Posted on 03/05/2002 2:27:35 PM PST by jmp702
U.S. Deports Israelis Amid Warnings of Espionage Activities
By Ted Bridis Associated Press Writer
Published: Mar 5, 2002
WASHINGTON (AP) - Authorities have arrested and deported dozens of young Israelis since early last year who represented themselves as art students in efforts to gain access to sensitive federal office buildings and the homes of government employees, U.S. officials said.
A draft report from the Drug Enforcement Administration - which first characterized the activities as suspicious - said the youths' actions "may well be an organized intelligence-gathering activity."
Immigration officials deported them for visa violations; no criminal espionage charges were filed.
The arrests, made in an unspecified number of major U.S. cities from California to Florida, came amid public warnings from U.S. intelligence agencies about suspicious behavior by people posing as Israeli art students and "attempting to bypass facility security and enter federal buildings."
The Israelis were arrested and deported on charges of working in the United States without authorization or overstaying visits on tourist visas, said Russ Bergeron, a spokesman for the Immigration and Naturalization Service in Washington. He described dozens of arrests since early 2001 but gave no exact figures.
The DEA report said a majority of the students questioned by U.S. investigators acknowledged having served in military intelligence, electronic signals interception or explosive ordnance units in the Israeli military. The DEA said one person questioned was the son of a two-star Israeli general, one had served as the bodyguard to the head of the Israeli Army and another served in a Patriot missile unit.
Israeli Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Yaffa Ben-Ari said it was "nonsense" that the students were spying on the United States.
Another Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, Irit Stopper, confirmed that a few Israelis posing as art students were expelled from the United States for working without permits. However they were not accused of espionage, she said. She did not say how many Israelis were expelled and did not give any additional details.
The DEA report was first obtained by a French Web site that specializes in intelligence news, Intelligenceonline.com, and confirmed Tuesday as authentic by DEA spokeswoman Rogene Waite in Washington. The Web site said 120 Israelis had been arrested.
"That these people are now traveling in the U.S. selling art seems not to fit their background," the report said.
An FBI official, speaking on condition of anonymity, noted there were no espionage charges filed against any of the individuals and that they had been deported. Asked whether any spying activity occurred, the official repeated that no charges had been filed.
A Justice Department official, also asking not to be publicly identified, said investigators have been aware of some "alleged linkage" between the students and alleged espionage activities in the United States since early 2001, and said authorities have made arrests in Dallas, Chicago, San Diego and in south Florida. INS spokesman Rodney Germain in Miami said five or six people were arrested in that area at least six months ago on immigration counts.
Although security experts at the DEA first characterized the youths' behavior as suspicious, and INS authorities later arrested them, the FBI typically investigates espionage cases in the United States.
The DEA report said that among U.S. sites apparently targeted was Tinker Air Force Base in Oklahoma City, home to the military's AWACS surveillance planes and the place where many of the nation's B-1 bombers are repaired. Investigators also said that one female art student went to the home of a worker for the Environmental Protection Agency in Denver to sell paintings and returned later to photograph the house, according to the report.
No one within the Justice Department has expressed concerns about the Israeli students possibly committing espionage, Justice spokesman Bryan Sierra said. The deputy U.S. attorney general, Larry Thompson, declined to discuss the arrests when asked about them during a news conference Tuesday.
The U.S. Office of the National Counterintelligence Executive, a federal agency, circulated a public warning in March 2001 urging employees to report contact with people describing themselves as Israeli art students.
"These individuals have been described as aggressive," the warning said. "They attempt to engage employees in conversation rather than giving a sales pitch."
Cooperation with Israel, a longtime key ally, is increasingly important in the U.S. war on terrorism.
AP-ES-03-05-02 1658EST
Nothing false about it, it happened. I told what I knew. We believe in the first amendment here, sir.
The First Amendment protects you from the goverment, not Jim or any private party; if you believe in it, please know what is says and does. Further, it allows one to speak but not necessarily to be heard. Furthermore, it is is altogether irrelevant: in a debate, one wants not just to speak but to pursuade. The oppponent, in order to be pursuaded, needs clarifications and validation of facts. This is precisely what I did.
You appeal to the First Amendment therefore reveals your true motives: you do not want to debate, to inform --- you use this place as loudspeaker for propaganda. That is fine with me, once we figure that out.
Just kindly refrain from insulting the First Amendment and attemts to hide behind it your inability to conduct a discourse.
You're right, of course. Perhaps we should just cut Israel loose, so that it could turn the rest of the middle east into one big glass parking lot.
The civilized world would be in their debt, don't you agree?
Probably quite a few, but they'll be the guys running around with checkered tablecloths on their heads.
Why does that upset you so much?
"Maybe you will like this one I posted yesterday:: Is Pickering Dead?"Amazing! I had no idea that Pickering was Jewish!!!
Hmm? No mention at all of jews in the linked thread. You like dead Jews?
Your tastes would seem pretty obvious from your latest postings. But why do you hang around here, DrLiberty - or should I say DrPierce, perhaps? You know, your homestead over at SamFran is gone but I hear they have made a new rats-nest, run by some Dutch nazi.
Funny thing. Member since 1999 and thirty-something posts ;).
So, these American dumbasses are afraid Israel will kick their a*s?
Woo-hoo!
I think JustIn suffers from premature... ehh.. something ;).
The civilized world would be in their debt, don't you agree?
It would be a tragedy for humanity, but no more so than if India and Pakistan fight each other with nuclear weapons. How is the fight between Israel and the Arabs any different in principle?
I don't advocate putting Americans in harm's way to stop other countries from annihilating each other. If Americans must risk war, let it be to defend our own shores from a direct threat.
In the meantime, if you feel so strongly about Israel, you're welcome to encourage your family members to contact a recruiter and enlist.
Here is a story that originates with an online service that promises hard-to-get information for its subscribers. Google research reveals that the editor of Intelligence Online is one Guillaume Dasquie, a French journalist who recently co-authored a book (invariably referred to as a "blockbuster" by its admirers) which "proves" that the whole war in Afghanistan is about the evil oil companies' lust for Caspian oil rights.
Gasquie is always referred to as an "intelligence analyst" though before this he seems to have been the author of a book on Perrier's mismanagement of the recall in 1990 of mineral water containing traces of benzene. See this 1999 Time article. Since that book was written since 1990, Gasquie has certainly worked fast to become an authority on intelligence and Afghanistan. His co-authored book is sacred scripture to the whole anti-American, anti-Israel, anti-market Left-Right (talk about not a dime's worth of difference). It's closest approach to mainstream attention has apparently been an interview with its authors on CNN - if you call that mainstream.
I suppose one has to decide whether this is because Gasquie and his co-author Have Dared to Tell the Truth which Chomsky and CounterPunch and Lew Rockwell and, of course, the Democratic Underground knew by sheer intuition -- or because it's a crackpot anti-American screed like thousands of others. What we can do is draw some reasonable conclusions about M. Gasquie's politics.
Then the story is picked up by "Le Monde" a pro-Arafat leftist newspaper whose knee-jerk anti-Americanism was only interrupted for about 15 minutes by its famous "We are all Americans now" editorial after 9-11. "Le Monde" definitely has a political interest in prying Israel and the US apart. Indeed, Le Monde has arguably used invented news to put pressure on Israel before. On May 8, 2000 Le Monde reported that agreement on nearly all final-status issues had been reached between Israel and the PA in a meeting with US Mideast Envoy Dennis Ross. It went on to describe the plan in great detail. As in the present case, all the responsible parties denied that there was any basis for the report. It was apparently a fiction either concocted or accepted uncritically in the hope of pressuring Israel.
The story is then picked up by wire services. Reuters - the "objective" wire service that won't use the "T" word about the 9-11 attackers - reports Le Monde's claims as though they were fact for four paragraphs before citing the FBI's characterization of the story as "bogus." AP omits any mention of Le Monde but quotes sources in the Drug Enforcement Agency. It turns out that the "secret report" was a draft reporting suspicions by DEA personnel concerning matters with which they have no experience which the Justice Department and the FBI have rejected as baseless.
Of course, the Courageous Opponents of the Dastardly Elders of Zion are quick to dismiss anything said by the government of the United States, especially its law enforcement and intelligence agencies. They conveniently overlook the fact that by accepting this report they are not cannily disbelieving the perfidious gubmint but swallowing whole something emanating from the Drug Enforcement Agency. They are blindly trusting the DEA over against the agencies, however competent or admirable or otherwise they may be, whose writ actually runs to matters of espionage. Little Justin backing the DEA -- well, perhaps only the chance to defame Israel could bring this miracle to be.
Bottom line: a story floated by anti-American, anti-Israel Frenchmen, backed up only by a tentative document from an agency which has no authority or experience in espionage matters, a document, moreover, which has been repudiated by all the agencies which do have that authority and experience. A story moreover nicely timed to appear just as the PA terror war against Israel has picked up its pace dramatically - perhaps in the hope of confusing US public opinion at a crucial moment?
Why does that upset you so much?
Sorry, but espionage against the United States does upset me. I have no doubt that it upsets all true Americans, this is, people who are loyal to American first and some other country on the grounds of religious or ethnic solidarity.
Pat Buchanan said it best: when are you people--Israel Firsters--going to start acting like real Americans?
Yes, the author is French, and he's this and he's that: don't they teach logic in the schools anymore, oh "Southern Federalist"? An ad hominem argument is a logical fallacy. But then logic has nothing to do with your screed. Even if it were proven beyond all possible doubt -- even if the Israelis admitted that they had foreknowledge of the 9/11 terrorist attack -- you would justify it, deny it, and "spin" it in classical Clintonian fashion. Why not admit that you don't care about the truth?
Skipped your lithium again, Justine? You know, I think they were looking for an "american" editor over in Saudi. One who wouldn't commit such howlers as "the infamous Rudolph Hitler". If you just keep a certain restraint I'm sure you can manage to convince them that you would be an improvement.
Give a ping if you're going. We'll be sure to wave ;).
Typical. Not one bit of fact. Just conjecture and ifs. And Fox did NOT say that Israel had specific foreknowledge. The truth is simply meaningless to you. Say, how's that crow tasting?
Bottom line: a story floated by anti-American, anti-Israel Frenchmen, backed up only by a tentative document from an agency which has no authority or experience in espionage matters, a document, moreover, which has been repudiated by all the agencies which do have that authority and experience. A story moreover nicely timed to appear just as the PA terror war against Israel has picked up its pace dramatically - perhaps in the hope of confusing US public opinion at a crucial moment?
Rings true. Quite diabolical if so.
FACT: The MAJORITY of these were trained in military and intelligence matters, including the son of an Israeli general.
FACT: A major news organization in the US, citing law US enforcement sources, and now one in France, has made these accusations.
Are THEY "anti-Semites"? Is Carl Cameron an "anti-Semite"? You are pathetic, Veronica: a classic case of dogma overriding reality.
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