A Spy Myth is Born- (Spy? vs Spy, MAD MAD MAD)

New York Post ^ | March 11, 2002 | Daniel Pipes

[LarryLied]

Huh? Parents are going to help them avoid the IRS and various state agencies?

I think not. They made, or had, a lot of money. Hawking stuff around office buildings is more lucrative than 99% of the people imagine. They had to take checks and probably credit cards. There is a paper trail miles long. I doubt very much everything was nice and tidy when the were deported. You can bet they owe a lot in taxes. The question is, why is no one is asking about that?

[Nix 2]

Larry. Ever see the the ad on tv where the college kid calls home and simply says, send money? Do you think their parents WEREN'T involved when their sons were detained? Has it possibly occurred to you that since these fellas were art students they might have been proud of their work? Must have been pretty good if people bought it, wouldn't you think? Could it be possible that being from another country they didn't know about permits and such? They didn't endanger anyone. They didn't bomb buildings. You are really speculating here. Making mountains out of molehills. How do you know that the things you accuse them of were even an issue? Do you really dislike us THAT much?

[dighton]

Interesting name.

PRUNEYARD SHOPPING CENTER ET AL. v. ROBINS ET AL.

... The Prune Yard is open to the public for the purpose of encouraging the patronizing of its commercial establishments. It has a policy not to permit any visitor or tenant to engage in any publicly expressive activity, including the circulation of petitions, that is not directly related to its commercial purposes. This policy has been strictly enforced in a nondiscriminatory fashion. The Prune Yard is owned by appellant Fred Sahadi.

Appellees are high school students who sought to solicit support for their opposition to a United Nations resolution against "Zionism." ...

[LarryLied]

Has it possibly occurred to you that since these fellas were art students they might have been proud of their work?

Nope. Because they didn't paint the work themselves. Not for $50 to $200 apiece.They were buying imports for $3 to $30 and hawking them as originals. Done all the time. I've been to warehouses with 100,000 "original" oils in stock. Any genre you want. They are produced assembly line style in South Korea or who knows where. Everyone on the line has one color. I've seen individuals and groups of people selling this schlock door to door and at hotels from CT to CA.

A retail operation this size is not unwound with a phone call to a parent in Israel.The books of these people would be fascinating to go over.

[LarryLied]

Could it be possible that being from another country they didn't know about permits and such?

snicker...yeah right, citizens of one of the most socialist countries around don't know you need permits to sell stuff. They came here because, aside from perhaps spying, they knew we are easier on that nonsense than their country is. Friend of mine spends 6 months in Israel and 6 months selling at street fairs in NYC (She nets over $100,000 in NYC). I asked why she didn't sell a little in Israel and she looked at me as if I was crazy. NYC is one of the worst places for taxes but it makes Israel look, to her, like there are no taxes and paperwork.

[Tarakotchi]

Sure, why not check out Universal Art's ("art students") books and go after Quality Sales (Zoomcopter salesmen) for their hiring practices? I'm not holding my breath though. Quality Sales said, oops, we got bad legal advice, we thought it was okay since they were considered 'trainees', not 'employees'.*

I'm still skeptical that the art scam would work though, since I think any good office receptionist would tell them to buzz off. (Wow, your friend makes $100K in 6 months at street fairs, is that selling these imports?)

[LarryLied]

She is French, knows and can sell jewelry and accessories She buys in Southeast Asia ($6 becomes $64 with a simple plane ride). When she was 5 the Vichy government turned her over to the Nazis. One of the few kids to make it out of Auschwitz. We're friends but we don't talk politics, she is as liberal as anyone I've met.

That Art dealer is going to have one huge tax bill for what the Israelis probably didn't pay. IRS can claim they were not independent contractors and make him pay everything. If anything is left, the states will grab it.

[veronica]

You guys still spinning your yarns? Sheesh give it up. :)

[ValenB4]

I'll take your word for it. There are people who will believe every possible Israeli conspiracy theory and there are also those who will never even consider questioning Israel's actions. The jury is still out on this story, which I don't think will go away.

Nations do spy on their friends. It's part of the Great Game. I believe there's probably something to this. I highly doubt any possible foreknowledge of the 9/11 attack would have gone all the way up to Sharon. It's probably a faction in their intelligence community woudn't mind seeing the US more directly involved over there.

Israel hasn't been afraid to dirty it's nose. They broke into the Peach Bottom nuclear power plant in York, PA, stole equipment, and nothing came of it. Then there was the USS Liberty incident, which they say was an accident but could well have been an attempt to draw us into the war. The truckload of secrets stolen by Jonathon Pollard were forwarded to the Soviets, who gained, among who knows what else, the locations and routes of our nuclear submaries.

This criticism of the Israeli government has nothing to do with the people, who I greatly admire. Jews are the most oppressed people in all of history. But they have remained strong and maintained their cultural identity in spite of facing wave after wave of oppression. That is truly a great achievement.

I actually empathize with Likud. Israel's borders make no sense. It's simply untenable to have that easily penetrable 10-mile gooseneck that could see the country split in half. If that would happen, the Palestinians would do in 4 weeks what the Nazis did in 4 years. But something has to be done to appease the anger and hatred of the Palestinians. If the refugees had been repatriated in 1948, when there were only 750,000 or so, this could have been avoided.

[LarryLied]

The jury is still out on this story

My take too. What piqued my interest were the frantic denials. Like you, I expect Israel and others to spy on us. If someone impartial had to place a serious bet on whether this spying occurred or not and they knew the truth would come out, few or none would bet it didn't.

I would say the same in reverse too. If Americans had done this in Israel, my guess would be something was up.

[Nix 2]

So you still don't answer the question. Avoidance and obfuscation is all I ever see or hear from you. It is pretty clear that you wouldn't cut a Jew a break if one was dying from thirst and you had water. Henceforth, I will regard you as the anti-Jew you are, and your words become meaningless to me personally. Every chance I have gotten, I have tried to give you some benefit of the doubt. No more. You are not interested in conversing, you are interested in blame and scapegoating. So be it. I am not your scapegoat and not going to treat you with any more respect than I treat any other Jew Hater on this board. Thank you for the enlightenment.

[LarryLied]

Ok..and I'll lump you in with Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, Alan Dershowitz, Abe Foxman and all the other identity politics, race baiting, victimology con men.

One can wonder if these were spies or not without being against Jews. The more posts I see like yours above, the more I think somebody knows something and is covering it up by calling names. Standard Liberal Operating Procedure (S.L.O.P)

[Nix 2]

That would be fine if in this case it was true. What is true, is that I've been VERY civil to you, while watching you become more and more outrightly anti-Jewish, as if we had no redeeming qualities whatever. You know full well that the people on this board are, for the most part, broken glass conservatives, yet you keep at it and at it as if you were WRITING to Al, Abe, Jesse, et al. You aren't. You know it. And that makes you very disingenuous.
Bye, now.

[LarryLied]

Broken glass conservatives? Yeah sure. When the Ramallah incursion turned sour on Sharon, many were screaming for Bush's head. Bush sold Israel out. Bush thinks Israeli blood is "cheap." Bush isn't allowing Israel to defend herself.

The fact is that game isn't over, the USA will see Israel is protected and these "broken glass conservatives" outed themselves as not caring a whit about conservatism or the USA. They turned in one day. Bush did Sharon a favor. The international media was killing Israel and nothing of lasting value was being accomplished. Securing Israel is in America's security interests and it will be accomplished. But conservatives will get kicked in the teeth for it by liberal Jews. It is happening already.

Same thing happens with the black community. The GOP wants school choice. So do inner city blacks. What thanks do conservatives get for enacting voucher plans and spending millions defending them in court? They get called racists. Same thing you are doing.

[onyx]

I wish I had a dollar for everytime you've been called an anti-semite, which you are NOT!

[LarryLied]

Thanks! Maybe I need a disclaimer: "Some of my best friends are...blah..blah...blah"

In your city, Vegas, one of my business buddies was an armorer for the Jewish Defense League. Hank sold "Street Sweepers" at the Broadacres Swap Meet. Semi-Automatic 12 gauge shotgun which could empty a 15 round drum "in THREE POINT FOUR SECONDS!" Never heard any "poor me" victim speeches from Hank.

[VinnyTex]

TALK OF THE TOWN | FISHWRAPPER 03.13.02

The spies who came in from the art sale
Some reporters have said what U.S. and Israeli officials don't want to hear

BY JOHN SUGG

Good advice for journalists is to take note of where the rest of your colleagues are staring, then turn 180 degrees and see what your pals have missed. Often it's a  story. Sometimes a scary one.

A major international espionage saga has many of its roots right here in Atlanta. Incredibly, you haven't read about it in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution even though that paper's Washington bureau last week reported the seething scandal.

It's a touchy subject, to be sure, because it isn't Saddam, Fidel, Osama or even what passes nowadays for the KGB spying on America -- but our "friend" in the war against "evil," Israel.

In an era where CNN CEO Walter Issacson says it would be "perverse" to televise Afghan babies killed by U.S. bombs, it's not surprising some stories go unnoticed by a press that embraces "patriotism" by ignoring sacred cows.

One of those cattle is what's happening in Israel and Palestine. Reporters know that to criticize Israel -- to point out, for example, that wanton killing of innocents is equally devilish whether committed by Ariel Sharon's soldiers flying U.S.-made helicopters, or by a Hamas suicide bomber who pushes the button -- is to risk being called an anti-Semite.

Even with that background, however, it's a little hard to understand the media's avoidance of the spy story I'm going to tell you.

In 1999, word began spreading among intelligence agencies about bands of Israeli "students" doing veeeerrrrry strange things, such as popping up around federal buildings and military establishments marketing artwork.

According to intelligence sources, low-level alerts began being flashed around to offices of the FBI, DEA, federal prosecutors and others. By March 2001, counterintelligence officials had issued a bulletin to be on the watch for Israelis masquerading as "art students."

At the same time, American intelligence services were increasingly worried by the dominance of many highly sensitive areas of telecommunications by Israeli companies. Comverse Infosys (now called Verint) provides U.S. lawmen with computer equipment for wiretapping. Speculation is that "catch gates" in the system allowed listeners to be listened to. Other software called Amdocs provided extensive records of virtually all calls placed by the 25 largest U.S. telephone companies.

Often the Israeli "students" sold their artwork on street locations near federal buildings. In one incident in Atlanta, they showed up outside an unlisted FBI office and began taking photos, according to sources. Agents collared them and sent them on their way.

Also in our town, a DEA agent recalled seeing the "students" selling art around his offices. Later, when he spied the same artwork (Chinese made, as it turned out) at the Mall of Georgia, he became suspicious. The DEA is the lead U.S. agency in monitoring money laundering -- which would explain a spy's interest.

Similarly, a former federal prosecutor was visited at his home by the Israeli "art salesmen" -- and, according to sources, concluded that, wow, this was exactly what the alerts had been about.

Then came Sept. 11. While America was mesmerized by the "War on Terrorism," the media went out to a four-martini lunch when it came to skeptical reporting.

With a few commendable exceptions. One of those is Carl Cameron, a gutsy reporter for Fox News. On Dec. 12, Cameron broke the blockbuster spy story. He said at the time: "Since Sept. 11, more than 60 Israelis have been arrested or detained, either under the new PATRIOT anti-terrorism law, or for immigration violations. A handful of active Israeli military were among those detained, according to investigators, who say some of the detainees also failed polygraph questions when asked about alleged surveillance activities against and in the United States."

That was enough of a gut-kick. Then Cameron threw this incendiary bomb: "There is no indication that the Israelis were involved in the 9-11 attacks, but investigators suspect that the Israelis may have gathered intelligence about the attacks in advance, and not shared it."

Fox also reported the Israeli "students" "targeted and penetrated" U.S. military bases.

In the rest of the world -- Europe, Arab countries and Israel, especially -- the story made headlines. Even the official Chinese news agency perked up. Not in our well-defended (against disturbing news) homeland, however.

Cameron, in an interview, said he doesn't believe the conspiracy theories about why the story was ignored here. An honest scribe, he points to a shortcoming in his own work -- one hammered on by Israeli critics at the time -- conceding "there were no [on-the-record] interviews. I didn't tell other reporters where to find the documents. They couldn't do instant journalism."

Others at Fox confirm there was intense pressure on the network by pro-Israeli lobbying groups, such as the Anti-Defamation League and the misnamed Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting (CAMERA).

"These charges are arrant nonsense unworthy of the usually reliable Fox News," CAMERA huffed in a Dec. 12 release.

Cameron reported Dec. 13 that federal agents were afraid to criticize Israel. "Investigators within the DEA, INS and FBI have all told Fox News that to pursue or even suggest Israeli spying ... is considered career suicide."

Cameron told me in similar language that's what journalists also can face. And, what's clear is that Fox quickly removed the story from its website. (Fox reposted the story last week after other media finally picked it up.)

The story pretty much fell asleep before Christmas. Then, all hell broke loose in the last 10 days. A French Web-based service, Intelligence Online, obtained the same 61-page June 2001 federal report that Cameron had. The website reported that 120 Israelis had by now been detained or deported by U.S. authorities.

Let me repeat that: 120 potential spies. This isn't worth press curiosity?

Few papers have given the story significant space. Many, like the AJC, haven't uttered a peep.

Some of what has seeped out is disturbing. The Oklahoman reported last week that 10 months ago four Israelis peddling artwork (but carrying military IDs) were detained near Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma. Le Monde in Paris recounted that six intercepted "students" had cell phones purchased by an Israeli vice consul in the United States. Sources told CL that many of the phones had a walkie-talkie feature that was virtually impossible to intercept.

Intelligence Online connected many dots, naming which Israelis were employed by the tech companies, and what military specialties they had ("special forces," "intelligence officer," "explosive ordnance/combat engineer," "electronic intercept operator" -- even "son of Israeli army general").

Many of the apparent operatives had set up shop at addresses only stones' throws from Arabs in San Diego, Little Rock, Irving, Texas, and in South Florida. Especially in Florida, where 10 of the 19 Sept. 11 terrorists lived, the French report bolsters speculation that the Israelis might have gained advanced knowledge of the attack -- and not passed on that critical intelligence to the United States.

Bush administration shills were quick to try and spin the story. A Justice Department spokeswoman, Susan Dryden, called the Intelligence Online report an "urban myth," and other federal flaks trumpeted that no Israeli had been charged with or deported for spying. Of course, in the Great Game, "friendly" spies are seldom embarrassed by being called by their true colors.

Predictably, Israeli Embassy spokesman Mark Reguev derided the Intelligence Online report as "nonsense." Israel in the past has stridently denied wrongdoing until long after the truth was obvious. Israel claimed Jonathan Pollard -- a super spy who did horrendous, deadly damage to the United States until arrested in 1985 -- wasn't an agent. And, Israel has stubbornly contended its 1967 attack on the USS Liberty, in which 35 American sailors were killed, was an accident -- a lie exposed in recent reports including one that aired last fall on the History Channel. A recent authoritative book, Body of Secrets , by James Bamford, concludes that National Security Agency officials "were virtually unanimous in their belief that the attack was deliberate."

Following U.S. denials of the recent spy story, Intelligence Online editor Guillaume Dasquie threatened to post the sensitive report online. He commented: "The document we have in our possession details not only the identities of the members of this network, but also their activities in the Israeli army, and even their serial numbers in the intelligence services, their passport numbers and their validity, and their visas and their validity."

There's more to this story to come -- but you might have to move to Paris to read it (or keep your eyes on CL).

Senior Editor John Sugg can be reached at 404-614-1241.

[LarryLied]

John Sugg doesn't have the best credentials. From The American Muslim Alliance:

Hasbrouck Heights, New Jersey -- John Sugg, whose writings have exposed Stephen Emerson's alleged "anti-terrorism" expertise as a fraud, and Mike Monseur, who was fired from his Chicago television anchor job because of his Arab American heritage, were both winners of the Second Annual M.T. Mehdi Courage in Writing Award presented on Oct. 5, 2000.

The award was presented at the annual meeting of the Arab American Media Association (AAMA) held in Hasbrouck Heights, New Jersey, from October 6 - 8. AAMA President Samir Tahhan, the late Dr. Mehdi's daughter, broadcast journalist Anisa Mehdi, and Palestinian American journalist and author Ray Hanania gave the award to Sugg in absentia and to Manseur, who was attending the conference. Ms. Mehdi and Hanania founded the award, which was first presented at the 1999 Arab American Writer's Conference in Chicago.

NPR doesn't like Stephen Emerson either. I think he got everything right. Too bad few paid much attention to his book “Jihad in America” before 9/11.

[Cachelot]

Hmmmm.....

Bush sold Israel out. Bush thinks Israeli blood is "cheap." Bush isn't allowing Israel to defend herself.

-- snip --

Same thing you are doing.

Well, looky here. LarryLied. Again.

To: ladyinred

Bush is singing the Arabs a lullabye, and giving Israel a breather to boot. Arafat can't control those maniacs and Bush knows it, but things will quiet down somewhat for Israel for a while. He is turning their own game back on them. Everything he SAYS is very carefully worded to lull the Arabs into a position of relaxation. By looking as if the US has removed support for Israel, which he would NEVER do, it also returns Israel to its underdog status. It will look as though Israel is dazed and confused. It will seem as though she cannot defend herself. In the eyes of those who remain convinced that our support for Israel was the reason for 911, they will perceive an Israel standing alone and the US as standing alone, though both have a common enemy. When the shi'ite hits the fan, Israel will have regrouped and gotten its act together. And Peres will be odd man out. May he and Arafat wind up sharing eternity together. Why do you suppose Sharon met with the DOD on his trip over here? Do you really think Bush doesn't know what is at stake? Recall the Parable of the Mustard Seed.

45 posted on 3/15/02 9:09 PM Pacific by Nix 2