| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Thursday, Feb 14 '13, Adar 4, 5773 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
1. Kuwaiti Report: Zygier Tried to Sell Mossad Spy Names to Dubai
by David Lev  Just who was the alleged spy Ben Zygier after all? What was he doing in an Israeli prison, and why did the court put a gag order on the case for nearly three years? Speculation has been running rife in Israel, Australia, and other places in recent days, after the Australian ABC television network ran an expose on the story of Zygier's imprisonment in an Israeli cell, where he allegedly killed himself. No credible theories have yet been presented on what the story was all about, however. Until Thursday, when a report in a Kuwaiti newspaper theorized that Zygier was involved in a major spy case – and was prepared to endanger many Israeli agents who were also involved. According to the story, based on Western “sources familiar with the case,” Zygier had been involved in the murder of top Hamas terrorist Mahmoud al-Mabhouh. According to the report, he tried to sell the names of other Israeli agents involved in the operation to police in Dubai, and in exchange, received cash and protection from authorities there. However, he was tracked down by Mossad agents, who removed him from Dubai and brought him back to Israel, where he was to be tried for traitorous activities and spying. The case was kept under wraps, to the extent that even his name was unknown to all except a few in the security community. He apparently committed suicide before he could be tried. The story is unsourced, and the Kuwaiti paper did not present corroborating evidence, other than the anonymous testimony of those quoted in the story. On Wednesday, after long hours of silence after the story was broadcast on Australian television earlier this week, Israel admitted that to the existence of “Prisoner X,” identified as Zygier in the Australian report. A Petach Tikvah court released for publication that the prisoner's death in a high-security Israeli prison in 2010 was due to suicide. In a statement, the Justice Ministry said that the individual's identity had been kept secret for security reasons, but that his family had been informed of his death immediately.
More on this topic
Comment on this story
2. Report: Iran Tried to Upgrade Nuke Program With Chinese Magnets
by David Lev  Iran had tried to purchase centrifuge parts that would significantly boost its nuclear production capabilities, a report in the Washington Post said Thursday. The parts were special magnets used for uranium enrichment, and would have given a significant boost to Iran's nuclear program, the report said. The report was based on research by the Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) The ring-sized magnets are among the items that are banned for shipment to Iran under international sanctions. About a year ago, Iran tried to purchase the rings from China, hoping to circumvent international sanctions, documents showed. The magnets could have been used to outfit 50,000 new centrifuges, which would have increased the number of centrifuges by 500%. The sale did not go through, apparently, although the report did not say why. However, Iran announced Wednesday that it would install a new generation of centrifuges at its Natanz facility to produce nuclear fuel. The new centrifuges are supposedly faster and can generate significantly more fuel, Iran said. An analyst told the Post that the report on centrifuge acquisitions could be linked to the upgrade announcement. The report quoted a European diplomat as saying that the Iranians “are positioning themselves to make a lot of nuclear progress quickly. Each step forward makes the situation potentially more dangerous.”
More on this topic
Comment on this story 
3. Tehran Accuses Israel of Killing Top Iranian Official
by David Lev  Iranian news media on Thursday were full of reports that Israeli forces have killed a senior Iranian official. According to the report, “Zionists” assassinated Commander Haj Hassan Shateri, a member of the Revolutionary Guards who was in charge of Iranian construction efforts in Lebanon. Shateri reportedly oversaw reconstruction in south Lebanon after the 2006 Israel-Hizbullah war. He had returned to Iran, but was on a visit to Lebanon this week when he was allegedly killed. According to a report on Al Jazeera, Shateri landed in Damascus this week and traveled towards Beirut. At one point, while he was still in Syrian territory, Shateri's vehicle was ambushed, and he was killed. Iran insisted that the killers were Mossad agents, either themselves Israelis or Syrian rebels “who are working on behalf of the Zionists.” Shateri is to be buried Thursday in Tehran, Iranian reports said.
More on this topic
Comment on this story
4. Human Rights Watch Says Israel Violated Laws of War
by Chana Ya'ar  The U.S.-based Human Rights Watch organization says Israel violated the laws of war during its counter terror Pillar of Defense offensive last November. The group claims the IDF carried out 14 air strikes in which it said there did not appear to be a valid military target, claiming Israel's military instead was aiming at Gaza civilians. In addition, HRW alleged the IDF used “disproportionate force” in targeting terrorists in four other strikes. The group claimed that more than 40 Palestinian Authority Arab civilians were killed in Gaza during the operation, which was launched to silence the constant rocket fire aimed at southern Israeli civilian communities. HRW listed the alleged bombing of a home in the northern Gaza town of Jabaliya where a 46-year-old “janitor,” Fouad Hijazi, and his children ages 2 and 4 were killed as an example of an Israeli attack on civilian targets. The organization, however, based its information on interviews with local residents. Such interviews included questions about terrorist activity near attack sites, and reviews of lists of alleged victims handed to them by Gaza terror organizations. Often those who are listed have been wearing two hats, working at regular jobs while also carrying out terrorist activities, a fact their families are sometimes but not always aware of. In addition, terrorists often hide weaponry and even rocket launchers within their homes, in their yards or near schools and mosques – creating a dilemma for IDF personnel who must eliminate the threat to Israeli civilians while trying to avoid creating a threat to Gaza’s innocents. Allegations such as those in the HRW report are always investigated by Israel, and these reports will be no exception, responded a spokesperson for the defense establishment. “It is regrettable, however, that the organization chose to publish unverified claims,” she added, noting that the IDF had already established a board of inquiry headed by a major-general to probe the eight-day operation – including all incidents raised by HRW. Between November 14 and 21, Gaza terrorists fired approximately 1,500 missiles at Israel, and more than half of them exploded in Israel, including 60 in populated areas. More than 40 people were either killed or wounded, not including two Gaza Arabs who were killed by their own misfired rockets, Human Rights Watch said in a report published in December following its investigation into the eight-days of the operation. HRW also accused Gaza's terrorist organizations of committing war crimes in its December report, with unusual bluntness. “Palestinian armed groups made clear in their statements that harming civilians was their aim last month,” wrote HRW’s Middle East director Sarah Leah Whitson. “There is simply no legal justification for launching rockets at populated areas.” The organization “found that armed groups repeatedly fired rockets from densely populated areas, near homes, businesses, and a hotel, unnecessarily placing civilians in the vicinity at grave risk from Israeli counter-fire.” HRW named the “armed groups" as Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and the Popular Resistance Committees’ terrorist branches. Hamas and other terrorist groups rejected the report, denying they had targeted Israeli civilians with the rocket fire.
Tags: IDF ,Gaza Region ,rocket and mortar attacks ,HRW ,missile attacks ,war crimes charges ,Pillar of Defense,war crime
More on this topic
Comment on this story
5. Terrorists Who Set Up Hamas 'Office' in Jerusalem Convicted
by David Lev  A Jerusalem district court judge on Thursday convicted two top Hamas terrorists of security violations. The two, Khaled Abu Arfa and Mahmad Toutach, are top officials of Hamas, having served as members of the Palestinian Authority parliament and the PA government. The two were convicted of participating in a terrorist activities against Israel. In a plea deal, the charge of being members of a terrorist organization was dropped from their indictment. The two were elected to the PA parliament, with Toutach serving as a member of the parliament from January through June 2006, and Abu Arfa appointed as an assistant to the PA Ministry for Jerusalem Affairs. However, both were Israeli residents at the time they were elected – both lived in Jerusalem and held Israeli ID cards - and began working on behalf of the PA. On June 30, 2006, the Interior Ministry removed the two from the list of legal residents of Jerusalem. Now subject to being deported to PA areas, the two holed up in the offices of the Red Cross in the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, from July 2010 until they were arrested in 2011, in order to avoid deportation. During that time, they conducted PA government business inside the city limits of Jerusalem, another violation of Israeli law. The two asked Hamas to send them VIPs – especially foreign ones – to create “facts on the ground,” and enhance Hamas' stature in Jerusalem. Among the visitors, Israeli officials said, were top Hamas terrorists, who apparently consulted with the two about possible attacks. Sentencing will take place at a later date, the court said.
More on this topic
Comment on this story
6. Bennett and Lapid a Package Deal
by Maayana Miskin  Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid have created a pact between their two parties, agreeing that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu will have either both of their parties in his coalition or neither, political sources have told Arutz Sheva. Together, the two have 31 seats. Netanyahu’s chances of putting together a coalition without either party are not considered good. Bennett and Lapid banded together due to a shared interest in preventing Netanyahu from creating a coalition that excluded one of them in favor of hareidi-religious or left-wing parties. Netanyahu has reportedly responded by attempting to lure one or both leaders away from the agreement. His Likud party recently offered Bennett’s Bayit Yehudi (Jewish Home) party two ministries and other high-ranking positions if it would agree to join the coalition within two days. The Jewish Home party rejected the offer. The party’s coalition talks are being led by MK Uri Ariel. Ariel’s party in the last Knesset, Ichud Leumi, was reportedly mistreated by Netanyahu during coalition talks. Netanyahu allegedly implored party head MK Yaakov “Ketzaleh” Katz to recommend him as Prime Minister, and said Ichud Leumi had a guaranteed spot in his coalition, only to shut the party out of the coalition after he was chosen to lead the government. Netanyahu did include the Labor party, at that time led by Ehud Barak, who had recommended his rival, Tzipi Livni, to be the Prime Minister. Bennett has not confirmed the reported deal with Lapid, or the offers from Likud. Bennett said Tuesday night that he is not yet concerned with positions in the next government, but rather, is waiting to see what the coalition will look like.
More on this topic
Comment on this story
7. Journalist Claims 'Prisoner X' Worked for Mossad Front Company
 The Australian journalist who first investigated allegations that Ben Zygier, who is believed to be Israel’s mysterious “Prisoner X', was a Mossad agent, said on Wednesday that Zygier had been working for a front company established by the Mossad. The journalist, Jason Katsoukis, told the British Guardian that in 2009, while living in Jerusalem and filing stories to the Australian Fairfax group, he was contacted by an anonymous source with connections to the intelligence world. The source named three Australians with joint Israeli citizenship whom, he said, were working for a front company set up by Mossad in Europe selling electronic equipment to Iran and elsewhere. "I was tipped off in October 2009," Katsoukis told the Guardian on Wednesday, recalling the events that would lead to his calling Zygier at his home in Jerusalem and accusing him of being an Israeli spy. "The story was that Mossad was recruiting Australians to spy for them using a front company in Europe. It all seemed too good to be true,” he said. "But what I was told seemed to check out. The company did exist. I also managed to establish that Zygier and another of the individuals had worked for it. I wasn't able to confirm the third name. "I was told too that the Australian authorities were closing in on Zygier and that he might even be arrested,” said Katsoukis. "There was other stuff about Zygier. In Australia you can change your name once a year. He'd done it four times I think, but they were beginning to get suspicious. I also found out that he had applied for a work visa for Italy in Melbourne." The repeated changes of name would have allowed Zygier to create new identities and multiple passports, he noted. Katsoukis told the Guardian that the 2010 assassination of Hamas official Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai, which was widely blamed on the Mossad (though Israel never confirmed the allegations), brought him to contact Zygier directly. Reports that the team who killed Mabhouh had been supplied with false passports from a number of countries seemed to confirm the very practice Katsoukis was investigating. "The feeling was that we should go to Zygier and put the story to him. It wasn't difficult to find him. He'd was back in Jerusalem so I called him at home,” said Katsoukis, who added that Zygier cursed him upon receiving the call “but what was interesting was that he did not hang up. He did soundly genuinely shocked. But he listened to what I had to say. "I still wonder why he didn't hang up. He denied everything however. He said he hadn't visited the countries it had been claimed he had. I tried calling again but in the end he told me to buzz off," recalled Katsoukis. On Wednesday night, an Israeli court partially lifted the gag order on the “Prisoner X” affair. The court ruled that media outlets may reveal that there was indeed an Israeli citizen, who held foreign citizenship as well, who was held in an Israeli prison under a false name. The prisoner was given a false name for security reasons. While the prisoner was given a false identity while in jail, his real family had been informed of his whereabouts. He also had lawyers – attorneys Roi Belhar and Boaz Ben-Tzur – who were aware of his situation. The prisoner’s name or false name were not revealed in Israeli media reports, and Zygier’s name has only appeared in foreign media reports. An Australian newspaper revealed on Wednesday that Zygier was under investigation by the Australian Security Intelligence Organization (ASIO). The gag order on the Prisoner X affair was removed in Israel after three Knesset Members exposed the affair in the Knesset plenum, thus using their parliamentary immunity to circumvent the gag order. The three - MK Dov Khenin (Hadash), MK Zehava Galon (Meretz) and MK Ahmed Tibi (Raam-Taal) - grilled outgoing Justice Minister Yaakov Neeman over the rumored suicide on Tuesday.
More on this topic
Comment on this story
8. Iran, IAEA Agree on 'Some Points' in Latest Talks
by Elad Benari  Iran agreed on "some points" in talks with UN atomic experts in Tehran on Wednesday, AFP reported, two weeks ahead of negotiations with world powers aimed at finding a diplomatic solution to end a standoff over its nuclear ambitions. "Some differences were resolved and agreement on some issues in the modality was reached," Ali Asghar Soltanieh, Iran's envoy to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), was quoted as saying by the ISNA news agency. "New proposals," Soltanieh said, had been put forward in the meeting but they would be discussed at "future meetings." He did not say if a date had been agreed for the resumption of talks with the IAEA, whose chief inspector Herman Nackaerts led its delegation to Tehran. Nackaerts had hoped that in Tehran, the IAEA would "finalize the structured approach document" which would allow a probe into a possible military dimension of Iran's nuclear drive. The Vienna-based agency says "overall, credible" evidence exist that until 2003 and possibly since Iran conducted nuclear weapons research, despite repeated denials from Tehran. The IAEA is also pressuring Tehran to grant it access to Parchin, a military base near Tehran where the agency suspects Iran could have carried out experiments with explosives capable of triggering a nuclear weapon. Those calls have been spurned by Tehran, which says it should first reach a final agreement with the IAEA before such visit is debated. Wednesday's discussions took place as the P5+1 group of the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany are gearing for parallel diplomatic efforts to persuade Iran to curb parts of its nuclear drive. The six are to meet Iranian negotiators in the Kazakh city of Almaty on February 26, after an eight-month hiatus and failed meetings in Istanbul, Baghdad and Moscow. European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, who coordinates efforts with the P5+1, said on Wednesday she hoped Iran would show some "flexibility" at the upcoming talks. "We hope that Iran will come to these negotiations with flexibility, and that we can make substantial progress," Ashton told the UN Security Council, according to AFP. "We remain determined to work towards a solution to the Iran nuclear issue based on the dual-track approach," combining sanctions and dialogue, she said. Iran is already slapped with multiple sets of Security Council sanctions for its refusal to stop uranium enrichment, a process that can be used for peaceful atomic purposes as well as for making the core of a nuclear bomb. The United States and the European Union have also imposed their own separate sanctions to choke off Iran's revenue from its vital oil exports -- a measure exacerbating Iran's struggling economy and rising inflation. On Wednesday, as the talks with the IAEA were underway, Iran announced it was upgrading its uranium enrichment machines. Atomic Energy Organization chief Fereydoon Abbasi Davani said new centrifuges with "a higher efficiency" were being installed at Iran's Natanz site, which uses the machines to enrich uranium gas by spinning it at supersonic speeds. IAEA diplomats said earlier this week that Iran appears to have resumed converting small amounts of its higher-grade enriched uranium into reactor fuel. If this process is expanded, it could buy time for negotiations between Washington and Tehran on its disputed nuclear program, the diplomats said. The possibility of Iran converting enriched uranium into fuel, slowing a growth in stockpiles of material that could be used to make weapons, is one of the few ways in which the nuclear dispute could avoid hitting a crisis by the summer.
More on this topic
Comment on this story
More Website News:
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Everyday of Freedom is an Act of Faith for my writings ============> http://robertoscaruffi.blogspot.com for something on religions ===> http://scaruffi1.blogspot.com
Thursday, 21 February 2013
Assassinated in an Israeli prison by the Israeli government
Assassinated in an Israeli prison by the Israeli government
