Free Republic

JERUSALEM — Israel’s government moved Sunday to shut down the Al Jazeera Media Network’s operations in Israel, clamping down on one of the few international broadcasters providing largely uninterrupted coverage of the Gaza war. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the decision followed a unanimous vote by Israel’s war cabinet, posting on Twitter/X that “the incitement channel Al Jazeera will be closed in Israel.” In a separate statement, he accused Al Jazeera correspondents of having “harmed the security of Israel” and said “the time has come to eject Hamas’s mouthpiece from our country.” Israel’s actions placed it in the company of...

Northern Gaza is experiencing a “full-blown famine”, the head of the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) has said, and warned that it is “moving its way south”. In an interview with NBC News set to air on Sunday, Cindy McCain said that her remarks are based on what the WFP has seen and experienced on the ground. UN officials and aid agencies have for months warned of such a scenario. “It’s horror. It’s so hard to look at and it’s so hard to hear,” McCain told the US broadcaster’s Meet the Press programme. “What we are asking for and...

An unprecedented wave of antisemitism has been rising in the United States, including violent protests, tent encampments, harassment of Jewish and Israeli students, and aggressive anti-Israel and anti-Jewish messages. Those who monitored Qatar's covert activity in the US and its massive financial influx saw it as a natural continuation of promoting extremist agendas under the guise of supporting science and students. "Qatar had ideological goals, primarily to promote the ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood," explained Dr. Charles Asher Small, CEO of the Institute for the Study of Global Antisemitism (ISGAP), and organization Vice Chairman David Harris, in a New York...

The president’s brother, James Biden, will likely receive renewed focus from the fledgling House impeachment inquiry following disclosures about his involvement with Qatari government officials and his attempts to gain access to the country’s sovereign wealth fund. James Biden — who has already appeared for a transcribed interview with the impeachment investigators — has been scrutinized for more than a year due to his decades-long career as a lobbyist. The first brother has made tens of millions of dollars over the years by working for the tobacco and healthcare industries, among other ventures. His foray into Qatar and its sovereign...

I have long been wondering about Qatar's willingness to host Hamas' leadership post-10/7. As non-Western as Qatar is, the Emirate has been working assiduously to court Western approval and is hardly a radical Islamist state. This is not to suggest the regime is liberal or Liberal, but rather that they aren't exactly Iranian-style fanatics. The state is pretty much what you would expect in a country that is in a dangerous region filled with radicals but with an elite who are Western-educated and resolutely capitalist. I had long suspected that Western governments had given implicit approval for Qatar's hosting of...

Qatar accused Israel on Wednesday of deliberately starving Palestinians in Gaza and called on the international community to put more pressure on Israel to facilitate deliveries of aid without restrictions. Qatari foreign ministry spokesman Majed al-Ansari said aid provided to Gaza “is a very small part of what the residents of the strip need. There are 2.3 million people living in the complete absence of health and emergency services. More than one million live in tents in the south of the strip”. […] Speaking to the US news network CNN on Tuesday from Gaza’s southern city of Rafah, Norwegian Refugee...

Qatar, the oil-rich Middle Eastern nation that provides shelter and cash to the Hamas terror group’s top leaders, has spent nearly $6 billion since 2007 lobbying the American government and funneling cash to the United States’ top universities, funding that is generating scrutiny in Congress. With Qatar emerging as a central mediator in the United States’ attempts to reach a hostage deal between Israel and Hamas, Doha’s decades-long influence peddling operation in America is raising concerns about the country’s ties to the Iran-backed terror group. Qatar has given or contracted more than $5.6 billion to 61 American schools since 2007,...

Tehran is moving closer to accessing frozen funds, according to Iranian and Qatari readouts of a call between the nations’ foreign ministers. The Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs claimed on Friday that it has Qatari assurances of Washington’s “commitment” to allowing it to use $6 billion in frozen funds, which the Biden administration released to Qatari banks. Readouts from Tehran and Doha of a phone call between Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian and Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman bin Jassim Al Thani—who serves as both Qatar’s foreign minister and prime minister—emphasized different things. But they agreed in principle that the deal...

Chinese military enthusiasts are claiming a win for a Chinese-made fighter jet against a European counterpart in a military exercise between Pakistan and Qatar. The Pakistan Air Force (PAF) fielded its Chinese-made J-10CE jets against Qatar’s Eurofighter Typhoon fighters for the first time in the Zilzal-II air exercise, which got under way in Qatar on January 10. Chinese social media users saw the exercise as a test for the Chinese 4.5-generation fighter against a European-made jet of the same generation. Military influencers and bloggers, in particular, celebrated an unverified claim that the J-10CE prevailed over the Typhoon in all nine...

Terror group appears to pour cold water on mediators’ latest offer after Qatari PM says ‘good progress’ made; Israel said open to lengthy truce but refuses to end war Hamas on Monday evening appeared to reject a new framework for a hostage deal that had been agreed to by Israel, saying it would not accept any agreement that did not include an end to the war and the withdrawal of all Israeli troops from Gaza. The terror group issued a statement alongside a smaller terror group the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, insisting Israel must halt its “aggression”...

One of the more disturbing facts about public schools–and let’s face it, almost all facts about our public school system are disturbing–is that foreign governments and Left-wing nonprofits now design a good chunk of the curriculum. Planned Parenthood provides curricular support. The United Nations does. China does. And, in this case, Qatar is doing so. I’d love to see some investigative reporter dive into all the different groups that provide curricular material and/or funding to our public schools in order to slip into the curriculum their preferred propaganda.A map of the "Arab World" hangs in PS 261, a public school...

Fox News host Mark Levin discusses revelations that allege billions in foreign funding of U.S. academia on 'Life, Liberty & Levin.' Egypt, KSA and other middle-eastern countries are funding elite universities, in which anti-Semitism and suppression of free speech on campus have grown exponentially.

Sen. Bob Menendez is facing additional allegations contained in a superseding indictment returned Tuesday in New York. The new allegations accuse Menendez, who has pleaded not guilty to all prior counts, of making positive comments about Qatar in exchange for items of value, including luxury wristwatches. The luxury wristwatches Menendez was allegedly offered were valued between $10,000 and $24,000, according to the new indictment. “How about one of these,” the indictment quoted co-defendant Fred Daibes as saying in a message he sent to Menendez along with photos of the watches. Menendez and Daibes had attended an event in Manhattan hosted...

Sultan Al Jaber, the oil executive who is leading the COP28 climate summit in Dubai, sent shockwaves through the gathering by claiming in the days before the UN-backed talks that there is “no science” that says phasing out fossil fuels is necessary to keep global warming under a critical threshold — comments Al Jaber said were misinterpreted. Al Jaber held a surprise news conference Monday where he fiercely defended his commitment to climate science, after an increasing number of scientists and advocates expressed alarm at the comments and concern for the direction of the talks. The future role of fossil...

Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Strength) threatens to resign from government if a deal to release hostages ends the war with Hamas. Otzma Yehudit threatens to dissolve the government, if Israel does not continue fighting with Hamas in Gaza, after the implementation of the outlines for the return of the captives. Sources in the party emphasize that if another deal is brought to the government that will result in the stopping of the war, all six Otzma Yehudit Knesset members, led by Minister Itamar Ben Gvir, will leave the coalition. "The utimate goal of the war is the complete elimination of Hamas....

Can someone explain to the rest of us why the leaders of Hamas, the world's evilest terrorist organization which has just murdered 1,400 innocent people, are actual billionaires living their best lives in Qatar? According to the New York Post:While their people languish in poverty and are treated as human shields, the leaders of Hamas live billionaire lifestyles.The terror group’s three top leaders alone are worth a staggering $11 billion between them and enjoy a life of luxury in the sanctuary of the emirate of Qatar. The emirate has long welcomed the leaders of the terror group and installed them...