National Security

Former Central Intelligence Agency analyst John Gentry has written a scathing indictment of “unprecedented” attacks on President Trump.

Venezuelan dictator Nicolás Maduro celebrated the “rebel Christ” on Friday to mark Easter, what was once a joyous holiday in the country now nearly impossible to celebrate amid its current socialist collapse.

Unrelenting rainfall reportedly prompted a section of a South African church to collapse during an Easter season service on Thursday, killing 13 people and wounding many others.

Members of a Baghdad-sanctioned umbrella organization of Iranian-backed Shiite militias in Iraq are blocking Christian victims of the Islamic State (ISIS) from returning home and otherwise persecuting them, the Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) reported Thursday, echoing U.S. government warnings.

President Donald Trump recognized the “significant role in fighting terrorism” of Libyan Gen. Khalifa Haftar’s Libyan National Army (LNA) in a phone call with Haftar on Monday, potentially marking a shift from favoring the United Nations-brokered government to endorsing the warlord who controls most of the country.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) spent some of the congressional recess in South America, which included visiting the Colombia-Venezuela border, where he expressed support for the Venezuelan people and condemned president Nicolas Maduro as he clings to power and citizens suffer.

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his wife Akie Abe will visit the White House next week, the White House announced Friday. 

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi previewed the third annual Belt and Road Forum by defending China’s infrastructure plan as a constructive program, rather than the string of debt traps depicted in U.S. criticism. He prodded the U.S. to stop interfering with Belt and Road by persuading prospective members to back away from the project.

The Russian government confirmed Thursday an unprecedented in-person meeting between President Vladimir Putin and North Korean dictator Kim Jong-un before the end of the month, noting that it anticipates positive “chemistry” between the leaders but it can only help so much.

The city of Guangzhou in southern China is offering a substantial cash reward, worth about $1,500 in U.S. dollars, to citizens who report “illegal religious activities” and help the authorities crack down on underground churches. Warm approval for the program by Chinese media suggests the practice will spread to other cities as the Communist Party works to “Sinicize” – in other words, subdue and control – all religions.

The socialist regime in Venezuela is managing to avoid U.S. sanctions by funneling oil through Russian state energy giant Rosneft, an exclusive report by Reuters detailed on Friday. 

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) asked Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, how the Pentagon is addressing climate change.

TEL AVIV – Israeli President Reuven Rivlin on Wednesday officially appointed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to the task of forming a new government for the 21st Knesset and added a plea that the Israeli premier do everything in his fifth term to bridge divides in the nation after an “us versus them” election campaign.

A radical group linked to the Islamic State has threatened an attack on the damaged cathedral of Notre Dame, or possibly another historic Christian building.

TEL AVIV – The long-anticipated U.S. peace proposal for solving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will not be unveiled before the Muslim holiday of Ramadan is over in June, President Donald Trump’s senior adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner confirmed.

E-commerce giant Amazon reportedly plans to close its domestic marketplace to Chinese consumers by mid-July due to Chinese companies dominating the market. Jeff Bezos’ company will continue to sell goods from other countries in China.

Qualcomm Inc., the U.S. company that makes the chips used in many popular smartphone models, has decided to terminate a joint venture with the government of China’s Guizhou province. The company established by this venture in 2016, Huaxintong Semiconductor Technologies (HXT), will reportedly cease operations by April 30.

The Philippines province of Pampanga hosted nine crucifixions and dozens of flagellations in its Good Friday observance this year, a tradition the Vatican discourages but continues to thrive thanks to faithful who view it as the ultimate act of penance.

Al-Qaeda declared solidarity with Chinese Uighur jihadi members of its affiliate, the Turkistan Islamic Party (TIP), amid Beijing’s ongoing oppression of its Muslim minority in Xinjiang province, the Long War Journal (LWJ) reported this week.

The head of the United Nations mission in Libya on Wednesday blasted “in the strongest terms” warlord Gen. Khalifa Haftar’s ongoing offensive to take the capital of Tripoli from troops loyal to the internationally recognized administration, accusing his eastern forces of committing “war crimes” with “indiscriminate” shelling overnight that struck densely-populated area.

The communist government of Cuba once again arrested Pastor Ramón Rigal and wife Ayda Expósito on Wednesday shortly before they had planned to leave the country. Rigal and his wife are at the forefront of an Evangelical movement against allowing the regime to educate their children. 

An unprecedented round of Qatar-based peace negotiations between the Afghan government and the Taliban scheduled to start Friday was reportedly “postponed indefinitely” on Thursday over the narco-jihadis’ objections to size of the Kabul delegation.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu used his social media platforms in the hours before the start of the Jewish festival of Passover to salute Israel’s burgeoning place in the world.

TIME magazine’s 2019 list of the world’s 100 Most Influential People, published on Wednesday, includes the self-professed “proud” anti-Semitic prime minister of Malaysia, who has publicly disparaged Jews as “hook-nosed.”

JERUSALEM — Thousands of Christian pilgrims and clergy members are marching through the ancient alleyways of Jerusalem’s Old City, retracing Jesus’ path to crucifixion in observation of Good Friday.

Israeli forces destroyed two apartments in the West Bank early on Friday that housed the family of a Palestinian terrorist who confessed to the brutal murder of an Israeli teen.

A community of Muslims who converted to Christianity over the brutality displayed by the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) during its reign of terror is reportedly growing in the once-besieged border town of Kobani, Syria, where the terrorist group suffered its first major defeat, Reuters learned this week.

Earlier this week Moroccan police arrested 23-year-old Zouhair El Bouhdidi, claiming the radical Islamist was plotting a terror attack in the Spanish city of Seville.

The World Health Organization said Thursday that 205 people have been killed, including 18 civilians, and 913 injured in two weeks of fighting in Libya.

China’s state-run Global Times on Wednesday pushed back against India’s informal boycott of Chinese products by telling Indians to adopt the brutal “996” work schedule to “catch up” with China’s tech industry instead of resorting to protectionism.