In two weeks, a Portland musician will travel to ISIS-controlled Syria to perform a concert for peace.
It may sound crazy to some, but it’s not the first time James Twyman has gone to a war torn area to sing and pray for peace. While it might be dangerous, James feels he has to do it.
Twyman sings the Muslim prayer. It’s just one of many prayers he puts to music from various religions when he sings for peace around the world.
In the late 90’s, Twyman performed in Baghdad amid fallout from Dessert Storm and he played in Syria a couple years ago.
On Jan. 20, Twyman will travel to the Israeli-Syrian border to hold a concert in a Syrian village. It is in ISIS-dominated territory, but Twyman says he has people there setting it up and making sure it’s as safe as possible.
Twyman’s goal is for people at the concert and around the world to sing and pray for peace at the exact same time. He’s well aware of the danger involved, but says that’s not enough of a reason to stay away.
“With all the violence, with all the feat that has been generated, I think the only answer is for us to focus on love and compassion and peace. And so do something as crazy as going over there, it hopefully inspires people.”
Mexican marines had barely faced down .50-caliber sniper guns and a loaded grenade launcher to recapture the world’s most notorious drug lord when the calls started coming: Extradite Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman to the United States. And soon.
Mexico’s leaders avoided talk about extradition following Guzman’s capture early Friday, but even if they decided to send him to the U.S., the process likely would not be fast. For now, they have sent him back to the Altiplano maximum-security prison from which he escaped in July.
Guzman, head of the powerful, international Sinaloa Cartel, was presented late Friday in dark blue athletic clothing. He was frog-marched to a helicopter by marines, who stopped mid-transit and turned his expressionless face toward the media for a clear view.
CNN was all too happy to give one self-proclaimed “silent protester” a voice.
Saying she didn’t plan to disrupt the event, a Muslim woman wearing a hijab and a yellow Star of David was escorted out of a Donald Trump campaign rally on Friday when she disrupted the event.
And she caught an earful from Trump supporters in Rock Hill, South Carolina, over her staged antics — CNN interviewed the woman BEFORE the rally.
Rose Hamid strategically positioned herself behind Trump and stood up in silent protest wearing a shirt that read “Salam, I come in peace,” when the candidate began talking about Syrian refugees, according to the network.
Woman in turquoise w/ hijab is Rosa Hamid. Said she’s here bc “most Trump supporters probably never met a Muslim.” pic.twitter.com/G6jO15xQpa
— Jeremy Diamond (@JDiamond1) January 9, 2016
Hamid, 56, and one other man with her were wearing yellow stars similar to those worn by Jews during the Holocaust — the only difference being that no one has shoved 6 million Muslims into ovens.
‘There is hatred against us that is unbelievable,” Trump told the audience as Hamid was being removed. “It’s their hatred, it’s not our hatred.”
Muslim woman kicked out of Trump Rally for being Muslim. Short says ‘I come in peace’ asked if she had a bomb pic.twitter.com/BGdeoK1UUd
— Teymour (@Teymour_Ashkan) January 9, 2016
Full of chutzpah, Hamid displayed the same stereotyping she claimed to be protesting.
“I figured that most Trump supporters probably never met a Muslim so I figured that I’d give them the opportunity to meet one,” she told CNN beforehand. “I really don’t plan to say anything. I don’t want to be disrespectful but if he says something that I feel needs answering I might — we’ll just see what strikes me.”[…]
Hamid is the co-founder and president of Muslim Women of the Carolinas and writes a column for The Charlotte Observer about her faith, according to the Daily Mail.
On Sept. 11, 2012, a group of local fighters, AK-47s in hand, burst through the fortified front gate of a US outpost in Benghazi, Libya.
One very long night later, the diplomatic compound was engulfed in flames and a covert CIA base a mile away lay in ruins, partially reduced to rubble by mortar fire. Four Americans were dead, including Ambassador Christopher Stevens and two CIA members.
An Uzbek refugee authorities say had an unwavering commitment to kill personnel at a military base or civilians at crowded Fourth of July celebrations in downtown Boise, Idaho, has been sentenced to 25 years in prison.
Fazliddin Kurbanov received the sentence Thursday that includes three years of supervised release and a $250,000 fine. He will also face deportation proceedings after serving the prison sentence.
A federal jury in August convicted Kurbanov of conspiracy, attempting to support a terrorist organization and possession of bomb-making components. Kurbanov has maintained his innocence.
“Your honor,” Kurbanov told U.S. District Judge Edward J. Lodge through an interpreter, “I’d like to say that I’m not a terrorist. I’ve never been a terrorist.”
But Lodge in handing down the sentence said Kurbanov “intended to commit jihad against the United States.”
Prosecutors say the 33-year-old Russian-speaking truck driver who fled Uzbekistan in 2009 downloaded jihadist and martyrdom videos from a terrorist website and communicated with a terrorist organization, the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan. Authorities monitored his communications and arrested him in 2013.
Besides targeting Boise, authorities said, Kurbanov also discussed with a confidential FBI source targeting military bases, in particular West Point Military Academy in New York.
A new lawsuit in New York claims a teacher was fired after crafting a lesson plan on the Central Park Five intended to “rile up” black students.
In 1989, jogger Trisha Meili was savagely raped while jogging in Central Park, New York, and spent nearly two weeks in a coma. Five black and Hispanic men, nicknamed the Central Park Five, were tried and convicted for the attack and spent years in prison. But in 2002, another man confessed to the attack and all of the men had their convictions vacated.
The case fueled allegations of racism in policing, with supporters of the Central Park Five saying they were victims of a hostile police force and biased media coverage. In 2014, a lawsuit stemming from the case was settled for $41 million.
High school English teacher Jeena-Lee Walker says she wanted to use the Central Park Five as major part of her curriculum, claiming that it captivated her students in a way other subjects would not.
The student visa program is allowing dangerous enemies into the US, a former top Homeland Security official claims.
Claude Arnold, retired special agent of Homeland Security Investigations, said that the program invites 1.2 million foreigners into the U.S. each year.
He told told FoxNews.com that most student visa recipients take advantage of America’s system of higher education and leave when their terms expire.
But every year approximately 58,000 overstay their visas and dropout of contact with authorities.
Tens of thousands of immigrants have fallen off the government’s radar and ‘it is only a matter of time before there is some horrible act, or some act of terrorism’, according to Arnold.
The Louisiana Right to Life is causing quite a stir in the ever-so-liberal New Orleans area.
The state’s largest pro-life organization has placed pro-life signs along city-owned streetlight poles on St. Charles near Nashville Avenue, but now some city officials and abortion advocates are demanding the signs be removed because they are “offensive.”
Ben Clapper with the Louisiana Right to Life said the organization went through the entire process with New Orleans’ Public Works Department and got the signage approved. The guidelines for banners on streetlight poles prohibit commercial advertising or political campaigning, only “community messaging” is allowed.
Subsequently the pro-life banners were approved by the city because they fall under the “community messaging” category.
However, abortion advocates in New Orleans say the signs need to be removed because it makes it seem as though the city endorses the pro-life initiative.
“For it to look like the city is endorsing this in the same way they would put up a banner for the anniversary of the Treme neighborhood is very inappropriate,” said Jessie Nieblas, communications coordinator for the New Orleans Abortion Fund, which tries to assist women who cannot afford to pay for abortions.
Nieblas went on to claim that the banners could ignite violent rhetoric and violent behavior from pro-lifers in the New Orleans area.
The Jerusalem District Attorney’s Office filed an indictment with the city’s district court on Friday against two Arab Israeli residents of East Jerusalem who allegedly plotted to kill Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during an event at the capital.
According to the indictment, Hazem Ziad Amran Sandouqa, a 22-year-old resident of Jerusalem’s Old City, and Fahdi Daoud Muhammad Abu Qaian, a 19-year-old Bedouin Israeli from the Negev, planned, along with Hamas activist Ahmad Jamal Mousa Azzam, 24, to plant explosives in the Jerusalem Payis Arena at a time when Netanyahu would be scheduled to speak at the site, Ynet reported.
Elwood police have cited a truck driver after he allegedly entered the Abraham Lincoln National Cemetery and ran an 18-wheel semitrailer over the graves of three veterans.
Disobeying the “No Truck” signs posted at the entrance to the cemetery off Route 53, the driver told police he was traveling Monday afternoon to a warehouse located at the nearby intermodal facility operated by CenterPoint Properties, according to a news release from Elwood initiative Safe Roads Illinois.
Identified by Elwood Police Chief Fred Hayes as Faraz Namdari, 43, of Chicago, the driver rolled the truck over the graves, narrowly missing several headstones, the release stated. Namdari was stopped by cemetery staff who notified police.
Police issued three citations to Namdari. He was cited with disobeying a 5-ton weight limit sign, operating an over-length truck and spilling debris on the roadway.
At least 1,340 emails that Hillary Clinton sent or received contained classified material, according to the State Department’s latest update from its ongoing review of more than 30,000 emails.
The State Department released a new batch of 3,007 pages of Clinton’s emails after 1:30 a.m. Friday in response to a court order. Of those, 66 contain classified information.
None of Clinton’’s emails was marked as classified during her tenure, State Department officials say, but intelligence officials say some material was clearly classified at the time. Her aides also sent and received classified information.
Notice the audience claps when Whoopi says we need to get rid of automatic weapons, both before and after being told that there are no automatic weapons being used. This is the problem that liberals exploit, the lack of understanding of the facts and the law.
Supporters of the Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamisation of the West (PEGIDA) have rallied outside the main train station in Cologne today, the location of nearly 200 migrant sex attacks on New Year’s Eve.
Around 1700 PEGIDA supporters and 1300 counter demonstrators turned out, as well as a contingent of around 800 football hooligans. They were met by roughly 2000 German police.
Those from PEGIDA carried banners and signs bearing slogans like “Rapefugees not welcome”, waved German and British flags and chanted “Merkel out!”
Things went peacefully for the most part, but a smaller number of mainly football hooligans were involved in disturbances near the end as police blocked the path of the demonstration. There was ongoing disruption from the counter demon also. Pepper spray was used and water cannon deployed against the PEGIDA marchers at around 3pm, and an unknown number of arrests were made.
Notice the question is not whether the migrants have done anything wrong, can’t ask that question. Because then you’d really have to address the ‘clash of civilizations’ and the fundamental difference in respect for the rights of women.
The career criminal accused of slashing a woman on her way to work at Whole Foods on Wednesday is also suspected of striking a 25-year-old victim on the head with a bottle while calling her a “white bitch,” police sources said.
Kari Bazemore, 41, was charged Thursday night with a third assault, and has been linked to two more attacks since the end of September, sources said.
According to the newest charges, he struck a 43-year-old victim in the face with a heavy shopping bag as she stood on Fifth Avenue in Midtown on Nov. 4.
Cologne’s police chief has been sent into early retirement following criticism over his handling of allegations of sex assaults and violence by migrants on New Year’s Eve.
Wolfgang Albers admitted mistakes were made in a report compiled after more than 100 New Year revellers were sexually assaulted, robbed or threatened during the city’s celebrations, mostly by migrants and asylum seekers.
Cologne police said the decision to retire Mt Albers would be formally discussed by North Rhine-Westphalia’s governing Cabinet on Tuesday, but he would not be returning to his job.
The sacking came as a women’s rights campaigner and performance artist named Milo Moire staged a naked protest over the assaults.
Ms Moire stood in front of Cologne Cathedral brandishing a placard which read: “Respect us. We are not fair game even when we are naked.”
The U.S. military released a video Saturday showing what it says is an Iranian military vessel firing several unguided rockets near the aircraft carrier Harry S. Truman and other Western warships and commercial craft.
The incident occurred Dec. 26 in the Strait of Hormuz. Navy officials released the video to Military Times in response to a Freedom of Information Act request. The images show what appears to be an Iranian Revolutionary Guard vessel firing rockets from a distance of about 1,370 meters.
Officials with U.S. Central Command first disclosed details about the incident last month. Approximately 20 minutes before the incident occurred, the Iranians had announced over maritime radio that they would be carrying out a live-fire exercise, officials said.
Political prognosticators Lynnette “Diamond” Hardaway and Rochelle “Silk” Richardson said Friday that Donald Trump is destined for a landslide victory in the 2016 presidential election.
The former Democrats were charmed by the handsome business mogul early in his candidacy. Ever since, they have used their mastery of social media to spread the news of his candidacy. Hardaway and Richardson “stump for Trump” under their pseudonyms on the YouTube channel The Viewer’s View.
“Listen. He is going to be the next president of the United States,” Diamond predicted. “So everybody needs to get onboard with Donald J. Trump, baby. Stump for Trump.”
“What’s so good about Donald Trump that you would switch away from the Democrats and support the Donald?” Fox Business anchor Stuart Varney asked.
Berlin (AFP) – Cologne police said Saturday the number of cases filed over violence during New Year’s festivities had reached 379, and that asylum seekers and illegal migrants made up the majority of suspects.
“Those in focus of criminal police investigations are mostly people from North African countries. The majority of them are asylum seekers and people who are in Germany illegally,” police said in a statement, adding that around 40 percent of the cases related to sexual assault.
Investigations were ongoing to determine if charges could be brought against the suspects, it said, with 100 investigators now examining the cases.
Cologne police chief Wolfgang Albers was suspended yesterday after his force came under fire for failing to prevent the shocking spate of crime a week ago.
Witnesses had described terrifying scenes of women running the gauntlet of groping hands, lewd insults and robberies in the mob violence.
The rampage has shocked Germany and added fuel to critics of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s open-door stance to war refugees that brought 1.1 million new asylum seekers into the country last year alone.
