May 27,
2008: Israel recently revealed that it
had arrested and indicted an Israeli who had been born in Iran. The suspect had
gone to the Iranian embassy in Turkey, to obtain a visa to travel to Iran
(where many Israelis from Iran still have kin). But while he was there, he had
passed information to Iranian intelligence officials. Israeli officials would
not reveal any more, but it is known that Iranian intelligence regularly tries
to get Israelis, with family in Iran, to do intelligence work. The Iranians can
threaten to harm family members in Iran (where Jews have lived for over two
thousand years), if intelligence information is not provided. It's believed
that some past cases of persecution of Jews in Iran (including imprisonment and
execution) were related to these intelligence gathering activities. Israel does
not have any restrictions on its citizens visiting Iran, but it does warn those
with kin in Iran, that they may be subject to pressure by Iranian intel
operatives, and all such contacts must be reported to the Israeli government.
Iranians
are not the only problem in this department. Some Jewish-Americans, especially
academics, are anti-Israel (or at least agree with Iran, and most Arabs that Israel is the bad guy in the
Israel-Palestinian dispute). Recently, a Jewish-American academic was barred
from entering Israel, and banned from doing so for ten years. Israeli
intelligence feared that the academic, who had earlier met with Hizbollah
officials in Lebanon, might also be used by Iranian intelligence for
information gathering, or for some propaganda campaign.
It's
become very fashionable in academia to take the side of the Palestinians, and
treat Israel as evil incarnate. This makes anti-Israel academics susceptible to
pleas from Iran, or the Palestinians, to "do anything" to help. Often all that
is asked for is information, and enough small bits of data can be very valuable
to a skilled intelligence operative.
