DARKER SIDE OF U.S.- ISRAELI TIES REVEALED

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000807260012-9
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 12, 2012
• Sequence Number: 12
• Publication Date: June 5, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/01/12 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000807260012-9
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NEW YORK TIMES
5 June 1986
Darker Side of U. S. -Israeli Ties Revealed ;
sk,
By BERNARD WEINRAUB
Special to The New York Times
WASHINGTON, June 4 - Relations
between United States and Israeli intel-
ligence agencies are normally marked
by intimate cooperation. But the guilty
pled today by Jonathan Jay Pollard,
corfibined with the naming of four Is-
raeli officials as co-conspirators who
were not indicted, underlines another
facet of the relationship: When the in-
terests of the two nations diverge, they
spy on each other.
By all indications the United States
has been inclined to forgive the Israelis
f pie Pollard case, and officials at the
Viite House and elsewhere in the Ad-
augistration were plainly seeking to
treat it as an isolated incident in a re-
markably close military and intelli-
gedce relationship of more than three
decades. Mr. Pollard pleaded guilty to
ore count of espionage for selling mili-
t~y secrets to the Israelis.
Yet the case has in recent months
stirred concern within the White
1 oltse, the Central Intelligence Agen-
cy,, the Pentagon, the State Depart-
rpe~tt, the Federal Bureau of Investiga-
tipn and other agencies about the de-
gt g to which Israel has been able to
obtain sensitive information on United
States secret weapons, policy delibera-
tiots and advanced technology. The
P~bl~ard case itself has left a thread of
uncertainty and annoyance among
some United States officials.
,., 'Expect Full Cooperation'
"Ouite frankly it's too premature to
speculate about this because the inves-
tleation is continuing," said an Admin-
istration official. "But we do expect
full cooperation of the Israelis on this."
Asked if the Israelis were fully coop-
erating, the official replied: "The Is-
rs+elis are cooperating but we expect
ft dl cooperation. Let's leave it at that."
'Certainly United States-Israeli intel-
ligence cooperation has been intense
since the 1950's and, officials say, ties
have grown even closer in recent years
with the United States giving Israel ac-
cess to more reconna sance satellite
data.
The two nations shad' large amounts
of'-information about terrorism and
Soviet activities in the Middle East.
Tice Israelis, for their part, have been
especially useful to the United States in
providing captured Soviet-made mili-
tary equipment after the 1967 and 1973
wars in the Middle East, offering infor-
mation from countries such as Iran,
where the Israelis still have contacts,
as well as data on nuclear develop-
ments in Pakistan, officials have said.
Beyond this out of self-interest and
mutual need, 'U.S. and Israeli intelli-
gence organizations have maintained a
discreet arrangement since the 1950's,
banning covert operations against each
other," wrote Wolf Blitzer, a Washing-
ton correspondent of The Jerusalem
Post, in his book, "Between Washing-
ton and Jerusalem: A Reporter's Note- The cooperation between the
C.I.A. and the Mossad, Israel's foreign
intelligence service, was "so close that
the two organizations do not really
have to spy on each other."
Both nations are, of course, sover-
eign. Their respective interests, while
rarely colliding, sometimes diverge.
The Israelis, for example, have been
frustrated by the refusal of the United
States to provide certain information
on troop deployments by moderate
Arab countries, including Jordan and
Egypt. Moreover, some Israelis have
said that the United States declined to
turn over all the intelligence data that
would be helpful in protecting Israel.
A classified study by the C.I.A. in
1979 said two of the principal goals of
Israeli intelligence were the "collec-
tion of information on secret U.S.
policy or decisions" concerning Israel
and the "collection of scientific intelli-
gence in the United States and other de-
veloped countries."
Seeking to obtain scientific and tech-
nical intelligence, the report said Is-
raeli agents had made "attempts to
penetrate certain classified defense
projects in the United States and other
western nations." The study did not
give examples.
Earlier Spying Cited
The Pollard case is not the only ex-
ample of Israeli spying to have come to
the attention of United States law-en-
forcement officials. But the case is the
first one to be prosecuted. Moreover,
the Federal Bureau of Investigation
knew of at least a dozen incidents in
which American officials transferred
classified information to the Israelis,
Raymond W. Wannal Jr., a former
assistant director of the bureau, told a
reporter late last year. The Justice De-
partment did not prosecute.
At the same time, John Davitt, for-
mer chief of the Justice Department's
internal security section, said: "When
the Pollard case broke, the general
media and public perception was that
this was the first time this had ever
happened. No, that's not true at all. The
Israeli intelligence service, when I was
in the Justice Department, was the sec-
ond most active in the United States, to
the Soviets."
Mr. Davitt, who left the Justice De-
partment in 1980 after 30 years, said
most of the Israeli activity focused on
gathering information on Arab coun-
tries. But, he said, "There we
stances in which we were tarp
"They would approach someone is
our Government and in our defeosa.l*
dustries and seek to obtain clameloo
information," he said.
By all accounts, though, and despite
the strains, the intelligence ties be.
tween the United States and IsraeLss-
main intense, and American officials
have praised the skill with which the Is-
raelis have gathered data.
The Israelis, according to tom
counts, have even been responsibl for
providing some historic into
For example, the Israeli agents iaA
widely believed to have obtained so
provided to the C.I.A. % copy of,dA
speech in which Nlkita S. Kht'Ka VbM
then the Soviet leader, denounged
(Stalin before the 20th Congress of ,Jbp
Soviet Communist Party in 1966. j
Declassified and Approved For Release 2012/01/12 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000807260012-9