Outsourcing Airport Security to the Shin Bet?

Baum wants airport security be outsourced to the Israeli Shin Bet.

Belen Fernandez

Perhaps I am out of the loop, but is it normal in mainstream U.S. media these days to suggest that domestic airport security be outsourced to the Israeli Shin Bet?
At first glance, you might not guess that this is the gist of Caroline Baum’s Nov. 28 Bloomberg article “My Breasts Pass Unchecked by Airport Screeners”, which begins with Baum admitting she was jealous to learn that an Orlando passenger had been subjected to additional airport screening due to the size of her breasts.
Upon learning that this Orlando passenger was not the only one to receive such treatment, Baum excuses “breast stares” from male Transportation Security Administration agents as follows:
“What’s so bad about that? There was a time — think Marilyn Monroe — when women encouraged longing looks from the opposite sex with cinched-in waists and cups that runneth over.”
As long as we are reducing female worth to physical appearance, let me go ahead and say that I sympathize with the TSA decision to waive the pat-down in Ms. Baum’s case.
After reviewing additional details such as that “far more graphic material [than that generated by full body scans] is available at a newsstand in most airports”, Baum arrives at the Shin Bet connection:
“Could we do smarter security? Of course. We could learn a few things from the Israelis, maybe even outsource airport security to the Shin Bet, Israel’s domestic security agency, which is charged with protecting El Al, the national airline.
“Ben-Gurion International Airport outside Tel Aviv has been recognized as the safest in the world. By the time passengers arrive at the airport, Israeli security agents know who they’re looking for. The screening process begins when a ticket is booked.
“Israel employs ethnic profiling, spending more time interviewing a young Arab male with a one-way ticket paid for in cash than an elderly Jewish grandmother or Hebrew University students off on a summer holiday. Muslim Arabs may be singled out unfairly, but they’re the ones committed to the destruction of the Jewish state. It’s this same group — albeit a small minority — that’s targeting the U.S.”
The phrasing of the final two sentences leads us to believe that all Muslim Arabs are committed to the destruction of Israel while a small minority targets the U.S. However “unfair” ethnic profiling is, it is thus necessary.
Luckily for Ms. Baum, she will also be exempt in the event the TSA decides to adopt other methods perfected by the Shin Bet, such as shackling Muslim Arabs in unnatural positions and depriving them of sleep for prolonged periods.
I would meanwhile advise Bloomberg columnists who end their odes to Israeli security with jokes about push-up bras to consider taking the time to speak to people who have far more to worry about than whether or not security officials are looking at their breasts.
- Belén Fernández is an editor at PULSE Media and the author of Coffee with Hezbollah, a satirical political travelogue about hitchhiking through Lebanon in the aftermath of the July War. She contributed this article to PalestineChronicle.com. Contact her at: belengarciabernal@gmail.com.

The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of this Blog!

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Shin Bet Torture ‘Investigator’ Moved to Israeli Justice Department

By Saed Bannoura – IMEMC News –

The Israeli secret service, or Shin Bet, has always depended on ‘internal investigations’ to respond to allegations of torture and mistreatment. Now, the Shin Bet officer in charge of complaints will be moved under the jurisdiction of the Justice Department.

Israeli activists demonstrate Shin Bet torture technique (photo by ‘Abolish Torture’)

The ‘internal investigations’ have, in 100% of cases, resulted in a dismissal of complaints, often with a single sentence reply to the complainant: “There is no basis for the complaints in your letter.” The Public Committee Against Torture in Israel recently released a report showing that every single one of the 650 complaints brought to the Israeli government’s legal advisors were dismissed out of hand.
After the report’s release, Israeli Attorney General Yehuda Weinstein announced that he will move the employee who deals with complaints from within the Shin Bet to the Justice Department for “the sake of appearances”.
According to the Attorney General’s office, it is unlikely that the shift in jurisdiction will result in any actual change in how ‘investigations’ of complaints are conducted.
The Shin Bet has a reputation among Israeli military branches for harsh interrogation and torture of prisoners. Palestinians who have been abducted by the Shin Bet report horrific techniques used by the Shin Bet officers during interrogations, and officers within the organization have publicly admitted their use of certain techniques including the so-called ‘Palestinian hanging’, in which prisoners are hung by their handcuffed hands from a wall.
Despite the violations of international law and human rights conventions, Shin Bet officers continue to authorize the use of torture against Palestinian prisoners, including children, on a regular basis.

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*Stop the lying!*

By: B. Michael
Yedioth Aharonoth

Every few years one's patience runs out. The soul again recoils at the
festival of falsehoods, deceit and mutual ass-covering. At the
uproarious binge of bluffing that once again makes tangible the degree
to which the culture of the lie and the wink have taken root in the
heart of the power structure.

It is not clear which bluff broke the camel's back this time. Was it the
shooting in the head of an emotionally-disturbed person in Ni'lin
village? The distraught mother who went to a police station to report
the disappearance of her daughter and left it with a broken hand? The
Israel Security Agency [ISA – Shin Bet] clerk who decided once again
that seriously ill patients are a "security danger"? Or maybe the
courts, that buy with such casual indifference all the nonsense on offer
from the army, the police and the ISA? Clearly they have all gone too
far. In order to avoid confusion, we will place each under a separate
heading.

Let us start with the army.

We will not once again delve into its systematic "deep lies". Like the
"Civil Administration", which is nothing but a tyrannical military
government with all that implies. Like the shady collaboration between
the army and the "hilltop" thugs. Like the routine abuse by soldiers
against passers-by, just for the sake of entertainment and relief of
stress. Like the scandalous military policies that for year now have
prevented any serious investigation into the killing of hundreds of
innocent people by soldiers' gunfire.

All the above has been known for years. It wasn't those cold noodles
that strains one's patience to the breaking-point. So what did it?

It would seem that the first thing was the episode of the battalion
commander who ordered the shooting of a bound man. First of all, the
commander lied. That was his default response, and if the incident had
not been filmed the system around him would have joined in the lying.
And why not? Mendacity long ago became the reflexive first response of
the army. Only after filming or stubborn investigations reveal the
facts, is the army forced to consider the option of truth.
That lie was still hovering in the air, and along comes the story of the
emotionally-disturbed man from Ni'lin village. Soldiers shot him. He was
gravely wounded. Quick as a flash, within a few hours, the army produced
an exculpatory "investigation": "the wounded man tried to grab a
soldier's gun".

The army's version is baseless. Film and testimony prove that the man
was standing on a balcony and was shot from the street. He didn't try to
grab anything. He just yelled abuse, and thereby upset the sensitive
honour-glands of the young men with rifles. But the army stuck to its
story. Everything's OK. Why, what happened? Another Arabush that got a
rubber bullet to the head, that's all.

Everybody knows they all lie. And they all lie under oath. Because
that's the procedure.

Never mind me, a stinking leftist consumed by self-hatred, but what
about the commander of the army? Is not General Ashkenazi, as has been
made clear more than once, a man who knows how to turn his gaze towards
the truth? Is he too not fed up with this culture of lying? Does he not
know that this mendacity is rotting his army?

Now let us move on to the police.

About a month ago a man and his wife, he a doctor and she an art
lecturer, left a theatre in Jerusalem. A police car was blocking the
street, and the policeman who had come in it was busy writing parking
tickets. A fairly familiar scene. After all, everything is permitted for
police cars. The woman mockingly clapped her hands and declared: "all
honour to the police". Can a worse crime be imagined? To mock a diligent
writer of tickets, in the middle of his fruitful shift?

Quick as a flash the woman was violently shoved into the police car,
handcuffed and taken to the police station. With brutality, threats, and
savagery, the husband received no less. Quite the crime family.

This week the couple received word that the Police Investigations Unit
has closed the file. But what? "The complainant prevented [the officer]
from writing tickets … attacked an officer … insulted …". Can anyone
have any doubt about what really happened there? Who is lying and who is
not? But the Police Investigations Unit, the official launderer of the
Israel Police, did its duty well. Mendacity won the day again.

Let us proceed. A distraught woman went to a police station to report
that her 15-year-old daughter was missing. She left the station
battered, bleeding and with a broken hand. Her emotional behaviour had
apparently not pleased the police officers. So they neutralized her with
blows. "She screamed, attacked a policewoman, tore the file …", report
the police. As usual. Those violent citizens always attack our poor
persecuted police.

The perfidious PIU is investigating again. And who will be surprised if
this file too is closed expeditiously?

And let us conclude with the ISA.

Ah, the ISA. An entire book could be written on the artistry of the
ISA's mendacity. From the Bus 300 affair* to Tali Fahima. From the
despicable use of the courts and hospitals to take revenge on those who
refuse to collaborate, to all those ludicrous "al-Qaeda cells" that
suddenly pop up among the Israeli citizenry as if on order.
Below is a tiny sample from recent days: two gardeners working for the
Jerusalem Municipality were savagely beaten by guards of the Prime
Minister's Residence. Those wearers of sunglasses and loose-fitting
shirts were apparently offended when the gardeners asked them to
identify themselves. The guards, incidentally, are obliged to identify
themselves before they accost passers-by.

One of the gardeners was hospitalized in serious condition. The guards
are undisturbed. They most likely marketed one of the accepted bluffs
("suspicious behaviour, obstruction, insolence" and suchlike nonsense),
which will surely be immediately embraced by their employers. Perfidy
will prevail again.

And another patient in grave condition has been defined as a "security
risk". He was forbidden to go to a hospital to receive treatment.
Another baseless lie. One of the hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands
of lies that are part of the routine work of the secret security police.
And that one is not being investigated at all, not even for appearance's
sake.

Well – our patience has run out again, and once again our frustration
has been alleviated with a few angry words.

You can go back to sleep now.

* In 1984 an Israeli bus that was operating on line 300, from Tel Aviv
to Ashkelon, was hijacked by a group of four armed Palestinians. Two of
the Palestinians were subsequently extra-judicially executed by a Shin
Bet agent. The affair came to light when photographs were published of
two of the Palestinians alive in Israeli custody, whom the Israeli
authorities had announced were killed by gunfire, along with the other
two Palestinian hijackers, when the bus was stormed by Israeli soldiers
– trans.

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From triumph to torture

 

John Pilger

Israel's treatment of an award-winning young Palestinian journalist is part of a terrible pattern

Two weeks ago, I presented a young Palestinian, Mohammed Omer, with the 2008 Martha Gellhorn Prize for Journalism. Awarded in memory of the great US war correspondent, the prize goes to journalists who expose establishment propaganda, or "official drivel", as Gellhorn called it. Mohammed shares the prize of £5,000 with Dahr Jamail. At 24, he is the youngest winner. His citation reads: "Every day, he reports from a war zone, where he is also a prisoner. His homeland, Gaza, is surrounded, starved, attacked, forgotten. He is a profoundly humane witness to one of the great injustices of our time. He is the voice of the voiceless."

The eldest of eight, Mohammed has seen most of his siblings killed or wounded or maimed. An Israeli bulldozer crushed his home while the family were inside, seriously injuring his mother. And yet, says a former Dutch ambassador, Jan Wijenberg, "he is a moderating voice, urging Palestinian youth not to court hatred but seek peace with Israel".

Getting Mohammed to London to receive his prize was a major diplomatic operation. Israel has perfidious control over Gaza's borders, and only with a Dutch embassy escort was he allowed out. Last Thursday, on his return journey, he was met at the Allenby Bridge crossing (to Jordan) by a Dutch official, who waited outside the Israeli building, unaware Mohammed had been seized by Shin Bet, Israel's infamous security organisation. Mohammed was told to turn off his mobile and remove the battery. He asked if he could call his embassy escort and was told forcefully he could not. A man stood over his luggage, picking through his documents. "Where's the money?" he demanded. Mohammed produced some US dollars. "Where is the English pound you have?"

"I realised," said Mohammed, "he was after the award stipend for the Martha Gellhorn prize. I told him I didn't have it with me. 'You are lying', he said. I was now surrounded by eight Shin Bet officers, all armed. The man called Avi ordered me to take off my clothes. I had already been through an x-ray machine. I stripped down to my underwear and was told to take off everything. When I refused, Avi put his hand on his gun. I began to cry: 'Why are you treating me this way? I am a human being.' He said, 'This is nothing compared with what you will see now.' He took his gun out, pressing it to my head and with his full body weight pinning me on my side, he forcibly removed my underwear. He then made me do a concocted sort of dance. Another man, who was laughing, said, 'Why are you bringing perfumes?' I replied, 'They are gifts for the people I love'. He said, 'Oh, do you have love in your culture?'

"As they ridiculed me, they took delight most in mocking letters I had received from readers in England. I had now been without food and water and the toilet for 12 hours, and having been made to stand, my legs buckled. I vomited and passed out. All I remember is one of them gouging, scraping and clawing with his nails at the tender flesh beneath my eyes. He scooped my head and dug his fingers in near the auditory nerves between my head and eardrum. The pain became sharper as he dug in two fingers at a time. Another man had his combat boot on my neck, pressing into the hard floor. I lay there for over an hour. The room became a menagerie of pain, sound and terror."

An ambulance was called and told to take Mohammed to a hospital, but only after he had signed a statement indemnifying the Israelis from his suffering in their custody. The Palestinian medic refused, courageously, and said he would contact the Dutch embassy escort. Alarmed, the Israelis let the ambulance go. The Israeli response has been the familiar line that Mohammed was "suspected" of smuggling and "lost his balance" during a "fair" interrogation, Reuters reported yesterday.

Israeli human rights groups have documented the routine torture of Palestinians by Shin Bet agents with "beatings, painful binding, back bending, body stretching and prolonged sleep deprivation". Amnesty has long reported the widespread use of torture by Israel, whose victims emerge as mere shadows of their former selves. Some never return. Israel is high in an international league table for its murder of journalists, especially Palestinian journalists, who receive barely a fraction of the kind of coverage given to the BBC's Alan Johnston.

The Dutch government says it is shocked by Mohammed Omer's treatment. The former ambassador Jan Wijenberg said: "This is by no means an isolated incident, but part of a long-term strategy to demolish Palestinian social, economic and cultural life ... I am aware of the possibility that Mohammed Omer might be murdered by Israeli snipers or bomb attack in the near future."

While Mohammed was receiving his prize in London, the new Israeli ambassador to Britain, Ron Proser, was publicly complaining that many Britons no longer appreciated the uniqueness of Israel's democracy. Perhaps they do now.

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Israeli doctors complicit in torture -rights group

Israel's Physicians for Human Rights (PHR) group accused Israeli doctors on Thursday of ignoring what it described as the torture of Palestinian detainees during interrogations. The PHR said its findings were based on testimony from two Palestinians who developed trauma-related symptoms, such as weak hearing, panic attacks and incontinence during and after their detention.

Israel said those findings were "fraught with mistakes, groundless claims and inaccuracies". Palestinian prisoners undergo medical examinations before, during and after their interrogation, but doctors in detention facilities fail to report such symptoms, making them complicit in "prisoner torture", the PHR said in a statement.

PHR Executive Director Hadas Ziv told Reuters her organisation's findings were also based on reports by other Israeli human rights groups. Last year, two groups, B'Tselem and HaMoked, said they had found Israeli security interrogators routinely mistreat and sometimes physically torture Palestinian detainees.

The PHR urged the Health Ministry in a letter to forbid doctors from participating in interrogations carried out by Israel's internal security service, the Shin Bet. A Health Ministry spokeswoman said it had not received the letter and therefore could not respond to the PHR's appeal.

The rights group said doctors working for the Shin Bet risked losing their jobs if they reported torture and urged the Health Ministry to protect them.

(Writing by Joseph Nasr, Editing by Ibon Villelabeitia)

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Israeli army carrying out rampage of terror, sabotage in Palestinian town

by Khalid Amayreh

For the third consecutive day, hundreds of Israeli
occupation soldiers and agents of Israel’s chief domestic security agency,
the Shin Bet, are savaging and terrorizing this small Palestinian town of
10,000 inhabitants, located just a few kilometers north of Hebron in the
southern West Bank.

The occupation forces declared the town “a closed military zone” as crack
soldiers moved from house to house, terrorizing civilians, beating
youngsters, and vandalizing public and private property.

According to residents reached by telephone, Israeli soldiers were “carrying
a wave of collective punishments sweeping arrests.”

“First, they ordered all males from 12 to 70 to school yards and streets in
sub-zero temperature, and then heavily armed soldiers moved from house to
house, beating youngsters, verbally abusing women, vandalizing property and
smashing electrical appliances,” said Yousuf Abu Ayyash, an elderly
resident.

Abu Ayyash said Israeli troops were behaving in patters “resembling the
middle-ages”

“Where in the world today a state deploys huge bulldozers in the heart of
urban centers in order to destroy businesses and shops. If they want to
arrest someone, they can arrest him, but why destroy his business? Why
demolish his home?”

So far, as many as sixty residents have been arrested and herded into large
army trucks. Most of the detainees are likely to be sent to the notorious
detention camp, known as Kitziot, in the Negev desert, where thousands of
Palestinians, including professionals, students, doctors, and intellectuals
are incarcerated indefinitely without charge or trial for opposing the
Israeli occupation.

Israel is keeping more than 11,000 Palestinian in jails, apparently as a
bargaining chip to blackmail the Palestinians into giving political and
territorial concessions to the Zionist state.

The detainees rounded up Wednesday night include minors and children such
as Muntaser Fakhri Ikhlayel, 15 and his cousin Adam Hasan Ikhalyel, 16.

According to municipal officials, a number of residents were wounded after
being beaten severely by soldiers, apparently for violating the curfew
imposed on the town. Medial sources named Fakhri Nasr Ikhlayel and his son
as among the people injured.

The elected mayor of the town, Farhan Alkam, has been languishing in jail,
without charge or trial, ostensibly for “holding religious ideas.”

Moreover, significant parts of the water and sewage disposal system were
damaged. In addition, a large number of personal computers, mobile phones
and personal documents were confiscated.

Residents said Israeli soldiers barricaded themselves inside private homes
after confining family members at gunpoint into a small room or a kitchen.

On Wednesday, an army bulldozer demolished a grocery store owned by Sabri
Zamel Abu Mariya in the center of the town. No reason was given for the
demolition.

An Israeli army spokesman refused to comment on the rampage in Beit Ummar,
saying the army doesn’t comment on military operations while still in
progress.

Israel has stepped up systematic persecution of Palestinians lately despite
continuing peace talks with the Palestinian Authority.

On Tuesday, the Western-backed Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayadh
complained that Israel was not giving his government any chance to succeed.

He said that provocative Israeli actions, including daily incursions and
raids in Palestinian population centers, were undermining the government’s
stature among ordinary Palestinians.

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