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Comment by baklavaEmperor | Hacker News Reader

What stands out to me here is the pipeline. Israel has built an unusually tight feedback loop between military intelligence, private startups, and global markets. When that ecosystem scales internationally, it’s fair to ask whether partners are buying technology or importing unilateral leverage that only benefits Israel here.

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Recently for obvious reasons I’ve started questioning everything. I imagine I’m not alone.

Let’s just say I’m even more of a fan of EU digital infrastructure moving to strictly EU countries, no outside traffic allowed.

Don't get me wrong, I get why they want to and it is probably a justified security concern, but it's also things like that which will probably cause Europe's economy to continue to stagnate while the US's will probably continue to soar even with Trump (and perhaps, later, Vance) completely destroying our international reputation and credibility and our most important political and scientific institutions.

The fact that the US can continue to economically do so well relative to others despite currently being run by some of the stupidest and most abhorrent people possible is... sad.

Europe could be more competitive but then they snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Just in the past week they're meddling with the infinite scroll feature and then the unrealized taxes in the Netherlands. Why would a tech company wanna operate in such an environment?

Why would we care about competivity where it doesn't benefit society? Addictive social media and wealth accumulation actively harm society

You have fun with that. Lemme know how it goes.

What for an answer is that?

It's not like it's going real well here in the U.S.

Obviously one cannot simply accept any potential societal trade-off in favor of benefitting the economy, but going too far in the opposite direction eventually manifests as worse living standards for the average person, which is not beneficial to society.

How does banning intentionally addictive media-feed apps (they are not social media, they are parasocial at best) make society worse?

"How does banning unhealthy food make society worse?" "How does banning unhealthy habits make society worse?" "How does banning harmful/hateful speech make society worse?" "How does banning things and, as a result, our economy stagnating, make society worse?"

Pam Bondi suggested that it would be impossible to prosecute the pedophiles, because the economy would collapse. To which many people reacted: then let it collapse. You remind me of Pam Bondi.

Except Bondi was wrong and I am right, and also letting the economy collapse actually would be really, really bad and saying things like that is something only children and economically illiterate people do.

Also, most of the things I listed in my previous post had absolutely nothing to do with the economy. It's just that it's unethical and tyrannical for the government to dictate people's behavior in this way. "How is it unhealthy for the government to ban alcohol?" These statements would apply whether in a socialistic or fully neoliberal country.

Infinite scroll? Just ban social media algorithms you buffoons. Then u can even let kids use it.

> The fact that the US can continue to economically do so well relative to others despite currently being run by some of the stupidest and most abhorrent people possible is... sad.

It's not sad, it's strong evidence (I hesitate to call it proof, but...) that a federated model of governance with limited regulation is the most resilient and successful form of government.

All the EU states need to do is learn that regulation is not the solution to every theoretical problem any bureaucrat can imagine, and they too can experience meaningful economic growth.

I agree that if you want to pursue economic growth laissez-faire is possibly the best course of action, but economic growth isn't the only metric worth pursuing.

> economic growth isn't the only metric worth pursuing

It's not, but the absence of it makes it much harder to pursue the many other worthy goals. Which again, is a lesson the EU seems to refuse to accept.

I have no idea where you got that idea from. If anything the EU has been focused way too much on the economy, hoping trade and economic growth will solve all problems.

Probably one of these scissor statements where economic leftists think that obviously the problem is focusing way too much on [X] and the others saying the problem is focusing far too little on [X].

To some extent yes, but the issue the leftists have in this case is that X = money (or the equivalent in resources) which is absolutely required in large quantities to enact their political agenda.

Is it? When the political agenda is "no infinite scrolling" it seems they can just ban infinite scrolling, and that doesn't cost any money.

You'd think so, but paying all the people who sit around and think of things to regulate, the people who actually write the regulations, the people who enact the regulations, and the people who enforce the regulations is not a trivial cost, especially at the scale that the EU wants to regulate things.

Also, the actual political agenda is based around a welfare state, which absolutely costs money to maintain.

I like infinite scrolling. Probably most users like it. My country's government banning apps from letting me infinite scroll in them sounds very paternalistic and silly.

I make apps for myself above all else. I always add infinite scrolling support to all my apps. It's just a better and smoother experience than pagination.

I got it from two places:

1. Watching the standard of living in the US outpace the EU for decades and comparing their economic systems.

2. Basic common sense tells you that you need resources in order to fund a welfare state, a long list of positive human rights, and all the other things that the EU states want to do. Money buys resources, especially when you don't have direct access to them (which is the case for most EU states).

I'd be super surprised if EU doesn't have similar "dashboards".

Don't underestimate the incompetence of our governments.

The German foreign intelligence service (BND) played the PR of incompetence for a very long time.

Well until press found out that they had tapped into Obamas encrypted phone calls while flying in the AF1 for a long time.

I did not know - here's a link to Washington Post reporting: https://archive.ph/kCxNw

> Well until press found out that they had tapped into Obamas encrypted phone calls while flying in the AF1 for a long time.

As per the article linked above (https://archive.ph/kCxNw)

"The intelligence agency, called the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND) discovered that some calls on Air Force One were unencrypted and it was able to tap into radio frequencies that were used for those calls, according to the book, "

No hacking or deployment of listening devices, just passive listening. Unless you have other sources?

They are usually incompetent on things that are not important, like keeping infrastructure from falling off the cliff, maintaining a good economy, or in general serving the people. They are pretty competent on things that are really important, like hacking into people's phones, killing other people.

After all you have to admit that getting killed is more serious than getting starved...

Appear weak when you are strong, and all of that

hope for the best, expect the worst...

EU member states do and often with collaboration with Israeli vendors - especially in the CEE and Southern Europe. It even became an ongoing scandal in the EU [0][1].

Northern and Western European states tend to use American products, but the difference between "American", "Israeli", "Czech", and "Indian" blurs because of how much overlap the industry has transnationally.

Italy, Czechia, Poland, and Netherlands all have significant domestic capacity in the space as well, but a large portion of it is via American and Israeli tech.

[0] - https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-spyware-probe-slams-gover...

[1] - https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-commission-national-secur...

EU law enforcement agencies regularly buy this kind of software, even if illegal!

The Italian Carabinieri bought Paragon even though they can't legally use it, because mass surveillance is obviously illegal and against our constitution.

And yet, nothing's being done.

but its not mass surveillance, its targeted at a large but finite number of people

Balkanization of the internet. It was foretold.

It is probably in their blood because as someone surrounded by enemies you gotta be pragmatic and on your toe all the time. No wonder they are pretty good at intelligence collection. One of my previous bosses told me that people with highest scores join the intelligence staffs. Not sure if it is true, though.

> One of my previous bosses told me that people with highest scores join the intelligence staffs.

Certainly the common practice of looting civilian homes and posting about it on social media implies something about their infantry.

At least they didn't rape and behead them on camera like the opposition.

And they were punished for it rather than celebrated and their families paid a wage for life...

Surrounded by enemies of their own creation. It’s a beautiful cycle of aggression and self-victimization; a true ouroboros.

On the intelligence front, Mossad does a wonderful job performing extra-judicial killings using the dirtiest tricks you could think of. They’re also very good partners: almost every counter-intelligence outfit sings their praises.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1948_Arab%E2%80%93Israeli_War

Start here, and then work your way both forwards and backwards if you have any interest in learning.

Wow thanks for the pointer, I had no idea! Eye opening stuff!

You apparently need it, given your illogical and inaccurate statements in this thread, but I won't hold my breath while waiting for you to accept that.

Feel free to respond where you disagree for the benefit of those reading the thread.

Btw, linking to a wiki page does not reflect any knowledge on your part. By not engaging with your own words, it is fair to default to assuming that you have no idea what you’re talking about.

Others have already done so since my initial comment and your response was either "nah" or to disengage, so I'm not going to waste my time arguing with someone who is clearly personally invested in a very specific narrative.

Oh, I was never interested in arguing with you at all given how you decided to start off this conversation.

I was just pointing out that you can always respond and demonstrate your brilliance to readers of the thread.

> Surrounded by enemies of their own creation.

Step 1: Get 6 million of you systematically eradicated in Europe and hundreds of thousands more booted from their homes in the Middle East for "reasons".

Step 2: Build yourself a country so no one can throw you out again.

Step 3: Get attacked by the countries who threw you out for "reasons".

Step 4: Get accused of "aggression".

People's continued downplay and revisionism of Jewish and Israeli history is truly something to behold.

How dare the Israelis not let themselves get genocided. The audacity.

At what point in its history was Israel ever in actual danger of being “genocided”?

This rhetoric circles back to the self-victimization complex btw.

Every day since its first day as a state. There are several countries with billions of people whose stated, official objective is the destruction of Israel. Iran has giant countdown clocks and advertisements for the destruction of Israel. They have laws against peace with Israel. The Houthis literally have "Death to Israel" (and America) on their flag.

Internet arguments are entirely irrelevant.

This women is in a trench just for fun.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1948_Arab%E2%80%93Israeli_War#...

Apparently at the beginning and throughout the Cold War, IMO. Not to say that I want to blame on just one side, though.

No, Israel has never been seriously threatened with elimination. Even in 1948, they were militarily superior and more organized than all of their neighbors. They in fact proved this in 1967.

But they sure love to claim that they were at the cusp of elimination at various points - again, the self-victimization complex in action :)

> Even in 1948, they were militarily superior and more organized than all of their neighbors.

Yeah I think that's why they were not wiped out, not that their neighbours were super good heart. They were and still are less competent.

The point is that they were never in danger of being wiped out.

How do you know?

Step 1: A Holocaust perpetrated by Germany, not Palestine.

Step 2: Build a country out of Lego- I mean, gradually settle an existing, populated area of the Levant - Palestine - and then have daddy Britain and later big daddy USA forcibly carve out a chunk of the land without input from the natives. And no, it was not a UN partition plan because most of the world was still colonized at the time.

Step 3: Take advantage of the obvious discontent with this move by the natives and activate Plan Dalet to take even more of the land. After all, the land granted by the partition plan is not enough.

Step 4: War starts with neighboring countries, partly to disrupt the ethnic cleansing campaign against a mostly defenseless population, but also to satisfy their own expansionist aims (esp. Transjordan).

Step 1: Lie.

The people who fled Europe or forced out of the Middle East purchased empty lands, dried marshes, planted forests, installed infrastructure, sown fields, built cities and created a democracy to govern themselves. Incidentally, some purchased lands had squatters from Syria, Jordan, Arabia, etc., who lived on lands they did not own. Bye bye and boo hoo.

Seven different armies invaded Israel on its day of foundation. Seven armies got wrecked. Entire countries with billions of people keep crying about it, going so far as making the destruction of Israel an official goal, in some countries even actual laws! No conspiracy theories, no "Plan Dalet" and other bullshit your Hamas friends told you about, their real, actual goals stated right in your face.

I mean, Israeli historians corroborated Plan Dalet, but sure, let’s call it a conspiracy. I am going to stop responding here.

Are you saying that the Jews didn’t buy land in the Ottoman Empire and the early British mandate times?

I know that the pro-Palestinian side attempts to erase any link of Jewish people to the area, but there are documents that are not even 100 years old.

This is frankly, completely ahistorical. The British famously backed the Palestinians in the 1948 war (only barely, they mostly didn't care, but still did back them) and didn't like the idea of Israel so much so that they withdrew from the UN committee over it. Palestinians famously collaborated with Hitler as well. The USA only started being allied with Israel in the late 60s.

> And no, it was not a UN partition plan because most of the world was still colonized at the time.

And I can't even begin to fathom what this means.

As you noted in an another comment, Plan Dalet was corroborated by Israeli historians. Which is false. It was corroborated by one Israeli historian, who retracted his findings after finding out his source for the writings of Ben-Gurion were edited posthumously.

And "war starts" is a very nice and PG way to phrase "attempted to genocide Jews".

Yes, it is completely ahistorical - if you buy in to the blessed Zionist narrative, that is.

> The British famously backed the Palestinians

No, the British backed the Jordanians, not the Palestinians. Jordan had its own goals as I alluded to elsewhere. I would recommend reading a bit further on the subtleties and limits to that backing, as well as the strategic reasons for said backing. But I wasn’t talking about the war at all here.

They withdrew because they did not know how to balance the two sides. It was a hot potato, so they threw into the lap of the US.

> And I can't even begin to fathom what this means.

How many seats were there at the UNGA at the time? And how many of those seats belonged to countries who could make sovereign decisions without fear of repercussion from the newly emerged world powers? Keep in mind that WWII ended less than two years ago at this point.

> As you noted in an another comment, Plan Dalet was corroborated by Israeli historians. Which is false.

So there was no ethnic cleansing at all? I suppose 700k or so Palestinians just oopsied their way out of their homes and villages.

> And "war starts" is a very nice and PG way to phrase "attempted to genocide Jews".

Oh boy, not this again..

I find it interesting that all of your arguments rely on emotion, not fact.

> No, the British backed the Jordanians, not the Palestinians.

What is the difference between Jordanians and Palestinians given that the line that separates them is drown by the Brits?

> So there was no ethnic cleansing at all? I suppose 700k or so Palestinians just oopsied their way out of their homes and villages.

So they all left because Israel kicked them all out? What about the interviews and news articles from the time where Arabs themselves said that Jordan Army asked them to leave for the duration of the fights?

And you are the one talking about narratives?

> War starts with neighboring countries, partly to disrupt the ethnic cleansing campaign against a mostly defenseless population

Did you made this all up?

There is zero evidence that the war started because the Jews were ethnically cleansing “defenseless population”. It is enough to go to the library and read newspapers from the time where Arabs openly stated that they do no accept Jewish state for the sake of it being Jewish.

Zionism existed since the late 19th century. It cannot be considered solely a response to the Holocaust. It was an outgrowth of the many nationalist movements that were occurring in Europe at the time, and even as far back as the 1920s the consensus was that the establishment of a Jewish state required a Jewish majority. This is clearly evident in the writings of people like Jabrotinsky and Herzl himself. I don't think any native population would take kindly to what exactly this implied.

You're a little off on the history. Zionism as a political movement (as opposed to the cultural idea which has existed for 3000 or so years) dates back to the late 18th century, as one of the responses to both antisemitism and the emerging nationalist ideas in Europe. The deciding philosophy in this case is the idea that antisemitism cannot be fought, that it is a universal constant of sorts. This was originally a fringe left-wing idea, with the response being to stop being Jews (the Reform branch was borne out of this and is the reason many Jews, including me, still dislike it, even if it is a bit unfair). After the Holocaust, however, this idea transformed from a left-wing one to a right-wing one, where the solution became to take up arms and defend ourselves from those who would wish to kill us. I don't know about Jabrotinsky but your claim on Herzl is very hotly debated[0]. Not that I imagine many Arabs can read German. The claim also heavily erases Jewish presence in the Levant.

[0] https://tikvah.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/Hazony-Did-Her...

I think you need to dive into more detail of what "build yourself a country" entails.

I don't disagree with you, but this is the reality already and I don't see how they can get out of it. I wouldn't hope for any long-term peace between IL and surrounding country without IL holding a very big stick which the US gives to them.

I think actually they are in a bit of panic mode because the US might want to get out from the ME and focus on China. They want a guarantee that Iran won't be able to come on its foot again in at least 10 years. That's all my guess, though.

I think also everyone needs to understand that Israel are a wedge in the operations of rival Islamic terrorist factions. If they went poof and ceased to exist suddenly then it'd switch straight to Darfur mode out there. It wouldn't suddenly be kumbaya and holding hands.

So the solution is for Israel to get an even bigger “stick” than nuclear weapons? How about a just solution for the Palestinians instead?

Who is going to do that? Obviously not in anyone's interests. That is, anyone who can push the situation towards that direction.

You’re either missing my point or deflecting. Let me expand one last time.

Israel claims to be threatened by its neighbors. Israel claims to want peace with countries in the region. Neighboring countries have repeatedly stated that a precondition to normalization is a just solution for Palestinians. But Israel does not want a just solution.

In other words, the problem is entirely self-inflicted. Israel wants peace, but without making any concessions on the issue of Palestine. So instead it pursues a system of “peace through violence” - just like it does in the West Bank and Gaza.

This is bullshit. Between 1948 and 1967 the entire West Bank and Gaza were under control of neighbouring Arab countries. They could’ve set up a Palestinian state within “the 1967 borders”, but nobody did. Instead they went to war to try and take the rest.

Besides, Israel has since made peace with Egypt and Jordan.

Okay, and? Do you think the fact that neighbors having their own expansionist ambitions is somehow a “gotcha”? And given the whole Greater Israel plan, do you seriously think that Israel would have even allowed this to happen?

Now, back to the present day. Palestinians live under a system of occupation and blockade and recently genocide. This is not a just situation. It is also not sustainable without continued repression and use of force. There is no way that Israel will be welcomed into the wider ME under this regime.

> And given the whole Greater Israel plan

What is this “plan”?

> Palestinians live under a system of occupation and blockade

What did the Palestinians do to not end up in this situation?

> genocide

War is not genocide. And remarks by some of the politicians are not a proof of genocide as well.

> There is no way that Israel will be welcomed into the wider ME under this regime.

Israel just need to be stronger to survive as they did in the first 20-30 years of their statehood.

There peace with Jordan and Egypt. 2 countries that were at war with Israel, Egypt got Sinai back, Jordan did not want the West Bank back.

What do you mean by “back”? The West Bank was never legitimately part of Jordan - they forcibly annexed it in 1948.

As for the peace treaties:

Jordan simply did not have the ability to fight Israel any longer, or to deal with Palestinian factions operating in its territory.

Egypt wanted its land back after failing to reclaim it in 1973.

> What do you mean by “back”?

> Egypt wanted its land back after failing to reclaim it in 1973.

It seems you are aware that peace deal with Egypt is what got Sinai back to Egypt.

Regarding this comment specifically, if you took the time to read the next sentence, you would have understood that “back” is referring to Jordan.

I have read your other comments. I am not going to engage further, for two reasons:

1. You’re a bit late to the party, and I primarily respond to engage with readers.

2. You’re clearly coming in with a closed mind.

What a wonderful way to not discuss the facts and claims made by you on their merits.

Also, I am not sure how you can imply that you are unbiased.

> I don't disagree with you, but this is the reality already and I don't see how they can get out of it.

Maybe by starting to behave as if the Palestinian population that live on the territory they control have equal rights? Like stopping West Bank colonization projects?

2006 Gaza was left to their own independent rule. Shortly after that Hamas killed the PLO, assumed control, and started fire rockets into Israel. And you’re saying that we need to try that again with the West Bank?

That’s not what happened. You (unintentionally I am sure) glossed over the elections being overruled by the US and Israel, the attempted coup by Fatah in Gaza, and the subsequent blockade.

The blockade started after the rockets. And how can US and Israel overrule elections in Gaza? Fatah wanted a coup because they lost to Hamas. That’s why there’s no election in the West Bank.

Read up on the election here, tired of responding in this thread: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_Palestinian_legislative_e...

On rocket attacks, Hamas was sticking relatively well to the ceasefire (again, talking about Hamas, not other groups). The blockade was tightened by Israel post-takeover, which then lead to a resumption of rocket attacks.

> Hamas was sticking relatively well to the ceasefire

By launching rockets? Are you serious?

How can you argue in good faith that launching unguided rockets indiscriminately over civilian population centers as “sticking to the ceasefire”?

This is not an argument for illegal occupation and expansion into West Bank. Israel should follow international law and agreements they themselves signed.

Palestinians too. Unfortunately, they are not sticking to their side of the bargain as well.

Oh yeah, I'm sure stopping the "West Bank colonization projects" will make Iran be peaceful.

At least that'd improve the chance of having peaceful neighbours, instead of ones who'll listen to any envoy from Iran saying that bombing Israel is the best solution for living in peace.

It really wouldn't make a difference. A country that is already so radicalized that it thinks bombing Israel is the best solution for living in peace would not change its mind for the Palestinians.

I think this article explains it well: https://www.richardhanania.com/p/how-trump-proved-foreign-po...

Question: why do Palestinians do not take a unilateral step of declaring “no more armed resistance”? If basks can, why Palestinians can’t?

As always, experience breeds competence. Much like Ukraine are good at drone warfare, Israel are good at missile defence etc etc...

> Israel has built an unusually tight feedback loop between military intelligence, private startups, and global markets.

How's that different from the US? half of the big players started as three letters agency side projects

Why is everyone surprised that a country of less than 10 million has a tech sector where everyone effectively knows each other?

I would put the upper bound on the population relevant to _the_ tech sector at 28000.

Impressive how effective they are with such a small foot print. The rest of us should be taking notes.

Amazing what you can achieve with the kind of kompromat Epstein gathered.

Do you believe everything else Holocaust deniers[0] say?

[0] https://www.semafor.com/newsletter/02/08/2026/semafor-media-... (paragraph 5)

His connections to mossad have been documented well before then https://electronicintifada.net/content/us-media-barely-touch...

You might as well have cited 4chan with that link but whatever. No, it isn't known. What is known is that he had contacts who in turn had contacts in Mossad. And seeing both Epstein's vocal dislike of Israel and his vocal like for some of Israel's enemies (Russia in particular), I seriously doubt those contacts went any deeper than that.

Paragon co-founded by former Unit-8200 commander Ehud Schneorson and former Israeli Prime-minister and defence-chief, Ehud Barak who tapped his long-time friend Jeffrey Epstein (a wealthy American financier and eccentric) to find him clients for his ventures in the US and across the world. That certainly is some tight-integration!

https://www.dropsitenews.com/p/jeffrey-epstein-ehud-barak-le...

The thing is everyone goes into the IDF. The smart ones get put into unit 8200 where they hone their persistent, iterative, troubleshooting skills. Then their service is over they leave and they've basically been trained in innovation and leadership.

Then they go about solving problems. Some of those problems are people dont have a good trustworthy pornsite. Some of them are their buddies that stayed in the military have a military related or adjacent problem.

Darknet diaries did a great podcast on unit 8200.

> tight feedback loop between military intelligence, private startups

It's just friends buying from friends.

They're just too busy repackaging the same spying tech on different channels and then selling that for billions in the US stock market. Also knowing that US regulators won't say a single word, because how could they ever say something bad about these companies... It must be a very good business.

You should look at Israel deal for the F-35. They got the only F-35 unlocked and non dependent on the US software lock. They were never part of the development program like Norway, Denmark, Italy or the Netherlands so did not have to bear those costs. Norway, Denmark, Italy or the Netherlands, still had to pay for their F-35...

Israel paid 2.3 Billion for their F-35, but the US committed to buy 4 Billion from Israel defense firms, so concluding with a net positive of +1.25 Billion for Israel economy....all at the cost to the US tax payer. :-)

"F-35I Adir: Israel’s Custom F-35 That No Other Nation Has" - https://www.19fortyfive.com/2025/04/f-35i-adir-israels-custo...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Martin_F-35_Lightning...

This net positive argument is asinine.

You aren't burning money, you're getting services and technologies.

I pay you 2 dollars and you buy 4 dollars from me. In the meanwhile I also get 20 F-35...

So the US basically got billions and billions worth of F-35 R&D for the price of 2B?

Sounds like a decent deal to me.

You completely misunderstood the money flow....

You completely miss the fact that the same R&D Israel has done would have cost 100x more if it were done by US based companies.

The US gains massive cheap R&D and real world tested capabilities for a fraction of the price it would pay domestically.

Now you could argue about the moral implications, but money wise it's a great deal.

Except that is not what is happening:

"...To sweeten the deal, Lockheed Martin said it would buy parts and systems for the F-35 from Israeli companies at a cost of $4 billion..."

What is funny thing to say, since Israel, unlike the other nations, never supported the development costs of the F-35 program :-)

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