With the help of the
eavesdropping, Der Spiegel reports, Israeli leaders were better able to
understand Kerry's plans for his efforts during the negotiations and
prepare for them. At times, the material collected even served to help
Israel attack the US diplomat.
The author of the profile is Holger Stark, one of the magazine's
senior writers and Germany's "Journalist of the Year" in 2013. Stark
exposed the American eavesdropping of German Chancellor Angela Merkel's
cell phone – which led to a severe crisis in the relations between the
two allies.
Stark is the current Washington, D.C. bureau chief for Der Spiegel.
According to the profile which will be published in Monday's
paper, at the height of US-led nine-month period of negotiations Kerry
was making daily phone calls to his colleagues in the Middle East.
When he was in the United States, most of the calls were placed
from his office or – as would happen often due to the time difference –
from his home in Georgetown. Both locations have secure phone lines.
But during Kerry's numerous flights his plane was not equipped
with an encrypted phone line and the US diplomat made calls using a
regular satellite phone which Israeli intelligence – according to Der
Spiegel – managed to intercept.
According to the report, Israel was one of two countries which
eavesdropped on the phone calls but the profile of Kerry does not name
the second country.
Since Kerry
was running the US State Department during these flights – and not only
the peace process between Israel and the Palestinians – many of the
recorded calls involved other international officials, including Russian
and Chinese leaders.
Der Spiegel notes that
the transcripts of the conversations were not kept within the Israeli
intelligence community and were passed on to the political
establishment, which employed them for its own purposes. Israel and the
US refused to respond to Der Spiegel on the matter.
I guess this is the week for disclosures even outside the framework of Wikileaks. No, this one did not come from Wikileaks.
Former Israeli ambassador to the US Itamar Rabinovich (pictured with Bill Clinton and Ariel Sharon) told Army Radio on Monday that the United States tapped the phone lines at the Israeli embassy in Washington for many years.
Rabinovich did not say exactly when the code was broken and when Israel found out about it, but it was understood from his remarks that the tap started after his 1993-1996 tenure in the U.S. capital and was discovered only years later.
The former envoy said that every staffer at the Israeli Embassy in Washington is warned about possible leaks of conversations held in the building and on ordinary phone lines, but also on the secure phone line.
After the Americans broke the code, Israel's deepest policy secrets were apparently exposed.
"Every 'juicy' telegram was in danger of being leaked," Rabinovich told Army Radio's Razi Barkai. "We sent very few of them. Sometimes I came to Israel to deliver reports orally. The Americans were certainly tapping the regular phone lines, and it became clear that in later years they were also listening to the secure line."
...
As far as is known, American spies have not been caught by Israel's intelligence services, although there have been instances when U.S. intelligence operatives contacted Israeli citizens and explored the possibility of recruiting them.
The Americans have also used their military attaches to gather information.
Israel believes that over the years, U.S. intelligence services have been listening - or at least attempting to listen - to conversations between key people in Israel and staff at its missions around the world.
For that reason, diplomats going abroad are instructed by the Shin Bet security service to treat every conversation as if it is being tapped and to make sure not to reveal secret information.
However, the assumption was still that the secure phone line could not being tapped.
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
