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Pro-Israel News Anchor Fired From Sky News Australia Vows to Be ‘Loudest Member of the Silent Majority’
Television presenter Erin Molan at a press conference during a visit to Penshurst Girls School in Sydney, Wednesday, December 8, 2021. Photo: AAPIMAGE via Reuters Connect
An Australian news anchor who has repeatedly expressed support for Israel on air has been fired from hosting a Friday night news program on Sky News Australia.
Erin Molan, 41, presented the final episode of her evening show “Erin” on Nov. 29, and her firing was announced days later. She was not able to return on air to say farewell to her viewers. Sky News thanked Molan for her work in a statement to Australia’s Daily Mail but did not specify the reason for her firing.
“Erin has been a fantastic member of the Sky News team over the past three years, and has worked incredibly hard for her viewers, passionately advocating on the issues close to her heart,” the news network said. “We would like to thank her for her contribution to the network.”
Molan is the daughter of the late Major General Jim Molan, an Australian senator who was an avid supporter of Israel and a strong advocate for Australia-Israel ties. She grew up in Indonesia, which has the largest Muslim population in the world, and joined Sky News Australia in July 2022. Her morning show on Australia’s largest radio station, Southern Cross Austereo, with comedians David Hughes and Ed Kavalee, was canceled in August.
Since the start of the Israel-Hamas war, Molan has made numerous comments on her show “Erin” in support of the Jewish state and its military actions targeting the terrorist organization controlling the Gaza Strip that orchestrated the deadly massacre in southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. She has also received death threats for backing the Jewish state.
On Friday, Sky News Australia host Sharri Markson denied that Molan was fired by the network because of her strong support for Israel. Markson wrote on X it is “categorically untrue” that her colleague was sacked by Sky News Australia “because of her Zionism.”
Nevertheless, Molan on Thursday posted a nine-minute video on X in which she talked largely about her unwavering support for Israel, and how she will keep defending the country publicly even after being fired from Sky News Australia. The single mother said that while her show “Erin” became her “purpose” and “passion,” that’s “done now, but I am not. In fact, I’m just getting started.”
She then started listing off the topics close to her heart that she refuses to stay silent about, including “fighting for every single hostage still captive in Gaza hundreds of days in, whilst a fair chunk of the world seemingly not only allows their captors completely off the hook, but praises them, worships them, idolizes them, rewards them.”
“Pressure Hamas? Oh God, no. Don’t be silly; they’re just terrorists, let them be,” she sarcastically added. “Pressure Israel, that’s it. The only democracy in the Middle East fighting bloodthirsty killers on multiple fronts on behalf of the entire world, desperately trying to get their people back, including babies, while simultaneously trying to protect the rest of their citizens from the same fate. Yes, demonize them. They are the problem. What a plan, huh? Brilliant. And how many people fell for it and continue to.”
Molan also discussed continuing to advocate for the innocent children in Gaza suffering under Hamas rule, and further condemned the terrorist organization that perpetrated the Oct. 7 massacre last year. She criticized the “deafening silence” for the women who were killed, raped, and kidnapped by Hamas-led terrorist during the Oct. 7 attack, and the “unfathomable support for evil amongst young people in the West who are so deluded regarding where their empathy belongs.”
“I’m here to be the loudest member of the silent majority that I can be,” she said. “I’m not from Israel. I’m not Jewish … I have no skin in this game. But you see, I do. We all do. It doesn’t matter how far away we are. When hate is allowed to fester, we all lose … And if I back down now and sit idly by, then I am just as much to blame as the fool waving a Hamas flag at a bogus protest that has nothing to do with Palestinian lives.”
“Terrorism and extremism hurts all of us,” she said in conclusion. “That is why I will not stop.”
During one segment on “Erin” in September, Molan told viewers: “If you care about innocent civilians everywhere, then you must stand with Israel. Imagine the Middle East without terror. Hard to, isn’t it? Imagine every cent in Gaza going towards health and education, instead of terror tunnels and bombs … imagine peace. There’s only one side fighting for that right now and their victory in the Middle East is the only one that will ever achieve it.”
In October, after the premeditated and violent attack on Israeli soccer fans in Amsterdam, Molan said: “If it doesn’t hurt you when you look at the footage from Amsterdam, you are not human.”
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Germany: 5 Killed, Scores Wounded after Saudi Man Plows Car Into Christmas crowd
Magdeburg Christmas market, December 21, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Christian Mang
i24 News – A suspected terrorist plowed a vehicle into a crowd at a Christmas market in the German city of Magdeburg, west of the capital Berlin, killing at least five and injuring dozens more.
Local police confirmed that the suspect was a Saudi national born in 1974 and acting alone.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz expressed his concern about the incident, saying that “reports from Magdeburg suggest something bad. My thoughts are with the victims and their families.”
Police declined to give casualty numbers, confirming only a large-scale operation at the market, where people had gathered to celebrate in the days leading up to the Christmas holidays.
The post Germany: 5 Killed, Scores Wounded after Saudi Man Plows Car Into Christmas crowd first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Syria’s New Rulers Name HTS Commander as Defense Minister
A person waves a flag adopted by the new Syrian rulers, as people gather during a celebration called by Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) near the Umayyad Mosque, after the ousting of Syria’s Bashar al-Assad, in Damascus, Syria, Photo: December 20, 2024. REUTERS/Ammar Awad/File Photo
Syria’s new rulers have appointed Murhaf Abu Qasra, a leading figure in the insurgency which toppled Bashar al-Assad, as defense minister in the interim government, an official source said on Saturday.
Abu Qasra, who is also known by the nom de guerre Abu Hassan 600, is a senior figure in the Islamist Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) group which led the campaign that ousted Assad this month. He led numerous military operations during Syria’s revolution, the source said.
Syria’s de facto leader Ahmed al-Sharaa discussed “the form of the military institution in the new Syria” during a meeting with armed factions on Saturday, state news agency SANA reported.
Abu Qasra during the meeting sat next to Sharaa, also known by the nom de guerre Abu Mohammed al-Golani, photos published by SANA showed.
Prime Minister Mohammed al-Bashir said this week that the defense ministry would be restructured using former rebel factions and officers who defected from Assad’s army.
Bashir, who formerly led an HTS-affiliated administration in the northwestern province of Idlib, has said he will lead a three-month transitional government. The new administration has not declared plans for what will happen after that.
Earlier on Saturday, the ruling General Command named Asaad Hassan al-Shibani as foreign minister, SANA said. A source in the new administration told Reuters that this step “comes in response to the aspirations of the Syrian people to establish international relations that bring peace and stability.”
Shibani, a 37-year-old graduate of Damascus University, previously led the political department of the rebels’ Idlib government, the General Command said.
Sharaa’s group was part of al Qaeda until he broke ties in 2016. It had been confined to Idlib for years until going on the offensive in late November, sweeping through the cities of western Syria and into Damascus as the army melted away.
Sharaa has met with a number of international envoys this week. He has said his primary focus is on reconstruction and achieving economic development and that he is not interested in engaging in any new conflicts.
Syrian rebels seized control of Damascus on Dec. 8, forcing Assad to flee after more than 13 years of civil war and ending his family’s decades-long rule.
Washington designated Sharaa a terrorist in 2013, saying al Qaeda in Iraq had tasked him with overthrowing Assad’s rule and establishing Islamic sharia law in Syria. US officials said on Friday that Washington would remove a $10 million bounty on his head.
The war has killed hundreds of thousands of people, caused one of the biggest refugee crises of modern times and left cities bombed to rubble and the economy hollowed out by global sanctions.
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Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels
View of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) building in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip. Photo: Abed Rahim Khatib / Flash90.
i24 News – Sweden will no longer fund the U.N. refugee agency for Palestinians (UNRWA) and will instead provide humanitarian assistance to Gaza via other channels, the Scandinavian country said on Friday.
The decision comes on the heels of multiple revelations regarding the agency’s employees’ involvement in the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led massacre in southern Israel that triggered the war in Gaza.
Sweden’s decision was in response to the Israeli ban, as it will make channeling aid via the agency more difficult, the country’s aid minister, Benjamin Dousa, said.
“Large parts of UNRWA’s operations in Gaza are either going to be severely weakened or completely impossible,” Dousa said. “For the government, the most important thing is that support gets through.”
The Palestinian embassy in Stockholm said in a statement: “We reject the idea of finding alternatives to UNRWA, which has a special mandate to provide services to Palestinian refugees.”
Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Sharren Haskel thanked Dousa for a meeting they had this week and for Sweden’s decision to drop its support for UNRWA.
“There are worthy and viable alternatives for humanitarian aid, and I appreciate the willingness to listen and adopt a different approach,” she said.
The post Sweden Ends Funding for UNRWA, Pledges to Seek Other Aid Channels first appeared on Algemeiner.com.