Taliban fighters Thursday opened fire on a group of protesters celebrating Afghanistan’s independence day and waving the Afghan national flag in Kabul. 

Afghans gathered in the streets to commemorate the anniversary of a 1919 treaty that gave the country independence from Great Britain and waved the Afghanistan national flag, only to be dispersed by gunfire from Taliban forces.

In the video obtained by Fox News, Afghans who were upset that the Taliban changed the national flag after taking over on Sunday took to the streets on foot and in cars waving the former national flag. Shots can be heard being fired by the Taliban and the crowd quickly disperses in panic. 

“In many cities, the Taliban opened gunfire and charged and beat the people,” a source told Fox News, explaining that protesters were attacked by Taliban fighters across the country in similar fashion.

The source added that the Taliban had removed a large Afghan flag in Kabul and the protesters in the video were attempting to replace it but were driven back. 

“May the Afghan flag fly forever,” the protesters could be heard chanting while others shouted, “Long live Ashraf Ghani” in reference to the now-deposed former president of Afghanistan, who fled the country as the Taliban took control. 

“May Afghanistan live forever,” others chanted. 

At least two people were reportedly killed in a similar protest in the country’s Kunar province after gunfire prompted a stampede.

U.S. forces are trying to evacuate thousands of American citizens and allies trapped in Kabul, where the Taliban has taken full control of the city with the sole exception of the Hamid Karzai International Airport, where 4,500 U.S. troops are currently occupying.

President Biden has authorized 6,000 U.S. troops to deploy to Afghanistan to assist in the evacuation mission, as the Taliban pushes to restore the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan – the formal name of the country under the Taliban rule before the militants were ousted by U.S.-led forces in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. The attacks on Sept. 11, 2001, were orchestrated by Al Qaeda while it was being sheltered by the Taliban in Afghanistan. 

The president, adamantly standing by his initial decision to withdraw all U.S. troops from Afghanistan by Aug. 31, outlined the current mission for the U.S. military in Afghanistan, saying it will be “short in time, limited in scope and focused on our objectives: get our people and our allies as quickly and as safely as possible.”

By Andrew Mark Miller | Lucas Y. Tomlinson contributed to this report.

The New Testament of the Bible contains the story of the life of Jesus Christ. Within its pages is recounted how He was crucified on Friday, and his body was hastily removed from the cross and placed into a tomb hewn into the rock, with very little time to appropriately prepare the body for final burial before the Jewish Sabbath started at sunset.

It was early Sunday morning when Mary Magdalene and other women disciples arrived at the tomb to see the sepulcher and prepare His body. Suddenly there was a great earthquake and an angel of the Lord descended from heaven, and came and rolled back the stone from the door, and sat on it. His countenance was like lightning, and his raiment white as snow.

The angel said to the women, “Fear not: for I know that you seek Jesus, which was crucified. He is not here: for he is arisen. Come, see the place where the Lord lay.” He then instructed her to go and tell Jesus’ disciples that He was risen from the dead and that He would go before them to Galilee; and there they would see Him.

The others ran to tell the Apostles what they had seen and heard, but Mary stood at the door of the sepulcher weeping. As she wept, she stooped down, and looked into the sepulcher, and saw two angels in white sitting, one at the head and the other at the feet where the body of Jesus had lain.

They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?”

She said, “Because they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where they have laid him.”

And when she had spoken she turned back, and saw Jesus standing, but knew not that it was Him. He spoke to her and said, “Woman, why are you crying? Whom do you seek?”

She, supposing him to be the gardener, said, “Sir, if you have borne him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.”

Jesus looked upon her with compassion, and said, “Mary.”

Suddenly recognizing His voice, she turned herself and said to him, “Rabboni,” which is to say, Master.

Mary ran to him and embraced him, but Jesus said to her, “Touch me not; for I am not yet ascended to my Father: but go to my brethren, and say to them, ‘I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God.’”

What is the significance of this event nearly 2,000 years later? Each of us must decide its implications and importance for ourselves, and apply its lessons and realities in our own lives as we interpret the message for ourselves. John, the Apostle who recorded this version of the incident gives us his own explanation of why he recorded it: “But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing, ye might have life through his name.”

Let us remember Him this Easter.

James Thompson is a Christian author, political commentator and ghostwriter.

Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Texas, released photos of migrants in clear pens akin to cages

Photos of migrants in a crowded border facility in Donna, Texas, were released Monday by the office of Rep. Henry Cuellar, D-Texas, as the Biden administration limits media access to the southwestern border. 

The migrants, who are in clear pens akin to cages, are seen sleeping on pads on the floor with aluminum blankets. In some instances, it appears that dozens are sharing individual pens. Most appear to be wearing masks.

Amid a significant surge of migrants to the southern border in President Biden’s first two months, some in the media have complained about a lack of access to facilities like the one in Donna.

“I respectfully ask US Customs and Border Protection to stop blocking media access to their border operations,” award-winning photojournalist John Moore tweeted Friday. “I have photographed CBP under Bush, Obama and Trump but now – zero access is granted to media. These long-lens images taken from the Mexican side.”

He added: “There’s no modern precedent for a full physical ban on media access to CBP border operations.”

The White House has said that it is limiting media access to border facilities in order to prevent the spread of the coronavirus. White House press secretary Jen Psaki said on Monday that the Biden administration is aiming to finalize details on how the media can access border facilities like the one in Donna, Texas. 

Psaki responded to the photos on Monday, as a reporter asked her whether the conditions the migrant children are being kept in represent a crisis. 

“Children presenting at our border who are fleeing violence, who are fleeing prosecution, who are fleeing terrible situations, is not a crisis,” she responded. “We feel that it is our responsibility to humanely approach this circumstance and make sure they are treated and put in conditions that are safe. I will say that these photos show what we’ve long been saying, which is that these border patrol facilities are not places made for children. They are not places that we want children to be staying for an extended period of time. Our alternative is to send children back on this treacherous journey. That is not, in our view, the right choice to make.”

She continued to say that the Biden administration is aiming to ease the pressure on facilities like the one in Donna, Texas.

The photos released Monday also upset some on the right who believed Democrats are being hypocritical in saying there is no crisis currently on the southern border after sounding the alarm over the treatment of migrants under former President Donald Trump. 

“Either Dems and media faked the tears and ‘outrage’ pre-Biden, or they meant it,” Rep. Dan Bishop, R-N.C., tweeted. “If it’s the latter, where are they now? Kids are in cages. And this surge is far worse than any under President Trump.”

By Tyler Olson, Evie Fordham contributed to this report. 

Lawmakers in the House and Senate on Tuesday welcomed the Justice Department’s (DOJ’s) move to file an antitrust lawsuit against Google that claims the tech behemoth used its power to preserve its monopoly via its search engine.

“Today’s lawsuit is the most important antitrust case in a generation,” Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., said in a statement. “Google and its fellow Big Tech monopolists exercise unprecedented power over the lives of ordinary Americans, controlling everything from the news we read to the security of our most personal information. And Google in particular has gathered and maintained that power through illegal means.”

The DOJ suit alleges that Google has used its dominance in online search and advertising to stifle competition and boost profits. The suit could be an opening shot in a battle against a number of Big Tech companies in the coming months.

A Google spokesperson told Fox News: “Today’s lawsuit by the Department of Justice is deeply flawed. People use Google because they choose to — not because they’re forced to or because they can’t find alternatives. We will have a fuller statement this morning.”

According to the lawsuit, “For years, Google has entered into exclusionary agreements, including tying arrangements, and engaged in anticompetitive conduct to lock up distribution channels and block rivals.”

“American consumers are forced to accept Google’s policies, privacy practices, and use of personal data; and new companies with innovative business models cannot emerge from Google’s long shadow. For the sake of American consumers, advertisers, and all companies now reliant on the internet economy, the time has come to stop Google’s anticompetitive conduct and restore competition,” it says.

The DOJ claims the action was brought to stop Google from “unlawfully maintaining monopolies in the markets for general search services, search advertising, and general search text advertising in the United States through anticompetitive and exclusionary practices, and to remedy the effects of this conduct.”

“Largely as a result of Google’s exclusionary agreements and anticompetitive conduct, Google in recent years has accounted for nearly 90 percent of all general-search-engine queries in the United States, and almost 95 percent of queries on mobile devices,” the lawsuit says.

The lawsuit has been in the works for over a year, and Big Tech executives from Google, Apple, Facebook and Twitter have been anticipating an announcement — designing their testimonies in Congress to ward off a potential federal suit. 

House Antitrust Subcommittee Chairman David N. Cicilline, D-R.I., described the lawsuit as “long overdue” and brought attention to prior investigations by the committee.

“The Subcommittee’s investigation uncovered extensive evidence showing that Google maintained and extended its monopoly to harm competition,” he said in a statement. “It is critical that the Justice Department’s lawsuit focuses on Google’s monopolization of search and search advertising, while also targeting the anti-competitive business practices Google is using to leverage this monopoly into other areas, such as maps, browsers, video, and voice assistants.”

The lawsuit alleges that Google used billions of dollars from advertisers to pay phone manufacturers to ensure Google is the default search engine on browsers.

“For a general search engine, by far the most effective means of distribution is to be the preset default general search engine for mobile and computer search access points,” the lawsuit says. “Even where users can change the default, they rarely do. This leaves the preset default search engine with de facto exclusivity.”

The Trump administration has long had Google in its sights. A top economic adviser to President Trump said two years ago that the White House was considering whether Google searches should be subject to government regulation. 

Trump and other Republicans have accused Big Tech companies of having an anti-conservative bias — claims they have denied.

In a press conference, Deputy Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen said that the case had nothing to do with online bias, and was only about competitive conditions in the marketplace.

By Gillian Turner, Jake Gibson and Bill Mears, as well as The Associated Press, contributed to this report.Adam Shaw is a reporter covering U.S. and European politics.

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President Trump has promised to announce a pick for the US Supreme Court promptly, specifying this coming Saturday. The seat was vacated by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who died Friday at age 87 following cancer complications.

Democrats have been howling that there would be something unjust about Trump nominating Ginsburg’s successor, and for the GOP controlled Senate giving its “advice and consent” regarding the nomination. Of course, that is exactly what the US Constitution requires of each of them.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman, Lindsey Graham, has announced that there are enough votes in the senate to confirm Trump’s pick.

Trump has indicated that he plans to nominate a woman to the high court. Sources say that the president has already met with 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Amy Coney Barrett, a very well known conservative judge, recently approved by the Senate to sit on the 7th Circuit bench.

In retaliation for the President and Senate doing their constitutionally mandated jobs, Democrats are threatening (again) to “pack” the Court when they take control of the White House and Senate–hopeful that will be the outcome of the upcoming November election.

Packing the US Supreme Court was threatened by FDR when the Supreme Court ruled many of his big government New Deal power grabs were unconstitutional. Packing the Court means (to liberals) adding liberal justices to the present 9 justices, diluting the conservative votes on the court. For instance, if Trump and the Senate install a conservative justice on the Court, it will give the court 6 conservative voices and 3 liberal. By packing the court with additional justices, say a total of 13, that would leave the Court with 6 conservatives and 7 liberals–ensuring that every case would be ruled on according to liberal activist philosophy.

Okay — Let’s Pack the Court, if it’s such a great idea!

If Democrats are so keen on the idea of packing the Court, perhaps the Republicans, who have actually been voted into control of the White House and the Senate by The People, should do just that.

Perhaps President Trump should nominate 5 judges to be seated on the Supreme Court, raising its members to 13. Indeed, such an act would ensure conservative (historically constitutional) rulings from SCOTUS for the next 30 or 40 years–probably much longer.

The Democrats could not overcome this super-majority by adding a few more judges to the Court when they take control–unless they add enough justices to total 21. Although the Democrats have proved that there is no new low to which they are unwilling to go–no law, tradition or rule they are unwilling to break–I cannot see them convincing The People of the need for 21 Justices on the Court.

If Packing the Court is a great idea–then let’s do it. If it’s a stupid idea, and it is, then it shouldn’t be done by either party. When I say “shouldn’t be done,” I mean that a party that threatens to do it should be permanently retired by The People, and never given The People’s trust again.

By James Thompson | James Thompson is a political consultant and a ghostwriter.

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Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died Friday at her home in Washington, the court says. She was 87.

Ginsburg died of complications from metastatic pancreatic cancer, the court says.

Ginsburg has had many health related issues in the past few years, and finally succumbed today.

Ginsburg’s death clears the way for President Donald Trump to nominate a third justice to the Supreme court in his first term. A major fight is anticipated from Capital Hill democrats, who have long feared President Trump receiving this rare opportunity to heavily influence the court.

By James Thompson

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President Trump on Tuesday declared the “dawn of a new Middle East” as he presided over the signing of two historic Middle East diplomatic deals between Israel and two Gulf nations.

“We’re here this afternoon to change the course of history. After decades of division and conflict we mark the dawn of a new Middle East,” he said at the ceremony in the South Lawn of the White House.

“Thanks to the great courage of the leaders of these three countries, we take a major stride toward a future in which people of all faiths and backgrounds live together in peace and prosperity,” he said.

The deals, known as the “Abraham Accords,” involve the exchanging of ambassadors, establishment of embassies and co-operation on a range of fronts, including trade, security and tourism. The deals also allow Muslims to visit Islamic holy sites in Israel. Trump said the deals would form “the foundation for a comprehensive peace across the entire region.”

Earlier in the Oval Office, Trump said “we’re very far down the road with about five additional countries.” He declined to name the countries he is speaking with and later said it could be “five or six” other countries.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will sign the deals, which mark the normalization of relations, with the foreign ministers of both the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain. The UAE deal was announced last month, with the Bahrain deal announced on Friday. They have been dubbed the “Abraham Accords.”

Netanyahu rejected the idea that Israel was isolated in the region and declared that “we’re breaking out to the entire world.”

While critics have noted that such deals ignore Palestinians and the Israel-Palestinian conflict, it is hoped that the deals would be the start of warmer Arab-Israeli relations.

Trump told “Fox & Friends” on Tuesday morning that other countries “want to come in” and that he believes the Palestinians will eventually come in too.

“You’re going to have peace in the Middle East,” Trump said, adding that countries including Iran were “actually getting to a point where they’re going to want to make a deal. They won’t say that outwardly. They want to make a deal.”

Israel, Bahrain and the UAE are expected to sign a trilateral document, in addition to the bilateral agreements. Trump is expected to sign on as a witness.

Democrats have given some support to the agreements, with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi saying in a statement that it marked “an important day” but said that “questions remain” including about a commitment for the UAE to purchase F-35 jets — which has led to fears it could blunt Israel’s military superiority in the region.

“As we learn more about the full details of both agreements, questions remain – specifically, regarding the commitment that the UAE has received from the Trump Administration to purchase American-made F-35 aircraft. The U.S. Congress, on a bipartisan basis, will be watching and monitoring to ensure that Israel can maintain its qualitative military edge in the region.

“It is also critically important that we fully understand the agreements’ details regarding the announced freeze of efforts by Israel to annex portions of the West Bank,” she said.

By Adam Shaw

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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Just weeks after helping to broker peace between Israel and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), President Trump has been nominated for the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize.

The nomination submitted by Christian Tybring-Gjedde, a member of the Norwegian Parliament, lauded Trump for his efforts toward resolving protracted conflicts worldwide.

“For his merit, I think he has done more trying to create peace between nations than most other Peace Prize nominees,” Tybring-Gjedde, a four-term member of Parliament who also serves as chairman of the Norwegian delegation to the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, told Fox News in an exclusive interview.

Tybring-Gjedde, in his nomination letter to the Nobel Committee, said the Trump administration has played a key role in the establishment of relations between Israel and the UAE. “As it is expected other Middle Eastern countries will follow in the footsteps of the UAE, this agreement could be a game changer that will turn the Middle East into a region of cooperation and prosperity,” he wrote.

Also cited in the letter was the president’s “key role in facilitating contact between conflicting parties and … creating new dynamics in other protracted conflicts, such as the Kashmir border dispute between India and Pakistan, and the conflict between North and South Korea, as well as dealing with the nuclear capabilities of North Korea.”

Tybring-Gjedde, further, praised Trump for withdrawing a large number of troops from the Middle East. “Indeed, Trump has broken a 39-year-old streak of American Presidents either starting a war or bringing the United States into an international armed conflict. The last president to avoid doing so was Peace Prize laureate Jimmy Carter,” he wrote.

This is not Trump’s first such nomination, as Tybring-Gjedde submitted one along with another Norwegian official in 2018 following the U.S. president’s Singapore summit with Kim Jong Un. Japan’s prime minister reportedly did the same. Trump did not win.

Tybring-Gjedde, a member of a conservative-leaning populist party in Norway, told Fox News that his latest nomination is not about trying to curry favor with the U.S. president.

“I’m not a big Trump supporter,” he said. “The committee should look at the facts and judge him on the facts – not on the way he behaves sometimes. The people who have received the Peace Prize in recent years have done much less than Donald Trump. For example, Barack Obama did nothing.” Video

The 2009 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to then-President Barack Obama for what the Nobel Committee called his “extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.”

That decision made just nine months into Obama’s first term was met with criticism in the U.S. – including from Donald Trump, then a private citizen. Lech Walesa, Poland’s former president and a 1983 Nobel laureate, also said at the time it was too early to bestow the award on Obama — just 263 days after taking office: “Too fast. For the time being Obama’s just making proposals. But sometimes the Nobel Committee awards the prize to encourage responsible action.”https://omny.fm/shows/the-fox-news-rundown-1/president-trump-nominated-for-nobel-peace-prize/embed?t=0s

Even Obama was taken aback, saying at the time he was “surprised and humbled” by the Nobel Committee’s decision. “To be honest,” he said, “I do not feel that I deserve to be in the company of so many of the transformative figures who have been honored by this prize, men and women who’ve inspired me and inspired the entire world through their courageous pursuit of peace.”

Besides Obama, three other U.S. presidents have won the Nobel Peace Prize: President Theodore Roosevelt in 1906 for “having negotiated peace in the Russo-Japanese war”; President Woodrow Wilson in 1920 for being the “leading architect of the League of Nations”; and President Jimmy Carter in 2002 for “his decades of untiring effort to find peaceful solutions to international conflicts.”

The Nobel Peace Prize recipient is determined by a five-person Nobel Committee, which is appointed by the Norwegian Parliament. The winner of the Peace Prize for 2021 will not be announced until October of next year.

By Jon Decker | Fox News Jon Decker | currently serves as the White House correspondent for FOX News Radio (FNR).

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