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Could Mossad have sabotaged the EgyptAir flight that went down in 1999?
There were 33 high ranking Egyptian officers on board. I remember watching ABC news at the time and was told that the Egyptian pilot had said "I have made my decision now." After Egyptian investigators listened to the voice recorders, that quote was nowhere to be found. Why was that lie televised and why was it never corrected -- leaving the impression that the Egyptian pilot really had committed suicide.
http://www.wsws.org/articles/1999/nov1999/air-n24.shtml
Last Friday morning the two leading US daily newspapers, the New
York Times and the Washington Post, carried virtually identical articles
about the Egyptian reaction to claims in the American media that a
suicidal pilot had caused the EgyptAir Flight 990 crash.
Public opinion in Egypt was refusing to give credence to the evidence and
was searching wildly for some alternative theory, both papers reported.
This reaction was fueled, they implied, by a propensity of people in the
Middle East to believe in conspiracy theories where the United States
was concerned.
The Times article, written by Douglas Jehl and headlined "Conspiracy
Theories Cripple Probe," declared that "conspiracy theories are
circulating wildly in Egypt, troubling both US and Egyptian officials.
Some have blamed Israel's intelligence service for the crash; others have
suggested the US investigators are covering up for Boeing, the plane's
manufacturer."
The Post article, by Howard Schneider and Lee Hockstader, noted the
widespread rejection of the suicide theory, not, they claimed, on the basis
of examining the evidence, but "from the simple conviction that an
Egyptian would not do such a thing."
The article continued: "That has left much of the Cairo press scrambling
for an alternative theory. Writers have come up with everything from
'laser rays' to sabotage by Israel's Mossad intelligence service to a US
government plot designed to avoid exposing Boeing Co. to liability."
State Department spokesman James P. Rubin denounced what he called
"wild conspiracy theories" in the Arab press. "We're appealing for calm,
and calm can only come if there is a minimum of speculation about
conclusions in this country, and a minimum of wild, exaggerated,
unfounded conspiracy theories in other media in the Middle East."
But before the day was out, National Transportation Safety Board
(NTSB) Chairman James Hall acknowledged that American officials had
leaked false information about the contents of the cockpit flight recorder
tape—information that seemed to substantiate US claims that copilot
Gamil Batouti deliberately crashed the plane.
Hall called a press conference Friday afternoon to denounce published
accounts of taped conversations on the cockpit recorder. He criticized
"reckless" media reports which were "just flat wrong." His agency wanted
the truth, he said, and "we won't get there on a road paved with leaks,
speculation, supposition, and spin."
While he would not single out the specific distortions, it was generally
assumed he was referring to the alleged statement, "I have made my
decision," widely reported to have been made by Batouti just before the
plane began its sudden dive. After a team of Egyptian officials was
allowed to listen to the tape, it emerged that these words were simply not
to be found.
Hall said that any misinformation given out by unnamed government
sources came from agencies other than his own. "We have not released
specific information from the cockpit voice recorder," he said, "and any
so-called verbatim information you have heard about that recorder is
unauthorized, second-, third- or fourth-hand."
The agency most likely responsible for releasing the false information is
the FBI, which has been seeking to take over the investigation into the
EgyptAir crash for the past two weeks. FBI Director Louis Freeh himself
may be the source of many of the leaks to the media attributed to "high
Justice Department officials" or "anonymous government sources."
The American media was unfazed about its role as a conduit for such
disinformation. Not one of the newspapers or television networks which
falsely reported the contents of the cockpit voice recorder tape has
publicly admitted that it was lied to or identified the "anonymous" and
"senior" officials who supplied the false information.
As for the alleged affinity of Egyptians and Middle Eastern Arabs
generally for "wild conspiracy theories," there are no more grounds for
dismissing out of hand suspicions of US bias in favor of Boeing or fears
of CIA or Israeli intrigue than there are for ruling out the possibility of
pilot suicide. Up to this point, no convincing evidence has been brought
forward to warrant a supposition of either mechanical failure, pilot
responsibility, or some other explanation for the disaster.
What is disturbing is the evident haste on the part of American
investigators, and the eagerness on the part of the media, to prematurely
rule out mechanical failure and, on the basis of meager evidence at best,
declare the probe a criminal investigation and turn it over to the FBI.
As both Arab and non-Arab commentators have noted, it seems unlikely,
from a psychological standpoint, that a long-serving pilot, about to leave
his job for a comfortable retirement, would suddenly take his own life
and the lives of 216 other people.
On the other hand, theories suggesting a terrorist attack, directed either
at the Egyptian regime in general or the 33 Egyptian military officers on
board the flight, cannot be discounted. This includes the possible role of
the Israeli secret service Mossad, working either directly or through
agents in Islamic fundamentalist organizations. Such provocations have
taken place in the past.
Nor can the US missile theory be simply dismissed as ludicrous. The US
government has shot down at least one passenger airliner in the Middle
East, the IranAir jet which was destroyed over the Persian Gulf in 1987.
According to a current Italian judicial investigation, an Alitalia jet was
shot down in 1980 over the Mediterranean by US warplanes pursuing a
Libyan MiG in international waters—a shoot-down which has been
concealed from the American public for nearly 20 years, but is widely
known about in the Arab world.
It is, moreover, absurd to label the suspicion that US authorities are
seeking to protect Boeing, the largest American aircraft exporter, as a
“wild conspiracy theory.” This is exactly what the US government and
Boeing did for more than a year after the explosion of TWA Flight 800 in
1996, pursuing claims of sabotage and terrorism until forced to admit that
the disaster was caused by a design flaw in the fuel tank of the Boeing
747.
This is not only a matter of the huge potential liability should the deaths of
217 people be attributed to a failure of the company. Boeing is locked in
an increasingly difficult struggle with the European aircraft manufacturing
consortium Airbus Industries, and a series of highly publicized
disasters—TWA Flight 800 now followed by EgyptAir Flight
990—could tip the balance and lead to the loss of multibillion-dollar
orders.
Transferring the case from the NTSB to the FBI would mean a
curtailment, or even a virtual halt, to the expensive recovery effort in the
Atlantic. As a result, whatever evidence there might be of mechanical
failure might be left to lie at the bottom of the ocean.
http://www.wsws.org/articles/1999/nov1999/air-n24.shtml
Last Friday morning the two leading US daily newspapers, the New
York Times and the Washington Post, carried virtually identical articles
about the Egyptian reaction to claims in the American media that a
suicidal pilot had caused the EgyptAir Flight 990 crash.
Public opinion in Egypt was refusing to give credence to the evidence and
was searching wildly for some alternative theory, both papers reported.
This reaction was fueled, they implied, by a propensity of people in the
Middle East to believe in conspiracy theories where the United States
was concerned.
The Times article, written by Douglas Jehl and headlined "Conspiracy
Theories Cripple Probe," declared that "conspiracy theories are
circulating wildly in Egypt, troubling both US and Egyptian officials.
Some have blamed Israel's intelligence service for the crash; others have
suggested the US investigators are covering up for Boeing, the plane's
manufacturer."
The Post article, by Howard Schneider and Lee Hockstader, noted the
widespread rejection of the suicide theory, not, they claimed, on the basis
of examining the evidence, but "from the simple conviction that an
Egyptian would not do such a thing."
The article continued: "That has left much of the Cairo press scrambling
for an alternative theory. Writers have come up with everything from
'laser rays' to sabotage by Israel's Mossad intelligence service to a US
government plot designed to avoid exposing Boeing Co. to liability."
State Department spokesman James P. Rubin denounced what he called
"wild conspiracy theories" in the Arab press. "We're appealing for calm,
and calm can only come if there is a minimum of speculation about
conclusions in this country, and a minimum of wild, exaggerated,
unfounded conspiracy theories in other media in the Middle East."
But before the day was out, National Transportation Safety Board
(NTSB) Chairman James Hall acknowledged that American officials had
leaked false information about the contents of the cockpit flight recorder
tape—information that seemed to substantiate US claims that copilot
Gamil Batouti deliberately crashed the plane.
Hall called a press conference Friday afternoon to denounce published
accounts of taped conversations on the cockpit recorder. He criticized
"reckless" media reports which were "just flat wrong." His agency wanted
the truth, he said, and "we won't get there on a road paved with leaks,
speculation, supposition, and spin."
While he would not single out the specific distortions, it was generally
assumed he was referring to the alleged statement, "I have made my
decision," widely reported to have been made by Batouti just before the
plane began its sudden dive. After a team of Egyptian officials was
allowed to listen to the tape, it emerged that these words were simply not
to be found.
Hall said that any misinformation given out by unnamed government
sources came from agencies other than his own. "We have not released
specific information from the cockpit voice recorder," he said, "and any
so-called verbatim information you have heard about that recorder is
unauthorized, second-, third- or fourth-hand."
The agency most likely responsible for releasing the false information is
the FBI, which has been seeking to take over the investigation into the
EgyptAir crash for the past two weeks. FBI Director Louis Freeh himself
may be the source of many of the leaks to the media attributed to "high
Justice Department officials" or "anonymous government sources."
The American media was unfazed about its role as a conduit for such
disinformation. Not one of the newspapers or television networks which
falsely reported the contents of the cockpit voice recorder tape has
publicly admitted that it was lied to or identified the "anonymous" and
"senior" officials who supplied the false information.
As for the alleged affinity of Egyptians and Middle Eastern Arabs
generally for "wild conspiracy theories," there are no more grounds for
dismissing out of hand suspicions of US bias in favor of Boeing or fears
of CIA or Israeli intrigue than there are for ruling out the possibility of
pilot suicide. Up to this point, no convincing evidence has been brought
forward to warrant a supposition of either mechanical failure, pilot
responsibility, or some other explanation for the disaster.
What is disturbing is the evident haste on the part of American
investigators, and the eagerness on the part of the media, to prematurely
rule out mechanical failure and, on the basis of meager evidence at best,
declare the probe a criminal investigation and turn it over to the FBI.
As both Arab and non-Arab commentators have noted, it seems unlikely,
from a psychological standpoint, that a long-serving pilot, about to leave
his job for a comfortable retirement, would suddenly take his own life
and the lives of 216 other people.
On the other hand, theories suggesting a terrorist attack, directed either
at the Egyptian regime in general or the 33 Egyptian military officers on
board the flight, cannot be discounted. This includes the possible role of
the Israeli secret service Mossad, working either directly or through
agents in Islamic fundamentalist organizations. Such provocations have
taken place in the past.
Nor can the US missile theory be simply dismissed as ludicrous. The US
government has shot down at least one passenger airliner in the Middle
East, the IranAir jet which was destroyed over the Persian Gulf in 1987.
According to a current Italian judicial investigation, an Alitalia jet was
shot down in 1980 over the Mediterranean by US warplanes pursuing a
Libyan MiG in international waters—a shoot-down which has been
concealed from the American public for nearly 20 years, but is widely
known about in the Arab world.
It is, moreover, absurd to label the suspicion that US authorities are
seeking to protect Boeing, the largest American aircraft exporter, as a
“wild conspiracy theory.” This is exactly what the US government and
Boeing did for more than a year after the explosion of TWA Flight 800 in
1996, pursuing claims of sabotage and terrorism until forced to admit that
the disaster was caused by a design flaw in the fuel tank of the Boeing
747.
This is not only a matter of the huge potential liability should the deaths of
217 people be attributed to a failure of the company. Boeing is locked in
an increasingly difficult struggle with the European aircraft manufacturing
consortium Airbus Industries, and a series of highly publicized
disasters—TWA Flight 800 now followed by EgyptAir Flight
990—could tip the balance and lead to the loss of multibillion-dollar
orders.
Transferring the case from the NTSB to the FBI would mean a
curtailment, or even a virtual halt, to the expensive recovery effort in the
Atlantic. As a result, whatever evidence there might be of mechanical
failure might be left to lie at the bottom of the ocean.
http://www.wsws.org/articles/1999/nov1999/air-n24.shtml
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Someone in the US government fabricated the line "I have made my decision now" -- attributing it to the pilot -- and fed it to the media which transmitted it to the American people.
Whoever gave out this lie must not have foreseen that Egyptian investigators would be allowed to listen to the flight tape recorders.
After the Egyptian investigators could not find this passage anywhere on the recordings, you would think that the media would correct their erroneous report. But there was barely a peep. Why is that?
Something funny was going on and I believe it was one of the two things that this article mentions: Mossad sabotage along with the usual US government and media lies. OR Blaming the pilot to steer blame away from Boeing.
As for anti-Semitism, I suggest you grow a thicker skin to criticism.
you guys are funny.
that's like saying you are racist against the chinese if you don't agree with state communism. Patently ridiculous. C'mon. Get real. The Israeli government has to stop hiding behind this anti-semitic crap. If someone had blamed Jews for it, then it would be anti-semitic. I'm sure you are intelligent enough to realize this, but seem to choose to use your powers of intellect for the purpose of misinformation. This is an unworthy abuse of your own mind. Anti-semitism is a cause which will not, in the long run, be served by disingenious tactics of misinformation. Rather, it is a cause which depends vitally on education and truth. I was called anti-semitic the other day simply for stating that the original program of extermination in Nazi Germany dealt with German dissidents. The Nazis had to get rid of the opposition before moving on to liquidate other groups. I never claimed Jews were not victims, I merely stated that the extermination program dealt also with dissidents, Russians, homosexuals, the disabled, and a whole host of other groups. The whole anti-semitism thing is getting out of hand. This is a term now being used to justify the very thing it stands to prevent; namely genocide. Its high time a stop was put to this before anti-semitism loses meaning and context. You people who bandy that word about freely without regard are guilty of endangering Jewish people and promoting ignorance.
You can easily convice me it is not anti-semitism. Show me that there is/was same sized response to the following horrific events:
Russian war on Afganistan (left 1000000 afgans dead)
Russian war in Chechnia
Saddam Hussein gassing tens of thousands of Curds
Ethnic clensing in Bosnia
Now, why is it that when tiny Israel - the only land Jews have for themselves is fighting for it's existance, such hatred is expressed?
Its not hatred, its anger and condemnation. An appropriate response. I also condemn the atrocities in those other countries you mentioned. I have even protested some of them. But what is unique about the Israeli atrocities, is that SOME PEOPLE THINK THEY ARE JUSTIFIED, which is cause for debate.
By the way, I suppose these Rabbis are anti-semites, are they???
And there is. The most relevant information about a crash in which the crew, through accident, mistake or design, was suspected of being the cause wouldn't be the cockpit voice recorder, it would be the flight data recorder, which keeps track of what's being done with the controls, among other things.
This paragraph, taken from http://www.planecrashinfo.com, is derived from the NTSB investigation- after it was completed. Notice that while it makes a positive statement that control inputs caused the crash ( the flight data recorder was recovered), there isn't any official finding about why the plane was flown right into the ocean- just a weak bit of speculation.
"The plane took off from JFK at 1:19 a.m. bound for Cairo, Egypt. Thirty-three minutes later, after attaining an altitude of 33,000 feet, it was observed on radar in an extremely rapid descent. The aircraft was observed in a 66 degree dive at 483 knots. The descent continued to 16,700 feet after which the aircraft climbed to 24,000 ft. After that, the plane began a second dive and broke up at around 10,000 ft. crashing into the Atlantic Ocean, 60 miles southeast of Nantucket Island. The aircraft was named Thutmosis III. The accident was caused by the relief first officer's flight control inputs which caused the airplane's departure from normal cruise flight and subsequent impact with the Atlantic Ocean. The reason for the first officer's actions were not determined by the NTSB. One could conclude the actions were deliberate in an attempt to commit suicide."
What atrocities exactly?
"...An appropriate response. I also condemn the atrocities in those other countries you mentioned"
Are you blind? Millions of people died in the other conflicts i mentioned, where is the condemnation? where are the hate sites? where is the name calling? is it really proportionate to the other conflicts?
"By the way, I suppose these Rabbis are anti-semites, are they???"
Nope, just a weird cult much like the Amish. Most Jews look at them with amusement.
Your Neo-Nazi doctrine is showing, X2. This is only 'fairly well know' in Nazi and Arab circles and hate organizations. You are a low life bigot, the KKK would be proud of you.
http://www.jewsnotzions.org
of course, haven't you read Noam Chomsky's work? he is an excellent example of an Anti Semitic Jew. And i didn't say Satmer are Nazis i just said they are capable of Nazi like mentality.
There was a great article a few months ago in the Atlantic Monthly detailing the investigation. You may be able to read it on line.
Basically all the evidence from the flight data recorder points to a deliberate crash. What's more, Boeing bent over backwards to test every possible scenario/alternative interpretation put forth by the Egyptians, no matter how implausible. Many were tested in simulators and pilots were able to recover easily. This doesn't sound like a cover-up or an attempt to protect Boeing. It sounds like the U.S. government and Boeing doing everything possible to avoid ruffling Egyptian feathers.
Why is it only in this case that it's suggested that the government has some interest in protecting Boeing. There have been other airline crashes that have led to concrete design changes on the basis of the investigation. Why suddenly the desire to "protect" Boeing?
IMC devotees are often offended by anything that displays this trait.
No doubt future posts will claim that Boeing is a Zionist enterprise, Israeli colaborators, or part of that whole Jew-dominated conspircacy. Anything that doesn't tell them what they want to hear or blames the people they don't want blamed is offensive to them and therefore needs a conspiracy to justify how to call it a lie and divert blame to America and/or
Israel.