Here it is hot off the internet: SY HERSH's interview with Blitzer

[LittleApple81]

on CNN Late edition!

Seymour Hersh joins us here on "LATE EDITION."

Thanks, Sy, very much for joining us. What are the Israelis doing in Iraq?

SEYMOUR HERSH, "THE NEW YORKER" MAGAZINE: They're in Kurdistan in northern Iraq. They're not in Iraq central. They're in northern Iraq, and they're working with the Kurds. Their long-time friends.

And what the Israelis did, as I write about, they decided six months ago, this was a no-win for us. We were in real trouble without a major change in policy.

And one of the Israeli issues all along had been that the United States was very slow to recognize the fact that Iran was playing a peaceful but very aggressive role in helping the insurgency against us. And they tried, they batted heads against us, and we would not listen. This is the White House and the Defense Department.

So they took the option of going in there with their old allies, the Kurds, and they're beginning run operations against the people they really are frightened of, the Iranians, nuclear issue, and the Syrians. They like to pose trouble for the Syrians. The only problem with their operation is that it puts them face to face with the Turks.

BLITZER: Well, we're going to get to that in the moment because the Israelis have a long-standing, very good relationship with Turkey, as well. But what you're saying is that there are Israeli operatives in northern Iraq, in Kurdistan, the Kurdish part of northern Iraq, that are, what, engaged in actions against Iran?

HERSH: Intelligence-gathering. There's no gun play here. We're talking about Israeli operatives, and many of them are going in -- some Masad people go in without passports. They're not wearing uniforms. They're undercover.

How many? A few hundred probably is the best guess, maybe more even. But what they're doing -- and don't forget, there's always been, as I say, a long ties, a lot of economic ties, a lot of Kurdish Jews are very friendly with -- emigrated to Israel. There's a lot of ties.

What they're doing is they're -- Kurdistan puts them very close to some very central potential nuclear sites in Iran, and they're running operations with the Kurds into Iran setting up, you know, the kind of devices, you have the sniffers, the kind of activity you get to see what kind of nuclear goings on might be going on.
http://www.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0406/20/le.00.html

[Beam Me Up]

1. Thanks LittleApple YBMTI n/t

[LittleApple81]

2. There is a lot more on this program and on the transcript that

I could not copy because it is so long (question and answer format...)

[LittleApple81]

3. So he is having a New Yorker article on Israeli presence in Iraq?

Now I think Hersh better hide....
This country is not safe for him.

[nostamj]

4. IIRC the article comes out on Monday

should be ANOTHER killer scoop for Sy. (after the Abu Ghraib scandal, and SO many others)

[LittleApple81]

5. The Saudi representative still denies they transported binLadens out

after 9-11
We see these charges or these myths being perpetrated about Saudi Arabia in order to malign our country, and then we see them later on shattered: the myth of whisking the bin Laden family out of the U.S. when airspace was closed; the myth of the Saudi government giving money to al Qaeda; the myth of Princess Haifa giving money to two of the hijackers. All of these were dispelled by the 9/11 Commission, and I believe this myth will also be dispelled when the report comes out.

(In my opinion, is the other "myths" are like this one, heavens protect us.)

[LittleApple81]

6. This Saudi Arabia's foreign policy adviser, Adel al- Jubeir

must think we are really, really stupid... or they have the entire BushCo in their pockets. He says that the guys that attacked the compound and killed so many foreigners "took cars to a FARM??? and painted them like police cars?????" What?????

[nostamj]

8. i saw that!

a cum loudly graduate of the Baghdad Bob's School of Utter Bullshit

[LittleApple81]

7. Senator Levin is not letting Saudi Arabia off the hook:

BLITZER: But, Senator Levin, do you think the Saudis are doing everything they should be doing right now?

SEN. CARL LEVIN (D), MICHIGAN: No, I think the two biggest exports of Saudi Arabia have been oil and terrorism, and that one of the ways in which they supported terrorism was by their support for the schools in which hatred was taught of the West, the so-called madrassas.

And according to the Council of Foreign Relations report, which just came out -- and this is a very nonpartisan, highly respected group -- they are still, in Saudi Arabia, very ambivalent in terms of the funding issues, the support of the terrorists through their charities.

Now, I think they finally have been hit at home, so they realize that what they have helped to unleash in the world is coming back to bite them as well. And so I'm hopeful that they'll take stronger action now.

But until now, I don't see that they have taken strong actions in many areas. And that's part of the problem that we've had.

[Gyre]

9. Pretty amazing stuff!

Thanks very much for posting this!:)

Gyre

[scarletwoman]

10. Wow! This is pretty stunning...

I had not known about the nature of Kurdish-Israeli relations before. I knew that Israel/IDF/Mossad(?) have been involved with U.S. military and intelligence (and who knows what else...) in the rest of Iraq, but had not given any thought to what they were up to in the north.

Sheeeeesh... This Iraq invasion has been woven out of MANY threads -- none of them savory. And the layers of deceit and disimformation used to bury over the true dimensions of the geostrategic maneuvering going on there is utterly infuriating!

The Great Game lives, only at this point in time it's being played by the rankest, lowest order, incompetent and unenlightened pathetic excuses for human beings EVER! :mad:

sw

Oops! Also wanted to thank you for posting this extremely interesting excerpt! Thanks! :toast:

[LittleApple81]

11. Levin went after Cheney...

BLITZER: All right. I want to move on and get to this issue of Saddam Hussein and al Qaeda.

The 9/11 Commission, Senator Levin, concluded -- and I'll read the quote specifically what they said -- "We have no credible evidence that Iraq and al Qaeda cooperated on attacks against the United States."

I assume that is consistent with everything you've learned in the course of your own investigations as a member of the Intelligence Committee and the Armed Services Committee.

LEVIN: That is consistent. And I find it, frankly, shocking that the exaggerations of the administration before the war relative to that connection continue to this day.

We still have Vice President Cheney, as recently as three days ago on NBC, saying that we don't know whether there was any such relationship. And he even denied that the staff of the 9/11 Commission found just in the last few weeks that there was no relationship, saying, "No, no. All they said is that there's no evidence." That's not accurate. They found that there was no relationship.

And also, he even denied that he said what he did say prior to the war. When he said, prior to the war, that a meeting, a key meeting which alleged to have taken place but apparently never took place in Prague between the Iraq intelligence and the lead hijacker, Mr. Atta, he said was pretty well confirmed. He said that, and it's on tape, before the war. And now he denies that he ever said that that meeting was pretty well confirmed.

I find that amazing, frankly.

[LittleApple81]

12. The Israelis are not happy with Hersh for commenting on this:

HERSH: They've been pessimistic for six months. I write about the fact that, beginning last summer, late last summer, they started worrying about, as I say, the Iranian infusion.

But more than that, even people like Ehud Barak, the former prime minister, who's very straightforward, I write about a meeting he had with our vice president, Mr. Cheney, in which he, said according to a witness, he told Cheney, "Your only issue now is how much humiliation will you collect."

BLITZER: Let me read you exactly what you wrote. You said, "Israel had learned that there's no way to win an occupation. The only issue, Barak told Cheney, was choosing the size of your humiliation."

What Barak saying to Cheney, what, get out, or stop, or move on? What was his bottom line?

HERSH: Get real. Change your policy. Understand that you have a problem with the insurgency that you can't wish away.

This is an administration that doesn't want to hear bad news and doesn't absorb bad news. So they just go along hoping it'll change. He was saying you have to do a lot of things to change the policy.

I should also say Cheney's office would not respond to comment. And I'm sure Mr. Barak isn't happy that I'm quoting him in that way.

[LittleApple81]

13. I think all DUers should read THE ENTIRE transcript. It is amazing.

I tried to print it because it was hard for me to read so much on my monitor... it was 27 pages! And most of it is very interesting.

[rumguy]

14. Wow. Powerful stuff!