The Jewish Defense League (JDL) is a far-right religious and political organization in the United States and Canada. Its stated goal is to "protect Jews from antisemitism by whatever means necessary"; it has been classified as "right-wing terrorist group" by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) since 2001, and is also designated as hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center. According to the FBI, the JDL has been involved in plotting and executing acts of terrorism within the United States. Most terrorist watch groups classify the group as inactive as of 2015.
The Lavon affair was a failed Israeli covert operation, codenamed Operation Susannah, conducted in Egypt in the summer of 1954. As part of a false flag operation, a group of Egyptian Jews were recruited by Israeli military intelligence to plant bombs inside Egyptian-, American-, and British-owned civilian targets: cinemas, libraries, and American educational centers. The bombs were timed to detonate several hours after closing time. The attacks were to be blamed on the Muslim Brotherhood, Egyptian communists, "unspecified malcontents", or "local nationalists" with the aim of creating a climate of sufficient violence and instability to induce the British government to retain its occupying troops in Egypt's Suez Canal zone. The operation caused no casualties among the population, but resulted in the deaths of four operatives. The overseer of the operation allegedly informed the Egyptians, after which 11 suspected operatives were arrested. Two died by suicide after being captured, two were executed by the Egyptian authorities, two of them were acquitted at trial, and the remaining five received prison terms ranging from 7 years to life in prison.
The Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations is the umbrella organization for the American Jewish community. Comprising 50 national Jewish organizations, it was founded in 1956 to develop a consensus voice among Jewish organizations, especially to the U.S. government.
Eliyahu Ben-Shaul Cohen was an Egyptian-born Israeli spy. He is best known for his espionage work in Syria between 1961 and 1965, where he developed close relationships with the Syrian political and military hierarchy.
A diplomatic bag, also known as a diplomatic pouch, is a container with certain legal protections used for carrying official correspondence or other items between a diplomatic mission and its home government or other diplomatic, consular, or otherwise official entity. The physical concept of a "diplomatic bag" is flexible and it can take many forms.
Victor John Ostrovsky is an author and intelligence officer who was a case officer in the Israeli Mossad for 14 months before his dismissal. After leaving the Mossad, Ostrovsky authored two books about his service with the Mossad: By Way of Deception, a #1 New York Times bestseller in 1990, and The Other Side of Deception several years later. Former US Congressman Paul Findley and Pete McCloskey stated Ostrovsky's courage saved the life of former President H.W. Bush However both books were criticized by journalists, scholars, and historians who are supportive of Israel stating it lacked historical accuracy and contained sensationalist claims.
Robert Soblen was a prominent member of the pro-Trotsky Left Opposition in Germany in the 1930s. He moved to the United States in 1941 with his brother Jack Soble, and was arrested in 1960 as a Soviet spy. Convicted and sentenced to life in prison, he fled the United States while on bail and sought asylum first in Israel, then in Britain. He committed suicide by overdosing on barbiturates when his last appeal for asylum in Britain was denied.
Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr, also known as Abu Omar, is an Egyptian cleric. In 2003, he was living in Milan, Italy, from where he was kidnapped and tortured in Egypt. This "Abu Omar case" prompted a series of investigations in Italy, culminating in the criminal convictions of 22 CIA operatives, a U.S. Air Force colonel, and two Italian accomplices, as well as Nasr, himself.
Alexander Michel Odeh was a Palestinian activist who was assassinated in a bombing in 1985. Odeh was the West Coast regional director of the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee.
Trunk to Cairo is a 1965 Israeli-West German international co-production spy film directed by Menahem Golan and starring Audie Murphy and George Sanders. It was distributed by American International Pictures. It was Murphy's first non-western or war film since The Quiet American in 1958.
Mordechai Vanunu, also known as John Crossman, is an Israeli former nuclear technician and peace activist who, citing his opposition to weapons of mass destruction, revealed details of Israel's nuclear weapons program to the British press in 1986. He was subsequently lured to Italy by the Israeli intelligence agency Mossad, where he was drugged and abducted. He was secretly transported to Israel and ultimately convicted in a trial that was held behind closed doors.
Gonen Segev is a former Minister of Energy & Infrastructure of Israel, member of Knesset, and pediatrician. In 2005 he was convicted of forgery, credit card fraud and attempting to smuggle drugs. In 2019 he was convicted of spying for Iran and was sentenced to 11 years in prison.
Yad Kennedy, located in the Mateh Yehuda Region near Jerusalem, is a memorial to John F. Kennedy, the 35th President of the United States, who was assassinated in Dallas, Texas in 1963. The 60-foot high (18 m) memorial is shaped like the stump of a felled tree, symbolizing a life cut short. Inside is a bronze relief of Kennedy, with an eternal flame burning in the center. It is encircled by 51 concrete columns, one for each of the 50 states in the United States plus one for Washington, D.C., the United States capital. The emblems of the states are displayed on each of the columns, and the columns are separated by slim panels of glass. The monument measures approximately 250 feet (76 m) in circumference around its base, and there is space within the memorial for approximately 100 visitors at a time. The monument was built in 1966 with funds donated by American Jewish communities.
Lev Tahor is an extremist Jewish sect founded by Shlomo Helbrans in 1988. Often described as a cult, it consists of about 200–300 members. The group follows a fundamentalist form of Jewish practice and adheres to its own atypical interpretations of Jewish law, including practices such as lengthy prayer sessions, arranged marriages between teenagers, and head-to-toe black coverings for girls and women beginning at the age of three. The group has faced accusations of kidnapping, sexual abuse, and child abuse, and some of its members have been charged and convicted of related offenses.
Jeffrey W. Castelli is a CIA officer who served as CIA station chief in Rome at the time of the Niger uranium forgeries. His subsequent involvement in the CIA-led kidnapping of Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr would lead to his subsequent sentencing to seven years in prison, by an Italian court, in 2013.
The Abu Omar Case was the abduction and transfer to Egypt of the Imam of Milan Hassan Mustafa Osama Nasr, also known as Abu Omar. The case was picked by the international media as one of the better-documented cases of extraordinary rendition carried out in a joint operation by the United States' Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Italian Military Intelligence and Security Service (SISMI) in the context of the global war on terrorism declared by the George W. Bush administration.
Sabrina de Sousa is a Portuguese-American ex-CIA operative convicted of kidnapping. In 2009 she was convicted of kidnapping in Italy for her role in the 2003 abduction of the Muslim imam Abu Omar, who was kidnapped in Milan and subsequently tortured. Sousa was sentenced to four years in prison for her role in the kidnapping. A European Arrest Warrant valid throughout Europe was subsequently issued for her arrest, and she was arrested in Portugal under that arrest warrant in 2015. She was due to be extradited back to Italy to serve her sentence, having exhausted her appeal rights against her extradition in Portugal, when the President of Italy issued her a pardon ending extradition proceedings against her in February 2017. She was still due to serve community service when she left Italy for the US in October 2019 citing fears for her safety.
Eliezer Berland is an Israeli Orthodox Jewish rabbi, convicted sex offender and fraudster affiliated with the Breslov Hasidic movement in Israel. He is "rosh yeshiva" of Yeshivat Shuvu Bonim, also known as Yeshivat Nechamat Zion, in the Muslim Quarter of the Old City of Jerusalem. The movement is sometimes viewed as being a sect. Berland is a member of Vaad Olami D'Chasedai Breslov, a supervisory council for many Breslov activities.
The Institute for Intelligence and Special Operations, popularly known as Mossad, is the national intelligence agency of the State of Israel. It is one of the main entities in the Israeli Intelligence Community, along with Aman and Shin Bet.
Eliyahu Michael "Eli" Ben-Dahan is an Israeli Orthodox rabbi and politician. He most recently served as a member of the Knesset for Ahi and Deputy Minister of Defense. In that position, he was responsible for "pre-military training academies, hesder program which combine military service and yeshiva study, military conversion programs, legislation between Israeli law and the military rule in Judea-Samaria, and to deal with public infrastructure in Judea-Samaria".
