SUICIDAL
TENDENCIES
Naturally,
the law enforcement sources who utilized Cameron's investigation
to voice their concerns didn't dare allow their names to be
used: as Cameron related in his report, any question regarding
the possibility of Israeli spying in the US is "career
suicide" for those who dare raise it. Question: is it
also career suicide for journalists to raise it?
I
have seen a few news items reporting on the Cameron exposé,
but, given the implications and scope of what we're talking
about here, the answer is, apparently, yes.
For Cameron and Fox News are not merely saying that the Israelis
have been conducting a "sprawling" spy operation
in the US, involving the massive penetration of our communications
systems and government agencies. As Cameron so diplomatically
put it in the first segment of his four-part
investigation:
"There
is no indication that the Israelis were involved in the 9-11
attacks, but investigators suspect that the Israelis may have
gathered intelligence about the attacks in advance, and not
shared it."
A
GUILTY SILENCE
In
other words: Israel's passive complicity made the worst terrorist
attack in American history possible. One would think that
the sheer enormity of such a charge would provoke a storm
of outrage from Israel's many defenders in the media: the
columnists, the think-tankers, the publicists who dote on
Ariel Sharon's every word. But, no: instead, there is an ominous,
one might almost say a guilty
silence.
THANKS
BE TO GOOGLE!
It's
frightening, really, when you think about it. Here, after
all, is a reporter's dream: a heretofore-undiscovered angle
on the biggest story of our time. Yet no one will touch it.
Why? It couldn't be because you'd need an army of researchers:
you don't. All that's necessary is internet access, and, of
course, the miracle of Google: anyone can go to google.com
and type in the appropriate words and phrases, such as "Israelis
detained," or, better yet, "Israeli art students"
along with the word "detained." Go ahead: do it,
and see
what happens….
ARTISTIC
ASPIRATIONS
Okay,
so you did it and came up with a whole slew of news stories, published mostly
in local newspapers, telling different variations on a single,
very bizarre story: In locations as diverse as Dallas,
Saint
Louis, Kansas, Atlanta, New York,
and Findley,
Ohio, groups of young people describing themselves as
Israeli art students suddenly descended on federal office
buildings and no less than 36 Department of Defense facilities. They
seemed particularly
active in the state of Texas: in Dallas, one "student"
was found wandering
the halls of a federal facility with a floor plan in his hands.
Say, what?
Starting
in the third week of January, reports began to pour in to
the National Counterintelligence Center (NCC) about "suspicious
visitors to federal facilities." The NCC's bimonthly
report for March 2001
states:
"In
the past six weeks, employees in federal office buildings
located throughout the United States have reported suspicious
activities connected with individuals representing themselves
as foreign students selling or delivering artwork. Employees
have observed both males and females attempting to bypass
facility security and enter federal buildings."
INVASION
OF THE 'ART STUDENTS'
The
NCC described these people -- supposedly working for an outfit
known as "Universal
Art, Inc." -- as "aggressive" in attempting to gain access
to federal facilities, and reported that two had been arrested
for having counterfeit work visas and green cards. Then this
stunner: "These individuals have also gone to the private
residences of senior federal officials under the guise of
selling art." Now wait just a friggin' minute, dude –
stop right there!
OMINOUS
PORTENTS
Okay,
so we're talking about some nine months before The Day, and
mysterious "art students" are following high government
officials home – that is, when they aren't trying to
break in to Defense Department facilities, staking out DEA
offices, and hanging around the federal prosecutor's office
in Dallas. We've already had numerous terrorist scares, at
this point: remember
the New Year's hysteria, and there were all those frantic
warnings by various "anti-terrorist" commissions
and study groups. The NCC report posits the existence of two
groups of "art students":
"One
group has an apparently legitimate money-making goal while
the second, perhaps a non-Israeli group, may have ties to
a Middle Eastern Islamic fundamentalist group."
So,
this was the first ominous sign of the terrorist onslaught
to come – or was it? The NCC's speculation that these
"art students" were Bin Laden's boys turns out not
to have been correct. They were Israelis, alright, except
for a few Latin Americans. Not only did they carry forged
immigration papers, in some cases, but also at least one we
know about failed a polygraph test when he
denied spying for Israel.
CELLMATES
AT LAST
With
some 140 picked up before 9/11, and some 60-plus afterward,
we have no idea how many of these "art students"
were sent back to Israel to pursue their "studies."
All we know is that those let go were kept for months, and
others – according to Fox News, those identified as Israeli
agents – are still in custody, perhaps sharing a nice
cozy cell with detainees from Arab countries. I'm sure they
have a lot to talk
about….
HOW
ODD
The
Arab detainees, as we have seen, have been the subjects of
a national controversy between civil libertarians and the
Bush administration. We have John Ashcroft denouncing those
who would spread the "false fear" of a police state
as "aiding the terrorists," while on the other hand
Arab-Americans and the ACLU are rallying opposition to the
round-up. But when it comes to the Israeli detainees, there
is no controversy, virtually no mention of it in the national
media, no nothing.
Jewish groups are not rallying to the defense of these poor
defenseless "art students," held without bail and
without lawyers, for the most part, in very uncomfortable
and worrisome circumstances. Doesn't anybody find this odd?
SUCKER
PUNCH
What's
significant about this story is, first, that it amounts to
the biggest spy operation in the US since the days of the
Cold War, and, secondly, that it provides some context
for understanding the mystery of 9/11. To most of us, that
horrific event was a bolt out of the blue, with no prelude,
no precedent, and no way to anticipate that the best days
of our lives could turn into the worst. But the view from
inside the US Government must have looked a whole lot different,
i.e. far more threatening. Yet the threat seemed to be coming,
not from Bin Laden, but – incredibly – from the Israelis,
who, not content with having gained access to our phone system
and federal wiretaps, were penetrating American military and government
targets. Law enforcement
authorities were in the midst of a massive crackdown on the
Israelis, when, suddenly, they were hit – from the other
direction.
IN
THE DARK
We
are being kept in the dark about so many things, these days,
but this, it seems, is too important to be kept secret for
long. If we are going to be asked to give up our liberties,
our peace of mind, and even our lives in an apparently eternal
"war on terrorism," then Americans at least have
a right to know who their enemies are. Yes, we know the evil Bin Laden is responsible for the murder of 3000 innocent
people – but we still don't know how they managed to
pull off such a well-organized and spectacular display of
murderous skill, unassisted by any state sponsor.
A
CAROLINA COVEN
Much
has been said – but nothing proved – about the alleged
role of Iraq in all this. But to anyone who has seen or read
through parts one, two, three and four
of the Fox News investigative report, it seems clear that
the most active state intelligence agency in the US prior
to the twin towers attack was not the Iraqis, but the Mossad.
Carl Cameron informs us that a North Carolina Israeli spy
coven is suspected of renting an apartment in California "to
spy on a group of Arabs who the United States is also investigating
for links to terrorism." What were they doing –
and, most importantly, what did they know about the planning
and execution of the 9/11 atrocity?
DEMAND
AN INVESTIGATION
In
the months preceding 9/11, a secret war was being waged on
American soil, a silent struggle from coast to coast –
not an undercover battle between us and Muslim terrorists,
but one pitting US law enforcement agencies against one of
our closest allies. Make
of that what you will. For until the US government comes clean,
and Congress investigates, we'll never even have a chance
to start asking the right questions.
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