Scandals
There are two huge scandals rocking Israel these days:
1. The Anat Kamm spying case: Anat Kamm was the model of an Israeli, she was a scout and passed her security clearance and did national service as a secretary in military intelligence. During the course of her service in 2005-2007 she copied ca. 2,000 top secret documents and illegally removed them from her office copied on a CD. According to the reports she did this for "ideological" reasons, i.e. she was either a leftist or was against the existence of the State, because the documents she copied are of incredible importance to the safety of the people and the State of Israel, including plans for mobilization should there be a military emergency. This information could be of great value to any enemy of Israel, such as the Palestinians and Iran. Kamm then leaked some of these papers to a reporter, Uri Blau of Ha'aretz, a left leaning newspaper. Blau wrote several articles startign in 2008 based on these documents, although the articles were cleared for publication by the military censor (this also raises some questions). Eventually the Shin-bet (Israeli counter-intelligence agency) caught up with Blau. They made an agreement with him to return the papers he held and give up his laptop. But, later they caught Kamm, and she confessed to stealing far more documents than Blau acknowledged. Blau by this time had been allowed to leave the country on vacation. It is a serious question why the two of them were not immediately arrested. Kamm was put under house arrest where she continues her activites, and Blau is in London probably with top secret Israeli documents. By being sensitive to the fact that Blau is a reporter and in order to get their cooperation the Shin-bet has made mistakes that make the case much more difficult to prosecute. For some time the Judge placed the case under a gag order here in Israel at the request of the prosecution, although the details were published in the international press. This allowed the Shin- bet to cover up their incompetence. No doubt we will be hearing much more about this case.
2. The Holyland Affair: The Holyland project is one of the most monstrous, ugly building projects anyone has ever seen. It is enormous and covers the entire top of a hill in the middle of west Jerusalem. The area is called "Holyland" after the hotel of that name that has been there for many years. The case came to light after the trial of former PM Ehud Olmert was suspended for a month while his possible involvement in this additional case is investigated. Eight men were arrested, including Olmert's former attorney Uri Messer, and the builders and owners of the Holyland project. It is alleged that they paid millions of dollars in bribes to get fast planning permission for this huge project, that would have been rejected by any reasonably conscious citizen. Not only is the place a colossal eyesore, but it raises the density of population in that area so much that it required the building of new roads and sewers at public expense, and other such developments are planned in the Tel Aviv area and in the north. It is a terrible reflection on the construction business in Israel that such people were able to get away with this for so long and that the corruption reached to the level of the Prime Minister!
There have been other scandals like these before in Israel and no doubt they occur in other countries. But, one wonders how many such scandals little Israel can take.
1. The Anat Kamm spying case: Anat Kamm was the model of an Israeli, she was a scout and passed her security clearance and did national service as a secretary in military intelligence. During the course of her service in 2005-2007 she copied ca. 2,000 top secret documents and illegally removed them from her office copied on a CD. According to the reports she did this for "ideological" reasons, i.e. she was either a leftist or was against the existence of the State, because the documents she copied are of incredible importance to the safety of the people and the State of Israel, including plans for mobilization should there be a military emergency. This information could be of great value to any enemy of Israel, such as the Palestinians and Iran. Kamm then leaked some of these papers to a reporter, Uri Blau of Ha'aretz, a left leaning newspaper. Blau wrote several articles startign in 2008 based on these documents, although the articles were cleared for publication by the military censor (this also raises some questions). Eventually the Shin-bet (Israeli counter-intelligence agency) caught up with Blau. They made an agreement with him to return the papers he held and give up his laptop. But, later they caught Kamm, and she confessed to stealing far more documents than Blau acknowledged. Blau by this time had been allowed to leave the country on vacation. It is a serious question why the two of them were not immediately arrested. Kamm was put under house arrest where she continues her activites, and Blau is in London probably with top secret Israeli documents. By being sensitive to the fact that Blau is a reporter and in order to get their cooperation the Shin-bet has made mistakes that make the case much more difficult to prosecute. For some time the Judge placed the case under a gag order here in Israel at the request of the prosecution, although the details were published in the international press. This allowed the Shin- bet to cover up their incompetence. No doubt we will be hearing much more about this case.
2. The Holyland Affair: The Holyland project is one of the most monstrous, ugly building projects anyone has ever seen. It is enormous and covers the entire top of a hill in the middle of west Jerusalem. The area is called "Holyland" after the hotel of that name that has been there for many years. The case came to light after the trial of former PM Ehud Olmert was suspended for a month while his possible involvement in this additional case is investigated. Eight men were arrested, including Olmert's former attorney Uri Messer, and the builders and owners of the Holyland project. It is alleged that they paid millions of dollars in bribes to get fast planning permission for this huge project, that would have been rejected by any reasonably conscious citizen. Not only is the place a colossal eyesore, but it raises the density of population in that area so much that it required the building of new roads and sewers at public expense, and other such developments are planned in the Tel Aviv area and in the north. It is a terrible reflection on the construction business in Israel that such people were able to get away with this for so long and that the corruption reached to the level of the Prime Minister!
There have been other scandals like these before in Israel and no doubt they occur in other countries. But, one wonders how many such scandals little Israel can take.
posted by Jack Cohen at 3:27 PM
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