Public Intelligence Blog

Josh Kilbourn

High Alert! Millions Of Bankers Cant Bank Online. BofA Blames Hackers From Middle East. Bank Cyber Attacks By Iran? Black Monday October 1, 2012?

The financial and banking industries are on high alert tonight as a massive cyberattack continues, with potentially millions of customers of Bank of America, PNC and Wells Fargo finding themselves blocked from banking online.

“There is an elevated level of threat,” said Doug Johnson, a vice president and senior adviser of the American Bankers Association. “The threat level is now high.”

“This is twice as large as any flood we have ever seen,” said Dick Clarke, an ABC News consultant and former cybersecurity czar.

Sources told ABC News that the so-called denial of service attacks had been caused by hackers from the Middle East who had secretly transmitted signals commandeering thousands of computers worldwide.

Hackers, Possibly From Middle East, Block U.S. Banks’ Websites

A group of purported hackers in the Middle East has claimed credit for problems at the websites of both banks, citing the online video mocking the founder of Islam. One security source called that statement “a cover” for the Iranian government’s operations.

The attack is described by one source, a former U.S. official familiar with the attacks, as being “significant and ongoing” and looking to cause “functional and significant damage.” Also, one source suggested the attacks were in response to U.S. sanctions on Iranian banks.

Senior U.S. officials acknowledge that Iranian attacks have been the subject of intense interest by U.S. intelligence for several weeks. Last week, the Joint Chiefs of Staff’s Intelligence Directorate, known as J-2, confirmed continuing Iranian cyber attacks against U.S. financial institutions in a report described as “highly classified.”

Officials see Iran, not outrage over film, behind cyber attacks on US banks

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DefDog

I know nothing about the science, but this seems credible–certainly worth considering.

World Renown Nuke Expert Nails Bibi to the Wall on Iran Bomb Threat

Jim W. Dean

EXTRACT (Letter Only, Editorial Hyperbole Detracts)

Dear Prime Minister Netanyahu:

Iran may be in your red zone, but can not score.

Sure, Iran could divert a few tons of 3.5% or a ton of 20% enriched uranium hexaflouride gas for enrichment to 90+%. But what then?

No one has ever made a nuclear weapon from gas. It must be converted to metal and fabricated into components which are then assembled with high explosives.

Iran lacks experience with and facilities for these processes which are very dangerous because of potential for a criticality accident or nuclear explosion. Iran would not jeopardize its important, fully safeguarded nuclear programs by an attempt to have a deliverable, one kiloton yield nuclear weapon ten to fifteen years later.

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Who, Me?

YouTube, 1:54, absolutely worth watching!

Today’s nominee for the Larry Silverstein Award for Chutzpah Beyond the Call of Duty: Israel lobbyist Patrick Clawson, who is openly calling for the mass murder of Americans, along the lines of the USS Maine, Lusitania, Pearl Harbor, USS Liberty, and (by implication) 9/11 orchestrated war-trigger events.

Tip of the Hat to Kevin Barrett at Veterans Today.

WATCH THE SHORT VIDEO

Phi Beta Iota:  The Israel lobbyist ably recounts false flags from WWI and WWII to Viet-Nam, neglects to mention 9/11 and the 935 now-documented lies led by Dick Cheney that took the USA into wars that restored Afghanistan as the world’s #1 supplier of opium (and Pakistan as the #1 producer of heroin) while destabilizing the entire Middle East.

Click on Image to Enlarge

Saudi Arabia: Saudi Arabia and Bahrain discussed a political union at a meeting in Riyadh on 13 May. The arrangement under discussion would allow Bahrain to retain its seat at the United Nations, but the two states would merge foreign relations, defense and economic policy, according to press sources. The details have not been released.

Bahrain’s Prime Minister, the Army Chief of Staff and the Foreign Minister – all members of the al-Khalifa royal family — have stated their support for the union.

Comment: The King of Bahrain and the royal family are Sunni Muslims who govern a population of mostly Shiite Muslims. Thus, the news that a union with Saudi Arabia is under discussion has prompted widespread criticism that Saudi Arabia intends to make Bahrain a vassal state so as to keep the Shiites disenfranchised and subjugated.

On the other hand, the limited information in the public domain suggests Bahrain’s administration of internal affairs will not be changed by the union proposal. Bahrain, by itself, is not defensible against an Iranian attack or subversion, but in a union arrangement with Saudi Arabia it would not be alone.

Saudi King Abdallah has warned Iran repeatedly against meddling in Arab affairs. This union is consistent with his policy decision to stop Iranian meddling in Arab countries as well as the spread of Shi’i Islam which the Sunnis consider a heresy.

One advantage of the union would be that it would bypass tricky conditions attached to US foreign military sales. Conditions of the sales include that US military equipment can only be used for defense, cannot be resold without US permission and cannot be used outside the recipient country without US permission. Under a union arrangement, the Saudis would not need to consult the US before sending Saudi forces equipped with US tanks and armored personnel carriers back to Bahrain, unless they chose to.

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Phi Beta Iota:  It is entirely possible that Saudi Arabia is moving to a whole new level of global diplomacy, information-sharing, military alliances, and economic entanglements (DIME).  Qatar is similar to Bahrain in multiple ways.  Below is a map of the Sunni – Shi’ite spread.  A religious war is brewing, not just Sunni – Shi’ite, but Pentecostals against Islam, Jews against everyone, Catholics in a panic, and so on.  We say it again:  counter-intelligence generally, and religious counter-intelligence specifically, is the ONE 21st Century aspect of the craft of intelligence that must continue to be secret and that must *explode* in the near-term.  Note:  within the eight “tribes” or communities, we include religion and labor organizations within the Civil Society tribe.  The others are academic, commerce, government at all levels, law enforcement, media, military, and non-government/non-profit.

See Also:

Graphic: Muslim Sunni – Shi’ite Distribution (Global)

2012 PREPRINT AS SUBMITTED: The Craft of Intelligence

Interactive: Map: US bases encircle Iran

Dozens of US and allied forces’ military installations dot the region, from Oman, UAE and Kuwait to Turkey and Israel.

Doha, Qatar - US military bases continue to form a strategic envelope around Iran, although the American withdrawal from Iraq at the end of 2011 may have changed the regional balance somewhat towards Iran’s favour. While US forces are scaling back in many parts of the globe due to budget cuts – and have begun a gradual depature from Afghanistan to be completed by 2014 – their international presence remains vast.

From an active-duty force of 1.4 million soldiers, the US has deployed some 350,000 troops to at least 130 foreign countries around the world. Some are at Cold War-era installations, but many are in or near combat zones in the Middle East. At more than 750 bases internationally, private contractors and third-country nationals also form a large percentage of the staff, in addition to military reservists and civilian employees of the Pentagon.

US military installations in the Middle East serve to keep an eye on Iran, but their regional footprint was significantly expanded well before Iran became the most publicly cited foreign “threat”.

There were three reasons why the US sought a presence across the Middle East, says Mehran Kamrava, Director of the Center for International and Regional Studies at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service in Qatar:

“Securing oil resources, guaranteeing the security of the state of Israel and combating threats to American interests” were the initial priorities of US military activity in the region prior to the first Gulf War, Kamrava says.

“Subsequently, direct military presence wasn’t in the form of impositions, but the [security umbrella] was a conscious policy decision on the part of the Persian Gulf states.”

See Interactive Map

Earlier Version with Black Dots:  Graphic: US Bases (44) Surrounding Iran

Richard Wright

An Mini-Me would say, “Huh”?

US intelligence gains in Iran seen as boost to confidence

Israel’s Escalating Rhetoric on Iran

By following Israel in lawlessness, the US is sullying its own constitution

by Abolala Soudavar

Veterans Today, 3 April 2012

In September of 2010, a group of the Friends of the Freer and Sackler Museums of Washington DC were visiting Iran. As a former member of the board of these museums, I naturally extended an invitation for the group to visit the Malek Public Library and Museum in Tehran, an institution that was endowed by my grandfather to the Shrine of the Eighth Imam. To coincide with this visit, the Malek Library had organized a small exhibition of religious texts—Islamic, Christian, Zoroastrian and Jewish—at the center of which stood a magnificent 18th century Torah scroll. The scroll had been recently donated to the Malek Library by the Chief Rabi of one of Tehran’s synagogues, and the exhibition was meant to honor this donation. The donors of the scroll were therefore invited to attend the opening of the exhibition.

The Chief Rabi, or Khakham as they are called in Iran, was accompanied by a junior Rabi who spoke English and served as his interpreter. When one of the visitors asked the Chief Rabi “for how long have you lent the scroll to the Library?” he jokingly answered that “contrary to the general belief that Jewish people cannot depart with their precious belongings, this was not a loan but a donation.” Furthermore, the junior Rabi revealed that he taught two days a week at the Holy City of Ghom, at a seminary of Talmudic studies organized for Shiite theology students. To the American visitors, it looked surreal: while the official propaganda in the US portrayed Iran as a country bent on exterminating the Jews, in Iran proper, Rabis were donating gifts to an institution that operated under the aegis of a Shiite shrine, joked around, and taught the Talmud to theology students in Ghom.

When this was related by my sister to Eugene Schulman, an antiquarian and bibliophile friend in Geneva, he took it upon himself to complement the Rabis’ generous gift with one of his own: he donated to the Malek Library a most rare volume, a copy of the first edition of the first translation of the Koran into English by George Sale, published in 1734.

Today, there are of course those who, like Eugene Schulman, despite being of Jewish faith, see through Israeli propaganda and prefer a cordial approach to animosity. There are also those who like the Freer and Sackler visitors—one third of whom were also of Jewish faith—want to have a first-hand opinion and visit Iran. But for a vast majority of the population at large, who remain at the mercy of the virulent Israeli propaganda machine, Iran has been so demonized that the threat of bombing, and the killing of thousands of innocent civilians, almost seems to be an accepted right of Israel!

Read full article with many links, photos, and several important videos.

Phi Beta Iota:  While Israel may still attack Iran after the November 2012 elections, Iran is not a nuclear threat and both Israel and the USA know this.  Right now the primary purpose of the Iran “threat” is to drive oil prices up so really evil bets made on oil futures pay off, and to distract the world from the dramatic expansions of the settlements–not that we oppose them, but in the absence of a legitimate coherent Palestinian state with no ghettos and no walls, we do not believe the US taxpayer should be paying a single cent for anything having to do with Israel (or Arab militaries).

See Also:

<Iran Israel nuclear> at Phi Beta Iota

Iran – European Union – Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (Swift): Swift, the communications provider for secure financial transactions for more than 10,000 financial institutions and corporations around the world announced it will disconnect Iran’s banks from the system.

On its home page, SWIFT published the following news item:

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Chuck Spinney

Did Obama Take Netanyahu’s Cape?

Syria-Saudi Arabia: During Friday’s meeting in Tunisia, Saudi Foreign Minister Saud al-Faisal said he supported giving weapons and ammunition to groups fighting the Syrian regime. “I think it’s an excellent idea,” Prince Saud told reporters in Tunisia. Asked why, he replied: “Because they have to defend themselves.”

Comment: Prince Saud’s remarks make clear that Saudi Arabia has decided to roll back the Shiite heresy in Syria and block Iranian influence in Arab lands.

Syria-Hamas: On Friday, Hamas leaders, including Ismail Haniya, publicly turned against the al-Asad regime in Syria by announcing their support for the opposition. During Friday prayers at Al Azhar mosque in Cairo, Haniya said, “I salute all people of the Arab Spring, or Islamic winter, and I salute the Syrian people who seek freedom, democracy and reform.” The crowd answered with calls of “No Hezbollah and no Iran” and “the Syrian revolution is an Arab revolution.”

The policy change also was announced at a rally in the Gaza strip. Hamas’ leadership also confirmed longstanding reports that they have vacated offices in Damascus and moved to Lebanon.

Comment: The Hamas statements, if backed by action, represent a strategic setback for Iran and seem to signify that Hamas has reconciled with Arab leaders, such as the Saudis and the Muslim Brotherhood. This does not signify a reduction in hostility toward Israel, but the Palestinian cause appears to be an Arab cause once again.

Last year the Saudis warned the Iranians on several occasions to cease meddling in Arab affairs. A Saudi role in Hamas’ change of policy has not been reported, but its congruence with Saudi desires and interests to contain Iran strongly suggests significant Saudi involvement.

While Iran is maintaining its defiance over nuclear issues, it is proving unable to preserve its strategic position west of Baghdad. It is being contained on multiple fronts.

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NIGHTWATCH on Syria at Phi Beta Iota