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<a class="gmail-domain gmail-reader-domain" href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/michael-f-brown/firm-helping-israel-spy-gaza-includes-genocide-advocate">electronicintifada.net</a>
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<h1 class="gmail-reader-title">Firm helping Israel spy on Gaza includes genocide advocate</h1>
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<span class="gmail-field gmail-field-author"><a href="https://electronicintifada.net/people/michael-f-brown">Michael F. Brown</a></span>
<span class="gmail-field gmail-field-blog"><a href="https://electronicintifada.net/blog/rights-and-accountability">Rights and Accountability</a></span>
<span class="gmail-field gmail-field-publication-date"><span class="gmail-date-display-single">28 March 2024</span></span> </p>
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<img src="https://electronicintifada.net/sites/default/files/styles/original_800w/public/2024-03/280324-giora-backed-humanitarian-crisis.jpg?itok=FgA60BZx×tamp=1711665160" width="408" height="272" alt="Palestinian children and adults try to secure food" title="" class="gmail-moz-reader-block-img" style="margin-right: 25px;">
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<p>Giora Eiland, a retired Israeli major general, has pushed for a
humanitarian crisis in Gaza, a position which has contributed to
desperate scenes of Palestinians trying to secure food.</p><small>
<span>DPA</span></small>
<p>The Israeli military is using Corsight facial recognition technology to collect information about Palestinians in Gaza <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/27/technology/israel-facial-recognition-gaza.html">according to</a> <em>The New York Times</em>.</p>
<p>“The facial recognition program, which is run by Israel’s military
intelligence unit, including the cyber-intelligence division Unit 8200,
relies on technology from Corsight, a private Israeli company, four
intelligence officers said.”
</p>
The Israeli military also employs Google Photos.
Israel’s apartheid army <a href="https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/01/01/a-palestinian-poets-perilous-journey-out-of-gaza">detained, interrogated and beat</a>
Palestinian poet Mosab Abu Toha, a graduate of Syracuse University,
with the assistance of Corsight’s facial recognition technology. Other
Palestinians have been similarly detained via Corsight technology.
<p>Abu Toha notes Palestinians have <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2024-03-07/ty-article/.premium/27-gaza-detainees-died-in-custody-at-israeli-army-facilities-since-the-start-of-the-war/0000018e-1322-d950-a18e-f3bbaa370000">died</a> in <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/28/world/middleeast/palestinians-detained-in-israel.html">Israeli custody</a>.</p>
<p>There is little complaint from western politicians. Corsight’s complicity isn’t seen as an urgent matter.</p>
<p>Nor, for that matter, do most of these politicians give sufficient attention to Israel’s genocidal policies in Gaza.</p>
<h2>Board of directors</h2>
<p>Unmentioned by the <em>Times</em> is that Giora Eiland, a retired Israeli major general, <a href="https://www.corsight.ai/company/">serves</a> on the board of directors of Corsight.</p>
<p>When Eiland joined the board in January 2021, Igal Raichelgauz, chairman and founder of the Cortica Group, <a href="https://www.calcalistech.com/ctech/articles/0,7340,L-3887496,00.html">stated</a>,
“We are excited to add Giora to the company board, we believe that due
to his extensive experience in the national security field, Corsight
will continue growing into new markets and territories and lead the face
recognition market in Israel and in the world.” Corsight is a
subsidiary of Cortica, a firm focused on artificial intelligence.</p>
<p>Eiland is a proponent of the ethnic cleansing of the occupied territory of Gaza.</p>
<p>He <a href="https://www.ynetnews.com/article/sju3uabba">wrote</a> for the Israeli publication <em>Ynet</em>
on 12 October that “One option is a massive and complex ground
operation, with no regard to duration and cost, while the second option
is to create conditions where life in Gaza becomes unsustainable.”</p>
<p>In fact, Israel has done both.</p>
<p>Eiland noted, without voicing dissent, that “Israel has already begun
suspending the supply of diesel, fuel, electricity and water, as well
as closing the border crossings. Yet, it remains uncertain whether these
measures are enough.”</p>
<p>He then moved to ethnic cleansing.</p>
<p>“Israel issued a stern warning to Egypt and made it clear that it
would not permit humanitarian aid from Egypt to enter Gaza. Israel needs
to create a humanitarian crisis in Gaza, compelling tens of thousands
or even hundreds of thousands to seek refuge in Egypt or the Gulf.”</p>
<p>He said nothing of wanting such an arrangement to be temporary.</p>
<p>Eiland then jumped beyond an ethnic cleansing of “tens of thousands
or even hundreds of thousands.” He wrote: “The entire population of Gaza
will either move to Egypt or move to the Gulf.”</p>
<p>The retired general also recommended targeting civilian vehicles in Gaza.</p>
<p>“Every vehicle in Gaza is considered a military vehicle transporting
combatants. Therefore, there is no vehicular traffic, and it does not
matter whether it is transporting water or other critical supplies.”</p>
<p>Such rhetoric amounts to abetting war crimes and has had real
consequences for Palestinian children such as 6-year-old Hind Rajab who,
according to the Palestine Red Crescent, the Israeli military <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/10/world/middleeast/hind-rajab-gaza.html">killed</a> earlier this year in a car along with other family members.</p>
<p>Eiland pushed collective punishment of Palestinians in Gaza as well.</p>
<p>“The UN secretary-general has initiated humanitarian aid to Gaza. The
Israeli condition for any aid should be a visit by the Red Cross to
Israeli hostages and especially the civilians among them. Until this
happens, no aid of any kind will be permitted to enter into Gaza.”</p>
<p>Hinting at the overwhelming violence to come against Palestinian
civilians, Eiland wrote of the developing Israeli attack: “It is
comparable to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, which led to the
launch of an atomic bomb in Japan.”</p>
<p>The Israeli military has <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/03/27/world/middleeast/military-action-americans-gaza.html">killed</a>
over 32,000 Palestinians in Gaza since 7 October, including more than
13,000 children. The International Court of Justice deems it <a href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/maureen-clare-murphy/world-court-orders-israel-halt-gaza-genocide">plausible</a> that Israel is engaged in genocidal actions in the small coastal territory.</p>
<p>Eiland wrapped up his opinion piece by declaring, “As a result, Gaza
will become a place where no human being can exist, and I say this as a
means rather than an end. I say this because there is no other option
for ensuring the security of the state of Israel. We are fighting an
existential war.”</p>
<p>This goes beyond ethnic cleansing to genocide talk when speaking of “a place where no human being can exist.”
</p>
Omer Bartov, a professor of Holocaust and genocide studies at Brown University, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/10/opinion/israel-gaza-genocide-war.html">documented</a> this and more from Eiland in a November opinion piece in <em>The New York Times</em>.
<p>He cited a column Eiland <a href="https://www.ynet.co.il/yedioth/article/yokra13625377">wrote</a> in the Israeli newspaper <em>Yedioth Ahronoth</em>.
The Brown University professor quoted Eiland as writing, “The state of
Israel has no choice but to turn Gaza into a place that is temporarily
or permanently impossible to live in.”</p>
<p>Bartov also quoted Eiland for maintaining, “Creating a severe
humanitarian crisis in Gaza is a necessary means to achieving the goal.”</p>
<p>Then he cited the same <em>Ynet</em> quote noted above that “Gaza will become a place where no human being can exist.”</p>
<p>Bartov commented, “Apparently, no army representative or politician denounced this statement.”</p>
<p>Eiland continued with the <a href="https://mondoweiss.net/2023/11/influential-israeli-national-security-leader-makes-the-case-for-genocide-in-gaza/">genocidal talk</a>
in November when he wrote, “The international community warns of a
humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza and of severe epidemics. We must not
shy away from it, as hard as it is. After all, severe epidemics in the
south of the Strip will hasten victory.”
</p>
Corsight, with its invasive technology against a largely refugee
population dispossessed in 1948, should expect heavy criticism with a
board member calling for the ethnic cleansing of Gaza and to make the
place uninhabitable.
<p>Of course, Democratic Majority for Israel received scant attention
when it came to light that its board member Archie Gottesman once <a href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/michael-f-brown/dmfi-board-member-archie-gottesman-wanted-burn-gaza">issued</a> her own genocidal call against Palestinians in Gaza when she tweeted: “Gaza is full of monsters. Time to burn the whole place.”</p>
<p>Ethnic cleansing and genocide against Palestinians don’t properly
register with most western politicians who, of course, are providing
weapons to Israel to carry out the devastation in Gaza.</p>
<p>That Corsight <a href="https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/corsight-ai-announces-us-expansion-due-to-market-demand-for-leading-ai-facial-recognition-technology-301514859.html">carries out</a>
“global operations and support in the US, UK, Singapore, Australia, and
R&D in Israel” with the backing of a board member proponent of
ethnic cleansing and genocide will not be a significant concern in
Washington.</p>
<p>Popular concern, however, may prove to be a different matter.</p><br>
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