US, British intelligence agencies spied on Israelis and Palestinians, files show

Documents accessed by a French newspaper show that American and British intelligence agencies worked together to spy on diplomats, academic researchers and defense contractors in Israel and the Palestinian territories. Last year, the German newsmagazine Der Spiegel and the American newspaper The Wall Street Journal reported that the United States National Security Agency spied on senior Israeli politicians throughout the last decade, including Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and his successor, Benjamin Netanyahu. Now French daily Le Monde has alleged that the NSA teamed up with its British equivalent, the Government Communications Headquarters to spy on Israeli foreign service officials and diplomats, academic researchers and defense contractors. The newspaper also alleged that British and American spies targeted Palestinian government officials.

According to Le Monde, the information came from documents leaked by Edward Snowden, a former employee of the NSA and the Central Intelligence Agency, who is currently living in Russia. Snowden defected there in June 2013, after initially fleeing to Hong Kong with millions of stolen US government documents in his possession. In a leading article on Wednesday, the newspaper claimed that British and American spy agencies have systematically targeted senior officials in Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Jerusalem. Several Israeli foreign service officials stationed abroad have also been targeted, said Le Monde, including Israel’s ambassadors to Nigeria and Kenya. But the Anglo-American intelligence alliance has also targeted Palestinian government institutions, including the Office of the Secretary General of the Palestinian Liberation Organization. Senior Palestinian officials that have been spied on include Ahmed Qurei, a former prime minister of the Palestinian National Authority, and Ahmad Tibi, a member of the Israeli Knesset who served as an advisor to Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in the 1990s.

Palestinian diplomats stationed around the world have also been targeted by the NSA and the GCHQ, said Le Monde, in cities such as Paris, Brussels, Lisbon, Islamabad, Pretoria, and Kuala Lumpur. The documents also show that the two intelligence agencies have spied on Israeli defense contractors, including a company named Ophir Optronics, which works in the areas of laser and fiber optic technologies. Finally, the French newspaper said that research centers throughout Israel had been targeted, including scientific laboratories located at the Jerusalem-based Hebrew University.

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