Rebel News - Independent News and Analysis

US President Barack Obama is to unveil new economic initiatives which mainly aim at reducing the unemployment rate in the country, administration officials say.

Obama will ask Congress on Wednesday to increase and permanently extend a tax credit for business research as a way of boosting job growth, administration officials said.

The US Department of Defense has reportedly refused to investigate hundreds of purchases of child pornography by its personnel.

According to documents obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, the Pentagon identified over 260 employees who purchased child porn in 2006, The Upshot news blog reported on Friday.

US federal investigators have ruled a suspicious fire that damaged construction equipment at the site of a future Islamic Center of Murfreesboro in the state of Tennessee as 'arson'.

Laboratory tests on a burnt truck found at the site tested positive for accelerants, showing the fire was deliberately begun. Investigators believe a person doused a lorry in diesel and then ignited it.

American demonstrators marking International Quds Day have announced that they would boycott Israeli products as an indication of their support of the Palestinian nation.

Americans staged rallies in the US capital Washington on Friday along with other Muslims across the world to mark International Quds Day, IRIB reported.

A Muslim soldier has asked to leave the US military because he says his faith forbids him from taking part in US-led wars.

Private First Class Naser Abdo said Islam is a peaceful religion and he believes US-led wars are not legitimate for a Muslim to take part in, ABC news reported on Friday.

The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) is planning measures to counter the recently stepped-up anti-Islam campaign in the United States.

In a news conference, CAIR introduced advertisements that will be broadcast on millions of American TVs on September 11, 2010, the ninth anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Center towers, a Press TV correspondent reported.

The number of illegal immigrants in the US has declined for the first time in two decades, as it has tightened measures at its southern borders.

The US illegal immigrant population fell to 11.1 million in 2009 from a peak of 12 million in 2007, according to a Wednesday report by the Pew Hispanic Center quoted by The New York Times.

Former Chief UN Weapons Inspector Scott Ritter says the US is addicted to nuclear weapons to use them as deterrence against its imaginary enemies.

It was the US that introduced the nuclear weapons to the world and it is the only nation in the history of the world to actually have used nuclear weapons in a time of war, Ritter told Press TV in an interview.

A Jewish group in the US shares the view that Israelis are in danger wherever they are - and believes they should prepare themselves for the worst. Its members are involved in intensive training in military skills and survival methods. But as Lauren Lyster discovered, critics claim their enemy is mostly in the mind...

The US Department of State has adopted new efforts to bring diplomacy into the digital age by using widely available technologies to reach out to non-state actors.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton promoted an attempt called “the 21st Century Statecraft” which encourages using such tech-based tools as social networking websites on the internet.