Fox News: Israeli Spy ring story - "evidence linking these Israelis to 9-11 is classified."
Johnny Asia
May 28, 2003
It turns out that Israel has had a potential wiretap on every phone in
America for years, along with the ability to monitor and record who any
person is calling, anywhere in America; information of great value even if
one does not listen to the calls themselves. Amdocs, Inc., the company which
subcontracts billing and directory services for phone companies around the
world, including 90 percent of American phone companies, is owned by Israeli
interests. Yet another company, Comverse Infosys, is suspected of having
built a "back door" into the equipment permanently installed into the phone
system that allows instant eavesdropping by law enforcement agencies on any
phone in America. This includes yours.
Fox News, alone of all the media, actually ran the story as a four part
broadcast, and put the story up on its web site. Then, without explanation,
Fox News erased the story from their web site and have never mentioned it
again.
Entire report at google video
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6110095161238848541
Part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5fm0_7jVqcE
Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhAEjSQghj8
Part 3
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ENwze5owq4w
Part 4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwckJoP7-wg&search=zionist
[]Part 3 in Real Player format (2.4mb)
[]Part 4 in Real Player format (2.4mb)
[]Part 4 in Windows Media format (6.6mb)
Part 1 of 4
BRIT HUME, HOST: It has been more than 16 years since a civilian working for
the Navy was charged with passing secrets to Israel. Jonathan Pollard pled
guilty to conspiracy to commit espionage and is serving a life sentence. At
first, Israeli leaders claimed Pollard was part of a rogue operation, but
later took responsibility for his work.
Now Fox News has learned some U.S. investigators believe that there are
Israelis again very much engaged in spying in and on the U.S., who may have
known things they didn't tell us before September 11. Fox News correspondent
Carl Cameron has details in the first of a four-part series.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CARL CAMERON, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Since September 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.
There is no indication that the Israelis were involved in the 9-11 attacks,
but investigators suspect that they Israelis may have gathered intelligence
about the attacks in advance, and not shared it. A highly placed
investigator said there are "tie-ins." But when asked for details, he flatly
refused to describe them, saying, "evidence linking these Israelis to 9-11
is classified. I cannot tell you about evidence that has been gathered. It's
classified information."
Fox News has learned that one group of Israelis, spotted in North Carolina
recently, is suspected of keeping an apartment in California to spy on a
group of Arabs who the United States is also investigating for links to
terrorism. Numerous classified documents obtained by Fox News indicate that
even prior to September 11, as many as 140 other Israelis had been detained
or arrested in a secretive and sprawling investigation into suspected
espionage by Israelis in the United States.
Investigators from numerous government agencies are part of a working group
that's been compiling evidence since the mid '90s. These documents detail
hundreds of incidents in cities and towns across the country that
investigators say, "may well be an organized intelligence gathering
activity."
The first part of the investigation focuses on Israelis who say they are art
students from the University of Jerusalem and Bazala Academy. They
repeatedly made contact with U.S. government personnel, the report says, by
saying they wanted to sell cheap art or handiwork.
Documents say they, "targeted and penetrated military bases." The DEA, FBI
and dozens of government facilities, and even secret offices and unlisted
private homes of law enforcement and intelligence personnel. The majority of
those questioned, "stated they served in military intelligence, electronic
surveillance intercept and or explosive ordinance units."
Another part of the investigation has resulted in the detention and arrests
of dozens of Israelis at American mall kiosks, where they've been selling
toys called Puzzle Car and Zoom Copter. Investigators suspect a front.
Shortly after The New York Times and Washington Post reported the Israeli
detentions last months, the carts began vanishing. Zoom Copter's Web page
says, "We are aware of the situation caused by thousands of mall carts being
closed at the last minute. This in no way reflects the quality of the toy or
its salability. The problem lies in the operators' business policies."
Why would Israelis spy in and on the U.S.? A general accounting office
investigation referred to Israel as country A and said, "According to a U.S.
intelligence agency, the government of country A conducts the most
aggressive espionage operations against the U.S. of any U.S. ally."
A defense intelligence report said Israel has a voracious appetite for
information and said, "the Israelis are motivated by strong survival
instincts which dictate every possible facet of their political and
economical policies. It aggressively collects military and industrial
technology and the U.S. is a high priority target."
The document concludes: "Israel possesses the resources and technical
capability to achieve its collection objectives."
(END VIDEO CLIP)
A spokesman for the Israeli embassy here in Washington issued a denial
saying that any suggestion that Israelis are spying in or on the U.S. is
"simply not true." There are other things to consider. And in the days
ahead, we'll take a look at the U.S. phone system and law enforcement's
methods for wiretaps. And an investigation that both have been compromised
by our friends overseas.
HUME: Carl, what about this question of advanced knowledge of what was going
to happen on 9-11? How clear are investigators that some Israeli agents may
have known something?
CAMERON: It's very explosive information, obviously, and there's a great
deal of evidence that they say they have collected none of it necessarily
conclusive. It's more when they put it all together. A bigger question, they
say, is how could they not have know? Almost a direct quote.
HUME: Going into the fact that they were spying on some Arabs, right?
CAMERON: Correct.
HUME: All right, Carl, thanks very much
60 Israelis who had been detained in connection with the Sept. 11 terrorism
investigation.
Carl Cameron Investigates Part 2
Part 2 of 4
BRIT HUME, HOST: Last time we reported on the approximately 60 Israelis who
had been detained in connection with the Sept. 11 terrorism investigation.
Carl Cameron reported that U.S. investigators suspect that some of these
Israelis were spying on Arabs in this country, and may have turned up
information on the planned terrorist attacks back in September that was not
passed on.
Tonight, in the second of four reports on spying by Israelis in the U.S., we
learn about an Israeli-based private communications company, for whom a
half-dozen of those 60 detained suspects worked. American investigators fear
information generated by this firm may have fallen into the wrong hands and
had the effect of impeded the Sept. 11 terror inquiry. Here's Carl Cameron's
second report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CARL CAMERON, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Fox News has learned
that some American terrorist investigators fear certain suspects in the
Sept. 11 attacks may have managed to stay ahead of them, by knowing who and
when investigators are calling on the telephone. How?
By obtaining and analyzing data that's generated every time someone in the
U.S. makes a call.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What city and state, please?
CAMERON: Here's how the system works. Most directory assistance calls, and
virtually all call records and billing in the U.S. are done for the phone
companies by Amdocs Ltd., an Israeli-based private elecommunications
company.
Amdocs has contracts with the 25 biggest phone companies in America, and
more worldwide. The White House and other secure government phone lines are
protected, but it is virtually impossible to make a call on normal phones
without generating an Amdocs record of it.
In recent years, the FBI and other government agencies have investigated
Amdocs more than once. The firm has repeatedly and adamantly denied any
security breaches or wrongdoing. But sources tell Fox News that in 1999,
the super secret national security agency, headquartered in northern
Maryland, issued what's called a Top Secret sensitive compartmentalized
information report, TS/SCI, warning that records of calls in the United
States were getting into foreign hands - in Israel, in particular.
Investigators don't believe calls are being listened to, but the data about
who is calling whom and when is plenty valuable in itself. An internal
Amdocs memo to senior company executives suggests just how Amdocs generated
call records could be used. "Widespread data mining techniques and
algorithms.... combining both the properties of the customer (e.g., credit
rating) and properties of the specific 'behavior..'" Specific behavior, such
as who the customers are calling.
The Amdocs memo says the system should be used to prevent phone fraud. But
U.S. counterintelligence analysts say it could also be used to spy through
the phone system. Fox News has learned that the N.S.A has held numerous
classified conferences to warn the F.B.I. and C.I.A. how Amdocs records
could be used. At one NSA briefing, a diagram by the Argon national lab was
used to show that if the phone records are not secure, major security
breaches are possible.
Another briefing document said, "It has become increasingly apparent that
systems and networks are vulnerable..Such crimes always involve unauthorized
persons, or persons who exceed their authorization...citing on exploitable
vulnerabilities."
Those vulnerabilities are growing, because according to another briefing,
the U.S. relies too much on foreign companies like Amdocs for high-tech
equipment and software. "Many factors have led to increased dependence on
code developed overseas.... We buy rather than train or develop solutions."
U.S. intelligence does not believe the Israeli government is involved in a
misuse of information, and Amdocs insists that its data is secure. What U.S.
government officials are worried about, however, is the possibility that
Amdocs data could get into the wrong hands, particularly organized crime.
And that would not be the first thing that such a thing has happened. Fox
News has documents of a 1997 drug trafficking case in Los Angeles, in which
telephone information, the type that Amdocs collects, was used to
"completely compromise the communications of the FBI, the Secret Service,
the DEO and the LAPD."
We'll have that and a lot more in the days ahead - Brit.
HUME: Carl, I want to take you back to your report last night on those 60
Israelis who were detained in the anti-terror investigation, and the
suspicion that some investigators have that they may have picked up
information on the 9/11 attacks ahead of time and not passed it on.
There was a report, you'll recall, that the Mossad, the Israeli intelligence
agency, did indeed send representatives to the U.S. to warn, just before
9/11, that a major terrorist attack was imminent. How does that leave room
for the lack of a warning?
CAMERON: I remember the report, Brit. We did it first internationally right
here on your show on the 14th. What investigators are saying is that that
warning from the Mossad was nonspecific and general, and they believe that
it may have had something to do with the desire to protect what are called
sources and methods in the intelligence community. The suspicion being,
perhaps those sources and methods were taking place right here in the United
States.
The question came up in select intelligence committee on Capitol Hill today.
They intend to look into what we reported last night, and specifically that
possibility - Brit.
HUME: So in other words, the problem wasn't lack of a warning, the problem
was lack of useful details?
CAMERON: Quantity of information.
HUME: All right, Carl, thank you very much.
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Part 3 of 4
[]Part 3 in Real Player format (2.4mb)
BRIT HUME, HOST: Last time we reported on an Israeli-based company called
Amdocs Ltd. that generates the computerized records and billing data for
nearly every phone call made in America. As Carl Cameron reported, U.S.
investigators digging into the 9/11 terrorist attacks fear that suspects may
have been tipped off to what they were doing by information leaking out of
Amdocs.
In tonight's report, we learn that the concern about phone security extends
to another company, founded in Israel, that provides the technology that the
U.S. government uses for electronic eavesdropping. Here is Carl Cameron's
third report.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CARL CAMERON, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The company is Comverse
Infosys, a subsidiary of an Israeli-run private telecommunications firm,
with offices throughout the U.S. It provides wiretapping equipment for law
enforcement. Here's how wiretapping works in the U.S.
Every time you make a call, it passes through the nation's elaborate network
of switchers and routers run by the phone companies. Custom computers and
software, made by companies like Comverse, are tied into that network to
intercept, record and store the wiretapped calls, and at the same time
transmit them to investigators.
The manufacturers have continuing access to the computers so they can
service them and keep them free of glitches. This process was authorized by
the 1994 Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act, or CALEA.
Senior government officials have now told Fox News that while CALEA made
wiretapping easier, it has led to a system that is seriously vulnerable to
compromise, and may have undermined the whole wiretapping system.
Indeed, Fox News has learned that Attorney General John Ashcroft and FBI
Director Robert Mueller were both warned Oct. 18 in a hand-delivered letter
from 15 local, state and federal law enforcement officials, who complained
that "law enforcement's current electronic surveillance capabilities are
less effective today than they were at the time CALEA was enacted."
Congress insists the equipment it installs is secure. But the complaint
about this system is that the wiretap computer programs made by Comverse
have, in effect, a back door through which wiretaps themselves can be
intercepted by unauthorized parties.
Adding to the suspicions is the fact that in Israel, Comverse works closely
with the Israeli government, and under special programs, gets reimbursed
for up to 50 percent of its research and development costs by the Israeli
Ministry of Industry and Trade. But investigators within the DEA, INS and
FBI have all told Fox News that to pursue or even suggest Israeli spying
through Comverse is considered career suicide.
And sources say that while various F.B.I. inquiries into Comverse have been
conducted over the years, they've been halted before the actual equipment
has ever been thoroughly tested for leaks. A 1999 F.C.C. document
indicates several government agencies expressed deep concerns that too many
unauthorized non-law enforcement personnel can access the wiretap system.
And the FBI's own nondescript office in Chantilly, Virginia that actually
oversees the CALEA wiretapping program, is among the most agitated about
the threat.
But there is a bitter turf war internally at F.B.I. It is the FBI's office
in Quantico, Virginia, that has jurisdiction over awarding contracts and
buying intercept equipment. And for years, they've thrown much of the
business to Comverse. A handful of former U.S. law enforcement officials
involved in awarding Comverse government contracts over the years now work
for the company.
Numerous sources say some of those individuals were asked to leave
government service under what knowledgeable sources call "troublesome
circumstances" that remain under administrative review within the Justice
Department.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
And what troubles investigators most, particularly in New York, in the
counter terrorism investigation of the World Trade Center attack, is that on
a number of cases, suspects that they had sought to wiretap and survey
immediately changed their telecommunications processes. They started
acting much differently as soon as those supposedly secret wiretaps went
into place - Brit.
HUME: Carl, is there any reason to suspect in this instance that the
Israeli government is involved?
CAMERON: No, there's not. But there are growing instincts in an awful lot
of law enforcement officials in a variety of agencies who suspect that it
had begun compiling evidence, and a highly classified investigation into
that possibility - Brit.
HUME: All right, Carl. Thanks very much.
Part 4 of 4
[]Part 4 in Real Player format (2.4mb)
[]Part 4 in Windows Media format (6.6mb)
TONY SNOW, HOST: This week, senior correspondent Carl Cameron has reported
on a longstanding government espionage investigation. Federal officials
this year have arrested or detained nearly 200 Israeli citizens suspected of
belonging to an "organized intelligence-gathering operation." The Bush
administration has deported most of those arrested after Sept. 11, although
some are in custody under the new anti-terrorism law.
Cameron also investigates the possibility that an Israeli firm generated
billing data that could be used for intelligence purpose, and describes
concerns that the federal government's own wiretapping system may be
vulnerable. Tonight, in part four of the series, we'll learn about the
probable roots of the probe: a drug case that went bad four years ago in
L.A.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CARL CAMERON, FOX NEWS CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Los Angeles, 1997, a
major local, state and federal drug investigating sours. The suspects:
Israeli organized crime with operations in New York, Miami, Las Vegas,
Canada, Israel and Egypt. The allegations: cocaine and ecstasy trafficking,
and sophisticated white-collar credit card and computer fraud.
The problem: according to classified law enforcement documents obtained by
Fox News, the bad guys had the cops' beepers, cell phones, even home phones
under surveillance. Some who did get caught admitted to having hundreds of
numbers and using them to avoid arrest.
"This compromised law enforcement communications between LAPD detectives and
other assigned law enforcement officers working various aspects of the case.
The organization discovered communications between organized crime
intelligence division detectives, the FBI and the Secret Service."
Shock spread from the DEA to the FBI in Washington, and then the CIA. An
investigation of the problem, according to law enforcement documents,
concluded, "The organization has apparent extensive access to database
systems to identify pertinent personal and biographical information."
When investigators tried to find out where the information might have come
from, they looked at Amdocs, a publicly traded firm based in Israel.
Amdocs generates billing data for virtually every call in America, and they
do credit checks. The company denies any leaks, but investigators still
fear that the firm's data is getting into the wrong hands.
When investigators checked their own wiretapping system for leaks, they grew
concerned about potential vulnerabilities in the computers that intercept,
record and store the wiretapped calls. A main contractor is Comverse
Infosys, which works closely with the Israeli government, and under a
special grant program, is reimbursed for up to 50 percent of its research
and development costs by Israel's Ministry of Industry and Trade.
Asked this week about another sprawling investigation and the detention of
60 Israeli since Sept. 11, the Bush administration treated the questions
like hot potatoes.
ARI FLEISCHER, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I would just refer you to the
Department of Justice with that. I'm not familiar with the report.
COLIN POWELL, SECRETARY OF STATE: I'm aware that some Israeli citizens have
been detained. With respect to why they're being detained and the other
aspects of your question - whether it's because they're in intelligence
services, or what they were doing - I will defer to the Department of
Justice and the FBI to answer that.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
CAMERON: Beyond the 60 apprehended or detained, and many deported since
Sept. 11, another group of 140 Israeli individuals have been arrested and
detained in this year in what government documents describe as "an
organized intelligence gathering operation," designed to "penetrate
government facilities." Most of those individuals said they had served in
the Israeli military, which is compulsory there.
But they also had, most of them, intelligence expertise, and either worked
for Amdocs or other companies in Israel that specialize in wiretapping.
Earlier this week, the Israeli embassy in Washington denied any spying
against or in the United States - Tony.
SNOW: Carl, we've heard the comments from Ari Fleischer and Colin Powell.
What are officials saying behind the scenes?
CAMERON: Well, there's real pandemonium described at the FBI, the DEA and
the INS. A lot of these problems have been well known to some
investigators, many of who have contributed to the reporting on this story.
And what they say is happening is supervisors and management are now going
back and collecting much of the information, because there's tremendous
pressure from the top levels of all of those agencies to find out exactly
what's going on.
At the DEA and the FBI already a variety of administration reviews are
under way, in addition to the investigation of the phenomenon. They want
to find out how it is all this has come out, as well as be very careful
because of the explosive nature and very political ramifications of the
story itself - Tony.
SNOW: All right, Carl, thanks.
Content and Programming Copyright 2001 Fox News Network, Inc. ALL RIGHTS
RESERVED. Transcription Copyright 2001
--
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