Slovenian officials blame Israeli firm Black Cube for trying to manipulate vote

https://www.wsj.com/world/europe/spies-lies-and-fake-investors-in-disguise-how-plotters-tried-to-flip-a-european-election-1f42b39a

by cramsession • 4 months ago

634 188 4 months ago

wsj.com

https://archive.ph/LwhOj

https://www.politico.eu/article/black-cube-leak-tape-corrupt...

Terr_• 4 months ago

Alternate source due to paywall: https://www.politico.eu/article/black-cube-leak-tape-corrupt...

fidotron• 4 months ago

"The SDS says the recordings — which feature a former minister, a top lawyer and other prominent figures — are proof of corruption at the highest levels of Slovenian society; while Golob’s supporters say the scandal is evidence that Janša is collaborating with foreign entities to retake power."

Sounds like they're all just different brands of scum.

catlikesshrimp• 4 months ago

If I had a choice in my country, and all else being equal, I would prefer the scum not supporting either Israel or Russia

mrkstu• 4 months ago

Yeah, what studiously seems to be absent is a denial of the contents of the recording. Kind of as if Nixon's Watergate burglars had found damning evidence of Democratic shenanigans- just a melee between dirty handed criminals all around.

gregopet• 4 months ago

First let me say that any corruption admitted to in those recordings should be prosecuted immediately, no question about it.

But really, the admissions were really nothing much, I'm actually surprised that's all they got. The former minister was forced to resign under allegations of corruption and was/is under investigation for it, no big surprise. And the talk about having access to Ljubljana's mayor (and that he is "for sale") - well that's been in the news for years, he's under several open investigations and many more were already closed (he always comes out victorious - either because he's innocent and it's all just hearsay, or more likely because he's extremely good at dodging liability and covering his tracks). The rest is just people who used to have some power trying to appear like they still have in order to impress a potential employer or get a business deal (that was the agents' cover).

Again, I hope the authorities are combing the tapes for evidence, but it really wasn't anything bombastic. That the Israelis were doing this on the other hand...

hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm• 4 months ago

I wonder when people will stop being scared to speak out. Is it once they lose their job due to stolen data? Is it once Palantir decides they are a threat and they lose their freedom? Is it once they lose their own land? Is it after starting the 10th war?

crimsoneer• 4 months ago

At the risk of stating the obvious, Black Cube is an actual private intelligence firm that sells spy services [1], while Palantir is a software firm that sells software (even if that software is used by intelligence, gov, etc). You can go spin up a free Foundry instance [2] and test it, and it doesn't have secret buttons to imprison people.

[1] https://www.blackcube.com/

[2] https://www.palantir.com/developers/

kennywinker• 4 months ago

And yet both these technologies are being used to subvert democracy and suppress opposition… almost like it doesn’t need to be fully automated fascism to be fascistic.

ks2048• 4 months ago

Yes, they are master hackers - they even hacked the scrollbar on their web page.

frm88• 4 months ago

From Black Cube's website:

Our Code of Ethics was developed together with Prof. Asa Kasher, an internationally acclaimed scholar specialising in philosophy and ethics, who wrote the Code of Ethics for the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF).

From Wikipedia on Prof. Kasher:

Kasher states explicitly that it is justified to kill a Palestinian child who is in the company of a hundred 'terrorists', because the 'terrorists' might kill children in Sderot. But in reality, it was a case of killing a hundred children who were in the company of one 'terrorist'." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asa_Kasher

Ethics code. Got it.

verdverm2• 4 months ago

NoKings is this weekend, millions are speaking out together

tremon4• 4 months ago

Yes. The problem is, it is only this weekend.

pvaldes4• 4 months ago

A lose of time and rage.

NoKings starting a new political party around the movement, or explaining how to do it to people, so youngsters can fire the GOP for good... that would change the game. THAT would send the clear message that politicians will hear with fear.

But marching, not, It will not change anything. Is just distracting the frog in the bath for a little more, while the slow cooking coup continues. Unless the politicians think that they personally have something to lose, they will not care.

cbcoutinho• 4 months ago

https://archive.ph/LwhOj

greenavocado• 4 months ago

Joel Zamel, an Israeli intelligence veteran, led the Israeli intel company Psy-Group, which worked closely with Netanyahu and the Trump campaign circle, including Steve Bannon and Jared Kushner.

Psy-Group partnered with Cambridge Analytica (later Emerdata) to influence the 2016 US elections using social media data.

The Black Cube intel firm, staffed by former Mossad agents, was employed by Cambridge Analytica, which was involved in harvesting Facebook data.

Harvey Weinstein Hired ex-Mossad Agents to Track Women Accusing Him of Sexual Assault

Weinstein hired Israeli firm Black Cube to research his accusers and to scuttle reports of his sexual abuse

Black Cube operatives posed as activists, abuse victims and sources for journalists

https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/2017-11-07/ty-article/report...

shevy-java• 4 months ago

Israel really needs to stop interfering in other countries' elections. That's not acceptable. We don't interfere when their population votes for warcriminals either.

afavour2• 4 months ago

This isn't Israel the state, it's a private company that's based in Israel.

chiengineer2• 4 months ago

Oh thats adorable

asadm• 4 months ago

gee I wonder what does the private company gain from defaming another country's "pro-Palestine" party.

amarcheschi• 4 months ago

That's like saying that Raytheon doesn't advance US interests in the world

postsantum• 4 months ago

NED is not a CIA front sweatie, it's just a private institute

tsimionescu2• 4 months ago

If you think for a second that the Israeli state allows this company to sell its services to anyone who is opposed to their interests, you really don't understand how defense companies and states work.

vrganj4• 4 months ago

Sure, a private company that just happens to have had multiple former Mossad directors on their board.

Coincidences are funny sometimes :-)

akudha• 4 months ago

So many countries (Russia is reported to be helping Orban, for example) meddle in other countries' affairs, even when it doesn't affect them at all, directly or indirectly. These days a lot of damage can be done online (propaganda, riling people up, fake news etc) for very little money - how does one even begin to counter this? Especially if you are a small country/poor with limited resources

fweimer• 4 months ago

Is “we” referring to the United States?

Sheldon Adelson's backing helped Netanyahu a lot, and not just by funding the free Israel Hayom newspaper (which generally assumes a right-wing, pro-Netanyahu editorial stance).

seydor3• 4 months ago

Israel has created a whole industry around "politics" as a service. Between rampant spying in multiple countries using Predator etc and slimy campaings like this, you can buy governments for an increasingly affordable price.

65103• 4 months ago

It might be cheaper than we think.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSM-JOzL_uU

tristanMatthias• 4 months ago

I'm SO surprised more people don't know about this... I'm always dismissed when I say the elections are rigged.

chiengineer2• 4 months ago

At this point its extremely clear and important to understand

It doesnt matter how men, bodies / hours / time / millions and billions you spend building a defensive

They will infiltrate with less than 500k

And come out on top

100% of the time

This is a fundamental human problem that needs fixing across the entire planet

It does not matter what country or secret groups are involved or how much life or death is truly at stake

There is a 100000% chance some dumbass is willing to fuck if all up for a small bribe

65103• 4 months ago

We should have some benchmark project that bluntly describes the issues with each democracy. Like, did elected officials dramatically change in appearance (length, ears, nose, teeth, chin, eyes), election agenda points that don't match execution, issues with method of voting, issues with vote counting etc

bilekas2• 4 months ago

Am I mistaken but in theory aren't Solvenia and Isreal technically allies ?

I'm not naive to believe intelligence agencies don't target each other in many ways, but general voting interference seems quite brazzen. I would love to see an example being made out of them here.

That said, bar sanctions, Isreali 'private' companies like this seem to have carte blanch on whatever they want to do. No sanctions, no fines, not even investigations will happen I fear.

seydor3• 4 months ago

How are they technically allies? Israel is not in eu or nato.

If you mean broadly, western-minded, yes but slovenia expressed some uncomfortable positions for israel lately

bilekas2• 4 months ago

yes but slovenia expressed some uncomfortable positions for Israel lately

hasn't everyone though ? Does that mean Isreal is in the clear to interfere ?

Israel is not in eu or nato. No of course not, but there is an alignment technically, I guess the western minded.

Ireland is not a NATO member but there would be some backlash from hearing Isreal was interfearing in elections.

CodingJeebus• 4 months ago

but general voting interference seems quite brazzen.

It's also not a new tactic. During his '68 presidential campaign against Lyndon Johnson, Nixon convinced the South Vietnamese to not engage in peace talks with the Communists to weaken Johnson's campaign. The war went on for 7 more years and killed hundreds of thousands of Americans and Vietnamese.

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/06/yes-nixon-sc...

megous2• 4 months ago

When it comes to IL most of the EU's countries leadership strategy comes down to getting willingly fucked and getting their population fucked for literally no benefit, just so that elites will not be temporarily called "anti-semitic".

It's nuts. Israel's idea of being an ally is fucking all their allies over, with useless war they can't win but that will erase and reverse within a few weeks all benefit countries like mine (Czechia) ever derived from a bilateral trade with them, just based on increased energy prices alone. (Compared to Slovenia, it's well deserved here, though. Czechs should suffer, to learn.)

This little stuff, like meddling in elections, is nothing, compared to big effects of IL state policy.

Israel doesn't have allies aside from US, they nurture a herd of masochist sycophant states.

jmyeet• 4 months ago

I want to talk about Ticketmaster.

People hate Ticketmaster. For good reason. TM throws on all these fees, clearly engages in third-party selling, makings buying difficult and jacks up prices. All of this is known. But what's less known is that artists, especially big artists, like Ticketmaster. Why? Because TM is a sacrificial anode. It takes all the hate but adding junk fees that in part go to the artist. The artist can say they're selling seats from as low as $20 in press releases while the least they will get for a seat is $30 because of all the fees.

Being hated is a service you can sell because it takes away attention from what you're doing. You get to blame this third-party but you're still absolutely complicit in everything they're doing. You see where this is going?

Israel is America's Ticketmaster. Anything bad that Israel or an Israeli firm does, the US could end today with a phone call by simply saying "we're cutting off aid if you don't stop doing". The price of this is to be the sacrificial anode for what is actually American foreign policy. There are well-funded and organized efforts to whitewash Israel's reputation and those were successful up until the last few years.

Israel is a huge supplier of spyware eg Pegasus [1]. Despotic regimes use this to spy on journalists and opposition figures and has likely been used to locate and kill them. You think we couldn't stop that? Of course we can. But we like that because, again, Israel takes the heat.

So Israel interfering in Slovenia's elections is the least surprising thing I've heard. I'd be surprised if it wasn't true. You will find Israeli influence in probably every election.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pegasus_(spyware)

rafram• 4 months ago

I’m not a fan of comparing a cruel, genocidal government to a site that jacks up the prices on concert tickets, personally.

margalabargala3• 4 months ago

Your broader point is true but the characterization of Israel as an extension of America is not.

Israel is happy to be the sacrificial anode for more or less anyone willing to pay and not immediately counter to Israel's own geopolitical interests. This is a service they offer to the world, not just America.

America simply happens to be the largest customer among many.

throw3108223• 4 months ago

This is a service they offer to the world, not just America.

It's a service that they offer first and foremost to themselves and against anyone else, including America.

windowliker• 4 months ago

Who would be the Terry A. Davis of Israel-as-Ticketmaster?

mattfrommars• 4 months ago

Yeah, I’ve come to the same realization. Israel does the dirty work for the US and they take all the heat. If the U.S. really wanted Israel to stop, all they need to do is take out special privileges Israel gets and put down economic sanctions.

throw3108223• 4 months ago

If the U.S. really wanted Israel to stop

But could they? You are somehow assuming that all this "dirty work" as you call it is only done on behalf of others and not used to ensure continued ("unwavering") support for themselves.

focusgroup0• 4 months ago

As the Qatari emir said in the wake of the recent Middle Eastern conflict, it's clear who's running the show geopolitically. Cui bono?

js2122• 4 months ago

Qatar is running the show behind the scenes.

rekrsiv3• 4 months ago

I agree with everything you said except that the US is able to stop it. Think about it: Wouldn't Israel simply use these same tools in the US to install a puppet president they can easily manipulate?

Can we even prove it hasn't already happened?

dudefeliciano• 4 months ago

there was some talk some weeks ago about some emails being released that implicated a lot of politicians and business leaders...but I can't really remember so much has happened since then!

underlipton2• 4 months ago

All of this might be true if Israel didn't have undue influence over the American officials who are authorized to pick up that phone. But they do, and so the phone doesn't get picked up.

Also, if your parable about Ticketmaster were true. But it isn't. Most artists do indeed dislike them; the paltry kickback isn't worth the... bad blood... it sends their way. And it's weird that your read is that most artists secretly hold their fans in contempt. I don't know what kind of person just assumes that of others, except that they're that way themselves, maybe.

chimpanzee2• 4 months ago

[flagged]

GZGavinZhao• 4 months ago

Always baffles me why some people think and act like being proud of their state/country/race and criticizing its actions are mutually exclusive.

Jerrrrrrrry• 4 months ago

Because its actions are exclusively critiquable and little to commiserate.

sp4cec0wb0y• 4 months ago

Tell my fellow Americans this too.

Tostino• 4 months ago

This site definitely has a cohort of completely unhinged war mongers. The same names (and a bunch of random new accounts) never fail to show up to defend genocide or any other atrocities being committed.

epolanski3• 4 months ago

This board sure attracts hordes of alt right apologists and anarcho capitalists.

And in general a huge lack of empathy and obsession with power and money.

I guess it's normal given the coupling to the #1 VC incubator of the #1 country that obsesses over power and money.

epolanski3• 4 months ago

I'm quite convinced that Israelis have an edge in communication and socials.

And god forbid how easily you're labeled as anti semitic for bringing up facts about Israeli spying and lobbying in the west.

Hell, in Italy, neo nazi hooligans go protest for Israel with hundreds of police defending them.

Whereas genuine pro Palestinian protests (99 times out of 100 peaceful) met nothing but batons and condemnation.

Even the tv narratives about these events is disgusting.

It's clear the Israelis know how to do their job.

Imustaskforhelp3• 4 months ago

Doesn't matter, half of HN will still defend them.

And I would say half can't/won't speak about this. I try to stray away from these discussions sometimes because I feel worried that someone is going to take any comment out of context within these messages which is a bit of a strange way of self censorship actually and I feel like I might not be the only one. It's also worth mentioning that I have found this to be the case especially for Israel.

For example, I feel valid criticizing the current American Regime and Americans themselves would agree with me at a a much higher proportion/magnitude compared to Israel in which from my small sample bias of online acquaintances, I only had one Jewish (Living in America, not Israeli) person agree that Israel is doing some pretty horrendous things and although do take this with a grain of salt as something they told me but they said that Zionism and Antisemitism are effectively something comparable as within the Jewish religion, There is an idea of the world hating the Jews as being a pre-condition within Jewish religion for them to win within the end-times theology of the jewish faith.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gog_and_Magog I think they were referencing this: Zechariah 14:2 states, "I will gather all the nations to Jerusalem to fight against it." The idea is that the Jewish people will have no earthly allies left.

moogly• 4 months ago

There is an idea of the world hating the Jews as being a pre-condition within Jewish religion for them to win within the end-times theology of the jewish faith.

Just so we're clear, this is religious fundamentalism.

dadoum• 4 months ago

Recently, there were municipal elections in France, and there was Israeli interference there as well [0] (the article is pay-walled and in French but it's written in the title at least).

[0] https://www.lecanardenchaine.fr/politique/53391-la-campagne-...

port112• 4 months ago

Given the current sentiment towards Israel in most of Europe, manipulating elections might not be the cleverest way to win our sympathy again.

yostrovs• 4 months ago

Europeans give too much value to their sympathies. Given that it's now clear to anyone that will open their eyes that there is no international law, Europe ends up looking like an old grandpa yelling at the clouds, powerless to actually do something. Sympathies are not enough.

nmeofthestate3• 4 months ago

"Black Cube" - wonder what they're going for there. Maybe "Sinister Obelisk" was taken.

TinyRick• 4 months ago

Black cube is a common form of symbolism in occult/Kabbalah traditions

gunapologist99• 4 months ago

As well as Islam (the Kaaba).

cr125rider• 4 months ago

They wanted everyone to know they are the bad guys, just like Black Rock.

nmeofthestate3• 4 months ago

It works, to be honest - I would never let Beige Rock manage my money.

p0w3n3d• 4 months ago

Black Rock Black Stone... Maybe even Black Dodecahedron someday

underlipton2• 4 months ago

Just more cultural appropriation. Black Cube, Blackrock, Blackstone... And not a black person in sight. Someone even took Blackstreet which was already ours. /s

EdwardDiego• 4 months ago

Anyone registered The Torment Nexus as an LLC yet?

mentalgear• 4 months ago

Aligns just well with the world's other top villain entities: BlackStone, BlackRock, BlackWater ...

vrganj4• 4 months ago

Israel under Netanyahu is part of the international antidemocratic axis of imperialist autocracy.

Other members, in no particular order:

Orban, Trump, Putin, Babis, Thiel, Bolsonaro, Ellison, Milei, Nawrocki.

These gentlemen (and of course they're all men) constitute the 21st century axis of evil, responsible for most of the backsliding and worsening of rule of law around the world.

flir• 4 months ago

Not Meloni, then?

vrganj4• 4 months ago

This list might be non-exhaustive. Good point on Meloni, she's a bit of a special case. Turns out women can be evil, too!

kotaKat• 4 months ago

Hey now, there’s a few axis girlbosses out there! Don’t forget Sana’s skin in the game.

eithed• 4 months ago

Nawrocki is just incompetent (and to be fair that was his selling point for PiS). Now - Kaczynski, that's where true evil lies

reducesuffering• 4 months ago

Milei though? His social views, eccentric behavior, and seeing other right wing leaders as kindred spirits is unfortunate.

However, practically and policy-wise, what has he done that's antidemocratic or imperialist? He's repeatedly democratically elected, as part of the people's mandate to fix their economy, and despite leftwing hang-wringing it'll never work, all data seems to point to their economy getting better.

_zoltan_2• 4 months ago

and Russia is now doing the same in Hungary... :(

ajewhere• 4 months ago

Russia has no resorces to do that, no matter how many times you retell the myth about "troll factories", "Russia did Brexit" and all the other lies / half truths which US, UK, Israel and other western states told and continue to tell to divert the attention from the enormous scale of their propaganda industry.

phatfish• 4 months ago

It's the ONLY thing that Russia has the resources to do. Apart from fighting their smaller neighbour to a standstill.

_zoltan_2• 4 months ago

???

it's a FACT that they do this.

consumer451• 4 months ago

This is the most disconnected-from-reality comment that I have read on this website, ever?

zug_zug• 4 months ago

It seems to me that interfering in a foreign election should be understood to be grounds for war.

nextos2• 4 months ago

Yes, and the EU, due to this fragmentation, seems to be a fertile playground for all this unacceptable interference by foreign powers.

tremon4• 4 months ago

Actually, no. The decentralization of power means that it takes a lot more effort to subvert each country individually, rather than propping up a few candidates for the entire region like they do in the US.

close04• 4 months ago

That’s true but that fragmentation is also what limits the propagation of fractures. You can see it like sandboxing.

A deal with foreign intelligence is a dead with the devil that comes with a lifetime of subservience. And subservience to foreign powers is a greater evil than yo usual internal corruption. At least the locally corrupt in a democracy have some interest in things going somewhat well in their country. The foreign actors only care about theirs.

amelius• 4 months ago

No because any attempt at interference would in that case trigger article 5 of NATO.

JumpCrisscross2• 4 months ago

interfering in a foreign election should be understood to be grounds for war

Requires a rigorous definition of interference.

The allegations here—trying to catch politicians on tape being sleazy and then releasing them with sketchy editing-doesn’t seem to rise to the level of calling for a kinetic response.

armchairhacker• 4 months ago

Russia and China are definitely interfering in the US (to spread discord, ex https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_interference_in_the_20...), so should the US formally declare war against them?

What I do think is that nations should 1) interfere back, and 2) make their citizens more resilient to foreign propaganda. And I specifically don't mean building a firewall. In fact do the opposite: if a firewalled nation is leaking out propaganda, ensure firewall-breaking tools leak in.

fromMars4• 4 months ago

No idea why this is being downvoted. It seems only en-vogue on HN voice outrage about Israel.

everdrive• 4 months ago

If this were really taken seriously there would be much more war.

epolanski3• 4 months ago

It's insane the power and influence Israelis have.

In the US it's blatant, from the insane amounts of money and weaponry sent to Israel (why are american taxpayers subsidizing Israel exactly? It's not like they are neither poor nor US owes them) to the recent events in the middle east.

But even in Europe. Here in Italy the coalition government has multiple high profile politicians that just happen to be shareholders or CEOs of security companies owned by Israelis. And just so it happens that the same security and communication companies get lots of work by the Italian government. And when journalists brought this up because they didn't report it to neither the government nor parliament, nothing happened anyway.

It's a scandal really, but if you write or say it, you're labeled as anti semitic, so criticizing and surfacing this terrible stuff is always controversial.

bawolff3• 4 months ago

why are american taxpayers subsidizing Israel exactly?

The same reason USA is subsidizing half the middle eastern countries - its a strategic location near extremely important transit routes, near important resources, and right between major powers so the region doesn't squarely fall in any major power's sphere of influence and thus up to be influenced.

I dont know why all these conspiracy theories think the usa<->israel relationship is so strange, but dont blink at the relationship usa has with egypt, uae, saudi arabia, bharain, etc.

cramsession5• 4 months ago

We primarily fund the other Middle Eastern countries to keep Israel safe. Were it not for Israel, we would just have normal diplomatic relations with them.

Gud• 4 months ago

Israel controls no strategic resources, unlike the other allies the USA has in the Middle East.

Your comment completely ignores the long history Israel has of rigging the US elections by funding their pet congressmen.

gregoryyy• 4 months ago

Actually - it's not Israeli influence. It's pro-Israel influence. Important difference. This includes lobby organisations funded or founded by wealthy Jews, conservative Christian lobbyists, pro-arms trade interests, and geopolitical interests (essentially Israel acts as a US military proxy they can use to keep the middle east in check). Not quite Israel secretly pulling strings (which is quite rightly dismissed as traditional boring anti-semetic conspiracy theory wearing a different hat), more of an alignment of interests, which dictator Netenyahu is currently taking advantage of to pursue his own career agenda (complete destruction of Iran and security of Israel from the mindset of a paranoid Israeli nationalist). Naturally, this involves attempting to buy out journalists and promote propaganda - and the Israeli attempts to do this are usually rather inept. What's far more effective is the already existing domestic pro-Israel lobby groups that have a completely above board, and vastly more effective way of funding Israel (and the vastly more powerful US military-financial-geopolitical interests).

fromMars4• 4 months ago

Agree with your post. As a Jewish American, I have been advocating that it would be better for Americans and even Jews if we stop sending money to Israel and put political pressure on Israel to abandon illegal settlements, end the war on Gaza and work towards a resolution of the Israeli Palestinian conflict.

Unfortunately, this POV doesn't seem to be widely held by many woth influence.

fromMars4• 4 months ago

As a Jewish American, I don't think it's antisemitic. We really shouldn't be sending any money or weapons to Israel or joining them in any wars.

What I do think is a bit antisemitic is the suggestion that Israel is somehow unique here. Russia, China, and the U.S. are all doing this. Heck we just captured Maduro and killed leader of Iran. I just think a country like Russia is way more effective and subtle when it comes to election manipulation, especially in Eastern Europe.

calgoo• 4 months ago

So, if I don't follow your what-about-ism, Im a racist? Thats what you are saying there; We all know that the US, china, Russia, and 99% of the countries in the world are doing this. Why is it racist to pick on the COUNTRY of Israel, which right now is trying its hardest to wipe out entire countries? We know Russia is doing that right now in Ukraine, but that does not eliminate what Israel is doing.

amunozo2• 4 months ago

We see hate everywhere to China and Russia every time in way higher levels than to Israel. Is that racist, too? Russia is also embargoed for doing the same things Israel does. Why isn't Israel embargoed? Antisemitism, too?

The US sadly just do the fuck they want, but I think they get a lot of criticism here in Europe at least. The only thing in what Israel is unique about is that it seems there are no consequences for their actions.

ifwinterco2• 4 months ago

"Sovereign is he who decides on the exception" - Carl Schmitt.

Always different rules for Israel vs. any other "normal country", and that in itself tells you all you need to know

Pay083• 4 months ago

Indeed. Israel is the only country that can get the majority of UN condemnations for merely existing.

pvaldes4• 4 months ago

Same in Spain with prominent figures of the right. Diaz Ayuso the president of the Madrid autonomic region and a very powerful figure in the right party, has been particularly combative for months to refuse to see a genocide in Gaza, or tried to justify it with nail and teeth. Then her connection with some Israel millionaires was disclosed, and now she is suddenly very quiet about the theme. Not more party invitations, it seems.

pvaldes4• 4 months ago

To add context and data: Ayuso is a close friend of David Hatchwell Altaras, CEO of Excem technologies (Cibersecurity, telecom and Intelligence).

Hatchwell was one of the biggest donors of Netanyahu campaign, and was in the inner circle of Sheldon Adelson.

He is related also with "Action and Communication on the Middle East" (Acom), the "company accelerator" Zakut (Provider of entrepreneurship and technology consulting services), the investments platform OurCrowd, and several business on real state in Madrid.

nashashmi• 4 months ago

The desperation of the state is becoming apparent. Look for more election interference in the future. It will be more sophisticated. And likely can be traced in past elections.

tremon4• 4 months ago

I think it's also true that government officials around the world are less inclined to just go along with it, since Israel has lost control of public perception. So the tactics have to become more brazen and forceful to achieve the same results, increasing the risk of exposure and/or blowback.

8bitsrule• 4 months ago

I don't think for a minute that this stuff is anything new ... to the contrary. I think what is new is that, every time they step in it, the whole world now quickly knows.

bawolff3• 4 months ago

So is the allegation that this private intelligence firm tried to induce members of the government party to offer a bribe. They then published the recorded conversations.

I guess what is missing from the article is was the videos misleading or did they really get offered the bribe? Because if its the latter, its kind of hard to feel sympathy for a corrupt official getting caught even if the mechanism was problematic.

rekrsiv3• 4 months ago

A bribe in a low trust society is not the same as a bribe in a high trust society.

In this context, a bribe is irrelevant compared to the act of election interference by a foreign actor.

bawolff3• 4 months ago

Appearently not to the electors or this scheme wouldn't have worked.

sigismund2• 4 months ago

The videos weren't directly about bribing. They were more about people talking about someone else taking a bribe. Sadly all of the videos were edited, so we don't have full context.

rekrsiv3• 4 months ago

Quick question: Could they also be manipulating this message board's voting?

Bender• 4 months ago

If they could get people to install a mobile UI app that fetches instructions on what to up/down-vote, what to flag/vouch then they could and unlikely anyone would notice.

It is unlikely that enough people would check their up/down vote history, vouch and flag history and even then some would assume they fat-fingered such things.

Such a UI could also save and upload username and password to another site. Some people use the same creds on multiple sites.

bjacobel• 4 months ago

Exactly such an app exists.

https://www.palestine-studies.org/en/node/232163

stainablesteel• 4 months ago

assume this is the case on every platform

izacus• 4 months ago

Online community spam/brigading has been a normal occurrence since I've been running a message board 15 years ago. At least in Europe.

Seeing a sudden flood of new messages from low use accounts around elections or referendums is normal these days.

Imustaskforhelp3• 4 months ago

I think a larger question to ask is if could they also be manipulating the people themselves who are reading these message boards prior to this post which later impacts such message board's voting.

rendall3• 4 months ago

Lol. If Israel could manipulate HN do you think so many anti-Israel posts would appear on the front page, and each mitigating or nuanced comment about Israel would be flagged so quickly? No, Israel does not control or manipulate HN.

submeta• 4 months ago

Maybe there are lots more articles posted on HN criticising Israel, and only a fraction remains, because they win the up- and downvote war?

hebelehubele• 4 months ago

Vast majority of post critical of Israel get flagged as soon as they get enough traction

aaa_aaa• 4 months ago

I saw many new accounts doing brazen propaganda.

dplesh• 4 months ago

I take it as obvious, that all message boards are swarmed with bots of different actors, might it be China, Russia, US, Israel, Turkey

Bombthecat• 4 months ago

I just assume nothing is unmanipulated anymore.

Companies, trolls, states etc have it way to easy now

beboplifa• 4 months ago

The tapes show prominent Slovenian figures apparently discussing corruption, illegal lobbying and the misuse of state funds. Is there any evidence that the tape is fraudulent? The article doesn't provide any. I wonder if anybody even read the article other than words "Israeli firm" and jumped to a lynching

megous2• 4 months ago

Giora Eiland is the architect of "General's Plan". If anything, this scumbag criminal should have been locked up the moment he touched down in Ljubljana with his "company".

throw3108223• 4 months ago

"The plan, conceived by retired major general and former head of the National Security Council Giora Eiland and presented to the Knesset by a group of several retired Israeli generals, proposed giving approximately 300,000 Palestinians a one-week evacuation period to depart from the northern third of Gaza before designating it a military exclusion zone. Under this strategy, anyone remaining in the area would be considered a combatant. The plan would then implement a complete siege that would block essential supplies until militant surrender, denying all essential supplies including medicine, fuel, food, and water"

carabiner• 4 months ago

Why are they like this... There are elite cultures that just live and don't bother anyone. Israel isn't one of them.

nmeofthestate3• 4 months ago

So it sounds like these guys posed as investors, schmoozed politicians, and got them on tape agreeing to do corrupt stuff. The recordings were then released to influence voters.

The thing about this is, the response to it will depend on who the politicians were. For example, if it was the "far right" politicians caught on tape, there wouldn't be the same furore about election interference. The recordings may of course be edited to be misleading.

sigismund2• 4 months ago

The videos weren't directly about bribing. They were more about people talking about someone else taking a bribe. Sadly all of the videos were edited, so we don't have full context.

trinix9123• 4 months ago

I'm from Slovenia and it is very obvious what is going on behind the scenes. It's a public secret at this point that both the parties in charge (especially the people in/around Gibanje Svoboda) and the various people "from behind" take their cuts at big infrastructure projects.

Just to be fair, this is not unique to the current government. We've had several similar corruption scandals throughout several governments; it was almost always related to infrastructure projects.

A few days prior to this leak there was a separate one posted on Facebook (that I sadly can't find anymore; it has been covered by several media outlets here [1]), in which the former GS secretary reveals who gets what % and that they have to "set our own people to the right places, as (2023) floods cleanup is where the most money flows".

It is also not a secret that the mayor of Ljubljana, Janković, is able to bypass all laws to issue building permits in exchange for a 20% "donation" to city-ran sports clubs, which are ran by his friends. This was revealed in the case of an Austrian investor and his luxury flats at Celovška cesta, Ljubljana, a few months ago.

It's also plain obvious that the state media (RTV SLO) is trying hard to shift the conversation towards the origin of the leaks rather than the supposed corruption revealed in them. The practice had usually been to investigate the content first.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/shorts/c5OFcRRSF6k

refulgentis3• 4 months ago

This skips over what the article actually describes. Švarc Pipan's account isn't of politicians getting caught, it's of an entrapment operation. The fake investors "seemed to know nothing about data centers," kept pushing her toward suggesting a bribe, and paid a €500 tab in cash. She says she refused to lobby and told them she was legally barred from doing so at the time.

trinix9123• 4 months ago

There is no direct proof that Janša is linked to them, however plausible it seems.

(the parent comment has been edited to remove this claim shortly after I made my comment responding to it)

SOVA has only been able to confirm that an unlabeled Israeli charter landed at Brnik and that a taxi ride with two businessmen was made from the airport to the street in Ljubljana where SDS is headquartered.

This could have also been any two legit businessmen, who might have come with any other flight, for any other purpose. It’s not confirmed whether they entered the SDS building either.

It’s also anachronistic - the videos appear to have been filmed a while ago (given the statements made and the held positions of the people in them), while that flight has only happened a few weeks ago.

Švarc Pipan also didn’t refuse to lobby, she just brushed it off by saying “it’s not lobbying” after bring told it indeed was, right after bragging about lobbying.

She then goes on to explain that she kept arranging things from behind, after resigning from her position because of the Litijska corruption scandal about a year into her turn.

tlogan• 4 months ago

Interesting. I have vey limited knowledge of Slovenian politics, but it often seems that whoever gets elected ends up facing corruption charges and ends up in prison after the next election cycle.

Since Janez Jansa will be prime minister he will be charged for corruption by end of his term and this could be the third time for him to go to prison (the first instance happened under the socialist regime, so maybe that does not count).

Anyway, I do not think Israelis needed to work hard here to find some dirt.

nec4b• 4 months ago

There was no rigging or any manipulation of votes. Current and previous government officials were caught bragging about their previous corrupt adventures. The government after some initial shock came up with a story about foreign intervention. Slovenian newspapers and journalist activist carried it all the way to Brussels in order bank on negative emotions about Israel and hopped people will think about that. There was no institutional response, because the current government has cleaned institutions of people not loyal to them. It's a rather sad situation. The society is deeply divided. When similar thing happened in Belgium, the corrupt people were immediately punished and nobody cared who exposed them.

trinix9123• 4 months ago

Yes, pretty much. It's much more obvious if you take into account the Počivalšek leaks before the previous elections and compare the media response to this time.

easymodex• 4 months ago

Thing is, the ones "exposing" them are already known as corrupt from multiple previous scandals, now all they did was get some people on camera which say that the other side is also corrupt. While none of this is good, I'd still vote for the ones supposedly somewhat corrupt instead of those known to be fully corrupt.

tzu321• 4 months ago

Here are the videos: https://www.anti-corruption2026.com/

They are speaking in English. Only appendices 1-5 are available.

maxdo• 4 months ago

This instance is a kindergarten if you compare Victor Orban doing phone calls during EU sessions from toilet to report secrets to Russia.

ejpir• 4 months ago

so, interfering with elections is "kindergarten", compared to leaking secrets?

ahhhhnoooo• 4 months ago

Israel has recently invaded Lebanon, started a regional war with Iran, and has been recognized as committing genocide in Gaza.

The UN believes the IDF uses rape as a matter of policy and has published a report with quite a bit of evidence.

Hearing Israel is meddling with elections is like, yeah, if you are doing that other stuff I'm not shocked when you also do this.

abdelhousni2• 4 months ago

Same Slovenia which Prime Minister of Slovakia Robert Fico was shot and critically injured in 2024 after, certainly not related, his government's opposition to military assistance to Ukraine and of hypocritical face of the EU inaction against Israel "treatment" of Palestinians.

ZenDroid• 4 months ago

Nope, not the same Slovenia. That Slovenia was actually Slovakia.

abdelhousni2• 4 months ago

I stand corrected thanks and sorry

ncr100• 4 months ago

Is this an act of war?

One country, Israel, attempting to change out the government of another?

That's hideous.

derelicta• 4 months ago

Remember; its not the tail that is wagging the dog. Behind every Israeli operation hides an American one.

Slovenian officials blame Israeli firm Black Cube for trying to manipulate vote

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