Jerusalem – The communal nightmare of the kibbutz and moshav agricultural villages near Gaza is that bands of terrorists will dig under their communities and conduct surprise infiltrations from underground.

To cope with that deadly scenario, Israel has developed an underground sensor designed to detect tunnel construction and operation.

Israel’s Spider Technologies Security has produced and delivered sensors designed to detect and track underground activity. Executives said the Israeli military as well as the U.S. government have been testing the system for underground and above-ground use.

“The most recent tests in the U.S. involve tunneling detection,” SpiderTech marketing director Elkana Pressler said. “The demonstrations have shown that the SpiderTech sensor can accurately identify underground activity even with intense surface noise, like car and truck traffic.”

SpiderTech, based in Lod, near Israel’s International Ben Gurion Airport, was also commencing field trials of its sensor network in Europe and South America.

One of the sensor systems, Tarantula, was said to comprise a network of SpiderTech’s proprietary seismic sensors based on novel seismic measurement components along with signal specially designed processing technology that could detect and classify the approach of people above ground as well as underground activity. The network horizontal architecture allows coverage of tens of kilometers over regular PC base control station.

In prototype testing, Tarantula, said to have a false alarm rate of below 10 percent, detected people at a distance of 20 feet and light vehicles at 80 feet.

The ranges of the cylindrical three-dimensional sensor — each measuring 120 inches high x 80 inches in diameter and with a target positioning accuracy of up to five meters — were about twice that of existing sensor technology systems.

“Since the system is designed as a multi-layer decision maker, the sensors have a very low rate of false alarms, thus, being extremely difficult to bypass and enhance any existing perimeter security solution,” SpiderTech said on Sept. 29.

SpiderTech has signed a collaboration agreement with Israel’s Rada Electronic Industries for the producing and marketing of Tarantula – an effort that could result in contracts in 2010. Executives said Rada would focus on Western governments and militaries, particularly the United States. The system, which does not require a line of sight with targets, is within an on-going feasibility classified program by the U.S. Homeland Security and defense parties.

“We are currently focused on the high-end government market segment where our solution is urgently needed,” Pressler said. “We also intend to expand our offering and introduce a commercial product line, tailored for mini sites, portable stand alone solutions, home and residential protection.”
http://thebulletin.us/articles/2009/10/18/news/world/doc4adad976a5a6f774736902.txt

Underground Sensor To Assist Israel In Fighting Terrorists

By DAVID BEDEIN, Middle East Correspondent

Jerusalem – The communal nightmare of the kibbutz and moshav agricultural villages near Gaza is that bands of terrorists will dig under their communities and conduct surprise infiltrations from underground.

To cope with that deadly scenario, Israel has developed an underground sensor designed to detect tunnel construction and operation.

Israel’s Spider Technologies Security has produced and delivered sensors designed to detect and track underground activity. Executives said the Israeli military as well as the U.S. government have been testing the system for underground and above-ground use.

“The most recent tests in the U.S. involve tunneling detection,” SpiderTech marketing director Elkana Pressler said. “The demonstrations have shown that the SpiderTech sensor can accurately identify underground activity even with intense surface noise, like car and truck traffic.”

SpiderTech, based in Lod, near Israel’s International Ben Gurion Airport, was also commencing field trials of its sensor network in Europe and South America.

One of the sensor systems, Tarantula, was said to comprise a network of SpiderTech’s proprietary seismic sensors based on novel seismic measurement components along with signal specially designed processing technology that could detect and classify the approach of people above ground as well as underground activity. The network horizontal architecture allows coverage of tens of kilometers over regular PC base control station.

In prototype testing, Tarantula, said to have a false alarm rate of below 10 percent, detected people at a distance of 20 feet and light vehicles at 80 feet.

The ranges of the cylindrical three-dimensional sensor — each measuring 120 inches high x 80 inches in diameter and with a target positioning accuracy of up to five meters — were about twice that of existing sensor technology systems.

“Since the system is designed as a multi-layer decision maker, the sensors have a very low rate of false alarms, thus, being extremely difficult to bypass and enhance any existing perimeter security solution,” SpiderTech said on Sept. 29.

SpiderTech has signed a collaboration agreement with Israel’s Rada Electronic Industries for the producing and marketing of Tarantula – an effort that could result in contracts in 2010. Executives said Rada would focus on Western governments and militaries, particularly the United States. The system, which does not require a line of sight with targets, is within an on-going feasibility classified program by the U.S. Homeland Security and defense parties.

“We are currently focused on the high-end government market segment where our solution is urgently needed,” Pressler said. “We also intend to expand our offering and introduce a commercial product line, tailored for mini sites, portable stand alone solutions, home and residential protection.”

Jerusalem – The Goldstone report, which accuses Israel of war crimes in the course of Operation Cast Lead, was raised Thursday for discussion at the UN Human Rights Council, at the request of the Palestinian Authority.

Ahead of the discussion and the subsequent vote that will decide if the report will be adopted by the UN, Israel is getting into high gear.

Despite the low chances of obtaining a majority in Israel’s favor in the vote, politicians and diplomats are trying to influence a few countries in order to recruit them to Israel’s side.

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said last week that the Israeli battle against the report is very difficult because of the majority against Israel in the UN and in a number of UN committees.

He says that this battle will preoccupy Israel in the coming years.

High-ranking government sources said that as of now, the chances of the Goldstone report not being adopted are very low and it appears that the Palestinians will succeed in obtaining a majority.

At the moment, Israel is focusing its public relations activity in the countries belonging to the European Union, the African states, Asia and South America.

As part of the Israeli PR campaign, the work was divided between four people: President Shimon Peres, Prime Minister Netanyahu, Defense Minister Ehud Barak and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman. Each of them received a list with a number of heads of state with whom they will talk and ask them not to support the report.

Israel will warn that adopting the Goldstone report means ending the peace process, because Israel will not agree to wage a legal-diplomatic battle along with conducting a peace process.

“The Goldstone report will be part of the international discourse for a long time yet and will be a heavy burden on Israel in the international arena,” said a high-ranking Israeli source.

“We can cope with its ramifications but the problem is that it turns Israel into the defendant and makes the state into a leper. It’s not good for Israel when it is spoken about as if it is a country that commits war crimes.”

What particularly irks Israel is that Palestinian Authority Chairman Abu Mazen and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon are now aligned. The UN secretary general expressed his support for discussing the report at the U.N. Human Rights Council.

Jerusalem – This week, Jamal Muheisin, a member of the Fatah’s Central Committee, told Ma’an, the Palestinian news agency, that the Fatah, the ruling party of the Palestinian Authority, has signed an Egyptian-backed deal for reconciliation with Hamas. Hamas is defined by Israel, the U.S., the European Union, Canada, Russia and Australia as an illegal terrorist organization.

Hamas spokespeople said the party’s senior leadership has also approved the document, although they have not yet declared this publicly.

Other Palestinian factions are expected to respond by Oct. 20, and a formal signing ceremony will take place after the Islamic Eid Al-Adha holiday at the end of November. Hamas confirmed this schedule. Fatah leader Azzam Al-Ahmad will depart for Egypt at the beginning of the week to hand over the document, which he said was signed by Fatah’s supreme leader, President Mahmoud Abbas.

A Hamas official told the Ma’an news agency that the movement’s leaders have decided to sign the Egyptian proposal.

Ismail Al-Ashkar, a Hamas-affiliated member of the Palestinian Legislative Council (PLC) confirmed to Ma’an that Egypt set out a timeline calling on other factions to sign the deal by Oct. 20, with a signing ceremony after Eid Al-Adha.

In a statement, Mr. Al-Ashkar also shed light on the details of the Egyptian plan. He confirmed that the document calls for a Joint National Committee in lieu of a unity government. The committee would include 16 members and would represent Fatah, Hamas, and the other factions, the official said. He said the committee’s role is to implement a national unity agreement, and does not have any “political obligations” outside of this goal.

A U.S. government spokesperson said, in response to the new Fatah-Hamas accord, it would support the next Palestinian government if it follows certain conditions.

“We certainly favor an effective Palestinian government, and we are certainly supportive of a reconciliation process,” State Department spokesperson Philip Crowley said in a Washington press briefing.

“If you have a unity government that operates… on the basis of the principles that we’ve laid out, then we will be supportive of it,” Mr. Crowley stressed.

“We’ll be happy to work with whoever is in a Palestinian government that supports the principles,” he added.

Mr. Crowley was referring to the conditions of the international Quartet (the U.S., E.U., UN, and Russia), which stipulate that any Palestinian government must recognize Israel and renounce armed struggle.

That was the basis of the Declaration of Principles of the 1993 Oslo accord, which were hammered out between Israeli and Palestinian Fatah negotiators in Oslo, Norway on August 20, 1993 and signed on September 13, 1993 on the White House lawn by the two Fatah chieftains – Yassir Arafat and his protégé, Mahmoud Abbas, who has run the Palestinian Authority since Arafat died in November 2004.

Arafat and Mr. Abbas signed the agreement in the presence of President Clinton, the late Yitzhak Rabin and then-Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres.

However, the American government has consistently ignored the fact that the Fatah never ratified the Declaration of Principles of the 1993 Oslo accord. The Fatah executive committee met in special session on Oct. 6, 1993 to consider ratification of the Declaration of Principles of the 1993 Oslo accord. However, the Fatah would not ratify it, “for lack of a quorum” and has never ratified the Declaration of Principles of the 1993 Oslo accord.

Meanwhile, meeting in special session on April 24, 1996, the Palestine National Council considered cancellation of the PLO covenant, which defines the PLO purpose to destroy the state of Israel. Instead of canceling the PLO covenant, the PNC created a committee to consider changes in the PLO covenant. However, that committee has never met and the PLO covenant remains part and parcel of the Palestinian political reality. Yet, the American government acts as if the PLO cancelled its covenant, despite evidence to the contrary.

Jerusalem – This week, NATO approved the Israel Navy’s active inclusion in a NATO force patrolling the Mediterranean Sea in the framework of the global war on terror. This is the first open inclusion of its kind between the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) and NATO on an operational basis and its timing is particularly important at present, after Turkey canceled the largest aerial exercise of the alliance, which was to have included the participation of the Israel Air Force. 


NATO’s Operation Active Endeavour has been operating in the Mediterranean Sea since the September 11, 2001 terror attacks. The force is comprised of 10 vessels of different kinds, backed by submarines and aircraft, which work to prevent naval acts of terrorism and arms smuggling. The naval force monitors suspicious ships and, when necessary, raids them. NATO also escorts ships of the alliance until they leave the Mediterranean Sea at the Straits of Gibraltar as there is intelligence information that the ships are at risk. The majority of the ships that make up the force are from the navies of the members of NATO who have a shore on the Mediterranean Sea – Greece, Italy, Spain and Turkey, but are also helped by more major navies of NATO in the region. 


Israel relayed a request to have an Israeli ship join the force over 
two years ago, but approval was delayed time after time, and Israel remained outside the multi-national force. The Israeli security establishment 
believed that the reason, among other things, was the diplomatic 
sensitivity created in wake of criticism of Israeli’s actions in the Second Lebanon War and in Operation Cast Lead.

The news about the approval to join the special naval force was relayed to Israel Navy Commander Maj. Gen. Eliezer (Cheney) Marom in the course of his visit to the U.S. last week. Maj. Gen. Marom was there to take part in a global meeting of navy commanders. 


Sources in the Israeli security establishment affirm that the approval, given at this time, reflects NATO’s esteem for the Israel Navy’s capabilities under Marom’s command, to help prevent international acts of terror. 
 In the framework of this cooperation, an Israeli Navy officer was also stationed in the position of liaison at NATO’s naval headquarters in Naples, Italy. The decision to include a vessel, one of the Israel Navy’s most advanced missile boats that will join NATO’s active task force, is expected to be made soon. 


Mark of Esteem


The idea of having Israel join NATO had been raised occasionally in recent decades as part of the thinking about security guarantees for Israel – and no less, in order to acquire a sense of security and belonging to the world of its citizens – in the framework of a comprehensive arrangement in the Middle East. Today, this idea seems distant, as does a comprehensive arrangement. In Israel’s international situation today, with legitimacy for its military actions shrinking, the inclusion of an Israeli ship in the alliance’s naval police force is greeted as big news in Israel

In a Jerusalem Post article “In the land of miracles, let’s get real (Sept. 29),” Gershon Baskin describes Palestinian Prime Minister Salaam Fayad’s plan as “one of the most positive and optimistic developments of recent times.”

However, a reading of Fayad’s plan, entitled “Ending the Occupation, Establishing the State: Program of the Thirteenth Government (August 2009)” would seem to belie Baskin’s postulation.

While the preface to Mr. Fayad’s paper introduces a Palestinian state that would strive for “peace, security and stability in our region on the Palestinian territory occupied in 1967, with east Jerusalem as its capital,” Mr. Fayad’s 38-page position paper reads like a declaration of war, not of peace.

Mr. Fayad asserts that “Jerusalem” will be the Palestinian capital of the Palestinian state – not east Jerusalem.

In case anyone was wondering if Mr. Fayad had made a typographical error by not mentioning “east” Jerusalem as the capital of a future Palestinian state, he repeats – 10 times – that he means Jerusalem, all of Jerusalem. He leaves nothing to the imagination, and writes that the Palestinian state will “protect Jerusalem as the eternal capital of the Palestinian state,” because he asserts that, “Jerusalem is our people’s religious, cultural, economic and political center. It is the Flower of Cities and Capital of Capitals. It cannot be anything but the eternal capital of the future Palestinian state. Jerusalem.”

Mr. Fayad goes on to claim that Jerusalem “is under threat” and that “the occupying authority is implementing a systematic plan to alter the city’s landmarks and its geographical and demographic character in order to forcibly create facts on the ground, ultimately separating it from its Palestinian surroundings and eradicating its Arab Palestinian heritage.” Mr. Fayad further claims that “Palestinian life in Jerusalem is under daily attack through systematic violations perpetrated by the occupation regime” and that “it is the right and the duty of all Palestinians to protect their land, reject the occupation and defy its measures,” adding that the Palestinian state “bears special responsibility for nurturing our people’s ability to persevere and protect their homeland.”

He adds that the Palestinian government will maintain its “unreserved commitment to defending the Arab character and status of Jerusalem…. The government will continue to do all that is possible to achieve this goal. The government will work with all organizations to preserve the landmarks of Jerusalem and its Arab Palestinian heritage, develop the city, and secure its contiguity with its Palestinian surroundings.”

Mr. Fayad frames Jerusalem as an illegal settlement, postulating that, “the occupying authority is pursuing its intensive settlement policy in and around Jerusalem…. The occupation regime has shut down our national institutions, neglected the development of Palestinian life, continued to demolish and evacuate Palestinian homes, and restricted access to sacred Christian and Islamic sites.”

He goes so far as to present a practical plan to Arabize Jerusalem: Maintaining Jerusalem as a top priority on the government’s agenda and “highlighting its predicament in the media. Launching programs to promote the steadfastness of Jerusalemites, including: Strengthen Palestinian institutions in Jerusalem, providing financial support to help them deliver services to citizens.”

He reassures his readers that a future Palestinian state would not be satisfied with Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza as the national home for Palestinians, and says that the Palestinian government will continue to advocate for “Palestinian refugees in accordance with relevant international resolutions, and UN General Assembly Resolution 194 in particular,” which mandates that Palestinian refugees and their descendants have a right to return to the homes and villages that Palestinians left during the 1948 war and its aftermath.

Mr. Fayad reminds Palestinians that, “the refugee issue will remain under the jurisdiction of the PLO through its Department of Refugees’ Affairs… in a manner that does not exempt the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) from its responsibilities.” In Mr. Fayad’s view, UNRWA will therefore continue to confine Palestinian refugees and their descendants to the indignity of refugee camps under the premise and promise of the “right of return.”

Meanwhile, Mr. Fayad expresses full support for Palestinians who have been convicted of murder and attempted murder, saying that, “the state also has an enduring obligation to care and provide for the martyrs, prisoners, orphans and all those harmed in the Palestinian struggle for independence.” He simply cannot understand why Palestinians convicted of capital crimes should be jailed.

He proclaims that “the continued detention of thousands of Palestinian detainees and prisoners in Israeli prisons and detention camps in violation of international law and basic human rights is of great concern to all Palestinians,” and declares that “securing the freedom of all these heroic prisoners is an utmost Palestinian priority and it is a fundamental duty all Palestinians feel to honor their great sacrifices and end their suffering,” and demands the “freedom of all Palestinian detainees and prisoners and will continue to strive to secure their liberty.”

He further declares that the Palestinian state will be an Islamic state and will “promote awareness and understanding of the Islamic religion and culture and disseminate the concept of tolerance in the religion through developing and implementing programs of Shari’a education as derived from the science of the Holy Koran and Prophet’s heritage.”

In sum, the Palestinian prime minister concludes with a demand for a Palestinian state in the next two years, along the parameters that he has outlined – Jerusalem as the capital of an Islamic Shari’a state that will campaign for all convicts to be freed, for all refugees to return to the homes and villages that they left in 1948.

It would be instructive to know whether Baskin even bothered to read the plan before calling it a “positive development.”