Terrorism

It's amazing what you learn about yourself when you start publishing about Turkey's links to terrorist groups.

Gary Saul Morson on the literary legacy of 19th-century Russian revolutionary terrorism.

Is it terrorism? It depends.

Jalaluddin Haqqani is dead. The terror network he created lives on.

A year after President Trump announced his Afghan policy, the Taliban are closer to victory than we are.

The country is a working model of political Islam capable of coexisting with the West. That makes Indonesia a target for the terrorist group.

In first major foreign policy address, the secretary of state does an about-face on Obama-era efforts to downplay ties between the two.

America’s biggest partner in Africa faces a host of internal crises—and its approach to security only makes matters worse.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is considering a plan to integrate drones across U.S. national airspace. Several large corporations have proposed a low-altitude control grid, which they would operate, to manage these unmanned aircraft systems (UAS), popularly referred to as drones. For…

"The powerful Jews are my enemy," remarked Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan at his organization’s annual “Saviours’ Day” celebration in Chicago on February 25. That was just one of several of his choice anti-Semitic tropes. Another one, oddly stated in the third person: “The FBI has been the…

Legislation that would pressure the Palestinian Authority to stop monetarily rewarding acts of terror is moving toward final passage, according to one of the bill’s top backers.

Foz do Iguaçu and Ciudad del Este,Tri-Border Area of Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay

In December 2015, newly elected Nigerian president Muhammadu Buhari declared that the terrorist group Boko Haram had been “technically defeated” after intensive military efforts. The Multinational Joint Task Force (MNJTF), a consortium of military units from Benin, Chad, Cameroon, Niger, and…

When the young Muslim known as “Mo” decided he could no longer live in America, the Islamic State wasn’t his destination of choice. Initially, he said, he wanted to migrate to Saudi Arabia to study at the University of Medina—but he couldn’t get in. A diet of online propaganda convinced him the…

Not so long ago, ISIS held territory in Syria and Iraq equivalent to the size of the United Kingdom. Yet the U.S. and allied forces have slowly but systematically pried virtually all that real estate from its grip. ISIS will have to change tactics.

“You dirty son of a bitch.  .  . somebody’s got to beat you up and I hereby appoint myself.” Thus Edward Lansdale recalled addressing the CIA station chief in Saigon in the mid-1950s, when Lansdale was a CIA operative under cover of assistant air attaché at the American embassy. Whether or not his…

On New Year’s Day, Donald Trump fulminated on Twitter that the United States had “foolishly given Pakistan more than 33 billion dollars in aid over the last 15 years, and they have given us nothing but lies & deceit, thinking of our leaders as fools. They give safe haven to the terrorists we hunt…

A bill that would pressure the Palestinian Authority to stop financially rewarding acts of terror against Israelis and Americans easily passed the House of Representatives Tuesday.

Abu Khatallah, the first person publicly charged in connection with the 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya, was acquitted of federal murder charges Tuesday after a grueling seven-week trial.

The trial of Ahmed Abu Khatallah, the first person to be publicly charged in connection with the 2012 Benghazi attacks, is becoming mired in discord, as the government and defense appear at odds over explosive intelligence that could put a dent in the government’s portrayal of Khatallah as the…

President Donald Trump announced Monday that the United States would once again designate North Korea as a state sponsor of terrorism, reversing a change made under the George W. Bush administration.

The Islamic State's smattering of remaining strongholds in Iraq and Syria are under siege. At the height of the self-declared caliphate’s power in mid-2014, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s men controlled large swaths of both countries. Today, the jihadists hold only a few towns straddling the Iraqi-Syrian…

What are the Saudis trying to do in Lebanon? They have clearly forced the resignation of Prime Minister Saad Hariri. Do they want to destabilize the country? Destroy its government? Is the new Saudi approach another example of the often-alleged incompetence and overreach of the crown prince,…

The day after an immigrant from Uzbekistan murdered cyclists and pedestrians in New York, running them over with a rented pickup truck, NPR did an interview to highlight how such events make life uncomfortable for Muslims. They spoke with Hussein Rashid, a professor of religion at Columbia…

Donald Trump’s feud with North Korea’s “Little Rocket Man” notwithstanding, the most likely major war on the horizon is one between Israel and Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shiite militia that, thanks to years of experience and an increasingly lethal arsenal, has become part of the vanguard in Iran’s…

We don't use the word “lie” with abandon in these pages. It’s used far too often in public life, to the point at which nearly every statement someone disagrees with is characterized as a “lie.” The L-word is tightly regulated in parliamentary bodies—in Congress, for example—and rightly so. Once you…

Today on the Daily Standard Podcast, deputy managing editor Kelly Jane Torrance talks with host Eric Felten about Tuesday's terrorist attack in New York.

At least eight people are dead and 11 sustained "serious but non-life threatening" injuries after a motorist driving a rented truck veered onto a bicycle path in Manhattan Tuesday afternoon, the NYPD has confirmed.

Top Trump administration officials urged lawmakers on Monday not to unduly constrain the executive branch under a potential new authorization for the use of military force (AUMF).

Tom Watson is going on a hunger strike. Writing in the Guardian, the deputy leader of the Labour Party announced that he was taking the action “in solidarity” with two hunger-striking detainees at Guantanamo Bay. Watson claims that they “are being slowly starved to death by President Trump.”

President Donald Trump refused to certify the Iran nuclear deal Friday, a move that has been described as one piece of a larger strategy to toughen U.S. policy toward Iran.

Lawyers want Boeing to reveal the secret details of its multibillion dollar deal with Iran Air to an Illinois federal court, a disclosure that hinges on the approval of the Trump administration.

"I want them to hate him," a federal prosecutor said quietly on the evening of October 2 as his colleagues packed up. It had been a long first day in the trial of Ahmed Abu Khatallah, the man charged with instigating the tragic 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya.

"I want them to hate him," a federal prosecutor said quietly on the evening of October 2 as his colleagues packed up. It had been a long first day in the trial of Ahmed Abu Khatallah, the man charged with instigating the tragic 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya.

A terror attack in a crowded London tube train left at least 18 hospitalized Friday morning, according to multiple reports.

Few Americans noticed, but this past June, Muammar Qaddafi’s longtime spy chief Abdullah Senussi was apparently released from prison in Tripoli, where he had been sentenced to death in July 2015 for decades of officially sanctioned murders of his fellow Libyans. If Senussi was not…

In 1996, Hamas gunmen shot to death David Boim, a 17-year-old American citizen waiting for a bus in the West Bank. At the behest of Boim’s parents, attorney Nathan Lewin filed suit against charitable organizations in the United States who solicited funds for Hamas. The unorthodox decision to seek…

Few Americans noticed, but this past June, Muammar Qaddafi’s longtime spy chief Abdullah Senussi was apparently released from prison in Tripoli, where he had been sentenced to death in July 2015 for decades of officially sanctioned murders of his fellow Libyans. If Senussi was not…

Today on the Daily Standard podcast, deputy managing editor Kelly Jane Torrance discusses how Iran is also helping the Taliban to destabilize Afghanistan.

For many years General Franco’s regime used the slogan “Spain is different” to attract tourism. Spain had sun and great beaches, unlike, say, Germany and Belgium, but the country was also a dictatorship and lagged economically and socially. We were indeed different from the rest of Europe. Today,…

For many years General Franco’s regime used the slogan “Spain is different” to attract tourism. Spain had sun and great beaches, unlike, say, Germany and Belgium, but the country was also a dictatorship and lagged economically and socially. We were indeed different from the rest of Europe. Today,…

President Donald Trump announced a troop increase for the U.S. war in Afghanistan, promising Monday night that “our troops will fight to win” our nation’s longest-running conflict while acknowledging his own change of heart on U.S. foreign policy.

The Islamic State (ISIS) quickly claimed responsibility for the van attack in the popular Las Ramblas area of Barcelona on Thursday. At least 13 people were killed, and dozens more wounded, when a terrorist drove the vehicle into pedestrians. Amaq News Agency, the group’s propaganda arm, declared…

President Trump gave a much better statement Monday on the dismaying events in Charlottesville than he did on Saturday. But while he now is willing to call out the KKK, neo-Nazis, and white supremacists as “evil,” he still won’t use the T word—“terrorism.”

The war in Afghanistan is nearly 16 years old. It is the longest in our nation’s history. Many Americans wonder why our soldiers are still there. This widespread frustration is shared by our commander in chief. The Trump administration has not yet announced its plans for Afghanistan in large part…

A presidential decision on a new strategy for the war in Afghanistan, long delayed and the subject of bitter dispute inside the White House, may finally be at hand. Key members of the Trump administration’s war council met with the president on August 10 at the summer White House in Bedminster,…

The war in Afghanistan is nearly 16 years old. It is the longest in our nation’s history. Many Americans wonder why our soldiers are still there. This widespread frustration is shared by our commander in chief. The Trump administration has not yet announced its plans for Afghanistan in large part…

A presidential decision on a new strategy for the war in Afghanistan, long delayed and the subject of bitter dispute inside the White House, may finally be at hand. Key members of the Trump administration’s war council met with the president on August 10 at the summer White House in Bedminster,…

A bill slashing funds that benefit the Palestinian Authority will easily pass the Senate’s foreign relations panel, likely before August recess, the leaders of the committee told THE WEEKLY STANDARD. The measure conditions the flow of U.S. dollars on whether the PA has stopped monetarily rewarding…

When former president Barack Obama initiated efforts to implement his pledge to close Guantánamo Bay and transfer its detainees to U.S. and foreign prisons, he started a cascade effect that has boosted the global jihadist insurgency. The most recent example of the impact of Obama’s foreign policy…

Today on the Daily Standard podcast, senior writer Michael Warren joins host Eric Felten to discuss the lack of response by President Trump regarding the terror attack in London on Sunday night.

Last week, several Arab states, including Bahrain, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates, put Qatar on notice. They removed their diplomats from Doha, closed airspace and ports to Qatari vessels, expelled Qatari nationals, and prohibited their own nationals from visiting the country.…

Surveys consistently rank Scandinavian countries the happiest on earth. But now, even they are getting ticked off by the Palestinians.

Last week, several Arab states, including Bahrain, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates, put Qatar on notice. They removed their diplomats from Doha, closed airspace and ports to Qatari vessels, expelled Qatari nationals, and prohibited their own nationals from visiting the country.…

Today on the Daily Standard podcast, travel journalist Rudy Maxa talks with Eric Felten about the effects of terrorism on travel, and how recent attacks in England have hit right at the beginning of the high season for British tourism.

In the week following Salman Abedi's suicide bombing at an Ariana Grande concert in Manchester on May 22, a great deal was revealed about the perpetrator, most of it deeply unsettling.

At his first on-camera briefing of the press since President Trump returned to Washington, Sean Spicer spent a good 10 minutes Tuesday recapping the highlights of an "incredible, historic trip" to the Middle East and Europe. "We've never seen before at this point in a presidency such sweeping…

Donald Trump is fond of claiming that his predecessor mismanaged America's role in the world. "And I have to just say that the world is a mess. I inherited a mess," the president noted during a joint press conference with King Abdullah of Jordan in the Rose Garden on April 5. "Whether it's the…

On April 30, 2012, Barack Obama's top counter-terrorism adviser made a bold prediction: It was possible to envision a world in which al Qaeda's central leadership would "no longer [be] relevant" to the United States and the organization itself would be eliminated. "If the decade before 9/11 was the…

The investigation into the Manchester Arena bombing quickly turned to the possibility that the bomber, 22-year-old Salman Abedi, had accomplices. "I think it's very clear that this is a network that we are investigating," Chief Constable Ian Hopkins of the Manchester Police told reporters on…

On Monday evening, a terrorist blew himself up in the foyer of Manchester Arena as the audience was filing out of an Ariana Grande concert. At least 22 people were killed and 59 wounded in the blast. British authorities have identified Salman Abedi, a 22-year-old whose parents are from Libya, as…

On Monday night in the English city of Manchester, a suicide bomber detonated a homemade IED in the foyer of the Manchester Arena, killing at least 22 people and wounding almost 60 others as they left a concert by Ariana Grande. Shortly after the worst terrorist attack in Britain since the 7/7…

Editor's note: This piece has been updated to reflect developing news.

Today on the Daily Standard podcast, editor-in-chief Stephen F. Hayes weighs in on Trump's Middle East tour and the clarity of his message on terrorism.

President Trump appeared to admit Tuesday morning that he did share sensitive information, which multiple news outlets have reported was classified, with Russian officials in the Oval Office.

A hotel in Qatar with links to the United States has decided against hosting a Hamas press conference Monday, THE WEEKLY STANDARD has learned. The cancellation came after reports that the company could face penalties for providing material support for terrorism if it held the event.

Senior writer Michael Warren reports on the Daily Standard Podcast that White House sources suggest "something is changing" when it comes to U.S. policy toward Syria. Will it be regime change, or targeted attacks in response to the recent chemical weapons attack? And how much of the decision will…

Busting terrorist charities here in the United States was a low priority for the last eight years under Barack Obama. It's time for the Trump administration to instruct the bureaucracy to get back into this important fight.

This afternoon's terrorist attack on the Houses of Parliament in central Westminster left four dead, including the attacker and a police officer, and twenty injured, some seriously. For the third time in a year, a lone killer has used a vehicle as a weapon on the streets of a major European city.…

Paris

Paris

The White House conceded Tuesday that it wouldn't close the Guantanamo Bay detention facility by the time President Obama leaves office later this week, but it hasn't stopped releasing detainees in the run-up to Inauguration Day.

It all seems a bit like an ugly fairy tale now—an allegory, set in the heady and hectic late 1960s and early '70s, of good versus evil, order versus chaos, revolution by dynamite sticks and law enforcement by black-bag jobs. This was, in retrospect, a match made in heaven: The Weather Underground…

It all seems a bit like an ugly fairy tale now—an allegory, set in the heady and hectic late 1960s and early '70s, of good versus evil, order versus chaos, revolution by dynamite sticks and law enforcement by black-bag jobs. This was, in retrospect, a match made in heaven: The Weather Underground…

Just weeks after 9/11, Charles Krauthammer declared in these pages that our holiday from history—the 1990s—had come "to an abrupt end." And the United States did get back to work—briefly. But it turns out that President George W. Bush's exhortation in the aftermath of 9/11 that we should keep on…

Great Britain has a new tool for combating the very real threat of terrorism—an app.

The photos of the assassination of the Russian ambassador to Turkey in Ankara shocked many people. Jerry Saltz, the senior art critic for New York magazine, was mesmerized by their artistry.

A new suspect in the terrorist attack that claimed a dozen lives at a Berlin Christmas market was under covert surveillance for several months this year, according to German authorities, and is now the focus of a continental manhunt launched Wednesday.

The Task Force to Investigate Terrorism Financing of the House Financial Services Committee released a report Tuesday highlighting the methods terrorist groups use to secure money and prescribing ways for the United States to combat them.

The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for what German Chancellor Angela Merkel called a "gruesome" attack on a Berlin Christmas market Monday, which killed a dozen people and injured nearly 50 more, many of them seriously.

A man arrested in connection with a truck attack that killed a dozen people in Berlin Monday has been released, the Associated Press reports, with German authorities citing a lack of evidence.

Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, said the incident Monday at a Berlin Christmas market that left 12 people dead and dozens more injured is a "terrorist attack." Here's the New York Times with more:

An Israeli advocacy group is seeking to collect billions in terror-related damages from Iran and in the meantime put a hold on the delivery of dozens of Boeing airliners to Tehran, the Associated Press reports.

Founded in 2007, the Community Security Service (CSS) is a low-profile, nonprofit organization based in New York City and concerned with protection of American Jewish institutions and public activities. CSS has trained thousands of volunteers in professional security methods, provides physical…

At the Washington Free Beacon, Aaron MacLean writes about the false narratives about the state of the economy and the world under the Obama administration. MacLean suggests the alternative reality presented by Obama and propagated by a compliant media led the country to revolt against it and reject…

Until October 26, perched on the French coast of the English Channel, the "Jungle" refugee camp housed over 6,000 migrants. Living conditions were awful.

Lawmakers will crack down on business with Iran under the Trump administration, warning interested companies that they could wind up funding illicit Iranian activities and slapping sanctions on entities linked to Iran's military, according to a leading House Republican.

Hurd's Bank, July 2015

A man sentenced to 30 years in prison Monday for plotting an ISIS-inspired assault on the U.S. Capitol defiantly shouted that Allah, not the presiding judge, was "in control" as he was escorted out of a federal district courtroom in Cincinnati.

Hurd's Bank, July 2015

Perhaps the most cheering aspect of our American democracy is the optimism meeting a new president and his administration. In two months, Donald Trump will move into the White House and bring with him a host of ideas and people to implement them in order to advance the interests of American…

Incoming White House chief of staff Reince Priebus said the government will not have a registry of people "based on a religion" but did say he would not rule out anything with respect to preventing radicalized people from entering the United States. Speaking with Chuck Todd on NBC's Meet the Press…

Mike Rogers, the former Michigan congressman who chaired the House Intelligence committee for four years, is no longer working on the transition team for President-elect Donald Trump.

Now that American victims of terrorism can sue Saudi Arabia on allegations of facilitating 9/11, the kingdom's counterterrorism record is under the microscope like never before.

Olivier Roy is one of France's most distinguished scholars of Islam, and author of, among many other books, Globalized Islam, Holy Ignorance, and The Failure of Political Islam. Joint-chair of the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies and Political and Social Sciences department at the…

How best to defeat Islamist terrorism? Expel ISIS from Iraq and Syria? Crack down on domestic radicalization? Work with Muslim reformers to dismantle the ideological roots of Islamism? Each of these would, of course, be admirable pursuits. But none of them seems to spring first to mind among…

Urumqi, China

The Obama administration wired almost one million dollars to an Iranian bank account in Europe last July, months before making a separate $1.7 billion payment to Iran that officials say had to be made in cash. The administration also withheld some details of the wire payment from Congress and…

Within a few hours on September 17, a pressure cooker bomb exploded in the Chelsea neighborhood in New York injuring 31 people, a man stabbed 10 people in a Minnesota mall, and bombs were found near the site of a Marine Corps charity race in New Jersey. The following Monday morning, White House…

A Democratic lawmaker on Wednesday criticized a $1.7-billion payment the Obama administration made to Iran earlier this year, suggesting that the administration ignored a law that prohibits such payments to Iran until claims against the country from American victims of terror had been "dealt with…

Minneapolis

The father of the New York bomber alerted federal law enforcement about his son being a "terrorist" back in 2014, the New York Times reports. Mohammad Rahami, the father of Ahmad Khan Rahami, told police his son was a terrorist after the younger Rahami was arrested following a domestic dispute with…

Bill Kristol joined CNN's Jake Tapper Monday to discuss how Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton handled responding to the attacks in New York, New Jersey, and Minnesota during the weekend.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with editor William Kristol on this weekend's attacks and attempted attacks in New York and New Jersey.

The White House press secretary said Monday the United States is in a "narrative fight, a narrative battle" with the Islamic State terrorist group. Josh Earnest, speaking with CNN host Chris Cuomo about the recent bombings in New York and New Jersey as well as the stabbing attack in Minnesota over…

As Barack Obama prepared to enter the final year of his presidency, he sat down for an interview with Olivier Knox to discuss a bold new policy change. He had announced a year earlier that the United States would be ending its decades-long isolation of Cuba and seeking rapprochement with the…

Even as the sky was falling Tuesday morning, September 11, visitors to the Nation magazine's website could find a freshly posted essay by Edward Said on the intellectual's role in the modern world. A true intellectual, Said declared, now makes it his mission to publicize those injustices that are…

Fifteen years after the September 11, 2001, hijackings, the al Qaeda threat is growing. Al Qaeda has the capacity to attempt a mass casualty attack inside the U.S. and Europe today.

"We have to get back to the place we were, where terrorists are not the focus of our lives, but they're a nuisance." —John Kerry, New York Times Magazine, October 10, 2004 "What American would not trade the economy we had in the 1990s, the fact that we were not at war and young Americans were not…

It doesn't seem right, really—romanticizing catastrophe instead of just confronting its grim particulars head-on. Still, they cut quite a swath at Sir Harry's Bar in the Waldorf-Astoria, these brave men with forearm tattoos and walrus mustaches—firefighting volunteers who have swooped in from…

Donald Trump's speech on national security at the Union League of Philadelphia Wednesday may have been his best imitation of a traditional, conservative Republican to date, particularly on his proposals to rebuild the U.S. military. When The Donald cites the 2014 National Defense Panel report, he's…

The death of Islam Karimov, the 78-year old party boss and dictatorial president of Soviet and post-Soviet Uzbekistan, a key strategic power in Central Asia, was announced September 2 in official Uzbek media. The cause of his demise was reported to be a stroke, and rumors of it had circulated for…

British Airways resumed flights to Iran on Thursday, but the airline did not say it will give customers special warning about the risk of travel, despite government notices that describe the potential for capture and imprisonment there.

The House of Representatives is currently considering legislation passed by the Senate that would change the law of foreign sovereign immunity in order to allow the families of victims of the 9/11 attacks to sue Saudi Arabia, where 15 of the 19 attackers were citizens, for its supposed culpability.…

The Defense Department has transferred 15 detainees—12 Yemenis and 3 Afghan citizens—from Guantanamo to the United Arab Emirates. The Pentagon's web page says nothing about the risks the detainees pose beyond the fact that the transfers supposedly "took place consistent with appropriate security…

The Islamic Republic of Iran does not recognize the independence of the Republic of Kosovo. While the Balkan state of some 1.8 million people is 80 percent Muslim, few among them are Shia, save for some spiritual Sufis whose variety of Shiism is extremely heterodox when compared with Tehran's…

Donald Trump delivered a strong speech Monday on thwarting terrorists and crushing ISIS while cleverly disguising it as an address on national security policy.

Hillary Clinton has disavowed the support of Seddique Mateen, father of Orlando gunman Omar Mateen, a full day after he was spotted at a Clinton campaign event in Florida.

Israeli law enforcement officials have charged Mohammed el-Halabi, an employee of World Vision, a child welfare organization supported by Christians throughout the world, of funneling millions of dollars to the anti-Semitic terror organization Hamas.

France, struggling to regain a sense of normalcy after the Bastille Day atrocity in Nice, was stunned again by the murder of a priest in Normandy. It's just the latest in a string of attacks over the course of the last several years, which have left the French government struggling to find new…

After initial reports that the Nice attacker, Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, was a self-radicalized lone wolf, French prosecutors said last week that he had a group of accomplices. Like Lahouaiej Bouhlel, all had been living in France for several years, some with dual citizenship. As the threat of…

During morning mass Tuesday, two ISIS terrorists stormed a Catholic church in France and killed an 86 year-old priest. Another person was seriously wounded. Monday afternoon, German authorities announced that a suicide bomb attack in Ansbach was perpetrated by a man pledging allegience ISIS leader…

Last week, President Barack Obama’s administration dismissed reports of Iranian support for al Qaeda as the product of fevered minds. Claims of collaboration between the Islamic regime and the terrorist organization are little more than "baseless conspiracy theories," an Obama administration…

“La Marseillaise," the French national anthem, was originally sung by the Revolutionary Army as it marched forth to defend "la république" against European monarchies who wished to quash the revolution as soon as it began. It's a song of war, calling Frenchmen to take up arms against "foreign…

In this first episode of the new WEEKLY STANDARD podcast Kristol Clear, editor Bill Kristol speaks with host Michael Graham about the fallout from this week's terrorist attack in Nice, Mike Pence's selection as Donald Trump's running mate, and the upcoming convention in Cleveland.

Not long ago, a slick, viral video appeared in my Facebook feed. Produced by Al Jazeera Plus, it featured a woman named Amaryllis Fox talking about what she had learned working for the CIA. I was frankly alarmed by a lot of what she said.

Jay Nordlinger writes a brief but poignant reflection on Thursday night's massacre of nearly 100 innocents in Nice, France. Here's Nordlinger at National Review Online:

Donald Trump announced he was delaying an expected Friday announcement of his vice presidential pick that was slated to take place in New York. Trump made the announcement on Twitter:

A truck drove through a crowd of celebrants in the French city of Nice Thursday night, reportedly killing at least 60 people and injuring many more.

Al Qaeda operatives based in Iran worked on chemical and biological weapons, according to a letter written to Osama bin Laden that is described in a new book by a top former U.S. intelligence official.

Donald Trump claimed last week that Saddam Hussein, the deceased Iraqi dictator who was deposed from power more than a decade ago, was "so good" at killing terrorists. The presumptive Republican nominee's point was to suggest Iraq would be better off as it was prior to the 2003 invasion by…

Donald Trump praised Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein for his handling of terrorists at a Tuesday campaign rally in Raleigh, North Carolina.

Bangladesh, with 170 million people, 99 percent of them Muslim, is the world's fourth-largest Muslim polity. It became the latest nation where radical Islamist violence has drawn world attention on July 1. A band of terrorists seized control of a popular café, the Holey Artisan Bakery, killing 20…

A deputy head in the Iranian Revolutionary Guard threatened that the Tehran-backed Lebansese terrorist group Hezbollah had the missile capability to launch a sustained attack on Israel. The Jerusalem Post reports:

Donald Trump is no stranger to conspiracy theories. Mother Jones recently reported some of Trump's thoughts on asbestos. The toxic material "got a bad rap," Trump wrote in his 1997 book The Art of the Comeback, adding that he believed the mafia was behind the asbestos removal frenzy because…

Among the many revelations that will emerge from the voluminous majority report of the Benghazi Select Committee when it is released Tuesday is this one: Barack Obama skipped his daily intelligence briefing one day after the Benghazi attacks on September 11, 2012. The president's briefer handed a…

The final majority report of the Benghazi Select Committee is set to be released later Tuesday morning. Representatives Jim Jordan and Mike Pompeo have signed onto the official majority document and authored a supplemental, 51-page "additional views" report of their own.

A veteran al Qaeda fighter, and an expert in document forgery who has decades of experience helping jihadists travel internationally without detection, has gone missing after being released from the detention facility at Guantanamo.

After the 9/11 attacks, politicians divided into two camps. The 9/12ers were the largest. They believed the world had changed and America faced a frightening new threat from Islamic terrorists. But there were plenty of 9/10ers. They were mostly liberals and Democrats who felt the world wasn’t much…

President Obama used part of his speech Tuesday to renew calls for gun control, warning that failing to enact new gun laws will allow San Bernardino- and Orlando-style terrorist attacks "to keep on happening."

Minneapolis

An EgyptAir flight bound for Cairo crashed Thursday, with an Egyptian official saying that terror is a "stronger" possibility as a cause than technical error.

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with Foundation for the Defense of Democracies Senior Fellow and frequent contributor Thomas Joscelyn on what we know about the Brussels terror attacks.

President Obama reacted to today's terror attack in Brussels in an ESPN interview. The sitdown was at the Rays-Cuba game today in Havana.

On NBC's Today Show, Hillary Clinton phoned in to chat with Savannah Guthrie as cries of the wounded and dying in Brussels set the scene in the background.

Two terrorist attacks in Brussels this morning have left at least 27 dead, the Wall Street Journal reports.

Calais

Two weeks ago, al Qaeda-linked jihadists attacked the Splendid Hotel in Burkina Faso and murdered 28 people, including an American missionary. It was the work of al Qaeda’s Algerian franchise, one of the world's deadliest jihadist groups, albeit one less known to Westerners. Al Qaeda in the Islamic…

It was a great year for the Obama administration’s foreign policy .  .  . says the Obama administration. The State Department even created a new hashtag to celebrate the White House's annus mirabilis—#2015in5Words. "Protecting Arctic Climate and Communities" and "Protecting Health of Our Ocean" are…

Nigeria, once known only as Africa's most populous country, now mainly makes headlines for the eruption in its northeast of the brutal jihadist force, Boko Haram ("Western education is prohibited"). Boko Haram has occupied parts of Nigeria and invaded neighbors, including Niger, Cameroon, and Chad.…

President Obama needs to accept that our current conflict is as much against the idea of radical jihadism as it is against the physical presence of ISIS. Furthermore, by failing to define the religious-political ideology underpinning the enemy, the president contributes to an environment where all…

Should the United States militarily defeat jihadist outfits in the Middle East? After 9/11 the answer seemed easy, but after the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, Barack Obama is not alone in arguing that large-scale offensive campaigns against radical Muslim movements aren't worth the cost. Even if…

Key West

"The magazine of the Islamic State orders Muslim parents to withdraw their children from French schools and calls for them to kill those who teach there." Thus declares a recent headline in the French press.

Not so very long ago, commentators used to talk about human evolution. No, not actual, Darwinian evolution. This evolution was more along the lines of wishful thinking. In the 19th century, Marx and his followers rejected so-called "bourgeois morality" (which properly recognized that humans, if…

In the wake of the San Bernardino shooting by a radicalized Muslim couple, House and Senate Democrats have spent the week pushing a dead-on-arrival measure to restrict gun purchases by those on the FBI's no-fly list.

Law enforcement officials in San Bernardino and Los Angeles may have investigated Syed Farook one week before the shooting on the community development center on December 2, 2015, that left 14 dead and 17 injured, according to a review of police communications immediately following the attacks.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with executive editor Fred Barnes on the President's speech to the nation on terrorism.

Ben Sasse, a Republican U.S. senator from Nebraska, went to San Bernardino last night to deliver a rebuttal to President Obama's speech to the nation on terrorism.

Barack Obama says he wants the truth. On November 21, the New York Times reported allegations that military intelligence officials provided the president with skewed assessments that minimized the threat from ISIS and overstated the success of U.S. efforts against the group. The Times story was an…

If you get your news from the headlines, you can be excused for thinking that “Minnesota men” pose a special risk of taking up the terrorist jihad at home and abroad. As the Wall Street Journal reported this past April, for example, “U.S. charges six Minnesota men with trying to join ISIS.” The…

It's inspiring when a leader meets a moment and takes charge. President Obama didn't come close to doing that Sunday night in his Oval Office speech.

President Obama used the terror attack in California this week to push gun control. In his weekly address, Obama called the massacre an "act of terror" but then pivoted to talking about American gun laws.

It seems that:

White House spokesman Josh Earnest said that President Obama thinks that gun control would help deter terrorists. Earnest made the comments today at the White House's daily press briefing.

News stories this week have brought attention back to the name Lori Berenson, and that was truly a blast from the past.

After the astonishing German break through the French lines in May 1940, Winston Churchill flew to Paris to meet his French counterpart, Prime Minister Paul Reynaud, and army chief Maurice Gamelin. Reynaud had called Churchill in near-hysterics, but even Churchill wasn’t prepared for the utter…

In the confusion and horror of Paris in shock, the details stay with you. In the bleary early Saturday morning, behind the police barriers, a lone tour bus was still parked on Boulevard Voltaire in front of the Bataclan concert hall, where the Eagles of Death Metal gig had been bloodily interrupted…

For those of us who were in Mumbai during the 2008 terrorist attacks there, the bulletins from Paris on Friday night evoked queasy déjà vu. With each shocking addition to the story—drive-by shootings at one crowded restaurant and then another, explosions reported at the other end of town, casualty…

Speaking in Paris on November 17, Secretary of State John Kerry made what are already infamous comments about the fight against terrorists and terrorism. He spoke to the staff and families of the U.S. embassy in Paris, and his remarks deserve quoting at some length—because they display a deep…

The New Hampshire Union Leader has endorsed Chris Christie for president. The state's largest daily newspaper, which has a conservative-leaning editorial board, published the endorsement Saturday. Here's an excerpt:

New Jersey governor Chris Christie directly challenged an account from presidential rival Donald Trump that "thousands" of Muslims in the Garden State cheered on the day of the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.

The nation’s capital, a top terrorist target, has received new advice should it come under a Paris-style attack. Instead of waiting for police to arrive, D.C.’s police chief is advocating a more aggressive -- albeit unarmed -- approach.

Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) during President Obama's tenure, went on the Kelly File last night to talk about the possible manipulation of ISIS intelligence. He said the investigation should "start at the top. Where intelligence starts and stops is at…

There are a few tentative observations to be gleaned in the aftermath of the Paris attacks:

Mark Steyn has a typically great column about the reaction to the terror attacks in France and reading it is well worth your time. But I want to focus on one particular paragraph:

Walter Russell Mead has a terrific piece in the American Interest on "President Obama's Cynical Refugee Ploy."

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie slammed Secretary of State John Kerry for remarks the top diplomat made Tuesday about the attacks in Paris and the Charlie Hebdo attacks in January. Kerry contrasted the Paris attacks, which he called “indiscriminate,” with the attacks on the French satire…

The fight between GOP presidential candidates Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio continues to heat up. Cruz set things off last week with a direct hit against Rubio over the latter’s support for the Gang of 8 immigration plan, an attack that the Rubio camp seemed ready for. This week, their debate has moved…

Give a man a reputation as an early riser, as the old saw goes, and he can sleep until noon everyday. The same phenomenon evidently applies to bad reputations as well. Brand Donald Trump a bigot, and suddenly every policy he endorses, no matter how innocuous or mainstream, becomes repugnant.

THE WEEKLY STANDARD podcast with Foundation for the Defense of Democracies Senior Fellow and frequent contributor Thomas Joscelyn on the fight against terrorism in the Middle East.

CNN's Jim Acosta was one of several reporters to question President Barack Obama Monday about the current U.S. strategy against ISIS after the attack on Paris. At a press conference in Turkey, where Obama is meeting with other members of the G20 nations, Acosta asked a pointed question.

Last week, the Obama White House moved to ensure Hezbollah’s ability to point 100,000 missiles at Israel. That’s not how they would describe it, of course. But it was the Obama administration—as U.S. officials are quietly letting on—and not Russia that invited Iran to participate in talks in Vienna…

The Republican chairman of the House select committee on the 2012 Benghazi terrorist attack told Hillary Clinton that his investigation is "not about" the former secretary of state, despite claims to the contrary from members of Congress in both parties.

On September 29, the State Department added British citizen Sally Jones to its list of foreign terrorists. Jones is a 46-year-old punk rocker who converted to Islam and moved from Kent to Raqqa to join the Islamic State in 2013. She is also newly widowed, having lost her 21-year-old husband, ISIS…

Hanna Kozlowska at Quartz writes that:

Secretary of State John Kerry blamed Israeli settlements for Palestinian terrorism, in remarks made recently about the wave of terror attacks in Israel:

Marco Rubio is standing up for Israel after a series of Palestinian terror attacks targeting Jews in Israel. 

Since becoming the leading candidate for House speaker, majority leader Kevin McCarthy has been treated with suspicion by some conservative commentators. Sean Hannity is one of them, and in an appearance on Hannity’s Fox News program Tuesday, McCarty faced tough questions from the host about what…

Even now with the Russians on the verge of combat operations in Syria, the White House still says it believes that they’re there to fight ISIS. John Kerry says that his Russian counterpart told him that the Russians are “only interested in fighting” the Islamic State. Other administration officials…

The Transportation Security Administration (TSA) confiscated a record 67 firearms located in passengers' carry-on baggage during the week of September 11, 2015. On September 11 alone, ten guns were found. Out of the 67 firearms found during the week, 56 were loaded and 26 actually had a round…

A photograph of a drowned 3-year-old boy washed up on a Turkish beach after his family failed to find refuge from the war in Syria seems to have finally gotten the world’s attention. The conflict has been an unfolding humanitarian catastrophe for more than four years. A quarter of a million are…

There was a memorable instance of multiculturalism last week that The Scrapbook heartily commends to readers. Google for the touching video of the ceremony at the Elysée Palace in which the president of France, François Hollande, pins the Legion of Honor ribbons on Spencer Stone, Anthony Sadler,…

When Donald Trump botched a question Thursday about General Qassem Suleimani, head of Iran’s Quds Force, it wasn’t the first time. He did the same thing last month during the Fox News debate, but his answer was largely overlooked in the post-debate hysteria over Trump’s answers to questions on a…

Hugh Hewitt’s interview with Donald Trump has received a fair amount of attention, mainly because Trump didn’t know the answers to some of Hewitt’s supposed “gotcha” questions.

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) has released its latest statistics on the number of former Guantanamo detainees who are either confirmed or suspected of returning to the fight. As expected, there has been a slight increase in the number of ex-detainees who have rejoined…

Former vice president Dick Cheney and his daughter Liz Cheney appeared on MSNBC's Morning Joe Wednesday morning to promote their new book, Exceptional. The Cheneys spoke about national security, foreign policy issues like the Iran deal, and 2016 politics.

The State Department released another tranche of emails from Hillary Clinton's private server Monday evening. While messages between Clinton and other State and administration officials concerning the most interesting and consequential subjects (like the Benghazi attacks) were heavily redacted,…

Hillary Clinton compared Republican views on federal funding for abortion and elective contraception to the views of terrorists. Speaking in Cleveland Thursday, Clinton criticized Republicans who want to limit federal funding for abortions as wanting to deny "access to health care."

One of the more puzzling manifestations of the conflict ­between radical Islam and the West is the presence of Islamist communities in places like Great Britain, the Netherlands, and France: They are unwelcome in their Muslim homelands—indeed, they are in exile from them​—​and yet they harbor an…