Israeli spies tapped Clinton E-mail

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|| Subject: [ISN] Israeli spies tapped Clinton e-mail
|
| http://www.the-times.co.uk/news/pages/sti/2000/05/21/stifgnusa02003.html
|
| May 21st, 2000
|
| MORE than 20 years of Israeli spying operations in Washington
| culminated in the interception of e-mails from President Bill Clinton,
| intelligence sources claimed last week.
|
| The revelations come at a sensitive time as Ehud Barak, the Israeli
| prime minister, is ex-pected to fly to Washington today for talks with
| Clinton about the Middle East peace process.
|
| The latest spying operation is said to have taken place in 1998 while
| Benjamin Netanyahu was Israel's prime minister. According to the
| sources, it entailed hacking into White House computer systems during
| intense speculation about the direction of the peace process.
|
| Sources in Israel say intelligence agents infiltrated Telrad, a
| company that had been subcontracted by Nortel, America's largest
| telecommunications conglomerate, to help develop a communications
| system for the White House.
|
| Company managers were said to have been unaware that virtually
| undetectable chips installed during manufacture made it possible for
| outside agents to tap into the flow of data from the White House.
|
| Information being sent from the president to his senior staff in the
| National Security Council and outside government departments could be
| copied into a secret Israeli computer in Washington, the sources said.
| It was transferred to Tel Aviv two or three times a week.
|
| One opportunity for Israeli agents to mount the operation arose when
| Nortel, Telrad and another firm won a 33m contract to replace
| communications equipment for the Israeli air force. Members of the air
| force were allowed access to manufacturing areas as a result.
|
| Company and White House Officials last week denied any knowledge of
| the intelligence operation. "We have no information that our phone
| system has been compromised," said Jake Siewert, the deputy White
| House press secretary.
|
| An Israeli government official said that Mossad, the country's
| intelligence service, was banned from conducting illicit surveillance
| in America. "Spying on the US is out of the question," he said.
|
| However, the FBI has conducted a highly classified investigation into
| previous claims that Israeli intelligence has breached White House
| security.
|
| The inquiry was revealed earlier this month by the Washington Times
| Insight magazine, which reported that Israeli agents used a software
| company in Missouri to intercept telephone conversations from the
| White House, State Department and other departments.
|
| The FBI inquiry began some years ago after an investigation by the
| State Department led to suspicions that Israel might have the
| technology to overhear the conversations of American officials in
| their offices.
|
| It shifted to the White House in September 1998 when Kenneth Starr,
| the independent prosecutor, reported that the Israelis may have
| listened to amorous conversations between Clinton and Monica Lewinsky,
| the White House trainee with whom he had an affair. The allegation was
| denied by both Israel and the United States.
|
| Both countries have been wary of the harm that could be caused by
| Israeli intelligence operations since Jonathan Pollard, a former
| American navy analyst, was jailed for spying for Israel in 1986.
|
| Sources familiar with past operations, however, said penetration of
| the White House was considered so secret that even some members of
| Mossad's hierarchy were not informed.
|
| They cited at least three occasions on which Israel had monitored the
| White House, starting shortly after Gerald Ford became president in
| 1974.
|
| A source who participated in the infiltration of Ford's White House
| said the Israelis were interested in American plans to sell the Awacs
| early warning aircraft to Saudi Arabia, a prospect that would have
| allowed the desert kingdom to monitor Israeli air force activity
| throughout the Middle East.

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