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First Israeli in Space
Sleepyman writes "CNN has a story about the first Israeli in space going on STS 107 Slated to takeoff today from NASA's Space Center in Florida this afternoon. Good luck to him and the rest of the crew of STS 107."
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I'm sure that will comfort the palestinians who are lucky to live day to day lives. No its not off topic because this isnt a story about nerdy things its a "go israel!" story.
Maybe now the Israelis can move to the moon and give the Palestinians their land back.
(Soviet & all) the first to send a domesticated animal into space?
For some reason, the scene from the end of Mel Brooks's film History of The World Part 1 just bounced into my head... :)
-MT.
By Justin Raimondo
... terrorists also ceased" when the "art students" were apprehended. But if the information had been shared then and there - in March, when the authorities first became aware of the Hollywood-centered South Florida operation - then what prevented the FBI from taking up where the Mossad had left off? Der Spiegel is vague about this:
Israel had foreknowledge of 9/11 - that was Carl Cameron's explosive contention, made last year in a blockbuster series of reports on Fox News exposing an Israeli spy ring in the U.S. New evidence confirms his story - and points to a rather ominous conclusion....
Reporting the round-up and deportation of scores of Israeli agents - masquerading as "art students" - Cameron noted last December that several were "active Israeli military" and the rest had skills that one normally associates with spies: electronic interception, explosives, and special operations. Several failed polygraph tests when asked if they were engaged in "surveillance activities against and in the United States." Aside from trying to penetrate U.S. government facilities, this network, which went into high gear in the months prior to 9/11, was also watching the Al Qaeda terrorists, according to Cameron:
"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 highly placed investigator said there are - quote - 'tie-ins.' But when asked for details, he flatly refused to describe them, saying, - quote - 'evidence linking these Israelis to 9-11 is classified. I cannot tell you about evidence that has been gathered. It's classified information.'"
This was denied up and down by the U.S. and Israeli governments, and the story was derided as an "urban myth," denounced as an "anti-Semitic" canard, and subsequently banished from the pages of the "mainstream" media. But evidence began to pile up: reports of hundreds of Israelis descending on U.S. government facilities, and a massive round-up of these operatives claiming to be "art students," began to leak out.
The story refused to die. A secret government report (originating with the Drug Enforcement Agency) detailing the highly suspicious activities of these aspiring Israeli "artists" was subsequently uncovered, and a series of stories appeared in the international media: Le Monde, the British media, and then leaping across the Atlantic. An excellent article in Salon, by Christopher Ketcham, and wire stories detailing the leaked contents of the DEA report raised awareness of a possible Israeli connection to the events surrounding 9/11.
I've been covering this since November of last year, when I noticed a story in the Washington Post reporting the detention of some 60 Israelis under the same legal rubric as the Arabs being held on suspicion of terrorist connections. These guys, said the Justice Department lawyers, were of "special interest" to the government; and, as their role in the events leading up to 9/11 begins to come into clearer focus, I can see why.....
A report in Die Zeit, a German newspaper, outlining the glitches and outright obstructionism that led to the greatest intelligence failure in our history reveals a stunning bit of information. The BBC reports:
"The paper has uncovered details of a major Israeli spy ring involving some a 120 agents for the intelligence service Mossad operating across America and some masquerading as arts students."
The Israeli "art student" story has come a long way since the days when it could be airily dismissed: the whitewashers have been forced back to their second line of defense, which is admitting that, yes, there was an Israeli spy ring in the U.S., but they had no foreknowledge of 9/11. That was the conclusion reached by a recent article in the Forward, as well as an ABC News report, "The White Van." But the latest revelation goes further:
"The ring was reportedly hard on the heels of at least four members of the hijack gang, including its leader Mohammed Atta."
The whitewashers, it seems, have retreated to their third line of defense, as iterated by the BBC:
"But the Israeli agents were detected by their American counterparts and thrown out of the country, it says. The US authorities said then that they were students whose visas had expired.
"Just a month before the deadly attacks, the paper said, Mossad handed over to the Americans a detailed report naming several suspects they believe were preparing an attack on the United States."
So the Mossad has an alibi, after all. Or maybe not. For, according to these same reports, including one in Der Spiegel:
"An entire troop of Israeli terror investigators disguised as students took to the tracks of Arabic terrorists and their cells in the USA between December 2000 and April 2001. During their undercover investigations, the Israelis came very close to the later perpetrators of September 11. In Hollywood, Florida they located both of the former Hamburg students and later terrorist pilots Mohammed Atta and Marwan al-Shehhi as potential terrorists. Agents settled down in immediate proximity of their apartment and observed the seemingly normal flight school students around the clock."
So they were living next door to the terrorists, including the leader of the 9/11 hijackers, watching their every move - but didn't tell us what they were up to until August, 2001.
The list turned over to the FBI by the Israelis apparently contained the names of at least four of the nineteen hijackers, but the warning was non-specific: only that these were potential terrorists. It stretches the bounds of credulity to believe that, after observing them up close for an extended period of time - and perhaps monitoring them in other ways - the Israelis knew no more than this.
The DEA report names South Florida, and specifically Hollywood, a small city near Ft. Lauderdale, as the nexus of the Israeli "art student" spy ring: "The Hollywood, Florida area seems to be a central point for these individuals with several having addresses in this area." The DEA investigators also noted that a whole platoon of these characters, including the leaders, were apprehended in the South Florida area from March to May, 2001. Prior to 9/11, the authorities had detained 140 of them nationwide: and they were still rounding them up, some 60 more, after the event.
So if the Israelis had decided, in August, to come clean with the information they had, then why were federal agents still arresting and detaining our "partners" in the "war on terrorism" in late November and early December? The DEA report also shows that the South Florida operation was active since at least January, perhaps earlier: plenty of time and opportunity to gather more than vague inferences as to the terrorists' intentions.
But the spin put on this by Die Zeit and Der Spiegel is that if only those stupid Americans had listened to their friends, the Mossad, 9/11 would never have happened. The latter avers that no sooner had the Mossad located Atta and his crew, then the ungrateful Americans acted in their typically pig-headed and even vindictive manner:
"Yet soon after, the agents were unmasked by US authorities and deported to Israel. As usual in such cases, the exposure was not made public and only led to disgruntlement between the traditionally competitive intelligence agencies Mossad and CIA. This case proves once again that even in concretely dangerous situations, the US agents were not obliged to cooperate, instead opting to antagonize each other."
This case proves nothing of the sort. What it does prove is 1) that those of us who identified the Israeli "art students" as part of a spy operation in the U.S. were absolutely correct, 2) that the Israelis were not only conducting covert operations against U.S. government facilities but were also watching the hijackers very closely, and 3) that some people will go to any lengths to avoid considering some very unpleasant and politically explosive possibilities.
It is possible that the Israelis were doing more than merely watching the hijackers. As Mohammed Atta and Marwan Alshehhi went back and forth between Huffman Aviation, a flight school in nearby Venice, and their Hollywood apartment, what were the Mossad agents next door doing - and why did they wait until August, after their operation had been discovered and busted up, to share this vital information?
But Der Spiegel knows better than to implicate the Israelis in anything untoward, and instead mournfully reports that "observation of the
"The Israelis' list with at least four of the 19 assassins from September 11 was apparently not handled by the CIA with the necessary urgency, nor was it forwarded to the FBI. Fact is that the US authorities did not efficiently follow up on the Israeli agents' leads. Information on the Israeli tips has also been made known in the USA during the [Senate intelligence committee 9/11 hearings], which [have] been ongoing for weeks."
While the FBI is scapegoated for its alleged inefficiency, the Israelis were not exactly forthcoming. On March 3, 2001, alerted to the Israeli "art student" invasion, the Orlando office of the DEA took one Peer Segalovitz into custody, and interrogated him for four hours. According to the DEA report:
"Segalovitz was untruthful about his reasoning to be in the United States for approximately the first 3 hours. Segalovitz finally admitted that he was one of approximately 30 Israeli art students who are currently in Florida. Segalovitz would not admit what their purpose was in Florida, but did state that they were not here for legitimate means."
A 27-year-old officer of the Israeli special military forces, attached to the 650th battalion stationed in the Golan Heights, Segalovitz gave his rank (Lieutenant) and serial number (5087989) and said that he "specialized in demolition." After recounting his familiarity with military operations, and stating "that the only thing he was not trained to operate was military aircraft," he "asked agents not to divulge this information to Israel because it would lead to his immediate arrest in Israel."
If it's true, as Der Spiegel avers, that the distinguished members of the Senate Committee investigating 9/11 are pinning the blame on our own intelligence agencies and exonerating the role of the Mossad, one can only wonder why they don't call Mr. Segalovitz as an expert witness?
And while they're at it, they might also call for the extradition from Israel of two people named on the FBI's terrorist suspect list: Dominik Suter and Ornit Levinson Suter, who fled when their Urban Moving Systems office and warehouse was raided by the police. Four employees of this New Jersey-based firm had been arrested on 9/11, hours after the attacks, when they were seen cheering as the World Trade Towers burned. They were held for months, and then deported. Even Barbara Walters' whitewash of this incident admitted that Urban Moving Systems was undoubtedly a Mossad front.
I deal with this subject at length in my forthcoming book, The Terror Enigma, to be published by Verso Books sometime next year. Suffice to say here that the Israeli role in the events leading up to 9/11 is, at best, highly suspicious. Certainly the news that their agents were close neighbors of Mohammed Atta and an accomplice leads to some disturbing juxtapositions.
Did the "art students" stand behind the terrorists in line at the local supermarket? Did they bump into each other in the street - and what, pray tell, did these dedicated Al Qaeda cadre think of a group of Israelis living in such close proximity?
In considering the mystery of how the Mossad and Al Qaeda came to be next door neighbors, I am reminded of this little exchange between Brit Hume and Carl Cameron at the end of their December 11 broadcast:
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 known?"
Inquiring minds want to know....
I'm not kidding, I'm living in Israel ;)
Wow, I am always shocked by the amount of anti-semitism on slashdot. I always thought the /. crowd was different. I was wrong.
What exactly is news in this ? The *nationality* of a astronaut ? Will we now have slashdot storeis about the first astronaut from all countries ?
/anything/ that is a) negative and b) involves israel, however indirectly, is a rabid anti-semite.
Apparently what he's doing or what the mission is for or anything of the sort is not interesting enough to be worth metioning, only the nationality is so sensational it deserves a story of its own.
Oh, and offcourse anything who says
This IS worthy Slashdot Science Section news, but NOT because of the "first person from country X in space" angle.
The important science news here is all about political use of the Space Shuttle, the security problems created thereby (how many lives and $millions would certain terrorists happily give to sabotage or shoot down this Shuttle?), etc.
(Yes, i know that the whole Shuttle program is at least as much about pork spreading as space science, and that's *very* old news.)
It's easy to make up & spread cool- and credible-sounding stuff. Finding & checking hard facts is hard work.
is how they are able drive a Cadillac into outer space! Gag... moan... argh
And it seems that Slashdot is crawling with these Palestinian terrorist scum. Luckily, Palestinians don't understand mathematics so, they will eventually be extinct.
Headlines:
Palestinian bomb kills 3 Israeli Shoppers - 20 Palestinians dead.
Palestinian blows up bus - Israel levels refugee camp 50 Palestinians dead.
Palestinian boy throws stones at tank - Palestinian boy killed.
Israel sucks. I wish I had a super-power to protect me from the real world as well.
Every day the israeli's try and put Palestinians in orbit. What's the big deal ?
And now, for your enjoyment, the first /. posting by a cat:
(missed were the multiple function keys that were also stepped on.)Ilan Ramon, the Israeli astronaut, was one of the F-16 pilots who had bombarded and destroyed the Iraqi nuclear reactor back in 1981. If not for him (or rather, if not for the Israeli Air Force), ten years later (in 1991) the USA would have had to face an Iraq that owns nuclear weapons. Not a nice prospect.
or we might have ourselves a Gaza-Trek strip in space ;).
'A lie if repeated often enough, becomes the truth.' - Goebbels
Remeber the end of history of the world? "We're Jews in space, zooming around protecting the hebrew race!" I wish I could find a screen grab of that.
Could it be Anti-Semitism?
When you think about it, Israel is one of the smallest countries in the world. Even if the Israeli and Palestinian populations fought to the death it wouldn't make a dent in the world popultion. Despite all the tragedies, the number killed on both sides combined account for only a tiny fraction of the violent deaths in the world. Israel has no natural resources which Europeans covet. If Europeans were truly concerned about doing good in the world, there are many jucier projects both among the neighboring MidEast dictators and in just about every other corner of the world.
To many distant observors, the pathological fixation of Europeans on Israel while at the same time selling their soles to the most evil dictators in the world smacks of a delusional illness. That illness bears an uncanny resemblance to the thousand year fixation of Europeans on opressing their small and weak internal minorities. In the scientific and medical world, when 2 species or maladies exhibit many similarities, Occum's razor calls for classifying them as similar. So, to many European knee-jerk anti-Israel sentiment is near indistinguishable from knee-jerk anti-Semitism. Wh
What else could explain the boycott of Israeli academics even though the academic segment in Israel is about as left wing and pro-Palestinian as any segment?
Of course, since much of Europe contributed collectively to the near extermination of European Jewry, it is only natural that they now need to turn to Israel to find new sources of Jew hatred.
If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck.
and the rest of the arab world:
"First Israeli in Space...
6.592 million to go."
If they're muslum, how do they know which way is East to pray to?
A woman born in India is in the same space shuttle
In case you didn't know - In addition to the Israeli guy, the space shuttle also has a woman who was born in India and now works for NASA like many other people born in India. Her name is Kalpana Chawla and she has been in space before.
Here is her bio on NASA's website
In November, 1996, Kalpana Chawla was assigned as mission specialist and prime robotic arm operator on STS-87 (November 19 to December 5, 1997). In completing her first mission, Kalpana Chawla traveled 6.5 million miles in 252 orbits of the Earth and logged 376 hours and 34 minutes in space. This is her second mission.
Very surprising that the media is covering the story of Israeli guy while they completely ignored her(or not surprising at all, considering that media has been completely oblivious to contribution of Indians in American society which results in ignorant public opinion)!
A woman born in India is in the same space shuttle
In case you didn't know - In addition to the Israeli guy, the space shuttle also has a woman who was born in India and now works for NASA like many other people born in India. Her name is Kalpana Chawla and she has been in space before.
Here is her bio on NASA's website
In November, 1996, Kalpana Chawla was assigned as mission specialist and prime robotic arm operator on STS-87 (November 19 to December 5, 1997). In completing her first mission, Kalpana Chawla traveled 6.5 million miles in 252 orbits of the Earth and logged 376 hours and 34 minutes in space. This is her second mission.
Very surprising that the media is covering the story of Israeli guy while they completely ignored her(or not surprising at all, considering that media has been completely oblivious to contribution of Indians in American society which results in ignorant public opinion)!
The media takes sides, don't forget
I wish more people on slashdot would understand that.
I've lived all over the world, and it's amazing how different the media handles things. Here in the US, it's Palestinians bombing busses. In Europe, it's Israelis shooting houses.
I wouldn't put it that simply. In Europe, the view you get depends on what you read or watch. The media on the left (labour/social democratic) side of the political axis is more pro-palestinian. On the right (conservative) side the opinions seem to be more pro-israel. (The right/left-wing loudmouths seem to be anti-Israel, but no-one listens them anyway).
If you really want an anti-Israel view, you could check for example IRNA (IRanian News Agency).
Is it inherited?
Is it CONTAGIOUS!
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Why bother with praying? It doesn't do anything
I can't wait for the first Scotsperson to reach earth orbit, amid a fanfare of bagpipes, accordions and fiddles. The tartan of the Black Watch will be worn with pride by said astronaut as she circles the earth at 250 miles up, bag of liquidised haggis in hand being consumed through a straw. As the shuttle passes Edinburgh the Capitol's inhabitants and Scots from all over the world will raise their glasses of Glenmorangie in a toast to celebrate this gloroius achievement. A gigantic Saltire will be floated on Loch Lomond, visible from space. Burns will be quoted. Jimmy Shand will be exhumed and Ricky Fulton will provide the comedy. Oh wait, that's Hogmanay...
Stick Men
In the continuation of the NASA program of "Racists In Space" the next astronaut will be a KKK member. NASA policy is that he must be a KKK member in good standing. That means that he must have murdered a minority. A NASA spokesman said that we must be certain of the caliber of the people that we send into space. NASA is also accepting applications from Ayrian Nation members and skin heads.