Still think Israeli airport security is 'too expensive'?
I have written many, many posts over the years calling on the United States to implement Israeli style airport security. The excuse I keep hearing is it's 'too expensive.'
On Sunday at Chicago-OHare - an airport I fly through from time to time - 'dozens' of people missed their flights and ended up spending the night at the airport on army cots due to security lines that were three hours long.
What does that cost you, America?
Let's go to the videotape.
For the record, in Israel, from arrival at the airport to the end of passport control, I am through the airport in 30-45 minutes (okay, I have the equivalent of a trusted traveler card in Israel, so I don't wait in line for passport control).
Confirmed: Suspicious package on Air France flight was a (fake) bomb
A suspicious package on an Air France flight from Port Louis, Mauritius to Paris that forced the plane to land in Nairobi has been confirmed to be a bomb.
BREAKING: Suspicious package found between Air France luggage headed from Kenya to Paris confirmed as a bomb. #AF463pic.twitter.com/k6WTEb3SWS
Where's the outrage over US spying? CIA agents instructed how to avoid secondary screening at Ben Gurion
Wikileaks has released a CIA document entitled "CIA Assessment on Surviving Secondary Screening at Airports While Maintaining Cover." The document, which is dated September 2011, has instructions for CIA agents traveling on false identities on how to avoid secondary screenings at Israel's Ben Gurion Airport.
"Secondary screening – a potentially lengthy and detailed look by
airport officials at passengers not passing initial scrutiny – can
significantly stress the identities of operational travelers," reads the
introduction. "Referral to secondary screening can occur if
irregularities or questions arise during any stage of airport processing
– immigration, customs, or security – and regardless of whether the
traveler is arriving, in transit, or departing. Officials may also
randomly select travelers."
...
The document details the reasons that could lead to security agents at
Ben-Gurion to refer a traveler to secondary screening. "A review of
clandestine reporting reveals examples of what various countries
consider to be suspicious," it is written.
"Israel’s security personnel focus on frequent travel to Islamic
countries," the document explains. "Security personnel at Ben Gurion
Airport in Tel Aviv, Israel, commonly refer military-aged males
traveling alone with backpacks to secondary screening, regardless of
their nationality or skin color."
The document includes a detailed description of secondary checks at Ben-Gurion.
"At Ben Gurion airport in Israel, the secondary screening room contains
trace-detection equipment for explosive residue; tools for dismantling
passengers’ personal items for inspection, particularly items unfamiliar
to security officers; and a disrobing area, divided by privacy
curtains, to conduct strip searches of individuals, if necessary,"
according to the document.
The CIA's internal guide book also refers to an internal manual from
2004 published by International Consultants on Targeted Security, an
Israeli-founded company, which provides security advice to various
governments on matters such as profiling techniques. The manual
reportedly "lists suspicious signs in passenger behavior, documentation,
tickets, or baggage." The document adds, "Although dated, the ICTS
guidelines probably are typical and remain valid."
Now imagine what would happen if a Mossad manual were released that showed how to avoid being stopped at TSA checks in the US.... I know - it would be laughable.... But you can bet the Americans would be outraged.
This line is particularly telling:
"With the exception of Israel’s Ben Gurion airport and a few others,
immigration inspectors conducting primary screenings generally lack the
time and tools to conduct in-depth examination of travelers’ bona
fides," according to the document released by WikiLeaks.
Sounds to this frequent traveler like a great argument for implementing Israeli-style security everywhere....
If you're flying to the US from abroad, make sure your cell phone and laptop are charged
TSA, the people who made... let's skip that joke... will be inspecting laptops and cell phones on flights to the United States from selected, unnamed airports in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. If the laptops and cell phones aren't charged, you won't be able to bring them on the plane.
It is part of the agency's efforts to bolster airport security amid
suggestions of a plot by Islamic extremists to blow up an airliner.
The TSA said that passengers at certain international airports may be
asked during security screening to turn on their electronic devices,
such as mobile phones, tablet or laptop computers.
If they do not have power the devices will not be allowed on planes, said the agency.
The TSA will not specify which airports will be subject to the extra screening.
"As the traveling public knows," the TSA's written statement said, "all electronic devices are screened by security officers.
"During the security examination, officers may also ask that owners power up some devices, including cell phones.
"Powerless devices will not be permitted onboard the aircraft. The traveler may also undergo additional screening."
US security officials said last week they fear bomb-makers from the
Yemen-based al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) have worked out how
to turn phones into explosive devices which can avoid detection.
Why does this remind me of the water bottle thing? As long as the TSA continues to look for yesterday's terrorists, rather than implement real security measures (i.e. psychological profiling), the American traveling public and visitors from abroad will not be safe.
Way back in 2006, I wrote a critique of North American airline security in which I argued that it is looking for yesterday's terrorists and that the only way to do airline security is the Israeli way. I have written manysimilarpostssince, and have gotten numerous comments claiming that it cannot be done.
Now, there will be no choice. ISIS - the new terror group that's taking over Iraq - claims to have developed non-metallic bombs and is sending them to the United States with Syrians carrying US passports.
In case you couldn’t bring yourself to watch this indisputable
display of abuse — this disgusting mistreatment of a little girl and her
family about which her mother and father comment“look
at her all dressing like a potential terrorist/drug trafficker; people
who roll in on hot pink wheelchairs, wearing a gingerbread coat and
clutching a stuffed baby lamb, are just begging to be harassed” —
let me itemize the violations and absurdities at hand (perhaps you can
identify more; as a mother myself, I’m too upset by what I just watched
to further research the laws, statutory and logical):
First, there is the obvious Fourth Amendment violation against
unwarranted search and seizure. I don’t care what kind of pretzel logic
the TSA twists itself into parroting in order to justify groping a
three-year-old in a wheelchair who’s on her way to Disney World: it’s a
violation of her Constitutional rights. Period. Full stop.
And this should not stand. Not in the country that calls itself the
United States of America. Citizens and residents who accept otherwise
should not only be ashamed of themselves, but should, in my opinion, be
constantly, and in strenuous terms, be made aware that they’re engaging
in a kind of treason against the very freedoms the nation’s founders
established (and countless fought for and died to protect), and thus, by
extension, debasing the idea of America itself.
Second, travelers are indeed permitted to photograph and/or videotape the so-called “screening procedure”
(more accurately, security theatre), including aggressive pat-downs
that would be defined as sexual assault in any other context and nude
photography of their bodies. The only subject matter exempt from
passengers’ freedom-to-document are the screening machines themselves.
As shown in the above video, these TSA screeners try to claim otherwise
and keep harping on their imagined rule that the passengers can’t record
the incident, even as the parents ask them to cite the actual law
pertaining thereto.
Third, the tactics here are insensitive and unkind on their face, as
well as pointless. Not only is this little girl so obviously terrified
to the point of crying out loud, and desperately upset that her comfort
toy — her stuffed animal — is being taken away, she is distraught that
her parents’ attempts to protect her are being summarily ignored.
Imagine how frightening that must be. If indeed the child “alarmed,” the
screeners could have resolved the matter by allowing one of the cleared
parents to carry her through the metal detector in their arms while
they checked her wheelchair for hidden bombs, machetes, or
fusilage-piercing grenade launchers.
When will the United States of America stop being so darned politically correct and recognize that there are better ways to detect 18-35 year old Muslim terrorists than searching 3-year olds in wheelchairs?
Forty years ago today, three Japanese terrorists boarded an Air France flight from Paris to Tel Aviv via Rome. Upon arrival in Israel, they passed through security, customs and police without being detected as suspicious or threatening (they did not belong to a high risk ethnic or racial population). At the baggage claim area, they opened their luggage, pulled out automatic weapons and hand grenades from what looked like violin cases, and opened fire on everyone in sight. Twenty-six people were murdered and 80 were wounded in what was later referred to as the Lod Airport Massacre.
On that day, 40 years ago, three inconspicuous Japanese men dressed in business suits disembarked Air France Flight 132 from Rome and strolled into the baggage claim area. After retrieving what appeared to be violin cases, the men pulled out machine guns, opened fire and threw grenades indiscriminately at the crowds of people. One of the three, Tsuyoshi Okudaira, ran out onto the tarmac and began shooting at passengers descending the stairs from an El Al plane before taking his own life.
The gunmen killed 26 people: 17 Christian pilgrims from Puerto Rico, one Canadian citizen, and eight Israelis, and 80 people were injured. Among the Israelis killed was renowned scientist Aharon Katzir, whose brother, Ephraim Katzier became president a few years later. Gunman Yasuyuki Yasuda was also shot dead during the attack - it is unclear whether by his own weapon or that of his partners or security forces. The lone surviving gunman, Kozo Okomato, was injured, arrested by security forces and given a life sentence. He was later freed in the 1985 prisoner swap known as the Gibril Deal between Israel and the Palestinians.
In a document cited by Puerto Rican online newspaper Primera Hora, Pablo Tirado related that his father, who was injured in the attack, “came out of the baggage claim area and walked to the bathroom,” while Camelo Calderon Molina, who was killed in the massacre, “was waiting in the baggage claim area with others standing nearby.” He said the terrorists ran through the airport shooting and throwing grenades until they ran out of ammunition.
Molina’s daughter Ruth Calderon Cordona cried as she gave her testimony, 37 years after losing her father: “He always told us he didn’t want to die until he saw the land where Jesus walked - but he never saw it, because he died in the airport,” Primera Hora quoted her as saying.
...
The Lod Airport Massacre shocked Israel into making serious changes in its airport security system and there have not been any successful terrorist attacks within the airport grounds since. The meticulous security measures serve as a constant reminder to the Israeli public of past tragedies, while half way across the world, the Puerto Ricans commemorate yearly the victims they lost at the hands of international terrorism.
You will recall that three weeks earlier, terrorists took over a Sabena flight from Brussels to Tel Aviv via Vienna, and the passengers on that flight were rescued by the IDF.
I have mentioned before that I flew that same Sabena flight to Israel in late June of 1972 to come spend the summer in Israel on a tour. In retrospect, I am amazed that my parents let me go.
Scenes like the one in this picture may soon be a thing of the past for American airline travelers - or at least for frequent fliers of American and Delta. The Transportation Safety Administration is finally adopting a system that will allow certain pre-screened travelers to pass through without removing their shoes and belts, and with shampoo in their bags (Hat Tip: NY Nana).
The federal government announced today that it will expand an expedited check-in program called Pre-Check, now used by 310,000 travelers at seven major airports, to 28 more sites, including JFK, O'Hare and D.C.'s Reagan National, by the end of 2012.
Passengers who enroll in Pre-Check, run by the Transportation Security Administration, do not have to remove shoes or belts, can keep their computers in their bags, may keep three-ounce containers of gel or shampoo in their carry-on luggage, and may wear a light jacket. Pre-Check will be operating at Reagan National by the end of March, said Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, who called the expansion of the program "part of a fundamental shift in how we approach aviation security."
...
Pre-Check prescreens passengers before they arrive at the security checkpoint. Members of the program will be identified via the bar code on their boarding passes. They will be steered to a dedicated line -- a sort of E-ZPass lane for fliers -- for quicker passage through security.
The Pre-Check program is already being used by American Airlines frequent flyers at the Dallas, Miami, Las Vegas, Minneapolis and Los Angeles airports, and by Delta passengers in Atlanta, Detroit, Las Vegas and Minneapolis.
The 28 additional airports expected to be part of the Pre-Check program by 2012 include all three D.C. area airports, all three New York City airports, O'Hare, Boston Logan, Seattle-Tacoma, Phoenix, San Francisco, New Orleans, San Juan, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Portland (PDX), Tampa, Salt Lake City, Honolulu, San Juan, Anchorage, Orlando, St. Louis, Houston (IAH), Indianapolis, Charlotte, Cincinnati, Denver, Ft. Lauderdale and St. Louis.
I followed the links and the only requirements seem to be that you be a US citizen and that you belong to American's or Delta's frequent flier program or to one of the Trusted Traveler programs run by the Customs and Border Patrol. I logged into my account and it did not have an enrollment tab as is supposed to happen if you meet the enrollment criteria. I added my (US) passport and country of residence information to my profile, and I will let you know if I get in. I may have to contact American's customer service to push this ahead....
Just when you thought things could not get any worse for American travelers....
Rebecca Hains told ABCNews.com today that a Transportation Security Administration agent at Las Vegas- McCarran International Airport seized her cupcake, saying the frosting sitting atop the red velvet cake was gel-like enough to violate regulations.
The incident took place Wednesday.
Hains, a teacher, said the cupcake was a gift from one of her students. She was traveling with her husband and toddler, and thought her young son might get hungry on the long trip home.
The cupcake was packaged in a glass container with a metal lid, which was why it attracted the attention of the scanner in the first place.
The TSA agent didn’t know what to do with the cupcake, so she called over her supervisor, Hains said.
“The TSA supervisor, Robert Epps, was using really bad logic – he said it counted as a gel-like substance because it was conforming to the shape of its container.”
“We also had a small pile of hummus sandwiches with creamy fillings, which made it through, but the cupcake with its frosting was apparently a terrorist threat…I just don’t know what world he was living in,” said Hains, speaking of the TSA officer.
Morons. It's long past time for the US (and other countries) to implement Israeli airport security. Of course, if that happened, TSA would have to fire much of the current staff and hire people who pass intelligence tests instead. That won't happen while Obama is in office.
I haven't been inside since early June but it seems that Ben Gurion Airport - you know, the one with the security that they can't have in the US because their airports are busier - has become quite a busy airport this summer.
Some 1.365 million passengers passed through Israel's international airport in July, including arrivals and departures, tourists and Israelis – a 15% rise compared to the same month last year.
According to the IAA figures, the summer of 2011 is expected to be the busiest summer of all times at Ben-Gurion Airport, with 2.83 million passengers.
The busiest day so far was Thursday, July 28, with 61,091 passengers on 373 flights.
According to Israel Airports Authority figures, the leading destinations this summer for both Israeli and foreign passengers are Greece, the United States, Germany, France, Italy and Russia.
Note who's not on the list: England (somewhat surprising) and Turkey (not surprising at all).
But let's put those statistics in some perspective. At Boston Logan (an airport I usually fly into and out of a couple of times a year), there were 894,893 passengers in January 2011 (last month available) and 1,283,848 in July 2010. Maybe that's why they're finally experimenting with Israeli-style security.
Will the Transport Safety Administration in the US drop grope or strip in favor of using Israeli profiling methods? Well, maybe.
TSA already has "behavior detection officers" at 161 airports nationwide looking for travelers exhibiting physiological or psychological signs that a traveler might be a terrorist. However, Pistole said TSA is preparing to move to an approach that employs more conversation with travelers—a method that has been employed with great success in Israel.
"I'm very much interested in expanding the behavior detection program, upgrading it if you will, in a way that allows us to….have more interaction with a passsenger just from a discussion which may be able to expedite the physical screening aspects," Pistole said during an appearance at the Aspen Security Forum in Colorado. "So, we’ve looked at what works around the world, some outstanding examples and we are planning to do some new things in the near future here."
Pistole declined to elaborate on the enhanced behavior detection program but said it would "probably" be announced in August. During an on-stage interview with CNN's Jeanne Meserve, Pistole acknowledged that the Israeli techniques have been carefully examined.
"There's a lot—under that Israeli model—a lot that is done that is obviously very effective," he said. However, critics have said the Israeli program is too time consuming to use consistently at U.S. airports and may involve a degree of religious and racial profiling that would draw controversy in the U.S.
Israeli scientists have created a detector, similar looking to a full-body scanner but with three concealed cartridges each containing eight specially trained mice.
According to the New Scientist the mice work four-hour shifts and are more accurate than using dogs and x-ray machines, the researchers claim.
Air is pumped into the cartridges every four hours so the mice can breathe.
When the mice sense traces of drugs they run to a side chamber where the trigger an alarm, the magazine said.
Eran Lumbroso, and inventor whose company BioExplorers is hopeful a larger company will help with the final stages of development, said: "It is as if they are smelling a cat and escaping. We detect the escape."
The device was tested last year on 1,000 shoppers in a Tel Aviv shopping mall when the mice successfully picked out 22 people carrying mock explosives.
Israel's Supreme Court issues show cause order on profiling
And you thought we finished with this nonsense four years ago. The Israeli Supreme Court has issued a show cause order to the government, asking it to explain why it cannot conduct airport security without assuming that 'Israeli Arabs' are a security risk. (Duh - because they are one?).
Following a hearing on a discrimination suit last week, the Supreme Court issued a show-cause order demanding that the Airport Authority explain why it cannot run security checks based on equal, uniform and practical criteria, instead of the current situation, in which Israeli Arab citizens are automaticly labelled a security risk.
Ahead of the Airport Authority's formal response, a security figure told Arutz Sheva's Hebrew service Monday morning that he was "sorry to hear that Supreme Court judges sit in their air-conditioned rooms and do not understand the dangers posed by the debate." Referring to the September 11, 2001 attacks by Arab extremists on the United States, the source continued, "The Twin Towers tragedy took place, the danger has not disappeared and peace has not come. The court is endangering the security of the citizens of Israel."
The petition, which was submitted in May 2007 by the Association for Civil Rights in Israel (ACRI) against the Israel Airports Authority, the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) and the Transportation Ministry, says that Arab Israelis receive more thorough security inspections than Jewish ones before they board a flight at Israeli airports and when flying to Israel on Israeli airlines.
The petition said that this was the result of racial profiling practiced by the security authorities that designates Arabs as more dangerous, even if there is no indication that the individual Arab passenger poses a risk.
ACRI stated that the longer and more thorough security checks that the Arab passengers undergo create and encourage stigmas and negative attitudes towards Arabs and humiliate the Arabs whenever they fly.
The petitioners claimed that the practice was a violation of the Basic Law:Human Dignity and Freedom and laws ensuring free movement, protection from discrimination and protection of privacy.
The petition outlined numerous examples of cases where Arabs were forced to undergo rigorous questioning and luggage inspections, as well as instances where Arabs were barred from boarding their flights. It also told of instances when Arabs where singled out of the group they were traveling with and forced to undergo additional inspections.
The petition stressed that racial profiling took place on a daily basis and that Arabs were constantly under suspicion for no other reason than that they were Arabs.
...
In its response to the petition, which the state submitted in 2008, it wrote that based on security requirements, which are determined by the Shin Bet, every passenger, without exception, undergoes some form of security inspection before boarding an aircraft.
“However, the level of inspection passengers undergo is derived from a variety of details and characteristics, according to their potential risk evaluation,” the state said.
This evaluation, according to the state, “is based upon experience and risk assessment, which considers various details and characteristics that experience indicates have probable correlation to involvement in terrorist activities.”
The state’s attorneys stressed that the precise nature of the regulations and the reasoning that supports them is highly classified and volunteered to inform the court of them behind closed doors.
The lawyers added that the Israel Airports Authority had taken steps to reduce the friction between the passengers and the security inspectors, including the installation of new technological methods of inspection that are less intrusive, and have written a code of ethics and trained their employees to be more sensitive and polite in their treatment of passengers.
They also promised that additional changes that would improve the situation would be introduced in the future, citing an investment of more than NIS 300 million.
If the court makes the Airports Authority change its security procedures and God forbid there is a terror attack, the judges ought to be held personally liable. That would make them think twice about doing anything.
Channel 7 news in New York reports that TSA employees have been stealing. No, not from your checked bags, at least according to this report. Rather, they are stealing things from people going through the checkpoints who remove jewelry, watches, laptop computers and other valuable items in order to go through the checkpoints.
Let's go to the videotape.
I don't think I've traveled out of LaGuardia since I moved to Israel, but I do occasionally travel out of Kennedy (most recently last November). Still this is very disconcerting and may be happening in other airports as well.
But Israeli style security won't fly in the US says Janet Incompetanto. Aren't you glad?
Janet Incompetanto: 'Profiling won't fly in the US'
In Israel on a visit that included a behind-the-scenes tour of Ben Gurion Airport, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano rejected the idea of adopting an Israeli style 'profiling' system for airport security.
Speaking between a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and a tour of Ben-Gurion Airport, Napolitano said "a quarter to a third" of her visit was focusing on aviation, and the rest on other security concerns.
She said the allies "share a common goal" but was circumspect on whether Ben-Gurion's methods for vetting outgoing passengers and cargo might be adapted for U.S. airports.
"There are real differences, for example, in size and scale between Israel and the United States," she said, noting the latter's 450 international airports, many of which dwarf the mid-sized Ben-Gurion with its elaborate state-funded safeguards.
...
While avoiding direct comment on Israeli policy, Napolitano made clear profiling would not fly in the United States.
"There are some differences in the laws and the legal constraints that we abide by," she said. "There may be some things that can be shared (with Israel) and some things that would not ... The practices and techniques that we use will differ and do differ."
I have a real fear that it's going to take another 9/11-type event for America to wake up and smell the coffee on Islamic terrorism. What could go wrong?
Awesome: TSA misses loaded Glock pistol in computer case; 'It happens all the time'
ABC News reports that a Houston-based Iranian American businessman left a loaded Glock pistol like the one pictured in his otherwise empty computer case. The case got through security at a Houston airport as his carry-on bag without being found by the geniuses from TSA. And we're told 'it happens all the time' (Hat Tip: Gershon D).
According to one report, undercover TSA agents testing security at a Newark airport terminal on one day in 2006 found that TSA screeners failed to detect concealed bombs and guns 20 out of 22 times. A 2007 government audit leaked to USA Today revealed that undercover agents were successful slipping simulated explosives and bomb parts through Los Angeles's LAX airport in 50 out of 70 attempts, and at Chicago's O'Hare airport agents made 75 attempts and succeeded in getting through undetected 45 times.
Despite the results, there is no sign that the numbers have changed as the screeners have been tested year after year, former Department of Homeland Security Inspector General Clark Kent Ervin told ABC News.
"Those reports were classified but it's sufficing to say that reports, both classified and unclassified, are concerning. Too often guns and knives and fake explosives get through the checkpoint," Ervin said. "And what is particularly concerning is that nine times out of 10 the checkpoint is the most critical layer of aviation security."
Ervin said a combination of factors is likely to blame for the persistent failures on the part of screeners. Low pay, poor training, and the monotony involved in watching bags pass through x-ray machines are a recipe for trouble, Ervin said.
"To be fair to screeners, it's very difficult work," he said. "After so many hours of seeing things that are innocuous, there's really a limit for the human brain to process something anomalous."
And many of them are barely high school graduates and they have not even been trained properly.
Remember how when I was discussing the Israeli system last month, all the US reports said it was 'too expensive'? How much is saving lives worth?
Last month, TSA Chief John Pistole told ABC News that the poor performance during undercover tests helped convince him that airport screening needed to get that much tougher -- and a desire to do better helped give rise to the controversial new regimen that includes enhanced pat-downs and back-scatter machines that can see beneath a traveler's clothing.
But with all the political correctness, they're finding random people and not potential terrorists.
Let's go to the videotape.
But Mrs. Incompetanto will tell us that the system is working since Omar Farouk Abdulmutallab was eventually caught.
What could go wrong?
P.S. I'm in Boston where it's not the Sabbath yet.
Why Israeli security doesn't need to touch your 'junk'
Jeff Dunetz describes Israeli airline security blow by blow for those of you who have never been through it before. I suggest that you read it. Yes, they do discriminate. In general, Jews get through more quickly. What Jeff's describing goes for every El Al flight anywhere in the World and for all flights that depart from Ben Gurion Airport. I have also told you in the past that if you fly from North America to Israel via Europe and connect to El Al in Europe, you almost always have to go identify your bag, open it up and make sure that no one has put anything inside (they are not particularly enamored of the notes from TSA that say "we went through your bag;" I once pointed out one of those in London and they had me go through the entire bag again). Here are some highlights and then I'll tell you a couple of stories.
The ISA (Israeli Security Agency) calls it “human factor.” Some part of that human factor would cause Al Sharpton to show up to picket the Airport if it was practiced in the US. Ethnic profiling of passengers plays a central role in Israel’s multi-level approach. Not just ethnicity is profile, race religion, general appearance and behavior are also part of the information used to profile. And wherever that profile is being made, no matter what country it is being made in, it is an Israeli doing the profile.
All passengers travelling to and from Israel are questioned by security staff. For Jewish Israelis, the process takes a couple of minutes at most, with passengers being asked whether they packed their luggage alone, and whether anyone had access to the luggage once it was packed. Jewish tourists also usually pass through security within a few minutes.
...
Non-Jewish tourists tend to be questioned a bit more thoroughly, and may be grilled over the purpose of their visit and about their accommodation…
… the procedure for Arabs and Muslims can often be lengthy and irritating, ending with a full body and baggage search. Visitors who have passport stamps from countries hostile to Israel are also questioned intensively in what can be a traumatic experience for the uninitiated.
….Anyone admitting to leaving their luggage at an airport or bus station left-luggage area before check-in will have their suitcases stripped, with each item individually checked and re-packed.
In 2008, Israel’s supreme court rejected a petition presented by a group of disgruntled Israeli Arab citizens, backed by the Association of Civil Rights in Israel, demanding an end to ethnic profiling as discriminatory and illegal.
...
“It is mindboggling for us Israelis to look at what happens in North America, because we went through this 50 years ago,” said Rafi Sela, the president of AR Challenges, a global transportation security consultancy.,.
Officers are looking for nervousness or other signs of “distress” — behavioral profiling. Sela rejects the argument that profiling is discriminatory.
“The word ‘profiling’ is a political invention by people who don’t want to do security,” he said. “To us, it doesn’t matter if he’s black, white, young or old. It’s just his behavior. So what kind of privacy am I really stepping on when I’m doing this?”
There are other differences, most importantly is that you don’t just come off the street and get a job with the ISA (Israel Security Agency). These security agents are all ex-military (as most of the country is) and they are selected based on their intelligence and their ability to behavior profile.
Shlomo Harnoy, vice president of the Sdema group, an Israeli security consultancy firm which specialises in aviation security, believes Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian who tried to blow up the Detroit-bound Northwest Airlines aircraft on Christmas Day, would have been detained “within seconds ” at Ben Gurion airport. According to Harnoy, a young Muslim traveling alone, on a one-way ticket, with no luggage, was an obvious suspect.
Harnoy, who once headed the Israel Security Agency’s aviation security department, believes investing millions in new technology is not the answer. “Whoever is concentrating on stopping old ladies bringing a bottle of mineral water on to the plane will not find the terrorist, or the bomb. The old lady is not a suicide bomber and the bottle of water is not a bomb component.”
Not only do most Israeli security selectors have degree-level education, they are trained to the highest standards. The most important element in the “human factor” is that the security guards understand the threat.
And of course, on every El Al flight there are armed air marshals. You won’t know who they are, but I do not recommended you making a fuss mid-air just to find out.
Two quick stories. When I first came on aliya, my boss had a Jewish Austrian client, who had a non-Jewish Austrian assistant. Once, the client sent the assistant back to Vienna early. In Israel, businesspeople routinely prepare 'To Whom It May Concern' letters for their visiting, non-Jewish counterparts, to make security go a little more smoothly, and we prepared such a letter for this woman. She called us from the airport in tears - she had been raked over the coals by security but was going to make her flight (this was 1991 and most people did not have cell phones, so she took the trouble of going to a payphone, which required a token at the time, to call us). When we told her boss what had happened, he snapped, "she's a fool. If she would just answer their questions, they would let her go."
Three years ago, I flew Tel Aviv - London - Boston and back with one of my children. Tel Aviv - London - Tel Aviv was El Al. On the way back, I had to go downstairs in London, identify my bags, open them, and ensure that nothing had been added during the courst of my first flight. They even made me open the box with my brand new computer (on which I am typing this post) because Homeland Security had put tape around the box indicating that they inspected it. When I asked the security personnel why I had to open the computer, she reminded me that "the people who blew up Mike's Place worked at Heathrow." She was right. But the Brits still haven't figured that out: Two weeks ago, it was reported that one of the terrorists who was arrested in connection with the plot to blow up planes flying between London and the US was a Heathrow employee with an all-area access pass.
The second story is a classic ait El Al, and will show you that while they profile terrorists and that helps, they also think. On 17 April 1986, semtex explosives were found in the bag of a pregnant Irishwoman attempting to board an El Al flight. The explosives had been given to her by her Jordanian boyfriend and father of their unborn child Nizar Hindawi, and the incident became known as the Hindawi Affair. The pregnant Irishwoman was obviously not an Arab and the Jordanian boyfriend was not with her on the flight.
Israeli security doesn't need to touch your 'junk' because they have far better methods. Maybe it's time for other countries to learn them.
This quote by Thomas Sowell is destined to be a classic (Hat Tip: Debbie R).
Those who made excuses for all of candidate Barack Obama's long years of alliances with people who expressed their contempt for this country, and when as president he appointed people with a record of antipathy to American interests and values, may finally get it when they feel some stranger's hand in their crotch.
Ouch.
The other reason to read this article is that it's all about Israeli airport security. Here's the bottom line:
What do the Israeli airport security people do that American airport security do not do? They profile. They question some individuals for more than half an hour, open up all their luggage and spread the contents on the counter-- and they let others go through with scarcely a word. And it works.
Meanwhile, this administration is so hung up on political correctness that they have turned "profiling" into a bugaboo. They would rather have electronic scanners look under the clothes of nuns than to detain a Jihadist imam for some questioning.
Will America be undermined from within by an administration obsessed with political correctness and intoxicated with the adolescent thrill of exercising its new-found powers? Stay tuned.
I am an Orthodox Jew - some would even call me 'ultra-Orthodox.' Born in Boston, I was a corporate and securities attorney in New York City for seven years before making aliya to Israel in 1991 (I don't look it but I really am that old :-). I have been happily married to the same woman for thirty-five years, and we have eight children (bli ayin hara) ranging in age from 13 to 33 years and nine grandchildren. Four of our children are married! Before I started blogging I was a heavy contributor on a number of email lists and ran an email list called the Matzav from 2000-2004. You can contact me at: IsraelMatzav at gmail dot com
