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Sorry, I'm late.
I had to stop by the wax museum again and get the finger that FDR.
We know Al Qaeda Zawahiri is supporting the opposition in Syria.
Are we supporting Al Qaeda in Syria?
It's a proud day for America.
And by God, we've kicked Vietnam syndrome once and for all.
Thank you very, very much.
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The meeting of the largest armies in the history of the world.
Then there's going to be an invasion.
All right, you guys introducing Alex Kane.
He's a freelance journalist, right?
Sometimes for the intercept.
This one is at in these times, and it's called ending deadly collusion between us and Israeli police.
Welcome to the show.
How you doing Alex?
I'm good.
How about you?
Thanks for having me on.
I'm doing good, man.
Good to talk to you again.
I know it's been a little while here.
And you're always doing great work on Palestine issues, man.
Thank you.
Appreciate that.
Yeah, yeah.
So this is really important one.
And it's something that I don't know, man, I guess I'm willing to say maybe most people who are interested in these type of subjects have heard of this, but I don't even think I know very much about it.
And it's American police going to Israel to train.
And so the the event that inspires your report here is that, as you say, this time was different, because this time the Jewish voice for peace chapter in Washington, D.C., decided that they wanted to do a publicity stunt and, you know, call some attention to this problem.
Yeah.
So in general, you know, this issue is undercover.
I think you're right that people who follow the politics of Israel in the United States know about the fact that hundreds of American police officers fly to Israel, have flown to Israel in the past decade and a half or so, and have trained with Israeli commanders.
But, you know, not a lot of people know about it.
And so Jewish Voice for Peace has started a new campaign called Deadly Exchange.
And this campaign is about calling attention to and trying to stop police exchange programs between American cops and Israeli security forces.
In Washington, D.C., they obtained a document through a public records request that showed that a Washington, D.C. police officer was joining a delegation in September alongside, you know, maybe a dozen other police officers from around the country to Israel sponsored by the Anti-Defamation League.
And they obtained this and they swung into action.
So my reporting sort of followed what they did.
You know, they got some coverage of it and then they got a D.C. councilman to write to the city's police chief about how he was troubled that a police officer would be trained with Israeli security forces because they are security forces that have engaged in serial human rights violations.
Yeah, pretty big deal.
And so then what kind of reaction came from that?
Well, you know, as far as I know, the delegation, you know, went forward and, you know, obviously the ADL did not cancel the delegation because it was found out or got some bad publicity.
So nothing, you know, concrete came out of the attention that JVP brought to this delegation.
But, you know, it's just one part of a larger campaign that Jewish Voice for Peace is building on.
You know, they're doing protests and teach-ins and legislative campaigns to try to end police delegations to Israel.
They're also pointing out that, you know, this exchange goes both ways.
Israeli commanders have come to the United States to speak with American police officers and have, you know, for instance, the head of the Israeli police came to New York to meet with the NYPD to talk about broken windows policing, which is, you know, this policing philosophy that going after petty offenses like jumping turnstiles or graffiti on subways will somehow lead to an overall reduction in violent crime, which has been, you know, a philosophy in New York in the late 80s, 90s, and until today.
So the Israeli police chief came over to learn about that.
So there's a real two-way exchange going on that JVP is interested in and wants to, you know, call attention to it and ultimately stop.
Mm-hmm.
Well, it's interesting you mentioned GINSA, the Jewish Institute for National Security Affairs, and their role in creating this.
I think it was Colin Powell who called the Cheney fifth column inside the Bush Jr. government there, the men from GINSA.
This was really, you know, along with AEI and WINEP and the Center for Security Policy, GINSA was really at the core of the group that led us into war with Iraq.
I believe David Wormser and a lot of those guys, right?
Yeah.
Well, you know, I'm not as familiar, I think, as you are with their role in the Iraq war.
I definitely know that they're a neoconservative group.
I mean, I haven't tracked them since 2003.
But what I do know is that, you know, after 9-11, they created their own program called the LEAP program, Law Enforcement Exchange Program, that has brought, you know, many police officers to Israel for training.
And, you know, so GINSA has done it, the Anti-Defamation League has done it, the American Jewish Committee has done it.
Many different types of pro-Israel groups in the United States have done this.
You know, they have framed it as, you know, the American law enforcement should learn from Israel about how to combat terrorism.
And, you know, it's also a way to solidify the Israeli-American relationship at a more personal level.
You know, obviously, the American-Israeli relationship has many different facets, economic, diplomatic, military.
This is just another part of that.
And it's a part that focuses on, you know, cops in American cities and getting them to understand the world and understand the terrorism threat through Israel's eyes.
Right.
Well, and just as they say about occupying the West Bank, right, it's all about establishing facts on the ground.
So after years and years of this, this becomes part of police culture in America that, oh, yeah, we're all friends with the Israelis.
We love seeing things their way.
We all do see things their way.
We have for many years now.
Yeah.
I mean, you know, I think it's important to note that, you know, it's not as if, you know, American policing has its own problems.
They don't need Israel to teach them these problems.
They don't need Israel to teach them how to, you know, abuse the rights of Americans.
So, you know, I just want to be clear with listeners that the Jewish Ways for Peace campaign is not about saying that absent Israel, if Israel was never created, American cops would not have problems.
That's not what their campaign is saying.
But their campaign is calling attention to a troubling exchange of tactics.
And it's, you know, important to place it in the context of the global war on terrorism and how Israel has successfully marketed itself as a, you know, a model for how law enforcement around the world should treat the issue of terrorism.
And Israel, of course, can do that because they have had, you know, 50 years of experience in occupying the West Bank, Gaza, and Jerusalem.
And, you know, basically using a military to do police tactics of controlling civilian populations.
Well, yeah.
Oh, by the way, just in parentheses here, I guess it was Jason Vest who coined the phrase the men from JINSA.
It's the men from JINSA and CSP.
That's Frank Gaffney's group, the Center for Security Policy.
This is an article August 15th, 2002.
So just right around the time that Dick Cheney was giving his VFP speech and making all of his initial round of accusations against Iraq.
Jason Vest was coming out with this.
It's in The Nation magazine.
The men from JINSA and CSP.
Sorry for just since they got brought up here.
It's important.
It's not a group that gets that much publicity.
But yeah.
And now as far as what you're saying about American police.
Boy, oh boy, do we got problems with American police.
And that's the real problem here.
Right.
Is that as our police are really being turned into paramilitary occupying troops in our cities, that this is exactly what the Israelis are training them on.
It is, as you say, what they're doing anyway.
But more specifically, it's not just that there are abuses, right.
You know, bad practices in in testimony, in evidence collection, in race as it comes into play, who they target, this, that, the other thing.
It's also just really turning them into troops, changing them from anything like a peace officer or even a pretense of a real security force for the people to an occupying army over them.
And then so this is my real question.
I'm getting to a question.
Check it out.
The question is, which cops over there are training our cops?
Is it the shin bet who are like the FBI kind of or is it the IDF actual troops or is it the guys who do the local police patrols in Tel Aviv?
Because, of course, they have a whole different set of practices, right?
Well, you know, that's a really good question, actually.
It's actually all of them, all of the above.
And, you know, there's actually not.
So a couple of things, a couple ways to answer this question.
So it's all of the above.
It's Israeli army commanders.
It's Israeli police commanders.
And it is the shin bet.
It's also, you know, people that work at for the Israeli airports authority.
It is, you know, basically the full range of Israeli security forces that are participating in this training program.
For instance, in 2016, I actually obtained a document from the Orlando Police Department because the Orlando Police Department had participated in an anti-defamation counterterrorism seminar in Israel.
And just as an example of this trip, they spoke with, you know, someone from the shin bet, someone from the Israeli National Police, someone from an Israeli special patrol unit, you know, someone from, you know, intelligence analysts in the Israeli police.
And, you know, former majors from the army.
I mean, you know, like former brigadier generals from the army.
It's really like a whole range of people.
But what's also important to note is that it's not as if the Israeli police don't operate in the West Bank.
They do.
People may not know this, but basically all Israeli security forces operate in both Israel proper and in the occupied territories.
So, you know, the Israeli, they're sort of an integrated unit.
They obviously have different functions.
And but, you know, it's important to note that the Israeli police also do operations in the West Bank.
And they're constantly sharing intelligence and tactics with the army as well.
All right.
Hang on just one second.
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All right.
So now, I wonder if you have any anecdotes about American cops coming back and saying, yeah, we sure learned some new kicks or we sure learned some new excuses for cracking somebody's skull open or whatever it is.
Yeah.
Well, in my article for In These Times, I quote what a LAPD officer said.
And so this LAPD delegation had gone to Israel to attend a conference in Israel.
It was a homeland security conference.
And so this is what he said.
This is what the Los Angeles Police Department's commander of information technology said in 2016.
He said, let's be honest.
This whole idea of best practices is just a euphemism for we're here to steal some of your great ideas.
A lot of great ideas in technology, indeed, you do have here in Israel.
He goes on to say, we are much more alike than disalike.
As civilized nations, we are all confronted with, in many cases, the same enemy, the ever-growing threat of terrorism and other major criminal elements.
That's just one example.
A lot of these officers that come back say, we now know why Israel is so important, why Zionism is so important.
And then also a lot of them also say these similar things about war on terror tactics and how they're so important and how they understand why they need to have, say, for instance, an integrated security camera network in a particular place like they have in Jerusalem, all of these various things.
And there's also another example of how the Israeli model has become enticing to American law enforcement.
This anecdote is not from a delegation, but it's telling.
I think in Standing Rock, the indigenous Native American anti-pipeline camp, a JVP member obtained some emails about what cops around Standing Rock were saying.
He gave a speech at JVP's conference last year and talked about how Standing Rock, the law enforcement around the anti-pipeline camp, had emailed about Israeli skunk trunk.
The skunk trunk is a truck that goes around the West Bank and sprays toxic water at Palestinian protesters, and it smells awful.
And so this Standing Rock law enforcement person, I'm forgetting the name of the specific law enforcement agency, but a law enforcement agency in North Dakota was saying, oh, this is so great.
Look, if we had this, we would be great.
We would spray these protesters, and we would just be like the Israelis, and they know how to do it.
So this model is really prominent, and people know about it.
And of course, American cops know about it.
Yeah, well, you know, it's interesting.
What's usually an analogy to American Indians, you know, at least on this show, the way I like to frame it a lot is, you know, they act like, oh, they're for Apache.
The Israelis are for Apache for Western civilization, you know, out there on the plains or whatever it is.
But all that, which in a sense sort of is true, if you want to put it that way, surrounded by indigenous people and all that, but also, it ignores or kind of glosses over the victory over the Palestinians in the West Bank back 50 years ago.
And the fact that they've been already beaten and subjugated and occupied this whole time.
And sometimes I'll say on this show, it's sort of like, you know, we leave the Navajo with the reservation out there in Arizona.
But in this case, it's like if we just kept bombing them, kept harassing them, kept them on permanent lockdown and all this stuff, the way the Israelis do to the Palestinians.
And yet, as you're explaining, like, who's who gets it when it's time for the Israeli stink truck or whatever?
It's American Indians still to this day, getting beat up on on their Indian reservations.
I mean, the parallel is just too far.
There's something that Max Blumenthal and I talked about on the show years ago, I think before he even started writing Goliath or maybe when he was just starting to write Goliath, is that this is really just like what the Americans did to the Indians, although and we like to say did in the past tense.
And yet we're at least sorry about that.
Mostly, right.
The American people kind of think that, yeah, boy, if only it had gone different, if only we had just had a stink truck to keep them in line, maybe we wouldn't have had to genocide them all, something like that, you know, whereas the Israelis just keep right on going.
But anyway, it's just too bothersome of a thing, you know, something we feel guilty about and still do anyway.
Yeah, I would just underscore that, you know, the subjugation of indigenous people in the United States is an ongoing issue, even though it may be not as overt as genocide.
It's important to note that Standing Rock showed how native peoples in the United States, their natural resources have been targeted by corporations in the United States, that they suffer from environmental racism and, you know, deeply problematic conditions.
So just to underscore it, you know, the Native American issue is also it's not over.
And obviously, Native Americans continue to resist in all types of ways.
Right.
Yeah.
I mean, that was all I was trying to say.
I just didn't say as well.
But yeah, I mean, and it's a fact I brought up the Navajo.
You got all their, you know, subjugation.
They have no choice in all the uranium mines on their land and what's left of their land and all that.
Exactly.
So, yeah, man, hell of a thing.
All right.
So now, I guess part of this, though, would be like, oh, no, but counterterrorism, because I heard they're doing a ghost dance and their crazy, terrible religion makes them resent being occupied and slaughtered.
Yawn.
And so, you know, we have to have these specialized techniques.
We're not just talking about Officer Friday standing on the corner, keeping us all very safe from each other.
We're talking about individuals, lone wolves and foreign terrorists radicalized by ISIS.
And so don't we need some good Israeli advice about what to do to keep these ghost dancers down?
I mean, these Islamic extremists down.
Yeah, right.
I mean, that that is the argument that, you know, the the people that carry on these delegations make.
I mean, they don't they don't.
I mean, they're making the argument about terrorism.
They're making the argument that, you know, American police forces have to be nimble like the Israelis in combating terrorism.
Of course, this widely over over inflates the threat of terrorism in the United States.
And and also the situations are wildly different.
I mean, in Israel, you have an army occupying a foreign land, and obviously that engenders resistance and violent attacks on Israeli occupying forces as well as Israeli civilians in the United States.
You're not supposed to have a militarized force occupying neighborhoods, at least on paper.
Of course, many black residents of cities will say that police forces feel like occupying forces.
But, you know, the cops are not supposed to be like the military.
But unfortunately, after 9-11 in particular, and I mean, although I guess you could say this this trend started in the 80s with SWAT teams, you know, militarization of the police has really increased.
And so you have these parallel processes going on the militarization of American law enforcement, as well as the delegations to Israel that, you know, sort of fuel their desire to join the war on terrorism, be, you know, the eyes and ears on the on the ground in cities, and are, you know, learning some of these tactics from Israeli commanders.
Yeah, man.
So, I mean, I don't know, I hate to waste your time with this.
But maybe you're just an anti-Semite, Alex.
And the only reason anybody would ever criticize anything about Israel is because they wake up every morning with a irrational and passionate hatred of Jewish people.
What do you think?
Well, I'm Jewish.
Well, so then you hate yourself then, is that it?
Yeah.
Sorry, but this is the accusation.
And you know what, I feel like, I mean, I guess I know I hate that phrase.
I know that some people when they hear anything like this, they think, man, this is a real anti-Semitic thing, you know?
Oh, sure, you're just criticizing Israel.
That's just code for we know how you are.
Yeah, well, you know, what I would say is, I don't think, you know, unfortunately, there's been a campaign to conflate Zionism and Judaism.
But, you know, that is a conflation that people should resist and not buy into.
And when I'm talking about Israel and its occupation, it has nothing to do with Judaism.
I mean, the only connection is that Israel says that it is the, quote unquote, Jewish state.
And of course, they privilege Israeli Jews over Palestinians, but it has nothing at all to do with religion.
This is a story about a country that is occupying Palestine, has very little to do with anti-Semitism or the religion of people.
It is a story about power, occupation, and land.
And that's why, you know, groups like Jewish Voice for Peace, which says that, you know, I mean, they're called Jewish Voice for Peace because they're a Jewish group that tries to combat this conflation between Zionism and Judaism.
And they are coming out against these exchange programs because they think they're deeply problematic because of the occupation, not because Israel is Jewish.
So people are not criticizing Israel because it's Jewish.
People are criticizing Israel for its human rights abuses.
Yeah, well, I mean, I think that's really it.
And American Jews, and by super majorities, according to the polls, and obviously you're an example of this, are basically civil rights liberals.
So, hey, Palestinians are people.
That's really the end of the argument, right?
I mean, what are we talking about here?
That's right.
That's right.
And, you know, I think it's faint praise, but when Obama abstained last December at the U.N. vote on the occupation, I think this was the first time in years anyway, in many, in a very long time that anyone on cable news or really TV news at all put up a map of Israel and the West Bank.
And on MSNBC, these two guys, I don't know their names, but they actually went through and spent about five or ten minutes explaining about, yeah, man, so the thing is about the West Bank is it's already conquered.
It's been conquered.
It's not the country next door.
It's occupied territory.
And here are the Jewish only roads and the whatever, you know, restrictions, Area B and C.
And they did a pretty good job talking about it.
And the thing of it is, is that light just cast this huge shadow, right, of all other discussion of this issue just refuses to explain the circumstance.
I mean, they make it look like you just throw up a picture, a map, a bird's eye view map of Israel.
It sort of looks like the Palestinians have invaded from the east, right, and have stolen this chunk of Israel.
Why is it shaped like that?
That's just because that's the part they haven't completely finished annexing yet and ethnically cleansing yet, you know.
But they just never do explain that.
And as soon as someone explains that, anyone except the most hardcore right-wing partisan all of a sudden finds themselves siding with not even necessarily the Palestinians, but just fairness, right?
Once we find out what's going on here, we realize, well, that's not right.
I think that's right.
Yeah.
I mean, you know, the human rights abuses are clear for all to see.
And if you take some time to read human rights reports or really dig into the situation, I think a lot of people will realize that.
Yep.
Right on.
Well, listen, man, I think, as always, you just do great work.
I can't think of anything you ever wrote that I didn't want to talk to you about, even if I didn't have a chance to.
So I appreciate you coming back on the show there, Alex.
I appreciate that, Scott.
All right, you guys, that is Alex Kane.
You can find him all the time over at The Intercept.
This one is at In These Times, Ending Deadly Collusion Between U.S. and Israeli Police.
And I'm Scott Horton.
Check out all my stuff.
Sign up for the podcast feed, 4,500-something interviews all there for you at scotthorton.org.
Check out my book, Fool's Errand, Time to End the War in Afghanistan.
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Thanks.
