Officials Spot Former Interior Minister Within Group of Refugees Fleeing Afghanistan

The former minister of interior affairs for Afghanistan was reportedly seen fleeing the country with refugees, Richard Engel, a chief foreign correspondent for NBC News, said Monday.

“Some Afghan officials from fallen govt escaping with refugees. A senior Qatari official told me among those they’ve identified are former interior minister Gen. Abdul Satar Mirzakwal, one of his deputies and a sr army official,” Engel tweeted.

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CIA Director Reportedly Held Clandestine Meeting with Taliban Leader

William Burns

CIA Director William J. Burns secretly met with the leader of the Taliban in Kabul on Monday, The Washington Post reported.

Burns met with Abdul Ghani Baradar, the Taliban’s de-facto leader, in the highest-level in-person meeting between the Biden administration and the Taliban since the group seized Kabul, several U.S. officials told The Washington Post. The meeting took place amid the Biden administration’s continued efforts to withdraw American citizens and Afghan allies as the Taliban consolidates its rule.

The U.S. currently plans to withdraw all personnel by Aug. 31, but President Joe Biden indicated he could extend that time frame if there are still people left in Afghanistan.

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Commentary: Afghanistan Reveals U.S. Choices Have Dangerously Narrowed

In the “Nicomachean Ethics,” Aristotle has a lot to say about the activity of choice and its place in securing “eudaimonia,” that “good-spiritedness” that is synonymous with human fulfillment.

Choice is critical in the metabolism of virtue. But, Aristotle points out, it is possible for someone, through bad choices, to put himself in a situation from which choice cannot rescue him.

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While Taliban Flourish on Twitter, Social Media Giants Restrict U.S. Conservative Voices

Person holding smartphone

While the Taliban and Iranian mullahs still enjoy Twitter privileges, a growing number of Americans, mostly of conservative persuasion, face a range of restrictions imposed on their accounts by U.S. social media platforms.

The list of Americans who have seen their social media reach limited is topped by former U.S. President Donald Trump, who has been banned indefinitely on Twitter and for two years on Facebook. More recently, Georgia GOP Rep. Majorie Taylor Greene was temporarily silenced by Twitter.

The firebrand freshman congresswoman was suspended earlier this month for seven days for what Twitter called “misinformation” for arguing COVID-19 masks and vaccines are “failing,” as more fully vaccinated Americans are contracting the virus’s highly contagious delta strain.

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Biden’s Green Energy Plan and Botched Afghan Withdrawal Boost China’s Rare Metals Monopoly

At first blush, it may not seem that the Democrats’ $4.5 trillion infrastructure and spending plans and President Joe Biden’s bungled exit from Afghanistan have a nexus. But they do in China’s rare metals monopoly.

Beijing already dominates the rare metals market needed for electronics, electric car batteries and computers, a reality made more painfully obvious with the current computer chip shortage that is slowing production of new U.S. cars.

And now with the haphazard U.S. withdrawal from Kabul, one of the world’s largest untapped deposits of lithium — estimated by some at $1 trillion in Afghanistan — is poised to fall into China’s hands just as Biden has ordered that half all U.S. cars be electric by 2030 and congressional Democrats prepare to vote to invest tens of billions of dollars more to push that goal further.

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Northam: Virginia Willing to Take in Thousands of Afghan Refugees

As the Taliban continues to take over the government of Afghanistan, Virginia is willing to take in thousands of Afghan refugees, Gov. Ralph Northam announced on Twitter.

“Last week I was honored to meet some of the thousands of Afghan citizens and families who have sought refuge at Fort Lee in Virginia,” Northam tweeted. “I’m coordinating with [Washington] DC and have made it clear: we’re ready and willing to take thousands more. Virginia will continue to serve as [a] safe harbor.”

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U.S. Vetting Afghan Refugees with Biometrics but Uncertain of Some Identities, Memos Show

The U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency is processing airlifted Afghan refugees in locations like Germany, Bahrain and Qatar before sending them to the Washington D.C.-area Dulles International airport, using biometrics when possible to identify those without official travel papers, according to internal memos obtained by Just the News.

The memos acknowledge all refugees are being screened for COVID-19 after they arrive in the United States, and some may be arriving without their identities ascertained.

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Biden Helped Evacuate the French Embassy While Leaving American Citizens to the Mercy of the Taliban

President Joe Biden boasted during a press conference Friday that his administration supported the evacuation of the French embassy in Kabul while at the same time American citizens are being told the U.S. government cannot escort them to the airport.

The U.S. Embassy in Kabul informed American citizens on Thursday that the Biden administration “cannot ensure safe passage to the airport.” The message came one day after Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said the U.S. military lacks the capability to escort Americans trapped behind enemy lines to the airport.

However, the Biden administration did have the capability to provide support to a convoy of hundreds of French people from their embassy to the airport, the president said Friday.

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Trump Administration’s Careful Afghanistan Withdrawal Plans Were Ignored by Biden, Former Trump Aide Says

Joe Biden’s national security team reportedly ignored the Trump administration’s careful plans for withdrawing from Afghanistan, resulting in the nightmare scenario currently unfolding in the war-torn country.

Former National Security Council Senior Director Kash Patel told Just the News’ John Solomon on Thursday, “I don’t even know that anyone could have made this awful scenario up. It’s literally worse than you could possibly conjure.”

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Commentary: Biden Says ‘No One’s Being Killed,’ Ignores More Than 12,000 Dead in Afghanistan

“[N]o one’s being killed right now, God forgive me if I’m wrong about that, but no one’s being killed right now.”

That was President Joe Biden’s Aug. 18 description of the situation on the ground in Afghanistan to ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos, where the U.S.-backed government there has been toppled by the Taliban in an offensive that began in early May.

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Pentagon Does Not Deny That U.S. Military Is Buying Fuel from the Taliban to Evacuate People from Afghanistan

William Taylor

Army Maj. Gen. Hank Taylor and Pentagon Spokesman John Kirby dodged a reporter’s question about whether the US military is buying aviation fuel from the Taliban as evacuation efforts continue at Hamid Karzai International Airport (HKIA) in Kabul.

During a briefing at the Pentagon Thursday, Kirby also revealed that of the 2,000 people evacuated over the last 24 hours, only 300 of them were Americans.

“How are you fueling your planes… are you now in a position that you have to buy fuel from the Taliban?” asked Fox News national security correspondent Jennifer Griffin during a briefing at the Pentagon.

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Fort Bliss in Texas Becomes Ground Zero for Resettling Afghan Refugees During Chaotic Exit

Fort Bliss in El Paso, Texas, is best known as home to the Army’s tank division, the revered Old Ironsides military insignia and the country’s largest military-controlled airspace. But the Biden administration’s botched exit from Afghanistan is turning the vast installation into ground zero for the evacuation of Afghans who spent two decades helping the United States fight the war against terror.

Texas Sen. John Cornyn says the fort is preparing to receive 10,000 Afghan refugees, and military officials have hinted that number could reach much higher.

It’s the second major wave of civilian guests to be hosted at the fort, which began this spring helping the Homeland Security and Health and Human Services Departments to house thousands of unaccompanied minor children who were brought across the border.

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Biden State Dept. Quashed Trump-Era Program Designed to Evacuate Americans from Crisis Zones

The Biden Administration quashed a critical State Department program designed to help Americans evacuate safely out of crisis zones just months prior to the fall of Kabul, the National Pulse reported Wednesday.

The “Contingency and Crisis Response Bureau” was established late last year to handle medical, diplomatic, and logistical support involving Americans overseas.

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Commentary: Thousands Stranded in Afghanistan as Biden Ignored and Generals Disregard Warnings from the Battlefield

“Our military mission in Afghanistan will conclude on August 31st. The drawdown is proceeding in a secure and orderly way, prioritizing the safety of our troops as they depart… And thanks to the way in which we have managed our withdrawal, no one — no one U.S. forces or any forces have — have been lost.  Conducting our drawdown differently would have certainly come with a increased risk of safety to our personnel.”

That was President Joe Biden as recently as July 8 justifying not just a drawdown, but a rapid drawdown of U.S. military presence in Afghanistan, trying to reach an arbitrary goal of zero troops in the country by the end of this month.

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White House: ‘Certainly a Fair Amount’ of U.S. Weaponry Is in the Hands of the Taliban

White House National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said Tuesday that “certainly a fair amount” of U.S. weaponry that was in the possession of Afghan Security Forces has now fallen in the hands of the Taliban.

Sullivan spoke at a White House press briefing two days after the Taliban took control of Afghanistan and was asked whether the Biden administration knows where the billions of dollars in weaponry that the U.S. supplied the Afghan government will ultimately end up.

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Report: Terrorist Released by Obama in Exchange for Bowe Bergdahl Played Key Role in Taliban’s Return to Power

Taliban insurgents turn themselves in to Afghan National Security Forces at a forward operating base in Puza-i-Eshan

One of the five Taliban commanders who was released from Guantanamo Bay in 2014 by former president Barack Obama in exchange for Army deserter Bowe Bergdahl, is emerging as a key figure who helped the insurgents seize power in Afghanistan.

Khairullah Khairkhwa, along with the other freed detainees, used Qatar as a base to form a Taliban regime in exile, and eventually became an official negotiator for peace talks with the Biden regime, the New York Post reported.

Khairkhwa previously served as Spokesperson of the Taliban regime, Governor of the Kabul Province of the Taliban regime, and Minister of Internal Affairs of the Taliban regime, according to the United Nations National Security Council.

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Twitter Allows Taliban to Remain on Their Platform, Even as Other Tech Giants Ban Them

On Tuesday, Twitter admitted in a statement that they have no plans to ban the official accounts of the Taliban and its spokesmen, even after the radical Islamist group had seized control of the nation of Afghanistan over the weekend, as reported by the New York Post.

When asked about maintaining such accounts, the statement released by Twitter mostly dodged the issue and deferred to basic platitudes about how the social media giant would “continue to proactively enforce” its rules, and would only ban tweets that include “glorification of violence, platform manipulation, and spam.”

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Democrat Firebrand Senator Sheldon Whitehouse Compares Fall of Kabul to Saigon as Biden Admin Denies Connection

A Democratic senator compared the scene in Kabul as the U.S. rushed to evacuate embassy personnel and Afghan allies to the fall of Saigon in 1975 on Monday.

“Sad. My father was our next-to-last ambassador in Saigon, and our ambassador when ‘peace deal’ was negotiated in Laos,” tweeted Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island. “How that all ended deserved more attention.”

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Over 200 Afghan Allies Arrive on First of Many Expected Flights to Bring Thousands to the US

Over 200 Afghan allies arrived at Fort Lee, in Virginia, on the first of many expected flights bringing thousands of people who assisted the U.S. military to America, Axios reported Friday.

President Joe Biden promised to help Afghan interpreters and other people who aided U.S. forces during the war, according to Axios. Over 700 people and their family members are expected to come to the U.S. on special immigrant visas as American forces withdraw from Afghanistan.

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New York Mayoral Candidate Refuses to Answer Whether She Thinks the U.S. Is Comparable to the Taliban

Screen capture from video of Democratic candidate for NY mayor

New York City mayoral candidate Maya Wiley would not say whether she thinks the U.S. is comparable to the Taliban Thursday, video shows.

Wiley was questioned about Minnesota Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar’s comments comparing the U.S. and Israel to the Taliban and Hamas, video shows. She refused to answer and added that she was proud of her multiple congressional endorsements.

“I am not going to answer this question because I have been, actually, just come out of the debate, I appreciate you asking,” Wiley said in the video.

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Democrats Blast Omar for Comparing America, Israel to Taliban

Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN-05) caused another rift in the Democrat Party this week when she openly compared the United States and Israel to the Taliban and Hamas in a now-deleted tweet. 

After an exchange with Secretary of State Anthony Blinken, wherein Omar demanded an International Criminal Court investigation into possible war crimes in Afghanistan and Palestine, Omar took to Twitter, saying there have been “unthinkable atrocities committed by the U.S., Hamas, Israel, Afghanistan, and the Taliban.”

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