False flag
False flag attacks are carried out in ways calculated to deceive the victim as to the nature of the perpetrator, conventionally (though not necessarily) by a device such as flying false colours. Operations of this nature have sometimes been used in commerce and politics.
Please Note - This article is offered as an adjunct to the Wikipedia article "False Flag". It aims to fill in some otherwise puzzling gaps, presenting missing incidents from a "Neutral Point of View" to the "Reliable Source" standard of Wikipedia. However, see "Notes" at the end, where some information acceptable to the Wikipedia, and quoted from there, is not to a high standard.
Contents
Important examples inadequately covered at WP
1954 Lavon Affair
The Wikipedia article on "False Flags" barely mentions the so-called "Lavon Affair" when 13 Jews were arrested in Oct 1954 after one of their members was caught red-handed in a terrorist campaign.[1] It is now known to have been carried out by locally recruited Israeli agents in Egypt. Israeli agents "recruited nine young Egyptian Jews to stage terrorist attacks that, they thought, would be blamed on local insurgents and would discredit Nasser's rule" (Jewish Review, 2004.[2]) Two named individuals served 7 year sentences in Egypt, five(?) served 13 years and two commmitted suicide.
While there were no deaths from the bombs placed in Egyptian, US and UK facilities in Alexandria and Cairo, the consequences for internal Israeli politics and the situation of Jews in Egypt was very considerable. Pinhas Lavon was wrongly blamed and forced to resign and the innocent Prime Minister Moshe Sharrat was replaced by one of the perpetrators, David Ben-Gurion. Ben-Gurion went on to concieve and carry out a number of wanton provocations and killings, including the 1956 attack on Suez, the mass-killing of Egyptian POWs and the first major destruction in Gaza. Six years later, a secret internal inquiry led to David Ben-Gurion's resignation but Sharret and Lavon's reputations were never officially cleared.
Despite almost entirely ignoring this affair at the article on "False Flag", there is a Wikipedia article on it at Lavon Affair. The Wikipedia says that it was "disastrous for Israel in several ways" but fails to mention any of the very serious effects on Egypt or Egyptian Jews (mentioned below). It may otherwise be largely complete and trustworthy.
Acknowledgement by Israel
One of the perpetrators who had committed suicide was re-interred with military honour on Mount Herzl in 1959.[3]
On March 30, 2005 Israeli President Moshe Katsav.[4] and Chief of General Staff Lieutenant General Moshe Ya’alon presented official citations to the three surviving agents and to representatives of those deceased, saying: “This is historic justice for those who were sent on a mission on behalf of the state and became the victims of a complex political affair.”[5][6]
Israeli motives
After WW2, a much impoverished Britain was withdrawing from all of its interests "East of Suez" (India independence 1948 etc). It was preparing to give up the giant military base it had in the Suez Canal Zone while Bengurion and Eisenhower had been unable to persuade even a Conservative government under Winston Churchill not to do so. The head of Israeli intelligence, Colonel Benyamin Givli, ordered an existing, but ill-prepared, Egyptian spy-ring into action. He did so without Lavon or Sharret knowing anything about it.
It is easy to assume that Israel sought to cause strife beteen Egypt and the West but historians have largely accepted that the aim was to destabilise Egypt. The Israeli historian Shabtai Teveth goes further in his detailed coverage "Ben-Gurion's Spy" (1996) p.81 and states that the aim was to help the British and strengthen Egyptian opponents of withdrawal from the Suez Canal area. It was aimed at "generating public insecurity and actions to bring about arrests, demonstrations, and acts of revenge, while totally concealing the Israeli factor. The team was accordingly urged to avoid detection, so that suspicion would fall on the Muslim Brotherhood, the Communists, 'unspecified malcontents' or 'local nationalists'."[7][8]
Zionist sympathisers at the Wikipedia have been hostile to calling it a "False Flag Operation" and most such references were removed from the WP again in June 2011. However, the term is used by ex-Knesset member Uri Avnery in his writings[9][10] and is used in the book "Global Terrorism", 2004.[11] Other Israeli sources have tried to suggest that the fire-bombing was an "Intelligence Operation" rather than an attack.
Israeli benefit
Israel gained greatly, in public relations (positive in the west, negative in the Middle East) and population terms, from the fall-out of an event which was generally reported as an antisemitic purge. Prime Minister Moshe Sharett denounced "the show trial which is being organized there against a group of Jews who have fallen victims to false accusations". The trade union newspaper Davar claimed that the Egyptian regime "seems to take its inspiration from the Nazis" and lamented the "deterioration in the status of Egyptian Jews in general" For Haaretz the trial "proved that the Egyptian rulers do not hesitate to invent the most fantastic accusations if it suits them" and added that "in the present state of affairs in Egypt the junta certainly needs some diversion". The Jerusalem Post headlined "Egypt Show Trial Arouses Israel, Sharett Tells House. Sees Inquisition Practices Revived."[12]
Jews in Egypt suffer
In July 1954, when the bombings started, there were still at least 50,000 Jews in Egypt (more than half of whom were actually foreign nationals)[13] despite mob and bombing attacks (eg 70 killed in bombings between June and Nov 1984[14]) over the creation of Israel (and the defeat of the Egyptian forces). This, and the revolutionary upheaval four years later (eg eg in Jan 1951 mobs had rampaged through downtown Cairo setting fires and killing scores of people, including thirteen Britons) had caused around 10,000 Jews to leave (though few went to Israel). A Jewish journalist insisted: "We, Egyptian Jews, feel secure in our homeland, Egypt".[15]
In 1956, Israel again attacked Egypt in concert with the UK and France in the "Suez Affair" and Egypt expelled almost 25,000 Egyptian Jews and confiscated their property, while approximately 1,000 Jews were sent to prisons and detention camps.[16]
Descriptive terms
Despite the fact that it had caused a major and continuing scandal, Israeli military censorship applied to all the details of the "Lavon Affair" and, on the rare occasions it was mentioned in the years to follow it was called "Operation Susannah" or the "unfortunate business".[17] Attacks that are still known in English by the Zionist narrative, the "Lavon Affair", have most of the hallmarks of a significant (though fortunately cut-short) terrorist campaign but are not generally accepted as such.
1950 Baghdad bombings
Never acknowledged by Israel
The April 1950 bombings that helped panic most of the 150,000 Jews of Iraq to leave for Israel have never been claimed by the Zionists.
For and against the Zionists having done it
The Wikipedia generally presents a large number of other reasons why the Jews would have wanted to leave and strongly implies that the existence of Israel, and the activities of the Zionists in Iraq did nothing to cause problems for the Jews. But in the article on "Jews in Iraq" (Oct 2011) it admits:
The true identity and objective of the masterminds behind the bombings has been the subject of controversy. A secret Israeli inquiry in 1960 found no evidence that they were ordered by Israel or any motive that would have explained the attack, though it did find out that most of the witnesses believed that Jews had been responsible for the bombings.[18][19] The issue remains unresolved: Iraqi activists still regularly charge that Israel used violence to engineer the exodus, while Israeli officials of the time vehemently deny it. Historian Moshe Gat reports that "the belief that the bombs had been thrown by Zionist agents was shared by those Iraqi Jews who had just reached Israel".[20] Sociologist Phillip Mendes backs Gat's claims, and further attributes the allegations to have been influenced and distorted by feelings of discrimination.[21]
Journalist Naeim Giladi's position that the bombings were "perpetrated by Zionist agents in order to cause fear amongst the Jews, and so promote their exodus to Israel" is shared by a number of anti-Zionist authors, including the Israeli Black Panthers (1975), David Hirst (1977), Wilbur Crane Eveland (1980), Uri Avnery (1988), Ella Shohat (1986), Abbas Shiblak (1986), Marion Wolfsohn (1980), and Rafael Shapiro (1984). In his article, Giladi notes that this was also the conclusion of Wilbur Crane Eveland, a former senior officer in the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) who outlined that allegation in his book "Ropes of Sand".
Other accounts state that arms were stock-piled in synagogues by the Zionists and were shown to the Iraqi services by a captured member of the underground.
International Law, with examples
The Wikipedia section here says that "This practice was considered acceptable in naval warfare, provided the false flag was lowered and the national flag raised before engaging in battle" and covers (as at Oct 2011) the following: "Auxiliary cruisers" in both World Wars, Q-ships, the German commerce raider Kormoran sinking the Australian light cruiser HMAS Sydney in 1941, the use of a Kriegsmarine Ensign in the St Nazaire Raid and the destroyer Campbeltown made to resemble a German destroyer.
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Air warfare
The Wikipedia section here states that aircraft must always be correctly marked by nationality and their military nature. There are no incidents reported.
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Land warfare
The Wikipedia page here states that International Law permits approach of an enemy in his uniform, but it must be discarded before shooting.
Deception of other forms (eg false use of the Red Cross) are known as perfidy and are forbidden.
The only example given (and the one on which International Law is based) is Operation Greif. Otto Skorzeny had ordered his men to infiltrate behind American lines in American uniforms but was cleared by the military court at the Dachau Trials.
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Other types of False Flag and examples
The Wikipedia article includes these categories of "False Flag" including some useful examples.
As pretexts for war
The Wikipedia page here covers a few incidents of False Flag Attacks used as pretexts for war eg 1931 Mukden incident, the Gleiwitz incident on August 31, 1939, and the 1953 overthrow of Mohammed Mosaddeq. Also the 1962 Operation Northwoods plot intended to excuse an attack on Cuba.
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Pseudo-operations
The Wikipedia page here covers a few more incidents of False Flag Attacks.
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Espionage
The Wikipedia page here includes under "False Flag Attacks" cases where communist authorities have used spies posing as peace-campaigners to discover secrets.
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Dirty War
The Wikipedia page here includes more "False Flag Attacks".
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Non-state operatives, terrorism
The Wikipedia page here includes more "False Flag Attacks" carried out either by or against non-state operatives, eg the Reichstag Fire and actions during the Algerian Civil War. It alleges that some of the "Chechen Bombings" of the 1990s were actually carried out by the Russian state.
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Elections
The Wikipedia page here includes more "False Flag Attacks" carried out either by or against non-state operatives, eg shootings in the Caucasuses in 2008.
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Civilian usage
The Wikipedia page here includes more "False Flag Attacks" carried out by businesses, special interest groups, religions, political ideologies (eg Scientology) and campaigns for office (eg New Hampshire 2006).
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See also
Wikipedia offers other concepts on similar lines:
- Black propaganda
- Casus belli
- Covert operation
- Front organization
- Inside job
- Joe job, a similar online concept
- Mimicry
- State terrorism
Wikipedia offers these other examples:
- 1962 CIA Operation Northwoods, a Plan to blame Cuba for a Terrorist attack in order to get a pretext for 'justified' War of aggression after USA funded and organized failed Terrorist attack known as CIA Operation Mongoose.
- 1953 CIA Operation Ajax, overthrow of the Prime Minister of Iran and his replacement with the Shah.[22]
- 1939 Shelling of Finland by Joseph Stalin and USSR in order to get pretext for 'justified' war of aggression named Winter War
- 1933 The Reichstag Fire, Hitler's pretext for suspending the Weimar Constitution, may have been false flag.
- Bloed, Bodem, Eer en Trouw (Flemish neo-Nazi group preparing false flag attacks)
- Bologna massacre
- Canuck letter
- Celle Hole
- CIA PBSUCCESS ([USA]) Operation for overthrowing the Arbenz government in Guatemala in 1954
- CIA Project Cherry (USA non-stop assassination project to kill Norodom Sihanouk, Prince, and later King of Cambodia)
- Gleiwitz incident - 3rd Reich Nazis Operation Himmler in order to get pretext for 'justified' war of aggression against Poland with USSR day after that - named Fall Weiß
- Kommandoverband Jaguar German army unit conducting deep reconnaissance in Soviet uniforms
- Lavon Affair Israeli attempt to plant bombs in Western targets in Egypt, in blaming Arab elements
- Marxist-Leninist Party of the Netherlands (fake party set up by the Dutch security service)
- Masada Action and Defense Movement ("Zionist" group bombing Arab targets in France, really French white supremacists)
- Operation Jaque
- Special Activities Division
- The Plaza Miranda Bombings in the Philippines, which led to Ferdinand Marcos's suspension of the writ of habeas corpus.
- The strategy of tension in Italy during the 1970s, when right-wing Italian, Spanish, Greek, and CIA agents caused various terrorist acts in Italy, which were publicly laid to Communist terrorist groups that were actually fakes, and to the Red Brigades who were actually innocent of these particular crimes
Notes
- ↑ Hirst p.289
- ↑ Jewish Review: "recruited nine young Egyptian Jews to stage terrorist attacks that, they thought, would be blamed on local insurgents and would discredit Nasser's rule" 2004.
- ↑ Meir Max Bineth - Dedicated to his memory re-interred in the Mount Herzl military cemetery in Jerusalem in 1959. Hebrew with some English.
- ↑ "After half a century of reticence and recrimination, Israel ... honored ... agents-provocateur." YNetNews, 30th March 2005.
- ↑ “Egyptian-Jewish Spy Ring Gets Belated Salute” “Fifty years after an Egyptian court convicted them of being Zionist agents, and 37 years after their release from Egyptian prisons, Marcelle Ninio [aka Victorin Ninyo], Robert Dassa and Meir Zafran were accorded military ranks Wednesday in recognition of their service to the state and their years of suffering. “Ninio and Dassa were promoted to lieutenant-colonel (res.) and Zafran to major (res.) in the Israel Defense Forces." "This is historic justice for those who were sent on a mission on behalf of the state and became the victims of a complex political affair.” Jerusalem Post March 31, 2005.
- ↑ “Israel Honors Egyptian Spies 50 Years After Fiasco” after Reuters in Ha’aretz, March 30, 2005.
- ↑ Teveth, Shabtai Ben-Gurion's Spy "suspicion would fall on the Muslim Brotherhood, the Communists, 'unspecified malcontents' or 'local nationalists'" not on the Egyptian regime. Columbia University Press, 1996, p.81.
- ↑ Hirst, David The Gun and the Olive Branch "generally assumed that they were the work of the Moslem Brothers, then the most dangerous challenge to the still uncertain authority of Colonel (later President) Nasser and his two-year-old revolution" p.20.
- ↑ the army carried out a false-flag sabotage campaign against US and British targets in Egypt designed to cause strife between Egypt and the West. Uri Avnery, Zmag.
- ↑ Haolam Hazeh ... an Israeli false flag operation in Egypt Uri Avnery, Gush-Shalom.
- ↑ Israel even used 'false flag' operations "In 1954 sympathetic Jews in Egypt used bombs and arson against US installations. The objective was for local Arab..." Global Terrorism James and Brenda Lutz, 2004.
- ↑ Hirst, David The Gun and the Olive Branch "a group of Jews who have fallen victims to false accusations" p.289.
- ↑ Hirst p.290
- ↑ Howard Sachar A History of Israel NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 1979, p. 401. "Between June and November 1948, bombs set off in the Jewish Quarter of Cairo killed more than 70 Jews" cited JVL.
- ↑ Berger, Elmer Who Knows Better Must Say So Institute for Palestine Studies, Beirut, p. 14. cited Hirst p.290.
- ↑ 1956 - Egypt expelled almost 25,000 Egyptian Jews and confiscated their property, while approximately 1,000 Jews were sent to prisons Jewish Virtual Library.
- ↑ Teveth, Shabtai Moshe Dayan. The soldier, the man, the legend was written 20 years later and refers to the Lavon Affair as the "unfortunate business". Quartet Books, 1974, p.265
- ↑ I. Black & B. Morris Israel's Secret Wars (Futura, 1992), p93. "secret Israeli inquiry in 1960 found no evidence ... did find out that most of the witnesses believed that Jews had been responsible for the bombings". This is the reference in current use at Wikipedia.
- ↑ Palestinian account of the bombings If Americans Knew, 25th Mar 2006. This is the reference in current use at Wikipedia.
- ↑ M. Gat, The Jewish Exodus from Iraq, 1948-1951 (Frank Cass, 1997), p186-187. "Iraqi activists still regularly charge that Israel used violence to engineer the exodus, while Israeli officials of the time vehemently deny it". This is the reference in current use at Wikipedia.
- ↑ Sociologist Phillip Mendes attributes the allegations to have been influenced and distorted by feelings of discrimination. FORGOTTEN REFUGEES. This is the (dead link) reference in current use at Wikipedia.
- ↑ All the Shah's Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror Stephen Kinzer, Hoboken: John Wiley & Sons, 2003. This is the reference in current use at Wikipedia.