4 ms·

I find it interesting that NSO, an Israeli surveillance technology company, was allowed to have such dealings with Saudi Arabia. Their statement that "the sole

by gnode 7y ago

I find it interesting that NSO, an Israeli surveillance technology company, was allowed to have such dealings with Saudi Arabia. Their statement that "the sole purpose of NSO is to provide technology to licensed government intelligence and law enforcement agencies [...]" implies that their technology is subject to export controls. My understanding is that Saudi Arabia has poor diplomatic relations with Israel.

arcanim 7y ago
You have no idea. They don't. Israelis have been cozying up to Saudi and UAE for a while now, while it's not something you will read about in the major newspapers yet, you will find articles written about this by smaller publications. People only think Saudi must have poor relations with Israel based on somewhat outdated geopolitics, it's basically an assumption because "Saudi is an Arab country and therefore Israel must not do stuff with them", except you find out this is somewhat ridiculously false even going back decades, with all kinds of Arab regimes/groups dealing with Israelis. Just remember one thing the Arab people != the Arab regimes. They are mostly corrupt and could care less what their citizens actually want, so this should make more sense to you. You can look up several cases of Israeli companies (many with ties to the state) dealing with Arab countries. This is true especially of Saudi Arabia, UAE, Egypt & Jordan (which actually both have treaties with Israel... And somewhat less secret official relations). Most people don't know enough about the Middle East or pay enough attention to their politics to notice these things, which is understandable if you're not from the region. There was also that documentary made by Al Jazeera about Israeli lobbies (which was censored btw, ironically enough due to Israeli lobbying... What a great way to prove their point), in that documentary one of those guys mentions contacts in Arab countries. Honestly at this point anybody paying attention should have realized these ties. This shouldn't even be surprising all these countries involved are corrupt and shitty, Israel is only looked at in a weird way in the United States, outside of it people realize how extremely shitty that country is, if it wasn't for the US interests and Israeli Lobbies which in turn influence politics and Corporate media most Americans would see Israel as garbage, unless they are evangelicals. I don't think I need to talk about Saudi.
hassancf 7y ago
Sorry to say this but your understanding on Israel - Saudi relations is poor: they are excellent. I don’t blame you since the media usually carry that narrative. Anyone who can protect the rulers from the people is in excellent terms with the rulers. The rest is just posturing.
nradov 7y ago
It's complicated. Officially Saudi Arabia has no diplomatic relations with Israel and considers them as illegal occupiers in Palestine. But that's just for PR purposes in the Arab Muslim world. However behind the scenes they frequently cooperate and share intelligence on matters of mutual interest.
- Scoundreller 7y ago
  Thank you for bringing this up. It reminds me of Canadian telecoms. While they officially compete to extract more cash from customers, they’ll also call each other up and share infrastructure instead of duplicating builds. E.g. Telus built towers in its territory, and Bell did in its, and they just share them. Much cheaper than redundant builds and customers usually won’t notice when everyone in the car loses reception at the same time. Then there’s the stuff that they just do through signalling. Huh, our “competitor” is going to start charging for incoming SMS and the billing vendor that we all use just rolled it out as a new feature. Great!
einpoklum 7y ago
Your understanding is wrong. Saudi Arabia has great relations with Israel - they're just not being officially flaunted that much. In fact, not only is Israel's politicians and state apparatus acting in synch with Saudi positions and interests, but even the media and academia are awash with pundits and so-called experts which are essentially parroting the skewed Saudi outlook: Demonization of Iran, presentation of almost every conflict in the region as Shiites vs Sunni, suppression of criticism of US/Saudi-supported regimes and strong men, ignoring the government's active support of Islamic fundamentalists etc.

by gnode 7y ago

arcanim 7y ago

You have no idea. They don't. Israelis have been cozying up to Saudi and UAE for a while now, while it's not something you will read about in the major newspapers yet, you will find articles written about this by smaller publications. People only think Saudi must have poor relations with Israel based on somewhat outdated geopolitics, it's basically an assumption because "Saudi is an Arab country and therefore Israel must not do stuff with them", except you find out this is somewhat ridiculously false even going back decades, with all kinds of Arab regimes/groups dealing with Israelis. Just remember one thing the Arab people != the Arab regimes. They are mostly corrupt and could care less what their citizens actually want, so this should make more sense to you. You can look up several cases of Israeli companies (many with ties to the state) dealing with Arab countries. This is true especially of Saudi Arabia, UAE, Egypt & Jordan (which actually both have treaties with Israel... And somewhat less secret official relations). Most people don't know enough about the Middle East or pay enough attention to their politics to notice these things, which is understandable if you're not from the region. There was also that documentary made by Al Jazeera about Israeli lobbies (which was censored btw, ironically enough due to Israeli lobbying... What a great way to prove their point), in that documentary one of those guys mentions contacts in Arab countries. Honestly at this point anybody paying attention should have realized these ties. This shouldn't even be surprising all these countries involved are corrupt and shitty, Israel is only looked at in a weird way in the United States, outside of it people realize how extremely shitty that country is, if it wasn't for the US interests and Israeli Lobbies which in turn influence politics and Corporate media most Americans would see Israel as garbage, unless they are evangelicals. I don't think I need to talk about Saudi.

hassancf 7y ago

Sorry to say this but your understanding on Israel - Saudi relations is poor: they are excellent. I don’t blame you since the media usually carry that narrative. Anyone who can protect the rulers from the people is in excellent terms with the rulers. The rest is just posturing.

nradov 7y ago

It's complicated. Officially Saudi Arabia has no diplomatic relations with Israel and considers them as illegal occupiers in Palestine. But that's just for PR purposes in the Arab Muslim world. However behind the scenes they frequently cooperate and share intelligence on matters of mutual interest.

Scoundreller 7y ago
Thank you for bringing this up. It reminds me of Canadian telecoms. While they officially compete to extract more cash from customers, they’ll also call each other up and share infrastructure instead of duplicating builds. E.g. Telus built towers in its territory, and Bell did in its, and they just share them. Much cheaper than redundant builds and customers usually won’t notice when everyone in the car loses reception at the same time. Then there’s the stuff that they just do through signalling. Huh, our “competitor” is going to start charging for incoming SMS and the billing vendor that we all use just rolled it out as a new feature. Great!

einpoklum 7y ago

Your understanding is wrong. Saudi Arabia has great relations with Israel - they're just not being officially flaunted that much. In fact, not only is Israel's politicians and state apparatus acting in synch with Saudi positions and interests, but even the media and academia are awash with pundits and so-called experts which are essentially parroting the skewed Saudi outlook: Demonization of Iran, presentation of almost every conflict in the region as Shiites vs Sunni, suppression of criticism of US/Saudi-supported regimes and strong men, ignoring the government's active support of Islamic fundamentalists etc.