Leaked files show US police agencies took intelligence from IOF
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Of the bodies exposed in the leaks is LA Clear, which, according to its website, provides “analytical and case support” in narcotics investigations in southern California.
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An official watches security cameras at the Southern Nevada Counter Terrorism Center in Las Vegas, Nevada, on May 23, 2017. (AP)
According to hacked police files, US law enforcement agencies received direct analysis of incidents in the Israeli-Palestinian struggle from Israeli occupation forces and think tanks, training on what they call domestic "Muslim extremists" from pro-Israeli non-profit organizations.
This included the surveillance of pro-Palestine activists' social media accounts in the US.
The analysis of documents from the BlueLeaks collection of internal law enforcement records by The Guardian found no evidence that this was in any way balanced by intelligence from other Middle Eastern sources or US Muslim community groups. There was even no indication that pro-"Israel" activists were monitored by the US government, unlike pro-Palestine activists.
The news comes as no surprise seeing as how the US blindly backs "Israel" and funds its genocidal war against Palestinians. It also paints a clear image of why pro-Palestine activists are being censored in the US.
Actually, this particularly raises concern about the scope of police intelligence-gathering in the US and how "Israel" and its supporters influence these efforts, which can only be reflected in how activists and social movements, especially those who are pro-Palestinian, are being treated.
Mike German, a fellow at the Brennan Center for Justice, former FBI undercover agent, and author of Disrupt, Discredit, and Divide: How the New FBI Damages Democracy, called the findings "frustrating", detailing that the information becomes "an amplifier of disinformation rather than a corrective to that disinformation."
In June 2020, self-described hacktivists obtained and released the BlueLeaks collection. It incorporates information from over 200 law enforcement organizations, as well as intelligence distributed by federally supported umbrella groups, such as fusion centers and high-intensity drug-trafficking area (Hidta) initiatives.
Of the bodies exposed in the leaks is LA Clear, which, according to its website, provides “analytical and case support” in narcotics investigations in southern California.
Several of its documents included IOF analyses of confrontations in Gaza and the West Bank.
One of the documents is marked with "official use only," indicating its classified nature, and details a "sharp increase of terrorist attacks emanating from the Gaza Strip" and other areas in occupied Palestine with absolutely no mention of any history in the region, the apartheid Israeli entity, the siege of Gaza, and the violence committed by the IOF against Palestinians.
Other materials include the IOF perspective on operations like "Operation Cast Lead," a 22-day aggression on Gaza in 2008.
There is sufficient proof of a strong collaboration between law enforcement agencies and US-based pro-"Israel" organizations elsewhere in the BlueLeaks database.
ADL offers US law enforcement training sessions
In one instance, the archive demonstrates the strong collaboration that exists between several law enforcement agencies and the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), a pro-"Israel" lobby in the US.
Read more: Palestine vs Ukraine: How Pro-Israeli lobbies ensure a double standard
Leaked emails show various agencies promoting ADL training sessions for law enforcement employees, and ADL officials are featured as registered guests at fusion center events, with profiles stating that "we facilitate workshops for law enforcement on extremism, hate crime, and (in Washington DC and Israel) counter-terrorism."
The ADL is referred to by US agencies as an authority on extremism even though they are a for-profit lobby for "Israel".
In contrast, no Muslim organizations or groups are consulted on Muslim concerns. The Omaha Terrorism Early Warning Group describes the Council for American-Islamic Relations (Cair) as "unindicted co-conspirators in the Holy Land terror funding trial" in a series of four mailings.
In 2007, Cair was listed as an unindicted co-conspirator in an FBI indictment relating to a property trust that allegedly funded Hamas. A federal judge ruled in 2010 that the government had violated the organization's rights and the Office of the Inspector General identified "significant issues with the way the FBI implemented and managed its Cair policy and guidance" in 2013.
There is evidence that this emphasis influenced investigations. The National Criminal Intelligence Resource Center preserved social media feeds of Palestinian-American pro-Palestine activists in at least two cases. The feeds revealed no obvious misconduct.
German expressed that “at a time where there’s much more public sensitivity to foreign influence in domestic affairs, having a foreign country’s security services aligned with the beat cop on the streets of American neighborhoods is concerning.”
