Courtesy Of: The Montreal Gazette
Published: Tuesday, February 06, 2007
The Gazette
For at least three decades, Israel's spy agencies have had an unhealthy predilection for forging or stealing Canadian passports.
In 1997, 16 years after an official protocol banned such skullduggery, Canada recalled its ambassador to Israel for a spell over the practice, the diplomatic equivalent of a bench-clearing brawl.
That flap occurred after two presumed Mossad agents were caught in Jordan plotting to assassinate a prominent Hamas leader.
On Saturday, an apparent variation on that old practice came to light.
In Cairo, Egyptian intelligence services arrested Mohammed Essam Ghoneim al-Attar, a 31-year-old Egyptian national, charging that in 2001 Israeli agents in Turkey recruited, trained and began running him, paying him at least $56,300 U.S.
His controllers allegedly brought the former student to settle in Canada in 2003. Here, he got a job in a bank near a mosque, and is alleged by Egypt to have spied on fellow Arabs and Muslims in Scarborough, Ont., to have passed on banking information about them, and also to have tried to recruit other people to work for Israel's secret services.
Israel has not commented on the Egyptian claims, which are so far only claims but are disturbingly precise, detailed and extensive.
We look forward to Israel's response.
Attar's arrest raises all sorts of prickly questions:
Did he get his Canadian citizenship fairly and transparently? If not, precisely how did he get it?
Did he pass on banking information to Israel, information that our own police forces don't have access to without official approval?
Canadian officials are investigating, at the usual pace. We'll see where that leads.
But we hope this is not an abuse by an agency of a friendly nation.
We hope Mossad, and every other agency of every government, understands that they have no right to go fishing for Canadian banking information.
We hope friendly intelligence agencies that have good reason to suspect persons in Canada would pass the information on to Canadian officials, rather than running their own covert operations in this country.
We want no more abuses of Canadians' rights.
Privacy of personal information is part of the rule of law in this country. Canadian banks are subject to the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act and the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Act.
Only when the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada reports suspicious wire transfers or other transactions to the RCMP can the police seek the right to analyze the data.
There's no reason - not the fight against terrorism, not "the Mideast is a tough neighbourhood" excuse, etc. - that access should be any easier for foreign spies.
Covert actions tarnish Canada's reputation and undermine our relations with friendly countries.
They should stop once and for all.
© The Gazette (Montreal) 2007
Published: Tuesday, February 06, 2007
The Gazette
For at least three decades, Israel's spy agencies have had an unhealthy predilection for forging or stealing Canadian passports.
In 1997, 16 years after an official protocol banned such skullduggery, Canada recalled its ambassador to Israel for a spell over the practice, the diplomatic equivalent of a bench-clearing brawl.
That flap occurred after two presumed Mossad agents were caught in Jordan plotting to assassinate a prominent Hamas leader.
On Saturday, an apparent variation on that old practice came to light.
In Cairo, Egyptian intelligence services arrested Mohammed Essam Ghoneim al-Attar, a 31-year-old Egyptian national, charging that in 2001 Israeli agents in Turkey recruited, trained and began running him, paying him at least $56,300 U.S.
His controllers allegedly brought the former student to settle in Canada in 2003. Here, he got a job in a bank near a mosque, and is alleged by Egypt to have spied on fellow Arabs and Muslims in Scarborough, Ont., to have passed on banking information about them, and also to have tried to recruit other people to work for Israel's secret services.
Israel has not commented on the Egyptian claims, which are so far only claims but are disturbingly precise, detailed and extensive.
We look forward to Israel's response.
Attar's arrest raises all sorts of prickly questions:
Did he get his Canadian citizenship fairly and transparently? If not, precisely how did he get it?
Did he pass on banking information to Israel, information that our own police forces don't have access to without official approval?
Canadian officials are investigating, at the usual pace. We'll see where that leads.
But we hope this is not an abuse by an agency of a friendly nation.
We hope Mossad, and every other agency of every government, understands that they have no right to go fishing for Canadian banking information.
We hope friendly intelligence agencies that have good reason to suspect persons in Canada would pass the information on to Canadian officials, rather than running their own covert operations in this country.
We want no more abuses of Canadians' rights.
Privacy of personal information is part of the rule of law in this country. Canadian banks are subject to the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act and the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Act.
Only when the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada reports suspicious wire transfers or other transactions to the RCMP can the police seek the right to analyze the data.
There's no reason - not the fight against terrorism, not "the Mideast is a tough neighbourhood" excuse, etc. - that access should be any easier for foreign spies.
Covert actions tarnish Canada's reputation and undermine our relations with friendly countries.
They should stop once and for all.
© The Gazette (Montreal) 2007
No comments:
Post a Comment