Free Republic

Biblical scholars have discovered the first-known original Greek copy of an ancient forbidden Christian text that purportedly describes Jesus’ secret teachings to his “brother” James, an early leader of the Church. Geoffrey Smith and Brent Landau, religious studies scholars at The University of Texas at Austin, located the rare text in Oxford University archives earlier this year. The experts found several fifth- or sixth-century A.D. Greek fragments of the First Apocalypse of James, one of the books from an ancient collection known as the Nag Hammadi library. Previously, the text was thought to be preserved only via translations in the...

Kellyanne Conway, the adviser to President Trump who coined the phrase “alternative facts,” is facing another firestorm of criticism and fact-checking after she falsely spoke of a “Bowling Green massacre” by Iraqi refugees. She acknowledged and corrected her mistake Friday morning on Twitter. (snip) Ms. Conway did not specify whether she meant an attack in Kentucky, Ohio or Downtown Manhattan, for that matter. But the closest circumstance to what she described occurred in Bowling Green, Ky., in late May 2011. Two Iraqi citizens, Mohanad Shareef Hammadi and Waad Ramadan Alwan, were indicted on federal terrorism charges. According to a Justice...

Of the 31 states that have declared their opposition to taking in Syrian refugees, one state, Kentucky, has a specific reason to be wary of the background check process: previously two Iraqi refugees who settled in Bowling Green turned out to be al Qaeda-linked terrorists with the blood of American soldiers on their hands, an ABC News investigation found. In the wake of the Kentucky case, the U.S. halted the refugee program for Iraqis for six months, a fact the Obama administration did not disclose to Congress at the time, officials told ABC News in the 2013 investigation.

An al Qaeda-linked terrorist, who was resettled in the U.S. as an Iraq War refugee after allegedly killing American soldiers, was caught on camera in Kentucky handling heavy weapons that the FBI said he believed would be sent to insurgents back in Iraq. The 2010 video, obtained exclusively by ABC News, was part of a broader ABC News investigation into the flawed refugee vetting program, which officials said may have let “dozens” of terrorists into the country. READ FULL EXCLUSIVE: US May Have Let ‘Dozens’ of Terrorists Into Country as Refugees In the video, Waad Ramadan Alwan is seen expertly...

The Justice Department announced Tuesday the indictment of two Iraqis currently living in Kentucky on terrorism charges that included an alleged plot to deliver explosives and Stinger missiles for use against Americans abroad. Waad Ramadan Alwan, 30, and Mohanad Shareef Hammadi, 23, were arrested in Kentucky on May 25, and a federal grand jury in Bowling Green returned the 23-count indictment the next day. Each faces life in prison if convicted of the charges. Alwan has been under investigation since September 2009. Over the last eight years, officials say, he allegedly has supported efforts to kill U.S. forces in Iraq,...

NOTE The following text is a quote: www.fbi.gov/louisville/press-releases/2011/iraqi-national-pleads-guilty-to-23-count-terrorism-indictment-in-kentucky Iraqi National Pleads Guilty to 23-Count Terrorism Indictment in Kentucky Defendant Participated in Numerous Efforts to Kill U.S. Troops in Iraq with IEDs U.S. Department of Justice December 16, 2011 Office of Public Affairs BOWLING GREEN, KY—Iraqi citizen Waad Ramadan Alwan pleaded guilty to federal terrorism charges today in U.S. District Court before Senior Judge Thomas B. Russell, announced Lisa Monaco, Assistant Attorney General for National Security; David J. Hale, U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Kentucky; and Elizabeth A. Fries, Special Agent in Charge of the FBI Louisville Division. Alwan,...

WASHINGTON -- An Iraqi citizen who allegedly carried out numerous Improvised Explosive Device (IED) attacks against U.S. troops in Iraq and another Iraqi national alleged to have participated in the insurgency in Iraq have been arrested and indicted on federal terrorism charges in the Western District of Kentucky. The arrests in Bowling Green, Ky., and the criminal complaints and indictment unsealed today were announced by Todd Hinnen, Acting Assistant Attorney General for National Security

SALT LAKE CITY During her visit to Lebanon last week, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice sought extradition of five men–one of them missing Utah Marine Wassef Ali Hassoun, a Lebanese newspaper reported. The Daily Star said in a story posted on its Web site Monday that the Lebanese government has refused persistent U.S. requests to hand over the five Lebanese citizens. However, it quoted an unidentified Foreign Ministry spokesman as saying the refusal was not final, and the request was currently under study by officials. "We have no official final comment at this point,'' the spokesman told the newspaper. A...

Here are two items on different topics related by their common absurdity.Reuters is reporting that some of the ransom money paid for the German government for the release of Susan Osthoff (the archaeologist who was kidnapped by Iraqi militants and later released in exchange for Mohammad Ali Hammadi, the man who killed Navy diver Robert Stethem in a hijacked TWA flight) was found on her effects. (Hat tip: Davids Medienkritik) BERLIN (Reuters) - Part of the ransom money alleged to have been paid by the German government to win the freedom of Iraq hostage Susanne Osthoff last month was found...

Jewish World Review Jan. 10, 2006 / 10 Teves, 5766 ‘Justice Will Be Done’: Remembering Navy diver who was brutally tortured and murdered by freed Hezbollah terrorist By Michael Ledeen http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | This is a letter from Kenneth Stethem to President George W. Bush. Ken is a former U.S. special-forces operator and the brother of Robert Dean Stethem, the Navy diver who was brutally tortured and murdered by Hezbollah 20 years ago. Robert's murderer was just released by the German government (and fled to Lebanon) in an apparent exchange for a German hostage in Iraq. The administration has falsely claimed...

BEIRUT: The Lebanese government has criticized the U.S. demand that Lebanon hand over an alleged Hizbullah hijacker released by Germany last week after serving 19 years in jail for hijacking a U.S. airliner and killing an American passenger. "Originally they [the U.S. government] could have requested that Germany hand him over. Why are they asking us?" Prime Minister Fouad Siniora told reporters Wednesday. Mohammad Ali Hammadi, 41, from the southern town of Deir Kifa, returned to Lebanon after serving 19 years in a German jail after being sentenced to life imprisonment by a German courting 1987 for his role in...

KEHL AM RHEIN, Germany (UPI) -- Freeing a Hezbollah member sentenced to life in prison for killing a U.S. Navy Diver may turn into yet another setback for the trans-Atlantic friendship German Chancellor Angela Merkel has vowed to strengthen. Mohammad Ali Hammadi last Thursday left his prison in North-Rhine Westphalia after a parole board and psychologists decided he was eligible for early release. A U.S. State Department spokesman on Tuesday said Washington was \'disappointed\' by the development. Hammadi served nearly 19 years in prison for his involvement in the 1985 hijacking of a U.S. TWA passenger plane and the brutal...

BEIRUT, Dec 20 (Reuters) - Germany has secretly released a Hizbollah member jailed for life for killing a U.S. Navy diver and returned him to Lebanon despite an extradition request from the United States, Lebanese political sources said on Tuesday. They said Mohammad Ali Hammadi, convicted of killing Navy diver Robert Dean Stethem during the 1985 hijacking of a TWA flight to Beirut and sentenced to life without parole, was flown back to Beirut last week.