Defense Ministry probes 'Iraq affair'

[Scurrilous]

Official investigation launched into Israeli activities in northern Iraq as revealed by Yedioth Ahronoth last week. Ministry sources say were not aware of the unauthorized activity, criminal investigation may follow

<sanip>

"The Defense Ministry has started collecting testimonies from people related to the involvement of Israeli companies in training Kurdish security men in northern Iraq, Israel's leading newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth reported Monday.

According to the report, ministry officials were astonished to discover the scope of Israeli activity in northern Iraq, claiming that companies operated in the region were obligated to report their endeavors to the ministry and receive special permission allowing them to export security knowledge abroad.

Ministry sources admitted they were completely unaware of these operations.

Defense Ministry Director of Security Yehiel Horev has summoned to his office the companies heads involved in the lucrative deals with the Kurdish government, in a bid to asses whether their overseas operations constituted a criminal offense."


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[tinnypriv]

1. This is partly a smokescreen

The Israeli involvement in Iraq is MUCH larger than just the training of Kurds in northern Iraq as "revealed" in Yediot (incidentially, the print version had images of Israelis training Kurds with the faces redacted, suggesting the "secrecy" is a bit of joke).

For example, both Walla! and Ma'ariv both revealed long ago that Israeli companies (both front and not) are selling goods and services in Iraq, and that the US and Israel "secretly" authorised (note "special permission" from the article) this back in mid-2003. Not only that, but that Jordan is involved in "washing" the goods as they arrive (removing the "made in Israel"), which is an interesting transit point -to say the least- knowing what we know about Jordanian-US intelligence ties (surely including Mossad).

In any event, The New Yorker first revealed this training, not Yediot (though the details are more wide-ranging in the Israeli version). Walla! called this entire story "politically explosive", and it is very difficult to find out anything about it - US papers have refused to publish information from award-winning Israeli journalists on this, and have even refused to just reprint summaries from the Hebrew papers.