News Resources – Israel and the Mideast:
Israeli Military Intelligence: Israel is Not in the Crosshairs of Al-Qaeda
Ben Caspit
Maariv-Hebrew, 22Jul05
Israeli military intelligence has recently submitted an operational plan to decision-makers, according to which it will upgrade its capability to collect data on al-Qaeda and the global Jihad. It is the Israeli assessment that it will be possible in three years to reach a capability of thwarting 70% of attacks and to assist many countries around the world, especially in Europe. Israel remains a very low priority for the global Jihad. At the political echelon in Israel there is harsh criticism against senior British officials who blame the waves of attacks in London on the Middle East conflict. A senior source stated: “The U.S. found the strategic map of al-Qaeda in Afghanistan which shows the whole Christian world painted in Islamic green. Their war is with Christianity. Israel is not even on this map.”
I came across this on The Daily Alert which appears to be a popular aggregator for all news related to Israel. I figured Ma’ariv must be Israel’s equivalent of The National Enquirer based upon this reference, its layout, and soft porn content, so I must admit a fair amount of surprise that it’s a respected daily “considered to express the opinion and feeling of the Jewish general public in Israel, and quoted much by the foreign press because of the emotional headlines it uses for news events”. The tabloid has fans across the globe as well, described here as “more centrist (and somewhat more sensationalist) than either Ha’aretz or The JP, and featrues a genuinely wide range of opinions” but I’m not sure Harry was referring to then newly launched nrg website (get it? en-er-gy) available in Hebrew only (which is a true reflection of how it’s circulated in Israel), or the “dry as a bone, all-politics-all-the-time Ma’ariv Online in English”.
“Ma’ariv is an independent newspaper with no particular political line, preferring to remain open to all views.”
Scratching the surface of its shiny veneer reveals otherwise.
Ma’ariv, one of Israel’s most widely read Hebrew-language daily newspapers, published its first edition on February 15, 1948. Ma’ariv is produced by Ma’ariv Modiin Publishing House Ltd., a subsidiary of Ma’ariv Holdings Ltd. Headquartered in Tel Aviv, Ma’ariv Modiin Publishing House has news bureaus in Jerusalem, Haifa and Beersheva and overseas bureaus in Washington, New York, London and Paris.
Ma’ariv Holdings Ltd. was acquired by the Israel Land & Development Company (ILDC) in 1992. According to its website, ILDC is “a piece of Israel’s history. Founded in 1909, the Company goes back almost forty years before the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948. During its initial years, the main business of ILDC was to acquire and distribute land for urban and agricultural Zionist settlement. In this capacity, ILDC apportioned over 125,000 acres prior to the founding of the State. Anyone who examines or studies the historical development of the country, cannot overlook the importance of ILDC during those early years.”
In 1988, Nimrodi Land Development Company Ltd. purchased voting control of ILDC.
Ma’ariv publisher Ofer Nimrodi’s father, Yaakov Nimrodi:
Israeli ‘Consultants’ Should Be More Careful
BY Dan Raviv AND Yossi Melman
09/03/89
WASHINGTON POST (WP), PAGE 01
A third phase began after the 1973 war. Having been caught by surprise by Egypt and Syria, the Israelis vowed to be better armed and more prepared in every sense. An export drive would support an enlarged defense industry. More middlemen were employed, and they were told they could be more aggressive in knocking on foreign doors and opening them for Sibat and the growing military-industrial complex. Within 15 years, Israel’s arms exports grew to almost $1.5 billion a year.
These were the golden years for Yaakov Nimrodi, a veteran Mossad operative in Iran who returned there to sell arms and other Israeli products in what turned out to be the final years of the shah’s rule. After the Islamic revolution in 1979, there were small and sporadic sales of military equipment to Iran, but Israel was anxious to find another big buyer for its products.
October Surprise News Coverage
(House of Representatives – February 05, 1992)
ISRAEL AND ARMS
Israeli ambassador Moshe Arens later told The Boston Globe that Iranian arms sales had been discussed and approved at `almost the highest levels’ of U.S. Government in spring 1981. In fact, Reagan’s Senior Interdepartmental Group agreed in July 1981 that the U.S. should tacitly encourage third-party arms sales to Iran as a way of `advancing U.S. interests in the Middle East.’ The initiative was such a significant reversal of U.S. policy that it’s unlikely that Haig would have given his consent without the President’s knowledge and approval. Haig refuses to comment.
In November 1986, the Administration finally allowed that the Israelis had delivered U.S. military supplies to Iran in the early Eighties. The State Department downplayed the sales, claiming that the amount of arms Iran received was trivial, that only $10,000,000 or $15,000,000 worth of nonlethal aid had reached Iran. That figure was hotly disputed. The New York Times estimated that before 1983, Iran received 2.8 billion dollars in supplies from nine countries, including the U.S. A West German newspaper placed the figure closer to $500,000,000. Bani-Sadr said that his administration alone received $50,000,000 worth of parts. Houshang Lavi believes Khomeini got at least $500,000,000 in military supplies.
Lavi is in a position to know. In 1981, he and Israeli arms dealer Yacobi Nimrodi reportedly sold HAWK missiles and guidance systems to Iran. In April and October 1981, Western Dynamics International, a Long Island company run by Lavi’s brothers, contracted to sell the Iranian air force $16,000,000 worth of bomb fuses and F-14 parts. Admiral Bobby Ray Inman, William Casey’s Deputy Director of Central Intelligence, said that the CIA knew in 1981 that Israel and private arms dealers were making sizable deliveries to Iran. The Reagan White House raised no objections.
Eighteen months after Reagan took office, Iran had received virtually all the spare parts and weapons that Carter had refused to include in his hostage accord.
Thursday, December 2, 1999
Secret Irangate paper found in home of Nimrodi worker
By Nicole Krau and Zvi Harel
Ha’aretz
The private investigator suspected of being a potential hit man for Ma’ariv publisher Ofer Nimrodi was yesterday ordered remanded in custody for five more days on suspicion of “being in possession of secret information without authorization.” A police search of Oded Ben Dov’s home about ten days ago turned up a document which reportedly contains material related to the so-called “Irangate” affair of the mid-1980’s. The typewritten document of a few dozen pages, in Hebrew, was examined by various bodies, who determined that only authorized security personnel were permitted to have access to it.
It is now possible that Ofer Nimrodi’s father, Ya’akov Nimrodi, a former military attache in Iran during the period of the Shah and an arms dealer, may be summoned for questioning by the police.
Hitman?
Friday December 3, 1999
Israeli newspaper exec arrested on suspicion of hiring a hit man
MARGOT DUDKEVITCH
Jerusalem Post Service
JERUSALEM — Ofer Nimrodi, publisher of the Israeli daily Ma’ariv, was arrested last week on suspicion of hiring a hit man to murder three people.
He is suspected of being involved in a conspiracy to murder Ha’aretz publisher Amos Schocken, Yediot Achronot publisher Arnon Mozes and Ya’acov Tsur, the state’s witness against Nimrodi in a *1995 wiretapping affair.
Ma’ariv, Ha’aretz and Yediot Achronot are Israel’s largest daily Hebrew newspapers.
Nimrodi is also suspected of offering bribes to people involved in the wiretapping affair, for which Tsur is serving a prison term. *(Nimrodi served 4 months of an 8 month sentence.)
Sources close to the investigation said police have compiled strong evidence regarding plans to kill Tsur, but believe that information relating to Schocken and Mozes is based on hearsay.
Strange way to treat a business partner:
Ha’aretz moves in on Ma’ariv.
(Israel Land Development sells half of Modi’in Ma’ariv to Ha’aretz, newspaper, publisher Amos Shocken and Jack Lieberman)
Israel Business Today
March 06, 1992
The signature on the check paid by Israel Land Development for the ownership of the Modi’in Ma’ariv publishing house was hardly dry (see IBT No. 266) when new partners were added. Israel Land Development has sold one half of its shareholding, in equal parts to Amos Shocken, publisher of Ha’aretz newspaper and Jack Lieberman, Australian businessman and owner of a 50 percent shareholding in Paz Oil. The new partners are said to have each paid $3.65 million for a 21.5 percent shareholding. Israel Land Development will remain with a holding of some 43 percent. The remaining shares are held as follows: the Hefetz family, 8 percent; Dov Yudovsky the current editor, 5 percent and a group of employees, 1 percent.
What of Nimrodi’s other partners?
Last update – 02:42 26/12/2003
Moneygrabbers
By Hannah Kim
Sweet meats
One Friday during the past two months, a group of friends met with Ariel Sharon at his home in Sycamore Ranch in the northern Negev. It was a morning visit, and as always everyone present had barbecued meat, with a towel draped over their shoulder to wipe off greasy fingers.
Moshe Cohen, from Ramat Hasharon, who leased land at Sycamore Ranch for farming purposes, sat next to Sharon. Gilad Sharon, the prime minister’s son, took a pile of meat and placed it on the grill. Suddenly a Porsche jeep arrived, out of which stepped the lawyer of the millionaire Vladimir Gusinsky, one of the owners of the newspaper Ma’ariv. Everyone urged “Zvika” to have a seat at the table. This was in the period when no one, not even those close to Sharon, imagined that Zvi Hefetz would soon be appointed to the high post of Israel’s ambassador to London.
Huge Money Laundering Operation Discovered at Tel Aviv Bank Branch
by Mordecai Plaut and Yated Ne’eman Staff
March 9, 2005
Twenty-four employees, past and present, of Bank Hapoalim’s Hayarkon Street branch in Tel Aviv (535) were arrested Sunday in what officials called the biggest money-laundering case in the history of Israel, thought to involve as much as billions of dollars in the past year alone.
The branch’s former manager, Motti Cohen, was among those suspected of involvement in the massive schemes. Customers involved included some of the billionaire “oligarchs” from Russia who have business interests in Israel.
Police froze 180 suspected accounts held by 18 customers at the branch with some $375 million. Money came from outside the country into those accounts and then was quickly sent on out of the country. Many customers of the branch — about 200, mostly business people — are expected to be questioned. The branch, which only handles foreign customers, had effectively become a money-laundering station for hundreds of businesses worldwide, said police.
Ma’ariv owner Vladimir Gusinski, a customer at the branch, is likely to be questioned. His Tel Aviv offices were also raided. Israeli ambassador to London Zvi Hefetz was once Gusinski’s representative in Israel and the press speculated that he may also be under suspicion. Hefetz has strongly denied any connection to the affair, and sources close to Hefetz said that no one has questioned him or asked to question him about the affair.
Vladimir Gusinski:
Gusinksy is being investigated by Israeli officials for his part in a massive money-laundering operation. Wall Street Journal pA18 3/8/2005 Gusinsky reportedly owns 27 per cent of Maariv (or Ma’ariv) Holdings, a big Israeli newspaper publisher. Investigation has centered on Israel’s biggest bank Bank Hapoalim and on Bank Hapoalim Trust Co. Arnon Perlman, former spokesman for Prime Minister Arial Sharon, is vice chairman of the Maariv Holdings. The New York Times quotes Jonathoan Nitzan, associate professor at York University : “Many politicians there [Israel] are financed by organized crime, and Israeli politics has been penetrated very deeply by Russian money.” Israel, Greece and Spain have refused to extradite Gusinksey to Russia.
Centrist? Apolitical? Bosh.
*my links