Newsgroup: it.politica.internazionale
Titolo: Il boom dell'Apartheid hi-tech

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/06/15/1901/
Gaza: Not Just a Prison, a Laboratory
by Naomi Klein
Gaza in the hands of Hamas, with masked militants sitting in the
president~Rs chair; the West Bank on the edge; Israeli army camps
hastily assembled in the Golan Heights; a spy satellite over Iran and
Syria; war with Hezbollah a hair trigger away; a scandal-plagued
political class facing a total loss of public faith.
At a glance, things aren~Rt going well for Israel. But here~Rs a
puzzle:
why, in the midst of such chaos and carnage, is the Israeli economy
booming like it~Rs 1999, with a roaring stock market and growth rates
nearing China~Rs?
Thomas Friedman recently offered his theory in the New York Times.
Israel ~Snurtures and rewards individual imagination,~T and so its
people
are constantly spawning ingenious high-tech start-ups - no matter what
messes their politicians are making. After perusing class projects by
students in engineering and computer science at Ben Gurion University,
Friedman made one of his famous fake-sense pronouncements: Israel
~Shad
discovered oil.~T This oil, apparently, is located in the minds of
Israel~Rs ~Syoung innovators and venture capitalists,~T who are too
busy
making megadeals with Google to be held back by politics.
Here~Rs another theory: Israel~Rs economy isn~Rt booming despite the
political chaos that devours the headlines, but because of it. This
phase of development dates back to the mid-nineties, when Israel was
in
the vanguard of the information revolution - the most tech-dependent
economy in the world. After the dot-com bubble burst in 2000,
Israel~Rs
economy was devastated, facing its worst year since 1953. Then came
9/11, and suddenly new profit vistas opened up for any company that
claimed it could spot terrorists in crowds, seal borders from attack
and extract confessions from closed-mouthed prisoners.
Within three years, large parts of Israel~Rs tech economy had been
radically repurposed. Put in Friedmanesque terms: Israel went from
inventing the networking tools of the ~Sflat world~T to selling fences
to
an apartheid planet. Many of the country~Rs most successful
entrepreneurs are using Israel~Rs status as a fortressed state,
surrounded by furious enemies, as a kind of twenty-four-hour-a-day
showroom-a living example of how to enjoy relative safety amid
constant
war. And the reason Israel is now enjoying supergrowth is that those
companies are busily exporting that model to the world.
Discussions of Israel~Rs military trade usually focus on the flow of
weapons into the country-US-made Caterpillar bulldozers used to
destroy
homes in the West Bank and British companies supplying parts for
F-16s.
Overlooked is Israel~Rs huge and expanding export business. Israel now
sends $1.2 billion in ~Sdefense~T products to the United States-up
dramatically from $270 million in 1999. In 2006 Israel exported $3.4
billion in defense products-well over a billion more than it received
in US military aid. That makes Israel the fourth-largest arms dealer
in
the world, overtaking Britain.
Much of this growth has been in the so-called ~Shomeland security~T
sector. Before 9/11 homeland security barely existed as an industry.
By
the end of this year, Israeli exports in the sector will reach $1.2
billion-an increase of 20 percent. The key products and services are
high-tech fences, unmanned drones, biometric IDs, video and audio
surveillance gear, air passenger profiling and prisoner interrogation
systems - precisely the tools and technologies Israel has used to
lock-in the occupied territories.
And that is why the chaos in Gaza and the rest of the region doesn~Rt
threaten the bottom line in Tel Aviv, and may actually boost it.
Israel
has learned to turn endless war into a brand asset, pitching its
uprooting, occupation and containment of the Palestinian people as a
half-century head start in the ~Sglobal war on terror.~T
It~Rs no coincidence that the class projects at Ben Gurion that so
impressed Friedman have names like ~SInnovative Covariance Matrix for
Point Target Detection in Hyperspectral Images~T and ~SAlgorithms for
Obstacle Detection and Avoidance.~T Thirty homeland security companies
were launched in Israel in the past six months alone, thanks in large
part to lavish government subsidies that have transformed the Israeli
army and the country~Rs universities into incubators for security and
weapons start-ups (something to keep in mind in the debates about the
academic boycott).
Next week, the most established of these companies will travel to
Europe for the Paris Air Show, the arms industry~Rs equivalent of
Fashion Week. One of the Israeli companies exhibiting is Suspect
Detection Systems (SDS), which will be showcasing its Cogito1002, a
white, sci-fi-looking security kiosk that asks air travelers to answer
a series of computer-generated questions, tailored to their country of
origin, while they hold their hand on a ~Sbiofeedback~T sensor. The
device reads the body~Rs reactions to the questions and certain
responses flag the passenger as ~Ssuspect.~T
Like hundreds of other Israeli security start-ups, SDS boasts that it
was founded by veterans of Israel~Rs secret police and that its
products
were road-tested on Palestinians. Not only has the company tried out
the biofeedback terminals at a West Bank checkpoint, it claims the
~Sconcept is supported and enhanced by knowledge acquired and
assimilated from the analysis of thousands of case studies related to
suicide bombers in Israel.~T
Another star of the Paris Air Show will be Israeli defense giant
Elbit,
which plans to showcase its Hermes 450 and 900 unmanned air vehicles.
As recently as May, according to press reports, Israel used the drones
on bombing missions in Gaza. Once tested in the territories, they are
exported abroad: the Hermes has already been used at the Arizona-
Mexico
border; Cogito1002 terminals are being auditioned at an unnamed US
airport; and Elbit, one of the companies behind Israel~Rs ~Ssecurity
barrier,~T has partnered with Boeing to construct the Department of
Like hundreds of other Israeli security start-ups, SDS boasts that it
was founded by veterans of Israel~Rs secret police and that its
products
were road-tested on Palestinians. Not only has the company tried out
the biofeedback terminals at a West Bank checkpoint, it claims the
~Sconcept is supported and enhanced by knowledge acquired and
assimilated from the analysis of thousands of case studies related to
suicide bombers in Israel.~T
Another star of the Paris Air Show will be Israeli defense giant
Elbit,
which plans to showcase its Hermes 450 and 900 unmanned air vehicles.
As recently as May, according to press reports, Israel used the drones
on bombing missions in Gaza. Once tested in the territories, they are
exported abroad: the Hermes has already been used at the Arizona-
Mexico
border; Cogito1002 terminals are being auditioned at an unnamed US
airport; and Elbit, one of the companies behind Israel~Rs ~Ssecurity
barrier,~T has partnered with Boeing to construct the Department of
demand for devices that watch, listen, contain and target
~Ssuspects.~T
And fear, it turns out, is the ultimate renewable resource.
Naomi Klein is the author of many books, including her most recent,
The
Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, which will be
published in September.Visit Naomi~Rs website at 
nologo.org
.

a scandal-plagued political class facing a total loss of public faith.
*ROTFL*
Mi sa che il pusher della Klein deve avergli dato roba molto buona :)
*LOL*
-Stefano

 And fear, it turns out, is the ultimate renewable resource.
ah beh, certo se Israele si fosse specilizzata in filologia greca, mi chiedo 
come sarebbe ridotta adesso (ammesso e non concesso che fosse sopravvissuta)
A

 come sarebbe ridotta adesso (ammesso e non concesso che fosse sopravvissuta
hai ragione, meglio specializzarsi in terrorismo di stato, così si è
sicuri di sopravvivere e di perdere ogni barlume di umanità...

sicuri di sopravvivere e di perdere ogni barlume di umanitŕ...
terrorismo di stato č una di quelle parole come lotta del proletariato che 
vogliono dire tutto e un cazzo
Isrele ha dovuto pagare un prezzo altissimo per non soccombere, almeno ha 
tentato di trarre dei benefici dalla sua situazione
Ma un ebreo buono č sempre un ebreo morto, eh?
A

 Ma un ebreo buono è sempre un ebreo morto, eh?
dove vive la maggioranza degli ebrei, in Israele? Ed è a rischio di
morte imminente? Per cui di cosa vai cianciando?


Mah, ormai la ipotesi più probabile che ho elaborato dice che certi 
atteggiamenti degli ebrei della Diaspora verso Israele sono espressione di una 
sorta di "nevrosi collettiva".
Purtroppo esiste chi la strumentalizza a suo vantaggio, con grande abilità.
-- 
Gli USA hanno il piu' grande arsenale atomico del mondo. Ergo *DI FATTO*
controllano le vite e il destino di miliardi di persone.
-Stefano De Cesari-

 una sorta di "nevrosi collettiva".
scrivi a Harvard
Ti danno una cattedra subito, secondo me
A

morte imminente? Per cui di cosa vai cianciando?
alza il culo a vai in Israele a vedere di persona, invece di cianciare dal 
tuo tinello, buffone
A

 Ti danno una cattedra subito, secondo me
Red, non ti offendere, mi raccomando: un po' provoco per suscitare reazioni, un 
po' per verificare teorie...


 tuo tinello, buffone
mi fai la conta dei morti israeliani da quando c'è il muro, visto che
il buffone sono io?

 reazioni, un po' per verificare teorie...
non so quali teorie tu possa verificare qui su, francamente
A

il buffone sono io?
molti meno di prima
Il muro lo dovevano fare vent'anni fa, altro che storie
A

 Il muro lo dovevano fare vent'anni fa, altro che storie
questo non cambia il fatto che adesso parlare di rischio di
sopravvivenza di Israele è patetico...

sopravvivenza di Israele è patetico...
ah, bene
siamo passati da "mai stati minacciati da nessuno" a "adesso non si può 
parlare di rischio sopravvivenza"
Mi compiaccio, almeno hai fatto seri passi avanti
A

 parlare di rischio sopravvivenza"
dove ho detto che non sono mai stati minacciati da nessuno? Ho detto
che non hanno mai rischiato l'estinzione, è ben diverso...

 che non hanno mai rischiato l'estinzione
Vabbé, questo è negazionismo da tre soldi.
Non stupisce che arrivi dal fronte rossobruno.
Tb
-- 
רפוה שלמה לחולה פרנץ בן יוסף וחנה