikely to be welcomed by Italy which has called for solidarity in the drive to cope with thousands of immigrants who have recently arrived from North Africa. “Italy’s dirty tricks amount to unacceptable blackmail," remarks the conservative daily, which nonetheless acknowledges that "it is inadmissible that Italy and Malta pay the price for changes that are in all of Europe’s interest." For Die Welt, Europe should come together to invest...

n 2005, the United Nations Environment Programme predicted that climate change would create 50 million climate refugees by 2010. These people, it was said, would flee a range of disasters including sea level rise, increases in the numbers and severity of hurricanes, and disruption to food production. The UNEP even provided a handy map. The map shows us the places most at risk including the very sensitive low lying islands of the Pacific and Caribbean. It so happens that just a few of these islands and other places most at risk have since had censuses, so it should be possible...

Colonel Gaddafi, having foolishly agreed not to arm himself with chemical, biological or nuclear weapons*, a lesson other dictators may heed, has set upon a more surreal but perhaps more effective weapon against the West – refugees. According to this newspaper: Libya is unleashing a wave of migrants against Europe as retaliation for the coalition’s military strikes against the country.…Col. Muammar Gaddafi’s regime is alleged to have been actively encouraging boatloads of migrants to leave the country’s shores since March 22, when the first vessel sailed from Tajoura, a suburb of Tripoli.Libyan armed forces and militias are reportedly turning...

Larry Klayman, founder of Freedom Watch, has announced that he has launched a lawsuit against Facebook and its founder, Mark Zuckerberg, for allegedly facilitating jihad against Israel. It seeks damages of up to $1 billion. WND reported earlier this week on strategies that were being developed on Facebook pages for thousands of people worldwide to "return" to the original homes of their families in "Palestine" on May 15. It was explained in an in-depth report by L. Barkan, a research fellow at the Middle East Media Research Institute, which monitors and analyzes media reports throughout the Middle East. He reported...

Libya’s upheaval triggers life-or-death migration—up to 20,000 a day—to countries with enough chaos of their own. For Nigerian Ike Emanuel, a perilous trek across Libya's harsh desert turned into an unexpected funeral procession for the youngest member of his family: The 35-year-old migrant worker said he buried the tiny body of his infant daughter after she died of exposure during the flight from Libya's chaos. "We spent three days in the desert and she was a little baby of six months, and she could not endure the cold," Emanuel told Reuters on March 2. "I am going home with nothing."...

  Rachel Nyirahabiyambere and one of her grandchildren. WASHINGTON, D.C., March 11, 2011 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A Rwandan immigrant woman and survivor of the horrors of the 1994 genocide who had her feeding tube removed because a U.S. Catholic-affiliated hospital deemed her care too expensive, apparently will not die of starvation and dehydration thanks to a court order and the efforts of her children. Rachel Nyirahabiyambere, a 58-year-old grandmother and refugee from war-torn Rwanda, had been denied food and water since Feb. 19 after her feeding tube was removed by order of her court-appointed guardian. Now 21 days later and still...

The high crime rate in Ciudad Juárez has spurred many Mexican businessmen to transfer their business operations to El Paso, where there are already 100 new companies that have opened their doors in U.S. territory. Juárez, just across the Rio Grande from this Texas city, is Mexico's murder capital, where more than 8,000 people have died since early 2008 in drug-related mayhem. The Juárez business owners now in El Paso have created an organization, La Red (The Network), to provide logistical support so that Mexican exiles can begin their business activities anew. "We Mexican businessmen who invest in El Paso...

Hundreds of refugees who sought shelter in the United States during the early years of the Iraq war are coming under fresh scrutiny from U.S. government security officials for possible links to Al Qaeda's affiliate in Iraq. FBI Director Robert Mueller surprised some terrorism experts Thursday when, in response to a question about threats inside the United States, he said the FBI was closely monitoring Al Qaeda's Iraq-based offshoot. The group has killed thousands in Iraq but had not been viewed as a threat inside the United States. Mueller said the possible threat rested with "individuals who may have been...

taly on Friday warned of a looming immigration "emergency" and appealed for European Union assistance, as coast guards intercepted hundreds of undocumented immigrants sailing from Tunisia. "There is a risk of a real humanitarian emergency," Interior Minister Roberto Maroni said. The uprising in Egypt and last month's revolt in Tunisia are leading to a "mass flight" to Italian shores by immigrants, he added. Maroni said Italy needed European help and had made a request for the EU's justice and home affairs council later this month to discuss "the crisis in North Africa and its effects on immigration and internal security...

One of the issues we raised in the Jan. NER article, What Rep. Peter King Could Do About Radicalization of American Muslims was the broken humanitarian refugee program run by our State Department, Department of Homeland Security, Immigration Control and Enforcement agency and Department of Health and Human services, Office of Refugee Resettlement. We drew attention to the example of Somali Muslims who have posed terrorist threats here and abroad, rejected assimilation and lived off of taxpayer-funded welfare and MEDICAID while sending hundreds of millions of dollars home to war-torn Islamist Somalia wracked by civil war perpetrated by al Qaeda...

The following story was told to the American-Rattlesnake by a graduate of the Maritime College of the State University of New York, who has an unlimited master’s license and has been a sailor for over a decade. American-Rattlesnake has maintained their anonymity at their request.Working as a merchant mariner, stowaway stories were not new to me. I got my own story to tell on a vessel carrying two Ethiopian refugees back to the USA. This is not going to be a tale of woe and sympathy for refugees. It is a tale of woe for America – the great nation...

MINNEAPOLIS — Twenty-nine people have been indicted in a sex trafficking ring in which Somali gangs in Minneapolis and St. Paul allegedly forced girls under age 14 into prostitution in Minnesota, Tennessee and Ohio. The 24-count indictment, unsealed in U.S. District Court in the Middle District of Tennessee, said one of the gangs’ goals was recruiting females under age 18, including some under age 14, and forcing them into prostitution so the defendants could get money, marijuana or liquor. The indictment details several instances in which young Somali or African American girls were taken from place to place and forced...

Israel is often being treated unfairly. The world looks at the plight of the Palestinians in refugee camps in Lebanon, Gaza, and other places, and many blame Israel. The UN claims that there are over 4.7 million Palestinian refugees, and many blame Israel. These voices say the Palestinians should be allowed to return to “Palestine.” But where is Palestine? Many say Israel must solve the problems of Palestine. But is Israel guilty of the plight of the Palestinian refugees? My answer is “No.” The Arab leaders are to be blamed – and Islam is to be blamed. Let me first...

The gap between Israel and the Palestinians on the refugee question cannot be reconciled. Palestinians demand a "just peace," which implies recognition of the right of return and rejects any compromise on the issue. The Palestinian position looks to UN resolutions that uphold the right of return as a "private right" of every refugee. This means that representatives of the Palestinian people have no authority to waive this right in the name of the refugees. According to the Palestinian consensus, non-implementation of the right of return will leave open the gates of the conflict with Israel. This implies justification for...

<p>PORTLAND, Ore. – Undercover agents in a sting operation arrested a Somali-born teenager just as he tried blowing up a van full of what he believed were explosives at a crowded Christmas tree lighting ceremony in Portland, federal authorities said. The bomb was a fake supplied by the agents and the public was never in danger, authorities said. Mohamed Osman Mohamud, 19, was arrested at 5:40 p.m. Friday just after he dialed a cell phone that he thought would set off the blast but instead brought federal agents and police swooping down on him.</p>

President Barack Hussein Obama, in a determination letter to Congress, has announced that he will allow an additional 80,000 immigrants – - mostly from Islamic countries – - to resettle in the United States during fiscal year 2011. Mr. Obama says that the increase in Muslim immigrants “is justified by humanitarian concerns or is otherwise in the national interest.”

WASHINGTON — A Navy warship was providing humanitarian supplies to passengers aboard a broken-down boat off the coast of Somalia on Monday when the boat suddenly capsized, killing at least 13 passengers. Another eight passengers were still missing, Navy officials said. The failed rescue was the latest incident involving U.S. military personnel in Somali waters, where deteriorating security conditions have encouraged piracy and produced a flood of refugees trying to flee to Yemen. Most cross the Gulf of Aden in rickety and overcrowded vessels run by smugglers. According to the Navy, a skiff with 10 Somalis and 75 Ethiopians on...

CIUDAD JUAREZ, Mexico – Some 230,000 people have left Ciudad Juarez, a border city that has become Mexico’s murder capital, in the past three years as the death toll from a gang war topped 7,000, a non-governmental organization said in a new report. About 124,000 people, or 53.9 percent of the total, have sought safe haven in El Paso, Texas, which is just across the border, the Ciudad Juarez Citizens Security and Coexistence Observatory said. The rest have returned to their hometowns, mainly in Durango, Coahuila and Veracruz states, to get away from the drug-related violence. “Action should be taken...

Israel's Haaretz news agency recently reported that on Sept. 19 former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said that President George W. Bush promised to take in 100,000 Palestinian refugees, giving them automatic American citizenship in exchange for a mid east peace deal. Former prime minister Ehud Olmert said Sunday that the Bush administration had assured him that the United States would be willing to absorb some 100,000 Palestinian refugees immediately as American citizens, should Israel reach a permanent settlement with the Palestinian Authority. Imagine that. If Olmert can be believed the one president that built his reputation on being a...

I bet you didn't know that (I didn't). I wrote my Sun column about it today: Tamils on the reboundGreat news: There is a country in Asia willing to take Sri Lankan Tamil refugees by the thousand — with the United Nations’ seal of approval. And they’re already doing it. In the first six months of 2010, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees says the generous country accepted 1,857 Tamil refugees from Sri Lanka, who had been staying temporarily in India. UN refugee spokesman Michael Zwack says these Tamils are now “rebuilding their lives.” The UN quoted one Tamil refugee,...

A dingy floral print peels from the walls, and sheets of plastic are taped over some of the windows. But for Harka Rai, the sagging trailer home he bought in rural Oregon is his piece of the American dream. Rai, who is married with a 4-year-old son and another child on the way, was just a boy when new citizenship laws forced his ethnic Nepalese family out of Bhutan. For 18 years, they waited in a refugee camp in Nepal, hoping to return home. "We built a bamboo house," he said. "The dust comes inside. The rain comes inside. And...

WINDSOR, Ont. — Amherstburg police officers have nabbed five people — three children and two adults — attempting to enter Canada illegally by boat, the second time in a month they have foiled a human smuggling bid. Read more: http://www.windsorstar.com/news/Amherstburg+police+foil+human+smuggling/3417510/story.html#ixzz0x9AEG6w1

Thirty-five million Americans as homeless refugees: That would be a disaster proportionate to the horrific -- and worsening -- situation in Pakistan. This time, that forlorn country isn't threatened by Islamist terror, but by Mother Nature. Two weeks of flooding, with more rain on the way, have made refugees of 20 million Pakistanis. Try to grasp that number. Twenty million people, overwhelmingly poor, have lost their homes, their slight "wealth" and their livelihoods. Thousands have died. And international aid groups estimate that 3.5 million children are at mortal risk from diseases spread by polluted water and poor sanitation. Think cholera,...

Refugees? Canadians, even if their families have lived here for centuries, know something about refugees. We know Hungarians, we know Vietnamese, we know many others. We admire their energy and their accomplishments. Observing them can be a bracing lesson in human tenacity under adverse circumstances. But that pattern doesn't cover Palestinian refugees. They are a special case. For many reasons, various populations across the planet are displaced; only the Palestinians cling to their "refugee" status decade after decade. They present themselves as helpless victims of Israeli aggression. They await rescue-- as they have been awaiting it for three generations, since...

Several Senators have learned of a possible plan by the Obama Administration that would provide a mass Amnesty for the nation's 11-18 million illegal aliens. Led by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), eight Senators addressed a letter to the President asking for answers to questions about a plan that would allow DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano to provide an amnesty if they can't secure enough votes for a bill in the Senate. The letter that was sent to Pres. Obama earlier today asks the President for clarification on the use of deferred action or parole for illegal aliens. The executive actions are...

[Story #3] RUSH: Amnesty is the single largest voter registration drive which has ever occurred in the country. Now, Obama, by the way, speaking of that, a little blog here, Numbers USA: "Several Senators have learned of a possible plan by the Obama Administration that would provide a mass Amnesty for the nation's 11-18 million illegal aliens. Led by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), eight Senators addressed a letter to the President asking for answers to questions about a plan that would allow DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano to provide an amnesty if they can't secure enough votes for a bill in...

Eight Senators seem to think so. They have sent Obama a letter asking for a guarantee that he will not use an Executive Order to grant amnesty to illegal immigrants already in the United States: Numbers USA: Several Senators have learned of a possible plan by the Obama Administration that would provide a mass Amnesty for the nation’s 11-18 million illegal aliens. Led by Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), eight Senators addressed a letter to the President asking for answers to questions about a plan that would allow DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano to provide an amnesty if they can’t secure enough...

Angelina Jolie visited a refugee center in Sucombios province north Ecuador, Friday, June 18. The center houses thousands of refugees who have fled the conflict in adjacent Colombia.

As if we needed another reason not to vote for retread California gubernatorial candidate Jerry Brown, I just learned via a BookTV talk by former South Vietnamese, and now American, U.S. Marine veteran and author Quang Pham that Brown tried to block Vietnamese refugees from settling in California when he was governor in the 1970s. At the same time, he's always been soft on illegal immigration from Mexico and South America and friendly to Castro and Cuba. So one can surmise that the left-leaning Brown didn't want the Vietnamese refugees to settle in California because they were anti-Communists (and with...

A non-profit nation of hundreds of taxpayer funded 501(c)(3)s has grown up around refugee resettlement in the U.S. A recent government-sponsored study finds "U.S. resettlement communities are awash with ECBOs that exist in name only but provide little meaningful assistance." ("Practitioner Lessons from Ethnic Community Self-Help Programs," ISED Solutions, August 2009) Some of the ECBOs (Ethnic Community Based Organizations) apparently exist only to bring in grants and contracts for themselves. But this will not be mentioned in the flurry of meetings, memoranda, and recommendations around an initiative to "help restore the capacity of the US Refugee Program to serve increased...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_9oCv396yU

The Palestinians have been holding the title of “refugees” for over six decades . They have succeeded in creating a unique historical narrative for themselves . This myth is growing, so it should be shattered and the real facts presented: the Palestinian population before the first Aliya was sparse, hundreds of thousands of Jews were also expelled from Arab countries, and there is no precedent anywhere in the world for the right of return. The Nakba - the story of the Palestinian refugees is the greatest success story in the history of modern times - a success that is a...