Former NSA contractor Edward Snowden is back again. This time he's here to tell us that the NSA routinely shares data of United States citizens with Israel. This should come as no surprise to anyone, as it was previously revealed that the NSA shared citizen's information with Great Britain.
The communications transferred by the NSA to Israel, includes communication from Arab and Palestinian Americans who could allegedly one day become a threat. The information was transferred to a secret agency in Israel known as Unit 8200, though Snowden did not say whether or not citizens or their families were harmed in any way.
We understand that both Israel and the United States signed a memorandum of understanding that outlined several transfers that took place in 2009.
"It's one of the biggest abuses we've seen," Snowden was quoted as saying.
The data sent to Israel was done in raw form, which means the name of citizens and their personal information could have been viewed by Israel. Snowden went on to add that Unit 8200 uses the data it collects from the United States to persecute innocent Palestinians, a truly evil act if these accusations turns out to be true.
Some of the personal data collected by Israel on these American Palestinians include their sexual orientation, money problems, infidelities, and other private matters that shouldn't have been known by the government.
In the usual case, when such information is sent from one country to the other, personal information is almost always not shared, but for some reason, this was not done.
What the NSA has done should be a wake-up call for all Americans, whether they have Palestinian ancestry or not. This is a clear sign that no one is safe from the assault and clutches of the NSA, and probably will never be safe even if certain reforms are put into place.
If the NSA is capable of doing such things to its own people, one has to wonder how far the agency would go with folks who are outside of the United States. It's difficult to process right now, and we hope for some real change in the future.
Edward Snowden is currently residing in Russia as he aims to stay one step ahead of the United States. If he should ever return home, Snowden would face serious charges, and could be put to death.
