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Comment by salimmadjd | Hacker News Reader

This is not surprising. Israel is the number-one allied country spying in America [1]

The problem is that with so many Israeli supporters in either of the administration [2] as well as in the FBI and on many campuses, any allegation of spying by whistleblowers is reacted by extreme retaliations. This is why we don't hear about it more often.

This is not a new issue [3] from Pollard [4] to Rosen [5], recently

[1] http://www.businessinsider.com/israeli-spying-on-us-has-reac...

[2] http://www.thenation.com/blog/spy-story-harman-saban-and-aip...

[3] http://archive.lewrockwell.com/ips/lobe122.html

[4] http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/DC-Decoder/2014/0401/Who-is-Jon...

[5] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v._Franklin,_Rose...

edited: typo

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It is amazing just how much Israel spies on America, and how nobody knows about it. If you dare to say it publicly then your reputation and career are destroyed, and you are an antisemitic terrorist sympathizer, if not also a terrorist.

Israel spies on America, America tapped Angela Merkel's phone. The job of spies is to know the internal thinking of the current administration.

Spying, tapping, hacking, etc are not acts of war. In fact, they probably prevent more conflict than they could possibly ever cause.

Had we listened to Israeli spies, we would have never gone to war with Iraq over WMDs. Spies save lives.

Except for the very same Israeli Mosad spies who knew much more about 9/11 before it happened. That could have saved many many lives indeed.

If Israel is #1 among our allies, France is infamously #2. You don't hear much about that either. I don't think this has much to do with antisemitism.

Of course it doesn't. But exposing and criticising France will scarcely receive the retaliation reserved for revealing Israeli spooks in the US. Much less (or zero) accusations of antisemitism.

Please tell us exactly "how much" does Israel spy on America relative to other countries, based on what information, why is this "amazing", and provide some proof that "if you dare to say it publicly then your reputation and career are destroyed".

It's amazing how HNs usual standards of logical discourse seem to disappear once the argument becomes political.

It's amazing how people who should know better demand proof of something obvious that's been written about so many times, just like how Fox News demands proof that Obama isn't secretly a Muslim. Or how people demand proof that goto is a Bad Thing™.

Well in that case you shouldn't have any trouble providing written evidence of people who have accused Israel of spying on the US, and as a result had their reputation and careers destroyed, and where labeled as "antisemitic terrorist sympathizers" or as terrorists.

It is you who have claimed that "nobody knows about it", and therefore it's neither obvious nor extensively written about, and it is you who holds the burden of proof.

Savoire/faire is every/where!

http://www.businessinsider.com/nazi-scientists-space-program...

Huh and yet here, as per your links, we have mainstream media reporting on it.

Have those journalists been subjected to 'extreme retaliation'?

Perhaps we don't hear about it frequently not because there is a conspiracy among 'Israeli supporters' (we all know what you mean bro!) but because the issue is not so pressing or widespread as you would have us believe?

I don't see anything at all in your comment that doesn't contribute to the discussion. The fact that you are downvoted on HN for just for stating an uncommon opinion is disgusting and extremely disappointing.

> conspiracy among 'Israeli supporters' (we all know what you mean bro!)

This line clearly links "anti Israeli" with "anti Semite". It's a vile tactic and does not belong on HN.

Right. So that's why he was downvoted. And that's why every pro-Israeli comment in this discussion is being downvoted.

The current top post in this thread makes some claims that are disputed. It is possible to vigorously dispute those claims without having to accuse the poster of being an anti-Semite.

If you're asking why those posts are being down-voted: I can't tell you. There probably are Jew-haters who downvote anything pro-Israeli; I'd be surprised if there were enough of them to counter the corrective upvotes.

But the post you responded to accuses anyone who makes a post that is not fully in support of everything that Israel does as an anti-Semite. That's a poisonous tactic; it's one reason why political discussion is strongly recommended against on HN and I stand by my claim that it is why that individual post was down-voted.

Here are two pro-Israeli posts that are not currently downvoted...

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8610988

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8610951

...So even your claim that every Pro-Israeli comment is downvoted is incorrect.

I think people are very tired of the extremely preferential treatment Israel is getting in general. Can I say that without offending anybody?

Well in that case I guess it's ok to downvote all those "tiring" comments.

The only source of your claim that "Israel is the number-one allied country spying in America" is a single Newsweek article from 2014, citing anonymous sources. Yet you treat it as an absolute fact. I don't remember anybody doing the same when Newsweek "exposed" Satoshi Nakamoto.

You claim that "any allegation of spying by whistleblowers is reacted by extreme retaliations", yet none of your source ([3], [4], [5]) support any of that. So what reasonable allegations of spying were in fact reacted by "extreme retaliations", considering that the above allegations were all reported by big and reputable news agencies in the US, gained quite a large exposure, and are remembered by many to this day?

It's quite common among people with anti-Israeli sentiments to make wild accusations and then explain away their unpopularity by appealing to some government pro-Israeli conspiracy. An alternative hypothesis, worth considering, is that the accusations are in fact baseless, and are unpopular exactly because of that.

I seriously doubt that it makes much sense for Israel - a tiny country surrounded by enemies, with a rather limited budget that is never enough for anything - to devote any significant part of its intelligence efforts to developing sources in the US, instead of - say - in Iran, Syria, Lebanon, etc'.

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