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I'm glad that there is some internal opposition to the Israeli cyberterrorism trade. However, it is sad that K does not feel that they can come out openly about

I'm glad that there is some internal opposition to the Israeli cyberterrorism trade. However, it is sad that K does not feel that they can come out openly about their position in famously the only democracy in the middle east. I don't think people understand the devastation caused by just one of NSO's sales. Every country should teach in school the true cost of their own arms trades. Depressingly it seems peace can only be found within a weapons contract. How long do we wait for stability and freedom? Which arms shareholder's bank balance needs to be satiated before we can have peace? This community is full of talented and privileged people, if you are reading this I compel you to not lift a single finger in the way of another person's demise - no matter how sophisticated the abstraction or large the paycheck.

sagiegurari 6y ago
when you face extermination and terrorism maybe you will understand how the world works and what needs to be done to survive. peace sometimes comes from understanding of others strength.
- smashah 6y ago
  You don't know me. And I don't know you. But "We face extermination therefore we should be able to get rich by selling our (cyber)weapons to despots who in turn use it against their own citizens" doesn't sound like a winning argument.
  - marshmallow_12 6y ago
    If you phrase it like that, then no. how about "We face extermination, therefore we shall train soldiers who will work for us for a while, they will be able to make a living after their service using those skills"
    - smashah 6y ago
      >they will be able to make a living They can, and many have made a "living" by moving on to working on normal tech startups. Nobody needs to make a killing to make a "living".
      - marshmallow_12 6y ago
        The Multibillion dollar global defense industry refutes you.
        smashah 6y ago
        Not sure about you, but I don't concede any moral authority to "The Multibillion dollar global defense industry" so the refutation is invalid to say the least.
        marshmallow_12 6y ago
        I do. warfare breeds innovation via the military industry, jets, computers, internet, radar, advanced etc etc etc etc, All of which were catalyzed by warfare. You don't need to like it, but you probably wouldn't be able to let me know without acknowledging it.
        smashah 6y ago
        Wow. The industry has technological authority, but that doesn't mean it is owed a moral authority. Just how (I hope) you wouldn't give moral authority to a grooming gang just because they're super efficient in their trafficking techniques.
  - NeverFade 6y ago
    How many cybersurveillance tools are developed and sold by companies in the US, China, Russia, UK, and quite a few other nations? But let's focus on Israel again, always the safe scapegoat.
    - smashah 6y ago
      Easy one. Nobody should be selling these things to anyone else. Everyone should keep their weapons to themselves. If you are able to make it, well done now you have that upper hand in that arena. Cant make it? Sorry you can't buy it. Making it and have surplus? Sorry can't sell it - do something useful for society with all that brain power.
      - NeverFade 6y ago
        Right, "nobody should", but everyone does. And somehow we're again laser-focused on just the Israelis who do it. I wonder why.
        smashah 6y ago
        Oh I see where the confusion lies. This article is about the cyberterrorism companies inside the state of Israel, that's why. If you have articles where other countries are doing this (which of course they are) then please tag me and I will gladly condemn them also.
- mola 6y ago
  That's such a straw man. You don't have to build a huge commercial industry around the tech we make for our intelligence bureaus. The Israeli intelligence has become a way for greedy people to become billionaires at the price of killing democracy. I'm Israeli, and I know a lot of people in this industry. I know many people like me who actively refuse to work on active offensive cyber solutions because of moral reasons. OTH I see many greedy people working in NSO and the only thing they think about is money. They don't give a damn about positive or negative consequences of the industry they work in.
- _alxk 6y ago
  how does selling spyware to authoritarian regimes to crackdown on opposition and activists have anything to do with their own survival?
  - marshmallow_12 6y ago
    It helps fund new research. It's not exactly rocket science. Do you have any better complaints?
  - sagiegurari 6y ago
    the people work there usually start in areas of intelligence as stated. at that field, all work is done for protection. ignoring that is naive. not sure why even comment, most of the people here lack basic understanding of reality of life here. when you run with your kids for shelter from missiles, we will talk
    - _alxk 6y ago
      first of all, half my family are war refugees from a field that is way more dangerous than Israel has been in the last 20 years, so let's talk. you're making a ridiculous leap from "worked in intelligence for the government" to "starts selling spyware to the worst human rights abusers in the planet". it just looks to me like you're in the camp of "my country can do no wrong". I'm also British and feel fine openly criticizing my government for selling weapons to the Saudis.
- Daho0n 6y ago
  Sad how different this reads if you look at it as written by a Muslim or Jew. I wish it made no difference.
  - wizzwizz4 6y ago
    To me, it doesn't. The people in a position to do this kind of thing are not the same people as are facing the oppression.
- stefan_ 6y ago
  Selling Turkey a WhatsApp 0day and operating the C&C servers for use in a war zone isn't contributing to peace and Israels survival, it's a war crime. NSO employees should probably be jailed the moment they leave the country.
  - NeverFade 6y ago
    How about all the employees of all the other companies involved in the exact same activities? Sorry, I forgot, we're only targeting the Israelis. Literally the exact same action is tolerated when anyone else performs it, but when some Israeli company does, it's a "warcrime" and they must be "jailed". Chinese authorities are putting millions of minorities in prison re-education camps. Where are the calls to prosecute them for war-crimes? Nah, they just get thank-you notes in Disney movie credits, instead. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/09/08/disney-thanked-groups-linked-to-china-detention-camps-in-mulan-credits.html https://www.cnbc.com/2020/09/08/disney-thanked-groups-linked...
    - techfoolery 6y ago
      C'mon guy, that's not good faith argument. I have a whole twitter full of folks calling for war crimes against what China's doing; Not to mention, Disney got plenty of backlash for that move from the people paying attention. (Google Disney Xinjiang and it's so ubiquitous I don't feel the need to link myself) Seems your problem is more with mainstream media. You're deflecting from the argument at hand here. Not to mention, the wrongs of the Israeli cybersec industry, like with NSO group, seem much less covered than Xinjiang genocide (to me, but I'm sure there's ways to quantify the coverage differential)
      - NeverFade 6y ago
        My point is that there's a massive propaganda campaign targeted specifically at Israel. Many Western and non-Western nations are developing these kinds of tools. They are not at all unique to Israel. Yet again and again, we are exposed to publications targeting Israeli companies, specifically. This article doesn't even try to hide the fact that it is focused on Israel as a nation, while several other nations operate in this space. > Disney got plenty of backlash for that move from the people paying attention "So much backlash", yet nothing has been done. Mulan is still distributed, and that thank-you note to Chinese authorities who build and maintain massive prison camps is still there. It's almost like all these "moral concerns" are just thinly-veiled real politics.
- DSingularity 6y ago
  I wonder, would Israel face the violent opposition it faces today if Israel wasn’t founded through the terrorization of, extermination of, and colonization of the indigenous Palestinian people? It is well documented and widely accepted that groups like the Irgun and Haganah —- led by many of Israels most celebrated figures — resorted to terrorism and genocide to establish the supremacy of the Israelis.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - lr4444lr 6y ago
    You're aware that the Israeli military openly purged extremist groups, yes? Those paramilitary orgs predated the state of Israel to fight the British. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altalena_Affair https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altalena_Affair
    - DSingularity 6y ago
      Really? What do you make of former Irgun leader Menachem Begin? FYI he eventually became prime minister and is definitely a celebrated figure in Israel. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Menachem_Begin https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Menachem_Begin
      - Udik 6y ago
        Described by Albert Einstein and Hannah Arendt as "the leader of a party akin to the German Nazi party". https://www.haaretz.com/jewish/.premium-1948-n-y-times-letter-by-einstein-slams-begin-1.5340057 https://www.haaretz.com/jewish/.premium-1948-n-y-times-lette...
    - shrubble 6y ago
      How many from the (Lehi)/Stern Gang and Irgun, among others, later achieved high ranking political success in Israel? Both Begin and Shamir come to mind. Despite siding with the Nazis in WW2, Lehi membership was first granted a general amnesty and later an award was named in their honor.
- celticninja 6y ago
  when you face extermination and terrorism maybe you... Would think twice before creating tools for others to do this exact thing
- saiya-jin 6y ago
  I think Germany in 30s had broadly a very similar mindset, being humiliated, driven to utter poverty, and they felt they were doing what was necessary to survive as a nation. I guess you don't hear that as an excuse for their WWII atrocities often. In other situation it would be funny to point direct parallels between above and state of Israel, but this ain't even slightly funny topic. They achieved impressive things, but these kind of actions make them lose any moral points pretty quickly.
  - sagiegurari 6y ago
    humiliation is something very different! and you are comparing what israel does to nazi germany? nice
- cblconfederate 6y ago
  Selling their systems to totalitarian governments like azerbaijan is wreaking havok and not advancing peace for israelis. with great power comes great responsibility, yet a lot of israelis play the amoral card in my experience
- dang 6y ago
  Please don't take HN threads further into nationalistic flamewar. This one turned out to be hellish all over this thread, and it's not what this site is for. Nothing so repetitive is what this site is for. High-repetition plus high-indignation equals bad-for-HN. I'm not saying the indignation isn't understandable—of course it is. But users here need to use the site for its intended purpose, not for things that destroy its intended purpose. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
nickik 6y ago
> in famously the only democracy in the middle east. Except it isn't. Just because you draw an arbitrary border between the populations under your control doesn't mean those people don't exists. Israel is in control of these population, and they have no right to vote. In my opinion that makes them not worthy of being called a democracy.
- fileyfood500 6y ago
  Israel doesn't want to own or control these populations. The west bank is largely self governing, and Israel pulled out of the Gaza strip and helped orchestrate free elections there. Not exactly the same, but if quebec separated from canada and attempted to join the united states, was rejected, and then was self policing but monitored for crime by the US government in response to periodic violence, would you say the US is therefore not a democracy since they barred the people of Quebec from joining the country? Alternatively, if some of the people in Quebec said the US shouldn't exist and devoted the government to eliminating the US, and the US responded with a naval blockade to prevent arms from being shipped to Quebec, would you then conclude that the US is not a democracy? I think you can definitely question Israel's handling of interactions with the West Bank, especially around the military interactions. But I wouldn't say that Israel isn't a democracy. There are people in Israel who want to annex those territories, and make the people in them citizens. But most people in the territories and in Israel don't want that. The people of the territories refuse to be annexed, and most Israelis don't want to annex them.
  - nickik 6y ago
    Israeli armed forces have been in control of these population for 50 years. The West bank is basically a patch work of Bantustan-style territories surrounded by Israel controlled territory. Israel controls most of the resources, like water and most of the infrastructure. Those things are made available to Israeli settlers but Palestinians are barley allowed to move from one Bantustan to another. At the very same time as Israel claims not to be responsible for that area, they also claim the right to move in 10000s of people people into that very area every year. Israel went out of those territories because close domination is expensive, however simply surrounding the territories, taking their resources and restricting their movement is a cheaper way to control the population.

sagiegurari 6y ago

when you face extermination and terrorism maybe you will understand how the world works and what needs to be done to survive. peace sometimes comes from understanding of others strength.

smashah 6y ago
You don't know me. And I don't know you. But "We face extermination therefore we should be able to get rich by selling our (cyber)weapons to despots who in turn use it against their own citizens" doesn't sound like a winning argument.
- marshmallow_12 6y ago
  If you phrase it like that, then no. how about "We face extermination, therefore we shall train soldiers who will work for us for a while, they will be able to make a living after their service using those skills"
  - smashah 6y ago
    >they will be able to make a living They can, and many have made a "living" by moving on to working on normal tech startups. Nobody needs to make a killing to make a "living".
    - marshmallow_12 6y ago
      The Multibillion dollar global defense industry refutes you.
      - smashah 6y ago
        Not sure about you, but I don't concede any moral authority to "The Multibillion dollar global defense industry" so the refutation is invalid to say the least.
        marshmallow_12 6y ago
        I do. warfare breeds innovation via the military industry, jets, computers, internet, radar, advanced etc etc etc etc, All of which were catalyzed by warfare. You don't need to like it, but you probably wouldn't be able to let me know without acknowledging it.
        smashah 6y ago
        Wow. The industry has technological authority, but that doesn't mean it is owed a moral authority. Just how (I hope) you wouldn't give moral authority to a grooming gang just because they're super efficient in their trafficking techniques.
- NeverFade 6y ago
  How many cybersurveillance tools are developed and sold by companies in the US, China, Russia, UK, and quite a few other nations? But let's focus on Israel again, always the safe scapegoat.
  - smashah 6y ago
    Easy one. Nobody should be selling these things to anyone else. Everyone should keep their weapons to themselves. If you are able to make it, well done now you have that upper hand in that arena. Cant make it? Sorry you can't buy it. Making it and have surplus? Sorry can't sell it - do something useful for society with all that brain power.
    - NeverFade 6y ago
      Right, "nobody should", but everyone does. And somehow we're again laser-focused on just the Israelis who do it. I wonder why.
      - smashah 6y ago
        Oh I see where the confusion lies. This article is about the cyberterrorism companies inside the state of Israel, that's why. If you have articles where other countries are doing this (which of course they are) then please tag me and I will gladly condemn them also.
mola 6y ago
That's such a straw man. You don't have to build a huge commercial industry around the tech we make for our intelligence bureaus. The Israeli intelligence has become a way for greedy people to become billionaires at the price of killing democracy. I'm Israeli, and I know a lot of people in this industry. I know many people like me who actively refuse to work on active offensive cyber solutions because of moral reasons. OTH I see many greedy people working in NSO and the only thing they think about is money. They don't give a damn about positive or negative consequences of the industry they work in.
_alxk 6y ago
how does selling spyware to authoritarian regimes to crackdown on opposition and activists have anything to do with their own survival?
- marshmallow_12 6y ago
  It helps fund new research. It's not exactly rocket science. Do you have any better complaints?
- sagiegurari 6y ago
  the people work there usually start in areas of intelligence as stated. at that field, all work is done for protection. ignoring that is naive. not sure why even comment, most of the people here lack basic understanding of reality of life here. when you run with your kids for shelter from missiles, we will talk
  - _alxk 6y ago
    first of all, half my family are war refugees from a field that is way more dangerous than Israel has been in the last 20 years, so let's talk. you're making a ridiculous leap from "worked in intelligence for the government" to "starts selling spyware to the worst human rights abusers in the planet". it just looks to me like you're in the camp of "my country can do no wrong". I'm also British and feel fine openly criticizing my government for selling weapons to the Saudis.
Daho0n 6y ago
Sad how different this reads if you look at it as written by a Muslim or Jew. I wish it made no difference.
- wizzwizz4 6y ago
  To me, it doesn't. The people in a position to do this kind of thing are not the same people as are facing the oppression.
stefan_ 6y ago
Selling Turkey a WhatsApp 0day and operating the C&C servers for use in a war zone isn't contributing to peace and Israels survival, it's a war crime. NSO employees should probably be jailed the moment they leave the country.
- NeverFade 6y ago
  How about all the employees of all the other companies involved in the exact same activities? Sorry, I forgot, we're only targeting the Israelis. Literally the exact same action is tolerated when anyone else performs it, but when some Israeli company does, it's a "warcrime" and they must be "jailed". Chinese authorities are putting millions of minorities in prison re-education camps. Where are the calls to prosecute them for war-crimes? Nah, they just get thank-you notes in Disney movie credits, instead. https://www.cnbc.com/2020/09/08/disney-thanked-groups-linked-to-china-detention-camps-in-mulan-credits.html https://www.cnbc.com/2020/09/08/disney-thanked-groups-linked...
  - techfoolery 6y ago
    C'mon guy, that's not good faith argument. I have a whole twitter full of folks calling for war crimes against what China's doing; Not to mention, Disney got plenty of backlash for that move from the people paying attention. (Google Disney Xinjiang and it's so ubiquitous I don't feel the need to link myself) Seems your problem is more with mainstream media. You're deflecting from the argument at hand here. Not to mention, the wrongs of the Israeli cybersec industry, like with NSO group, seem much less covered than Xinjiang genocide (to me, but I'm sure there's ways to quantify the coverage differential)
    - NeverFade 6y ago
      My point is that there's a massive propaganda campaign targeted specifically at Israel. Many Western and non-Western nations are developing these kinds of tools. They are not at all unique to Israel. Yet again and again, we are exposed to publications targeting Israeli companies, specifically. This article doesn't even try to hide the fact that it is focused on Israel as a nation, while several other nations operate in this space. > Disney got plenty of backlash for that move from the people paying attention "So much backlash", yet nothing has been done. Mulan is still distributed, and that thank-you note to Chinese authorities who build and maintain massive prison camps is still there. It's almost like all these "moral concerns" are just thinly-veiled real politics.
DSingularity 6y ago
I wonder, would Israel face the violent opposition it faces today if Israel wasn’t founded through the terrorization of, extermination of, and colonization of the indigenous Palestinian people? It is well documented and widely accepted that groups like the Irgun and Haganah —- led by many of Israels most celebrated figures — resorted to terrorism and genocide to establish the supremacy of the Israelis.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- lr4444lr 6y ago
  You're aware that the Israeli military openly purged extremist groups, yes? Those paramilitary orgs predated the state of Israel to fight the British. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altalena_Affair https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Altalena_Affair
  - DSingularity 6y ago
    Really? What do you make of former Irgun leader Menachem Begin? FYI he eventually became prime minister and is definitely a celebrated figure in Israel. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Menachem_Begin https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Menachem_Begin
    - Udik 6y ago
      Described by Albert Einstein and Hannah Arendt as "the leader of a party akin to the German Nazi party". https://www.haaretz.com/jewish/.premium-1948-n-y-times-letter-by-einstein-slams-begin-1.5340057 https://www.haaretz.com/jewish/.premium-1948-n-y-times-lette...
  - shrubble 6y ago
    How many from the (Lehi)/Stern Gang and Irgun, among others, later achieved high ranking political success in Israel? Both Begin and Shamir come to mind. Despite siding with the Nazis in WW2, Lehi membership was first granted a general amnesty and later an award was named in their honor.
celticninja 6y ago
when you face extermination and terrorism maybe you... Would think twice before creating tools for others to do this exact thing
saiya-jin 6y ago
I think Germany in 30s had broadly a very similar mindset, being humiliated, driven to utter poverty, and they felt they were doing what was necessary to survive as a nation. I guess you don't hear that as an excuse for their WWII atrocities often. In other situation it would be funny to point direct parallels between above and state of Israel, but this ain't even slightly funny topic. They achieved impressive things, but these kind of actions make them lose any moral points pretty quickly.
- sagiegurari 6y ago
  humiliation is something very different! and you are comparing what israel does to nazi germany? nice
cblconfederate 6y ago
Selling their systems to totalitarian governments like azerbaijan is wreaking havok and not advancing peace for israelis. with great power comes great responsibility, yet a lot of israelis play the amoral card in my experience
dang 6y ago
Please don't take HN threads further into nationalistic flamewar. This one turned out to be hellish all over this thread, and it's not what this site is for. Nothing so repetitive is what this site is for. High-repetition plus high-indignation equals bad-for-HN. I'm not saying the indignation isn't understandable—of course it is. But users here need to use the site for its intended purpose, not for things that destroy its intended purpose. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

nickik 6y ago

> in famously the only democracy in the middle east. Except it isn't. Just because you draw an arbitrary border between the populations under your control doesn't mean those people don't exists. Israel is in control of these population, and they have no right to vote. In my opinion that makes them not worthy of being called a democracy.

fileyfood500 6y ago
Israel doesn't want to own or control these populations. The west bank is largely self governing, and Israel pulled out of the Gaza strip and helped orchestrate free elections there. Not exactly the same, but if quebec separated from canada and attempted to join the united states, was rejected, and then was self policing but monitored for crime by the US government in response to periodic violence, would you say the US is therefore not a democracy since they barred the people of Quebec from joining the country? Alternatively, if some of the people in Quebec said the US shouldn't exist and devoted the government to eliminating the US, and the US responded with a naval blockade to prevent arms from being shipped to Quebec, would you then conclude that the US is not a democracy? I think you can definitely question Israel's handling of interactions with the West Bank, especially around the military interactions. But I wouldn't say that Israel isn't a democracy. There are people in Israel who want to annex those territories, and make the people in them citizens. But most people in the territories and in Israel don't want that. The people of the territories refuse to be annexed, and most Israelis don't want to annex them.
- nickik 6y ago
  Israeli armed forces have been in control of these population for 50 years. The West bank is basically a patch work of Bantustan-style territories surrounded by Israel controlled territory. Israel controls most of the resources, like water and most of the infrastructure. Those things are made available to Israeli settlers but Palestinians are barley allowed to move from one Bantustan to another. At the very same time as Israel claims not to be responsible for that area, they also claim the right to move in 10000s of people people into that very area every year. Israel went out of those territories because close domination is expensive, however simply surrounding the territories, taking their resources and restricting their movement is a cheaper way to control the population.