WARSAW, Poland — Poland’s president strongly condemned all forms of racism, xenophobia and anti-Semitism as he led commemorations Monday marking the 70th anniversary of a massacre of Jews after World War II.

Andrzej Duda spoke in Kielce, where communist police and a mob killed 42 people on July 4, 1946. Coming a year after the end of World War II, the killings sent waves of fear through Poland’s Jewish community and sparked a wave of Jewish emigration from Poland.

“In a free, sovereign and independent Poland there is no room for any form of prejudice, for racism, for xenophobia, for anti-Semitism,” Duda said in a speech in Kielce, according to remarks carried by the Polish news agency PAP.

Duda and other leaders with the governing Law and Justice party, which backs Duda, have sent mixed messages on matters of prejudice since the election last year that brought them to power.

The party has taken a staunchly anti-migrant stance, with party leader Jaroslaw Kaczynski accusing refugees during the election campaign last year of carrying “parasites and protozoa” to Europe.
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Tue Jul 5, 2016 8:11PM

While offering condolences over the recent terror attacks in Saudi Arabia, Iran’s parliament speaker warned against the tactical manipulation of such incidents.

“We have on multiple occasions warned the countries in the region that the tactical use of terrorism is a strategic mistake,” said Ali Larijani (seen below) while addressing the Iranian parliament on Tuesday.

He further stressed that such policies will only create other problems in the region in the future.

Larijnai also expressed regret that the terrorist attacks were carried out next to the Prophet’s Mosque in Saudi Arabia.

Condemning the attacks, he noted that much more attention must be paid to terrorist activities in the region.


A picture taken July 4, 2016 shows of the covered body of a suspected bomber at the site of an attack near the security headquarters of the Prophet’s Mosque in the Saudi city of Medina. (AFP) 

On Monday, the Saudi Arabian cites of Medina, Qatif, and Jeddah were targeted in a series of attacks. Several security guards were killed when a terrorist detonated his explosives near the security headquarters of the Prophet’s Mosque in the western city of Medina.

 
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Tue Jul 5, 2016 8:3PM

The United States is irked by Israel over reports that the regime is planning to build hundreds of new illegal settlement units in Palestine.

The US State Department said on Tuesday that if more settlements are to be built in the West Bank, they will serve as an obstacle to the so-called “two-state solution.”

State Department spokesman John Kirby said US officials were aware of the reports in regard to Tel Aviv’s expansionist policy.

“If true, this report would be the latest step in what seems to be a systematic process of land seizures, settlement expansions and legalizations of outposts that is fundamentally undermining the prospects for a two-state solution,” Kirby said at a news briefing in Washington, DC.

Kirby’s remarks came after UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon condemned the decision, saying that such activities raise “legitimate questions” over Tel Aviv’s “long-term intentions” in the West Bank.

“The Secretary-General strongly criticizes the decision by Israeli authorities to advance plans to build some 560 housing units in the West Bank settlement of Maale Adumim, as well as the advancement of plans to build 240 housing units in a number of settlements in occupied East Jerusalem,” said Ban’s spokesman, Stephane Dujarric, in statement released on Monday.


A picture taken on July 4, 2016, shows buildings under construction in the Israeli settlement of Maale Adumim, east of al-Quds (Jerusalem) in the occupied West Bank. (AFP)

On Sunday, an unnamed official announced that the plans had been approved by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the minister of military affairs, Avigdor Liberman.
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