Category Archives: Iran Israel

Russia/Germany Join Abbas Against Israel

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In 2014: Hamas Issues ‘Terrorism 101 Handbook’

Manuals discovered by IDF give how-to tips for terror
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BDS:  The Boycott/Divest/Sanctions (BDS) Movement against Israel was formally launched in 2005, but really began gathering momentum as a result of the Second Intifada of 2000 and the UN’s World Conference Against Racism in 2001.This Report documents and dissects the BDS’ impact across a broad front of battlefields in the western world. These include economic struggles in corporate boardrooms and among trade unions, BDS’ “academic jihad” against Israel on campuses, the pressure on entertainment and cultural figures to cancel appearances in Israel, and efforts to gain support for BDS from important religious institutions.

Hamas’s link to BDS

Leading expert testifies to Congress over the terror group leading the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement.

Terror finance expert describes ‘network’ of ex-fundraisers in organizations linked to Hamas and key pro-boycott organization

ToI: WASHINGTON — The US should boost transparency of nonprofit organizations in order to shed light on ties between a key pro-boycott organization and defunct charities that were implicated in funding Hamas, analyst Jonathan Schanzer of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies told members of Congress during testimony Tuesday afternoon when two subcommittees of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs met to discuss current threats to Israel.

During testimony, experts including Schanzer highlighted regional nonstate actors such as Iran and the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement (BDS) as key threats to Israel.

The chairman of the Subcommittee on Terrorism, Nonproliferation and Trade, Ted Poe, described the BDS movement as “a threat which seeks [Israel’s] ultimate destruction.”

Schanzer, a former terror finance analyst for the US Treasury, presented open-source research conducted by his group, the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies which highlighted a network linking Hamas supporters with the leadership of the BDS movement.

The research tracked employees of three now-defunct organizations – the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, Kind Hearts Foundation for Humanitarian Development and the Islamic Association for Palestine — all of which were implicated by the federal government for terrorism finance, specifically of Hamas. A federal court found that the Holy Land Foundation had sent some $12 million to Hamas over the course of a decade

The research yielded what Schanzer described as “a troubling outcome” – with seven key employees of these organizations now associated with the Illinois-based organization American Muslims for Palestine.

Schanzer told members of Congress that the latter is “arguably the leading BDS organization in the US, a key sponsor of the anti-Israel campus network known as Students for Justice in Palestine.” The organization, he said, provides money, speakers, training and even “apartheid walls” to SJP activists on campus, for the annual Israel Apartheid Week events.

“The overlap between AMP, Holy Land, Kind Hearts and the Islamic Association for Palestine is striking,” said Schanzer, but noted that “our open source research did not indicate that AMP or any of these individuals are currently involved in any illegal activity.”

“The BDS campaign may pose a threat to Israel, but the network I describe here is decidedly an American problem,” he warned. Americans for Justice in Palestine raises money as a transparent 501c3 tax-exempt non-profit, which then provides funds for AMP which has the usually temporary designation of a corporate non-profit – a status that is usually transitional en route to a tax-exempt 501c3 organization.

“There appear to be flaws in the federal and state oversight of non-profits charities,” Schanzer complained. Although advocating for increased transparency, Schanzer said that he had a sense from talking to former colleagues that the Treasury was less invested in uncovering charities serving to fund terror networks than in the past.

“BDS advocates are free to say what they want, true or false, but tax advantaged organizations are obliged to be transparent,” Schanzer told the panel. “Americans have a right to know who is leading the BDS campaign and so do the students who may not be aware of AMP’s leaders or their goals.”

The BDS movement was not the only threat cited by the witnesses, who included former peace negotiator and Washington Institute for Near East Policy Distinguished Fellow David Makovsky, American Enterprise Institute Scholar Michael Rubin and the Brooking Institution’s Tamara Coffman Wittes.

Makovsky warned that the current stagnation of peace initiatives could feed further into BDS advances in the US.

The former negotiator warned “that the movement could metastasize beyond college campuses” if there is no peace solution on the ground – after noting that “under the current leadership” he did not envision peace efforts “succeeding in the near future.”

Makovsky said that he was “rather skeptical regarding efforts to put forward parameters at the UNSC,” warning that they “would be interpreted by both sides as an imposed solution and could serve as a baseline for defiance rather than bringing the parties closer.”

“We need to find a way to maintain the viability of a two-state outcome even if we can’t implement a two-state solution today,” he offered.

Makovsky suggested that it was not just the US but also European countries that could provide critical leverage in encouraging the Palestinians to jettison their anti-normalization policy and stop providing funds to families of jailed terrorists.

“The US needs to sensitize our European partners to these issues – given the closeness between Europeans and Palestinians, it would carry weight if the Europeans would practice the same tough love they have urged the United States to administer when it comes to Israel but they are reluctant to do when it comes to our Palestinian friends,” he said.

Iran Still Complains, White House Complies

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Where Iran’s Complaint About Banking Integration Misses the Mark

Levitt/WSJ: The governor of Iran’s central bank warned last week that failure to do more to integrate Iranian banks into the global economy could jeopardize the international agreement over Tehran’s nuclear program. The onus is on Washington and its allies to reassure banks that doing business in Iran is fine, Valiollah Seif said in a speech Friday at the Council on Foreign Relations. He said tellingly little about Iran’s efforts to change an environment businesses are wary of investing in, underscoring the discrepancy between Iran’s view of the nuclear deal and other international perceptions.

Mr. Seif complained that “almost nothing” has been done to reintegrate Iran into the global economy since implementation of the deal was announced in January. “Unless serious efforts are made by our partners,” he said, “in my view, they have not honored their obligations.”

Treasury official Adam Szubin said on Wednesday that Washington is not standing in the way of permissible business activities involving Iran. Some of the reasons entities might be wary of doing business there include rampant corruption, as Transparency International has documented, and the extent to which Iran’s banking sector is out of step with international banking norms, as my Washington Institute colleague Patrick Clawson has written.

“Effective implementation of the agreement,” Mr. Seif said, must be done “in such a way that Iran’s economic and business activities will be facilitated.” Otherwise, the deal “breaks up on its own terms,” he said.

Iran seems to expect the Obama administration to provide benefits beyond those in the nuclear deal, including access to the U.S. financial system and the ability to change into dollars foreign currency transactions through U.S.-based banks. U.S. officials say that neither demand will be met.

We live in a “post-sanctions environment,” Mr. Seif said. This ignores the fact that sanctions remain in place over Iran’s efforts to sponsor terrorism; its ballistic missile program; and its human rights abuses, which include executing minors and persecuting religious minorities.

Mr. Seif appeared to dismiss concerns about those activities as old hat. “If, according to our partners, it is our conduct which prevents international banks from engaging in business with us, they were fully aware of our conduct before signing. … We have not changed.”

That Iran has not changed is at the core of its problem, but that’s not how Mr. Seif seemed to see it. Asked about the risks of unwittingly doing business with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, which is still targeted by Treasury sanctions, Mr. Seif said potential investors could engage Iranian companies that run checks to determine who they would be doing business with. The use of Iranian companies to hide the IRGC’s involvement in business activities has been documented by the Treasury Department. And using in-country third parties to perform customer due diligence is seen as high-risk by international bodies that govern banking transactions.

The bottom line is that Iran has yet to curb or stop the illicit conduct that makes it a pariah state and a financial risk. It enacted a law against terrorist financing last July, but that’s done little to calm banks’ fears because its government continues to support terrorism. Until those behaviors change, banks are likely to continue to see prohibitive reputational, regulatory, and other risks to doing business there. And the only country that can do anything about that is Iran.

ALSO IN THINK TANK:

What the U.S. Has and Hasn’t Learned From Imposing Sanctions

On Iran Sanctions, Mixed News–and Warnings for Potential Investors

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Bloomberg: Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said international banks remain wary of U.S. regulations and need “reassurances” that they can resume business with his nation even after its nuclear deal with world powers.

Zarif, speaking in New York ahead of a Tuesday meeting with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, said talks with his counterpart were necessary to follow up on the implementation of the agreement on the U.S. side.

The deal’s aim “was to not have the U.S. intervene in Iran’s relations with most other countries,” the Iranian Students’ News Agency cited Zarif as saying. “We should prevent past U.S. regulations from being obstacles to most financial institutions in Europe and Asia having banking relations with Iran.”

Iranian central bank Governor Valiollah Seif voiced similar sentiments last week, telling Bloomberg Television that the U.S. Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control should issue guidelines encouraging European banks to be more receptive to Iran. Seif met Treasury Secretary Jack Lew on Thursday during the International Monetary Fund and World Bank meetings in Washington. More from Bloomberg.

 

China’s Cyber Attack on Pentagon Missile Defense Daily

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So, where are the strongly worded letters, the condemnation, the sanctions the counter-measures?

Cyber-warfare, industrial espionage, economic warfare.

 

November 2015:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. military on Sunday hailed the success of a complex $230 million test of the U.S. missile defense system that it said showed the ability of the Aegis and THAAD weapons systems to identify and destroy ballistic and cruise missiles at once.

The test was conducted near Wake Island in the western Pacific Ocean around 11:05 p.m. EDT by the U.S. Missile Defense Agency, U.S. European Command, U.S. Pacific Command, the Ballistic Missile Defense System Operational Test Agency and the Joint Functional Component Command for Integrated Missile Defense.

“This was a highly complex operational test of the BMDS which required all elements to work together in an integrated layered defense design to detect, track, discriminate, engage, and negate the ballistic missile threats,” MDA said in a statement released late Sunday.

The Missile Defense Agency website.

Admiral: China Launching Cyber Attacks on Missile Defense Nets ‘Every Day’

Cyber threat comparable to Iranian, North Korean missile danger

FreeBeacon: Chinese military hackers are conducting cyber attacks on the Pentagon’s Missile Defense Agency networks on a daily basis and will soon shift to hacking into networks of missile defense contractors, the admiral in charge of the agency told Congress on Thursday.

Vice Adm. James D. Syring, the MDA chief who is in charge of building multi-billion dollar anti-missile defenses, told a House hearing that while his networks are successfully fighting off the cyber attacks, missile defense contractors need to improve their network security.

The three-star admiral said the threat of Chinese cyber attacks was equal to North Korean and Iranian missile threats.

“I view the cyber threat that I specifically face with MDA and the systems we are fielding on par with any ballistic missile threat that either Iran or North Korea possess,” Syring said.

Asked by Rep. Mike Rogers (R., Ala.), the chairman of the House Armed Services subcommittee on strategic forces, if he is fighting off cyber attacks from Chinese military hackers, Syring answered: “Yes, sir.” He limited his comments and said he would provide details of the cyber threats during a later closed-door session of the subcommittee.

“We have taken inordinate steps to protect both our classified and unclassified networks from attack, [with] constant 24/7 monitoring with teams in place plus good material protections of those systems,” he said.

“My biggest concern remains in our cleared defense contractor base and their protections,” Syring added, noting that Chinese efforts to break into missile defense networks are relentless.

“They are continuing to try and attack my government networks, every day, classified and unclassified,” he said. “But where they’re going next and we’ve gotten examples of this is to my cleared defense contractors with the unclassified controlled technical information.”

Bolstering the network security of contractors is a high priority across the entire ballistic missile defense system, he said.

Foreign states are seeking to penetrate missile defenses and other weapons systems to steal technology and data for use in their own weapons. They also seek to disrupt or destroy the systems in the event of a crisis or conflict.

A report by the Defense Science Board warned in 2013 that critical U.S. weapons and other military systems are vulnerable to cyber attack.

“The United States cannot be confident that our critical Information Technology (IT) systems will work under attack from a sophisticated and well-resourced opponent utilizing cyber capabilities in combination with all of their military and intelligence capabilities (a ‘full spectrum’ adversary,” the report concluded.

Syring said in prepared testimony his agency is deploying upgraded command and control systems with better security against cyber attacks. Missile defense personnel also are being trained to prevent cyber intrusions.

“We know that malicious cyber actors are constantly attempting to exfiltrate information from U.S Industry,” Syring stated. “We will continue to work with the defense industrial base, the FBI, and other partners to identify these issues and raise the costs of this behavior to those responsible, in coordination with national authorities and in accordance with national policy.”

Syring said a key objective is hardening U.S. missiles defenses for future conflicts, which will likely involve cyber attacks against its networks.

“We must build resilient cyber defenses that are capable of detecting and mitigating threats without impeding operations in order to ‘fight through’ the cyber threat,” he said.

Two exercises simulating cyber attacks on missile defense networks were held last year. Another exercise is set for next month.

To prevent cyber attacks through equipment and parts, MDA is tightening the security of its suppliers.

“We also have a rigorous cyber and supply chain risk management inspection program to examine everything about our systems, from the truck to supply chain, to the fielded operational ability,” Syring said.

Chinese agents were detected spying on the U.S. missile defense interceptor base at Fort Greely, Alaska, several years ago, according to defense officials.

Barry Pike, executive officer for the U.S. Army’s missiles and space program, said during the House hearing that foreign military threats are growing with the emergence of synchronized air, missile, cyber, and electronic warfare attacks.

“Across all Army [air and missile defense] programs, we are improving our resilience and ability to mitigate cyber and electronic warfare attacks,” he stated in prepared testimony.

Rogers, the subcommittee chairman, said in opening remarks at the hearing that after eight years of President Obama’s administration “our nation’s security is in more jeopardy than any time in recent memory.”

“North Korea, Iran, Pakistan, Russia, and China are all advancing their ballistic and cruise missile programs, along with weapons of mass destruction programs, to put our military, our allies, and our homeland at risk,” Rogers said.

“At the same time, President Obama has cut missile defense practically every year he’s been in office,” he added. “America’s enemies know an opportunity when they see one; our allies see they are on their own.”

Disclosure of the Chinese hacking against missile defenses comes as Syring and other military leaders revealed the Pentagon is working on its own cyber weapons that could be used to disable or destroy missiles prior to launch.

Details about what the Pentagon calls “left-of-launch” measures remain classified but are said to include cyber attacks and other electronic warfare measures against missile launch controls and other information systems.

Pre-launch cyber attacks against missiles are designed to bolster other missile defenses, including lasers and anti-missile interceptors, that can attack enemy missiles in the early, middle, and late stages of flight, while decreasing costs.

China is developing both missile defenses and anti-satellite missiles that employ similar technologies and are known to be targeting U.S. and allied computer networks to steal technical information useful in developing its weapons.

China also has targeted U.S. and foreign suppliers that provide equipment and material used in missile defenses.

A briefing in 2014 by Joyce Corell, a senior U.S. counterintelligence official, identified numerous pathways used by foreign states to penetrate the U.S. supply chain.

“We have more than enough evidence to know the threat is real and dangerous, but we will inevitably have difficulty predicting targets and assessing impacts,” she stated in a briefing slide.

The New Relationship Codified Saudi and Egypt

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Mitvim Institute

Saudi Arabian King Salman’s visit to Egypt is an expression of the warming of ties since al-Sisi became president in June 2013. Morsi’s overthrowing and declaration of the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization in December 2013 were welcomed by Riyadh and immediately rewarded with a tremendous $12 billion aid package from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the UAE.

Yet with King Abdullah’s passing in January 2015 it seemed that the two states were growing apart. The media was quick to point out disagreements on issues such as the countries’ approaches to Yemen, the Muslim Brotherhood and Syria. However, despite tactical disagreements, the two countries strategically continued to share common interests vis-à-vis regional threats and challenges.

Therefore, Salman’s visit is a testament to the strong relationship – one might even say the alliance – between the two countries. Historically, cooperation between Saudi Arabia and Egypt has been a permanent feature of the Arab state system despite short periods of rivalry. The visit is consequential, primarily for Egypt. According to Egyptian media, no fewer than 36 agreements worth $25 billion were signed during the visit, including establishing a Saudi investment fund worth $16 billion, Saudi aid to rebuild Sinai (including creating a free-trade zone), building a university, and erecting a bridge to connect Sinai and Saudi Arabia. The bridge will allow countless tourists and pilgrims, as well as goods, to cross from one continent to the next. Like the Suez Canal expansion, this project will also contribute significantly to the Egyptian economy.

That Sinai is the focus of governmental aid is not surprising, because it is meant to be part of Cairo’s response to the challenge posed by the radical jihadi organizations. The regime understands full well that the answer to the problems in Sinai is not purely military. Rather, it involves improving the lives of the peninsula’s inhabitants.

During the visit, it was announced that the islands of Tiran and Sanafir, located at the entrance of the Gulf of Eilat, would be handed over to the Saudis, who previously controlled them. In 1950, the Saudis decided to lease the islands to Egypt in order to facilitate the Arab boycott and maritime quarantine of Israel. The islands were conquered by Israel in 1956 and again in 1967 but returned to Egypt after the 1979 peace agreement. Therefore, the current agreement will return them to the rightful owners. Israel has no reason to be concerned, despite the islands’ strategic importance, as Saudi Arabia has not been involved in previous wars with Israel and has no incentive to threaten it. More on the summary here.

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Meanwhile the United States has an estimated 700 troops in the Sinai and this has been an area of hostilities with the Islamic State cell operating there. Discussions have been underway to remove our 700 troops but a final decision has not been made rather they could just be moved further south and replaced with technology. The Sinai is of major significance to Egypt for tourism, something that Egypt relies on for revenue and to show stability in the region.

MiddleEastEye: Pentagon reviewing Sinai peacekeeping operations: Washington has formally notified Cairo and Tel Aviv that it is looking into replacing some personnel with technology

The Pentagon has notified Egypt and Israel that it is reviewing its peacekeeping operations in Egypt’s violence-wracked Sinai Peninsula.Officials said they are looking into the possibility of technology replacing the work of around 700 US peacekeepers in the region.”I don’t think anyone’s talking about a [complete] withdrawal,” Pentagon spokesperson Jeff Davis told a press conference on Tuesday.”I think we’re just going to look at the number of people we have there and see if there are functions that can be automated or done through remote monitoring.”However, a spokesperson for the White House on Tuesday maintained that Washington’s “commitment to this treaty and this mission has never been stronger.”Israel, which fears attack from within Egyptian territory in the restive Sinai Peninsula, last year protested proposals to cut back peacekeeping forces in the region, saying such a move would “reward terrorism”.

 

 

Dewey Clarridge Died, What More you Need to Know

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Personally, I have been talking about the matter of the Saudis and the Pakistanis nuclear weapons program.

By the way, the New York Times had no use for Clarridge.

Duane R. Clarridge, Brash Spy Who Fought Terror Networks, Dies at 83

Mark Mazzetti

New York Times

April 11, 2016

Duane R. Clarridge, a pugnacious American spy who helped found the C.I.A.’s Counterterrorism Center, was indicted and later pardoned for his role in the Iran-contra scandal, and resumed his intelligence career in his late 70s as the head of a private espionage operation in Afghanistan and Pakistan, died on Saturday in Leesburg, Va. He was 83.

His lawyer, Raymond Granger, said the cause was complications of laryngeal and esophageal cancer.

Mr. Clarridge was an unflinching champion of a brawny American foreign policy and of the particular role played by the C.I.A.’s clandestine service — a cadre he likened to a secret army that “marches for the president” and ought to be subjected to as little outside scrutiny as possible.

Mr. Clarridge, widely known by his nickname Dewey, delighted in the role of rogue. He often arrived at work in white Italian suits or safari jackets and bragged to other C.I.A. officers about the brilliant ideas he had conceived while drinking the previous night.

“If you have a tough, dangerous job, critical to national security, Dewey’s your man,” Robert M. Gates, the former director of central intelligence and later defense secretary, was quoted as saying in “Casey,” a 1990 biography of William J. Casey, the Central Intelligence Agency’s chief during the Reagan administration, by Joseph E. Persico. “Just make sure you have a good lawyer at his elbow — Dewey’s not easy to control.”

He spent years overseas as an undercover officer, but perhaps his most consequential effort at the spy agency was the creation of the Counterterrorism Center (then called the Counterterrorist Center) in 1986 after a string of attacks the previous year, including the hijacking of TWA Flight 847 and the massacres at El Al ticket counters in Rome and Vienna carried out by the Abu Nidal Organization.

Up to that point, the C.I.A. had devoted little effort to understanding international terrorism, and Mr. Clarridge persuaded Mr. Casey to create the center with an unusual arrangement: having undercover spies and intelligence analysts working together to try to dismantle terrorist networks. Within a year, C.I.A. operations had significantly weakened the Abu Nidal organization.

Since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, the Counterterrorism Center has grown into a behemoth, the heart of a spy agency transformed by years of terrorist hunting.

Mr. Clarridge’s efforts against international terrorism came as he was becoming ensnared by investigations into the Reagan administration’s efforts to use proceeds from secret arms sales to Iran to arm the contras, a Nicaraguan rebel group battling troops of the country’s socialist government, known as the Sandinistas.

Mr. Clarridge had been in charge of the C.I.A.’s covert war in Nicaragua in the early 1980s (he told his colleagues that his idea to mine the harbors of Nicaragua in 1983 came while he was drinking gin at home) and had developed a close relationship with Lt. Col. Oliver North, who was running the Iran-contra operation from his perch at the National Security Council.

According to the final report by Lawrence E. Walsh, the independent counsel investigating the Iran-contra affair, Mr. Clarridge testified that he had no knowledge that cargo ships sent to Iran to help secure the release of American hostages contained any weapons. He also denied trying to solicit money from foreign countries to circumvent a congressional prohibition against financing the contras.

“In both instances,” the report said, “there was strong evidence that Clarridge’s testimony was false.”

He was indicted on a charge of perjury in 1991, three years after he had retired from the agency. President George Bush pardoned him on Christmas Eve 1992, along with five other Iran-contra figures. He had the pardon framed, and he eventually hung it in the front hallway of his home near San Diego so it would be the first thing visitors saw upon entering his house.

But the scandal embittered him, and he used his 1997 memoir, “A Spy for All Seasons,” to settle some old scores. He lamented in the book that the C.I.A. had lost its swagger since the end of the Cold War, becoming a risk-averse organization that was beholden to lawyers and was degenerating “into something resembling the style, work ethic and morale of the post office.”

He joined the C.I.A. in 1955, after getting degrees from Brown and Columbia, and served undercover  in Nepal, India and Italy before being promoted to run the Latin America division in 1981.

He is survived by a daughter, Cassandra; two sons, Ian and Tarik; and five grandchildren. His first marriage ended in divorce; his second wife, Helga, died before him.

More than two decades after his retirement from the C.I.A., Mr. Clarridge began working as a government contractor when military officials in Kabul hired him and a small team to gather information about militant groups in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Using sources in the region — he identified them only by cover names, such as Waco and Willi — he would turn their field dispatches into reports he sent to the military command by encrypted email.

Mr. Clarridge worked for a security firm hired by The New York Times in December 2008 to assist in seeking the release of a reporter, David Rohde, who had been kidnapped by the Taliban. Mr. Rohde escaped on his own seven months later, but Mr. Clarridge used his role in the episode to promote his spy network to military officials.

The Pentagon canceled the contract in 2010 after the private spying operation was revealed.

But two years later, after Mr. Clarridge had moved into a retirement home in Northern Virginia, he told a reporter that he still had his “network” intact for the future.

In November 2015, Mr. Clarridge was back in the news when The Times identified him as an adviser to Ben Carson, the retired neurosurgeon and Republican candidate for president, who had come under criticism for statements he made about foreign affairs during debates. Asked about the candidate’s foreign policy acumen, Mr. Clarridge was typically impolitic.

“Nobody has been able to sit down with him and have him get one iota of intelligent information about the Middle East,” he said.