SWI NEWS: Saturday, October 30 2010 22 Heshvan,5771
Saturday, October 30th, 2010Documents submitted by the late American defense secretary Caspar Weinberger that were used to incriminate Israeli agent Jonathan Pollard should no longer be classified, Weinberger’s deputy at the time of Pollard's arrest, Lawrence Korb, said over the weekend.
Korb said there was no reason not to hand over the documents. But their declassification is considered very unlikely.
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Since he was sentenced, Pollard has never been allowed to challenge the claims in the documents in court. His security-cleared attorneys have never been allowed access to the secret portions of his sentencing file, though those who oppose his release have had access and used it against him.
New York Senator Charles Schumer and former mayor Rudolph Giuliani, who have seen the documents, have said publicly that there was nothing in them to justify the life sentence Pollard has been serving for 25 years. But Pollard cannot return to court, because all his legal avenues have been exhausted, so he is seeking clemency from US president Barack Obama.
In an opinion piece published in Thursday’s Los Angeles Times, Korb wrote that Pollard deserved to be severely punished for his actions but that his punishment does not fit the crime he committed of giving classified information to a US ally.
Korb noted that in return for his guilty plea – which spared the government the embarrassment of conducting a trial involving highly sensitive information – and his cooperation with the US government, the US attorney pledged not to seek a life sentence for Pollard.
He suggested three reasons why he was still given a life sentence: A false victim impact statement of Weinberger that is classified, the Israeli government's initial refusal to acknowledge that Pollard was one of its agents, and Pollard's lack of remorse for his actions.
Korb said that since then Weinberger's false contentions had been debunked, the Israeli government admitted that Pollard was its agent, and Pollard himself has publicly expressed remorse on multiple occasions.
“Some now argue that Pollard should be released because it would improve US-Israeli relations and enhance the prospects of success of the Obama administration's Middle East peace process,” Korb wrote.
“Although that may be true, it is not the reason I and many others have recently written to the president requesting that he grant Pollard clemency. The reason is that Pollard has already served far too long for the crime for which he was convicted, and by now, whatever facts he might know would have little effect on national security.”
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25,000 in Hevron for the Sabbath
"Hevron Sabbath" has ended, and the 25,000 visitors and guests are making their way home after spending Shabbat in the City of the Patriarchs.
The annual event attracts guests even from abroad. Among those who took part this year were Rabbi Chaim Druckman, Tzfat's Chief Rabbi Shmuel Eliyahu, and MKs Uri Ariel, Ze'ev Elkin, Tzipi Hotobeli, and Gila Gamliel.
Israeli technology has chief role in battling world threats
The event is held each year on the Sabbath of Parashat Chaye Sarah (Genesis 24 and 25), when the story of the Patriarch Abraham's purchase of the Machpelah Field and Cave is recounted. The three Patriarchs, as well as three of the Matriarchs - Sarah, Leah, and Rebecca - are buried there; the Matriarch Rachel died near Bethlehem, and was buried along the way in what is now Rachel's Tomb.
This year's "Hevron Sabbath" was marked, for the first time in 12 years, by the official opening of the streets of the Kasba – the old city marketplace and former Jewish quarter – to crowds of Jewish visitors. The guests saw 19th-century Jewish homes and institutions, now occupied by Arabs.
"We thank the myriads of visitors," a statement by the Jewish Community of Hevron said, "as well as the security forces and the residents of Hevron and Kiryat Arba who opened their homes and their hearts. We await the day when 25,000 Jews will live in Hevron, and will not be just visitors."
(IsraelNationalNews.com)
On Sunday, Israel begins to host the first three-day International Homeland Security Conference, showcasing locally developed and manufactured solutions to terrorism threats before security experts and decision-makers from around the world. One of the companies that will be presenting its products is Hi-Tech Solutions (HTS), a company based near Migdal Ha’emek that specializes in image processing and computer vision technologies, mechanisms critical for a wide variety of civilian and security applications.
Established in 1992, the company saw its first commercial product sold in 2000. HTS’s proprietary technology provides both digital and video image records, for direct recognition, identification and recording of alphanumeric and graphic codes.
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Put simply, HTS’s systems can read numbers from a photo and reproduce them in text form. This ability enjoys a wide range of possible applications, many of them in the fields of law enforcement, traffic management, cargo administration and security.
Today, HTS’s two main products are License Plate Recognition (LPR) and Container Code Recognition (CCR) systems. By pointing a camera, connected to a computer, at a cargo container or a vehicle’s license plate, HTS’s technology can reproduce the numbers in text form. Link that ability to any system that monitors movement of large volumes of traffic and you get a highly effective, real-time solution that can be put to many uses.
In the civilian market, HTS’s systems are especially useful for providing logistical solutions for anyone who wants to quickly and accurately track movement of vehicles. One major project that HTS is involved with in Israel is the soon-to-beopened Carmel tunnels.
The tunnels that run under the city of Haifa will use HTS’s system to assist in its toll collection.
HTS’s equipment is mounted on 24 toll routes in the tunnel project, where it will capture images of the license plates of all the vehicles that pass through and send the translated data to the operating company for billing purposes.
Another application that Israelis may be familiar with is automated parking lots.
Already in partnership with Tel Aviv’s Ahuzat Hahof parking lot chain, many of the city’s major parking lots use HTS’s products to enable users to exit the lot after paying without having to present the payment receipt at the exit.
HTS’s systems are also in use at ports to track containers entering and exiting the facility by land and by sea.
Mounted on cranes and port gates, the system enables the identification of hundreds of thousands of cargo containers, and crosschecks them with their manifests to make sure they are being offloaded at the correct location and contain the right cargo.
Another place that the system is in use is at the entrance to Ben-Gurion Airport. While waiting for the security guard to wave them through, all vehicles are filmed by HTS’s gatemounted cameras and the license plates numbers are crosschecked with a security database alerting the system if any blacklisted vehicles appear at the gate. Systems based on similar principles are used by commercial and state agencies all across the world.
According to HTS CEO Philip Elovic, HTS systems are successfully used in over 40 countries, with the See Container CCR system controlling 50 percent of the international CCR market.
Elovic said that though they have a smaller market share in the LPR market, it is there they see the most potential for growth.
“LPR technology has really evolved, and as the accuracy of the technology grows, so does customer confidence. Today the technology is accurate enough to be put to use in revenue collection systems, with a low enough error-rate to justify their widespread implementation,” said Elovic.
HTS is currently developing systems that will see its technology used on mobile platforms.
One possible use would be by municipal parking inspectors, who could carry a hand-held device installed with the software.
Additional future applications for the system are drivethrough banks and car rental agencies, and advanced building security systems.
At the Homeland Security Conference, HTS’s vice president in charge of business development, Meta Rosenberg, will present the company’s abilities before a large group of security professionals, including foreign public security ministers, chiefs of police, mayors and airport security experts.
Elovic said Rosenberg will talk about how HTS’s technology can be used to boost homeland security in a post-9/11 world.
