‘ADC’ concerned Burnat LAX detention was result of recent info-sharing agreement between the US and Israel

by on February 22, 2013 7
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From an American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee press release on 5 Broken Cameras director Emad Burnat's detention at Los Angeles International Airport:

Burnat visited the United States six times last year and never faced any issues during previous visits. ADC President Warren David said today: “ADC is concerned that detaining Burnat came a result of a recent agreement between the United States and Israel.” Last week ADC filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, demanding that DHS-CBP provide information pertaining to an agreement between CBP’s Customs-Trade Partnership Against Terrorism, or C-TPAT, and the Israeli Tax Authority’s Authorized Economic Operator Program. 

ADC is inquiring about information being shared under the agreement, and whether that information is being used to racially profile Arab nationals and Arab Americans arriving to the US from abroad. As we know, Customs and Border policies used by Israel are notorious for aggressive profiling techniques, often resulting in extensive secondary searches for individuals of Arab descent. Many US citizens travelling from the US to and from Israel have been forced to strip-searches, and a number of individuals have flatout been denied entry.

The practice of using information to target Arab nationals is one used by the US government in the past. ADC has obtained exclusive documents that show how in the 1970’s the implementation of “Operation Boulder” resulted in the profiling of Arab nationals, including Arab Americans. In another FOIA filed by ADC in 2008, results obtained show that the US government shared sensitive information about Arab nationals with other nations. A memo obtained exclusively by ADC dated October 13, 1972 directs the US Embassy, Tel Aviv, to send telegrams to Washington, DC about Arabs residing in Israel or occupied territories visiting the United States. The telegrams contain “brief physical description, estimated date of arrival in the United States, local residence, and individual to be visited in the United States.” The info was furnished to the FBI, and shared with other nations.

Read the full press release here.

About Adam Horowitz

Adam Horowitz is Co-Editor of Mondoweiss.net.
Posted in Activism, Israel/Palestine, Israeli Government, US Policy in the Middle East, US Politics

{ 7 comments... read them below or add one }

  1. LanceThruster says:
    February 22, 2013 at 11:51 am

    Can we at least declare to US to be a FOG (Fascist Occupied Government)?

  2. pabelmont says:
    February 22, 2013 at 12:16 pm

    I recall when Ed Kennedy (Senator) was on a no-fly list. NB: “no-fly” does not mean enhanced body/baggage search (as far as I know) — it means “no fly”. Despite the general proposition that freedom to travel is a constitutional right of Americans. Doubt this (Kennedy) thing arose from USA/Israel connivance. No, it came from the utter stupidity and power-without-accountability-or-controls of the USA’s so-called “security” bureaucracy.

    Here, it was probably having Burnat’s family along and making the entirely laughable and preposterous claim that he was going to attend the academy awards as a niminee for a prize, or whatever. Of course this was preposterous! What d’you think, ICE folks are stoopid?

    • sardelapasti says:
      February 22, 2013 at 2:50 pm

      Sure Icemen are stoopid and how, but there is no way to wash away a well-grounded assumption that suggests itself before that. If he entered the States six times in a year without any problem and now that he caught everyone’s attention he gets stopped and irregularly threatened with immediate expulsion, that means that the stoopids probably received an order from the Zionists (ignore that “information exchange” euphemism.) There is no need for a cooperation agreement since the US government is now officially and publicly only a front for the other partner.

  3. Mike_Konrad says:
    February 22, 2013 at 3:06 pm

    New World Order stuff. To have an arrest record anywhere is to have an arrest record everywhere.

    A DUI will get one banned from Canada, now.

    Burnat was tagged on a non-violent protest in Israel. He is now tagged everywhere.

  4. DICKERSON3870 says:
    February 22, 2013 at 4:30 pm

    RE: “‘ADC’ concerned Burnat LAX detention was result of recent info-sharing agreement between the US and Israel”

    SEE: “Boston airport security program rife with racial profiling has Israeli links”, by Alex Kane, Mondoweiss, 8/14/12

    [EXCERPTS] Security officers at Boston’s Logan International Airport have come under fire for the widespread racial profiling of Arabs, Muslims, Blacks and Hispanics in their zeal to ferret out terrorists.
    The New York Times broke the story over the weekend after officers who requested anonymity came forward; some officers have complained internally to the Transportation Security Agency as well. A Massachusetts lawmaker has called for congressional hearings on the racial profiling allegations.
    The Times reports that officers estimated that “80 percent” of passengers “searched during certain shifts” were people of color. What’s more, the Boston airport “is the testing ground for an expanded use of behavioral detection methods at airports around the country.”
    But what’s not touched on in the Times report is the fact that Logan International’s security procedures are modeled on Israel’s policies at their own airport–policies that are blatantly racist. . .
    . . . The Israel connection is integral to understanding Boston’s racial profiling problems. In 2009, according to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), the Jerusalem Post reported that “Boston’s Logan Airport has tapped the Israeli company New Age Security Solutions to help secure the facility using Behavior Pattern Recognition.” . . .
    . . . It took until August 2011 for the Israeli-inspired model to be operationalized. That was the date when the “behavioral profiling” became an official model at Boston’s airport–and this was “a direct result” of “Israeli influence” on security procedures at the airport    , according to the Associated Press.
    Fast-forward to the New York Times story. The Times reports that one anonymous TSA officer complained that this “behavior detection program is no longer a behavior-based program, but [rather] a racial profiling program.”
    To observers of how Israeli security works at Ben Gurion Airport, the allegations of racial profiling will come as no surprise. Palestinian and Arab travelers at Ben Gurion are guaranteed to be harassed by Israeli security. . .

    ENTIRE ARTICLE – link to mondoweiss.net

    • DICKERSON3870 says:
      February 22, 2013 at 4:35 pm

      P.S. RE: “But what’s not touched on in the Times report is the fact that Logan International’s security procedures are modeled on Israel’s policies at their own airport–policies that are blatantly racist. . .” ~ Alex Kane (from above)

      MY COMMENT: This is yet another reason I fear that Revisionist Zionism and Likudnik Israel (specifically by virtue of their inordinate sway over the U.S.) might very well be an “existential threat” to the values of The Enlightenment ! ! !
      “Down, down, down we [the U.S.] go into the deep, dark abyss; hand in hand with Israel.”

      ● OTHER EXAMPLES OF ISRAEL’S VALUES TRUMPING (OVERRIDING) THE VALUES OF THE ENLIGHTENMENT HERE IN THE U.S.
      • “How We Became Israel”, By Andrew J. Bacevich, The American Conservative, 9/10/12
      LINK – link to theamericanconservative.com
      • “America Adopts the Israel Paradigm”, by Philip Ghiraldi, Antiwar.com, 7/05/12
      LINK – link to original.antiwar.com
      • “Report: Israeli model underlies militarization of U.S. police”, By Muriel Kane, Raw Story, 12/04/11
      LINK – link to rawstory.com
      • From Occupation to “Occupy”: The Israelification of American Domestic Security, By Max Blumenthal, Al-akhbar, 12/02/11
      LINK – link to english.al-akhbar.com OR link to informationclearinghouse.info
      • “The Trial of Israel’s Campus Critics”, by David Theo Goldberg & Saree Makdisi, Tikkun Magazine, September/October 2009
      LINK – link to tikkun.org
      • “Brooklyn College’s academic freedom increasingly threatened over Israel event”, by Glenn Greenwald, guardian.co.uk, 2/02/13
      LINK – link to guardian.co.uk
      • ‘Israelis are helping write US laws, fund US campaigns, craft US war policy’, by Philip Weiss, Mondoweiss, 6/30/12
      LINK – link to mondoweiss.net
      • “David Yerushalmi, Islam-Hating White Supremacist Inspires Anti-Sharia Bills Sweeping Tea Party Nation”, by Richard Silverstein, Tikun Olam, 3/02/11
      LINK – link to richardsilverstein.com
      • “Obama’s kill list policy compels US support for Israeli attacks on Gaza”, By Glenn Greenwald, guardian.co.uk, 11/15/12
      LINK – link to guardian.co.uk

      ● P.S. AND HERE’S ANOTHER THREAT TO THE VALUES OF “THE ENLIGHTENMENT” (THIS TIME IN AFRICA):
      “US Religious Right Propelling Homophobia in African Countries”      , by Common Dreams, 7/24/12
      LINK – link to commondreams.org

  5. Citizen says:
    February 23, 2013 at 10:59 am

    The US has officially worked with Israel to track, monitor collect information on any Arab coming to the US from Israel or Israel-occupied territory since at least 1973. link to issuu.com